Page:An analysis of religious belief (1877).djvu/480

 confirmed by the fact that the next step is that of birth, followed, as a matter of course, by the miseries of human life, terminating in death. And death, unless every remnant of attachment to, and desire for, all worldly things has been purged away, unless every trace of sinful tendencies has been obliterated, is but a fresh beginning of the same weary round.

—Theology and Ethics of the Tripitaka.

Thus we have examined in succession the three great divisions of the Buddhist Canon. We may pass over a comparatively late and spurious addition to it, the Tantras—full of the worship of strange gods and goddesses, and of magical formularies—to consider the general features of these sacred works in reference to their theological teaching and to their moral tendency. Theology is perhaps a term that will be held to be misplaced in speaking of a system which acknowledges no God. Yet Buddhism is so full of supernatural creatures, and the Buddha himself occupies a position so nearly divine, that it would be hard to find a more appropriate word. Buddha himself is the central figure of the whole of his system, far more completely than Christ is the central figure of Christianity, or Mahomet of Islam. There is no Deity above him; he stands out alone, unrivaled, unequaled, and unapproachable. The gods of the Hindu pantheon are by no means annihilated in the Buddhist Scriptures. On the contrary, they play a certain part in them, as when some of the greatest among their number assist at the delivery of Mâyâ. But the part assigned to them is always a subordinate one; they are practically set aside, not by the skeptical process of questioning their existence, but by the more subtle one of introducing them as humbly seated at the Buddha's footstool, and devout recipients of his instructions. Hostility to Gautama Buddha there may be, but not from them. It proceeds from heretical Brahmans—rivals in trade—and from those whom they may for a time deceive. The gods are among the most docile of his pupils, and display a praiseworthy