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again as the summum bonum, but proposes to effect this by spiritual absorption either into universal spirit, or into an all-comprehending divine spirit; but the Buddhists recognize no such recipient for the liberated soul. No doubt, amongst the Buddhists, as amongst the Brahmans, differences of opinion occasionally prevailed, giving rise to various schools; four of these were known to the Brahmanical controversial writers before the sixth century; but, besides them, who are styled Sautrántika, Vaibháshika, Mádhyamika, and Yogáchára*, there was an Aiswarya, or theistical school, with which the notions admitted into Nepal may have originated: the more ancient and genuine school, however, was that of the Swábhávikas, whose doctrine is thus summarily indicated in a Buddhist Páli book: "Whence come existing things? from their own nature, swabhávát. Were do they go to after life? into other forms, through the same inherent tendency. How do they escape from that tendency? where do they go finally? into vacuity,―súnyatú," such being the sum and substance of the wisdom of Buddha** That this was the meaning of Nirvana is shown in numerous passages both in Sanskrit and in Páli. In the Saddharma Lankávatára *** Śákya is represented as confuting all the Brahmanical notions of Nirvána, and concludes by expounding it to be the complete annihilation of the thinking principle, illusKoeppen, 1. 1., 1, 151 ff. St. Julien in Journal Asiatique, Vol. XIV (1859), p. 327 ff.]
9
[Wassiljew, 1. l., 1, 285-367.
[Burnouf, Introd., 441 ff.]
[ibid., 514 ff.]
*
**
BUDDHA AND BUDDHISM.
***
