ANCIENT FAITHS AND MODERN:
A Dissertation upon Worships, Legends and Divinities
In Central And Western Asia, Europe, And Elsewhere, Before The Christian Era. Showing Their Relations To Religious Customs As They Now Exist.
By Thomas Inman
Author Of "Ancient Faiths Embodied In Ancient Names," Etc., Etc. Consulting Physician To The Royal Infirmary, Liverpool; Lecturer, Successively, On Botany, Medical Jurisprudence, Therapeutics, Materia Medica, And The Principles And Practice Ok Medicine, Etc., In The Liverpool School Ok Medicine. Etc.
1876
TO THOSE WHO THIRST AFTER KNOWLEDGE, AND ARE NOT DETERRED FROM SEEKING IT BY THE FEAR OF IMAGINARY DANGERS, THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED, WITH GREAT RESPECT, By THE AUTHOR
Contents
PREFACE.
Some thirty years ago, after a period of laborious study, I became the House Surgeon of a large Infirmary. In that institution I was enabled to see the practice of seven different doctors, and to compare the results which followed from their various plans of treatment. I soon found that the number of cures was nearly equal amongst them all, and became certain that recovery was little influenced by the medicine given. The conclusion drawn was that the physician could do harm, but that his power for good was limited. This induced me to investigate the laws of health and of disease, with an especial desire to discover some sure ground on which the healing art might safely stand. The inquiry was a long one, and to myself satisfactory. The conclusions to which I came were extremely simple—amounting almost to truisms; and I was surprised that it had required long and sustained labour to find out such very homely truths as those which I seemed to have unearthed.
Yet, with this discovery came the assurance that, if I could induce my medical brethren to adopt my views, they would deprive themselves of the means of living. Men, like horses or tigers, monkeys and codfish, can do without doctors. Here and there, it is true, that the art and skill of the physician or surgeon can relieve pain, avert danger from accidents, and ward off death for a time; but, in the generality of cases, doctors are powerless. It is the business of such men, however, to magnify their office to the utmost. They get their money ostensibly by curing the sick; but it is clear, that the shorter the illness the fewer will be the fees, and the more protracted the attendance the larger must be the "honorarium." There is, then, good reason why the medical profession should discourage too close an investigation into truth.
But, outside of this fraternity, there are many men desirous of understanding the principles of the healing art Many of these have begun by noticing the style of the doctor's education. They find that he is taught in "halls," "colleges," and "schools," for a certain period of time; and then, at about the age of two-and-twenty, he is examined by some experienced men, and, if considered "competent," he pays certain fees, and is then licensed to practise as physician. As all regular doctors go through this course, it is natural that all should think and act in a common way, and style their doctrines "orthodox." It is equally certain that to such opinion the majority adhere through life. But it has always happened, that many men and women have aspired to the position of medical professors, without going through the usual career; or, having done so, they have struck out a novel plan of practice, which they designate a new method of cure. These have always been opposed by the "orthodox," and the contest is carried on with varying success, until the general public give their verdict on one side or the other. Into the motives which sway the respective combatants we will not enter; our chief desire being to show that each set is upheld by those who are designated "laymen," whose education has not been medical The most intelligent on the heterodox side have been clergymen; and many have been the complaints of "orthodox" doctors, that "the parsons" should patronize, so energetically as they do, medical "dissenters."
As the "clerk" takes pleasure in examining the therapeutical doctrines of his physician, so the medical professor frequently inquires closely into his clergyman's theological views and feels himself at liberty to accept or oppose them, as the "clerk" adopts or attacks him and his theory and practice. It would, indeed, be disrespectful in the listener not to pay intelligent heed to the discourses which emanate from the pulpit. I have myself listened to the preaching of hundreds of university graduates, and of men who never took a degree, and have noticed that the same diversity of style exists amongst them, as is to be found in medical men. Some order a certain plan of treatment for a soul, which they assert to be grievously affected, and give no reason for what they say or do. Others give their motives for everything which they affirm, and for the plan which they prescribe for cure. Under the ministry of one of the last I sat for many years. Conspicuous for sound judgment, and for a peculiarly clear oratory, his sermons were to me an intellectual treat. From the exordium, forwards, I followed his words closely, and lost none of his arguments. But I soon became conscious that he never once carried his reasoning to its logical conclusion. Still further, it was manifest that certain things were by him taken for granted; and it was held to be culpable to inquire into the reality of those assumptions. In fine, it was evident, that there was a Bluebeard's closet in the house of God, into which, in the preacher's opinion, it was death to pry!
With the idea which was gradually forced upon my mind, that there was a systematic suppression of the truth in the pulpit, I very carefully searched the Bible, with which I have been familiar from infancy, and upon which, it is asserted, all our faith is founded. At this time, too, a casual inquiry into some ancient cognomens, which have descended to us from remote antiquity, induced me to examine into ancient faiths generally. With this became associated an examination of all religions, and their influence upon mankind.
I found that in every nation there have been, and still are, good men and bad, gentle and brutal, thoughtful and ignorant. That the best men of Paganism—Buddha, for example—did not lose, by comparison, with the brightest light of Christianity; and that such large cities as London and Paris, have as much vice within them as ancient Rome or modern Calcutta. I found, moreover, that there is a culpable colouring in the accounts given by Christian travellers of Pagan countries. The clerical pen rests invariably and strongly upon the bad points of every heathen cult, and contrasts them with the best elements of Christianity. I do not know that it has ever instituted a fair comparison between corresponding characters in each faith. As an illustration of my meaning, let us regard the stern virtue of the Roman Lucretia, who committed suicide, her body having been forcibly defiled by the embraces of another than her husband, even though the ravisher was a prince. She had heard nothing of the Jewish law or Christian gospel, nevertheless she was far better than the wives of the nobles in the courts of Louis the XIV. and XV., who gladly sold themselves and their daughters to the royal lechers. These, unlike the Italian woman, were instructed both in the law and the gospel; they attended one place or another of Christian worship daily or weekly. Nay, if report be true, "the eldest son of the Church," when he visited the "parc aux cerfs," made each fresh virgin, victim of his passion, duly say her prayers before she assisted him to commit adultery, and herself permitted fornication! We sympathize with Paul and the early Christian fathers in their denunciations of the Romans and Greeks for obscenities practised in honour of their gods; but, at the same time, we feel sure that, had those apostles and teachers lived in the middle ages, they would have denounced, with greater warmth, the murders which were constantly being perpetrated in honour of Jesus.
In like manner, we may greatly regret, with the writer of Psalm xiv., that amongst "the children of men, there is none that doeth good; no, not one;" but we must equally bow before the statement of Ezekiel (ch. xxii. 30), that there was no more propriety amongst the so-called "chosen people of God," than amongst the Gentile Canaanites and Babylonians.
Again, we feel pain when we find the great ones of the earth—aye, and many small ones too—seeking out for villains, "willing to commit murder for a mede," and lament that lawgivers should secretly encourage lawlessness; but we cannot forget that Jesus of Nazareth is represented, in John vi. 70, to have selected a devil to bring about certain ends—see also John xiii. 26, 27, in which the agency is well marked.
Modern divines tell us that war, tumult, hatred, malice, quarrels of all kinds, and murder come from the devil, and are the direct result of our fallen nature; nevertheless, we remember that Jesus is reported to have said—"I came not to send peace, but a sword; I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against the mother," &c. (Matt. x. 34, 35). When we institute comparisons like these, the balance is not uneven. I found, moreover, that the sharply defined line, commonly drawn between Paganism and Christianity, is worthless—the doctrines of the latter being, in many respects, identical with, or deduced from, the former.
It seemed necessary, therefore, to ascertain whether, in religion, any other line than the one in vogue in Europe, could be drawn with certainty.
The result of my observations showed a wonderful similarity to exist between the clerical and medical profession; and I feel that, if my views about the cure of souls and bodies were generally adopted, there would be no need either for parson or for doctor. Instead of discovering, as I had hoped to do, which of all the rival sects of Christendom is the best one, I found that all were unnecessary, that many are degraded in doctrine and bad in practice; and that, if any must exist, the one which effects the least mischief should be the one selected for general adoption. It required much courage to allow myself to believe that doctors have, taking everything into consideration, done more harm in the world than good, and still more to announce my conviction that Christianity was even more culpable than medicine. The physician, when professing to cure, has too often assisted disease to kill; and he who has had the cure of souls, has invented plans to make believers in his doctrine miserable. The first fills his coffers proportionally to the extent to which he can protract recovery; the second becomes rich in proportion to the success with which he multiplies mental terrors, and then sells repose. The one enfeebles the body, the other cripples the intellect, and aggravates envy, hatred, and malice. Both are equally influential in preventing man from being such as we believe that the Almighty designed him to be.
Though we oppose the old plan of medication of body and mind, we are far from asserting that there is no value in an honest doctor, either of divinity or medicine. On the contrary, I have a stronger faith in my own profession, as it has been reformed, than ever I had ere the light of good sense had shone upon it; and I have a far more confident trust in the religion propounded by F. W. Newman, in Theism, than in that current amongst Christians in general But in such schemes of physic and faith, very few "ministers" are necessary, shams find no place, and emoluments are small A man who communes with his God requires no priest, mediator, middle-man, or saint—whether virgin, martyr, or both—to intercede for him.
Holding such opinions as these, it is not probable that I shall find many followers. I do not seek them. My aim has been to set good sterling stuff before the world, so that any one, whose self-reliance is great, may receive strength. There are many who would rather die with a physician close beside them when they are ill, than live without a doctor; and there are few who would not rather enjoy the fear of hell with the orthodox, than be with heretics free from such terrors—"For sure, the pleasure is as great in being cheated, as to cheat." To all such our writings are caviare. Yet, even to them, we would say that we have warrant for our belief in statements, to which the orthodox cannot reasonably object—viz., "If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted?" (Gen. iv. 7); "In every nation, he that feareth God, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him" (Acts x. 35); "He that doeth righteousness, is righteous" (1 John iii. 7).
Let me contrast my own views with those generally current amongst us. I believe that God did not make men, any more than the beasts, to damn the largest number of them throughout eternity. I believe that all who aver that they have been selected by the Creator from all the world besides as the only recipients of salvation are wrong, and deceivers of the people. In fine, I believe that God's "tender mercies are over all his works." The common opinion that the Almighty so revels in cruelty, that He makes creatures to torture them, is a horrible one to me—fit only to come from impotent Pagan priests. That Jehovah selected about one million of bad men, out of about four hundred other millions equally bad, solely because their progenitor, Abraham, consented to murder and burn his son, is to me a frightful blasphemy; and, lastly, that God has no tender mercies for nine-tenths of the human race, is to convert our conception of the Author of all good into the conventional "Devil." The comparison may be summed up thus: I believe in God, the Father of all things; the so-called orthodox believe in the God Satan. I do not know anything in all my studies which excited my attention more painfully than the result of the analysis of Jehovah's character, as given in our Bible. Kind to those who are said to please Him, He is a fearful demon to all who are said to oppose Him.
How can any reasonable man hold the opinion that the Devil instigated all atrocities of the Syrians, Chaldees, Assyrians, Romans, Turks, Tartars, Saracens, Affghans, Mahometans, and Hindoos, and believe that the good God drowned the whole world, and nearly every single thing that had life; that He ordered the extermination, not only of Midianites and Amalekites, but slaughtered, in one way or another, all the people whom he led out of Egypt—except two—merely because they had a natural fear of war. What was the massacre at Cawnpore to that in Jericho and other Canaanite cities? I say it with sober seriousness—in sorrow, not in anger—as a thinking man, and not as an advocate for, or against, any religious view, that it is an awful thing for any nation to permit a book to circulate, as a sacred one, in which God and the Devil are painted in the same colours.
Into this analysis of religion I was led to enter from the observation of a friend, who challenged me to find, in any non-Hebraic or non-Christian country, a faith or practice equal to that current amongst the followers of Moses and Jesus, or to discover any spot in the wide world where there is, or has been, a civilization equal to that which existed in Judea, and the parts inhabited by Christians. In consequence of this defiance, it became more than ever necessary for me to study the nature of the current faith and practice of Christendom, and to inquire how far the latter was dependent upon the former—that is to say, whether the practices of civilization are due to our religion, or have gradually grown up in spite of it. The next point was to pay similar heed to the doctrines and manner of life common amongst those to whom our Bible has been wholly unknown.
Many of the conclusions to which I came have already appeared in the second volume of Ancient Faiths, under the heads of "Religion," "Theology," &c.; but others came upon me when that book had been completed, and the present supplement is designed with the idea of expressing, still further, the extent of my views, and the evidence upon which they are founded—with special reference to the differential value of Christian and unchristian faith and practice.
As was natural, this involved the question constantly before my mind in the preceding volumes—viz., "Is there in reality anything in the Hebrew and the Christian theology essentially different from that promulgated by the leaders of divinity in other countries?" This point has repeatedly been discussed, and amongst the orthodox there is no difficulty in allowing the existence of a strong similarity in all systems of religion; but the value of the fact is supposed to be reduced to ridicule by the monstrous assertion, that Moses and Jesus taught all the world. Amongst the books which came under my notice, whilst prosecuting my search, was a very remarkable one, called The Modern Buddhist, now The Wheel of the Law, which is an account of the religious thoughts of a Siamese monarch, with a statement of his conversations with Christian missionaries. In this the British churchman and non-conformist can see themselves as others see them; and the Asiatic has quite as great, perhaps even a superior, right to call the European "poor and benighted," as the Christian has to call the Buddhist "a miserable Pagan."
Notwithstanding my endeavours to be perfectly "judicial," and to give what I believe to be an impartial account of the subjects which I describe, I have been, by certain critics, accused of special pleading. It is, perhaps, unnecessary to deny the charge, for each reader must judge of my fairness, or otherwise, for himself. But, on the other hand, I retort most strongly, by averring that I have not met, in the whole course of my reading, a religious work by an orthodox divine, which does not "bear false witness against its neighbours."
There is in all both a suppressio veri and a suggestio falsi, which makes the honest inquirer almost entirely reject their books. In addition to this, there is in them a recklessness of statement and assertion which is unequalled, except in the fierce controversies of ancient doctors. The perfect contempt which certain puny divines, who have endeavoured to throw dirt upon the present Bishop of Natal, show for the laws of evidence, and the systematic way in which they avoid every real point at issue, are marvellous to those who know that such people have had an university education, have studied logic, and profess an unlimited respect for truth. In future years the theological writings, generally, of our time will be as much objurgated by enlightened, earnest, and thoughtful readers, as Protestants of to-day abuse the theology and prurience of Sanchez, Thomas Aquinas, and Peter Dens.
In conclusion, I would wish to add, that I am conscious, from the amount of correspondence which I have had on the subject in hand, that there is not only a wide, but a constantly extending dissatisfaction with the current theology taught by the ministers of all denominations—excepting, as a body, the Unitarians, and such individuals as Bishop Colenso, Bishop Hinds, Mr Voysey, and others. The laity are awaking to the fact that priests are strenuously endeavouring to quench the light of reason in the fogs of faith. Unless the Protestantism, of which Great Britain was once so proud, decides to drift into Papism—the only legitimate harbour for those who reject reason for a guide—it must thoroughly reform itself, and ruthlessly reject, as "necessary to salvation," every article of belief which is not only nonsensical or absurd, but which has unquestionably descended from a grovelling Paganism. To this end we hope that our essays will contribute.
INTRODUCTORY
CHAPTER I.
A recapitulation. Destruction of an old edifice precedes the
building of another on the same site. Chichester Cathedral.
Difficulties of reconstruction. Innovators are regarded as
enemies. The Old Testament appraised. The Jews and their
pretensions. Hebraic idea of Jehovah. The sun and moon. God
and goddess. Importance of sexual perfection in a Hebrew
male. Women are prizes given to the faithful Jews. Almost
everything Jewish came from Pagan sources, except the
Sabbath. Inquiry into the New Testament necessarily follows
upon an investigation of the Old. Thoughts upon the history
of Christianity. Malignancy of its professors. Life of
Jesus, by various authors. The ground preoccupied. The
plan proposed.
In commencing another volume of a series, and one to a great extent independent of the other two, it is advisable to pause and recapitulate the points advanced, and the positions attained. This is the more necessary when the present inquiry is a natural result of a preceding one, and when an attempt is made to collect and arrange the scattered materials into an harmonious and consistent edifice. Our volumes on the subject of "Ancient Faiths in Ancient Names" were, to a great extent, destructive. They struck heavy blows in all directions, wherever a false idol was to be recognized, and they destroyed many a cherished delusion, which was to many as dear as the apple of their eye. But, throughout the whole process of destruction, the idea of the necessity for a reconstruction was present to the mind of the author.
It may, indeed, be propounded as an interesting question, whether any iconoclast ever destroys the idols which his fellow-beings cherish, without entertaining the belief that he has something superior to offer in their place. When the fanatic Spaniards upset, fractured, and ground to powder the stone monsters venerated by the Mexicans, they offered to the natives the image of a lovely virgin and her gentle son to replace them; and when the enthusiastic Scotchmen destroyed the marble saints and gaudy figures of the Popish churches throughout their own country, they eagerly set forth the superiority of adoring the invisible creator in spirit and imagination, which afforded scope for the most entrancing mental delineations, and was far superior to reverencing an ugly effigy, which no one with any correct taste could admire. In like manner, when the Mahometan Caliph destroyed the library of Alexandria, he offered to the mourners in its place the book of the Prophet Mahomet, which was, in his eyes, a pearl of so great price as to be equivalent in value to all the world besides.
There can be no doubt, however, that the process of destruction is far more easy than the task of reconstruction. The engineer who is called upon to remove a bridge, on account of the badness of its foundation, may admire the extraordinary firmness with which every stone has been dovetailed together, and, with the means at his command, may be unable to construct another having a similar appearance of stability; yet, after all, an arch which is secure and stable is preferable to one which is good only in appearance. A very few years have elapsed since it was found that the tower and spire of the Cathedral at Chichester had been so built that there was imminent danger of the whole falling down. This part of the edifice resembled certain faiths which have been raised with great art to a vast height, with very slender and inadequate material. So long as they were not assailed by any storm, or tested by the changes which time produces, they seemed firm and unshakable; but, when they were really tried, they began to undergo a process similar to that which obtained in the Cathedral named—the admirers of the edifice attempted to prop up the failing tower; with iron and timber they shored up its bulging sides; they erected strong scaffolds to ease the mighty strain upon the crumbling walls; but all in vain—the lovely spire, built upon a foundation as rotten as the Mormon faith, came tumbling down, and the tall emblem pointing to the sky returned once more to earth. Before there could be any reconstruction attempted, it was necessary to procure all the material necessary; and when, with great labour, this was accumulated, a fresh erection was made, which was far stronger than the first, for every stone was duly examined, and solid masonry replaced the ancient rubble. So it has been with many a faith. Christianity has replaced the crumbling Judaism which existed at the beginning of our era, and the Reformed Church has since then, in many countries, replaced the gigantic sham of Popery. But the metaphor is one which we cannot wholly adopt, inasmuch as we believe that no faith of ancient times has ever wholly fallen like the spire and tower of Chichester, nor has any new system of belief the solidity of that new edifice which has replaced the old.
The difficulties connected with reconstruction are greatly increased by the propensity which is so common in the human mind to make the best of that which is in actual existence and familiar to the vulgar, rather than to adopt something entirely new. The child who dislikes to go to bed at night equally dislikes to get up in the morning, and we have known elderly people who have systematically preferred an old lumbering stage-coach to a first-class compartment in a railway carriage. In every walk of life an innovator is regarded as an enemy by the majority, and especially by those whose practice or whose theories his discoveries supersede.
Yet, great as is the contest which any new truth has to sustain, there is no doubt whatever that the first part of the fight—the preliminaries essential to conquest, are the investigation of the ground to be occupied; the real value of the defences; the superiority of the armour; and the temper, strength, and tenacity of the offensive weapons. The engineer to whom is confided the attack or the defence of a town will abandon or destroy everything which would harbour an enemy or facilitate his operations. The fighting commodore, ere he carries his ship into action, sacrifices readily all the gewgaws of luxury; and in like manner the ecclesiastic ought never to endanger his position by spending his energies in the defence of a useless outwork or a tinsel ornament. Entertaining these views ourselves, our first effort has been to clear the ground, and to remove every object which we consider to be detrimental to the spread of truth.
We have demonstrated, as far as such a matter is capable of demonstration, that the Old Testament, which has descended to us from the Jews, is not the mine of truth which it has been supposed by so many to be: that not only it is not a revelation given by God to man, but that it is founded upon ideas of the Almighty which are contradicted by the whole of animate and inanimate nature. We showed, that its composition was wholly of human origin, and that its authors had a very mean and degrading notion of the Lord of Heaven and Earth. We proved, what indeed Colenso and a host of German critics have demonstrated in another fashion, that its historical portions are not to be depended upon; that its stories are of no more real value than so many fairy tales or national legends; that its myths can now be readily traced to Grecian, Babylonian, and Persian sources; that its miracles are as apocryphal as those told of Vishnu, Siva, and other deities; and its prophecies absolutely worthless. We proved, moreover, that the remote antiquity of its authorship has been greatly exaggerated; that the stories of the creation, of the flood, of Abraham, of Jacob, of the descent into, and the exodus from, Egypt, of the career of Moses and the Jews in the desert, of Joshua and his soldiers, of the judges and their clients, are all apocryphal, and were fabricated at a late period of Jewish history, with the design of inspiriting the Hebrews at a period when their depression of spirit from foreign conquest was extreme; that the so-called Mosaic laws were not known until long after the time of David, and that some of the enactments—that about the Jubilee, for example—were never promulgated at all. We showed that the Jewish conception of the Almighty, and of His heavenly host, did not materially differ from the Greek idea of Jupiter and his inferior deities; that the Hebrews regarded Jehovah as having human passions and very human failings—as loving, revengeful, stern, merry, and vacillating—as "everything by turns and nothing long"—as forming a resolution, and then contriving how He might, as it were, overreach Himself. We pointed out that the Jews did, in reality, paint God and the Devil or Satan, as the same individual, being the former to His friends, and the latter to His enemies. Indeed, anyone who compares 2 Sam. xxiv. 1 with 1 Chron. xxi. 1 will see this most clearly demonstrated. We called attention to the apparently utter ignorance of the Jews that certain laws of nature existed, and of their consequent belief that defeat, disease, famine, slaughter, pestilence, and the like, were direct punishments of ceremonial or other guilt; while victory, wealth, virility, and old age were special and decided proofs of the Divine favour. We showed that the Jews were, in general, an abject but a very boastful race, and that their spiritual guides—the so-called prophets—were constantly promising, but always vainly, a striking manifestation of the Almighty's power in favour of the Hebrews when they were in the depths of misery, that histories were fabricated to give colour to these statements, and that these, like modern miracles of saints, were narrated as occurring a long time ago, and in a locality which could not be visited, e.g., in Samaria and Egypt; we showed, moreover, that the race was imitative, and readily adopted the religious ideas and practices of those who conquered them. Still further, we proved that the Jews had no idea whatever of a future state, and were in utter ignorance of heaven or hell; that they regarded the Almighty as punishing crime or rewarding goodness in this world alone, and, consequently, we inferred either—(1) that the conversation said to have been held between Jehovah and certain apocryphal men did not really occur; or (2) that God did not think the existence of a future world a matter of sufficient consequence to communicate to His friends; or (3) that Elohim had not then created either a habitation for the blessed, or a future prison-house for the damned; and we pointed out that the opinions of the Pharisees about angels, spirits, and futurity were not based upon the writings of Moses and the prophets, but upon Persian fantasies. In fine, we showed, that the Hebrews could not sustain the claim they made to be the especial people of God, and that their writings are of no more value, as records of absolute truth, or of Divine revelation, than the books of the Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hindoos, Chinese, or the more modern Mahometans.
With all this we indicated that there was, throughout the nations known as Shemitic, a general belief in the existence of an Almighty Being, Creator, Director and Governor of the heaven, the earth, and the sea; that He was considered to be One, yet that He was, nevertheless, represented by a multiplicity of names, and as having many and opposite attributes.
We also showed, that this sublime conception was very thickly coated with human ideas, often of a debased and grovelling type, and darkened by legends, which were invented by priests with the design of clothing themselves, and those of their order, with a portion of the garments which they had assigned to the Inscrutable. We showed, how the sun and moon, the stars and planets, became interwoven with the idea of a Celestial Being, and how they were described in turn as His ministers, His residence, His army, and sometimes even as Himself. We showed, moreover, that the Almighty was depicted by some as a male, having the attributes and passions of men, by others as a female, or celestial goddess, and by others as androgyne—not exactly a bifrons, like Janus, but masculine and feminine, Elohim, Baalim, Ashtaroth; that in the development of this idea, everything which has reference to the phenomena of mundane creation was closely studied, and introduced into one religious system or another. As a result of this, it followed, that there were some sects and temples consecrated to the adoration of the Creator as masculine, others as feminine, and others as both combined. We showed still farther, that each sect adopted certain emblems, which were intended to represent the distinctive mark of the sex under which it worshipped the Omnipotent, and that the emblems became multiplied as different nations came into contact with each other, learned foreign theology, and advanced in their knowledge of natural history. To such an extent was this symbolism, to which we refer, carried, that the sexual idea of the Creator at last pervaded, to a greater or less degree, all forms of worship, and gradually degraded them deeper and deeper, in consequence of the emblems of the deity being mistaken for the deity itself, much in the same way as the vulgar, amongst the Roman Catholics, regard a statuette or picture of the Virgin, or an Ashantee a particular form of idol fetish. As an example of such development, we pointed out that the Assyrians represented the Godhead as four-fold, consisting of the triple male and the single female element in mundane creation, and that the idea of the trinity in unity, which is a doctrine recognized as far back amongst all nations as history will carry us, was originally founded solely upon the well-known fact that the characteristic of the male is a triad, of which all the parts are really, and in no mysterious manner, "co-eternal together and co-equal." We also showed that the feminine idea of the Creator has, from time immemorial, been associated, in one form or another, with that of a lovely virgin holding a child in her arms, which is generally very young, and mostly receiving food from a maternal bosom, the reason of which we hinted at.
We showed that the myths of Adam and Eve, Abraham and Sarai, Esau and Jacob, were incorporations of the idea that the trinity and the unity, or, to use the very words of the Athanasian creed, "the trinity in unity," were the founders of the race of living beings, and, as such, worthy of worship and honour throughout all ages. This union was spoken of as "the four," and was symbolized as a square or a cross of four points, or a cross of eight points. We showed, still farther, that the male Creator was identified with the sun, and the female with the crescent moon, and also with the earth; and that one of the symbols of this celestial union of the sexes was the sun lying within the moon's crescent.
We also demonstrated, that a very large part of Pagan worship consisted in the performance of rites and ceremonies, whose end was the glorification of the deity under one or other of the selected symbols, and that a number of feasts were appointed to be held at certain astronomical periods, in which the assistants were encouraged to indulge in every form of sensuality (Deut. xiv. 26). We pointed out, that the Jewish people were largely tainted by this vicious form of worship prior to the Babylonian captivity, and that a very large portion of their nomenclature was based upon sexual ideas of the Creator. We also showed, that the Jewish writings encouraged certain forms of sensuality in a conspicuous manner; that the condition of the male organ was represented as being of such importance as to be the ground work of the covenant between God and the Hebrews, it being declared (Gen. xvii. 14), as if by the word of the Lord, that no man was to be allowed to live whose organ had not been improved in a definite manner, i.e., by circumcision or excision of the prepuce, and that no man was to be admitted into the congregation of the faithful whose characteristic male organs had in any way been injured or removed. Deuteronomy xxiii. 1 is conclusive upon this point, and there is no ambiguity in the words of the decree. We pointed out, also, that not only was abundance of offspring promised to the faithful as a proof of God's regard to them, but that the laws, said to be delivered by Jehovah to Moses, positively provided (see Deut. xxi. 10-14) the means by which the harems of the wealthy could be stocked in times of war, and by which even the poor might also be indulged, in or about the precincts of the temple, where slave and foreign women were kept for the purpose (Numb. xxxi. 40). We pointed out that the natural result of this licensed debauchery was a great increase in the population, which was so much in excess of the capacity of the land to sustain them, that it was necessary to check the number of adult mouths by conniving at infanticide, as was done in Rajpootana up to a recent period, and is said to be done in China now. It is clear, from the denunciations by the prophets of the vileness of the Jews of Jerusalem, and the impotent laws which were introduced into the so-called Mosaic code, that the Hebrew family was to the full as bad and vile as were the nations around them.
We further showed that there was a marked difference in the thoughts, the doctrines, the laws, the knowledge, the writings, and the form of worship amongst the Jews after they had come into contact with the Babylonians, Persians, and Greeks; and we adverted to the fact that the laws of the Persians, and those of him, whom we would designate "the fictitious Moses," were remarkably similar; and we showed that everything in the Old Testament, which is, by the majority of Christians, deemed to be of Divine origin, had been derived from or through one or other of the sources which we have named, and which we call Pagan. From this we deduced the important corollary, either that the so-called revelation of the Old Testament is a sham, a priestly fabrication, and what is known as "a pious fraud," or that it was not made originally to the Hebrews. In neither case can the Jews establish a title to be the "chosen people of God" in any sense of the words. If the Bible is true, the Gentiles have spiritual precedence over the Hebrews, and the Pagans have the pas of the Christians.
