Moreover, it was not composed in the Sanskṛit of the Veda and Ṡāstras—in the sacred language, the very grammar and alphabet of which were supposed to come from heaven—but in the vernacular of the part of India in which Buddhism flourished. Indeed, it is a significant fact that while the great sages of Sanskṛit literature and philosophy, such as Vyāsa, Kumārila, and Ṡaṅkara, in all probability spoke and taught in Sanskṛit[20], the Founder of Buddhism preferred to communicate his precepts to the people in their own vernacular, afterwards called Pāli. Nevertheless, he never composed a single book of his own. In all probability he never wrote down any of his own precepts; for if writing was then invented, it was little practised, through the absence of suitable materials. This is the more remarkable as Buddhism ultimately became an instrument for introducing literary culture among uncivilized races. All that Gautama did was to preach his Dharma, ‘Law,’ during forty-five years of itineration, and oral teaching. It was not till some time after his death that his sayings were collected (p. 97), and still longer before they were written down. Itineration, recitation of the Law, and preaching were the chief instruments for the propagation of Buddhism. At present the Buddhist Canon is about as extensive as the Brāhmanical[21], and in both cases we are left in doubt as to the date when the books were composed. How, then, did their composition take place? All that can be said is that at three successive epochs after the Buddha’s death, three gatherings of his followers were held for the purpose of collecting his sayings and settling the true Canon, and that a fourth assembly took place much later in the North. The first of these assemblages can scarcely with any fitness be called a Council. Nor can the fact of its meeting together in any formal manner be established on any trustworthy historical basis. It is said that a number of monks (about five hundred, called Mahā-sthavirāḥ, ‘the great elders,’ Pāli Mahā-therā) assembled in a cave called Sattapaṇṇi, near the then capital city of Magadha—Rāja-gṛiha, now Rāj-gīr—under the sanction of king Ajāta-ṡatru, during the rainy season immediately succeeding the death of Gautama, to think over, put together, and arrange the sayings of their Master, but not, so far as we know, to write them down.