In the published accounts of the religious opinions of the Bauddhas and Jainas, derived principally from oral information, doubts have been expressed as to the sense attached by them to the terms which they use to signify the happy state at which the perfect saints arrive. It has been questioned whether annihilation, or what other condition short of such absolute extinction, is meant to be described. Both the sects, like most others of Indian origin, propose for the grand object to which man should. aspire the attainment of a final happy state, from which there is no return.

All agree in assigning to its attainment the same. term, mukti or moksha, with some shades of difference in the interpretation of the word: as emancipation, deliverance from evil, liberation from worldly bonds, relief from further transmigration, &c. Many other terms are in use, as synonymous with it—and so employed by all or nearly all sects-to express a state of final release from the world: such as amrita, immortality; apavarga, conclusion, &c. But the term which the Bauddhas as well as Jainas more particularly affect, but which, however, is also used by the other sects, is nirvána, profound calm. In its ordinary acceptation, as an adjective, it signifies extinct, as a fire which is gone out; set, as a luminary which has gone down; defunct, as a saint who has passed away. Its etymology is from vá, to blow as wind, with the preposition nir used in a negative sense: it means calm and unruffled. A happy state of imperturbable apathy is the ultimate bliss to which the Indian aspires: in this the Faina as well as the Bauddha concurs with the orthodox Vedántin.

Great difference of opinion has long existed among European scholars as to the real nature of Nirvána; but Mr. Childers has cleared up most of the difficulties in his article on Nibbánam in his Pali Dictionary: 'Nirvána is applied to two different things: first, that annihila

tion of being which is the goal of Buddhism; and, secondly, the state of blissful sanctification called arahatta or arhatship, which terminates in annihilation.' Thus annihilation (as already indicated by the etymology) is the only ultimate meaning; all existence is absolutely an evil to the Buddhist, and consequently its absolute extinction is the only summum bonum. But although this may have been the true teaching of Buddhism from the first it does not follow that it was universally accepted and understood, especially as the doctrine spread beyond the limits of India and Ceylon.

Goldstücker well distinguishes the Brahmanical Moksha from the Buddhist Nirvána: The Brahmanic Hindus hope that their soul will ultimately become united with the universal Spirit, which, in the language of the Upanishads, is the neuter Brahma; and in that of the sects, the supreme Deity, who takes the place of this philosophical and impersonal god. And however indefinite this god Brahma may be, it is nevertheless to the mind of the Brahmanic Hindu an entity. The final salvation of a Buddhist is entire non-entity. The various expressions for eternal bliss in the Brahmanic creed, like moksha, mukti, etc., all signify either "liberation from this earthly career" or the "absolute good:" they, therefore, imply a condition of hope. The absolute end of a Buddhist is without hope; it is Nirvána, or extinction.'

CHAPTER IV.

THE VEDÁNTA PHILOSOPHY.

THE portion of Hindu philosophy most completely Pantheistic in its doctrines is that which goes by the name of the Vedanta, the literal interpretation of which is 'Conclusion of the Veda.' It is chiefly occupied with an inquiry concerning God, the omnipotent Creator of the world and omniscient Author of revelation.' But in addition to this it devotes a good deal of space to the refutation of the doctrines of the various atheistical and materialistic sects.

The manner in which the Vedantins describe the nature of God and the soul is as follows:

'This omnipotent, omniscient Cause of the Universe is essentially happy. He is the brilliant golden person seen within the solar orb and human eye. He is the ethereal element from which all things proceed and to which all return. He is the breath in which all beings merge, into which they all rise. He is the light which shines in heaven and in all places high and low, everywhere throughout the world, and within the human person. He is the breath and intelligent self, immortal, undecaying and happy, with which Indra, in a dialogue with Pratardana, identifies himself.'

'This universe is indeed Brahma, for it springs from him, merges in him, breathes in him; therefore serene -worship him. Ether and air are by Brahma created. But he himself has no origin, no procreator nor maker, for he is eternal, without beginning and without end. So, fire

and water and earth proceed mediately from him, being evolved successively, the one from the other, as fire from air, and this from ether. It is by his will, not by their own act, that they are so evolved; and conversely they merge one into the other, in the reversed order, and are reabsorbed at the general dissolution of worlds previous to renovation of all things.

'Intellect, mind, and organs of sense and action, being composed of the primary elements, are evolved and reabsorbed in no different order or succession, but in that of the elements of which they consist. The same course, evolution and re-absorption, or material birth and death, cannot be affirmed of the soul. Birth and death are predicated of an individual, referring merely to his association with the body, which is matter fixed and movable. The soul is a portion of the supreme Ruler, as a spark is of fire. The relation is not as that of master and servant, or ruler and ruled, but as that of whole and part.'

'The soul is subject to transmigration. It passes from one state to another, invested with a subtile frame consisting of elementary particles, the seed or rudiment of a grosser body. Departing from that which it occupied, it ascends to the moon, where, clothed with an aqueous form, it experiences the recompense of its works, and whence it returns to occupy a new body with resulting influence of its former deeds. But evil-doers suffer for their misdeeds in the seven appointed regions of retribution. The returning soul quits its watery frame in the lunar orb and passes successively and rapidly through ether, air, vapour, mist, and cloud and rain, and thus finds its way into a vegetating plant; and thence through the medium of nourishment into an animal embryo. Of a dying person the speech, followed by the ten exterior faculties (not the corporeal organs themselves), is absorbed into the mind, for the action of the outer organ ceases before the mind's. This, in like manner, retires into the breath, attended

likewise by all the other vital functions, for they are life's companions; and the same retreat of the mind is observable, also, in profound sleep and in a swoon. Breath, attended likewise by all other vital faculties, is withdrawn into the living soul which governs the corporeal organs, as the attendants of a king assemble around him when he is setting out upon a journey, for all vital functions gather about the soul at the last moment when it is expiring. The living soul, attended with all its faculties, retires within a rudiment of the body, composed of light with the rest of the five elements, in a subtile state. "Breath" is therefore said to withdraw into "light"; not meaning that element or fire exclusively, nor intending direct transition, for a traveller has gone from one city to another, though he passed through an intermediate town.

'This retirement from the body is common to ordinary, uninformed people as to the devout, contemplative worshipper, until they proceed further on their respective paths; and immortality (without immediate unity with the supreme Brahma) is the fruit of pious meditation, though impediments may not be wholly consumed and removed.

In that condition the soul of the contemplative worshipper remains united to a subtile elementary frame, conjoined with the vital faculties, until the dissolution of worlds, when it merges in the supreme Deity. That elementary frame is minute in its dimensions as subtile in its texture, and is accordingly imperceptible to bystanders when departing from the body; nor is it oppressed by cremation or other treatment which the body undergoes. It is by its warmth sensible so long as it abides with that coarser frame, which becomes cold in death when it has departed, and was warm during life while it remained.

'But he who has attained the true knowledge of God does not pass through the same stages of retreat, proceeding directly to reunion with the supreme being, with which he is identified, as a river, at its confluence with the sea,