BOOK IV.

of lotos that blossoms in the night. Their offspring was Buddha, the sidereal regent of the planet Mercury.' Thus it appears, that Fo-Hi and Buddha are alike described as the offspring of a nymph celebrated under the appellation of The flower-loving; an arbitrary coincidence, which in itself might be deemed sufficient to establish the point of their proper identity.

5. If then Fo-Hi be in every respect the very same as Buddha, it seems to me almost inevitably to follow, that Buddhism in some form must have been the religion of China from the very first.

This will account satisfactorily for the ready acquiescence in what has usually been esteemed the earliest introduction of Buddhism into that vast empire, an introduction placed after the Christian era: the Chinese did not receive a new religion, but were only led to embrace certain modifications or corruptions of that theology which was already familiar to them. Of the particulars indeed of that theology we can glean but little: yet, when we consider the evident identity of Fo-Hi and Buddha, I cannot but think it far more easy to suppose, that the Chinese, in adopting the superstition of Fo, adopted only what they deemed an improvement of their old system; than to believe that a large proportion of a great empire, which prided itself on its remote antiquity, was led, in consequence (as it is alledged) of its commercial intercourse with Hindostan and Ceylon, to reject its primeval religion in favour of the religion of foreigners.*

'Asiat. Res. vol. ii. p. 375, 376. vol. i. p. 162. vol. iii. p. 258.

The excellent Sir William Jones seems plainly to be not a little embarrassed by the hypothesis of Buddhism being first introduced into China after the Christian era.

The importation, says he, of a new religion into China, in the first century of our era, must lead us to suppose, that the former system, whatever it was, had been found inadequate to the purpose of restraining the great body of the people from those offences against conscience and virtue, which the civil power could not reach: and it is hardly possible, that without such restrictions any government could long have subsisted with felicity; for no government can long subsist without equal justice, and justice cannot be administered without the sanctions of religion.

The inference therefore to be drawn from these premises is, that a considerable proportion of the Chinese including the governing powers, in the first century of our era, finding the political insufficiency of the religion of their fathers, deliberately and philosophically renounced it; and that, in hopes of mending the matter, they made the atheistical superstition of the later

On the whole therefore I am inclined to conjecture, that the Chinese brought their ancient theology directly from Babel: but that, at a comparatively late period, some one of the Samanèan hierophants assumed the name and character of Buddha, and laboured to overset the whole system of the Brahmens; that this produced a struggle and a persecution; and that the persecution drove the modern Buddhists into various distant regions. Such an opinion, the latter part of which is adopted by Sir William Jones, seems to be confirmed by the assertions of the Brahmens themselves; for the impostor, who new-modelled the Samanèan faith, is said to have taken the name of Dharma, which is a title of Buddha: and it undoubtedly reconciles a contradiction, which cannot otherwise be very easily accounted for. The Brahmens universally speak of the Buddhists with all the malignity of an intolerant spirit: yet the most orthodox among them consider Buddha himself as an Avatar of Vishnou, and esteem him the Trimurti-Om or BrahmaVishnou-Siva united.'

6. In Cashgar, as we have seen, Buddha is sometimes called MachodarNath or the sovereign prince in the belly of the fish. Whether the Chinese have borrowed this precise name does not appear: but, according to the recently-mentioned Brahmen who had abjured his caste, they have a statue of the god in that character. It is placed in a temple near the wall of Pekin, and worshipped along with Maha Cala or Great Time; who is the same as Iswara, Satyavrata, and Cronus. In one part of the temple is shewn the Charan-Pad or the impression of the foot of Datta or Datt-Atreya; just as the Cingalese pretend to exhibit it on the summit of Adam's peak, and the Burmas on a large stone covered with hieroglyphics. Hence it is evident, that Datta is one of the names of Buddha or Somono-Kodom; because the legend of the impressed foot belongs to the history of Buddha. But Datta, as Mr. Wilford justly observes and as I shall have occasion hereafter to

Buddhists the paramount religion of the court and the nation. I can with difficulty believe, either the occurrence of so unparallelled a circumstance, or the superior efficacy of an atheistical system over any other (however bad it might be) to subserve the purposes of government by its action on the consciences of men. Asiat. Res. vol. ii. p. 376.

