Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume III.djvu/404

 398 BUDDHISM er up the whole third Dhyflna. The scheme of the intensity of the destructions is : the first, third, and fifth are moderate ; the second and sixth are middling ; the fourth is great. The world preceding the present was greatly de- stroyed. In short, there is a whole minute tariff of the medium, degree, and extent of world-destructions. The fourth Dhyiina forms the limit of destruction, it being, together with the higher heavens, a reservoir for the recon- struction of the universe. The Ealpa of emp- tiness is a dark vacuum below the preserved heavens, existing during 20 intermediate Eal- pas; after which a wind from the 10 quarters begins to blow ; then a cloud gathers ; rain, contained by the wind as in a vessel, fills the vacuum up to the reservoir; then all beings are reproduced by the churning action of the wind ; first the annihilated DhyJlnas, then the lower regions, the "throne of intelligence," and the Bodhi tree, near Buddha-GSya (gai, to sing), and the lotus, whose number of blos- soms is emblematic of that of the Buddhas (originally five, afterward 1,000) in the future Ealpas. Many of the beings preserved in the higher heavens are reborn on the new earth, with bodies shining like the sun, and live by meditation. After having tasted of the sweet new earth-sap, their bodies begin to ferment with lusts, to have need of the sun and moon (which only then shine forth), and they dete- riorate in the ratio of their appetites. Their nutriments grow coarser, and excite sexual de- sires, which beget the necessities of birth and other evils. The greedy accumulate too much rice, which ceases to grow spontaneously ; ag- riculture therefore becomes imperative. Then " mine and thine," or ownership, are contrived ; followed by laziness, gluttony, dissipation, envy, avarice, theft, murder, war, &c. Therefore MahSsammata (the great assented to) was cho- sen as the first king on earth ; and castes fol- lowed. The duration of life sank with the de- terioration of beings to 80,000 years; many are reborn as animals, and at last hell yawns. After this follows the Ealpa of stability. In it the life of men lasts only 10 years, then 80,000, and thus gradually and alternatively 20 times, in the ratio of sinfulness. In this the most majestic and perfect Buddhas are born, for the renewal of the Dharma. A Ealpa with five Buddhas is called Bhadra (prosperous, vir- tuous), and such is the present one, which is in its decline. Deterioration by sin is cured by wars, pestilence, hunger, scourges, which arouse the survivors to better conduct. The world is governed by destiny. This differs from the Greek polpa, the Latin fatum, and the maniyat of the Islam ; nor is it a law of nature, or an eternal decree, or predestination. According to the Buddhists, living beings are by no means products of nature. Only because the entities have sinned from eternity or become material, matter exists ; because they are from eternity in the process of purification, the innumerable worlds arise and vanish. The entities are the marrow, the universe is its lodging. In short, the universe is a result of the morality of breath- ing beings, and destiny is the product of their merit and guilt. There is no indivisible abso- lute being, as the germ of nature. The cardi- nal point of the rotations of the worlds lies in the lowest stations of the fourth DhySna, viz. : in the two heavens of the gods of great merits and of the unconscious, which form the line of demarcation between sin and sinlessness. Mo- rality is the prime agent of that whirlwind which tosses the universe into being and not- being. The mode of its action is variously ex- plained. Beings migrate, because they are sin- ful, by having fallen through terrestrial nourish- ment into avarice, hatred, &c., in consequence of unatoned guilt in former lives. Buddhism makes no inquiry into the origin of individual entities. SansSra (san, Lat. simul, and sri, to go), or mundane life, is the fundamental evil, the ocean of existence with the four poisonous streams, birth, age, disease, and death, upon which we are tossed by the storm of passion, restless and without haven. Out of the SansSra there is naught; on the one hand there is empti- ness, and on the other Nirvana, or beatific en- franchisement. In SansSra there is no truth, no essence ; all is deceit and fallacy. It is only constant in inconstancy ; in it every form or determination breaks like a bubble. Birth leads to death, death to rebirth, youth to old age ; beauty, health, wealth, vanish. All ages are beset by peculiar evils. Death is not the last of pains, for it leads to birth again. Sin de- grades to a lower being or leads into hell. Even godliness does not exempt from rebirth or from relapse into a bad Gati (way) of re- birth. With regard to ontology and psychol- ogy, the philosophic schools of Buddhism are at variance, and especially concerning the no- tions of the soul and of the Nirvana. In some cases the soul of man may sink even below the six Gatis or ways of rebirth into the vegetable and mineral way; although this view is less supported by the more ancient texts than by Brahmanic or Thibetan legends. Elesa (His, to suffer or inflict pain), or the original sin in a former existence, is the fountain of all evil. Its conquest is the last aim of all life and effort. He who breaks its fetters, "breaks through the eggshell" and escapes the alternation of births. The Elesa awakens evil desires, which are chains to existence; this clinging to life impels us to a renewal of existence, and to further wandering after death; the love of life begets new life. Both this motive and the so-called destiny by morality have their root in the Elesa : the former acting as impulse or gravitation into corporeality ; the latter as the germ, leading to the realization of the former. With the death of the body the soul is not freed from its desires, but wanders by that Gati which it deserves. All good and bad deeds are balanced against each other like credit and debit in a commercial account, and determine individual destiny, not providen-