manity, the practice of morality is of more importance than the principle on which it is grounded; it is a credit to philosophers that they induce men to live according to what is right rather than to think according to the principles of philosophy. All reforms must be preceded and strengthened by the long study which science demands; but when the reformer at last appears upon the scene, his teaching should be as clear and simple as possible. He speaks to the people and not to the learned. He must lead minds rather than enlighten them.

Moreover, although his aim was to convert and guide the masses, Sākya-muni does not endeavor to attract them by gross allurements, he does not flatter their passions; and the joys he promises them are neither earthly nor material. Contrary to most religious legislators, he does not predict to his followers either conquests, power, or riches; he calls them to eternal salvation or rather annihilation, which he confounds with salvation, by the narrow path of virtue, knowledge, and austerity. It is a great deal to expect of man, but evidently not too much; and it is well for us to hear such a noble appeal to the human heart in times so remote and in countries which our civilization has been accustomed to disdain. We too willingly fancy that these noble aspirations belong only to ourselves, and we are surprised at discovering the same in others. It was not in the Vedas or the religion that emanated from them that the Reformer found these lessons of self-renunciation. But the Brahmanic philosophy was not that base and selfish kind of worship, which consists in a mutual interchange between man and the gods -of homage and assistance. It had soared into the higher regions of thought, and the system of Kopilia alone suffices to show that Sākya-muni has made no innovation in preaching eternal deliverance. The whole of Brahmanic India had the same solemn turn of thought. Sakya-muni shared it, but did not originate it.

His true glory, which no one can dispute, is the boundless charity which filled his soul. The Buddha does not think of his own personal salvation; he seeks above all to save others, and it is in order to show VOL. XX.:

them the infallible road to Nirvana that he leaves the Abode of Joy, the Tushita, and that he comes back to endure the risk and ordeal of a last incarnation. He does not redeem mankind by offering himself as a sublime victim; he only proposes to instruct them by his teaching and example. He leads them in the path from which there is no straying, and he guides them to the haven from which there is no return. No doubt the spirit of Christianity has inspired more beautiful and elevated sentiments, but six or seven centuries before its appearance it is wonderful to find this admirable conception, associating all men in a common faith, and uniting them in the same esteem and the same love.

This is how Buddha was able to say, without presumption or error, that "his law was a law of grace for all," and how, although he did not attack the odious and degrading system of caste, he destroyed that fundamental basis of Brahmanic society. He never saw, it is true, the real principle of human equality, because he never rightly understood moral equality; but if he did not comprehend the real nature of man, he at least knew that if all men are equal in suffering, they ought also to be equal in deliverance. He endeavors to teach them to free themselves from disease, old age, and death; and as all beings are exposed to these necessary evils, they all have a right to the teaching which by enlightening them is to free them. In the presence of the same amount of misery, he perceives no social distinction; the slave is for him as great as a king's son. He is struck, not so much by the abuses and the evils of the society in which he lives, as by those which are inseparable from humanity itself, and it is to the suppression of these that he devotes himself, the others appearing to him very insignificant in comparison. The Buddha did not limit himself to curing Indian society, his aim was to cure mankind.

This great elevation and large-mindedness is certainly to be admired, for although man is not entirely as the Buddha saw him, the victim of suffering, yet he is so more or less, and it was a generous enterprise to have sought to deliver him from its bondage.

The means employed by the Buddha to convert and purify the human heart are not less noble, and they are characterized by an unfailing gentleness. He never seeks to compel, but only to persuade men. He even makes allowance for their weakness, varying in a thousand ways the means of impressing them; and when a too inflexible and austere language might repel them, he has recourse to the more persuasive teaching of parables. He chooses the most familiar examples, and by the simplicity of his expressions suits his lessons to the capacity of his hearers. He teaches then to lighten the weight of their sins by confession, and to atone for them by repentance.

