It is to be observed that in all these classes or stages the practice of virtue and the cultivation of purity were considered fundamental. In the preaching ascribed to Buddha great stress is laid on Enlightenment, and on Meditation, which leads to it; but at the base of all this system, as the first indispensable factor in securing perfection, was Uprightness. In the Suttas this formula constantly recurs: “Great is the advantage, great the fruit of earnest contemplation when set round with upright conduct. Great is the fruit, great the advantage of intelligence when set round with earnest contemplation. The mind set round with intelligence is free from the greatest evils, that is to say, from sensuality, from individuality, from delusion, and from ignorance.“ Again, “Righteousness, earnest thought, wisdom and freedom sublime: these are the truths realised by Gotama far-renowned.”[220] The uprightness, or righteousness required, presents, as the Moral Law of Scripture does, a much broader range of influence than the words would indicate. In prohibiting lying, Buddha enjoined avoidance of all offensive language, and of every word that could sever men. He also instructed his disciples not only to avoid showing enmity to those who hated them, but to overcome evil with good. Purity again in his regard meant purity not of word and deed alone, but of thought and feeling. In some respects his precepts go beyond the Moral Law. The command not to kill included respect not for human beings only, but for every creature that had life. He not only condemned drunkenness, but demanded total abstinence as essential. The precept “Do not commit adultery” was understood in our sense of it only by the laity; for the religious, marriage was not an honourable estate, but one polluted and polluting. Unlike the Moral Law, which recognises everything that is natural and sanctifies it, the rule of Buddha in these respects was unnatural in its restrictions. It pronounced common and unclean what God Himself has cleansed; and, as always happens when men add to the commandments of God in one direction, they are sure to take away from them in another. So Buddha’s rule, though excellent in that it lays its control not on conduct only, but on thought and feeling, is essentially negative and defective. It does not cover man’s whole nature, nor provide for his every possible relation. Ignoring God, it is therefore interpreted by no positive and active principle of goodness. It is inspired by no sense of duty, for it recognises in the universe no superior to whom anything is due, and, unconscious of any benefit, it owns no gratitude. Consequently unrighteousness, as an offence to or an outrage upon a better or kinder being than self, is not in all its range of view. Unrighteousness is only a calamity to be avoided or an imprudence not to be repeated. Struggling to get out of the meshes of an evil net, the Buddhist might