This deduction enabled us to recognize the importance of an extended inquiry into the faith, religion, and practice of other nations, before we assume ourselves to be in a position to appreciate the claims which one human being, or any body of men, might make to be the representatives of the Almighty, the sole recipients of His commands, and the only medium by which prayers can be forwarded to Him. Again, the history of the past, and a study of the present, enabled us to see that the foundation of a new religion, or the modification of an old one, did not destroy ancient practices, though it transferred priestly power to a new set of men, who, while they introduced new gods and new dogmas, endeavoured to incorporate the older ideas with new, so as to seduce or cheat the vulgar, whom it was not judicious to slaughter, into adopting the new faith. Consequently, we are able to understand how indecent ideas, sexual emblems, and Pagan festivals, with many of the licentious practices associated therewith, have been handed down from a remote idolatry to a modern and comparatively enlightened Christianity. The symbols of the objectionable still remain, but the things symbolized have been altered, and the original ideas suppressed. The male triad is a holy trinity; the monad is no longer the emblem of womankind, but of the so-called Mother of God, or, as the Romanists say, of the Mater Creatoris. But with this knowledge comes the very important consideration, how far Christian ideas, which are founded upon Pagan fancies, can be regarded as Divine. This, again, involves the question, how far Jesus, who had not penetration enough to discover the true nature of the writings to which he trusted, can be considered as an incarnation of Divine knowledge, or of unbounded wisdom. Still further, it became clear, after our arguments, that if the stories of the creation of man, the fall of Adam, the life of Noah, of Abraham, of Moses, the tale of Sinai, and the supremacy of Judah, are mythical—if the prophetic writings are as worthless as the oracles of Dodona and of Delphi—then all theories, dogmas, and doctrines founded upon them must be equally valueless.
In pursuance of my subject, I pointed out that there was not a nation known to history which had not its god or gods, a sacred priesthood, a set of prophets, either located in one spot, or appearing as independent vaticinators, a number of holy festivals, of hallowed shrines, of mysterious temples, and an inner and recondite arcanum into which the profane were not permitted to enter. I showed that other nations besides the Jews had a sacred ark which was an emblem of a divinity; that the use of sacrifices was common to every nation of antiquity; and that such things had existed in Hindostan from time immemorial. I pointed out, that there was no single precept or order contained in the Jewish Ritual which could not be found amongst all other people, with the sole exception of the Sabbath; and that the respect for this very strange law was due to the ignorance of the Hebrews, who regarded Saturn as the most high amongst the gods—information gained from the Babylonians.
Thus, an investigation into the nature and importance of Ancient Faiths becomes a necessary prelude to, or, rather, is unavoidably followed by, an inquiry into the beliefs, doctrines, and practices current in Christendom generally, and in Great Britain particularly. Yet, though I was insensibly driven forwards to complete the task which I began, without having any definite notion of the amount of labour I should have to undergo, I passively resisted for a long time the conclusions to which I was drawn, feeling myself unwilling, almost, indeed, unable, to undertake an examination which might shake my faith in the New Testament as it had been shaken in the Old. Like many others of a thoughtful turn of mind, I could see, without very strong regret, the Jewish writings consigned to their appropriate niche in the library of the world; but I shunned the effort required to take down the books of the Gospels and Epistles and weigh them in the impartial balance of critical truth. Nevertheless, as my work on Ancient Faiths progressed, I became painfully conscious that I must plead guilty to the charge of mental cowardice if I shirked the duty of examining the New, as I had investigated the Old, Testament. But when the resolution to investigate modern faith was at length formed, the difficulties surrounding the subject became apparent. The history of modern faith is, to a great extent, the history of Christianity, and the history of Christianity must start from a history of Jesus and his apostles—Paul, Peter, James, John, and Jude, as given in the Epistles and Gospels included in the canon of the New Testament. To cope with any one of these histories as they deserve to be handled would involve the work of a lifetime, and for one man to exhaust the whole seemed to me an impossibility. There was, in addition to this, another consideration which complicated my difficulty still farther, viz., the fact that there were already, written histories of the nature of those alluded to, and that it would be useless to multiply them. It is a thankless task to pursue the current of the Christian religion through the dark scenes which shrouded it, from the time when it was adopted by a few "unlearned and ignorant men," until it emerged as a power able to shake empires—from the period wherein its professors were burned and otherwise tortured to death, to the days when their own Christian successors racked, roasted, and tormented their opponents, with a malignancy and cruelty as great as that which they themselves had execrated when practised upon their predecessors. From the moment that Christianity became a political power, its history resembled that of any tyrant or other ruler, and it is filled with misrepresentation, lying, fraud, the records of fighting and slaughter, of brutal passions, frightful laws, and horrible punishments; in fact, the record of political Christianity is that of a Devil in sheep's clothing. Even Calvin, one of our cherished reformers, burnt another Protestant almost in the same year as the Papists burnt Ridley and Latimer. The English Episcopalians in Scotland, and the Cromwellian Puritans in Ireland, showed more of the ravening wolf in their actions than of the amiable shepherd, who "gently leads" the weak ones of his flock. In fact, the more loud the proclamation of a pure Christianity, the more devilish is the practice of its heralds.
When I turned to the consideration of the life of Jesus, it was clear that the ground was already fully occupied. In 1799 a Mr Houston published a work entitled Ecce Homo; or, a Critical Inquiry into the History of Jesus Christ: being an Analysis of the Gospels, a second edition of which was made public fourteen years afterwards, and, as a result, its publisher (D. J. Eaton) was prosecuted, and such of the impressions as could be collected were publicly burned in St. George's Fields, London, by the common hangman, whose business it was to strangle truth as well as murderers. This book, which is little known to modern readers, is strictly what it professes to be—a critical inquiry into the history of Jesus Christ, and it may, to a great extent, be considered as the progenitor of more modern treatises. It does not materially differ from the Ecce Homo of to-day, or from the other works which we shall name, except in its style and composition. Having been written when all were in the habit of expressing their views in strong language, and when opponents were abused in terms of coarse invective, the author has expressed himself in a manner calculated to offend rather than to convince, and to stir up anger rather than to encourage thought. Yet his arguments are unanswerable, and his deductions unimpeachable, by those who know the value of evidence and exercise their power of ratiocination. I have been unable to find that any work was written in refutation of the author's views, and the only opposition to it was from the usual agent of the weak-minded, but strong-bodied—persecution.
In more recent times, and within a very short period of each other—so short, indeed, that we may say that the books were composed simultaneously in Hindostan, Germany, France, and England—there have appeared A Voice from the Ganges, Strauss' New Life of Jesus, Kenan's Life of Jesus, The English Life of Jesus, by Mr Thomas Scott, of Norwood, a second Ecce Homo, from a modern Professor, and The Prophet of Nazareth, by Owen Meredith.* In these volumes, the historical value of the Gospel narratives closely and critically examined, and a just appreciation of the character, preaching, and practice of the Prophet of Nazareth are honestly sought after, and, in the opinion of impartial readers, they must be held to have been attained. Throughout the series which we have mentioned nothing that is capable of demonstration, or of approximate proof, is taken for granted. The scholarship of the critical philosopher everywhere overbears the prejudice of the Christian bigot. Since the appearance of these another author has treated upon the same subject, but only cursorily, and as bearing upon other matters, in a work entitled The Book of God; or, The Apocalypse of Adam Oannes, which was published anonymously, 1868.
* Whilst this sheet was in the printer's hands, a most
remarkable book was published anonymously, entitled,
Supernatural Religion, in two volumes. In it there is a
most scholarly account of the origin of the New Testament
writings, one which every thoughtful person should peruse.
Between the publication of the first Ecce Homo and the second, viz., in 1836, there was printed, for private circulation, a very remarkable work, entitled Anacalypsis; or, an Attempt to draw aside the Veil of the Saitic Isis, by Godfrey Higgins. His two volumes are replete with learning, and with deductions more startling than any which had appeared prior to his own time; but the subject matter is so badly arranged, that it is with very great difficulty that the trains of thought which occupied the author's mind can be dis-. covered. His main idea is, that very nearly everything in religion which appears to be mythical or mysterious enfolds certain astronomical facts—such as the precession of equinoxes, the duration of cycles of time—such as are necessary to reproduce exactly a concordance between certain terrestrial and celestial phenomena. With this theory he interweaves an amazing number of facts which seem to favour the opinion enunciated in the book of Ecclesiastes—i.e., that there is nothing new under the sun. He shows that the idea of "incarnations," the birth of a heavenly child from a pure virgin, and a variety of so-called Christian dogmas, have existed in every age of which we have historical accounts.
He gives a vivid sketch of the nature of Christianity and its progress from century to century, and he expresses himself respecting its modern developments much in the same strain, though in a far more gentlemanlike style, as did his contemporary, the Rev. R. Taylor, to whom was given, or who assumed for himself, the title of the Devil's chaplain.
In the estimation of some of these writers, Jesus, the son of Mary, is quite as mythical a being as Hercules, the son of Alcmena. This view has been more recently adopted by some freethinkers of the present day. The main support on which such individuals rely is the fact that there is no mention of Jesus by any contemporary historian; and that, although there are extant Jewish records of current history, at the time in which Christ is said to have lived, they make no mention of him who is now called the Saviour and of his wonderful history. It is pointed out that the histories of the Gospels came out with marvellous rapidity, from Alexandria, about the end of the first century, at a time when all contemporaries of Jesus were dead.
To this work of Higgins it is probable that we shall have repeatedly to refer, for his language is frequently so forcible that it cannot be improved, and, moreover, he very often quotes from books, copies of which I have been unable to obtain.
When I found that the ground which I intended to occupy had already been so well and so ably cultivated, it occurred to me that it would be advisable to take a wider flight than was originally contemplated, and, instead of examining the Christian faith alone, to associate with it an account of the faiths of those nations of whom we have some knowledge. By this means it appeared to me, that we should be enabled to see clearly, how far the current belief and practice of Christendom differs from the doctrines and practices of those to whom Christianity could never, by any possibility, have come, and we can examine, incidentally, into the teachings of Jesus, and compare them with that of his predecessor, Sakya Muni, or Buddha. We may also investigate impartially such doctrines as the immaculate conception, and the existence of angels.
When treating, however, a subject like the religions of the ancient and modern world, it is difficult to frame the history so as to bring out the salient points, in a manner satisfactory to the reader or to the writer. The latter is tempted to begin, as he believes, at the beginning, and to trace the development of religious thought from its simplest expression up to its highest aspiration. This temptation becomes all the stronger if, in the course of his study, he has investigated the animal and vegetable creations. In those vast kingdoms he sees that the philosopher is able to lead his disciples onwards from the minute monad, or the simplest mass of matter, to the gigantic mastodon, without any very conspicuous flaw or break in continuity; but, on closely observing his method of proceeding, the student finds that links which connect genera or species together are found in countries so wide apart, that no direct communication can be supposed between the one type and the other. Thus the gap between mammals and birds is said to be filled by the "ornithorhynchus paradoxus," an animal living in a vast island, in which scarcely one quadruped mammalian is known to have existed, and where the aboriginal birds form a class peculiar to Australia, and have no resemblance to the creature referred to.
Yet, though the temptation is great, and although we feel justified in reasoning from the known to the unknown, and in supplying missing links from analogy, or from our own imagination, still, we consider that it will be our best plan to confine ourselves, as far as possible, to that which is written, and to describe first, the religious ideas and practices of some so-called savages; secondly, the ideas and practices of some ancient races, whose histories, more or less perfect, have come down to us, with a view to ascertain whether there is anything essentially good in modern Christianity, either in faith or practice, which is peculiar to that form of religion, or whether almost the same style of teaching may not be found to have been common in the remote East, at a period some centuries prior to the birth of Jesus.
As we have investigated the subjects of Sin, Salvation, Prayer, Inspiration, &c., it is unnecessary to refer to them again.
CHAPTER II
Travellers' tales not to be trusted. Prejudice perverts
facts. The Esquimaux. Cause of reverence for parents. The
Red Indian in the presence of immigration is a moral
murderer. Inquiry into Indian religion. O. KEE. PA. Indian
reverence for phenomena of nature. Ruins of a past
civilization in America. Cairns and human sacrifices.
Manufactured goods. Bronze in Yucatan. Resemblance between
the ancient American people and certain Orientals. Abbé
Domenech's travels. Sacrifice at obsequies, idea involved
thereby. Scythian proceedings. Mexico and its theology. Two
different conceptions of deity. The Unity subdivided by
Mexicans, Jews, and Christians. The God of war and the Lord
of Hosts. The God of air a deity in Mexico, a devil in Judea
or Ephesus. Mexican baptismal regeneration. Resemblances
between the Occidental and Oriental people in many curious
doctrines. Particulars. Mexican Heaven, Hell, and Limbo.
Mexican baptism and prayers. Priests and their duties. A
parallel. Romanists and Mexicans. Confession. Expiation.
Human sacrifice to obtain pardon of sin. A comparison
suggested. Mexican education. Purity of life in the Mexican
priestesses. Father Acosta's opinion thereon. Tartary, Rome,
and Mexico have something common in culture. Education of
youth. Policy of the priesthood. Reflections thereupon.
Teocallis or houses of God. Worship. Festivals. Human
sacrifice. No sexual deities or rites. Question of
credibility—God and the Devil act alike! Aztecs and
Europeans compared. Christians have offered human sacrifice
from the time of Peter downwards. Transubstantiation is a
cannibal doctrine. Christian gods in Mexico as bad as the
Aztec deities. History of Peru. The policy of its rulers.
Roads and magazines. Nature of its government Governors were
instructed in their duties. Civil service examination.
Inauguration of youths into honourable manhood. Travelling
compulsory in rulers. Postal system—division of the people
—local magistrates—law speedy. Code of law. Punishment
without torture. Peruvians and inquisitors. Reports required
of lands and families. Register of births, &c. Rapidity of
communication. Plunder not permitted. Peace the motive for
war. The vanquished incorporated with the victors. A
paternal government. Peruvian religion. Difference between
political institutions and priestcraft. Peruvian sun god. An
invisible God recognised. Priests. Eternal life. Heaven
and Hell. Temple of the sun magnificent. Golden
ornaments. Huge urns of silver. Number of priests.
Festivals. Cannibalism not permitted. Fire made from rays of
sun and concave mirror, or by friction. Virgins of the sun.
Concubines of the Inca. Matrimony. Reflexions.
When the philosopher reads over the histories which adventurous travellers, or Christian missionaries, have given of the religions of the savage, or uncivilized, people whom they have visited, he feels painfully conscious that the accounts are not implicitly to be relied upon. In some he recognizes the fact that communications only take place between the one party and the other by signs, which not only may be, but very generally are, misinterpreted on both sides; in others he is able to see, or, at least, he comes to the conclusion, that the untaught barbarians have not a single idea which is not connected with eating and drinking, war, revenge, and love;—that such, indeed, resemble brute beasts, who have no more conception of hell or heaven, God and the soul, than an elephant has of aerostation, or a crow of theology. In other narratives the observer notices, that the individuals who interrogate the savages are themselves enthusiasts of a high order, who ask leading questions, and are content to receive, as a satisfactory answer, anything which can be considered as a reply. By this means very erroneous ideas have crept in amongst ourselves, and writers have built arguments upon a foundation as flimsy as a shifting sand. For example, I have repeatedly heard it alleged that every known tribe, in every part of the world which has yet been visited, has a tradition respecting an universal deluge, and the salvation of their progenitors by a floating vessel; and on this has been founded the hypothesis that all architecture, and even written characters, have an ark for their type. This development has been very ingeniously supported by J. P. Lesley, in Man's Origin and Destiny (Trubner, London, 1868), a work replete with learning, and bold, but somewhat unsound, deductions. This assumed fact has also been used in support of the Biblical story of Noah, his ark, and the universal deluge—a myth so palpably extravagant, that everyone who professes to credit it is compelled to object to some detail, and to lean upon some frail reed, with the hope that he may thus be pardoned for his credulity. Since the above was written, it has been ascertained that the tale of Noah and his deluge is adapted from an Assyrian or Babylonian legend, written apparently with a view to make a story fitting to the sign of the Zodiac called Aquarius, one to the full as fabulous as that of the birth of Bacchus, and the amours of Zeus.
In some instances, moreover, and palpably in those cases where the account of the religion of barbarous nations is given by fanatics, such as the Roman Catholic invaders of America, or by such conquerors as Cæsar and others, who have themselves very hazy notions of their own faith, the philosopher feels that the savage is intentionally misrepresented; consequently, in these, as in all other instances, it behoves the philosopher to examine the evidence at his command with critical acumen, rather than accept the statements made by more or less careless observers. Endeavouring, therefore, to avoid these difficulties as far as possible, let us summarize the result of our reading, and record the impressions left upon our mind respecting the faith, ritual, and practice of certain modern and ancient barbarians.
Beginning with the vast American continent, we find that the Esquimaux appear to have no conception whatever of a Creator, of a future state, of a mundane theocracy, or of any unseen agency but good or bad "luck." But they, nevertheless, put a certain amount of faith in conjurers—cunning men or women who profess to be able to insure them a good supply of seals or walrus, and protection from Arctic dangers. For such a people as this the wants of the day form the chief, if not the only, object of thought; and they resemble lions or eagles, who are now all but famished in the hunt for food, and now gorged to repletion with the result of their quest. To such a nation, Heaven, as described in the Bible, with its sea of glass, its harpists and singers, would afford no temptation, and, unless it was furnished with abundance of oily food, an Esquimaux would not visit it; nor would the fires and heat of Hell have any terrors for one whose torments on earth are connected with miserable cold. In practice, the Esquimaux are very much what they are made by their neighbours and visitors: they are very decently behaved to those who treat them well, and cruel, barbarous, and revengeful to strangers after they have themselves been worried by invaders. Alternately gluttons and starving they obey the necessities of their existence—they eat to keep themselves warm, and they must be anchorets as rigid as any Theban hermit whilst they are seeking their prey. With a temperature below zero, and winter huts constructed of ice, chastity is almost a necessary virtue, and adultery cannot possibly be frequent. Where everything of value is rare, covetousness is not common; but if the holder of the coveted prize be always alert, it is quite natural that murder shall be attempted, either by the thief or his victim. The reverence of parents here, as elsewhere, is a necessary accompaniment of savage life, and is quite independent of any knowledge of the decalogue. To prevent reiteration of this observation, let us consider for a moment, the chief if not the main cause, of the reverence given to the father, and, more rarely, to the mother in the economy of human life. We see that the Almighty has implanted an instinct in one or both parents, throughout the larger part of the animal creation, to nourish, guide, and teach their young. The duck leads her brood to a pond; the hen keeps her chicks from water, but teaches them to pick up seeds, grubs, and worms; whilst the cock keeps order amongst the family, The weasel teaches its offspring how to attack its prey most advantageously, and the eagle instructs her young ones to fly. In like manner, man is at the head of his own household; he is the first power to which the young ones bow; they know the weight of his arm, and dread his anger, knowing that they will suffer from it when it is stirred up. We all know, as a rule, that a habit contracted in childhood adheres to us throughout life, consequently, the dread of the father which exists in the youth becomes, very generally, filial reverence in the man. But we also know that almost throughout the animal creation, the young and sturdy males will, as they grow up to maturity, fight for supremacy, even with their parents. So long as the latter retain the mastery they are respected; but as soon as age and its accompanying weakness have made them succumb, all filial respect vanishes. If, therefore, a parent, when old, is unable to make himself feared by his prowess, revered for his good sense or knowledge, or beloved for some faculty which makes him pleasing to his family or the tribe, he is neglected, and often sacrificed, so that the young shall have only themselves to provide food for. Even in Christian England, where filial regard is cultivated as an essential part of our religion, we too frequently find that parents are wholly neglected by their adult offspring, as soon as they become, from sickness, age, or other infirmity, useless members of the family.
Without having ever heard of a law, or set of laws, given in a desert from Mount Sinai, the Esquimaux are as moral as modern Christians, and more so than the ancient Jews: they certainly have not more gods than one, and do not worship any graven image. Amongst them blasphemy is unknown. Parents are honoured; chastity is general; murder is very rare; theft only exists when strangers come amongst them with valuable matters, such as cutting weapons. Amongst such a primitive people false witness is unknown, and covetousness only exists in the presence of travellers who have well-stocked ships or sledges. But the Esquimaux do not keep a Sabbath of rest every seventh day; how, indeed, could they, when many of their days have a duration of six weeks—according to the Hebrew computation, which measures the day by sunsets. It is clear, then, that what many persons designate Christian virtues do not necessarily depend upon a knowledge of Jehovah, of Jesus, or of both.
The North American Indian appears to have been, when first discovered, wholly without any distinct religious faith. It is true that some authors have described him as reverencing his manitou, or great spirit, and speaking of some happy hunting ground to which his soul will pass after death; but I am unable to find any reliable testimony in support of this poetic notion. To me it seems that the Red Indian is nothing more than one of a ferocious tribe of men, who, having to subsist by the chase alone, bestows all his thoughts upon getting meat, and driving off his neighbours from interfering in his lands. To such an one a teeming population is equivalent to a diminution in the supply of game, and this, again, involves starvation. With him, therefore, the murder of his neighbours becomes a matter of necessity, one which may be regarded by him as an absolute virtue, a matter of public policy, and essentially a moral duty; and as he is little superior to a tiger or a cat, he does not scruple to add cruelty to homicide. He who has seen a carnivorous beast seize its living prey, disable, without killing it, and then lie by and watch its victim, rising now and again to give it a shake, or a pat with its claw, can well understand how a Blackfoot Indian might gloat over a dying Delaware, or a Mandan torture an Iroquois when he had the chance, each regarding the other as men consider wasps and hornets. Yet, though without religion, the Indian is not without fear. He is terrified by strange noises, and by weird sights; there is a being whom he dreads; and there is in every tribe a "medicine man," who is supposed to have supernatural power, and to be able to attract good or to banish evil fortune from the chief and his people. Practically, the Red Indian is as superstitious about lucky and unlucky days as was the Hebrew David and the Persian Haman, and, prior to the starting of an expedition, the diviner is consulted, who may, possibly, answer in the words of the Lord (?) of Judah, "let it be when thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees, then thou shalt bestir thyself, for then shall the Lord go out before thee to smite the host of the Philistines" (2 Sam. v. 24).
But though without religion, in the usual acceptation of the word, the Indians were not, when first the white man knew them, wholly without ritual, or what has been designated a sacred ceremony. The celebration to which we refer occurred every year, was conducted by a definite set of actors, and was attended to with wonderful reverence. A full account of such ceremony is given by G. Catlin, in a work entitled, O Kee Pa (Trübner, London, 1867). In it figures a mystic messenger, who comes to demand the initiation of the young men of the tribe who have attained a fighting age; tents are then prepared, and men and women are duly painted and otherwise disguised to represent buffaloes and bugbears, the bad spirit, etc.; the main intention of the whole being to test the courage, strength, and endurance of the young men by frightful tortures, which are too disgusting for description here. At the end of the trial, however, each votary sacrifices a joint of the little finger of one hand to the bad spirit. At this feast-some doll-like effigies are used to mark the "mystery" tent.
Amongst barbarians like these are, it will readily be imagined that such virtues as chastity and charity have no existence,—that successful theft ennobles the robber, and that the slaughter of an enemy, either by treachery or in fair fight, is regarded as a proof of courage, much as it was amongst the Spartan Greeks. Polygamy is simply a matter of wealth and arrangement, and women are purchased and treated like slaves. It is the man's business to hunt and fight, it is the woman's duty to make the best or the most of the spoils of the chase.
Yet, with this general absence of all religion, there appears to be, here and there, a reverence for certain strange phenomena of nature—such as hot or bubbling fountains, sulphur springs, steaming geysers, and curious rocks, like the celebrated pipe-stone rock in the Sioux territory. From this all pipes ought to be made, there being as much of orthodoxy in such bowls amongst the Indians as there is in an "Agnus Dei" amongst Christian papists. There is, too, a reverence for the dead occasionally to be met with, but it cannot be said to amount to worship. In some instances, but I do not find that the custom is general, a man is interred with his horse, weapons, and medicine bag, as if it was expected that he would live beyond the tomb, and require in his other state of existence that which he wanted in this.
What we have said of the North American aborigines applies with equal, if not with greater, force to those of the South.
From what the savage redskins are, and have been, during the last two or three centuries, a transition to what they have been in the past is very natural; and, whilst making the step, the philosopher will be reminded of the observation made by some profound observer, to the effect—-"go where you will, no matter how savage the nation, you will be sure to find the remains of a previous empire, nation, or civilization." Vast forests, scarcely yet fully explored, cover ancient cities in Ceylon and Central America alike, and men, who toiled to build vast temples, towers, palaces, and fortresses, are replaced by wild animals. In the Bashan of Palestine, primeval houses of stone still stand, where scarcely a resident is to be found, and the present inhabitants are far inferior to the ancient race that built these enduring dwellings. Thus the Abbé Domenech writes (Seven Years Residence in the Great Deserts of North America, London, Longman, 1860), vol. I., p. 353—"From Florida to Canada, from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, the American soil is strewn with gigantic ruins of temples, tumuli, entrenched camps, fortifications, towers, villages, towers of observation, gardens, wells, artificial meadows, and high roads of the most remote antiquity."
Without entering closely into the nature of the antiquities discovered, we may state that they comprise pyramids, cones, obelisks, hills surrounded by a deep vallum, like that adjoining Salisbury, and earthen constructions analogous to that at Avebury. There is evidence that the artificial erections, which were so built as to be visible from an enormous distance, were designed, possibly, as cairns, or memorials of the dead, but also as spots for sacrificial offerings, resembling those called high places in Ancient Palestine, the tumulus over Patroclus, and the Scythian mounds in the Crimea. The altars which have been discovered are made of baked clay or stone, and have the shape of large basins, varying in length from nineteen inches to seventeen yards, but generally about two yards and a-half. Under and around the altars calcined human bones were found, and sometimes a whole skeleton was met with in the tumulus, as if a sacrifice of men attended the funeral rites, as we learn from Homer that it did, before Troy, when Achilles directed the obsequies of his friend Patroclus. Cremation, as well as sepulture, was adopted, and with the dead, ornaments, arms, and other objects, which belonged in life to the departed, were buried; amongst these are to be reckoned trinkets of silver and of brass, as well as of stone and bone. As a proof of the advanced knowledge of the people referred to, I may here quote, from memory, a note from Stevens' Central America, to the effect that the bronze tools found in Yucatan, &c., amongst the quarries whence the stone for the ancient temples was procured, are nearly as hard as steel, and that a similar bronze is only known to have existed in some of the ancient tombs and quarries of Egypt, an observation which receives additional value from Domenech's remark, vol. I., p. 364—"These works of art (arms, idols, and medals, found in New Granada tombs) are acknowledged, by the archaeologists of Panama, to possess the characteristics of both Chinese and Egyptian art." Here, again, I would call my readers' attention to the facts, that in very modern times Chinese have migrated to California, Australia, Singapore, and other distant localities, and that Fortune found Egyptian curiosities in virtù, shops in China, whilst Egyptologists have discovered Chinese manufactures in Egyptian tombs. The subject of the extent of travel in ancient times does not enter into my present plan; but as I am desirous to make the mind of my readers expansive enough to receive everything which bears upon the history of man upon the earth, I may be allowed to sow seed by the way-side, some of which may blossom as "a garden flower grown wild." Domenech, in p. 408, vol. I., figures a remarkable stone, by many persons supposed to be a hoax or forgery, which was found at the base of one of the largest mounds in North America, situated in Western Virginia. It lay in a sepulchral chamber, thirty-five feet from the surface, was elliptic in shape, two inches and a-half long, two wide, and about half an inch thick, and the material was of a dark colour, and very hard. The following is a copy from Domenech's work, and, without dwelling upon it, we may call attention to the similarity of some of the letters with those known to, or used by the Phoenicians, Ancient Greco-Italians, and Carthaginians. Like the Newton Stone, in Scotland, and some Gnostic gems, it may be said to be learned "gibberish," which "the spirits" can read but no one else.
There is, indeed, much more evidence than is generally supposed to connect the ancient mound-builders in America with the inhabitants of the Eastern Hemisphere, particularly in their modes of burial, the nature of their earthworks, and the style of such ornaments and figures as have been found. For example, there is one enclosure described, in the centre of which is erected a mound and pillar, precisely resembling the linga yoni of the East. In addition to these, carved stones have been found, which unite together such Oriental emblems as the sun and moon, the Tau, T and the egg, O which together make the well-known Egyptian symbol A. Again, Domenech figures some male and female human effigies, of whom American savans write that they represent idols of sexual design, similar to those exposed in the Mysteries of Eleusis, one of them being a badly finished image of Priapus. Domenech still farther states, on the authority of Cortez, that a form of worship, recalling the Egyptian mysteries of Isis and Osiris, was established in America.
Respecting the nature of the religion of the mound builders the Abbé writes—"The government of these nations appears to have been theocratic or sacerdotal, like that of the Jews, and the religious administrative and military power was, probably, vested in one and the same person. This is clearly evinced by the taboo, or sacred monuments, being combined with those of a purely military character," p. 366. Without straining doubtful points too far, we may content ourselves with affirming that the researches of Davis and Squire, of Stephens, and of Domenech, show that the mound builders of America raised high places for sacrificial fires; that they built huge piles of earth over dead warriors; and, that during the funeral rites which were observed at the obsequies, they immolated certain human victims.
Let us now pause for a moment and consider how much is involved in the practice of making a sacrifice by fire, or otherwise, at the burial of any deceased chieftain or honoured man. With what idea could the living wife join her husband on the funeral pyre in India, or the ancient Tartars have slain the horse, slaves, wives, and chief officers of a defunct king, burying them all in a vast grave, unless they entertained the belief that there was a life beyond the grave? The faith may have been of the crudest form, yet the practice evidenced the belief that those who died, and were buried together, would arise and live at the same time and place, and in the same relative positions which they had during life. If this be granted, it demonstrates that the early dwellers in America had a higher conception of immortality than had the ancient Jews, even although the latter assumed, and pertinaciously persisted in the assertion, that they, and they only of all the nations of the world, were taught of God—a boast to which a vast number of thoughtless Christians give a profound reverence, and most implicit belief.
