The same notion of impurity doubtless explains the fact that certain persons devoted to religion have to live a single life. In the Marquesas Islands, no one could become a priest without having lived chastely for several years previously.[893] In Patagonia, according to Falkner, the male wizards were not allowed to marry,[894] and the same prohibition applied to the priests of the Mosquito Indians and the ancient Mexicans.[895] In Peru, there were virgins dedicated to the Sun, who lived in seclusion to the end of their lives; and besides the virgins who professed perpetual virginity in the monasteries, there were other women, of the blood royal, who led the same life in their own houses, having taken a vow of chastity. “These women,” says Garcilasso de la Vega, “were held in great veneration for their chastity and purity, and, as a mark of worship and respect, they were called ‘Occlo,’ which was a name held sacred in their idolatry.”[896] In Mexico, also, certain religious women were bound to chastity, although their profession was but for one year. Speaking of these nuns, the pious Father Acosta remarks, “The devil hath desired to be served by them that observe Virginitie, not that chastitie is pleasing unto him, for he is an uncleane spirite, but for the desire he hath to take from the great God, as much as in him lieth, this glory to be served with cleanness and integrity.”[897] Justinus tells us of Persian Sun priestesses, who, like the Roman vestals and certain Greek priestesses, were obliged to refrain from intercourse with men;[898] and according to Pomponius Mela, the nine priestesses of the oracle of a Gallic deity in Sena were devoted to perpetual virginity.[899] The Buddhistic doctrine teaches that lust and ignorance are the two great causes of the misery of life, and that we should therefore suppress lust and remove ignorance. We read in the ‘Dhammika-Sutta’ that “a wise man should avoid married life as if it were a burning pit of live coals.”[900] Sensuality is altogether incompatible with wisdom and holiness. According to the legend, Buddha’s mother, who was the best and purest of the daughters of men, had no other sons, and her conception was due to supernatural causes.[901] And one of the fundamental duties of monastic life, by an infringement of which the guilty person brings about his inevitable expulsion from Buddha’s Order, is, that “an ordained monk may not have sexual intercourse, not even with an animal. The monk who has sexual intercourse is no longer a monk.”[902] Mr. Wilson, indeed, states that, in Tibet, some sects of the Lamas are allowed to marry; but those who do not are considered more holy. And in every sect the nuns must take a vow of absolute continence.[903] Again, the Chinese laws enjoin celibacy upon all priests, Buddhist or Taouist.[904]