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Education, Litcrature and Sciences
349
Music presided over by an expert who was "the chief of his kind in all India." Buddha selected this place for the first promulgation of his gospel because it became the famous seat of learning in eastern India. It it stated that prince Agadadatta of Sankhapura went to Banaras for study. He stayed in the house of his teacher, and returned home after completing the course of study. Sāvatthi’ is mentioned as another centre of education.3
Mahāli4 a native of Vaiśālī, is known to have gone to Takshasilā for learning Silpa or arts. After the completion of his studies, when he came back home, he trained five hundred Lichchhavis. These five hundred again, after finishing their courses, instructed many in different parts of the country. Vaiśālı itself was a centre of learning. The Lichchhavis were so much interested in high religious and philosophical discussions that they built a Kūțāgāra Hall, where such discussions took place. The Buddha gave many of his discourses at this place. HERMITAGES AS CENTRES OF LEARNING
The educational system of this period produced men of affairs as well as those who renounced the world in the pursuit of Truth. The life of renunciation indeed claimed many an ex-student of both Taxila and Benaras. In the sylvan and solitary retreats away from the busy life of cities, thc hermitages served as schools of higher philosophical speculation and religious training. These special schools of spiritual study are also referred to as being consisted of 500 ascetics gathering round the personality of an individual hermit of establishıcd reputation to impart instruction as his disciples. Such hermitages were generally established in the Himalayas. Sometimes,
1. Jā, No. 243. 2. Ullarā. Ti, 4, p. 83. 3. Ibid. 2, p. 22. 4. FAUSBOLT.: Dhammapadam (Old cdition), p. 211. 5. Chullakäliiga jā, No. 301. 6. Ruys Darius : Surarigalarilasin, Pt. I, PTS, London, 1894 7. Jii, Vol. I, 11. 8. Ibid, Vol. I, 406, 431; III, 143; 11, 74.