Asiat. Res. vol. i. p. 284, 285. vol. ii. p. 123, 124. vol. iii. p. 196. vol. vi. p. 262.

CHAP. V.

BOOK IV.

ringing of changes on the cognate letters B and P, T and D'-Another of his names is Saman, which is varied into Somon, Somono, Samana, SumanNath, and Sarmana. From this was borrowed the sectarian appellation of Samaneans or Sarmanèans-A third is Gautama; which is indifferently expressed Gautameh, Godama, Godam, Codam, Cadam, Cardam and Cardama. This perpetually occurs in composition with the last, as SomonoCodom or Samana-Gautama3—A fourth is Saca, Sacya, Siaka, Shaka, Xaca, Xaca-Muni or Saca-Menu, and Kia which is the uncompounded form of Sa-Kia-A fifth is Dherma, or Dharma, or Dherma-Rajah — A sixth is Hermias, Her-Moye, or Heri-Maya'—A seventh is Datta, Datt-Atreya, That-Dalna, Date, Tat or Tot, Deva-Tat or DevaTwashta'—An eighth is Jain, Jina, Chin, Jain-Deo, Chin-Deo, or JainEswar A ninth is Arhan-A tenth is Mahi-Man, Mai-Man, or (if Om be added) Mai-Man-Om-An eleventh is Min-Eswara, formed by the same title Min or Man or Menu joined to Eswara"-A twelfth is Gomat or Gomat-Eswara"-A thirteenth, when he is considered as Eswara or Siva, is Ma-Esa or Har-Esa; that is to say, the great Esa or the lord Esa”— A fourteenth is Dagon or Dagun or Dak-Po'-A fifteenth is Tara-Nath" —And a sixteenth is Arca-Bandhu or Kinsman of the Sun."

8

2. Among the ancients, it was a common practice for the ministers of a

Asiat. Res. vol. vi. p. 260, 262. vol. ix. p. 220. vol. i. p. 162, 163, 166, 167, 170. vol. vii. p. 32, 398.

Asiat. Res. vol. vii. p. 38, 413, 414. vol. iii. p. 199. vol. vi. p. 259.

♦ Asiat. Res. vol. ii. p. 123. vol. vi. p. 262, 263. Kæmpfer's Japan. p. 247. Hamilton's

9 Comp. Asiat. Res. vol. vii. p. 414. vol. vi. p. 295, 483. vol. viii. p. 305. vol. iii. p. 195,

196.

10 Asiat. Res. vol. iii. p. 195, 201.

12 Moor's Hind. Panth. p. 253, 256.

"Moor's Hind. Panth. p. 256.

13 Asiat. Res. vol. i. p. 284, 285.

14 Hamilton's account of East-Ind. vol. ii. p. 57. Symes's Embass. to Ava. vol. ii. p. 110.

15 Asiat. Res. vol. vi. p. 124.

16 Asiat. Res. vol. ii. p. 124.

god to call themselves by the name of the deity whom they venerated. Such accordingly was the mode of distinction, which the votaries of Brahme and of Buddha adopted, probably from very remote antiquity. As the Samanèans confessedly derived their title from Samana or Buddha; so it is most natural to conclude, that the Brahmens or Brachmans borrowed their appellation from Brahme, the parent of their Trimurti Brahma-Vishnou-Siva. These two sects are mentioned by more than one of the Greek writers: and we are told, that Samana or Somona is still the name, by which the god, the priests of the god, and thence the whole body of the Buddhists, are alike distinguished.'

