It was during Kanishka’s reign that a fourth Council[34] was held at Jālandhara in Kashmīr, under Pārṡva and Vasu-mitra. It consisted of 500 monks, who composed three Sanskṛit works of the nature of commentaries (Upadeṡa, Vinaya-vibhāshā, Abhidharma-vibhāshā) on the three Pāli Piṭakas. These were the earliest books of the Mahā-yāna or Northern School, which afterwards formulated its more developed doctrines on the Indus, while the Pāli Canon of the South represented the true doctrine promulgated on the Ganges. Kashmīr was a centre of Sanskṛit learning, and Kanishka, who was a patron of it, became to Northern Buddhism what Aṡoka had been to Southern. Hence in process of time other Northern Buddhist books were written in Sanskṛit, with occasional Gāthās or stanzas in an irregular dialect, half Sanskṛit, half Prākṛit. It is usual to enumerate nine Nepalese canonical scriptures (Dharmas):—1.Prajñā pāramitā, ‘transcendent knowledge,’ or an abstract of metaphysical and mystic philosophy; 2. Gaṇḍa-vyūha; 3. Daṡa-bhūmīṡ-vara (describing the ten stages leading to Buddhahood); 4. Samādhi-rāja; 5. Laṅkāvatāra; 6. Saddharma-puṇḍarīka, ‘Lotus of the True Law;’ 7. Tathāgaṭa-guhyaka (containing the secret Tantric doctrines); 8. Lalita-vistara (giving a legendary life of Buddha); 9. Suvarṇa-prabhāsa. The eighth is probably as old as the 2nd century of our era, and next comes the sixth. Tibetan translations were made of all of them. These extend to 100 volumes and are collectively called Ka’gyur or Kan’gyur (Kanjur). We owe our knowledge of these to the indefatigable Hungarian traveller, Alexander Csoma de Körös. Copies of the Sanskrit works were brought to England by Mr. B. H. Hodgson. The sixth has been translated by Burnouf and recently by H. Kern. Dr. Rājendralāla-mitra has edited the eighth. As to the non-canonical works M. Senart has edited part of the Mahā-vastu, and Professor E. B. Cowell and Mr. R. A. Neil, the Divyāvadāna. They contain interesting old legends—some about the achievements of Aṡoka, some about Buddha himself, some perhaps from lost Vinaya books. As to the Pāli written character, it is a question whether that current in the holy land of Buddhism, or in Ceylon, or in Siam (Kambodia), or in Burma—that is, Devanāgarī, Sinhalese, Kambodian, or Burmese—should be used. Many think Burmese most suited to it, and in Europe the Roman character is preferred. It should be added that the recitation (Bhāṇa, Sanskṛit root Bhaṇ, ‘to speak;’ in Sinhalese spelt Baṇa) of the Law is one of the principal duties of monks, the reciter being called Bhāṇaka. A peculiar mode of intoning is called Sara-bhañña (sara = svara). The Buddha, they say, is not extinct, for he lives in the Dharma and in the Saṅgha, in the Law and in the monks who recite it. Hence the importance of recitation in the Buddhist system (p. 84). LECTURE IV. _The Saṅgha or Buddhist Order of Monks._