everywhere there are cheering indications of its dawning light. It is God's will that it should come. Let his will be done. Let us all unite to uprcar his true Church. Let each nation come with all the elements of truth and goodness in its sacred history, and all that is pure and divine in its national life. No nation, no sect, ought to be excluded, for through each, God has spoken, and in each some form of truth is deposited in the flow of ages. Bring with you English brethren, your noble charities, your industry and earnestness, and your respect for science—that glorious and perpetual revelation of God to man. Come, liberal minded children of America, with your world of modern thought and civilization, and your youthful freshness of mind and soul. Come, all ye nations of the West, with all the riches of truth ye possess. But the circle is not yet complete. Let the nations of the East come, with their ancient civilization, their sublime devotion, fervent faith and deep spirituality; let them come with the precious inheritance of thought and sentiment bequeathed by their venerable ancestors. Let the East come clad in the golden robe of morning light. Then the circle of universal religion will be completed. Thus shall the Scriptures of science in the West, and the Scriptures of inspiration in the East, constitute together the Word of God. Thus shall the "mind and strength" of the one, and the 'heart and soul' of the other, join in the service of God. Thus shall the spirit of charity, which 'went about doing all manner of good,' and the spirit of devotion, which went to the mountains to pray,' blend together, and form the unity of divine life in man. Thus shall all sects and races and nations in the world unite to form the catholic church of God, limbs of one body supported by the same vitality, and doing the work of the same Master; a harp of many strings playing harmoniously, and with their blended notes making sweet music in praise of the Great Ruler."

CHAPTER II.

BUDDHISM.*

HINDOSTAN, BURMAH, CHINA, &c.

THE FIVE BUDDHIST COMMANDMENTS.

1. Not to destroy life.

2. Not to obtain another's property by unjust means. 3. Not to indulge the passions, so as to invade the legal or natural rights of other men.

4. Not to tell lies.

5. Not to partake of anything intoxicating.

OVERCOME EVIL WITH GOOD.

Buddha said: A man who foolishly does me wrong (or regards me as being or doing wrong), I will return to him the protection of my ungrudging love; the more evil goes from him, the more good shall go from me. The fragrance of these good actions always redounding to me, the harm of the slanderer's words returning to him.

A foolish man once heard Buddha, in preaching, defend this great principle of returning good for evil, and therefore came and abused him. Buddha was silent, pitying his mad folly. The man having finished his abuse, Buddha said : "Son, when a man forgets the rules of politeness in making a present to another, the custom is to say: 'Keep your present." Son! you have railed at me! I decline to entertain your abuse! and ask you to keep it, a source of misery to yourself. For, as sound belongs to the drum, and shadow to the sub

* See Appendix B, for notes.

stance, so in the end misery will certainly overtake the evil doer.

Buddha said: A wicked man who reproaches a virtuous one, is like a man who looks up and spits at Heaven; the spittle soils not Heaven, but comes back and defiles his own person.

Again: He is like one who flings dirt at another against the wind-the dirt does but return on him who threw it. The virtuous man cannot be hurt—the misery that the other would inflict comes back on himself.

WHO IS A GOOD MAN?

Buddha said: Who is the good man? The religious man only is good. And what is goodness? First and foremost, it is the agreement of the will with the conscience (reason). Who is the great man? He who is strongest in the exercise of patience, who patiently endures injury and maintains a blameless life; he is a man indeed! And who is a worshipful man (one deserving reverence, or a Buddha)? A man whose heart. has arrived at the highest degree of enlightenment. All dust removed, all wicked actions uprooted, all within calm and pure, without blemish, who is acquainted with all things from first or last, and even with those things that have not yet transpired; who knows and sees and hears all things; such universal wisdom is rightly called "illumination."

SPIRITUAL CULTURE-ILLUMINATION.

Buddha said: A man who cherishes lust and desire, and does not aim after supreme knowledge, is like a vase of dirty water, in which all sorts of beautiful objects are placed-the water being shaken up men can see nothing of the beautiful objects therein placed; so lust and desire, causing confusion and disorder in the heart, are like the mud in the water--they prevent our seeing the beauty of supreme reason (religion). But if a man, by the gradual process of confession and penance,

comes near to the acquirement of knowledge, then, the mud in the water being removed, all is clear and pure; remove the pollution, and immediately, of itself, comes forth the substantial form. So the three poisons (covetousness, anger, delusion) which rage within the heart, and the five obscurities (envy, passion, sloth, vacillation, unbelief) which embrace it, effectually prevent one from attaining supreme reason.

But

once get rid of the pollution of the heart, and then we perceive the spiritual portion of ourselves, which we have had from the first, although involved in the net of life and death. Gladly then we mount to the Paradise of all the Buddhas, where reason and virtue continually abide.

A man who devotes himself to religion is like one who takes a lighted torch to a dark house; the darkness is dissipated! Persevere in the search after wisdom, and obtain knowledge and truth; error and delusion rooted out, what perfect illumination will there be !

In reflection, in life, in conversation, in study, I never for a moment forget the supreme end-Religion.

"BODHI❞—SUPREME REASON.

Buddha said: The Shaman who has left his home, banished desire, expelled love, fathomed the bottom of his own heart, penetrated the deep principles of universal mind (Buddha); understood the principle that there is no subjective personal existence, or objective aim in life, or result to be obtained; whose heart is neither hampered by the practice of religion, or fettered by the bonds of life; without anxious thought, without active endeavor, without careful preparation, without successful accomplishment, attaining the highest possible point of true being, without passing through any successive and distinct stages of progress; this is indeed "to be religious" (or to attain or practice Bodhi, i. e., Supreme Reason).

TWENTY DIFFICULT THINGS.

Buddha said : There are twenty difficult things in the world: being poor, to be charitable; being rich and great, to be religious; to escape destiny; to get sight (or understanding) of the Scriptures; to be born when a Buddha is in the world; to repress lust and banish desire; to see an agreeable object and not seek to obtain it; to be strong without being rash (or, having power, not to be proud); to bear insult without anger; to move in the world without setting the heart on it; to investigate a matter to the very bottom; not to contemn the ignorant; thoroughly to extirpate self-esteem; to be good, and at the same time learned and clever (or sagacious); to see the hidden principles in the profession of Religion; to attain one's end without exultation; to show, in the right way, the doctrine of expediency to save men by converting them; to be the same in heart and life; to avoid controversy.

ILLUMINATION-CLAIRVOYANCE.

At this time Ananda and all the great congregation, gratefully attentive to the words of Buddha Tathagata, as he opened the abstruse points of his argument, their bodies and minds worn out with exertion, they obtained illumination. This great assembly perceived that each one's heart was co-extensive. with the universe, seeing clearly the empty character of the universe as plainly as a leaf or trifling thing in the hand, and that all things in the universe are all alike, merely the excellently bright and primeval heart of Bodhi, and that this heart is universally diffused, and comprehends all things within itself.

And still reflecting, they beheld their generated bodies, as so many grains of dust in the wide expanse of the universal void, now safe, now lost; or as a bubble of the sea, sprung from nothing and born to be destroyed. But their perfect and independent soul not to be destroyed, but ever the same; identical with the substance of Buddha; incapable of increase or