It is only fair to state that not all of the accusations against the monks to be met with in the Russian periodicals are to be taken at their face value, or that they are to be indiscriminately generalized even when true. There are still to be found in Russia certain oases of ascetic monks who practice great austerities. There are to be found some small monasteries which have retained the spirit as well as the letter of the best cenobitic traditions; where the monks give themselves up to hard labor, where long hours are spent in the public recitation of the divine office, where the monks live in real seclusion from the world and reproduce in their lives the customs of the ancient monasteries." But these, unfortunately, are but rare exceptions, and as is nearly always the case, the virtues practised in these isolated houses are witnessed only by a few, whereas the laxity of morals and discipline which prevails in the more famous and more populous monastic institutions is of public notoriety, and renders monachism itself odious not only to the cultured classes, but to the common people as well. It is rarely that one meets in Russia any one who speaks well of the monks as a class. One reason for this is that they are recruited from the lowest classes of the population, from the gross sottish peasants who are often as fanatical as they are ignorant. The admirable development of scientific as well as charitable works which is the just pride of Western monachism is totally wanting in Russia. Monachism in that country is an inert factor, contributing nothing whatever to the Christian education of society. The only ground on which it might be defended would be that is is still a nursery and school of bishops and of seminary rectors. It furnishes the candidates for the Russian hierarchy and a nucleus of workers in matters pertaining to the sacred sciences. But these circumstances are precisely those which contribute the most to make monachism odious and bring it into discredit. The truth of this assertion will be shown in a forthcoming article on the Russian episcopate, the members of which, according to the canon law of the land, are obliged to embrace the monastic life before receiving the episcopal consecration.

P. AURELIO PALMIERI, O. S. A.

The Spirit and Merit of Monachism With Reference to the Church and to Society

(in Russian), St. Petersburg, 1874, p. 50-52.

THE DHAMMA OF BUDDHA

A. Roussel

The Samyuttaka-Nikaya (towards the end) relates that one day when Buddha was sitting in the woods of Sinsapas, he took up some leaves and asked his disciples whether there were more leaves in his hand than in the whole forest. In the forest, they answered. Then the Blessed One declared that in the same way the truths he had revealed to them were as nothing in number, when compared with those he had held back. As a matter of fact, he had taught them three things: the origin of pain, its abolition, and the means to this end. Other features of Buddhistic philosophy we shall discuss later, but the main consideration is that of Pain or Sorrow. see Buddha's own views of the place of pain in life:

First let us

'The transmigration of Beings (Samsara) has its origin in eternity. It is impossible to find the moment of time at which beings wrapped in ignorance and bound by the thirst for existence began to wander at haphazard from migration to migration. Which is greater, disciples, the mass of waters contained in the four great oceans or that of the tears which have flowed from your eyes during the long voyage as you wander at haphazard from migration to migration, having for your lot what you hate, and not having for your lot what you love? ...The death of a mother, of a father, of a brother, a sister, a son, a daughter, the loss of relatives, the loss of goods-all this through the long ages you have experienced. And whilst, during the long ages, you have suffered these trials, there have flowed from your eyes more tears...than there are waters in the four great oceans."

In another place we are told of a heart-broken mother who went about calling over and over the name of her dead daughter: "Jiva! Jiva!' The answer comes to her: "Eighty-four thousand girls named Jiva have been buried in this very place. For which of them do you mourn?" As is evident, such a consideration is not calculated to assuage a mother's grief; it is intended to show the emptiness of things here below, and the folly of those who attach themselves to them even by the most legitimate ties, such as those which unite mother and child.

King Mounda of Patalipoutta had lost his beloved wife, Bhadda. His grief was profound. By way of consolation the Bhikku Narada thus addressed him:

"There are five things which neither Samana nor Brahman, nor god, nor Mara, nor Brahma, nor anyone in the world can do. What are these five things? That what is subject to age will not grow old, that what is subject to illness will not become ill, that what is subject to death will not die, that what is subject to ruin will not fall into ruin, that what is subject to cessation will not cease."

To give a final touch to this picture of the instability of human affairs over which Buddhism lingers almost affectionately, we cite some stanzas culled by Oldenberg from the Dhammapada:

'How can you be gay, how can you give yourselves up to pleasure? Forever the flames burn. The darkness surrounds you—will you not seek the light? Man gathers flowers, all his thoughts are on pleasure. Just as on a village in the night the floods come down, so death comes upon him and sweeps him away. Man gathers flowers all his thoughts are on pleasure. Man of unquenchable desires, the Destroyer holds him in his power. Neither in the kingdom of the air nor in the midst of the sea, nor if you go down into the depths of the mountains will you find on earth a place where the power of Mara will not reach you.... Of joy is born pain; of joy is born fear. He who is freed from joy, for him there is no pain; whence can fear come to him? Of love is born pain, of love is born fear, etc., etc.... He who bends his eyes upon the world as if he looked upon a bubble of froth, as if he looked upon a dream, he escapes the eyes of sovereign Death....He who has mounted above the evil and difficult path of the Samsara, of wanderings astray, he who has crossed over and reached the other shore, rich in contemplation, sans longing, sans weakness, he who, being freed from existence, has found extinctionhe is whom I call a true Brahman."

