for it as a fact not only marvellous, but simply unique in the experience of mankind. It is not likely that the miraculous elements in the Christian religion will be found to be “the produce of its primitive theology, which will fade out of the conception of men as theology advances and becomes purified.” The demonstration of this must not be assumed to be complete because the miraculous is also found in other religions. We must be able to account for it in all of them. It is, indeed, the natural tendency of humanity to magnify and eventually to deify its heroes, to embellish their careers with similar marvels, to apply to them figurative language very liable to be misunderstood, which in later generations hardens into erroneous beliefs. That Christians as well as Buddhists have done so is sufficiently attested by the apocryphal Gospels, but we must not conclude that because there are so many fictitious and counterfeit wonders in currency there can be no real miracles. We must examine each religion on its merits, and its miraculous elements in the light of their purpose and of their actual genesis; and if we do so in the case of Christianity, we will probably discover the one supernatural reality from which the shadows in all other religions are reflected, and to which they all point.[173] Dr. Rhys Davids, in the Hibbert Lectures, informs us that the early Buddhist conception of Gotama was dominated and transformed by two ideals, neither of which had any necessary connection with the man himself. One of them, due to political experience, made him finally assume in the popular imagination the office of a Universal King; while the other, due to philosophic speculation, invested him with the attribute of Perfect Wisdom. The implied parallel between this conception, coloured as it grew by the sun myths which it incorporated, and the Christian conception of Jesus, suggested by the titles King of Glory and Divine Word, is obvious to everybody. Yet examination of the supposed similarities only reveals essential contrasts between the two sets of beliefs. The political experiences in India which are referred to occurred about two centuries after the death of Buddha. The victories of Chandragupta, resulting in the consolidation of a kingdom such as Indians had never before witnessed, combined with his patronage of the Buddhist monks, may have suggested the idea of the universal monarch. “His achievements recalled the nearly forgotten poetry of the Vedic legends, while the new and popular ethics of Buddha invested him with a righteousness which made him a worthy Lord of the Four Quarters (of the Globe).” So in one of the Suttas, said to be early, and which may have been assuming shape at this time, words like these are put in the mouth of Buddha:—“I am a king, O Sela, an incomparable, religious king; with justice I roll the wheel, the wheel that is irresistible.”[174] With this conception of Cakka-vatti, a glorious king, was connected, avers Dr.