Scatalogic Rites of All Nations: A dissertation upon the employment of excrementitious remedial agents in religion, therapeutics, divination, witchcraft, love-philters, etc., in all parts of the globeBourke, John Gregory
Religion
Scatalogic Rites of All Nations: A dissertation upon the employment of excrementitious remedial agents in religion, therapeutics, divination, witchcraft, love-philters, etc., in all parts of the globe
Bourke, John Gregory
Scatology
And, quoting from Pallas, book 1, p. 212, he adds: “Il est hors de
doute que le contenu de sa chaise percée est dévotement recueilli;
les parties solides sont distribuées comme des amulettes qu’on
porte au cou; le liquide est pris intérieurement comme une médécine
infaillible.”—(Maltebrun, Universal Geography, article “Thibet,” vol. ii.
lib. 45, American edition, Philadelphia, 1832.)
The Abbé Huc denies this assertion: “The Talé Lama is venerated by the
Thibetans and the Mongols like a divinity. The influence he exercises
over the Buddhist population is truly astonishing; but still it is going
too far to say that his excrements are carefully collected and made
into amulets, which devotees inclose in pouches and carry around their
necks.”—(Huc, “Travels in Tartary, Thibet, and China,” London, 1849, vol.
ii. p. 198.)
HUC AND DUBOIS COMPARED.
Huc was a keen and observing traveller; he was well acquainted with
the languages and customs of the Mongolians; his tour into Thibet was
replete with incident, and his narrative never flags in interest. Still,
in Thibet he was only a traveller; the upper classes of the Buddhist
priesthood looked upon him with suspicion. The lower orders of priesthood
and people did seem to consider him as a Lama from the far East, but
he did not succeed in gaining the confidence of the Thibetans to the
extent possessed by Dubois among the Brahminical sects. The history of
the latter author is a peculiar one: A French priest, driven from his
native land by the excesses of the revolution, he took refuge in India,
devoting himself for nearly twenty years to missionary labor among the
people, with whom he became so thoroughly identified that when his notes
appeared they were published at the expense of the British East India
Company, and distributed among its officials as a text-book.
While it is possible to consult earlier authorities, the determination
of this matter should not be allowed to remain in controversy. The first
Europeans known to have penetrated to Thibet (or Barantola, as they
called it) were the Jesuits Grueber and Dorville, who, returning from
China to Europe, walked through Thibet, and down through India to the
sea-coast. This was in 1661; another member of the same order, Father
Andrade, claimed to have succeeded in the same perilous undertaking at an
earlier date (1621), but the names of the cities he visited proves that
he did not get beyond what is now known as Afghanistan, at the foot of
the mountains bordering on Thibet. While Grueber and Dorville were making
their journey, or not many years after, Father Gerbillon, also a Jesuit,
had taken up his abode among the nomadic Tartars, acquiring an influence
with them of which the Emperor of China was glad to avail himself in
emergencies. None of these travellers claimed to have seen the Grand Lama
in person.
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