But if God made man in His image, why all this suffering that we see and feel? The best explanation ever given is that given in the Bible. Man was created holy, and was put on trial. He transgressed. A subject who disobeys the law of his sovereign incurs his displeasure. He suffers for it. We are suffering from this disobedience of our first parents by a law that we daily see exemplified. A man by extravagance or vice squanders his estate. His children are born penniless. The Prince of Wieng Chan rebelled against the King of Siam. His country was conquered and laid waste, and thousands of its inhabitants were made captive and deported. Thousands of the descendants of these captives are now serfs. Why are they so? Because of the errors or misfortunes of their ancestors. The Prince appoints a governor over a province, with the promise that if he is faithful, his children shall succeed him. Because of misdemeanor he is deposed. His descendants are born subjects and not rulers. We belong to a fallen race. Somana Gautama belonged to the same race. He groaned under its pains and penalties. He saw a race sunk in misery. He saw its religion shamefully corrupt. He inaugurated one of purer morality. But he does not profess to be divine or a saviour. His religion does not offer a sufficient remedy. By asceticism and self-mortification it would extinguish all noble desire as well as the vicious instincts with which we are born. And then, after interminable cycles of transmigrations, we may hope to reach a state of unconscious sleep. Happiness and misery are inseparable things. We escape the one only by escaping the other. That is the dark prospect which makes Buddhism so pessimistic. To this the Princess assented, “That is so.”