________________ Some Reflections on the Gaps in Vaisali's History 67 down into gold bullion. If this report is true, there can be no doubt that the person who sold these plates and the person who melted them down have done the greatest disservice to the cause of Vaisali, such thing must never be allowed to recur. It is not unlikely that copper plates, inscribed images or their pedestals may be accidentally discovered. All these must be secured and handed over to be religiously preserved in the local museum. The finder will no doubt receive a reasonable price and his name will also be noted down and perpetuated as the discoverer of the antiquity concerned. PITFALLS FOR REPUBLIC My predecessors have already dilated upon the valuable message of ancient republican Vaisali to the modern republican Bharata. The glorious example of ancient Vaisali shows to us how republican institutions are to be successfully worked and what pitfalls are to be avoided to ensure their prosperity. As long as the members of the Licchavi Parliament met frequently to transact the state business in harmony, as long as they did not allow their judgment to be warped by personal rivalries or individual self-interest, the republic prospered. As long as the Licchavi' youths cultivated martial qualities and excelled in military exercises, as long as they were daring leaders in commerce and colonisation, their state was invincible. The citizens of a free republic like modern Bbarata have to learn the difficult civic duty of combining respect for individual conviction with a regard for collective state decision as arrived at in the state Parliament. During the decline of Vaigali, the Lalitavistara tells us, that there was no respect for age nor for position; each citizen thought himself to be a Raja, not amendable to any higher authority, and thereby paved the way to the ruin of the state. There are indications in the contemporary civic and political life to show that a similar tendency is reasserting itself. SHOULD MAJORITY ALWAYS CARRY THE DAY ? There is no doubt that democracy attaches greatest importance to the individual convictions of every honest citizen. But when these convictions tend to differ widely, a way has to be found. One way is to take the opinion of the majority. But sometimes on such occasions the minority feels that its opponents are ruling by mere brute majority. A way out of such a difficulty is indicated to us by the procedure of the Second Buddhist Council held at Vaisali, when 700 Bhiksus assembled there to examine the validity of the points raised by the dissenting monks. For a long time no agreement could be arrived at, and the counting of votes did not seem
