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bear. They were written by anonymous authors, and not till one hundred and fifty years after the subject of them was said to have lived. How much credibility such anonymous productions are entitled to, whose writers are unknown, and the names of those who assuredly did not write them falsely given them, every person is at liberty to decide for himself.

8. The doctrine of each reformer spread with marked rapidity, but in this respect Buddha again has the advantage. He sent out the greater number of disciples to teach the gospel to all the world, and at the end of two hundred years the Buddhists were more than ten times as numerous as were the Christians two hundred years after the time of Jesus.

9. Both systems have been embraced by many nations of people and by numerous millions of the human race. Here again, however, Buddha has the advantage, there being about twice as many Buddhists in the world as Christians.

10. Both have tended to improve the morals of the nations which have embraced them. Here again the palm must be accorded to the Buddhists, for in the foregoing pages the testimony of a Christian missionary is given, showing that in Buddhistic countries there exists to-day a higher and more perfect state of morals than can be found in any Christian country in the world, or ever could be found in any Christian country.

11. Both taught the most severe self-denial, but Buddha went farthest in this direction.

12. Both lived a pure life of celibacy and enjoined it upon their most faithful followers. A far greater number of Buddha's than of Jesus' disciples lived lives of celibacy. 13. Both enjoined non-resistance and returning good for evil. 14. In both Buddhism and Christianity are monasteries and monks.

15. In both are nunneries and nuns.

16. Both have images of Virgin and child.

17. Both use the cross for a symbol.

18. Both have confession of sins.

19. In both the miter is used in the priestly paraphernalia.

20. Both have the dalmatica and cape.

21. Both use the psalmody and double choirs.

22. Both believe in devils and evil spirits.

23. Both believe in their power of exorcising evil spirits. 24. Both use the censer with five chains.

25. Both inculcate their doctrines in sermons.

26. Both use benedictions.

27. Both use chaplets in religious ceremonies.

28. Both believe in the efficacy of prayer, and enjoin it.

29. Both practice the worship of saints.

30. Both have images to represent saints.

31. Both enjoin fasting as a means of obtaining favor of heaven.

32. Both believe in religious processions.

33. Both use litanies in worship.

34. Both believe in holy water.

35. Both believe in the doctrine of incarnation.

36. Both believe in God or divine spirits cohabiting with virgins and producing offspring.

37. Both believe their founders were expiations for mankind.

38. Both believe in a future state of existence.

39. Both believe that the righteous will be saved, and the wicked damned.

40. Both use the altar in temples and places of worship 41. Both believe in pilgrimages to holy places.

42. Both believe in supernaturalism and miracles. 43. Both believe their founders to be divine.

44. Both teach love and forgiveness toward enemies.

45. Both attach more importance to the future life than to this life.

46. The founders of both encouraged mendicancy and idle

ness

47. Both exhibited great love and charity toward mankind. 48. Both taught self-abnegation to be a great virtue. 49. Both systems declaim against nature, and say it must be subdued.

50. The followers of both systems claim that their own is the most divine and true system of religion in the world.

Now, as there are so many important points of resemblance, as Buddhism has nearly everything of importance which

Christianity possesses, and as Buddhism had a priority of at least six centuries, it is submitted to the reader whether, all these things being so, it was worth while for God to leave his glorious home in heaven to live thirty years as an ordinary human being, in poverty and distress, and then lay down his life in a most ignominious manner, merely to reveal to the world what millions of his creatures possessed already. If a few intelligent Buddhist missionaries could have been sent from India to Palestine to preach Buddhism, and then if the European nations could have been induced to embrace the same, it would seem to have answered all purposes, thereby saving God and his son from a great amount of trouble and pain. If millions already knew the glad story, why spend so much to tell it again?