Without speculating upon the probable connexion between the mound-builders and the inhabitants of ancient Mexico, we will endeavour, with the aid of Prescott, and other writers, to ascertain something of the faith professed by Montezuma and his subjects. Derived from two sources, there were two distinct elements in the Mexican religion; one of these was gentle and mild as the teaching of Christ, and the other, ferocious and cruel, like the practice of such of his followers as the sensual Crusaders, the persecuting Popes of Italy, and the brutal, money-grubbing Spaniards. The former gradually dried up, like primitive Christianity, and the harmlessness of the dove was replaced by the ferocity of the wolf. It is in strict accordance with human nature, that virtues are harder to maintain than vices, hence malignancy swelled itself up and became dominant. The priests of the sanguinary class contrived as burdensome a ceremonial as ever existed in Judea, Greece, Spain, or Modern Rome, and they surrounded their deities with conceptions as grotesque as those which are clustered round the Hindoo gods of to-day, the divinities of the Greeks and Romans, and the innumerable virgins, saints, and martys of mediaeval and modern papal Christianity. The power and the inclination to make fetish is certainly not confined to African negroes. The Mexicans recognized a supreme Creator as the God by whom we live, one who was, for them, omnipresent and omniscient—the giver of all good things, "without whom man is as nothing." He was said to be "invisible, incorporeal, a being of absolute perfection and perfect purity," "under whose wings men may find repose and a sure defence." But this deity, though single, was subdivided by the Mexican theologians, much in the same way as Jehovah became separated into an innumerable host of angels, archangels, and devils, and as Zeus was split up into an equally numerous army of gods, goddesses, and demigods. The Mexicans had thirteen major, and about two hundred minor, divinities, to one or other of whom each day was devoted, much in the same way as certain modern Christians believe in one Creator, four persons, three of whom are male and the other female, seven archangels, and some hundreds of saints, virgins, or martyrs, to each of whom one day of the year is consecrated. There are more gods and goddesses in the Papal calendar than in that of Ancient Mexico, Greece, or even Rome.
At the head of the celestial army was "the god of war," "the patron of the kingdom," whose temples were more noble in their barbaric majesty than any other, and to whom human beings were sacrificed in abundance. They were the noblest creatures that could be found, and in truth, there were very few other animals to offer in their place.
This great Mexican divinity was essentially the same as the Jehovah Tsebaoth of the Hebrew Scriptures; the Lord of Hosts of whom we read in Exod. xv. 3, "The Lord (Jehovah) is a man of war, the Lord (Jehovah) is His name;" and in Ps. xxiv. 8, "Who is this King of glory?—the Lord, strong and mighty; the Lord, mighty in battle;" and again, the same idea appears in verse 10 of the same Psalm; see also 1 Chron. xvii. 24, "The Lord of Hosts is the God of Israel." Indeed, we should weary the reader if we were to quote all the texts to be found in the Old Testament, which prove that the Hebrew Jehovah was as much a god of war as was the chief deity of the Mexicans. Modern civilization may frame the belief that God is not "the author of confusion, but of peace" (1 Cor. xiv. 33); but the Hebrews in the East, and the Mexicans in the West, held a different opinion. Besides the god of war there was a god of the air, who once lived on earth, and taught metallurgy, agriculture, and the art of government. He was essentially a human benefactor, who caused the earth to teem with fruit and flowers, without the trouble of laborious cultivation—his reign was analogous to the golden age of the Greeks and Romans. But he was not wholly satisfactory, and was banished; yet he is to have a second coming, like Elias, and a modern deity of the Eastern world. His portrait is identical, apparently, with the commonly received likeness of Jesus. In Christian mythology (see Eph. ii. 2), "the prince of the power of the air" is regarded as "the adversary," or a devil. No other deities are described in detail by Prescott, but he says that every household had its "penates," or household gods. On turning to Higgins, who quotes entirely from Lord Kingsborough's Mexican Antiquities, we find that the Mexicans baptized their children with what they called "water of regeneration." Their king also danced before his god, as David did, to his chaste wife's disgust, and was consecrated and anointed by the high priest with a holy unction as Saul and the son of Jesse were. On one day of the year all the fires in the Mexican kingdom were extinguished and lighted again from one sacred hearth in the temple, which again reminds us of the Vestal Virgins, whose business was to keep up a holy fire in Rome, and of the lamp which was to burn perpetually in the Jewish temple (Exod. xxvii. 20). At the end of October the Mexicans had a feast resembling our "All Souls," or "Saints," day, which was called "the festival of advocates," because each human being had an advocate in the heaven above to plead for him, which again reminds us of Jesus' dictum, that children have guardian angels, who are always in God's presence (Matt, xviii. 10)
The same people had a forty-days' fast, in honour of a god who was tempted forty days upon a mountain, and thus resembled the Prophet of Nazareth. He was called the morning star, and thus is to be identified with Lucifer as well as Jesus (Isa. xiv. 12, Rev. xxii. 16), and carried a reed for an emblem (see Eev. xxi. 15). The Mexicans honoured a cross, and the god of air was represented sometimes as nailed to one, and even occasionally between two other individuals.*
* As we cannot imagine that the Mexicans were aware of the
manner in which modern Christians depict Jesus on the cross,
we most, I think, seek for some idea which was common to
both the East and West. In Payne Knight's work, so often
referred to by us, there is a picture which represents a
cock with a lingam instead of a head and beak; on its
pediment there is in Greek the words, soteer kosmou, "the
saviour of the world." This is also an epithet of Siva, and
he is sometimes represented as a phallus. In this he is the
Asher or Bel of the Assyrian triad, erected higher than the
other two. In Christian history the outsiders are said to be
thieves, but it was not so in Mexico. The three crosses
are simply emblems of the "trinity."
A virgin and child were also adored, as they were in Babylonia, Assyria, Egypt, and Hindostan, and as they are in a great part of Europe at the present time. The people believed in vast cycles of years, at the end of each of which there was to be a general destruction of life, and a perfect regeneration, an idea which Higgins has shown to have existed amongst Persians, Romans, and Jews alike. The Mexicans still further believed in a threefold future state—a heaven for the brave, and those who were sacrificed, there being, so far as I can discover, no abstract idea of what we call "virtue"; a hell for the wicked; and a sort of quiet limbo for those who were in no way distinguished. Heaven was located in the sun, and the blessed were permitted to revel amongst lovely clouds and singing birds, enjoying, unharmed, all the charms of nature: a conception which is to the full as poetical, and, probably, quite as near the truth, as that given in "Revelation." When a man died he was burned, and, if rich, his slaves were sacrificed with him, the Mexicans, in this respect, resembling the ancient Scythians, with whom they had much in common. When the ceremony of giving a name to children was gone through, their lips and bosom were sprinkled with water, and the Lord was implored to permit the holy drops to wash away the sin that was given to the child before the foundation of the world, so that the infant might be born anew, or, in modern terms, regenerated (Prescott, ch. 3). Amongst their prayers, or invocations, were the formulas, "Wilt Thou blot us out, O Lord, for ever? Is this punishment intended, not for our reformation, but for our destruction?" again, "Impart to us, out of Thy great mercy, Thy gifts which we are not worthy to receive through our own merits;" "Keep peace with all;" "Bear injuries with humility, God who sees will avenge you;" "He who looks too curiously on a woman commits adultery with eyes." These Mexican maxims so closely resemble those to be found in the Bible, that it is difficult to believe that the Spaniards really told the truth respecting them. The sacerdotal order amongst the Mexicans was a numerous one, well arranged and powerful. The priests used musical choirs in their worship, arranged the calendar, and appointed the time for festivals. They superintended the education of youth, and wrote up the traditions, like the "recorders" of the Jews, Persians, other Orientals, and Christian monks, and looked to the conservancy of the hieroglyphic paintings. There were two high priests, who alone had to undertake the duty of offering human sacrifices, and these were elected by the king and nobles, quite irrespective of previous rank, and, when elected, they were inferior only to the sovereign. When reading this, anyone who is familiar with biblical history will bethink him of Luke iii. 3, "Annas and Caiaphas being the high priests," the plural, not the singular, number being used, and of the dictum of Caiaphas, John xi. 50, "It is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, that the whole nation perish not." We may put what construction we please upon these facts, but, whatever interpretation we may adopt, we must acknowledge that the Hebrews, at the time when our era commences, had two high priests who were concerned in human sacrifice.
The priests, in general, were devoted to the service of some particular deity, and, during the time of their attendance, lived in the temple, celibate; but, when not on duty, they resided with their wives and families. Thrice during the day, and once at some period of the night, they were called to prayer, much like all the varieties of Christian monks and nuns. They were frequent in their ablutions, in which habit they may be contrasted with those saintly hermits, who regarded dirt as a divine ordinance, and never washed; and they mortified the flesh by long vigils, fasting, and cruel penance, drawing blood from their bodies by flagellation, or by piercing them with the thorns of the aloe. The resemblance of the Mexican sacerdotalism with Jewish and Christian customs is thus shown to be wonderful and striking, so much so, that the Spaniards started the idea that they had been taught by some stray apostle of Jesus. The great cities of Mexico were divided into districts, each of which was placed under the charge of a sort of parochial clergy, who regulated every act of religion within their precincts, and who administered the rites of confession and absolution. The secrets of the confessional were held inviolable, and penances were imposed, of much the same kind as those enjoined by the Roman Catholic Church upon her votaries.
It was a tenet of Mexican faith, that a sin once atoned for, was, if repeated, inexpiable a second time; consequently, confession was only once resorted to, and that late in life; a good plan, upon the whole, for it enabled a man whose days were numbered to get pardon "for good and aye." It was also held that sacerdotal absolution was equivalent to magisterial punishment. The formula of absolution contained this, amongst other things, "O merciful Lord, Thou who knowest the secrets of all hearts, let Thy forgiveness and favour descend, like the pure waters of heaven, to wash away the stains from the soul. Thou knowest that this poor man has sinned, not from his own free will, but from the influence of the sign under which he was born." This idea may well be compared with the current doctrine of the phrenologists, many of whom assert that a man acts according to the configuration of his brain and cranium, and is, therefore, only partially culpable for the commission of certain crimes. After a copious exhortation to the penitent, in which he was enjoined to undergo a variety of mortifications, and to perform minute ceremonies, by way of penance, he was particularly urged to procure, with the smallest possible delay, a slave, who was to be utilized in sacrifice to the Deity; the priest then concluded with inculcating charity to the poor—"Clothe the naked, and feed the hungry, whatever privations it may cost thee, for remember their flesh is like thine."
The necessity of sacrifice, as an atonement for sin, forms an essential, though bloody, part of both the Hebrew and the Christian faiths, and history has long taught us that the slaughter of a man, woman, or child, formed, in the estimation of the Ancient Greeks, and other nations, one of the most acceptable of the forms of homage paid by a human being to the Creator. This idea is at the very basis of the Christian theology. It has been held, from the time of the apostle Paul to the present day, that Jehovah would not look favourably upon mankind until He had been propitiated, not by the sacrifice of an ordinary individual, but by the murder, in the crudest of modes, of a being whom He personally begat, for the purpose of killing him when arrived at maturity. In Hebrews x. 12, we find this doctrine very distinctly enunciated, in the words, "this man, after he had offered one sacrifice of sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God," and subsequently, v. 14, "by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified." Again, in Heb. ix. 26, "once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself;" and in Heb. x. 10, "we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ;" and in ix. 28, "Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many." The philosopher may doubt whether the God whom the Christians have made for their own adoration, is in any way different to that of King Mesha, who offered up his own son in sacrifice, or to the Mexican one, who was contented with the blood of a slave.*
* It is doubtful whether any Christian has ever paid real
attention to the doctrines which are familiar to his ear, or
to the hymns which an most frequently on his tongue. In the
usual fashion which is prevalent amongst ministers and
hearers, everything which is told by missionaries of heathen
deities is taken as true. Thus it has become the general
belief that the Mexican theology, which required an annual
sacrifice of human beings, whose hearts were cut out, and
offered warm, palpitating and full of blood, to a God who
was supposed to be present in a sacred stone statue, was
beyond measure atrocious. But in what consists the horror,
unless in the fact that the sacrifice was seen by the
worshippers? In Christendom people are never called upon to
see a man killed by nailing him to a cross. If they were
condemned to this penance, very little would any of them
talk of blood. As it is, the minds of the majority are
lulled to sleep by the substitution of words for facts, and
texts of Scripture for ideas; and those who are unable to
look upon a cut finger without fainting, and would not for
worlds go to see a man decapitated, talk in the serenest
manner on most sanguinary topics. A reference to a few hymns
which are general favourites will illustrate what I mean. In
"Rock of Ages," for example, we have the lines—
"Let the water and the blood
From thy riven side that flowed,
Cleanse from sin and make me pure."
Another equally popular hymn begins
"From Calv'ry's cross a fountain flows
Of water and of blood,
More healing than Bethesda's pool,
Redeeming Lord, thy precious blood
Shall never lose its power..." and again—
"There is a fountain filled with blood,
Drawn from Immanuels veins,
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains."
No congregation of Christian, or any other men, would
tolerate for a moment the introduction into divine worship
of a bath of blood, into which all those should plunge who
desired salvation. Not one would endeavour to wash his sins
away in a sanguine stream, drawn from any source whatever.
The horror which would be produced by the doctrine that such
things are necessary to appease our God, would make every
thinking being detest it. Yet, when we only play with the
idea, we can talk of such matters with holy complacency. If
any Christian wants to test his faith, let me advise him to
get a basinful of blood and place it in his bed-room, and
say twice a day, when looking on it, that's the stuff which
propitiates my God! It would not be long ere he saw the
absurdity of his theological tenets, and the coarseness of
the hierarchy which invented so frightful an idea of the
Omnipotent.
For the education of the youth of Mexico a part of the temples was allotted, where the boys and girls of the middle and higher classes were placed at an early period—the girls to be taught by the priestesses, the boys by priests; and from a note in Prescott's corrected edition, 1866, p. 22, we learn that the former were even more generally pure in life than, we have reason to believe, the Egyptian priestesses and Christian nuns proved themselves to be, Father Acosto saying, "In truth, it is very strange to see that this false opinion of religion hath so great force amongst these young men and maidens of Mexico, that they will serve the Devil with so great vigour and austerity, which many of us do not in the service of the most high God, the which is a great shame and confusion." It is curious to notice how the Christian priest considers that chastity may be a snare of the Devil, as well as an ordinance of Jehovah. The boys, in these scholastic parts of the sacred temples, were taught the routine of monastic discipline—to decorate the shrines of the gods with flowers, to feed the sacred fires, and to chant in worship and at festivals. The Abbé Hue, in an account of his travels in Thibet and Tartary, has told us repeatedly of the similarity between the rites, practices, and ceremonies of the Romish Church and those in use amongst the followers of the Great Lama. It is equally marvellous to discover that the Mexican ritual resembles both. The Papalist endeavours to explain this, by the monstrous assumption that both Tartary and Mexico were evangelized by two different Christian Apostles. But it seems to us more probable that the Romanists, who are known to have adopted almost every ancient ceremony, symbol, doctrine, and the like, have unknowingly copied from travelled Orientals, than that the cult of the people of Thibet has travelled into America, as well as into Europe. Into the identity of the Tartars with the Red Indians it is not my intention to enter. The higher Mexicans were taught traditionary lore, the mysteries of hieroglyphics, the principles of government, and such astronomical and scientific knowledge as the priests would, or, probably, could, impart. The girls learned to weave and embroider coverings for the altars of the gods. Great attention was paid to morality, and offences were punished with extreme rigour, even with death itself. Youths were taught to eschew, vice and cleave to virtue, to abstain from wrath, to offer violence or do wrong to no man, and to do good where possible.
When of an age to marry, the pupils were dismissed from the convent, and the recommendation of the principal thereof often introduced those whom he regarded as the most competent of the students, to responsible situations in public life. Such was the policy of the Mexican priests, who were thus enabled to mould the mind of the young, and to train it early to the necessity of giving reverence to religion, and especially to its ministers—a reverence which maintained its hold on the warrior long after every other vestige of education had been effaced. In this matter America showed an astuteness equal to that exhibited by Papal hierarchs in Rome.
To each of the principal temples, lands were annexed, for the maintenance of the priests, and these glebes were augmented by successive princes, until, under Montezuma, they were of enormous extent, and covered every district of the* empire. The priests took the management of their property into their own hands, and treated their tenants with liberality and indulgence. In addition to this source of income, they had "first fruits," and other offerings, dictated by piety or superstition. The surplus was distributed in alms amongst the poor, a duty strenuously prescribed by their moral code. Thus we find, adds Prescott, whom we are closely, and almost verbatim, following, the same religion inculcating lessons of pure philanthropy and of merciless extermination—an inconsistency not incredible to those familiar with the history of the Roman Catholic Church in the early ages of the Inquisition.
In the course of a not very long life, I have heard, upon many occasions, the argument that the persistency of the Roman Catholic Church, in spite of its abominable corruptions, its utter contempt for truth, its outrageous cruelty, its glaring superstition, its intolerable arrogance, and its rapacious covetousness, proves that it is, and must ever be regarded as a divine institution. But this argument loses all its weight when we find that the religion of the Mexicans, which the Spaniards declared to have sprung from the Devil, had the virtues, as well as many vices, of the Roman faith. If one came from Heaven, the other could not have come from Hell. The simple truth seems to be, that crafty and designing men are always able to find dupes, and that red men and black, the haughty Italian and the lively Frenchman, the stolid boor and the polished orator, may all suffer alike from an education which has taught them, in youth, to believe in the reality of a revelation given to a class of human beings who, by its means, assume to be divine.
The Mexican temples—teocallis, or "houses of God "—were very numerous, indeed there were several hundreds in each of the principal cities of the kingdom; but we need not describe them more minutely than to say that they were truncated pyramids terminating in a level surface, upon which blazed the sacred fire. All religious services were public, as in Roman Catholic countries. There were long processions of priests, and numerous festivals of unusual sacredness, as well as monthly and daily appropriate celebrations of worship, so that it is difficult to conceive how the ordinary business of life was carried on. The sun was an universal object of reverence. At a period not long prior (about 200 years) to the Spanish conquest, human sacrifices were adopted for the first time, and they speedily became common, both as regards repetition and the numbers of victims slaughtered. In some instances the oblations terminated with cannibalism. The burnt offering was roasted, not incinerated, and, like the Paschal lamb, was devoutly devoured. Sexual rites, symbols, or worship, appear to have been very rare, for I can only find one or two doubtful references to them. In this matter the Mexicans were far superior to all the old Shemitic and Egyptian, as well as the Hindoo, races. So far Prescott.
Whilst writing the foregoing, it has required some determination not to comment very extensively upon the facts recorded, for they do, indeed, set the thoughtful mind on fire. Amongst the questions which they provoke, the first is, "how far the accounts given to us are to be depended upon?" In answering this query, we readily recognize that our authorities can only have been Spaniards, who were, to a great extent, implacable enemies of the Mexicans, to a great extent ignorant of their language, and bitterly hostile to them in matters of religion. But this recognition leads us to trust the accounts which they give, for, if the invaders had been able to treat the natives as unmitigated savages, they would have had the more excuse for pillaging their sacred stores, temples, and palaces, and exterminating the pagan worshippers. Again, if the picture thus painted were a fancy one, having no real existence save in the mind of the writer, we should be able readily to recognize its counterpart in the Spanish history of the Peruvians, just as we are able to ascertain the identity of the authorship of certain anonymous works by Lord Lytton, by the existence therein of his marked peculiarity of style. The best testimony, however, to the substantial truth of the accounts given of the nature of the Mexican faith, is to be found in various minute episodes of their general history, in the behaviour of the Aztecs with each other, and towards their invaders, and the general customs which are recorded. That the Spanish writers had a real belief in the account of which Prescott has given us so admirable a resume, we may feel assured, for one of them introduced the naïve remark, "that the Devil had positively taught to the Mexicans the same things which God had taught to Christendom."
When once we have satisfied ourselves of the truth of the Spanish accounts of the ancient Mexican institutions, we find ourselves in the presence of some very striking religious and political facts. We see before us a nation who had attained to as distinct a conception of the Almighty as we have ourselves; who had discovered a heaven, a hell, and an intermediate place, without the assistance of Jew or Greek, Babylonian or Persian; who had instituted a sacerdotal class, and made provision for their subsistence, without any assistance from Melchizedek or Moses; who had adopted a principle of national education long before such a thing was thought of in England, or in Europe. In fine, the Aztec faith and policy were, at least, as praiseworthy, if not far nearer to perfection, than the faith and policy which obtained in Christian Italy, France, and Spain, during the dark and the middle ages. There is not, indeed, any one point in which the contrast is not favourable to the Aztecs, except in the single point of human sacrifice. Christianity can, apparently, make a heavy accusation against the Aztec religion on this point, and may fairly seem to reproach it for that frequency of human sacrifice, and even cannibalism, which formed, at the time of the Spanish conquest, an essential part of the Mexican faith.
Yet, when we dive below the surface, and examine this matter with philosophic care, we readily see that the charge is deprived of much of its weight. Who, for example, can compare the practice of the people of Montezuma with that of Spaniards under the sway of Ferdinand and Isabella, without seeing that in Spain there were human sacrifices, which were conducted with far more cruelty than those in Mexico. We find, in the first place, that the custom of sacrificing human beings was no more an essential part of the Aztec, than it was of the Christian, faith; it was only in existence two hundred years before the Spanish invasion, and many centuries, bloodless of human offerings, had passed away ere the period of what we may term brutality arrived. Just so it was with the religion of Jesus; for centuries it was unstained by blood, and comparatively meek and humble, yet, when its priesthood rose to power, they indulged in human holocausts on a most extended scale. The Spaniards give accounts of thousands of victims offered up at once to the Mexican god of war; but what are these in comparison to the victims of Paris, sacrificed by Papists on the eve and day of St. Bartholomew, and those at Beziers.
It may be doubted by the philosopher whether the Christian religion was not, from its very commencement, as intolerant of opposition and as persecuting as it became hereafter.
The story of Jesus cursing a fig tree, which did not bear fruit out of its season (Mark xi. 13, 14, 21), shows that even he, whom the Christians take for an example, was quite capable of that pettiness, which visits upon the innocent the vexation felt by one's self. But when we read the story in Acts, v., about Ananias and Sapphira, we see, in all its naked horror, a fearful Christian persecution. The victims were done to death for deceiving an apostle. But why should we be surprised at the followers of "the Son" doing that which "the Father" ordained? Is there any human king who ever promulgated a more bloody order than did Jehovah Sabaoth, the God which, amongst the Hebrews, corresponded to the Mexican god of war, when he commissioned Samuel to say to Saul (1 Sam. xv. 3), "Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have; slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass!" After such a destruction of the Midianites as is narrated in Numb, xxxi., the fearful slaughter, effected by Crusaders, of Jews, Turks, and heretics is scarcely worth mentioning.
There was a teacher who remarked, "he who is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone" at the culprit; and surely, when our Bible, which is treasured by so many as the only rule of faith amongst us, details such horrible religious slaughters as are to be found in its pages, and abounds with persecuting precepts, we had better not talk too much about Mexican sacrifice. Was there any Aztec minister so brutal in his religious fury as Samuel was (1 Sam. xv. 33), who hewed Agag into pieces? The Mexican was merciful to his victim; the Hebrew was like a modern Chinese executioner, who kills the criminal by degrees. His cruelty has been emulated in Christian France, and under the reign of two of her kings, we have seen a Ravaillac and Damiens tortured slowly to death, by means too horrible to dwell upon.
The writers upon Mexico tell us of a lovely youth, who was educated for a whole year to become a victim, and how, at the end of that time, he was feted, adorned, and even worshipped; how four of the most charming maidens of Mexico were selected as his wives, and how he remained in the enjoyment of the highest honour until the time of his sacrifice arrived, and we feel due horror at the recital. Yet, what is it compared with the accounts we read of miserable men and women racked, in hideous dungeons, by the most horrible tortures which an enlightened Christian ingenuity could devise, and who then, with limbs whose loosened fibres could scarcely sustain their bruised and mangled bodies, were led, or driven at the sword's point, to a stake fixed in the ground, there to be tied and burned, whilst devout Christian multitudes stood around, rejoicing, like demons, over the hellish scene.
No one can gloat over the imaginary torments of Hell without being a persecuting devil at heart.
Surely the Christians have too much sin amongst themselves to cast a stone at the inhabitants of Mexico.
We find a strong offset to the horror of Aztec cruelty in the very Bible, which we regard as the mainstay of our religious world. What, for example, is the essential difference between a Mexican monarch sacrificing one or ten thousand men taken in battle, and Moses commanding the extermination of the inhabitants of Canaan, and only saving, out of Midian, thirty-two thousand virgins, that they might minister to the lust of his Hebrew followers? What, again, are we to say of David's God, who would not turn away his anger from Judah until seven sons of the preceding king had been offered up as victims? And lastly—thought still more awful! what must we say of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity, that Jehovah Himself sacrificed His own Son by a cruel death; and not only so, but that He had intercourse with an earthly woman, and had thus a son by her, for the sole purpose of bringing about his murder? Can we object to religious cannibalism in the Aztec, when Jesus of Nazareth is said to have urged his followers to eat his body and to drink his blood; and when hundreds of priests have shed the blood of millions of men, who, disbelieving the power of any man to convert bread and wine into flesh and blood, have refused to profane their lips by a cannibal feast?
Having now examined the nature of the Aztec faith, let us, for a while, linger upon the fruits which it produced. Who can read the mournful story of the fall of Mexico without contrasting, in his own mind, the respective characters of the conquerors and the conquered? In every so-called Christian virtue Montezuma proved himself to be superior to the lying, unscrupulous, rapacious and covetous Cortez. Even the greatest fire-eater who ever lived cannot fail to see that the Spaniard would not have been victorious over the Mexican, if the latter had been equally well equipped with arms, armour, and horses, as the former was. We can only tell vaguely what was the condition of Anahuac prior to the invasion of Cortez; but, from the testimony given by Prescott, we believe that there were annual wars between adjoining tribes, who met solely to obtain from their enemies victims for sacrifice, the battles always ending with the day, and never being resumed for conquest, or for the plunder of maidens to be an indulgence of a victor's lust. What the condition of the same country under Christian rule has been, and still is, every reader of modern and contemporary history knows; and he sees, with regret, that Jehovah Sabaoth, Jesus of Nazareth, and the Holy Spirit, with an army of saints, angels, virgins, and martyrs, as well as ancient gods of the Eastern Hemisphere are, if they are to be judged by the acts of their worshippers, as cruel, revengeful, and malignant, as were the deities of the Mexican kingdom.
The followers of the cross will appear to be quite as despicable when we contrast them with the Peruvians, as they were when compared with the inhabitants of Anahuac.
There is something very fascinating in the history of Peru, as recorded by the Spanish authors, and rendered into the English language by Prescott. There is no account of ancient or modern people extant which has interested me so much as those of the realm of Manco Capac. To hear of a nation, separated by an ocean, we may, indeed, say two, and a vast continent, from the civilized portions of Asia, Europe, and Africa, located in a mountainous tract, where soil and water were scanty, and locomotion was rendered difficult from the configuration of the land; whose country was surrounded by strong natural enemies of all kinds; whose people were unable to use such agents as steel and gunpowder, and who were yet enabled to construct vast cities and temples, to quarry, remove, and use in buildings, fragments of rock thirty-eight feet long, eighteen feet broad, and six feet thick, and to transport these to distances varying from 12 to 45 miles, to form good roads along the mountain tops, for an extent of nearly two thousand miles, necessitating the filling up chasms of enormous depth, and the making of suspension bridges over rivers whose stream was too furious to bridge in the ordinary European fashion, is perfectly astonishing.
The far-sighted Incas, to make these roads still more useful, accompanied them by the erection of large residences, like modern European bungalows in India, fit for the reception of a monarch with his army, and by vast magazines of provisions, sufficient to supply the wants of a warlike expedition, or of a population starving from an accidental failure of crops. The Peruvians, moreover, surrounded their chief towns with strong walls, in comparison with which the Cyclopean constructions of the old world seem small, stunted, and almost contemptible. It appears, in addition, that they knew how to form long tunnels, either for the passage of troops, for the benefit of travellers, or for the conveyance of water. All these, I say, are enough to fire the imagination of the dullest reader of history, and to shake the belief that civilization cannot be developed in the midst of what we have been accustomed to call savage life, and can only be brought to a moderate perfection by the influence of the Hebrew and Christian writings.
Our wonder is not, however, bounded by the physical results produced by the industrious population of Peru, it is still farther exercised by the descriptions which are given of their wonderful domestic and foreign policy. It would be difficult to conceive, and still more difficult to carry into execution for many generations, a plan of government so eminently fitted to give the greatest happiness to the greatest number, as that which the Incas elaborated. The rulers were specially educated to fulfil their duties in every respect, and were not permitted, as modern princes are, to enter into the ranks of chivalry until they had undergone a public examination, which was conducted by the oldest and the most illustrious chiefs. The trial included tests of every warlike and manly quality. It lasted thirty days, during which time every competitor fared alike, living on the bare ground, and wearing a mean attire. Those who passed the ordeal honourably were admitted formally into the knightly order, the ceremony including an investiture of the youth with sandals put on by the most venerable noble, equivalent to the donning of the toga virilis in Ancient Rome, and having the ear pierced with a golden bodkin by the reigning monarch. To take off the shoe was a ceremony exacted from all those who came into the Inca's presence, to have it put on by a grandee was great honour.
That the rulers might understand the condition of the kingdom, they systematically travelled, much in the same way as James V. of Scotland, and the Caliph Haroun Alraschid, are said to have done. The Incas, in addition to their other plans for good government, inaugurated a postal system: divided their peoples into tens, fifties, hundreds, five hundreds, thousands, and ten thousands, much in the same way as the Saxon King Alfred is said to have done, whose plan is, in many respects, conserved to the present day; and the head man of each division was in all respects its ruler, to repress crime, to announce to his superior officer all unusual occurrences, and to report, generally, the actual state of his division to the chief above him. All legal trials, or appeals, were decided in less than five days, and a code was established, which all might readily know, a thing only attained by the French under the first Napoleon, and long desired by England, but in vain. Punishments were never attended with torture, or unnecessary cruelty. In this respect the Peruvians differed from every other civilized nation of which I have yet read. The Chinaman methodically inflicts painful punishments which have only been surpassed by the followers of the "gentle Jesus." The Persians and Turks have, certainly, shown their capacity for giving pain to those who are brought before their ministers of justice, and the Red Indians, during their day, reduced the art of tormenting themselves, but, still more, their prisoners, almost to perfection. The Babylonians had discovered that a death of agony could be accomplished by means of myriads of ants. It was reserved to Christians, eager to uphold the faith promulgated by a God of mercy, to find out the most exquisite of torments. Even Frenchmen, who have for centuries assumed the position of leaders of civilization, were, until the great Revolution beat down their kings and prelates, more ruthlessly cruel than the most fierce redskin. The Inquisition, which arrogated to itself the power to keep the Christian religion pure, was distinguished by the atrocity with which it gave anguish to its victims, and it held its head high until it was put down, we may hope for ever, by fiery republican enthusiasts, whom priestly demons, baulked of their prey, declared to be devils incarnate. More modern hierarchs are obliged to content themselves with making a hell for their enemies—with foretelling a variety of punishments to be inflicted hereafter, which cannot be enforced here.