Porphyry does not seem to have been aware of any such rivalship and animosity, as that which subsists between the present Brahmenists and Buddhists; for he speaks of the Brachmans and Samanèans as being only two sects of those Indian divines, whom the Greeks were wont jointly to designate by the common appellation of Gymnosophists. Hence, as I have already observed, it may be doubted, whether the impostor, who introduced into the ancient Buddhic theology those alterations which made it so obnoxious to the Brahmenists, flourished earlier than the first century after the Christian era. Porphyry appears also, in some measure, to have confounded the Samanèans with those enthusiastic devotees, who are now called Sanyassis; while yet his account of the Brahmens is curiously accurate.* Much the same remark applies to the account, which Strabo gives of these two sects. He truly observes, that the system of the Brachmans was more orderly and coherent than that of the Samanèans: and he describes the latter, whom with a slight variation he denominates Germanes, as leading an eremetical life in the woods and as voluntarily submitting to the most painful austerities.'

Clemens Alexandrinus, though he also makes a certain branch of the Samanèans or (as he calls them) Sarmanèans to be plainly the same as the modern Sanyassis, distinguishes them from the Brahmens with a much greater degree of precision than Porphyry: for, after he has said, like that

CHAP. V.

BOOK IV. author, that the Brahmens and Sarmanèans are two sects of Gyinnosophists, he adds, that the latter obey the precepts of Butta, whom on account of his holiness they venerate as a god.' Neither Strabo nor Clemens, any more than Porphyry, give the least intimation that the two sects were then hostile to each other.

IX. The high country of Cashgar, Boutan, Thibet, and Bokhara, which has been shewn to be the proper geographical Meru both of the Brahmenists and the Buddhists, was one of the chief settlements of the Chusas or Scuths, and therefore one of the principal and earliest seats of the unmixed superstition of Buddha, to which that great family was ever peculiarly devoted. Yet it was not absolutely the cradle of the Samanèan theology. The primeval empire of Nimrod and the Cushim comprehended the central part of that fertile region; which, when viewed at its greatest extent, was still denominated Iran or Cusha-dwip within: and the mountaineers of Persia, to which the name of Iran seems more peculiarly to belong, were evidently of Scuthic extraction. Hence, as both Brahmenism and Buddhism branched out from Babylonia to every quarter of the globe, and as the long-lived Cuthic empire was the earliest empire of Iran, we may expect to find a large intermixture of Buddhism in the old Persic theology.*

* Such, I am persuaded is the meaning of Clemens, though his language is somewhat ambiguous, so far as the idiom is concerned. I subjoin the passage.

Διττον δε τούτων το γενος· οι μεν Σαρμάναι αυτών, οἱ δε Βραχμαναι, καλούμενοι. Και των Σαρμανων οἱ Αλλοβίοι προσαγορευομενοι ούτε πόλεις οικουσιν, ούτε στεγας εχουσιν, δεν δρων δε αμφιεννυνται φλοιοις, και ακρόδρυα σιτούνται, και ύδωρ ταις χερσι πίνουσιν ου γαμον, ου παιδοποιϊαν, ισασιν, ώσπερ οἱ νυν Εγκρατηται καλουμενοι εισι δε των Ινδών οἱ τοις Βουττα πειθομενοι παραγγελμασιν, ὃν δι ̓ ὑπερβολην σεμνότητος εις θεον τετιμηκασι. Clem. Αlex. Strom. lib. i. p. 305.

Some have supposed, that, after speaking of the Brachmans and the Sarmanèans, Clemens insinuates, that, besides these, there are certain of the Indians who venerate Buddha; thus in effect saying, that the Brachmans and the Sarmanèans did not worship Buddha. But, when we consider that Samana is a name of Buddha and that his votaries are still called Samana or Samanèans, it seems also necessary to conclude, that the Samanèans or Sarmanèans of Porphyry and Clemens are the same as the modern Samana; and consequently, that the clause ɛio de Twv lydwv ought to be rendered these are they of the Indians, not there are also some of the Indians.

2 Vide infra book vi. c. 2.