However, Oldenberg is of opinion that it is fundamentally wrong to ascribe to Buddhist pessimism as its characteristic mark a profound and incurable melancholy. In support of his opinion he quotes these stanzas from the Dhammapada:

"He whose senses are in repose like steeds completely curbed by their driver, he who has stripped off all pride, who is freed from

We can infer from this last word that the true Buddhist and the true Brahman are one and the same. Indeed, only the Brahmans could be in circumstances to practise the exercises of meditation, etc. The other castes were too much occupied with external affairs to have leisure for such matters.

all impurity, he who is thus perfected is an cbject of envy to the very gods. In perfect joy we live, without enemies in a world of enmity.... In perfect joy we live, healthy amidst the sick....In perfect joy we live, unwearied amidst the weary....In perfect joy live we to whom naught belongs. Gayety is fccd to us as to the radiant gcds. The monk living in a solitary spot, but with his scul full of peace, tastes of a superhuman happiness, gazing face to face upon the truth."

From this the above mentioned author concludes: "It is not enough to say that the end towards which the Euddhist aims in order to escape pain is Nirvana. We should also note as a fact proved beyond doubt the interior joyousness, far removed from resignation, with which he seeks this end."

Here, if anywhere, applies the dictum that he who proves too much proves nothing Buddhism, like every other system that has pessimism for its basis, was not, if I may use the expression, the philosophy of gayety. It is not when one has wept and is weeping more tears than the four seas can hold that one is born to laughter; unless indeed it be as a reaction from the ceaseless pangs of sorrow, as in the sudden outbursts of gayety in melancholy persons who are trying to stifle their troubles. Such joy is fictitious and fleeting.

L:

THE TRUTHS ON THE ORIGIN AND SUPPRESSION OF PAIN.

Here we come to the most obscure and complicated part of Buddhist speculation. First of all we shall quote two stanzas, of which the rest is only a development:

"Behold, O monks, the holy truth on the origin of pain: it is the thirst (for existence) which leads from rebirth to rebirth, accompanied by pleasure and desire, which finds its pleasure here and there; the thirst for pleasures, the thirst for existence, the thirst for the unabiding."

"Behold, O monks, the holy truth on the suppression of pain; the extinction of this thirst by the complete annihilation of desire, by banishing desire, by renouncing it, by getting freed from it, by leaving it no room."

The whole metaphysic of Buddhism is contained in these few lines; in fact it can be summed up in one word-desire.

The final goal of this teaching is non-existence (later on we shall see whether this is synonymous with nothingness); and non-existence is reached by the suppression of the sole cause of existence: desire.

A twofold series of propositions will help us to understand what may be called the processus and recessus, the flow and ebb of the vicissitudes of the Ego before, during, and after its existence-the double chain of causes and effects:

"From ignorance come the formations (Sandaras); from the formations come cognition (Vinnana); from cognition come name and body; from name and body come the six domains (the six senses and their objects-the sixth sense for the Hindoos was Manas or the organic senses); from the six domains comes contact (between the senses and outer objects); from contact comes sensation; from sensation comes desire (or more literally thirst-Tauha); from thirst comes attachment (to existence); from attachment to existence comes existence (Chava); from existence comes birth; from birth come old age and death, suffering and lamentation, sorrow, disappointment and dispair Such is the origin of the whole empire of pain." So much for ignorance and its effects. knowledge, or the suppression of ignorance. what we shall find-a reversal of the first. pressed by the total abolition of desire (or concupiscence), this suppression leads to that of the formations; by the suppression of the formations, cognition is suppressed... by the suppression of birth are suppressed old age and death, suffering and murmuring, sorrow, disappointment and despair. Such is the suppression of the whole empire of pain."

Now for the effects of We know beforehand "If ignorance is sup

I have compared this twofold series, positive and negative, to the flow and ebb of the sea. One leads from birth to birth, ever pro

"The phraseology is difficult to understand. The difficulty is certainly due in part to the obscurity and subtilty of the philosophy itself. Partly also, no doubt, it is due to our lack of thorough understanding of the value of the terms. European scholars are often at sea in these matters, and the Hindoo Pundits do not seem to be able to find equivalents in Western languages for the terminology of Buddhistic metaphysics. However, we shall try to clear up one or two expressions. "Cognition" (which does not mean knowledge or science) is one of the six elements enumerated by Buddha-the elements of earth, water, fire, air, ether, and cognition. It is called "the unmanifested, the infinite, the all-illuminating, in which neither earth nor water, fire nor air find place; that in which greatness and littleness, weakness and strength, name and body cease completely," This is not very clear, to say the least; nor is it clear why "name and body" are produced by "cognition," and also, as we now find, disappear in it.

As for the latter expressions, the "name" is said to be the domain of the sensations, representations, and formations." The "body" seems to mean the four elements; but they speak of it as distinct from them: "the four elements and the body (rupa)"-unless indeed we may translate this as "the four elements and their forms."