LIFE OF SÁKYAMUNI.

7

ing the divine eye, by the aid of which he could see all things within the space of the infinite worlds, and by his receiving the knowledge that unfolds the causes of the ever-recurring circle of existence.

Sakyamuni being now endowed with all these wonderful and marvellous faculties, became the wisest man, the most perfect Buddha. But having arrived at this state of perfection, he still hesitated whether he should make known his doctrines and propound them to men, his principles being, in his opinion, opposed to all those then adhered to. He was, at first, afraid of being exposed to the insults of animated beings, who are unwise and filled with evil designs. But, moved by compassion, and reflecting, that there would remain nevertheless many beings who would understand him and be delivered by him from existence-the cause of pains and sorrows-he at once resolved to teach the law that had been revealed to him.'

Sakyamuni died, the books say, after having attained an age of eighty years. The data contained in the sacred books as the year of this event, differ considerably, the most distant periods mentioned being the years 2422 and 544 B.C. Lassen, in his examination of these materials, gives preference to the literature of the southern Buddhists, which places his death in 544 or 543 B.C. Westergaard, however, in a recent essay on this subject, believes even this epoch to be by far too early, and calculates his death to have taken

Barthélemy St. Hilaire, "Le Buddha et sa Religion," p. 32.

place in the period from 370 to 368 B.C.,

or about

one generation before Alexander the Great took the throne. 1

Lassen "Indische Alterthumskunde," Vol. II., "Ueber Buddha's Todesjahr;" German translation, p. 94.

P. 51.

Westergaard,

CHAPTER II.

GRADUAL RISE AND PRESENT AREA OF THE BUDDHIST RELIGION.

DEVELOPEMENT AND DECLINE IN INDIA.-EXTENSION OVER VARIOUS PARTS OF ASIA.--COMPARISON OF THE NUMBER OF BUDDHISTS WITH THAT OF CHRISTIANS.

SCARCELY had Sakyamuni begun to teach his new religion in India, when he obtained a great many followers. His system had an extraordinary success both on account of its simplicity and of the abolition of castes; the Buddha admits to the blessings of which he is the dispenser the highest classes of man (Brahmans) as well as the lowest. Already at his death the number of Buddhists seems to have been very considerable; and about the middle of the third century B.C., during the reign of Asoka, Buddhism began to spread all over India. It then continued to flourish for eight hundred years (till the fifth century of our era), when a series of violent persecutions was commenced (instituted by Brahmanical sectaries. particularly by the adherents to the

worship of Siva) which almost caused the extirpation of Buddhism. Hiuen Thsang, a Chinese pilgrim who had passed much of his life in India during extensive travels between the years 629 and 645 A.D., mentions numerous Buddhist temples, monasteries, and monuments, which in his time were already deserted, and even fallen into ruins-buildings which, two centuries before, Fa Hian, another Chinese traveller, had found in the most prosperous condition. Nevertheless, in many parts of India, Buddhists were still in existence, and in Benáres, now again a centre of Brahmanism, they are reported to have been the prevalent sect until the eleventh century, and in the northern parts of Gujrát even as late as the twelth. After that period, Buddhism ceased to exist in India, by reason of a combination of circumstances, amongst which the jealousy of the various schools and the invasion of the Mussalmáns are to be mentioned as perhaps the most important.1

As present the area of Buddhism includes vast territories, from Ceylon and the Indian Archipelago in the south to the Baikal Lake in Central Asia, and from the Caucasus eastward to Japan; and the number of its adherents may be considered as being at least equal to, if it does not exceed, that of the followers of the Christian religion, as will be seen from the following data."

1

Compare Mountstuart Elphinstone's "History of India," Vol. I., p. 212. Lassen, “Ind. Alterthumskunde,” Vol. IV., p. 707.

2 Prof. Neumann of Munich has computed the number of Buddhists in China, Tibet, the Indo-Chinese countries, and Tartary at 369 millions. Ungewitter, "Neueste Erdbeschreibung," Vol. I., p. 51, estimates the total of

NUMBER OF BUDDHISTS.

11

The late Professor Dieterici, in his well-known compilation of the census of the globe,' estimates the population of China at four hundred millions, of Japan at thirtyfive; and for the Indo-Chinese Peninsula he gives fifteen millions as the number of inhabitants in the independent territories. The data for the Indian dependencies in the peninsula are of great variety. Thornton's "Gazeteer" gives for Arrakán, Pégu, and Tenásserim a population of about one million; but in a note contained in Allens Indian Mail, 1861, the inhabitants of Pégu alone are calculated to amount to one million. An average of two millions for these three provinces is, perhaps, most in accordance with their area when compared with the remainder of the peninsula. The inhabitants of the Indo-Chinese Archipelago are set down by Dieterici at eighty millions, of which twenty belong to the Dutch and Spanish possessions. The population of Ceylon, which is all Buddhist, exceeds, according to McCarthey, two millions. In India Proper there are scarcely any Buddhists at all.

3

2

For these regions of Asia we obtain, therefore, ac

Buddhists at 325 millions. Colonel Sykes, whose accuracy in every branch of science, especially, however, in statistics, is so well known, also considers it certain that the Buddhists out-number the followers of any other creed: see his essay "On Indian Characters." London 1859.

1 "Die Bevölkerung der Erde," in Petermann's "Geographische Mittheilungen," 1859, p. 1.

2 Thornton's "Gazeteer." Allen's Indian Mail, 1861, p. 802.

3

Report of the Proceedings of the fourth Session of the International Statistical Congress; London, 1861, p. 84. Compare Hardy, "Eastern Monachism," p. 310.