Page:Asoka - the Buddhist Emperor of India.djvu/61

Rh insect was not extended to the life of man. The monkish legend that Asoka abolished the death penalty is not true. His legislation proves that the idea of such abolition never entered his thoughts, and that like other Buddhist monarchs, he regarded the extreme penalty of the law as an unavoidable necessity, which might be made less horrible than it had been, but could not be dispensed with. Late in his reign, in 243, he published an ordinance that every prisoner condemned to death should invariably be granted before execution a respite of three days in which to prepare himself for the next world. This slight mitigation of the usual practice of Indian despots, whose sentence was commonly followed by instant or almost instant execution, is all that Asoka claims credit for. The inferior value attaching to human as compared with animal life presumably is due to the fact that men are responsible for their deeds while animals are not. In later times Hindu Râjâs have not hesitated to execute a man for killing a beast, and it is unlikely that Asoka was less severe.

One of the most noticeable features in the teaching of Asoka is the enlightened religious toleration which is so frequently and emphatically recommended. The Dharma, or Law of Piety, which he preached and propagated unceasingly with amazing faith in the power of sermonizing, had few, if any, distinctive features. The doctrine was essentially common to all Indian religions, although one sect or denomination might lay particular stress on one factor in it rather