Da. 256, 7. "A man is not a just judge if he carries a matter by violence; no, he who distinguishes both right and wrong, who is learned, and leads others, not by violence, but by law and equity, he who is a guardian of the law and equity, he who is a guardian of the law, and intelligent, he is called just." Our histories tell us of Christians persecuting Christians; Trinitarians endeavouring to extirpate Arians; Franciscans torturing Dominicans; of Jews slaughtered by those whose master said, "Father, forgive them;" we see brutal Spaniards exterminating, under the shadow of the cross, whole nations in the new world who had never harmed them, and in the old world we find Crusaders, under the guise of piety, murdering and robbing the dwellers in Palestine. There is scarcely a large town in Europe which has not witnessed the ferocious violence of Papal, yea, and Protestant, hierarchs. Even in recent times we have seen bishops and their congeners, in our so-called civilized nation, oppose violence, and the popgun thunder of excommunication, to a learned prelate, and to an humble priest. Judged by the standard of Buddha, our divines are unjust and unrighteous. I cannot discover any standard by which they can be regarded as "praiseworthy," except that embodied in the two sayings, "Get what you can, and what you get hold;" "Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise." We may say of such persecutors, in the words of the Dhammapada-- 260. "A man is not an elder because his head is grey; his age may be ripe, but he is called old in vain," and many would at once be able, if they tried, to remember the names of some who, in a Christian community, have abandoned their principles, or their learning, as soon as they became bishops or elders of the church. I have no doubt Popes have done so. There is a saying, that however clever a man is, you make a fool of him by placing a mitre upon his head. The following is, perhaps, more curious than our previous quotations, as it tells of the pre-Christian antiquity of a common Romish custom:-- 264. "Not by tonsure does an undisciplined man, who speaks falsehood, become a Sramana; can a man be a Sra-mana who is still held captive by desire and greediness?" The Sramana is a word equivalent to our "priest," literally, "a man who performs hard penances" (see Dhammapada, Note 265, p. cxxxii.).