The Incas exacted an annual report of the lands possessed by individuals, with their condition as regards culture; and also of every family. A register of births, marriages, and deaths was regularly kept, so that the government might always know the real condition of the nation, soil, and people.
As far as possible, families remained constant to their business, thus forming a sort of trade caste, but not a rigid one. The registers were always submitted to the perusal of the Inca, and, subsequently, kept in the capital.
By the arrangement of "posts," and roads, an insurrection or invasion was readily discovered, and it was speedily announced at the capital city. The march of troops to suppress it, under these circumstances, was easy and immediate, for every requisite for war was always at hand. In all circumstances, plundering by the soldiery, whether at home or in an enemy's country, was severely punished, and war was undertaken solely with a view to peace. If a neighbour was turbulent, he was conquered, and absorbed into the old state, and if a province was rebellious, its worst inhabitants were carried away to some other locality, where their power for mischief would be curtailed; a plan which, we are told, was pursued by the Assyrian Shalmaneser (2 Kings xvii. 6), indicated by Sennacherib (2 Kings xviii. 32), and carried out by Nebuzaradan (2 Kings xxv. 11.). In fine, we may repeat, that it would be difficult for a modern philosopher to conceive a better model of a really paternal government than that which, it is asserted, was found by the Spaniards when they invaded the kingdom of the Incas. Of the respective value of Christian Spanish government, and of the so-called Pagan Inca rule, none can doubt, who reads the present by the light of the past. The Peruvians kept up their roads, protected their subjects, respected life, and fostered everything which tended to increase the general happiness and prosperity of the kingdom—all these objects, have been for a long period neglected, and Peru, which was under the Spanish rule, one of the blots on the face of civilization and Christianity, is only just emerging from a long night, under the influence of Republican institutions.
Our next step will be to ascertain the religion of the people whose political condition contrasts so favourably with that of every other nation of whom travel and history have informed us. But we may, in the first place, remark, that there is no absolute or necessary connection between the happiness, or otherwise, of a nation and its dominant religion, as Buckle has already shown in his History of Civilization. The writer of to-day can find abundant evidence in recent history to illustrate the proposition here advanced. He can point to France, and its condition under a sacerdotal rule, prior to the time of the Revolution, and contrast it with its state since its rulers have tried to make the people prosperous and happy, independently of their religious faith. He can point to Austria and Spain, when they were laid at the feet of the Pope of Rome, and everything was made subservient to the demands of a powerful hierarchy, and to the same states now, when religion is subordinate to the material welfare of the majority. Who, that has read the story of modern Italy, or heard of the atrocities committed under the priest-led Ferdinand of Naples—better known in England by the sobriquet of Bomba; who, that knew anything of his brigand-rearing towns and cities, and has visited them since they have been ruled constitutionally, and with the priestly power curbed by a strong hand, can doubt which set of directors are the best? Christian Rome was never so happy under her Popes as she is now, when the so-called head of the church is subordinate to the chief of the state. But of all priest-ridden countries, one which would never have borne the popish sway as she has done, if her chieftains had been sensible and her people thoughtful, Ireland deserves our commiseration the most. Hibernian hierarchs of the Roman faith designate their country as a land of saints. So, perhaps, it is, if by the word is meant admirers of laziness and filth, who consider that attention to religion justifies murder, and every brutal crime against purse, person, and property.
As a rule, admitting of no exceptions, civil government has preceded sacerdotal rule, and a nation is generally in a weakly and fallen condition as soon as its affairs are directed by the priestly class. When first the Aryans invaded Hindostan, the hierarchy was second to the warrior caste; but as the first aggrandized their power, the second lost their supremacy, and under Brahminic rule the foundation was laid for pusillanimous and indolent luxury in the warrior. The power to plan, and the nerve to enforce laws, for the benefit of all classes of the community, is very different to that which is requisite to exalt and enrich the priestly order; and the well-being of a state depends far more upon the exercise of the first than of the second. Whenever, therefore, the executive government is entirely independent of the influence of the hierarchy, or is itself the head of that caste, it can produce good results for the nation, no matter what may be the dogmas of the priesthood, or the nature of the gods which are reverenced.
Still following Prescott as our guide, we find that the sun was the great god of the Peruvians, and that the Incas assumed the title of his true children. To that luminary a vast temple was built in Cuzco, more radiant with gold than that of Solomon at Jerusalem. To Cuzco, as to the capital of Judea, the name of Holy City was given, and to it pilgrims resorted from every part of the empire. Blasphemy against the sun was considered as bad as treason against the Inca, and both were punished with death. A province, or city, rebellious against the sun was laid waste, and its people exterminated. When conquest over a new tribe subjugated it to Peru, the people were compelled to worship the sun, temples to whose honour were erected in their territory. To these was attached a body of priests, to instruct the people in the proper form of adoration, which consisted in a rich and stately ceremonial. The divinities of the conquered people were removed to Cuzco and established in one of the temples, where they took order amongst the inferior deities of the Peruvians.
But, though the sun was unquestionably worshipped, Prescott observes, ch. iii, "it is a remarkable fact that many, if not most, of the rude tribes inhabiting the vast American continent had attained to the sublime conception of one Great Spirit, the Creator of the universe, who, immaterial in his own nature, ought not to be dishonoured by an attempt at a visible representation, and who, pervading all space, was not to be circumscribed within the walls of any building, however grand or rich."
As civilization progressed, we are told that a separate order of men, with a liberal provision for their subsistence, was set apart for religious service, and a minute and magnificent ceremonial contrived, which challenged comparison with that of the most polished nations of Christendom. This was the case with the natives of Quita, Bogota, and others inhabiting the highlands of South America, but especially with the Peruvians, who claimed a divine origin for the founders of their empire, whose laws rested on a divine sanction, and whose domestic institutions and foreign wars were directed to preserve and to propagate their faiths. Religion was the basis of their polity, the condition of their social existence. The government of the Incas was essentially a lay theocracy.
The Peruvians believed in the future existence of the soul and the resurrection of the body. They had faith in a Hell, located in the earth's centre, and a Heaven, in which the good would revel in a life of luxury, tranquillity, and ease. The wicked, however, were not to be hopelessly damned and tormented for everlasting, but were to expiate their crimes by ages of wearisome labour. They believed, also, in an evil principle or spirit, called Cupay, to whom, however, they paid no more attention than an ordinary Christian does to the Devil.
The great men were entombed after death, and were commonly buried with the chief things which they required on earth. Sometimes a chieftain was buried, not only with his treasures, but with his wives and domestics. Frequently, over the dead, vast mounds were raised, which were honeycombed, subsequently, with cells for the burial of others. Cairns were as common in that part of the New World as they have been in the Old, and the majority of buildings found at the present day in Peru have been connected with funereal pomp.
The supreme Being in Peru was named Pachacamac, "he who gives life to the universe," and Viracocha, of which the only translation given is "foam of the sea." To him one temple only was raised, which is said to have been built prior to the accession of the Incas, and largely visited by vast numbers of distant Indians. The sun, as we have noticed, was chiefly venerated, and to him a temple was erected in every city and large village, and to him burnt offerings were made in abundance. The moon was also venerated, being connected with the sun as his wife—and Venus, called by the name of Chasca, "the youth with the long and curling locks"—was also regarded reverentially as the page of the sun. Temples were dedicated to thunder and to lightning as God's ministers, and the rainbow was regarded as an emanation from the great luminary. In addition to these, the elements, the winds, the earth, the air, the great mountains and rivers, were considered as inferior deities, to which were added the gods of the conquered races. The chief temple of the sun was extraordinarily gorgeous. It was constructed of stone, and was so finely executed, that a Spaniard declared that only two edifices in Spain could, in the stone work, be at all compared with it like Italian and other churches, it contained many small chapels and subordinate buildings, and the interior was dazzling with gold. On its western wall the deity was emblazoned as a human face surrounded with rays of light, just as the sun is personified amongst ourselves. The figure was engraved on a massy gold plate, thickly powdered with emeralds and precious stones. This was so situated in front of the great eastern portal, that the rays of the morning sun, falling upon it, lighted up the whole temple with a wondrous sheen; but every part of the inner walls blazed with gold. The roof was, however, "thatch" alone. Adjoining the temple of the sun were fanes of smaller dimensions, for the worship of the moon, stars, thunder, lightning, and the rainbow.
"All the plate, ornaments, and utensils of every description appropriated to the uses of religion, were of gold or silver. Twelve immense vases of silver (said to be as high as a good lance, and so large that two men could barely encircle them with outstretched arms) stood on the floor of the great saloon, filled with Indian corn. The censers for the perfumes, the ewers which held the water for sacrifice, the pipes which conducted it through subterraneous channels into the buildings, the reservoir that received it, even the agricultural implements used in the gardens of the temple, were all of the same rich material. The gardens, like those belonging to the royal palaces, sparkled with gold and silver, and various imitations of the vegetable kingdom. Animals, also, were to be found there, amongst which the llama, with its golden fleece, was most conspicuous, executed in the same style, and with a degree of skill which, in this instance, probably did not surpass the excellence of the material" The reader of Prescott will find that he has not adopted this account without carefully estimating the value of his authorities, and I believe that he may be fairly trusted. The various reports, given by Spanish writers, of priests of the grand temple, seem also to have been carefully estimated by the historian, and the number which they amounted to is put down at four thousand at the least.
The high priest was second in dignity only to the Inca, and he was generally closely related to this ruler. The monarch appointed this Peruvian pope, who held office for life. He had the appointment of inferior priests, but all must be from the sacred race of Incas. The high priests of the provinces were always of the blood royal. The hierarchy wore no peculiar badge or dress, nor was it the sole depositary of learning, and it had not to superintend education, or to do parochial work. These duties were performed by others of the Inca class, all of whom were holy, though not, so to speak, in "holy orders." The priest's business was to minister in the temple; his science was confined to a knowledge of the fasts and festivals to be observed in connection with religion, for these were very numerous, and demanded separate rituals. The four principal festivals were solar, i.e., at the equinoxes and solstices, that of Midsummer being the grandest, on which occasion every one who could find time and money enough to do so visited the capital city. The feast was preceded by a three days' fast, and no fires were to be lighted during that period.
When the day arrived a vast array of people, dressed in their handsomest apparel, crowded the streets and squares, waiting for the rising of the sun. When it appeared shouts of joy, heightened by instrumental music, were raised in swelling tones, until the whole orb had ascended above the horizon, after which a libation was poured of fermented liquor, and all the nobles and the king repaired to the great temple, each individual, except members of the royal family, removing their sandals as they entered. After prayer came sacrifice, animals, grain, flowers, and sweet-scented gums being the prescribed offerings; sometimes a child or lovely maiden was also immolated, generally to commemorate a coronation, the birth of a royal heir, or a great victory. Cannibalism never followed the sacrifice; and it may be added, parenthetically, that when the Incas conquered and annexed man-sacrificing and man-eating tribes, they always abrogated the custom, and with far more decision and firmness than Britain has shown in abolishing self-immolation of Juggernaut pilgrims in her Indian Empire, and the burning of widows with their dead spouses. Some may doubt whether a conqueror ought to interfere with the religious customs of the vanquished, but few would plead for the continuance of such customs as human sacrifice and cannibalism.
The animal usually sacrificed by the Peruvians was the llama, and the priest who officiated drew auguries from the appearance of the intestines. To effect the oblation a sacred fire was now kindled by a concave mirror which acted as "a burning glass," precisely as was done by Numa in the days of Ancient Rome. If the sky was clouded, and no rays could be collected, fire was produced by friction. When lighted, the fire was committed to the care of the virgins of the sun, who were bound to keep it up for the ensuing year. After the single sacrifice was completed, great numbers of other animals were slaughtered, and a regular carousal began, attended with music, dancing, and drinking, that lasted for many days, during which period all the lower orders kept holiday. In the distribution of bread and wine at this high festival, the invading Spaniards saw a striking resemblance to the Christian communion, and they recognised a similar likeness in the Peruvian practices of confession and penance. The virgins of the sun were called "the elect," and were young maidens taken from their homes at an early age, and introduced into convents, where they were placed under the care of elderly matrons, who taught them their religious duties, and how to spin and weave, embroider and adorn hangings for the temples, and to frame garments for the Incas. Their work was such, that it was found to be superior to any which the Spaniards had ever seen, or were themselves able to produce. The virgins were separated wholly, not simply, from the world in general, but also from their own relations and friends—none but the king and queen could enter into their convent. The closest attention was paid to the morals of these maidens, and visitors were sent every year to inspect the institutions, and to report on the state of their discipline; a plan similar to which has been repeatedly proposed in Christian England, yet never sanctioned by the parliament! If a virgin was discovered in an intrigue she was buried alive, her lover was strangled, and the town or village to which he belonged was razed to the ground, and sowed with stones, to efface even the memory of its site. These solar attendants were all of royal blood, and were estimated to number fifteen hundred; but to provincial convents the inferior nobility were allowed to send their daughters, and sometimes a peculiarly lovely peasant girl was admitted. The convents were all sumptuously furnished. But, though virgins of the sun, they were brides of the Incas, and we cannot fail, when we read of the vast harem of the Peruvian monarch, to think of the female establishments of the Jewish Solomon, of the Persian Ahasuerus, and that of Louis XV. of Christian France. If at any time the Inca reduced his harem, the superfluous concubines were restored to their homes, swelling with the importance which they had gained by their familiarity with the monarch.
Polygamy was permitted. Matrimony was effected by the Inca, or other chief man, joining the hands of the parties. The king usually espoused his own sister, but no other person was allowed to do so. No marriage was valid without the consent of parents. As a general rule, all unions were effected on the same day of the year, and thus the wedding of couples was followed by general rejoicing.
The genius of the Peruvian government penetrated into the most private recesses of domestic life, allowing no man to act for himself, even in those personal matters in which none but himself, or his family, could be interested. No Peruvian was too low for the fostering vigilance of the government; none was so high that he was not made to feel his dependence upon it in every act of his life. The government of the Incas was the mildest, but the most searching and beneficent, of despotisms.
We now, but with great reluctance, leave our friendly guide, the accomplished Prescott, and ask ourselves, once more, the lessons which we have learned from the departed races of the vast American continent. Can anyone doubt that one of the most conspicuous results obtained is, that Christian rule, and the Christian doctrine, have not proved themselves, in any respect, superior to the Incas' government and their solar religion? Who can read of the civilization, the theology, and the practice of the Peruvians, without believing one of two things—the one, that Jewish ritualism, and the majority of Christian teaching, is of human invention; the other, that the Almighty has revealed His will in the Western as well as in the Eastern Hemisphere? Can any thoughtful man believe that the brutal, covetous, lying Spaniards, who broke, with impunity, every commandment promulgated in those Gospels, to whose authority they professed allegiance, and upon which their faith is founded, were better men, or more favoured by the Lord, "who loveth righteousness and hateth iniquity," than were the gentle Peruvians, who fell before them as lambs and sheep before wolves and tigers? Surely the story of the Incas should make Christians, in all ages, blush for their inferiority to those, amongst whom neither Moses, Samuel, and other so-called prophets, Jesus, nor any of his apostles, preached; and more strongly should it convince us that the wish to do good on a large scale can come otherwise than by the Gospel. If grace, and peace, and love came by the Nazarene alone, how is it—and let us ponder over the question deeply—that all Christian countries have been, and that some are still, conspicuous for the brutality of their political and priestly governments, for the frequency with which they make war, for their ferocity in the destruction of religious enemies, and for the intense hatred evinced against rival sects, by those who call themselves the representatives of the Prince of Peace; whilst, on the other hand, a nation who never heard of the son of Joseph or of Mary, should be conspicuous for the virtues which ought to adorn the soldiers of the cross, but do not? Surely, if the saying be true, "by their fruit ye shall know them," the denizens of the old world must be children of the Devil, who do the work, of their father, whilst certain of the nations of the new world, as it is called, were really children of the light, abounding in love, charity, and goodwill towards all men.
To me it is astonishing how thoughtful men, who have read accounts of the Mexicans and the Peruvians, can continue to believe that the Bible is the book of God, written by holy men, whose thoughts and diction were essentially those of the third person in the Trinity. Who can assert that Abraham and Jacob, Moses and Aaron, were taught of God, and that to the Hebrews alone has the Creator revealed His will? Who can see, in the sensual king David, a man after God's heart, and applaud the brutal murder of Agag, the destruction of the priests of Baal, by the orders of Elijah, and the extermination of the Baalites in Israel by Jehu? Compared with such wretches as these the Incas were angels. They had not left to them the bloody legacy which has come to the Christian world by means of the Old Testament: they had not been taught to believe that the Almighty revelled in the blood of human beings: they never had, amongst their sacred songs, verses like the following—"that thy foot may be dipped in the blood of enemies, and the tongue of thy dogs in the same" (Ps. lxviii. 23).
Ah, it is time for civilized men to cease their admiration for a book which has produced such frightful fruits, and which has converted millions of human beings into incarnate fiends.
The Vedas and the Shasters—the writings of the Buddhists, and those of the Parsees and the Chinese, contain, nowhere, such a justification of wholesale murder, as do the Scriptures of the Jews and of the Christians.* From these have been drawn the power to persecute, and, if possible, to exterminate those who worship God in a different fashion to those in power. Calvin was as bad as Torquemada; and, even at the present time, it is only public opinion that prevents fanatics, like the early New Englanders, from reducing their Christian hate to practical torture. Everywhere the professed followers of Jesus assume the power to torment their opponents, whenever they can do so without breaking the civil law, and there are few pulpits from which the voice of revilement, contumely, and denunciation is not repeatedly heard. The Romans abuse the Anglicans; the Establishment sneers at Dissent; Nonconformists censure all churches; and all libel those whom they call Free Thinkers and Atheists. To find "toleration" in matters of religion, one must seek amongst the Deists, or amongst those who refuse to see in the Bible the revealed will of God to man.
* See Matthew x. 34, 85; Luke xii. 49, 51, 52, 53.
CHAPTER III.
Can civilization grow out of barbarism? Dislike of progress,
especially if mental. Rediscovery of ancient knowledge.
Advance and retrogression. China and Japan—influence of
strangers. Decadence of nations—followed by a rise. The
Shemitic and Negro races. Varied religious ideas. The Negro
Fetish and Obi. Jewish, Arab, and Christian communication
with the dead. Australian idea about white men. Ideas of a
soul and futurity amongst the Aryans and Egyptians. Their
priesthood. The Aryans Monotheiste. An Aryan hymn. Max
Müller and Talboys Wheeler. Aryan conceptions compared with
Psalm civ. 1-4. Monotheism of the Egyptians. Shemitic
religions.
At one period of my life I entertained the idea that civilization never had grown, nor ever could grow, out of barbarism. Perhaps I have not yet wholly abandoned it. The considerations which the question involves are all but infinite. It is doubtful whether we can reduce them into shape without writing an extensive treatise. We will, however, attempt to do so, and present the subject to our readers to the best of our ability.
As far as our own personal and historic experience goes, we find that man has no natural propensity to learn beyond that which he has received simply as an animal. With him school is a hateful place, and education is a painful process, even in the midst of the highest civilization we see individuals who cast from them all the luxuries of life, and descend voluntarily to a level scarcely superior to that of the brute creation. But those who take kindly to education, and consent to try and learn everything which the teacher presents to their notice, are bounded by the amount of knowledge possessed by the instructor, who cannot impart to others information in matters of which all are ignorant. It is true that I once read a question propounded by his schoolmaster to one of my sons, which ran—"Enumerate upon paper all the capes, bays, and rivers of England that you don't know by name, and describe the seas which you have never heard of." Without dwelling upon the anecdote farther than to say, that it points out the absurdity of the idea that education of itself advances knowledge, we may pass on to remark, that even in nations, whose intellect is highly cultivated, the propensity to advance in knowledge is singularly small. Throughout the old world an inventor is usually regarded as a visionary, or a lunatic, and flouted by all his contemporaries.* From the time of Aristotle and Hippocrates, scarcely any advance was made in philosophy, and, throughout Europe, the fourteenth century was as barbarous, if not indeed more so, than the first of our era; and to such a dark age there is a strong clerical party in Great Britain which desires us to return.
* A man who had travelled much once said to me,—"I will
tell you the main difference between a Yankee and an
Englishman. If you inform the latter of some new discovery—
or propose the use of some recent invention for his own
benefit—he will tell you either that the thing is old, or
worthless. On the other hand, if you recount to the former
what you have told the latter of, his rejoinder will be, I
can improve upon that." This is true, and we are now
repeatedly adopting from the United States discoveries of
various kinds, which we rejected when offered to us in the
first place.
Yet, notwithstanding the propensity of cultivated nations to remain quiescent, there do appear, from time to time, individuals who, being discontented with things as they are, endeavour to bring about improvements in the arts, the sciences, and the general conditions of life. The recognition of a want, is an incentive to a thoughtful mind to supply the exigency. Whenever an individual endeavours to attain a definite end, he exercises his mind, not only in what he has been already taught, but what he can observe beyond that; he rakes up, if possible, the experience of others, studies their proceedings, and experiments with a definite object, and ponders upon the affinities, nature, and the like, of every substance which he surmises may be of service to him. When, by these means, he has obtained his purpose, he will repeatedly find that he has done no more than rediscover a something which was known thousands of years before his time. Without a doubt, much of the philosophy, science, art, religion, &c., of the present day, is due to a close observation and an attainment to the knowledge possessed by our predecessors. "Is there any thing whereof it may be said, see this is new?—it hath been already of old time, which was before us" (Eccles. i. 10).
If this be true, even though it may only be so to a partial extent, it is clearly more philosophical to believe that some primeval men were created with a considerable amount of knowledge, rather than that all were savage, barely, if at all, superior to monkeys, and that one or more of these, gradually elevated their race, by degrees so slow, as to be imperceptible in less time than many thousand years.
This side of the argument receives corroboration when we study the history of such semi-civilized countries as China, and such barbarous regions as those of Africa and Australia. In none of these parts do we see any general propensity to advance. In the first we see a retrogression; there is now no effort to repair ancient roads which have been worn away by centuries of traffic, to restore the old temples, towers, and landmarks, erected when time was younger, or even to keep up the teachings of Confucius. A similar apathy existed amongst the Japanese—yet no sooner do the civilized nations of Europe show the rulers of China and Japan that it is necessary for them to improve, if they desire to retain their power, than they attempt to learn the arts which have enabled their rivals to overcome them. In both cases, the progress is recognized as due to the interference of a nation, superior for the time being, to that whose education has been faulty. Advance, then, in such countries, is clearly due to foreign influence, rather than to an innate propensity to general, mental, scientific, or practical development.
But, on the other side, it may be alleged that the African has been in existence from time immemorial—that he has been in contact with the civilization of ancient and modern Egypt—with Christianity—with the ancient Tyrians and Carthaginians—with the Arabs—with the Spaniards, Portuguese, and British, and yet the African tribes remain almost as savage now as when they first were known. Similar remarks apply to the inhabitants of the Andaman Isles, of the vast islands of Borneo, Celebez, Papua, New Guinea, and others.
Yet in many places, now considered barbarous, we see the remains of previous empires—and when we are able to find some comparatively authentic history which tells of the overthrow of a powerful kingdom, it is clear that the civilized people have usually been destroyed by the barbarian. The wealth of Rome tempted the hordes from the inhospitable north, just as the gold of Mexico and Peru were the causes of their decadence under the Spaniards, whose people were in themselves scarcely superior to the troops led by Alaric, Genseric, and other so called barbarians. Yet we know, as in the case of Spain herself, that decadence from civilization to comparative barbarism may be due to causes inherent in the people and its governors, wholly independent of foreign conquest. This decadence is due to the bestial propensities of man being allowed to dominate over the intellectual, and the result is the same, whether the animal passions be cultivated by a debased and degrading policy of monarch and priest, or by the indolence of each individual.
By developing the train of thought thus indicated, we imagine that the philosophical reader will conclude that amongst men, some race, family, or tribe, has been created with intelligence, as much above the rest of their kind as the elephant is superior to the hippopotamus, and the dog to the cat, and that others are generically as low as is the Australian "dingo" in the canine race. Those once perfect may deteriorate, yet carry with them the power of rising again—whilst those originally low never rise at all, no matter what example may be set them, unless force is used to make them learn. To these we must add a third set, specially to include the American, for we have no evidence whatever that the civilization of the Aztec and Peruvian was anything more than a restoration of the scientific knowledge of a more ancient people, possibly of an Aryan stock. Who that is acquainted with the Shemitic race can fail to see in its people the type of an ancient condition which has decayed, until, like a fallen gentleman, it can only show what once it was, by conserving and exhibiting a few ornaments of no value, save from their age, but whose sons may yet become princes in their paternal domains? Who that studies the negro in Africa, America, and St. Domingo, can fail to see that he is, or, at any rate has hitherto shown himself, almost wholly incapable of development as a philosophic man? And who can read the pages of Prescott without recognizing the fact that some of the ancient inhabitants of America inaugurated—unassisted, as we judge by any example from others—a style of religion and government of which the world has hardly, if at all, seen an equal? Yet it is remarkable, that both the Mexican and Peruvian traced their laws and institutions to strangers who came amongst them, as Oannes did to the Babylonians, and who taught them what arts, religion, and science they themselves had. The subject of centres of human life into which our considerations have drawn us, is by far too vast for discussion here. It involves the study of geology, of anthropology, of glossology, of navigation, of physical geography, of climate, of the laws of reproduction, of the influences of climate over animals, and of diet upon man. Into all these we dare not enter: we shall confine ourselves rather to considering the religious ideas of the lowest of the known races of mankind; and then proceed to those which have been held by what we may call the oscillating people, i.e., those vibrating repeatedly between a state of empire and one of slavery, like the people of Hindostan, Babylon, Judea, Greece, Italy, Spain, and Egypt.
When we endeavour to ascertain the religion of the negro, by which term we include all the black native tribes of Africa, we find ourselves almost in the position of a modern chemist seeking for the philosopher's stone. In no single book, and I have read very many, can I find any trustworthy evidence of the negro having any religion at all. It is true that travellers in Abyssinia, and those who are now returned from their successful expedition against Magdala, tell us that in Abyssinia there is a form of religion which is evidently a corrupt form of Christianity, but with this exception, the blacks seem to have no idea of that congeries of fact and fiction, dogma, ritual, and practice, which passes current for religion in more civilized countries. Yet though they have no definite idea of a Creator, and the way in which He works throughout the universe, they have a dread of some unseen power, and, like a number of frightened children, dread the effects of "fetish," and the power of the Obi or Obeah man. When the mind is predisposed to fear, and it is so amongst the lower animals as well as in man, it is astonishing at what contemptible objects one may stand aghast. I can vividly remember being sent, whilst a very young child, with a message from an aunt, at whose home I was staying, to the maid, who was washing in an outhouse, but ere I reached the door of the latter, I was terrified at a head which seemed to be rising from the ground, Such was my horror that I ran away, too proud to scream, yet almost fainting with horror. To me that ancient battered barber's doll was "fetish," and if my friends had determined to cultivate the timidity which I then showed, it is quite possible that to this day I might have a dread not dissimilar to that of the African. As it was, my aunt told me that what had scared me, was only a piece of carved and painted wood, and so put me upon my mettle, that I delivered my message and gave the image a kick in the face; yet my valour was short lived, and during the rest of my sojourn I dared not venture within sight of the bugbear. To all intents and purposes that human head was, in my estimation, the guardian of the garden—its presence made all within its influence under taboo—had I ventured to tell a lie, or to have been naughty, I cannot conceive that any punishment would have been greater than being doomed to sit in the presence of the weird image. Hence I can easily understand the abject terror of the African at "fetish," and his dread of the Obeah man, who asserts that he can direct upon whom he will the power of the unknown god. So great is the fear of this negro magician, and so common is that fear to man in general, that we sometimes find the white man as full of it as the black. I have had, for example, under my own care, an Englishman of good education, who, whilst superintendent of a Jamaica plantation, became so cowed by "Obi," that he was obliged to give up his position and return to England, literally insane upon the subject of "fetish" and "Obeah," and wholly unfitted for any work whatever.
The objects to which the name of "fetish" is given are very numerous—a rock, a stone, a tree, a pool, a dried monkey, an alligator, man, or skull—anything will suit the purpose. One which is said to be very popular amongst chieftains is prepared somewhat in the following manner:—The head of a father is removed after death, and so placed, that as the brain decays and softens, it may fall into a receptacle already half filled with palm oil or other grease. The material so formed, consisting to a great extent of the thoughtful organ of the sire, is then supposed to give his spirit to the son, whenever the latter smears himself with it, or takes it as a potent medicinal spell. The head thus placed becomes the royal "fetish," and the king goes to take counsel from it just as ancient priests inquired, or pretended to inquire, from the god or lord of some shrine or oracle. I cannot charge my memory with everything that has been at one time or another regarded as an object of wonder, worship, or "fetish," but I have an indistinct recollection that a musical box has been venerated by Africans, as much as the Ancilia, the Palladium, the Diana which fell down from Jupiter, the Caaba or black stone of Mecca, the ark of the covenant, the brazen serpent, the wood of the true cross, the nails which pierced Jesus, and the handkerchief which was used to wipe the face of the suffering Nazarite, all of which have been sacred amongst civilized nations, and are still adored by some. It would be difficult for a philosopher to draw a distinction between an African "fetish" and a Papal relic. There is no virtue which the Romanist has attributed to old bones, old nails, old shoes, old coats, old houses, old staircases, old bits of wood, old links of chains, old hairs, old statues, &c., that has not been equally attributed by negroes to some absurd fetish in Ashantee, Dahomey, or elsewhere.