There is one point of dissimilarity between the two systems which may be properly alluded to here, and that is intolerance. and persecution. The Buddhists have ever been tolerant and have never indulged in a spirit of persecution. On the other hand, Christians have shown themselves the most bitter and blood-thirsty persecutors which the world has known. From fifty to seventy-five millions of human beings have been put to death by the Christian sword, the Christian Inquisition, the Christian stake, the Christian beheading-block, the Christian scaffold, and the numerous other Christian implements and machines which have been invented to inflict torture and destroy human life. Here the great dissimilarity between the two systems is found to exist. There is no record that Buddhists have ever put one person to death on account of heresy or for not accepting their system of religion. It has never been intolerant; it has not taken life; it has never spread itself by the sword or the fagot.

THE RELIGION OF PERSIA.

In connection with this chapter the reader will do well to note what is said in Vol. I. in reference to the gods of Chaldea and Persia, commencing on page 119. It will there be seen that there are very strong proofs of the great antiquity of that country. Zoroaster was its high-priest, prophet, and lawgiver; but the time when he lived is so far back in the ages of the past that it is impossible to settle with certainty the date of his existence. Plato, who wrote four hundred years before Christ, wrote of Zoroaster as one having lived in the far distant past. In speaking of a Persian prince, he said: "One teacher instructs him in the magic of Zoroaster, the son (or priest) of Ormuzd, in which is comprehended all the worship of the gods." Diodorus and Plutarch also wrote of Zoroaster and the belief which he and his people entertained. The elder Pliny did the same. The Greek historian Herodo tus wrote of the great teacher even before Plato. He gave a minute account of the ritual, priests, sacrifices, purifications, and mode or burial used by the Persian magi in his timefour hundred and fifty years before our era. He wrote thus: "The Persians have no altars, no temples nor images; they worship on the tops of the mountains. They adore the heavens, and sacrifice to the sun, moon, earth, fire, water, and winds." "They do not erect altars, nor use libations, fillets, or cakes. One of the magi sings an ode, concerning the origin of the gods, over the sacrifice which is laid on a bed of tender grass." "They pay great reverence to all rivers, and must do nothing to defile them. In burying they never put the body in the ground till it has been torn by some bird or dog; they cover the body with wax, and then put it in the ground." "The magi think they do a meritorious act when they kill ants, snakes, reptiles." Thus, by this ancient and reliable

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historian, it is very evident that the ancient Persians were worshipers of nature; their highest adoration was paid to the sun, and then to the smaller bodies.

Plutarch describes at considerable length the religion and gods of the Persians with marked accuracy, and his description is found to agree closely with the religious views of the Parsees of the present day, who are the successors of that ancient people, and still maintain in considerable purity the religion believed by them to be most sacred.

Some account of that remarkable ancient people came down to us through the Arabians, but the world is mostly indebted for what it knows of Zoroaster and the religion and history of the Persians to a Frenchman by the name of Anquetil du Perron, born at Paris in 1731. He devoted himself early to the study of oriental literature. He made himself master of the Hebrew, Arabic, and Persian languages, and by his ardor attracted the attention of the distinguished oriental scholars. He found in the Royal Library a fragment of the ZendAvesta, and he at once determined to visit Persia to learn the Zend language in which it was written, and also to study the Sanskrit and to acquire all the information possible of the great teacher and his religion. After heroic efforts on his part, the government took an interest in him and aided him to the extent of allowing him a small salary of five hundred livres. He set sail for India, February, 1755, being twentyfour years of age. He spent two years in traveling over Hindostan, informing himself about the people and religion of that country. For considerable time he was laid up with sickness. In 1759 he arrived at Surat, where lived the Parsee community from whom he expected aid in the pursuit so near his heart. Of them he learned the Zend language, and he obtained from them one hundred and eighty valuable manuscripts. With these he returned to France, and in 1771 published his great work, the Avesta, translated into French. During the French Revolution he was shut up in his study, wholly absorbed in the great work he had in hand. He died in 1805. To him were justly accorded immense erudition, indomitable industry, a pure love of truth, and an excellent heart.

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