'Je n'hésite pas à ajouter,' he writes, 'que, sauf le Christ tout seul, il n'est point, parmi les fondateurs de religion, de figure plus pure ni plus touchante que celle du Bouddha. Sa vie n'a point de tâche. Son constant héroisme égale sa conviction; et si la théorie qu'il préconise est fausse, les exemples personnels qu'il donne sont irréprochables. Il est le modèle achevé de toutes les vertus qu'il prêche; son abnégation, sa charité son inaltérable douceur, ne se démentent point un seul instant; il abandonne à vingt-neuf ans la cour du roi son père pour se faire religieux et mendiant; il prépare silencieusement sa doctrine par six années de retraite et de méditation; il la propage par la seule puissance de la parole et de la persuasion, pendant plus d'un demi-siècle; et quand il meurt entre les bras de ses disciples, c'est avec la sérénité d'un sage qui a pratiqué le bien toute sa vie, et qui est assuré d'avoir trouvé le vrai.' (Page v.) [Footnote 62: Burnouf, 'Lotus de la bonne Loi,' p. 300.] * * * * * There still remain, no doubt, some blurred and doubtful pages in the history of the prince of Kapilavastu; but we have only to look at the works on ancient philosophy and religion published some thirty years ago, in order to perceive the immense progress that has been made in establishing the true historical character of the founder of Buddhism. There was a time when Buddha was identified with Christ. The Manichæans were actually forced to abjure their belief that Buddha, Christ, and Mani were one and the same person.[63] But we are thinking rather of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when elaborate books were written, in order to prove that Buddha had been in reality the Thoth of the Egyptians, that he was Mercury, or Wodan, or Zoroaster, or Pythagoras. Even Sir W. Jones, as we saw, identified Buddha, first with Odin, and afterwards with Shishak, 'who either in person or by a colony from Egypt imported into India the mild heresy of the ancient Bauddhas.' At present we know that neither Egypt nor the Walhalla of Germany, neither Greece nor Persia, could have produced either the man himself or his doctrine. He is the offspring of India in mind and soul. His doctrine, by the very antagonism in which it stands to the old system of Brahmanism, shows that it could not have sprung up in any country except India. The ancient history of Brahmanism leads on to Buddhism, with the same necessity with which mediæval Romanism led to Protestantism. Though the date of Buddha is still liable to small chronological oscillations, his place in the intellectual annals of India is henceforth definitely marked: Buddhism became the state religion of India at the time of A_s_oka; and A_s_oka, the Buddhist Constantine, was the grandson of _K_andragupta, the contemporary of Seleucus Nicator. The system of the Brahmans had run its course.