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was opposed to that then prevalent; yet even here he had antique authority for his discipline.
To return to Gautama's[8] life. Legend tells how he fled away on his horse Kanthaka, in search of solitude and the means of salvation, far from his home to the abode of ascetics, for he thought: "Whence comes peace? When the fire of desire is extinguished, when the fire of hate is extinguished, when the fire of illusion is extinguished, when all sins and all sorrows are extinguished, then comes peace." And the only means to this end was the renunciation of desire, the discipline of Yoga concentration, where the mind fixed on one point loses all else from its horizon, and feels no drawing aside to worldly things.
What then has Gautama done from the point of view of the Brahman? He has given up his home to become an ascetic. But this was permitted by usage, for, although the strict western code allowed it only to the priest, yet it was customary among the other twiceborn castes at an earlier day, and in this part of India it awakened no surprise that one of the military caste should take up the life of a philosopher. For the historian of Indic religions this fact is of great significance, since such practice is the entering wedge which was to split the castes. One step more and not only the military caste but the lower, nay the lowest castes, might become ascetics. But, again, all ascetics were looked upon, in that religious society, as equal to the priests. In fact, where Gautama lived there was rather more respect paid to the ascetic than to the priest as a member of the caste. Gautama was most fortunate in his birth and birth-place. An aristocrat, he became an ascetic in a land where the priests were particularly disregarded. He had no public opinion to contend against when later he declared that Brahman birth and Brahman wisdom had no value. On the contrary, he spoke to glad hearers, who heard repeated loudly now as a religious truth what often they had said to themselves despitefully in private.
Gautama journeyed as a muni, or silent ascetic sage, till after seven years he abandoned his teachers (for he had become a disciple of professed masters), and
