There appears to be little doubt that Sakya Muni was born about 622 years before our era, and that he died when about eighty years of age, i.e.f B.C. 542. He was thus a contemporary of Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and other Jewish prophets. Though of royal birth, and of the warrior or kingly caste, he does not appear to have been instructed in general history, if, indeed, any such was in existence in Hindostan at that or any other period; and we cannot find a tittle of evidence that he ever heard of any other religion than Brahminism, the dominant faith, apparently, of the Aryan invaders of India. In that he was taught assiduously, and some of its tenets he most firmly believed. Amongst others, he held that men lived in a future world, in which each one was rewarded or punished according to his doings when in a human form. His teaching was founded upon the belief which the Brahmins inculcated, that all men endure misery in this world for their conduct in a previous state of existence, and that they would once again suffer after death, unless they conducted themselves, in this life, in a manner pleasing to the Almighty. In this creed is clearly involved, if not distinctly enunciated, a full acknowledgment of the existence and power of God, of the certainty of a future life, and a desire to escape from penalties to be inflicted therein by a supreme celestial Judge, for immorality or impropriety committed in the present state. For these points of doctrine Sakya did not contend, he merely laid down a different system to the Brahmins as to the method by which salvation was to be attained, and the penal consequences of a sinful life were to be avoided. We may now, halting here for a moment, examine these matters for ourselves, and inquire in what way such faith differs from our own. The Brahmin taught that man suffers pain, misery, and death for certain crimes committed in a previous state of existence; the Christian teaches that each one suffers for a fault committed by ancestors who lived thousands of years ago. Neither the one nor the other regard pain, sorrow, suffering, and death as the normal accompaniments of life, but both attribute them to the wrath of an offended deity, who can be, in some way, cheated, cajoled, appeased, or propitiated. Both assert that men are debtors to God, and that miseries are "duns" used to make men pay their obligations to heaven. The Brahmin taught that this could be effected by prayer, sacrifice, and sundry ceremonies to be performed by some man who had been specially appointed for the purpose. A due attention to morality was also inculcated, but it was apparently considered as of less importance than ritualistic observances.