In some parts of the vast African continent, however, there seems to be an indistinct idea of a life after death, and when a great man dies, or is killed, his wives, and many of his slaves, are sacrificed for his future use, and vast human sacrifices are made annually in his honour, that the departed may hear, from time to time, of the welfare of those whom he has left behind. Feeling indisposed to regard this practice as the offspring of religious faith, I would compare it with the crude conceptions of some of the lowest class in Europe and America, aye, of some cultivated intellects as well, who profess to be able, by means of media, to communicate with the dead, or who send messages to their departed relatives by friends that are dying. The most remarkable development of this idea which I have yet met with has recently occurred in France, where a young man attempted to murder a beautiful young woman, to whom he was a total stranger, the reason he assigned being, that he intended to commit suicide immediately after the murder, so that he might enter the future world with a pleasant companion.
We can scarcely regard the persons figuring in the following true story as being very much superior to the King of Dahomey. In a well-cared for English village a poor woman was about to die in the full odour of Protestant sanctity. In youth she had lost one leg, and now had disease in the other. To her came an old woman and said,—"I hear thou's goin' to dee Betty, and that thou's goin' to heaven—at least parson says so—when thou's got there, willee tell my owd man that I've just bought that field as he set his heart on." "Oh dear," said the dying woman, "how can I go stumping all about heaven with my legs in the state they're in." "Well, you can tell him at anyrate if you happen to see him go by!"
Passing from the African, let us now say a word or two about the Australian. It is, I think, Mitchell, who states, in an account of his travels in that country, that the white men were used in a manner so considerate, in some instances, indeed, so kindly, that he was induced to inquire into the cause. He found that these friendly tribes were in the habit of eating their defunct relatives—being always short of provisions, they used man meat, as do other starving creatures when they devour their like—and they cooked the body much in the same way as we do dead pig. By scalding the carcass, the cuticle and the black layer, called rete mucosum, was removed, and the corpse became white. This gave the people the notion that Europeans were their own dead relatives returned from the spirit world. Sir G. Gray also, in his account of an expedition to the north-west coasts of the same vast island, describes how all the people with whom he came into contact believed in the power of sorcery or witchcraft. Without extending our inquiry into the undeveloped religious ideas of other barbarians, we may affirm, from the preceding examples, that there is, even amongst the lowest human beings, some idea of a future state, and of the existence of some unseen power, which may work mischief upon themselves or their friends. Beyond these vague notions the savage who has neither been taught, nor inherited the power or propensity to learn, rarely, if ever, passes.
If, then, the surmise to which we gave utterance awhile ago is founded in truth, we may fairly endeavour to ascertain what is the race, or the people, which have been born with a higher religious development, a greater capacity for learning, and a higher appreciation of the value of agriculture and civilization than the rest of the world's inhabitants.
We now find ourselves on the threshold of a question which has, for many years past, divided the scientific world, viz., Was there originally one human couple only, or were there many intellectual centres? Into this matter it would be unprofitable to enter, for to give an account of the Chinese, Egyptian, Aryan, American, and Shemitic races, would require many huge volumes. It will, probably, be permitted to me to omit from the inquiry all but Aryans and Egyptians. I select these because I have, in the preceding volumes, descanted largely upon the faith of the Babylonians, Assyrians, Tyrians, and others, and because I believe that these ancients have done very much to modify the faith of Europe. If time and opportunity permitted, I fancy that anyone might make a most interesting analysis of that which Europe owes to the Shemites, Egyptians, and Aryans respectively; but it is beyond our powers at present to go into the whole subject. The volumes which have recently been published about the Ancient Hindoo religion may be counted by dozens, and the writings of Egyptologists are almost equally numerous. We must, therefore, content ourselves with a reference to a few main points.
It seems to be an undoubted fact, that both the Egyptians and Aryans recognized the existence of a soul in human beings, and believed that it survived the dissolution of the body in some state, whose position and physical condition were unknown. They held, moreover, that the locality and condition of the spiritual part of man after death depended upon the actions of the individual during life. Both people believed in the influence of prayer, of sacrifices, of a maceration, or torturing of the fleshy body, and they had, moreover, each of them, a priestly race, who regulated festivals, ordained ceremonies, and prescribed everything which those who regarded their spiritual welfare should do. I believe that the Egyptians were, in reality, monotheistic; but my authority for the idea has escaped me. It is certain that the ancient Aryans were so, and I cannot do better than refer my readers to the History of Sanscrit Literature, by Max Müller, and the first vol. of the History of India, by Talboys Wheeler. Yet, as the first is out of print, and the second a volume of considerable size, it will, perhaps, be judicious if I quote some passages from both. The following hymn, translated by M. M., p. 559 sq., is, to my own ideas, far more grand in conception than any other which I have read, and shows a depth or sublimity of thought that could only be attained by a profoundly intelligent intellect. Moderns might equal it, none could surpass it. Speaking of the beginning, the words run, "Nothing that is, was then; even what is not, did not exist then." The poet then proceeds to deny the existence of the sky, and of the firmament, and yet, unable to bear the idea of an unlimited nothing, he exclaims, "What was it that hid or covered the existing? what was the refuge of what? was water the deep abyss, the chaos which swallowed up everything?" Then his mind, turning away from nature, dwells upon man, and the problem of human life. "There was no death, therefore there was nothing immortal There was no space, no life, and lastly, there was no time—no difference between day and night—no solar torch by which morning might have been told from evening. That One breathed breathless by itself, other than it, nothing since has been. That One breathed and lived; it enjoyed more than mere existence; yet its life was not dependent upon anything else, as our life depends upon the air we breathe. It breathed, breathless. Darkness there was, and all at first was veiled in gloom, profound as ocean without life." Müller then rather describes what the poet means than gives his words; I will, therefore, adopt now, for the rest of the hymn, the metrical version, which he gives at p. 564:—
"The germ that still lay covered in the husk
Burst forth, one nature, from the fervent heat.
Then first came Love upon it, the new spring
Of mind; yea, poets in their hearts discerned,
Pondering this bond between created things And uncreated.
Comes this spark from earth,
Piercing and all-pervading, or from heaven?
These seeds were sown, and mighty power arose,
Nature below, and Power and Will above.
Who knows the secret? who proclaimed it here?
Whence, whence this manifold creation sprang?
The gods themselves came later into being.
Who knows from whence this great creation sprang?
He, from whom all this great creation came.
Whether His will created or was mute,
The Most High seer, that is in highest heaven,
He knows it; or, perchance, e'en He knows not"
One more hymn is even more distinct in its monotheism, p. 569. "In the beginning there arose the source of golden light. He was the only born Lord of all that is. He established the earth and this sky. Who is the God to whom we shall offer our sacrifice? He who gives life. He who gives strength; whose blessing all the bright gods desire; whose shadow is immortality; whose shadow is death.... He who, through His power, is the only King of the breathing and the awakening world. He who governs all—man and beast.... He whose power these snowy mountains, whose power the sea proclaims, with the distant river. He whose these regions are, as it were, His two arms.... He through whom the sky is bright, and the earth firm. He through whom the heaven was 'stablished, nay, the highest heaven. He who measured out the light in the air.... He to whom heaven and earth, standing firm by His will, look up, trembling inwardly. He over whom the rising sun shines forth.... Where-ever the mighty water-clouds went, where they placed the seed, and lit the fire, thence arose He who is the only life of the bright gods.... He who, by His might, looked even over the water-clouds, the clouds which gave strength, and lit the sacrifice. He who is God above all gods.... May He not destroy us. He, the creator of the earth; or He, the righteous, who created the heaven. He who also created the bright and mighty waters." In this hymn I have only omitted the repeated question—Who is the God to whom we shall offer our sacrifice?
Of the high antiquity of these productions no competent scholar entertains a doubt. It is not certain how many years before our era it was composed, but it is considered that it was prior to B. C. 2000, long before the time when the ideal Moses is said to have written, and à fortiori anterior, by at least a thousand years, to the authors of the Book of Psalms.
Talboys Wheeler remarks, p. 27—"Having thus sketched generally the individual character of the leading deities of the Aryans as they appear in the Rig Veda, it may be advisable to glance at that conception of One Supreme Being, as in all and above all, which finds full expression in the Vedic hymns. Upon this point the following passages will be found very significant:—'Who has seen the primeval being at the time of His being born? what is that endowed with substance that the unsubstantial sustains? from earth are the breath and blood, but where is the soul—who may repair to the sage to ask this? What is that One alone, who has upheld these six spheres in the form of an unborn?'" Then follows the hymn just quoted from M. Müller.
I may add that the so-called gods Indra, Agni, Surya, the Maruts, &c., are only personifications of the abstract powers of nature, the sky, fire, the sun, the winds, &c. These are the same conceptions as are referred to in Ps. civ. 1-4—they are not deities, but ministers.
It will probably be said by the orthodox that these descriptions of the creation and the Creator are mere efforts of the human mind, and not the products of "revelation." We grant it at once, and answer, why, then, should the comparatively miserable conceptions of one or more Hebrews, who knew nothing of a soul or a future life till they had learned it from the Chaldeans or the Persians, be regarded differently? Was the Jewish ignorance the result of Divine "inspiration?" Did the Devil give to the heathen the knowledge of Satan's origin and power? If so, why did the Jews, and why do Christians, adopt it?
I have already mentioned that the Aryans believed in the efficacy of prayer to their gods: they offered to them, much as we do now, supplications for rain, abundant harvests, prolific cattle, bodily vigour, long life, numerous progeny, &c., just as did, very rarely, the seed of Abraham.
We may now make some quotations from the Egyptian Ritual for the Dead (Bunsen's Egypt, Vol. V.). "O soul, greatest of things created" (p. 165); "I am the Great God, creating himself" (p. 172); "Oh Lord of the great abode, Chief of the gods" (p. 177). Throughout this invocation, however, the lord of the universe seems to be spoken of as the sun under various titles. There is frequent reference to the danger of the soul falling into the power of some malignant deity, and orthodoxy is secured by addressing every good god by his or her proper title. There is no grand conception anywhere, and the endless repetitions disgust the ordinary reader. I must add that the sun, Osiris, and the male organ, are spoken of as emblematic of each other.
If we next turn to the Shemitic religions, we have to contend with the difficulty produced by the paucity of written records, and the doubts which exist about certain epithets that relate to the gods. As far as I can discover, there was an idea of a Supreme Being, whose name was Jeho. Io. Iou., or the like, and Il or El. His ministers were the sun, moon, planets, constellations, and stars. His emblems were the sexual organs, and worship was, to a great degree, licentious. There was no conception of a spiritual life after death, or of a state of future rewards and punishments. Sacrifice was thought much of, but I doubt whether there was anything like what we know as prayer. At any rate, in all those parts of the Bible which seem to be the oldest, there is a singular absence of any formula or command for supplication. Solomon's prayer is comparatively of modern date. Indeed, this vacuity is implied in the expression of one of Jesus' disciples, "Teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples" (Luke xi. 1), thus showing clearly that the practice of prayer was not a Judaic, i.e., Mosaic one.*
* As a friend, who has been kind enough to assist me to
correct these sheets in their passage through the press,
considers that I ought to give some reasons for the
assertion made in the text, the following information is
appended:—
I. There are, in all, about a score of different words in
Hebrew which have been translated, "prayer," "I pray,"
"praying," &c. These are—(1) ahnah or ahna, (2) begah, (3)
ghalah, (4) ghanan, (5) loo, (6) lahgash, (7) na, (8)
gathar, (9) pagag, (10) pahlal, (11) tztlah, (12) seeagh,
(13) shoal, (14) tephilah. The rest are different forms
of the same roots.
II. These words do not, except in a few instances, really
bear the signification of "prayer" or "intercession," which
is given to them in the Authorised English Version of the
Bible; as any one may convince himself by consulting
Wigram's Hebrew concordance.
Thus, No. 1, in three instances, is translated in the A. V.
by the interjection "or,(OL)" No. 2, in the A. V. is once
used as "praying," but in other parts as "seeking" for
persons, "desiring" or "requesting," and "making." No. 8 is
translated in various parts of the A. V. "I am weak" "I
fell sick," "was not grieved," "a parturient woman crying,"
"to put one's self to pain," "is grievous," "hath laid," "is
my infirmity," and these meanings are far more common than
the signification of "prayer." No. 4 is only used twice, and
is in one place translated "by showing mercy," and in the
other by "making supplication." No. 5 is translated "O
that," "peradventure," "would God that," "if," "if haply,"
"though," and only once "I pray thee." No. 6 is translated
"enchantment," "orator," "earrings," "charmed," and once
only "prayer," with the marginal reading "secret speech."
No. 7 is in one place "now," in another "Oh," "go to," as
well as "I pray," and this in the same sense as we should
use the words to a child "I wish you would be quiet" No. 8
is generally used in the sense of "intreaty" or "prayer,"
but it once is found as "earnest," and "multiplying words,"
as in a Litany. No. 9 is used to signify "he came,"
"reached," "thou shalt meet," "fall upon," or "kill," "he
lighted" on a certain place, "they met together," and in
the 53d chapter of Isaiah the same word is used in verse 6,
"for the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all," and
in verse 12, for "and made intercession for the
transgressors!" No. 10 is used almost exclusively for
prayer, but it is only found six times in the whole
Pentateuch, in one of which it is read "I had no thought"
in the A. V. No. 11 is only found twice, once in Ezra and
once in Daniel, and signifies "prayer" in both. No. 12 has
many interpretations in the A. V., viz., "meditation,"
"speaking," "talking," "complaining," "declaring," in one
instance only is it translated "pray," and that in the
apparently important text Ps. lv. 17, "Evening and morning
and at noon will I pray." As a substantive the word is
rendered as "complaint," "talking, meditation,"
"babbling," and only once "prayer," and that in Ps. lv. 2,
"Hear my voice, O God, in my prayer." No. 13 is generally
translated "ask," as we should remark, "well, if he asks me
what must I say?" "beg," as "he shall beg in harvest;"
"consulted," in the text "he consulted with images,"
"salute," "to salute him of peace;" "enquired," "Saul
enquired of the Lord;" "wished," "and wished in himself to
die;" "lent," "I have lent him to the Lord," "so that they
lent unto them." No. 14 is used exclusively for prayer, but
the word is not to be found in the whole of the Pentateuch.
III. There is reason to believe that the most important of
these words have come from the Persian, a language allied to
the Sanscrit; and if so, it is clear that the idea of
prayer was adopted by the Jews after they were patronised by
the conquerors of Babylon. Some of the other words are
Aramaic, and probably even more modern than the rest. For
example, No. 10 is compared by Furst in his Hebrew and
Chaldee Lexicon, to the Sanscrit phal, and No. 8 may also be
derived from the Persian, and a Sanscrit root gad, which
signifies "to speak to," or "call upon," Anahf No. 1, is
Aramaic.
I think that it was Mons. Weill, in his remarkable book called Moise et le Talmud, who first drew attention to the influence of the Talmudists upon the Jewish Scriptures. He pointed out that in the Mosaic law there was no idea of prayer, intercession, or pardon; everything was based upon the "lex talionis," an eye was to be paid for with an eye, murder was to be avenged by murder, and ecclesiastical, ceremonial, and other transgressions were to be atoned, i.e., satisfaction was to be given by sacrifice and payments to the priest or tabernacle. But when the Jews, after their contact with the Chaldeans, Medea, Persians, Greeks, and Romans, began to study theology, two sects arose—the Talmudists, who explained away the older Scriptures, interpolated narratives, or simply texts therein, so as to suit their purposes; and the Sadducees, who refused to adopt as matters of faith anything which was not taught by Moses. The first was the strongest sect, and composed the majority in the Sanhedrim. They thus had power over the sacred canon, and could reject manuscripts or adopt them according as the purposes which were aimed at were served. The Talmudic interpolations are supposed to b« recognised chiefly in the more modern parts of the Old Testament, in Ezra, Nehemiah, the second Isaiah and Jeremiah, in the books of Zechariah and Malachi, in the Chronicles, Daniel, in many Psalms, more sparsely in the older histories, but very largely in the Pentateuch. From these considerations, from the absence of any order in the Mosaic law for the priests to offer any supplication, and from, the general absence of prayer from the sacrifices of all nations, we may conclude that "intercession" formed no part in the Jewish religion in the early days of its existence.
When working upon this subject I endeavoured to examine the curious Iguvian tables, on which Aufrecht, Eircher, and Newman have bestowed such pains. These are, I believe, the only tables extant which give directions to the old Umbrian, or any other ancient priests, how to conduct public sacrifices and the ensuing feasts. In them there are directions for invocations, but no formula for prayers, unless one can call invocations by that name. I fancy, that in some parts of the tables there are words which may be rendered "speak," or "mutter," or "meditate," or "pray silently."
The fact that a Hebrew historian has composed a prayer, and put it into the mouth of King Solomon, rather than into that of a high priest, shows that supplication for the people was not a strictly sacerdotal duty. Even now, with all our liberality of thought, we take our prayers from the Archbishops, and not from the crown.
But what we have said points to another important consideration, viz., how far our Authorized Version can be trusted as a foundation upon which to build a theory respecting the use of prayer, when we find that the words given in English do not correspond with the words in the original Hebrew.
We have noticed in the text that both John and Jesus taught their disciples to pray; we may now call attention to the idea which the latter had of "prayer." In a parable, which was evidently intended to represent what was common enough in his day, he says, "Two men went up into the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican; the Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself—God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are," &c (Luke xviii. 10-13). Surely one cannot call a boastful enumeration of one's virtues either "supplication," "prayer," or "entreaty;" but we understand readily that what we should call "meditation" was once included under the name "prayer." This anecdote unquestionably seems to prove that there was nothing like public prayer in the temple ritual. The idea of the Ancients was to obtain what they wanted by costly sacrifice; the idea of the Moderns is to obtain their desires by the expenditure of words only. We know that Pagans used long litanies, and that Christians do so too. In Jezebel's time "0 Baal, hear us" resounded on Mount Carmel in sonorous monotony. We have replaced that heathen chant by another, and our cathedrals reverberate constantly with the musical rogation, "We beseech Thee to hear us, good Lord," uttered more than a score of times. Our orthodoxy consists in our using English instead Phoenician words, and in calling Baal by a word more familiar to us; and as the highest commendation which we can give to others is to imitate them, so we praise the Ancient heathen highly, who thought that they would be heard from their "much speaking." It is ever easier to change our words than our practice. Like the Pharisee, Christians boast that they are not as other men are; but by their proceedings they show that they are like the Jews, of whose paternity Jesus had not an exalted opinion. (See John viii. 44).
In further illustration of the absence of a set form of prayer in the temple worship in Jerusalem, and of the independence of all devout solicitors of priestly aid, I may point to Matthew vi. 5 to 8, wherein we find that hypocrites offered their supplications, not only in the temple, but at the corners of the streets. It is just possible that in the former locality there might have been some public worship going on, in which the saintly could join, but certainly there was no such ritual at street corners. But if there had really been divine service in the temple, it follows that those who joined in it would not have been conspicuous, or deserving the name of hypocrites. The fault of these which is mentioned by Jesus is ostentatious public prayer, i.e.9 the doing of that which had not been prescribed by Moses.
As I have, in a preceding volume, spoken at some length concerning the morals and manners of ancient races, and shown how, as a rule, their conduct has been the same as that of modern Christians, and as, moreover, the subject has been treated of in an essay by Lecky (History of European Morals), I will not pursue this part of my subject further than to remark, that we have scarcely two articles of faith—if, indeed we have more than one—i.e., respect for one day in seven—which we have not received, directly or indirectly, from Pagans. Even our Christianity is but a modified Buddhism, as I shall endeavour, in my next chapter, to show.
CHAPTER IV.
Christianity and Buddhism. The new and old world. An
impartial judge is said to be a partisan. Works on the
subject. Sakya Muni's birth, B.c. 620 (about), position in
life, original views. Parallels between Brahmin-ism,
Buddhism, Hebraism, and Christianity. History of Sakya Muni
—that of Jesus corresponds with it marvellously. Sakya
receives a commission from an angel—is henceforth a
saviour. History of Jesus follows that of Sakya. Siddartha
neither dictated nor wrote. A favourite garden. Sakya and
the Brahmins. Buddha and Christ equally persecuted. Spread
of Buddhism after Siddartha's death. Asoka a royal convert
Buddhist missionaries, b.c. 307. Their wonderful successes.
Different development of Buddhism and Christianity.
Persecution a Christian practice, Buddha tempted by the
Devil, and by women, like St Anthony. Buddha's life reduced
to writing, at least B.c. 90. Hardy on Buddhist miracles.
His remarks criticised. Necessity for miracles is doubtful.
Sakya and a future life. Resurrection from the dead. Jesus
not the first fruits of them that slept. Paul's argument
worthless. Buddhists in advance of Christians. Priestcraft
at time of Buddha and Jesus. Both did away with ceremonial.
Sakya's doctrine—compared with Christian teaching. Another
parallel between Buddha and Jesus. Commandments of Tathâgata
(Buddha), or the Great Sramana. Rules for his saintly
friends—for outsiders. Definition of terms. The Sra-mana's
opinion of miracles—a comparison. The history of Jesus told
without miracles. Buddhistic confession—remarks on in
modern times. Filial respect. Public confession, murder
absolved thereby. Asoka, about B.c. 263, sent out
missionaries. Objections made against Buddhism. Ideas
respecting God. Salvation. Buddha and Jesus. Nirvana. Heaven
and Hell—Christian ideas. Apocalypse. The heaven of John
and Mahomet compared with that of Buddha. Prayer not a
Buddhist institution—nor originally a Christian one. Nature
of prayer. The developments of Buddhism, particulars—
comparison between the Eastern ancient and Western modern
practice. Abbé Hue. No sexual element in Buddhism and
Christianity at first—it has crept into both in later
times. Inquiry into the probable introduction of Buddhism
into the West. Asceticism peculiar to Buddhism and
Christianity. The Essenes, their faith and practice—
resemblance to Buddhism. John and Jesus probably Essenes.
If Jesus was inspired, so was Siddartha. Differences
between Sakya and Jesus. Jesus 'believed in an immediate
destruction of the world. Idea of préexistence in Jesus and
Sakya adopted by their followers. The basis of the two
faiths is morality—but an unsound one. Nature of the
unsoundness. Morality has a reference to a life on earth
only. The decalogue superfluous. Ideas of future rewards and
punishments. Dives and Lazarus. The world can exist without
a knowledge of a future life. God thought so when He taught
the Jews. Dogma versus morality. See how these Christians
live! There are a few good men amongst Christians.
Supplementary remarks.
From the Peruvian and Aztec religious systems in what we designate the New World, a phrase which involves the idea that its existence was for ages wholly unknown to the historians of the Eastern Hemisphere, we turn to another form of faith, which demands even greater attention. Buddhism has, probably, done more to influence the minds of men in Asia than any other religion in any part of the globe, and its history is so remarkable, that it deserves the attention of every philosophical student of mankind. To the Christian it ought to be especially interesting, inasmuch as there is strong reason to believe that the faith current amongst ourselves is to be traced to the teaching of Sakya Muni, whose original name, we may notice, in passing, was no more "Buddha" than "Christ" was the cognomen of the son of Mary.
An ingenious author on one occasion wrote a charming essay "upon the art of putting things," and I cannot read any treatise upon Buddhism, written by a Christian, without thinking how completely "the advocate" is to be seen throughout them all Ecclesiastical writers, who are Protestant preachers, endeavour laboriously to prove that the teaching of Sakya Muni could not have been inspired, and was certainly false; whilst other writers, who have no particular leaning towards Jesus, extol the author of Buddhism beyond that of Christianity. Truly, in such a matter it is extremely difficult not to appear as a partisan, however carefully the scales may be held. The very fact of endeavouring "to see ourselves as others see us" involves the necessity of "putting things" in a different light to that which is most common or familiar to us. A bumptious Briton thinks more of his own Islands than a Yankee thinks of them, and one who endeavours to describe "the wheel of the law" as an astute Buddhist would do, and who, at the same time, compares it with the teachings of the son of Mary, must seem to those who, without knowing its nature, despise the former, and yet implicitly believe in the latter, to be a partisan. Acting upon this belief, we shall not scruple to appear as an advocate, for we believe that "an opposition" is as good in religion as in politics, and that it behoves us all to examine every important question in all its bearings.
In the following essay I shall not attempt to go into every detail about the life of Sakya Muni, for to do so would weary the reader. Anyone who wishes for such information may be referred to Le Bouddha et sa Religion, par J. Barthélemy Saint Hilaire, Paris, 1860, a book which may be fairly designated as exhaustive. The English reader may also consult The Legends and Theories of the Buddhists, by Rev. R. Spence Hardy, London, 1866, which, though very prejudiced, is extremely suggestive. Hardy's Eastern Monachism and Manual of Buddhists are about the same. The Mahawanso translated by Tumour, is also a very valuable work of reference.
There appears to be little doubt that Sakya Muni was born about 622 years before our era, and that he died when about eighty years of age, i.e.f B.C. 542. He was thus a contemporary of Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and other Jewish prophets. Though of royal birth, and of the warrior or kingly caste, he does not appear to have been instructed in general history, if, indeed, any such was in existence in Hindostan at that or any other period; and we cannot find a tittle of evidence that he ever heard of any other religion than Brahminism, the dominant faith, apparently, of the Aryan invaders of India. In that he was taught assiduously, and some of its tenets he most firmly believed. Amongst others, he held that men lived in a future world, in which each one was rewarded or punished according to his doings when in a human form. His teaching was founded upon the belief which the Brahmins inculcated, that all men endure misery in this world for their conduct in a previous state of existence, and that they would once again suffer after death, unless they conducted themselves, in this life, in a manner pleasing to the Almighty. In this creed is clearly involved, if not distinctly enunciated, a full acknowledgment of the existence and power of God, of the certainty of a future life, and a desire to escape from penalties to be inflicted therein by a supreme celestial Judge, for immorality or impropriety committed in the present state. For these points of doctrine Sakya did not contend, he merely laid down a different system to the Brahmins as to the method by which salvation was to be attained, and the penal consequences of a sinful life were to be avoided.
We may now, halting here for a moment, examine these matters for ourselves, and inquire in what way such faith differs from our own. The Brahmin taught that man suffers pain, misery, and death for certain crimes committed in a previous state of existence; the Christian teaches that each one suffers for a fault committed by ancestors who lived thousands of years ago. Neither the one nor the other regard pain, sorrow, suffering, and death as the normal accompaniments of life, but both attribute them to the wrath of an offended deity, who can be, in some way, cheated, cajoled, appeased, or propitiated. Both assert that men are debtors to God, and that miseries are "duns" used to make men pay their obligations to heaven. The Brahmin taught that this could be effected by prayer, sacrifice, and sundry ceremonies to be performed by some man who had been specially appointed for the purpose. A due attention to morality was also inculcated, but it was apparently considered as of less importance than ritualistic observances.
The Jew, whom so many amongst us believe to have been especially taught by God, propounded a belief essentially similar to that of the Brahmin, with the single exception that he had no faith in a future existence, but thought that sacrifice and offerings, through a priesthood, were necessary to obtain comfort in this life.
The Christian teaches that the horrors of eternity can only be escaped by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ (Acts xvi. 30, 31), and by being moral in addition.
The "belief" here referred to is somewhat amplified in other parts of the Bible, and notably in John iii. 15-17, 36; vi. 39, 40; ix. 35; xi. 15; and Acts viii. 37; from which we learn that an item in the faith was a firm hold upon the idea that Jesus was the son, the only begotten son, of God. This dogma is still further extended in the "Apostles' Creed," wherein the Christians express, as articles of faith, their belief, that Jesus Christ was the only son of God, conceived by the Holy Ghost, and born of the Virgin Mary, &c. This tenet is somewhat varied in the Nicene Creed, which expresses the Christian belief to be, that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only begotten son of God—begotten of his Father before all worlds—being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made, &c.
The fundamental teaching of Sakya was, that man can only escape the tortures of the damned, by a strict propriety of conduct in this world, and a persistent endeavour to renounce and think nothing of the gratifications which make life pleasant. The modern Buddhist adds to this a belief in the absolute divinity of the founder of his faith, not simply that he was a son of God, but a visible embodiment of a portion of the Creative Unity. Brahmins and Buddhists believe in transmigration of souls: the Christian does the like, only, instead of being converted into a beast, he imagines that he will become either an angel or a devil.
Within certain limits, we may, therefore, say that the Brahminic, the Jewish, the Buddhist, and the Christian religions are essentially alike, differing only upon minor points, such as the absolute value of morality, of ceremonial, of doctrine, of asceticism, the nature of a hypothetical antecedent, and an equally uncertain future existence, and the best means of escaping the penalties attached, in the second state, to impropriety of conduct in the first. If we deride the Brahmin and the Buddhist for the faith which they entertain, our laugh must necessarily recoil on ourselves, for we have no more unequivocal grounds for our belief than they have for theirs. We point in vain to what we call "Revelation," for they can do the same, and if priority in such matters is good for anything, the Brahminic must take precedence of the Jewish, and the Buddhist of the Christian code. Nor can we call miracles to our exclusive aid, for the religious books of the Hindoo are as full of them as are those of the Jew and Christian, and the stories told in the one can be readily paralleled in impossibility, incapacity, frivolity, and absurdity by the others.
We must remember, then, when speaking of the teaching of Sakya, that it was constructed upon the supposed fundamental truths of Brahminism, just as the doctrines of Jesus were built upon those of Judaism. By adopting these, respectively, the two preachers have demonstrated their belief in them, but neither the one nor the other have advanced our knowledge as to the reality of the earliest faith, nor demonstrated the truth of their subsequent assumptions.
If we now endeavour, for the sake of comparison, to place the Eastern and the Western points of belief in parallel columns, we shall be better able to see the points of resemblance and of difference than by any other plan.
These are only a few of the leading points of resemblance and difference, and might be almost indefinitely multiplied.
