This being the case, we must assume that all the doctrines that are found in Açvaghoṣa and distinct from those usually held to be Hînayânistic are the teachings elaborated by Buddhists from the time of Buddha’s death down to the time of Açvaghoṣa. But as the latter apparently believes all these doctrines as Buddha’s own and raises no doubt concerning their later origin, even if they were so, we must assume again that these doctrines were in a state of completion long before Açvaghoṣa’s time. If our calculation is correct that he lived in the first century before Christ, the Mahâyâna faith must be said to have been formulated at least two hundred years prior to his age,--taking this presumably as the time that is required for the formulation and dogmatical establishment of a doctrine. This calculation places the development of the Mahâyâna faith during the first century after the Buddha, and, we know, it was during this time that so many schools and divisions,--among {248} which we must also find the so-called “primitive” Buddhism of Ceylon, arose among the Buddhists,--each claiming to be the only authentic transmission of the Buddha’s teaching. Did Mahâyânism come out of this turmoil of contention? Did it boldly raise itself from this chaos and claim to have solved all the questions and doubts that agitated the minds of Buddhists after the Nirvâna? For certain we do not know anything concerning the chronology of the development of Buddhist philosophy and dogmas in India, at least before Açvaghoṣa; but, as far as our Chinese Buddhist literature records, we must conclude that this was most probably the case. To give our readers a glimpse of the state of things that were taking place in those early days of Buddhism in India, I will quote some passages from Vasumitra’s _Discourse on the Points of Controversy by the Different Schools of Buddhism_,--the work once referred to in the beginning of this book. The two principal schools that arose soon after the Nirvâna of the Buddha were, as is well known, the Elders and the Great Council, and though they were further divided into a number of smaller sections and their views became so complex and intermixed that some of the Elders shared similar views with the Great Council School and vice versa, yet we can fairly distinguish one from the other and describe the essential peculiarities of each school. These points of difference, generally speaking, are as follows, confining ourselves to their conceptions about the Buddha: {249}