a great evil is therefore e never falls,

He even goes further. As it is alread to have to expiate sin, the essential poin to teach man not to commit it; for if he will not have to retrieve himself. Ience, in the doctrine of Sakya-muni are such wise and well-defined precepts, such just and delicate prohibition of certain actions. He undertakes and advises an incessant struggle against the body and its passions and desires; the body is in his eyes the sole enemy of man, and although the Buddha does not use this precise expression, it is in truth the aim of his asceticism. Man must overcome the body, he must extinguish the burning lusts that consume him. If the Buddha strenuously enforces absolute celibacy on his monks, he also enjoins chastity and decency on all the faithful, virtues that the Brahmans constantly violated, but which a secret instinct reveals to all men.

To these virtues he adds others still more difficult and no less useful, namely: patience and resignation, including the necessary energy to suffer courageously inevitable evil; fortitude and even indifference under all adversities and sufferings; above all humility, that other form of renunciation of worldly goods and greatness, which was not only practised by poor mendicants, "sons of Sakya," but also by the most powerful kings. From humility to forgiveness of injuries is but a step; and although the Buddha does not lay this down as a precept, his whole doctrine tends to this mutual forbearance, so indispensable to all human societies. The

very belief in transmigration helped him; the first sentiment of a Buddhist under an insult or an outrage or violence is not anger; he is not angry, because he does not believe in injustice. He simply thinks that in some former existence he has committed a sin which in this one deserves the punishment he receives. Instead of accusing his enemy or his oppressor, he accuses himself. Far from thinking of revenge, he only sees a lesson in the adversity he endures, and his sole idea is how he can henceforth avoid the sin that has rendered it necessary, and which, if renewed, would also renew the punishment that has already followed it. When the young prince Kunāla, whose touching history is related in the legends, undergoes a painful and iniquitous torture, he forgives his cruel stepmother who persecutes him, he forgives his deluded father, and he thinks only of his past sins, by which he must have deservedly called down upon himself such an affliction.

This resignation, which may easily become fear and cowardice in the weak, no doubt leads to the domination and despotism of the strong and wicked; doubtless it also encourages tyranny in those countries which have only known despotism. But in intelligent hands, what an element of order and social peace! What a healing of all the passions which too often destroy concord, and lead to relentless wars!

Add to this, the horror of falsehood, the respect for truth, the sanctity of the bond that unites intelligences; add the reprobation of slandering, or even idle speech; add also the respect for family ties, pious veneration of parents, consideration and esteem for women, who are considered equally with men to be worthy of all religious honors-and we must feel astonished that with so many social virtues Buddhism was not able to found, even in Asia, a tolerable social state or government. First it failed in India itself, where it arose; and in all the countries where it was received, its influence, excellent as it was in some respects, never prevailed sufficiently to reform the political morals of the people, who remained, in spite of it, under the most degrading and arbitrary yoke.-The Buddha and His Religion.

SAINTINE, JOSEPH XAVIER BONIFACE, a French novelist, dramatist, and poet, born in Paris, July 10, 1798; died there, January 21, 1865. His début in literature was made at the age of oneand-twenty, when he carried off the prize of the French Academy for some verses, entitled Bonheur de l'Etude. Two years later he took a second prize for an essay on teaching, and published soon after his Picciola, "a fine tale, full of heart and charmingly told," says Larousse, “which, translated into all languages, has won for its author more fame and fortune than have all his other works put together." This touching story of the love of a prisoner for a flower received the Montyon prize of 3,000 francs, and won for its author the cross of the Legion of Honor. "The quiet grace, the affecting sweetness, which make the success of this work, form the foundation of the character of Saintine himself, whose heart," says Larousse," was as noble as his intelligence was lofty. Yet this pen which could so well call forth the tears had equal power to provoke laughter." Under the pseudonym of Xavier he produced some theatrical compositions, among others, L'Ours et le Pacha, in collaboration with Scribe, and Les Cabinets Particuliers, with Duvert and Lausanne. In all, he wrote about two hundred vaudevilles comedies, or dramas. "Saintine's re