After this preface, we may proceed to notice that Siddartha—another name for Buddha—was of royal birth, and born in wedlock: his mother was called Maya Devi, and was herself the daughter of a king. His father was of the warrior caste, and, according to ancient usage, Sakya, like Jesus some centuries later, was presented in the temple of the God of his parents, and recognized by a Brahmin, whom we may designate as a predecessor, by some hundreds of years, of the Jewish Simeon (Luke ii 25, seq.)f as having the marks of a great man upon him. As Sakya grew up to man's estate he was found to be peculiarly clever, and soon distanced his masters, as Jesus was and did, when, at twelve years, he went into the temple and astonished the doctors. He was always thoughtful, and frequently remained alone. Once he wandered into a forest, (compare Matthew iv. 1-11), in which he was found lost in thought. When obliged to exhibit his talents, Siddartha was found to have every conceivable excellence, bodily and mental He was, by parental desire, married to a paragon of a wife, who showed her good sense by rejecting the use of a veil. In this Sakya differs from Mary's son, who never married, being, most probably, of the tribe of the Essenes. In later life Siddartha discouraged wedlock and every form of love. But, during all his outward happiness; Siddartha's thoughts ran upon the misery which he saw on every side to be common in the world, and he entertained a hope that he would be able to show man the road to a happy immortality. In these ideas the teacher was encouraged by a god, who appeared to him by night, and told him that the appointed time for the deliverer had come. This comforter also recommended him to leave his wife, his wealth, his father's house, and give up all he had, so as to be able to seek, unencumbered, the way of salvation. Compare here the passage, Mark x. 20-30, wherein Jesus gives the same kind of advice as the angel gave to Sakya Muni. Having become satisfied of his mission from God, he resolutely abandoned everything, and, being really a scion of royalty, he had much to renounce. Siddartha thus became a mendicant, dependent upon others for food and raiment, and resembled that son of Mary, of whom we read that he had not a residence wherein to lay his head (Matt. viii. 20; Luke ix. 58). He was about twenty-nine years of age when he thus became poor for the sake of mankind. Compare what is said of Jesus, Luke iii. 23. Though Siddartha was opposed to the Brahmins, he nevertheless studied their doctrines, as Mary's son did that of the Hebrew theologians, thoroughly, under one of the wisest of them, for many years. Then, leaving this teacher, he went about preaching and doing good. So much were men impressed with his beauty, his piety, and his doctrines, that they flocked in crowds to see him, and he taught them whilst sitting on the brow of Mount Pandava—even kings came to hear him. Compare here what is said of the Nazarene, Matt. iv. 23 to Matt. viii. 1. Sakya was persecuted for a long time by a relative, who ultimately became one of his most ardent disciples. Compare Matt. xvi. 22 and John xxi. 15, et seq. Siddartha's austerities and mortifications of himself, in every conceivable way, were excessive during the next six years, and these have been represented as a combat with the Devil, whose kingdom he destroyed. At the end of this probation, Sakya Muni, finding fasting and pain not profitable for eternal salvation, resumed the ordinary human habits of eating, &c. This disgusted many of his disciples, and "they walked no more with him." He was partly supported by a slave woman, and was content to clothe himself with vestments taken from the dead. Finally, this wonderful son of Maya heard within him a voice, which told him that he was divine, the saviour of the world, and the incarnation of the wisdom of God—Buddha, "the word" itself. Compare John i. 1, et seq. This was confirmed by a miracle, and thus, at the age of thirty-six, and at the foot of a fig tree, Sakya Muni received a divine commission, "and the word was made flesh." But, though thus divinely inspired, the saviour doubted his power to convert mankind, and at the first he only preached his new doctrines to a few. Even in this respect it is marvellous to see how closely the Christian story of Jesus follows that of his predecessor Siddartha. Some opposed Sakya, but these were soon converted by his majesty, and the glory with which he spake the words—"Yes," he said, "I have come to see clearly both immortality and the way to attain it; I am Buddha—I know all—I see all—I have blotted out my faults, and am above all law." Recognizing in Siddartha the teacher of mankind, the common people heard him gladly, and gave him homage, and he, in return, taught them his full doctrine. The Indian saviour then proceeded to the holy city, Benares, and taught there. But though he spoke much, he neither dictated nor wrote—like Jesus, subsequently, he made no provision by which his doctrines might be perpetuated. From Benares he went to other places, some of which were especially dear to him, and thus became sacred. In like manner Bethany was sanctified by Jesus. Amongst others was a garden, given to him, with a mansion, by a wealthy disciple, which a lively fancy might call a Hindoo Gethsemane. In this garden Buddha made many disciples, and in it the first council of his followers was held after his death. Another favourite retreat was a plantation of mango trees, and this, like every other spot that Siddartha is known to have visited, has been adorned by the faithful with ornamental architecture in commemoration of him.
As may be supposed, Sakya, when he assailed the Brahmins, was in turn opposed by them with persevering malevolence; the former was outspoken and said what he thought of the priests—he called them hypocrites, cheats, impostors, and the like—and they were apparently conscious that they deserved such titles.
Here, again, we notice a singular parallel between the Hindoo saviour and the Jewish one, who followed him after a long interval. Not that there is anything wonderful in the founder of a new faith reviling the ministers of one more ancient—nor in the priests of an established church endeavouring to suppress, by punishments, the professors who interfere with their repose. We know how the Christian fathers abused and lampooned the faith of those whose practices they detested—how Luther and his followers lashed the vices of the Papists, and how these in their turn burned the new preachers—when they had a chance; how the Nonconformists censured the Establishment, and how the Episcopal Church has harried Independents and Presbyterians. But it is strange to find both Sakya and Jesus inaugurating a religion of peace by fierce invectives. We have not particulars respecting the choice of language made use of by the Indian, but we can scarcely imagine that it could be more to the purpose than the vituperation employed by the Hebrew. Jesus says,—"Ye compass sea and land to make one proselyte, and when he is made ye make him twofold more the child of hell than yourselves,"—"Ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness" (Matt, xxiii. 15-27). One cannot wonder that the Brahmins and the Pharisees, who were objurgated as hypocrites, should retort upon their accusers, prosecute the one and crucify the other.
As Sakya's influence increased, the power of the old priesthood diminished, and there are accounts of many contests between the old dispensers of Brahma's religion and the new saviour, which were held before kings and people. In consequence of these disputes Buddha's life was repeatedly in danger. But though often threatened, Siddartha died peacefully when about eighty years old, beloved by many, respected by more, worshipped as a divinity by his immediate disciples and intimate friends, and venerated by all who had listened to his discourses.
There are a great many legends existent, and of very respectable antiquity too, which tell of miracles performed by this very remarkable Indian teacher; but the judicious historian, upon whose authority I am at present relying (St. Hilaire), does not intermingle these with the narrative of Siddartha's life. In this respect he shows greater judgment than the scribes who first compiled the stories of Buddha and of Jesus, both of whom conceived that human beings could not be converted to a new style of belief without thaumaturgy.
The account of Sakya Muni and his religion would be incomplete did we not add that he left behind him enthusiastic disciples who were eager and successful in spreading his views. But many years, how many we do not know with absolute certainty, elapsed ere any account was written either of his life or of his teaching. Nor ought we to wonder at this, for until time has been given to mankind, it cannot fairly estimate the value of anything new; and when men do at length form, what they believe to be, a perfect judgment of the importance of the doctrine which has become deeply rooted, they are more eager to promulgate it in the world than to record it by writing in the closet.
The new religion certainly spread extensively all over the vast continent of Hindustan, and in the course of about three hundred years, found an enthusiastic and powerful convert in the person of a king called Asoka, who was reigning when the third convocation of Buddhists was called, b.c. 307. This ruler was imbued with a missionary spirit, and under his influence, preachers full of energy went not only throughout India, but into China, Japan, Ceylon, and apparently into every country to which ships, caravans, and the flow of commerce gave them access, including Persia, Babylonia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and the very populous and important emporium Alexandria. We may judge of the fanaticism of these religious envoys by their success, and we may, as is often done by Christian missionaries, test the real value of their doctrine by its endurance, and its adaptability to the religious wants of the human animal. If missionary success is a test of truth in religion, Buddhism must be superior to Christianity. Buddah—for his name is spelled variously—has more followers, according to competent authorities, than Jesus, and if the depth and earnestness shown by the converts to the two men could be weighed in impartial scales, we believe that the preponderance would be in favour of the followers of the Indian saviour.
We readily allow that Buddhism has not developed in many matters like Christianity has done. The Buddhism of to-day does not essentially differ from that in the early ages of the faith; the followers of Siddartha have not adopted the doctrines of the nations amongst which they have settled. The Christianity of to-day, on the other hand, is so widely different from that current in the first century of our era, that it has been remarked, with great pungency, that if Jesus revisited us now, he would be denounced as a heretic, and abused as a nonconformist. His followers soon introduced politics into religion, and adopted the fables and the doctrines of the Pagans amongst whom they dwelt, merely changing certain names, and ascribing virtues and miracles to saints, which the heathen attributed to Apollo, Mars, or Venus. Jesus, though a Jew, never sacrificed, nor did his apostles, but his followers thought prudent to filch the practice from the heathen; and, to smooth their difficulty, they profess to turn bread and wine into flesh and blood, and offer it up as an oblation upon their ecclesiastical altar. Jesus knew nothing of purgatory; with him the rich man went direct to hell, and Lazarus to Abraham's bosom. Modern Christians are wiser than their teacher; for he disdained the learning of Egypt, his followers took their purgatory and trinity therefrom. All this shows, that the faith of Christians in their teacher has not been equal to the unbounded trust felt by the Buddhist in his master's wisdom. Buddhism, moreover, has neither taught nor sanctioned any system of persecution. Sakya, it is true, encouraged men to make themselves miserable upon earth that they might attain future immunity from woe, but he never ordered them to use the sword or dragonnades to force other people to do so. The followers of Jesus, on the other hand, have but too often founded their claim to a happy immortality on making other men, whom they called heretics, miserable, as during the period of the crusades against the Saracens, the Albigenses, the Lollards, and the Waldenses. The Christians in many ages seemed to argue thus:—As the painful death of Mary's son saved the world, so I, by torturing a heretic, may save myself. This is an idea of vicarious atonement which, though prevalent for centuries, has never been committed to writing by those who hold it. We do not mean to allege that the opinion referred to cannot be found in history, for it is from such a source that our assertion comes. A belief, such as we refer to, was promulgated amongst the Crusaders, and was fostered by the founders of the Inquisition. Such an idea, too, is embodied in the word—"The time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service" (John xvi. 2).
We may, however, trace the idea of persecution in the early Christian Scriptures. Paul, for example, when writing to the Corinthians (1 Epistle v. 3-5) gives such encouragement as he can to those who punish an erring brother Christian, by delivering him over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus, and in (1st Tim. i. 20), the same author declares,—"I have delivered Hymenseus and Alexander unto Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme." The idea being, that by thus acting, both the Corinthians and Paul were improving their own ecclesiastical condition.
As I may not have another available opportunity for introducing one or two striking parallels between Sakya Muni and Jesus, I may mention here that the former is represented as being tempted by and having conversation with an evil spirit called Mâra, Evil one, Destroyer, Devil, or Papiyan. In one of these confabulations Buddah says,—"I will soon triumph over you—'desires' are your chief soldiers, then come idleness, hunger and thirst, passions, sleepy indolence, fears, doubts, angers, hypocrisy, ambition, the desire to be respected, and to have renown, praise of yourself and blame for others—these are your black allies, the soldiers of the burning demon. Your soldiers subjugate gods and men, but not me, I shall crush them by wisdom, then what will you do?" (Hilaire, p. 61). The sage is then, not unlike the so-called St. Anthony, tempted by lovely woman, thirty-two lovely demons (Apsaras) deploying all their charms. Then follows a third trial, and Mâra says to Siddartha,—"I am the lord of desire, I am the master of the entire world, the gods, the crowd of Dâvanas (spirits), men and beasts have been subjugated by me and are in my power. Like them enter my domains, rise up and speak like them." Buddha replied,—"If you are the lord of desire you are not the lord of light. Look at me, I am the lord of the law, you are powerless, and in your very sight I shall obtain supreme intelligence," (p. 64, op. cit.). The demon makes one more effort, and is again conquered, and then retires, tracing with an arrow these words upon the ground—"My empire has passed away." It may be imagined that the French author whom I quote is a partisan of the Indian sage; far from it, he records such tales with regret, for he sees how strong an influence they must have upon the perfect or imperfect authenticity of the New Testament and the story of Jesus. The similarity of the two histories is heightened by the legend before noticed, that Buddha went to Heaven to convert his mother, whilst Jesus is said to have gone down to Hades to preach to the spirits in prison, with the implied intention of converting them to the faith which he preached.
It will doubtless have occurred to anyone reading the preceding pages, if he be but familiar with the New Testament, that either the Christian histories called Gospels have been largely influenced by Buddhist's legends, or that the story of Siddartha has been moulded upon that of Jesus. The subject is one which demands and deserves the greatest attention, for if our religion be traceable to Buddhism, as the later Jewish faith is to the doctrines of Babylonians, Medes, and Persians, we must modify materially our notions of "inspiration" and "revelation." Into this inquiry St. Hilaire goes as far as documentary evidence allows him, and Hardy in Legends and Theories of the Buddhists also enters upon it in an almost impartial manner. From their conclusions there can be no reasonable doubt that the story of the life of Sakya Muni, such as we have described it, certainly existed in writing ninety years before the birth of Jesus; consequently, if the one life seems to be a copy of the other, the gospel writers must be regarded as the plagiarists.
In the story of Buddha, we have eliminated the miraculous part, and exhibited him simply as a remarkable man. Nevertheless, in the writings of his followers, miracles in abundance are assigned to him. Whether these existed in the original history Hardy doubts, and his remarks are so apposite that we reproduce them (op. cit. p. xxviii). "Upon the circumstances of this first rehearsal (of the life and doctrine of Siddartha), most important consequences depend. If the miracles ascribed to Buddha can be proved to have been recorded of him at the time of his death, this would go far towards proving that the authority to which he laid claim was his rightful prerogative. They were of too public character to have been ascribed to him then if they had not taken place; so that if it was openly declared by his contemporaries, by those who had lived with him in the same monastery, that he had been repeatedly visited by Sekra and other Deivas; and that he had walked through the air and visited the heavenly world in the presence of many thousands, and those the very persons whom they addressed, we ought to render to him the homage awarded to him by even his most devoted followers. But the legend of the early rehearsal has nothing to support it beyond the assertion of authors who lived at a period long subsequent. The testimony of contemporaneous history presents no record of any event that quadrates with the wonderful powers attributed to the 'rahals,' which would undoubtedly not have been wanting if these events had really taken place."
The reader of this extract will now naturally turn his attention to the Christian gospels, and inquire into the time when they were written, and whether the arguments used by Hardy, for disbelieving the miracles of Buddha, do not equally disprove the authenticity of the miracles attributed to Jesus. We can find nowhere, in contemporary history—and there is an adequate account thereof, both Jewish and Roman—any records of the wonders said to have been done in Judea by the son of Mary. Though he was noticed by a certain writer in the Talmud, under the name of Ben Panther, that book contains no account of the marvellous works recorded in the gospels, nor any reference to his miraculous power. The Romans who dwelt in Jerusalem knew nothing of any real miracle, though Herod is reported to have noticed some gossiping accounts of John's successor. We do not find a single reference to any of the wonderful events told in the gospels in any epistle written by those who "companied with Jesus"—except the assertion that he had risen from the dead, to be found in 1 Corinthians xv. and elsewhere—whose value is problematical Still farther, we have tolerably good evidence to show that the Gospels were written at a time when they could not be tested by those people in whose presence the wonders were said to have been wrought. The narrative of John, for example, is, by scholars, supposed to have been written more than a century, probably one hundred and fifty years, after the crucifixion, and the others seem to have been composed for the benefit of those who did not live in, or know Jerusalem and Judea intimately. They resemble, in almost every respect, the stories told of such Roman saints as Francis of Assisi, Bernard, Carlo Borromeo, and Ignatius Loyola, which were always composed long after the death, and out of the presence of every one of those who could deny or controvert them. However much, or little, we may credit the biographies of Buddha and Jesus, we cannot for a moment doubt, that the two individuals were instrumental in founding forms of religion, which, by the aid of missionaries, spread over a vast extent of the habitable globe. Unlike that of Mahomet, the faiths referred to were promulgated by peaceful persuasion rather than by the sword, and by the power of eloquence, example, and precept, rather than by the influence of miracles. If, for the sake of argument, we grant that every specimen of thaumaturgy which his followers attribute to Jesus is correctly reported, we must allow also that his power of making converts by teaching, preaching, and wonder working, was inferior to that of his followers, who taught, preached, and proselytized without performing many, if any miracles. If we assert that miraculous powers are necessary for the establishment and propagation of a new religion, then we must, to be consistent with ourselves, believe in the thaumaturgy of the Buddhists, and the divine mission of Sakya Muni. If, on the other hand, we deny that Siddartha was an incarnate god or saviour, was not divinely inspired, and performed no real miracle, then it is clear that the miracles, which Jesus is said to have achieved, were wholly unnecessary, and not required in any way to upset an old religion, to found a new, or to spread it when established.
The philosopher may pause here, with profit to himself, and inquire whether there is, or there are, any new form or forms of religion which has or have sprung up within his own observation, and if so, whether it or they has or have been based upon thaumaturgy—and, if one or more have been so founded, whether one shows evidence of stability.
Few can deny that Mormonism is a form of belief which has a considerable number of adherents, a body of earnest missionaries, and a laity whose faith and practice have been sorely tested by hardship. Yet there has not been a single miracle performed by its prophets. It is reported that its founder announced that he would perform one in the sight of all Israel and of the sun, but when the time came he said, that if the spectators believed that he could do what was promised, that was quite enough!
Spiritualism, on the other hand, is a new sort of theosophy, ostensibly founded and supported wholly by thaumaturgy; its disciples have induced themselves to believe, against their original ideas, that we are not only surrounded by the spirits of the departed, but that these can be brought into connection with us by means of certain individuals, called mediators or mediums—that these have such power, over the invisible beings hovering in the air, that the souls of the dead may be made to shake the tables of the living, and lift up their sofas to the ceiling. The miracles are believed in by many, but Spiritualism lags far behind the Mormon theology, and probably always will do.
We may regard this part of our subject in yet another light. Let us, for example, suppose that the Buddhists and the Christians succeed in persuading each other of the incorrectness of the miraculous element in their respective books, does it therefore follow, that any essential part of the creed of either one or other must be altered? The doctrines of Siddartha would not be valueless even if his followers disbelieved in his power to fly as a bird, or cross a river on the surface of the water—nor would those of Mary's son be proved to be worthless if it were certain that he never marched over a billowy sea, and that he was not really killed by crucifixion. The disciples of Sakya Muni believed in a resurrection of the dead, without having had the advantage of a real or imaginary reappearance of their master after his supposed decease. The Etruscans, Greeks, and Romans, had all an Elysium to which the good folk went. The Red Indian believes in a future life and happy hunting grounds (so we are told), although he has never heard of Judea. The rude Northmen and Danes had also their Valhalla to go to after death, long ere they were Christians. Still farther, it is to be noticed, by the close observer, that the Jews at the time of Jesus, and some of the Greeks about the same period, were divided in their opinions respecting the existence of men in a future state. The Sadducees, holding fast to the books of Moses and the Prophets, denied the existence of a resurrection, of angels or of spirits. The Pharisees, on the other hand, influenced apparently by Babylonian and Persian theology, had faith in all three. That this belief in a future life was not commonly held by the poor folk in Judea, we infer from Mark ix. 10, wherein we are told that Peter, James, and John were "questioning with one another what the rising from the dead should mean." That the Athenians were equally careless about what is now called "heaven and hell," we judge from Acts xvii. 18, wherein we are told that Paul's preaching about "Jesus and the resurrection" was a strange affair, and from the thirty-second verse of the same chapter, wherein it is said that the doctrine of the resurrection of Jesus was received with derision.
I am quite aware that it may be objected to these remarks that the doubt about the rising from the dead does not point to a general resurrection, but simply to the return to life of one particular individual. This, however, only removes the difficulty to a short distance, for Greek story tells us of the annual return of Proserpine from the realms of Pluto to the light of day, and Adonis was yearly resuscitated, in mythical narrative. For the Hebrew, the rising from the dead ought not to be a wonderful matter. Was it not told in their Scriptures how, when certain persons were burying a man, the bearers in a fright threw the corpse into the sepulchre of Elijah, whose bones had such efficacy that they revived the dead man, who stood on his feet (2 Kings xiii. 21). We find also, from Mark vi. 16, Luke ix. 9, that Herod had a full belief in the power of John to rise again from the death to which that monarch had consigned him. The sceptic may doubt the ability of the two evangelists to read what was passing through the royal mind when Jesus and his works were brought before its notice, but he cannot doubt that the writer was aware that in Herod's time there was a belief in the resurrection of individuals. Indeed, we find in the verse following that which tells of the Apostle's bewilderment, Mark ix. 11, a question, "why say the scribes that Elias must first come?" To which the reply is that the prophet has come. We are constrained, therefore, to believe that Jesus was not the first who rose from the dead; nay, even he himself commissioned his disciples to "cleanse the lepers, and raise the dead" (Matth. x. 8). What, then, is the value of the arguments that Paul builds upon the assertion that Christ is "the first fruits of them that slept."
This being so, we may fairly ask, whence did Mary's son derive the ideas which he promulgated of a resurrection, and of salvation, and why had a sophistical writer like Paul to adopt the clumsy contrivance of asserting that Jesus not only had risen, but that he was the first individual who had done so, to demonstrate that the dead really did return again to life? Paul's argument, indeed, shows how little he knew or had thought upon the subject, for he distinctly preaches a resurrection of the body, not of the soul, a belief adopted into the Apostles' creed. Yet, at the very period when the minds of Christians were thus unformed, the disciples of Buddha, to a man, believed in a future "Nirvana," in which "there should be no more sorrow nor crying, neither should there be any more pain, and where all earthly things should have passed away" (see Rev. xxi. 4). We are not yet in the position to prove that Mary's son and certain of his followers received their inspiration from disciples of Siddartha, but there is certainly a strong presumption in favour of the possibility, much evidence of its probability, and nothing whatever to disprove it. To this, however, we will return by and by.
Ere we proceed to examine into the nature of the doctrines of Sakya Muni and of Jesus, we may cast a glance over the condition of the men whom they converted. In both instances, it is not too much to say that they all were "priest-ridden" in the fullest meaning of the term. The residents in Modern India and Papal Rome, until a short time ago, well understood what the term signifies; day by day, and almost hour by hour, there is, or was in these places, some ceremony to be attended, some prayer to be uttered, some confession to be made, some contribution to be given to monastery, church, or priest. Penances are, and were inflicted of the most painful, sometimes of the most disgusting kind. The last I heard of was in Wales, where a man was ordered to lie down at the church door as a mat, upon which the faithful were to wipe their feet. Both in India and Italy, men, women, and children alike are, or were, taught to regard themselves as the servants, and even slaves of the hierarchy, and their money is, or was, alienated from wives and children to swell the coffers of spiritual tyrants. Perpetual terrors of hell are sounded, until those hearers, whose hearts are impressionable, are habitually haunted by imaginary horrors, each one of which has to be bought off by a sort of hush-money paid to the priest, who has invented, adopted, or described them.
Such was the condition of England and France prior to the Reformation and the Revolution.
So long as men are debased by their guides, and allow themselves, with the docility of a well-trained dog, to be ruled, and so long as tyrannical flamens can wring an ever increasing tax from the people, there is probably nothing more in the breast of each than a vague feeling of dislike, or regret, at the existence of such things, which rarely receives utterance for fear of punishment. But as soon as a man, more bold than his neighbours, raises a standard of revolt, whose success appears to be secure, the bulk of the oppressed first sympathize with, yet fear to join him, then, after watching eagerly the course of events, and admiring the boldness of men more resolute than themselves, they timidly make common cause with the reformer, and, if circumstances favour them, they become enthusiastic. As the news of the mental revolt swells, the people, tired of oppression, rise in their might and sweep away the hierarchy, or compel it to abandon its pretensions. Buddha and Christ were such leaders as we here describe, and such was the course gone through by their followers. The timid Peter denying Jesus, and yet afterwards boldly preaching him up, is an example almost too well known to be quoted.
We are now in a position to inquire into the nature of Siddartha's teaching.
Premising that his doctrines were collected at least 200 years B. C., the first which we notice is one that he not only inculcated by language but enforced by his abiding example. He taught that the comforts and pleasures of this life act as fetters, to chain man's spirit to earth; that day by day they necessitate the cultivation of propensities and passions more or less bestial in their nature; and that as these strengthen, so the individual who possessed them would be born again, after his death, to some form of misery and woe in which he would have to atone for the human infirmities which he had not conquered. To escape from the possibility of such an event, Sakya counselled his disciples to wean themselves, as far as possible, from every sensual passion; to mortify the body by fasting, so as to make it more readily separable from the inner man; to renounce all comfort except that of doing good; and believing in a state of perfect future salvation.
A man, he taught, must abandon everything as valueless compared with the attainment of salvation or nirvana; he must be wholly dependent upon others for food and raiment; he must take no thought for the morrow, and live like a bird or lily, laying up no store; for certainly a disciple of Sakya ought not to undertake any trade or other means of gaining a livelihood, lest it should ensnare his spirit and tie it down to the grovelling things of earth.
This was the rule for the very faithful, the infirm believers had a more lenient code.
If we now turn to the doctrine said to have been taught by Jesus and his disciples, we shall find a close parallel between it and that of the Indian teacher. For example, John says (1 Epis. ii. 15,16) "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world." Paul says (Rom. xii. 2) "Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." James also says (ch. iv. 4) "Know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God; whosoever, therefore, will be a friend of the world, is the enemy of God." Again, we find in Matthew xix., Mark x., and Luke xii., the story of a young man who was possessed of wealth, probably scarcely less than that of Sakya Muni, and whose life had been conscientiously conducted, according to the commandments which he knew, and who having heard of Jesus, came to ask him if there were a more certain way of salvation than the one he was in. To him the reply is,—"If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven, and come and follow me." In the verses, moreover, which follow, there is a remark from the same teacher to the effect, that "every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundred fold, and shall inherit everlasting life."
Once again, we find an exact counterpart of Buddha's teaching in the sermon on the Mount, which is recorded in Matth. vi. 25-34—"I say unto you, take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink, nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air, for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?... Why take ye thought for raiment, consider the lilies of the field... if God so clothe the grass... shall he not much more clothe you? Therefore take no thought, saying, what shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or wherewithal shall we be clothed?... Take therefore no thought for the morrow... sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." Other similar passages might readily be given, but the above suffice to demonstrate the Buddhistic teaching of the prophet of Nazareth.
Both start from the idea that death, disease, pain, and misery is the result of sin—and both imagine that sin consists in living and acting upon the natural wants, necessities, and propensities of human kind. Both imagine that to be natural is to be vile, and that salvation is to be attained by resisting every impulse which is common to mankind Man desires to eat when hungry—this is a weakness to be combated; a mother loves her babe—this must not be tolerated; a youth covets a damsel in marriage—this is a snare to draw both down to hell; celibacy must be enforced. The argument runs thus,—If any one enjoys life he is sure to fear death, and will certainly pay for his pleasures; but if any one has the resolution to pass his years on earth in misery like that of hell, he will be glad to die, and fearless of any place of torment; use has bred a habit in him and no torture can come amiss.
Some Christian author has ventured to assert "religion never was designed to make our pleasures less," but he was a conspicuous heretic. Buddha's doctrine was founded upon the assertion that life is always short, and that it is not worth a man's while to buy a few years of enjoyment with myriads of years of agony. Jesus preached that the Jews' time was short, for they, and most probably all the world besides, were to be burned up any day within the duration of the generation—what then was the use of laying up stores of grain, of buying fine clothes, and keeping wine to get mellow?
Both preachers were equally short sighted and absurd in their teaching, for if their disciples were to live upon alms, and all repented and adopted the doctrine, it is clear that all would starve together, and self immolation by hunger was repugnant to both prophets. If no one made clothes all must go naked, and indecency was forbidden. If no one was to lay up money, there would be no one to pay for work, yet toil was considered to be a duty. If every one was to live from hand to mouth, who would keep a calf until it became a heifer, or a lamb to become a sheep?
It is difficult to conceive that two individuals could have worked out such a scheme of salvation independently, and the minuteness of the resemblances induces me to believe that Jesus, possibly without knowing it, first adopted and then promulgated in Judea the doctrines of the Indian sage.
Following, again, the lead of St. Hilaire (Le Bouddha, &c, 1860, pp. 81, et seq.), we find that Siddartha taught 600 years B. C., that death and all the miseries of mankind were due to the passions, desires, and sins of man; that all this misery would cease in Nirvana (of which we shall speak by and by), and that the means to attain to this salvation is to keep the true faith; to have a correct judgment; to be truthful in all things, and to hold every false thing in abhorrence; always to act and to think with a pure and honest mind; to adopt a religious life, i.e., one that is in no respect worldly, not owing even subsistence to anything which might be tainted with sin; to practise a careful and earnest study of the law; to cultivate a good memory, so that all mistakes in conduct may be remembered if they have occurred, and be avoided in the future; and frequent meditation, i.e., an abstraction of the mind from self consciousness, a thinking of nothing, so as to approximate the soul to Nirvana. These were Buddha's fundamental verities. It is put more shortly thus,—"Practising no evil, advancing in the exercise of every virtue, purifying one's self in mind and will, this is indeed the doctrine of all the Buddhas." Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, vol. xix. p. 473.
