influence on the origin of Christianity. So fundamentally unlike are the alleged “similarities” that the hypothesis of the derivation of the contents of the Gospels from Buddhist sources is as ridiculous as would be the supposition that the Venus of Milo was copied from the rude idol or hideous fetich of an aboriginal tribe.[158] When the missionaries of the two religions first came into actual contact has not yet been ascertained, and the influence of the Christian ideals of self-oblivion upon the most essentially selfish system of salvation ever promulgated to the world has yet to be traced. The conception of self-renunciation which is set forth in the legends may have originated in the memory of the kindness and gentleness and goodness of one whose life was far nobler than his creed, and it may have assumed greater strength and clearness when the teaching of the Gospels came to be reflected upon it. It may or it may not, but of this we may be positively certain, that the writers of the New Testament and the composers of the earliest Buddhist traditions knew positively nothing of each other’s productions. This is a conclusion accepted by the very best authorities on the subject, and it is maintained with the greatest firmness by those of them who discount the miraculous occurrences found in the scriptures of both religions as only the fond fancies which their affectionate disciples gradually wove around the memories of their respective teachers. They hold that working independently of each other, but under similar influences and in similar conditions, it was simply natural that they should have come to adorn with wonders somewhat alike in character the story of two lives so pure and beneficial.