We may once more stop to compare the teaching of Siddartha with that familiar to Christians. Paul says, for example (Rom. v. 12) "As by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned;" again, in chap, vi. 23, "the wages of sin is death;" again, in chap. vii. 5, "when we were in the flesh the motions of sins... did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death;" and again, chap. viii. 6, "to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace." We may next refer to what some call the fundamental teaching of Jesus, as enunciated in answer to the question of the young man "What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?" Matthew xix., Mark x., "If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments. Thou shalt do no murder, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, honour thy father and thy mother, and thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." And when the young man asserted that he had done so, all that he was told to do in addition, was to sell his property, give the proceeds to the poor, and become a follower of Jesus, who had not where to lay his head, and to live upon the charity of other people. I must, however, notice in passing, that the teaching of Jesus is not by any means so uniform as that of Sakya, for we find the former here instructing a young man to do no murder, but at a subsequent period, that of the last supper, Jesus exhorts his disciples, and through them, possibly, the very man to whom he rehearsed the commandments, thus "He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one," (Luke xxii 36). Certainly a direct encouragement to homicide.
For the benefit of the Buddhists a short formula of faith has been framed, which is to this effect—"Tathâgata (another name of Sakya Muni), in the proper condition, has explained that our present state is produced by antecedent causes, and the great Sramana, or Ascetic (another cognomen of Siddartha), has told us how to avoid the effects of sin. The effects are pain and actual existence, having for their cause past sins; the cause is the production of suffering: the cessation of these effects is Nirvana, the teaching of Tathâgata, or of the great Sramana, is the way which leads to Nirvana." The Christian formula runs, "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." To this we may compare a Nepaulese saying, "Arise, leave your possession, take up the law of Buddha, and break asunder the power of death."
In addition to the fundamental maxim given on the preceding page, Sakya Muni added many others, amongst them, "Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not lie, thou shalt not get drunk;" others are of lighter consequence—"thou shalt not eat out of due season, thou shalt not watch dances or theatrical representations, or listen to songs or music, thou shalt abstain from all ornamentation of dress, &c., and from perfume; thou shalt not have a large bed, nor ever take gold or silver; thou shalt remain inflexibly chaste."
To those who desired to become disciples and personal friends of Buddha, it was ordained that (a) They should only be clothed with rags taken from the cemeteries, or from heaps of refuse, or found on the high road. (b) That there should only be three of these vestments, and that each should be stitched by the wearer, and that they should be covered with a cloak of yellow wool (c) That the food should be as simple as possible—a rule adopted by Christian saints, but not by Bishops. (d) That all should live upon alms and offerings, which should be begged for, in perfect silence, from house to house, and placed in a vessel made of wood—a plan adopted by certain Christian mendicant friars. (e) That only one meal should be taken during the day—a rule to be found in some Christian monasteries. (f) That no aliments, even the most simple, should be taken after noon, the rest of the day after this period should be devoted to teaching and meditation. (g) The faithful should live in the wilderness or forest, and not in towns or villages. Hence Christian hermits lived in the deserts of the Thebaid. (h) They should only shelter themselves under the boughs and leaves of trees. (i) They should sit with the back supported only by the trunk chosen for refuge. (j) They should sleep sitting, and not lying down. (k) They should never change their sitting mat from the place where it was put first. (l) The disciples should unite together, at least upon one night in the month, to meditate amongst the tombs upon the instability of human things. Mendicity, chastity, and asceticism were essential parts of Sakya Muni's practice, and St. Hilaire (op. cit., p. 87) naively remarks that these certainly are not the means for making good citizens, though they may produce good saints.
We may notice, in passing, that the pious followers of Sramana (the one who mastered his passions) were very much more proper, in our eyes, than some of the Brahmins, from whom they seceded, inasmuch as the former wore sufficient garments to cover themselves decently, whilst the latter, whom the Greeks called "Gymnosophists," went without any more clothing than the horse or ass. It is also to be noticed that Siddartha provided a sort of code of laws to be observed by those who wished to adopt his method of salvation, without becoming altogether "religious." These consisted in the enforcement of chastity, purity, patience, courage, contemplation, and knowledge—these were, it was asserted, the transcendent virtues which would pass man across the river of death. They would not land him there in life, but whilst these were adopted as the rule of life, the aspirant was in the right way to attain "Nirvana."
The charity which Sakya Muni ordained was universal, extending even to what we call the lower animals, and one example is given in which a disciple cast himself into the sea to save a boat's crew in danger of death from a storm, whilst another tells of Buddha giving himself as food to a tigress, who had not sufficient milk for her young ones.
Again, the precept against "lying" included false witness, and all that we call "bad language," as well as trifling chat, called "badinage," "wit," and the like. Persons were not only to avoid wrong, but they were to cultivate every good habit, or what we designate each "Christian grace." It was inculcated, that beauty of language, or eloquence, pleasantness of voice, and a due respect to cadence should be studied, so as to make their teaching popular, a precept not much regarded amongst ordinary Christian divines. Beyond other things, humility was inculcated, not that which exists on the lips only, and is apparently compatible with the determined endeavour to exercise unlimited power, which has been conspicuous in the Papacy for a millennium at least, but that which conceals greatness and demonstrates littleness. Thus there is a legend of Buddha refusing, at the request of a king, to exhibit any miracle to convince his opponents, his answer being, "Great king, I do not teach the law to my hearers by saying to them, 'Go, oh you religious men! and before Brahmins and house-holders perform, by means of a supernatural power, miraculous things, which no other men can effect,' but I say to them, in teaching them the law, 'Live, oh ye pious ones, so as to conceal your good works, and to let your sins be seen.'"
At this point we pause once more to draw a parallel between Siddartha and Jesus, though, in the delineation of the doctrine of the latter, we shall see a discrepancy which appears to indicate two distinct authorships in the recorded story. We refer, in the first place, to Luke vi, wherein we find, v. 27, et seq., "Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and to him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other" (compare Matt. v. 39, 40). Again, Matt. vi. 3, "When thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth," and in v. 6, "When thou prayest, enter into thy closet," &c.; v. 16, "When ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance." Side by side with this we may place the directions given in Matt, x., where we find that Jesus called his disciples unto him, and gave them "power against unclean spirits to cast them out, and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease "—they were, moreover, "to cleanse the lepers and raise the dead," i.e.t the disciples were to perform miracles; but if they, in their wanderings and teachings, should be rejected, despised, or affronted, the apostles were to shake off the dust of their feet against the persecutors, being certain that condign punishment would fall upon the offenders.
It is curious that in the histories of the Indian and the Jew, there should be analogous discrepancies between records of their sayings and doings. Siddartha and Jesus are represented, each of them, as declining to perform miracles when asked or expected to do so. Nevertheless, in the same histories we find marvellous accounts of the wonders which they performed. We have seen the clashing reports of Buddha, the following reports of the son of Mary are equally discordant. To make the dissonance more striking, we place the passages in parallel columns.
At what time after the death of Jesus the miracles recorded of him were fabricated we can scarcely tell. If, with most critical scholars, we believe that John's Gospel was written by some Neoplatonic Greek, at least a century and a-half after the period alluded to, we must also believe, either that all the legends about the casting out of devils by the son of Mary were invented after the time when "John" lived, or else, which is probable, that the last evangelist gave no credit to them, if they did already exist; and if the good sense and superior knowledge of "John" led him to discredit the tale about the legion of devils, which left one man* to enter into about two thousand pigs, I do not see that other Christians are obliged to believe the legend. From considerations which we advanced in the articles Prophets, Prophecy, &c., in Ancient Faiths (Vol. II., p. 515), and especially in the history of Barcochab, who was supposed to be the Messiah by some Jews in A.D. 131-5, we argued that new matter was certainly introduced into the story of Jesus told by Matthew, Mark, and John, as late as the era of that enthusiastic Hebrew leader. We noticed the doubts that existed in the minds of many early Christians as to whether this redoubtable warrior was not "the man" of whom the prophets spake. We may now still further notice that he professed to perform miracles, which appear to be thoroughly contemptible when weighed against those of the gospels. To our mind it is inconceivable that the followers of Mary's son could have been acquainted with the marvellous works attributed to Jesus in the gospels, and, yet be shaken by such a man as Barcochab. We notice, also, that not one "Epistle" writer refers to them—consequently, we believe that all the wondrous tales told of the prophet of Nazareth, must have been introduced after the time of Hadrian (in whose reign Barcochab was destroyed), and were fabricated by pious Christians, to prove that the Messiah, in whom they believed, was infinitely superior to that warrior whom others had for a time trusted. Both, to be sure, had been killed by the Romans, and thus both might seem upon a par, but if history could be cooked—and there is probably no single history existing which is strictly true—to show that the first performed a hundred times the wonderful works of the second, he would thus become greatly exalted. See especially Matt. xxiv. 24, in confirmation of this view. Be this as it may, there is, I understand, solid foundation for the assertion that the New Testament, such as we have it now, might have been composed, altered, curtailed, added to, remodelled, or otherwise fashioned, at any period between the years a.d. 50 and 300, after which change was difficult, though we cannot say impossible. A corresponding statement is true of the books which record the life and doctrines of Buddha.
* In Matthew viii. 30-32, we are told that there were two
men who were possessed with the devils which subsequently
entered the herd of swine;—in Mark v. 11-13, the spirits
are represented as being concentrated in one person, and in
Luke viii. 32-33, the tale appears in the same guise as in
Mark—only the man is made to call himself "Legion," on
account of the multitude of devils living inside him. In
cases of this kind one need not be rigidly particular, for
it signifies little whether the spirits were one thousand in
one man or two thousand in two—the wonder is that spirits
could talk—fly away from man to pig, or commit suicide in
the bodies of the swine when they might have done the same
thing in one or two men. It is clear from the miracle that
certain devils change their habits when they take up their
habitation in porcine instead of human beings.
At this period of our parallel we may profitably examine the New Testament, and ascertain whether we cannot extract from it a tolerably fair account of the life and teaching of Jesus, without including therein a single act of thaumaturgy. We fearlessly assert, not only that we can, but that the miracles are not an essential part of his doctrine. For example, we learn that Jesus was the son of a woman betrothed to a carpenter, who became pregnant ere yet the ceremony of marriage was gone through. Her affianced husband did not make her frailty an excuse for annulling the contract, possibly for a good, and to him a sufficient reason. He married the already fruitful Mary, and her child passed amongst the neighbours as being the son of Joseph. This we learn from Matt. xiii. 55, where we find the people saying, "Is not this the carpenter's son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas, and his sisters, are they not all with us?" a statement repeated in similar terms, Mark vi. 3. This short account is important, since it completely destroys the papal doctrine that Mary was "ever virgin," for she bore at least four other sons than her first born, and two daughters. At no period was Jesus regarded either by the family or by the neighbours as illegitimate, nor is there any reason to believe that Joseph looked upon him otherwise than as his own son. Indeed, in Luke ii. 42-48, the carpenter distinctly appears to act as if he recognized Jesus as his own offspring—in verse 48, Mary says, "Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing," asserting as plainly as words could speak, that Joseph had begotten Jesus. It is true that the youth replied, "Wist ye not that I must be about my father's business?" but the story adds the important information, that the couple did not understand the saying.
It is clear to us, that if the legend of the impregnation of Mary by the Holy Ghost, after that event had been previously announced to her, and if, as we are told in Matt. i. 20, Joseph had been informed by "the angel of the Lord" that the foetus in Mary's womb was begotten by the Holy Ghost, it would not have been possible for Joseph and his wife to have misunderstood the words of Jesus. The very wonder which they expressed demonstrates the belief of the parents that there was nothing unusual in the conception. The father Joseph knew that he had borne his share in the event, and Mary knew that she had not conversed with any other man; consequently, for her son to indicate another father than Joseph, naturally mystified her. We therefore cannot allow the assertion to pass, that the conception and birth of Jesus was in itself a miracle. But as we shall revert to the subject in a separate chapter, we will say no more about it here.
After living and working with his parents for some years, Jesus was attracted by the preaching of his cousin John, whose doctrines were essentially Buddhistic and Essenian. Like the Hindoos, he used water as an emblem of purification, and urged his hearers to repentance and good conduct. What motives urged John to become "the voice of one crying in the wilderness," we have no means of judging, but the gospel narratives tell us that he, like Jesus, believed in the almost immediate destruction of the world. His text was, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Jesus adopted the view, and promulgated it more extensively. His text was the same as that of his cousin, but more expanded. "The kingdom of heaven means glory to the righteous, and everlasting life; misery and everlasting destruction to the wicked. The time is near, hasten to escape from the coming vengeance." The earnestness of Jesus, his acquaintance with the prophets, his self-denial and his constant kindness, endeared him to the common people. The same virtues had a like effect in the case of Buddha. Amongst villagers and poverty-stricken fishermen he soon won his way, and every one had some story to tell of him, which increased in wonder as it passed from mouth to ears, and from these to the tongue of the listeners. Those who know how an ordinary circumstance may gradually become described as miraculous, even in England, can well imagine how the miracles of Jesus and Siddartha were produced.
In time Jesus endeavoured to induce the magnates of Jerusalem to adopt his doctrine, and to trust in repentance for salvation rather than in sacrifice, but the enthusiast could not overcome the ritualists, and they at once began to weigh their power against the influence of Jesus upon the multitude. After a time the priests were convinced that supremacy rested with them, and the man who preached a religion of the heart, was sacrificed by the adherents of ceremonial. Such a fight is common, as we see around us. The Evangelicals and the Ritualists of to-day, resemble the followers of Jesus and of Moses. When the latter appeared in the guise of powerful Romanist rulers, they put down the former, but now when the former are the strongest, they endeavour to depress the latter.
After the death, or the withdrawal of Jesus from public life—for we have no belief in the legends of his resurrection—considering that his apparent decease was a prolonged fainting fit, for had he been dead blood would not have followed a spear wound as it did—the disciples of Jesus spread his fame largely. Whilst Jesus was with them they clung to him; when he was no more, each man became a preacher, and then Christianity spread until it met with Buddhism in Egypt, and thus became developed in a peculiar direction. Then came the gospels, which made Jesus a second Sakya. Although we can readily conceive that Jesus, like his paltry successor, Joe Smith, the Mormon, captivated the minds of hundreds without performing any supernatural deed, and that his "elders" vastly increased the number of those who believed in him, yet it is clear, that ancient and modern theologians were and are anxious to establish the reality of the thaumaturgy attributed to Jesus, that they may appeal to it to demonstrate that he was the son of God, an incarnation of a portion of the creative mind—"the word," or logos, having the same relationship to Jehovah, the "I Am," the Self-Existent One, as Buddha, "the understanding" had to "Brahma," The Supreme One.
Accepting this issue for the sake of argument, we affirm once again that, as the miracles of Sakya and of the son of Mary are equally unreliable, or equally true, Buddha was as much a true son of God as Christ was, or that Jesus was no more an incarnation of Jehovah, than Siddartha was of Brahma. Jehovah and Brahma being merely different names for the same great Being. That miracles are not necessary to the spread of a new faith, the history of modern Presbyterianism and Mormonism distinctly proves. For further remarks, we refer the reader to the article Miracle in the preceding volume. We will postpone to a subsequent page what we have to say respecting the asceticism of the Buddhists, and that which was prevalent in the early Christian church. For the present, we resume our account of Sakya Muni's teaching as described by St. Hilaire.
Founded upon his doctrine of absolute humility, he established the custom of confession amongst his apostles or disciples, and amongst those who venerated his teaching, though they did not' become his immediate followers. This confession was not that simply auricular one enforced by Ritualists, but it was made twice a month, at the new and the full moon, before the great Sramana and the congregation, in a clear voice. Powerful kings are reported to have followed this practice.
It will not require more than a minute's reflection to see that the Buddhistic system of confession was far superior—as regards the end in view—than that which has been adopted by Romanists and Ritualists. Sakya and James (ch. v. 16) advised the practice in question, that the sinner might be humiliated in his own eyes, and deterred from the necessity of having again to acknowledge a fall from virtue before a congregation of the faithful. Popes and Protestant Ritualists, on the contrary, use confession for the purpose of inquiring into the character of every penitent, and the practice is adopted by the sinner, not with the view of repentance, but to wipe out periodically a sin which is habitually renewed.
If confessions were made before a congregation, instead of to a priest in a closet, or some other secret spot, there would not then be current so many scandalous stories as there are—too true, alas, in many instances—respecting women who have been debauched under the guise of religion, and priests who have prostituted the ordinances of their church, until they have made them pander to vice, and act as seeds to produce immorality.
Though personally Tathâgata preached celibacy, he had not, like some of the so-called saints of Christianity, any feeling of disrespect towards family ties. He always spoke affectionately of his mother, though he never knew her, and the legends say that he endeavoured to convert her in heaven. His command that all his followers should honour their father and mother was repeatedly enforced, that being only second to the duty of learning, venerating, and keeping the law. It even went so high as to include endeavours to teach the parents if they were ignorant.
One of the main duties of every teacher appointed by Siddartha, was to go about preaching the law, and exhorting his hearers to learn and to obey it. But no one, on any account, was to introduce the persecuting element. No respect whatever was to be paid to caste, all being alike human before God. Buddha himself is described as a very striking preacher, charming his hearers by his clear and eloquent diction, astonishing them by his supernatural power, sometimes instructing the common folk with ingenious parables, and inciting them to emulation by telling what others had done. He referred to the sins which had been committed in former days by an ancient people, and how severely punished those who had committed them had been, or still were, and he even recorded his own faults, that others might learn to avoid them. He urged all his hearers to cultivate truth and reason, which is certainly not a Christian practice, and not blindly to obey their spiritual guides, as the modern faithful are taught to do. By making the practice of every virtue the sole means for attaining eternal salvation, he practically discouraged vice, but it does not appear that he endeavoured actively to denounce immorality, sin, or sinners. He did not, like many modern persons, "compound for sins they are inclined to, by damning those they have no mind to." It is distinctly declared that it was not necessary for ordinary followers of Buddha to become what is called "religious," or "to enter into religion," as friars, monks, &c. To those who preferred an ordinary mode of life, instructions were given, that they should cultivate charity, purity, patience, courage, contemplation, and knowledge. Indeed, we may assert that the precepts of Jesus, as recorded in Matthew v., vi, and viii, and in Luke iii. 7 to 14, are not essentially different from those propounded by Sakya Muni Neither the one nor the other ordered or even recommended all men to be celibate, all men to become poor, all soldiers to leave their profession—but both urged upon every one who wished for salvation, to be kind, pure, patient, courageous, thoughtful and eager after all knowledge. It would be well if those calling themselves Christians would endeavour more fully to understand that cultivating science is the same as advancing in the knowledge of God.
Some of the remarkable parables found in Buddhist books are very probably the original ones of Sakya; they are certainly ingeniously framed to illustrate his doctrine. Nor is there wanting, indeed, one in which there is an episode resembling the story of the thief upon the cross. It is of a lovely courtesan who falls deeply in love with a jeweller, young, and a devoted follower of Buddha, and solicits his company. To every message she sends him, he returns the answer "it is not time for you to see me." At length she commits a crime, and is sentenced to have ears, nose, hands, and feet cut off, and to be carried to the graveyard to die, leaving the cut off members at her ankles. At this period the young man visits her, to see the true nature of those joys which drown men in perdition; then he consoles the poor creature by teaching her the law; his discourse brings calm into her breast, and she dies in professing Buddhism with a certainty that she will rise again amongst the good.
We may mention, in passing, that there were female Buddhists as well as males, both being on the same footing. The law, as announced by Sakya, equally concerned and affected the two sexes.
Another and very interesting parable tells of a king who came before a Buddhist priest and his assembled hearers, to the number of 350, to confess his crimes, amongst others murder, and his resolution to avoid all faults in future, and Bhagavat (the teacher's name) at once remits, in conformity with the law, the faults of the king, which have thus been expiated before a numerous assembly of the faithful, a remarkable instance of remorse, repentance, confession, and remission of sin—some centuries before Jesus was born.
At length a powerful king, Asoka, was converted to the new faith, or came to the throne already a Buddhist, in the year b.c. 263, and reigned thirty-seven years, during which time he devoted himself to spreading the religion of his choice. He sent out a cloud of earnest missionaries who spread themselves over Hindostan, Ceylon, China, Japan, and Thibet. Indeed, they seem to have gone wherever there was means of locomotion, or a knowledge of the existence of a people. As the Greeks were then certainly trading with India, both by land and sea, it would be surprising if the Buddhist missionaries had not accompanied the merchant ships, or the overland convoys to Alexandria. But this subject, it is convenient for the present to postpone.
There are two points connected with the teaching of Sakya Muni to which many Christian writers have especially addressed their remarks, apparently with the view of rendering Buddha more or less contemptible, or at least of degrading him far below Jesus of Nazareth. It is asserted that Siddartha did not believe in a god, and that his Nirvana was nothing more than absolute annihilation. To these I am disposed to add, that the Buddhists were not taught to pray, nor did their founder practise the custom.
To my own mind, the assertion that Sakya did not believe in God is wholly unsupported. Nay, his whole scheme is built upon the belief that there are powers above which are capable of punishing mankind for their sins. It is true that these "gods" were not called Elohim, nor Jah, nor Jahveh, nor Jehovah, nor Adonai, nor Eliieh (I am), nor Baalim, nor Ashtoreth—yet, for "the son of Suddhodana" (another name for Sakya Muni, for he has almost as many, if not more than the western god), there was a supreme being called Brahma, or some other name representing the same idea as we entertain of the Omnipotent. Still further, in the life of Buddha, quoted by St. Hilaire (p. 9) we find the following as part of the thoughts of the young Siddartha—"The three worlds, the world of the gods, the world of the assours (the benighted ones, or, as we should call them, 'the devils ), and that of men, are all plagued by the occurrence of old age and disease." We do not, for we dare not assert that this opinion is identical with ours; but we are equally indisposed to say that the opinions current amongst ourselves are absolutely true.
Men living in future days, and whose minds are educated, will probably declare, "that the Christians of Europe and elsewhere, for nearly two thousand years, had no god but the devil They said he was good, but they painted him as one who rejoiced in pain, lamentation, mourning, and woe." Buddha preached that man suffered from the effects of his sins, and that unless he attained salvation, he would be punished everlastingly. The son of Mary, and all his followers, taught, and Christians still entertain the belief, that man suffers from the sin of a progenitor (assumed to be the parent of all mankind), and that each person will be tortured throughout eternity unless he is able to mollify his maker, who is also his judge. Both teachers had necessarily an idea of a power able to make laws for the conduct of human life, to ordain rewards for good behaviour, and to apportion punishment for offences, and yet who was sufficiently forgiving to cease from requital, "for a consideration," the bribe being invariably a bloody one. Jesus called this power "my Father," Siddartha called him Brahma, the Supreme one.
Jesus and his followers have asserted that the power of the son with "the Father" is so great, that the latter will conform to the former, nay, he even asserts his identity with the Supreme in the words "I and my father are one," (John x. 30). See also Acts iv. 12, and 1 Thess. v. 9, in which it is distinctly affirmed that Jesus is the sole means by which man can attain salvation, or, in other words, turn away the wrath of God and change it into love. But Jesus could only rise to the position of equal or prime favourite by a very sanguinary process, as we find from Heb. ix. 22, that there could be no remission of sin without shedding of blood. From the following verses, and from Heb. x. 19, we learn that it is by the sacrifice of himself that Jesus entered into his heavenly powers.
Can any one who depicts the gods of savages, of Grecians and others to whom human beings were immolated in hundreds, call such deities "devils," and then assert that the Jehovah, whom he extols as above all gods, is not painted by men in the same colours. Siddartha's god was not a sanguinary one, nor did Buddha always talk of shedding blood, or profess to give his disciples his own flesh to eat, and his blood to them, that they might all drink of it.
The way in which this Supreme One, Brahma, was painted at his time was accepted by Sakya as he found it. He no more questioned the accepted truths of Hindooism, than Jesus doubted about the absolute truth of the Hebrew scriptures. But, in his own mind, after he had contemplated deeply on the subject, he believed that the discovery which he had made of the way to Nirvana, universal knowledge, or whatever else Nirvana was, had raised him above Sakra Brahma, Mahesvara, and all the gods of the pantheon.
Instead of breaking into expressions respecting the insanity or the blasphemy of such an idea, let us school ourselves into calmness, and turn to our own New Testament and read over Philippians, chap, ii. vv. 5-11, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross: wherefore God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father."
Still further, I have repeatedly heard Protestant Christian divines assert that Jesus was really "Lord of the world above," and I cannot see any greater insanity or blasphemy in the son of Suddodana believing that he was at least equal with God, than in the son of Mary asserting "I and my Father are one" (John x. 30), and when reproached for making himself thus equal with God, he is reported to have remonstrated with his auditors who accused him of blasphemy because he asserted himself to be the son of God. The creeds of the Anglican and Roman churches repeatedly declare the identity of Jesus with Jehovah, e.g., "equal to the Father as touching his godhead."
The natural rejoinder to this representation is the assertion by the Christian that he knows that Jesus of Nazareth really was what he represented himself, and he is sure that Sakya Muni was not; but, on the other hand, the Buddhist may say just the reverse with equal pertinacity. This argument, if such a name it really deserves, is so common amongst all careless religionists, that it deserves a few words in reply. It is based upon the very natural notion, "what I believe, must be true," and to an objector, the only answer is the question, "you don't fancy that I can be wrong, do you?" When two such persons as a Christian and a Mahometan met in days gone by, these were the only arguments used by each, and they were first of all enforced by such revilings as come naturally to the faithful—"hound of a Moslem"—"dog of a Christian," "you are a serpent"—"you are a viper," and the like; from words they came to blows, and the strongest arm was supposed to demonstrate the correctness of the victor's faith. If, instead of taking physical strength as a test of truth, we assume that a numerical preponderance on one side or another proves the correctness of the belief held by the greatest number, we come to the absurd conclusion that what is right to-day may be wrong to-morrow. Babylonians were once far more numerous than Jews, and Jews than Christians, to-day the last exceed vastly both the others. Now, there are more Buddhists in existence than true followers of Jesus, in the next century the proportion may be reversed.
Truth does not so fluctuate, and a philosopher who uses his reason will take up a different stand entirely, and affirm that a man cannot become God by meditation, fancy or assertion, nor yet by the consent or vote of millions of his fellow-men, and that the assumption that any individual must be, and is the begotten son of God, is on a par with the folly of the potentates who call themselves brothers of the sun and moon. Such absurdity and blasphemy are very common, nevertheless, and men believe that Jesus is God, because they have elected him to that elevated position by a general vote—or European plebiscite.
We now address ourselves to another important statement made by some writers upon the religion of Sakya Muni, to the effect that he taught annihilation to be the end most desirable for good men who have learned and practised the law. This view is held by St. Hilaire, who, in almost every other respect, has shown himself an historian rather favourable to Siddartha than otherwise, and who speaks with some regret of the conclusion which he feels obliged to draw. But he is opposed upon this point by a very great English or German authority, viz., Max Müller, who, in a lecture delivered before the general Meeting of the Association of German Philologists at Kiel, and which is to be found translated in Trubner's American and Oriental Literary Record, Oct. 16, 1869, distinctly declares his belief that the nihilism attributed to Buddha's teaching forms no part of his doctrine, and that it is wholly wrong to suppose that Nirvana signified annihilation.
When two such earnest inquirers differ, it is instructive to notice the reason why. This is to be found in the fact that the etymological signification of the word does signify "nothingness," or "extinction," but not, as Müller contends, annihilation of the individual, but a complete cessation of all pain and misery. The last quoted author shows that Siddartha used Nirvana as synonymous with Moksha, Nirvritti, and other words, all designating the highest state of spiritual liberty and bliss, but not annihilation. It seems to be perfectly clear that what was meant by Sakya is, that to the good who have embraced the means of salvation preached by him, the future world would be a haven of rest, in which all sorrow, suffering, and sin should be annihilated. But the teacher does not go beyond this, and descant upon the opposite conditions, and promise joys ineffable and full of glory. His followers believe that they will attain to immortality, and that they will be free from all such horrors as life brings with it. But the pleasures which they expect are negative.
Before we either pity or despise Siddartha for not giving his followers any idea of what we call Heaven, it would be well to endeavour to discover the true teaching of Jesus of Nazareth upon this point, and the ideas of his followers. We must also say a few words about his ideas of Hell. He clearly believed that there was a place in which those whose lives had been wicked would be punished after death by the devil and his angels—the place was one of outer darkness, where shall be weeping and wailing, and gnashing of teeth (Matt. viii. 12). In Matt. xiii. 42 this place of outer darkness is described as "a furnace of fire," and in Mark ix. 43-44 this fire is described as one that never shall be quenched, and in which there lives a worm. In Luke xvi. 23-24 there is an expression of the belief that the body lives after death in its usual form, and has eyes, a tongue, the power of speech, &c.; yet in Matt. x. 28 the doctrine is inculcated that both body and soul are destroyed in Hell. In Jude 7 and 13 Hell is again described as a place of unquenchable fire, and yet one occupied by the blackness of darkness; whilst in Revelation xix. 20 and xx. 10 we are told that the fire is a lake of burning brimstone. Of the absolute locality of this horrible spot not a word is said.
On the other hand, Heaven is described (Matt xiii. 43) as a place where the righteous shall shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of God. In Luke xvi. 22 the pleasure of Heaven is made to consist of a simple repose in the bosom of Abraham; but though we are there led to believe that the blessed can see the torments of the damned, it does not appear that either "the father of the faithful," or the poor beggar Lazarus, take any pleasure in contemplating them, as some few divines of the church of England believe that they will do, when they have arrived at the abode of bliss, and see their enemies in the burning lake. Paul, when writing to the Corinthians, (1 Ep. xv.) gives his idea of the resurrection of the just as one in which each man will be a spiritual edition of his former terrestrial self, but beyond the statement in 1 Thess. iv. 17, that the redeemed will, when in heaven, dwell for ever with the Lord, he expresses no opinion of the occupation of the glorified ones. In John's gospel (xiv. 2) Jesus is reported as saying,—"In my Father's house are many mansions or houses—I go to prepare a place for you," but there is nothing like any account of what is to be done in those abodes.
Again, we find, Ps. xvi. 11, in a verse which has been largely adapted to Christianity, an idea of Heaven given thus—"in thy presence is fulness of joy, at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore." What David's pleasures were we may judge from his life, and we may fairly imagine that the writer of the passage had an idea something like that of Mahomet—that there were houris in Heaven for the delectation of the faithful. But in Isaiah lxiv. 4, and I Cor. ii. 9 everything about Heaven is declared to be vague—a something which the eye has not seen, the ear heard, or the heart conceived.
In the book called The Revelation of St. John the Divine, we have a far more detailed account of what was believed by some about heaven, than in any other, and there is no doubt that to it a large number of Christians appeal, for it is, indeed, almost the only foundation on which they can build. Yet the Apocalypse was for a long time an uncanonical book, and its truth and value were, and still are, doubted by many of the faithful. In the part referred to, heaven is described as a place incalculably rich in gold and precious stones, in music and pleasant odours, and its joys are pour-trayed as consisting in constant contact with the evidences of wealth, and in eternally singing a certain refrain, an hour of which would be a great trial to human ears. To this is added the absence of pain, sorrow, and suffering. The New Jerusalem, described in chapter xxi. is nothing more than a palace similar to that of Aladdin, which is described in The Arabian Nights? fabulously adorned with gems, lighted by other means than a burning sun or a cold moon, cooled or refreshed with a river of clear water, and furnished with trees bearing different kinds of fruit, but all delicious—thus involving the certainty that the singing referred to, must have been suspended whilst the palate was regaled—and having leaves said to be for the healing of the nations. The words thus italicised seem to show the indefiniteness of the idea, we dare not say of the knowledge of John, for the existence of this new Jerusalem involves the absence of any disease which required healing; and every person who was not already assigned to the brimstone lake, was a resident on the margin of the crystal river. Such discrepancies are common in visionary writings, and ought to make us distrust them; but instead of that, wild theories are founded upon these absurdities, and the builders thence attempt to prove their own superior knowledge. Well, in this new Jerusalem, every man is to be a ruler, for we are told, that in it the servants of the Lamb (chap. xxii. 3 sq.) shall serve him, and see his face, that his name shall be written upon their foreheads, and they shall reign for ever and ever. The word italicised, very naturally recalls to us an earlier passage in the same book (chap, i. 6) wherein the writer expresses the belief that Jesus Christ has made his followers "kings and priests." It is then clear that John had the notion that in heaven every denizen would be a king. But king over whom? or over what? if every one in new Jerusalem is a ruler, what is he a ruler of? It is, to the critic, moderately certain, that all which the words are intended to convey is, that every inhabitant of the New Jerusalem or Heaven will be as rich and happy as a mundane sovereign. This, again, involves the belief that the author of the Apocalypse had an essentially sensual idea of Heaven, and that he pourtrayed it as a man would do, who, pining in misery, suffering from disease, pinched with want, obliged to serve as the slave of wealth, and to contribute much, out of his little, to the king's taxes, saw daily, and envied deeply, the high position and great wealth of a tyrant, with whom, his faith induced him to believe, that he would change places hereafter.
That the descriptions of Heaven in Revelation can be considered as reliable, by any thoughtful Christian, I marvel, for they are bound up with an assurance which the lapse of time has fully demonstrated to be false. In chap, xxii., v. 12 and 20, the one who is described as the Lord of the New Jerusalem, the Christian Heaven, asserts that he is coming quickly, and that his reward is with him. Yet in no sense of the words is this true, nor has it ever been so.
Tested, then, by every available means, we assert that the Heaven described by Jesus of Nazareth and his immediate followers is quite as vague, indistinct, and unreliable as the Buddhist Nirvana; or, if the affirmative be preferred, we say that the Christian Heaven is quite as uncertain or indefinite a prize for Jesus' disciples as the Nirvana of Sakya. Both teachers seem to have been equally confident of the existence of a Hell, and equally cautious in expressing their ideas about a Heaven. And we, who have had the advantage of many centuries of civilization and thought, dare no more frame or promulgate a scheme of Elysium than the Romans did—we really know nothing whatever about a future state.
There is this, however, to be said in favour of Siddartha—he did not, like Mahomet and John, preach a Paradise, in which all the pleasures are worldly, sensuous, or sensual—John promising music and fruit, Mahomet feasting and women. All the Indian's teaching pointed to a future world, in which human passions, frailties, and propensities would find no place, for the purified being would cast off, with his earthly body, every carnal appetite. In fact, there is reason to believe that Buddha's idea was, that after death each essence would become reincorporated with the Great Spirit, of whom his soul had originally formed a part. It is doubtful whether any of us could tell him a more perfect way to the truth about the matter.
Yet, although neither Sakya nor Jesus gave any distinct account of Heaven, it is certain that some of their followers have done so, and it is remarkable to see how they have developed their ideas in the same way. Compare, for example, the account given by John, Apocalypse chaps, xxi., xxii., with the following account, which I copy from the Kusa Iatakya, a Buddhistic legend of Ceylon, by T. Steele, p. 195. "Swarga, or the heaven occupied by Indra, is described as the most splendid the human mind can conceive (Percival's Land of the Vedas, p. 160). Its palaces are composed of pure gold, resplendent diamonds, jasper, sapphire, emerald, and other precious stones, whose brilliance exceeds that of a thousand suns! Its streets are of crystal, fringed with gold. The most beautiful and fragrant flowers adorn its forests, whose trees diffuse the sweetest odours. Refreshing breezes, canopies of fleecy clouds, thrones of the most dazzling brightness, birds of the sweetest melodies, and songs of the most delightful harmony, are heard in the enchanting pleasaunces, which are ever fragrant, ever robed in summer green." The author whom I am quoting follows these remarks with lines from Bernard de Morley's hymn, Jerusalem the Golden, clearly showing how greatly he has been struck with the parallelism between the Buddhist and Christian idea.
So far as I can find, there appears to be a certainty that Sakya Muni did not teach to his followers the necessity for prayer. That Jesus did so teach his disciples is the common belief of Christians. Yet, in the parallel which we are thus drawing, we are perfectly justified in the assertion that the son of Mary did not teach it from his own spontaneous judgment, as John the Evangelist had done before him. Jesus certainly did not originate prayer; indeed, it appears that the subject was forced upon him, and that unless he had been urged to it, he would neither have taught to others the necessity for prayer, nor have dictated the supplication which still passes by his name. The following passage in Luke xi. 1 seems to be decisive upon this point:—"And it came to pass, as he was praying in a certain place, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples." We see, then, in the first place, that Jesus did not hold, as a fundamental doctrine, that prayer was part of the duty of man, but that he took it up as a necessary part of his Jewish education, and adopted it amongst the subjects of his discourses, following the example of John. When we try to penetrate into the mind of Jesus, as shown in "the Lord's Prayer," and ascertain what he regarded as the fittest objects for orison, we find that they are almost exclusively worldly. There is, in the first place, an ascription of praise, or of reverence, then an expression of a desire that the world should become good; that each man should have a daily meal; that all offences should be condoned, and none others committed; and that no harm should happen to any who used the entreaty. Compared with the composition attributed to Solomon, and said to have been uttered by him at the dedication of the temple, that which is said to have been given by Jesus is meagre in the extreme. It does not contain a single supplication for spiritual blessing, or for salvation.
In the mind of a philosopher there is a doubt whether the general heathen notion about prayer, or the apparent Buddhist prayerlessness, is to be the most commended. Yet, ere we discuss the point, I must remark that although Buddha does not appear to have taught the duty of prayer to his disciples, they practise it nevertheless, and have long litanies, chantings, and mechanical contrivances quite as efficacious, and not more absurd, than the senseless repetitions which pass current amongst us for supplications to the Most High. Now, if we require from ourselves a distinct answer to the question, what is prayer? we can frame no other than this—"it is the expression of a desire on our part that the Creator will modify the laws of nature in our favour, in favour of others, or in His own favour!" The idea that He will do this is plainly builded upon the supposition that the Creator is like a man, and can be induced to change His mind—that a creature thinks He is harsh or wrong, and must be set right. When put thus clearly, the most obtuse can see that prayer must necessarily be inefficacious, and must always proceed from a selfishness so intense as to cloak the blasphemy from view.
If, instead of the above definition, we designate prayer as the uttering of a fervent hope or desire for the benefit of an individual, we can understand that it is quite as useful as any other ejaculation. Nothing is more common than for an angry man to curse with all the energy of exasperation; nothing more common than for a punished hound to yelp, and for a child, when pained, to cry or roar. Still further I will say, from personal experience, that the utterance of cries or groans enables an individual to bear pain with less effect upon his nervous system than would be felt if they were suppressed. Vociferations are as natural, and, to some, as necessary as indulging the appetite for hunger. In like manner, when the mind of man, especially of one only partially educated, is dominated by intense fear, or by any form of anxiety or present suffering, there is an instinctive propensity to seek aid from any source, certain or uncertain, and the enunciation of hopes with an audible voice is as much necessary to some as roaring is to a lion, or bleating to a sheep. In this sense prayer is a comfort—it helps to soothe feelings which, if pent up, would become, probably, too great for endurance; and, knowing this, I would no more deride prayer than I would laugh at a baby who cried for his absent mother.
I do not doubt, in the smallest possible degree, that prayer is a comfort under certain circumstances. For example, my child may be seriously ill, and I may do everything which my medical knowledge enables me to do; but day by day drags wearily along, the fever seems to intensify, and it is clear that there is a struggle between the living force, and the agent which interferes with it. As hour after hour passes, and anxiety deepens into fear, I am like a hardy fellow under the lash: at first the stripes are borne with firmness, but as another and another falls, not only does-the pain seem keener, but the mental power which gives courage to bear the cutting agony diminishes, and the pent-up feelings are vented in a roar of anguish, or a groan of despair. Just so in the depth of my misery I may utter a prayer—a wish that in one way or another my torn and lacerated feelings as a father might be healed, and I may expect to receive solace thereby, no matter whether I address Jehovah, Brahma, Ishtar, or the Virgin Mary. To hear the sound of one's own voice, even the task of having to compose an intelligible sentence, relieves, for a time, the poignancy of grief, and thus helps one to bear it more patiently. That supplication thus brings relief I do not for a moment doubt, but that it has any influence in the result I deny.
Entertaining this view, I cannot regard prayer as a duty. It seems to me to be a deliberate insult to the Almighty to be constantly urging Him to alter the course of nature—or as we may otherwise put it "to change His mind." To trust that prayer will obviate the necessity for action seems to me the height of folly. If a man uttered the words "Give me this day my daily bread" a hundred times over, and yet never sought to obtain it, we should regard him as a lunatic. Equally silly should we be if, when praying "Defend us in all assaults of our enemies," we did not prepare for battle—or if, after ejaculating "defend us from all perils and dangers of this night," we were to go to bed without seeing that our premises were as secure as forethought could make them. However much the theologian may believe in prayer, he cannot deny that it is less efficacious than action. Now Buddha preached action whilst Christ preached inaction, e.g., "take no thought for the morrow," &c. (Matt. vi. 25-34), consequently we are more disposed to give the palm for correct judgment to the Indian than to the Jew.
We must, in the next place, notice that many followers of the son of Suddodana and the son of Mary have both acted, and do still act, upon the belief, not only that prayer is a duty, but that every supplication has positive power in the world above—consequently the more extended the utterances the greater their influence. In point of fact, prayers are spoken of as if they were equivalent to sacrifice, alms-giving, or any other supposed virtue. For this there seems to be some foundation in Acts x. 4, where Cornelius is told that his prayers and his alms have come up before God; in James v. vv. 15, 16, we are told that "the prayer of faith shall save the sick;" and that "the effectual, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." In Revelation v. 8, we are told that the prayers of the saints are kept in golden vials in heaven, and used as odours. In chapter viii. 3, we find they are offered with incense upon the celestial altar, and that the two conjointly come before the presence of God. This being so, there is a desire to accumulate prayers on the creditor side of the heavenly books, just as in the days when sacrifices were trusted in, there was an attempt to increase their influence by augmenting the number of the creatures slaughtered. This propensity to multiply orisons was distinctly rebuked by Jesus, who ordered his followers not to make vain repetitions, for that the custom was heathenish and to be avoided; a prohibition which had been made by Siddartha to his followers some centuries before.
To me, I confess, that a life of perpetual prayer without action indicates a belief that God can be "pestered" into doing something that He did not intend; and that it is infinitely worse than a life of action such as Sakya Muni inculcated. I can see no sense in praying for something that I do not want, or that I cannot have without personal exertion. It seems to me sheer nonsense for anyone to pray that he may not grow older, and equally foolish to supplicate that he may live to be a king. In like manner it would be silly in me to petition for power to read Assyrian writing, and yet never study its characters. If, then, by diligent and steady plodding a man can attain his desire, it appears wholly useless in him to pray for it. We may say the same of one who wishes to curb his passions—he can do so to a great extent by assiduous self-control; but he cannot do so any more completely by a lifetime passed in prayer. From this point of view, therefore, we must again side with Siddartha rather than with Jesus.
It now remains to us to make some observations upon the developments of Buddhism after the death of Sakya Muni, but we need not linger over them long. His doctrine of self-denial, of patient suffering, of celibacy, of fasting, of preaching and of meditation, gradually produced a system in which asceticism, solitude, and penance were the prevalent duties. Men and women desirous of being saintly and of attaining to eternal happiness, selected some den, cave, or tree in which they could live a life devoted to contemplation, or else they banded themselves into companies where they could practise the Buddhistic virtues in each other's presence, and one could encourage or correct another. Buddhist monkeries and nunneries are almost as common, and certainly more ancient than Roman Catholic monasteries, and they had very nearly the same numerous accessories in worship, which we are familiar with in papal countries. It is almost impossible to read the accounts given by the Abbé Hue, and other Eastern travellers, of Buddhism in China, Thibet, and Japan, without seeing the close resemblance of the Roman Church to that founded by Siddartha. Indeed, the Abbé was sorely tried by what he saw; and it is rumoured that he was punished by some ecclesiastical authority, and his book suppressed. Pure Buddhism, moreover, was, like pure Christianity, a very painful religion in practice, consequently both the one and the other have degenerated, and have gradually become altered much in the same way—both having amalgamated themselves with other systems, and having gradually eliminated those proceedings which are most repulsive to human nature. In both there is now, apparently, the idea that the ascetic life may be lived, as it were, by deputy. In Buddhism, certain men obtain their living by fasting, meditating, macerating their flesh, and praying instead of other people, being, of course, adequately paid for their endurance of privation. In a branch of the Church founded by Jesus the same notion has obtained, and men who have wallowed in filth, starved themselves, and spent their days in a miserable round of penance and prayer, are dignified by the name of Saints, and are supposed to be able to hand over—for a consideration in money—the benefit of their sufferings to people who wish to live comfortably as well as piously.
Without burdening this chapter with a dissertation upon the Romish doctrine of works of supererogation, I will quote a few extracts from the Roman Missal, in use in England, to show that works done by another can be made available for the use of any particular individual. On January 16, the day of Saint Marcellus, the people are told to pray "that we may be aided by the merits of blessed Marcellus, Thy martyr and bishop, in whose sufferings we rejoice." On January 29, the day of Saint Francis of Sales, we find in the prayer to be used by the people, "mercifully grant that we may by the aid of his merits, attain unto the joys of life everlasting." Again, on February 8, the day of Saint John of Matha, we find in the prescribed prayer, "mercifully grant that by his merits pleading for us, we may be," &c.—and, lastly, we notice on March 19, on Saint Joseph's day, "vouchsafe, O Lord, that we may be helped by the merits of Thy most holy mother's spouse," &c. The practice of the Buddhists is then essentially followed by the Roman Christians.
Pure Buddhism was wholly free from the sexual element so common in other religions of antiquity, and so was the religion of Jesus. Yet in Thibet the first became intermingled therewith and Vajrasatta or Dorjesempa the Thibetan "God above all," is represented in Schlayintweit's Atlas of Plates as a male conjoined with a female; but so ingenious is the contrivance that the many might see the drawings without noticing anything particular, for the trinity and the unity are both hidden from view; and in Europe the latter has introduced St. Foutin and St. Cosmo into her calendar, and has founded her worship of a trinity and a virgin upon the pagan reverence given to the creative organs in both sexes. Veneration for a triune God and his female consort is no more a portion of the teaching of the son of Mary than it was the doctrine of the child of Maya Devi, Buddha's mother.
It will probably be quite as difficult for the reader of the preceding pages, as it has been for the writer of them, to avoid putting the question to himself, "Was Jesus of Nazareth a Buddhist disciple?" In answer to this question I reply that we have no direct proof either on one side or the other, but there is much circumstantial evidence to show that he was. We may marshal it thus:—
1. There is very strong reason for belief that the intercourse between the inhabitants of India and the successors of Alexander was considerable. For example, we find before the time of the Maccabees, b.c. 280, or perhaps somewhat later, that Antiochus, the king of Syria, had 120 elephants—things which had never before been seen in Syria, Palestine, or Egypt, and which took their local name from the Phoenician aleph, a bull—the Jews supposing that they were a new kind of cattle. From the accounts given us we infer that these were Indian, and were trained either by Hindoo mahouts or by Greeks taught in Hindustan. Animals of this size may have come by land or by water. In either case we have evidence of traffic. We have already seen that the great missionary effort of Buddhism took place in the time of Asoka about B.C. 307, and it is not likely that the West would be neglected when the Eastern countries received such attention as they did. The Greeks had by this time found their way by sea to India, and thus it is certain that the route was known. There is then presumptive evidence that Buddhism was taught amongst the people frequenting the kingdom of Antiochus the Second, B.C. 261. At this period and subsequently, this king and his subjects came much into contact with the Jews, so that it is equally easy to believe that the Hebrews were found out by the Hindoo missionaries as that the Alexandrian Greeks were.
2. I have been unable to find in the Jewish law, in Grecian story, in the accounts of old Babylonians, Carthaginians, Romans, Egyptians, or in any other history except that of India, testimony which shows that asceticism was an essential part of religion. It is true that we do find fasting to be occasionally mentioned in the Old Testament as a sign of grief or of abasement,* but never as a means of gaining salvation in a future life—whose very existence was unknown to Moses and the Jews. The observation of a period of hunger formed no part of the Mosaic law. On the contrary, ancient European religions, and those of Egypt and Western Asia were associated with feasting and jollification (see Deut. xiv. 26.) The Jews were encouraged to indulge in a plurality of wives; but they were nowhere directed or recommended to live on alms. Again, we find nowhere any orders to the priests or Levites to go about the country expounding or teaching the law. Consequently, when we notice the rise of asceticism, preaching, and celibacy, between the time of Antiochus and that of Jesus, we are justified in the belief that they were introduced from without, and by those of the only religion which inculcated them as articles of faith and practice.
* In Lev. xvi. 30; xxiii. 27, 28; and Numb. xxix. 7, there
are directions given to the Jews, that on a certain day they
are "to afflict their souls," and a threat is added, that
"whatsoever soul it be that shall not be afflicted in that
self same day, he shall be cut off from amongst his people."
There is no specific direction as to the method of
afflicting the soul; but it is to be associated with
absolute laziness, for whatever soul doeth any work on that
day shall be destroyed (Lev. xxiii. 28-31). The law is
evidently a very modern one, as we do not find it referred
to in the Ancient Jewish records, and the idea of atonement
was introduced by the Talmudic Pharisees.
3. The Hebrews always showed during the Old Testament times a great aptitude to adopt the faith of outsiders—and as the Jewish people were in great abasement and misery at the period when it is probable that the Buddhist missionaries came into Syria, they would be prepared for the doctrine that they were suffering for bygone sins. The idea that men in the present were sometimes punished for sins done in the past was a Hebrew as well as a Hindoo idea, else Saul's sons would not have been hanged for their father's misdeeds, or the Amalekites have been slaughtered by Samuel, because their forefathers had some centuries before fought with Israel and been conquered by Moses and Joshua.
4. That after the Persian reign it is certain, that three Jewish sects existed,—the Pharisees, the Essenes, and the Sadducees—the last alone being purely Mosaic, and the two first being very like the Buddhists.
To strengthen the links of evidence, we may now say a few words about the remarkable sect of the Essenes, premising our belief that it was founded by missionaries of the faith of Sakya Muni, whose doctrines and practice became, subsequently, modified by Mosaism, just as Christianity was considerably remoulded by Talmudism, or, to use an example nearer our own times, as the Christianity preached by European missionaries to the New Zealanders has been altered by the natives, in accordance with their ancient ideas. To them the Old Testament is the Bible, the New Testament is of no value.
The Essenes are described by the Rev. Dr Ginsburg, whose authority I follow (The Essenes. Longmans, London, 1864), as a Jewish sect of singular piety. They did not sacrifice animals, but endeavoured to make their own minds holy—fit for an acceptable offering to Jehovah. They provided themselves with just enough for the necessities of life, and held such goods as they possessed, e.g., clothes and cloaks, in common. They only allowed themselves to converse on such parts of philosophy as concern God and man. They abhorred slavery, but each served his neighbour. They respected the Sabbath. Their fundamental laws were, to love God, to love virtue, and to love mankind. They affected to despise money, fame, pleasures, professed the most strict chastity, or, rather, continence, and they practised endurance as a duty. They also cultivated simplicity, cheerfulness, modesty, and order. They lived together in the same houses and villages, and sustained the poor, the sick, and the aged. When they earned wages the money was paid to a common stock. They did not marry, or have children; but if any of their body chose to wed, there was nothing in the regulations to prevent their doing so, only they then had to enter another class of the brotherhood. When possible, they worked all day. They were highly respected by those who knew them, and were frequently receiving additions to their number. They seem to have resembled, in their habits and customs, a fraternity of monks of a working, rather than a mendicant, order. Pleasure they regarded as an evil, having a tendency to enchain man to earthly enjoyments, a peculiarly Buddhist tenet. Still further, they considered the use of ointment as defiling, which was certainly not a Hebraic doctrine; but they dressed decently. They prayed devoutly before sunrise; but until the orb had risen they never spoke of worldly matters. They gave thanks, and prayed before and after eating; and ere they entered the refectory bathed in pure water. The food provided was just sufficient to keep them alive. When a person wished to enter the community, he underwent a period of trial, and, if approved, he proceeded to take an oath—"to fear God; to be just towards all men; never to wrong anyone; to detest the wicked, and love the righteous; to keep faith with all men; not to be proud; not to try and outshine his neighbours in any matter; to love truth, and to try and reclaim all liars; never to steal or to cajole; never to conceal anything from the brotherhood, and to be reticent with outsiders." The Essenes reverenced Moses, and so great was their respect for the Sabbath, that they would not ease nature on that day. They bore all tortures with perfect equanimity, and fully believed in a future state of existence, in which the soul, liberated from the body, rejoices, and mounts upwards to a paradise, where there are no storms, no cold, and no intense heat, and where all are constantly refreshed by gentle ocean breezes. Josephus compares this sect with the Pythagoreans; and I think this fact is worth noticing, for there was, in old times, a strong opinion that the founder of that sect brought his peculiar opinions from Hindostan. Pliny, in writing of the Essenes, remarks that their usages differ from those of all other nations—which we may take as a demonstration that they did not copy their constitution from Greeks, Romans, or Jews. Respecting the origin of this sect nothing certain is known, beyond that they were in existence at the time of the Maccabees. Critics decline to see in them any direct relations to the Pythagoreans, and some imagine that the order sprung naturally out of a spiritual reading of the Mosaic law, modified, probably, by Persian or Chaldee notions.
It seems to me, however, that the tenets and practice of the Essenes indicate rather a Buddhist than a Mosaic origin, for celibacy is everywhere in the Old Testament spoken of as a misfortune, and abundance of wives as a proof of God's favour; and I imagine that some devout Indian missionary persuaded many pious Jews to listen to his doctrine, but that he was unable to convert them sufficiently to induce them to give up the law of Moses for that of Siddartha. I conceive still further, that John the Evangelist, and, subsequently, Jesus of Nazareth, were perfectly cognizant of the doctrines of the Essenes, if they were not members of the sect, and that there is nothing incredible in the idea that both these preachers were instructed by some Buddhist missionary, although neither was ever induced to give up his belief in the absolute truth of those Jewish writings, which both had been accustomed to regard as absolutely true and sacred.
We readily allow that our theory may be called a wild one, but we assert that, in reality, it is far otherwise. Of course a critic may say that John, and his follower, Jesus, were just as likely to have struck out a new theory of salvation as Sakya Muni was; or, if exceedingly orthodox, he may assume that the preaching of Jesus was the pure result of inspiration, not such as was given to the prophets by Jehovah, but emanating from himself as a source of absolute truth. But we demur to both assertions. The profound reverence that Mary's son showed, in the early part of his career, for the law and for the prophets, would have prevented his doing anything to upset the former in so marked a manner as he did, in respect to the Sabbath day and other matters (see Matthew v. 31, 32, 33, 34, 38, 39, 43, 44), unless there had been some strong influence, from without, brought to bear upon his mind, and to cast it in a different mould to that of Pharisee or Sadducee. Nor can we believe Jesus to have been inspired, unless we extend the same belief to Buddha's teaching, and believe that he also was a fountain of light and righteousness, which we certainly are not disposed to do.
Our hypothesis respecting a connection between the teaching of the Indian and the Hebrew, appears to be strengthened when we contemplate the distinction between the doctrines of the Jewish and the Hindoo sage. We have seen how they agree as regards the morality which they inculcate, the celibacy and poverty that they enjoin, the firm belief in preexistent, or original, sin, and in a future state of rewards or punishments. They differ in the veneration paid to antecedent authority. Sakya Muni believed in his own inspiration, and rejected the writings which were reverenced by his parents and Mends. Jesus seems to have believed that he was himself supplemental to Moses and the prophets. He did not want to destroy or to supersede them absolutely, as we learn from Matthew v. 17, and xxiii. 23. He had, apparently, an unbounded confidence in their truth, and, with an assurance in their sanctity, he spoke of their writings as the very words of God, and we shall see that the main, if not the only, points in which Jesus diverges from the Hindoo prophet were the products of the Hebrew's full belief in the sacred truth of the Jewish Scriptures.
The son of Mary taught, as the most important part of his doctrine, that the world would shortly come to an end, and that he was sent to show mankind, or, rather, the Jews, how to escape from the terrible catastrophe. I do not think it possible for anyone to read the words attributed to Jesus, and not recognize that this was the turning point upon which everything in his preaching hinged. Sakya Muni spoke of the future misery of all those who did not adopt his method of salvation; Jesus treated of the impending destruction of the whole world, of an immediate judgment of mankind, and of the certain punishment of the majority. That we are not uttering vague assertions we may show by reference to Matt. xxiv. 3, wherein we find certain disciples asking, "What shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?" After a long preamble, telling of troubles and misery, we have the reply of Jesus in vv. 29 et seq.:—"Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken: and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to another.... Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled." This is substantially, and almost literally, repeated in Mark xiii. 26-30, and in Luke xxi. 32.*
* I have heard the words of this preceding quotation handled
by a great variety of divines, asserting themselves to be
orthodox, and who hold the position of Christian ministers.
All, without exception, profess to regard the expressions
about the sun being darkened and the stars falling, as
figurative or metaphorical, and each, according to his
prevalent ideas, or to the pet theory of the day, explain
the imagery as having a reference to some emperor, king,
queen, general of armies, and I know not what besides. But,
to anyone who examines the phraseology closely, it will be
seen that the words are to be taken in their most literal
sense. Jesus had, as we have shown, a firm belief in the
immediate destruction of the world, and upon that theme he
descants and dilates. Taking the Mosaic account of creation
as strictly true to the letter, Jesus regarded the sun,
moon, and stars as apanages of our earth, and very naturally
drew the inference, that when the world was burned up, there
would be no necessity for the celestial luminaries—the sun
would cease to shine, the moon would be dark, and the stars
fall from the sky under the influence of the same power that
produced the mundane destruction. These defunct bodies would
be replaced by a vast apparition, whose glory would exceed
that of the ancient rulers of the day and night, and he who
now stood on earth as a man of sorrows and acquainted with
grief would be seen and recognized as the arbiter of the
destinies of every man. The passages referred to in the text
bear no other meaning than the one here assigned to them;
nor would anyone, however wild "a divine" he might be, ever
see, or endeavour to discover, in the words referred to, a
hidden meaning, unless the solemn assertion of Jesus of his
immediate advent in the clouds of heaven had been such a
signal failure as time has proved it to be. We have always
protested against those theologians who pronounce passages
in the Bible to be metaphorical or literal as it suits the
event, and we do so now. Why such men should insist upon it
that everything in the Koran and Buddhistic books must be
taken au pied de la lettre and that everything in the Bible
may be allegorised, is a matter beyond my comprehension.
They surely forget the dictum—"with what measure ye mete it
shall be measured to you again" (Matt, vii. 2).
In Matthew x. we find Jesus sending out his disciples as missionaries, saying to them (v. 7), "as ye go, preach, saying, the kingdom of heaven is at hand," a doctrine previously proclaimed by John (Matt iii. 2), and based upon some words of Isaiah and the more precise presages in Daniel See also Matt iv. 14-17; Luke ix. 2, and x. 9. We find a yet more important reference in Matt. xi. 14, in which Jesus is reported to have said, when speaking of John, "If ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come." The observation here made plainly refers to an utterance of the Jewish Malachi, who, in his last two chapters, foreshadows the advent of a messenger, who should immediately precede the coming of the Lord to judge the world. There is yet another passage, of almost equal force, in Matt. xvi. 27, 28—"For the Son of man shall come in the glory of the Father with his angels, and then shall he reward every man according to his works. Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom." In Matt. xix. 28 we read, "Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, that ye which have followed me, in the regeneration, when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel," &c. Again, we see in Matt, xxv., after a parable intended to show the possibility of a sudden occurrence, the words, "Watch, therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh." That this belief was due to the Jewish writings we judge from the frequent references made to them; and we may especially notice one which is attributed to Jesus after his resurrection, viz., "all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me." So firmly was the belief of an immediate judgment impressed upon the minds of Christians, that we find Paul affirming respecting it (1 Cor. xv.), "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed... at the last trump" (vv. 31, 52). This is more decidedly enunciated in 1 Thess. iv. 15-17—"For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive, and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them that are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord." Compare with this 2 Peter iii. 1-4, in which there is a repetition of the same leading idea, and with Acts i. 11, and ii. 16-36.