Even Luther, with whom the monistic era of Christianity begins, speaks of his body with the utmost contempt. The term Madensack, i. e., a bag full of food for grubs, is a favorite expression of his.

The religious problem, as it presented itself to the ascetic Gautama before he had attained to Buddhahood, was formulated on dualistic principles, but his final solution rested upon a monistic basis. We know little of his philosophical evolution and the phases through which he passed; but the outcome is unequivocal in all important questions that form decisive test-issues as to the character of his system. He was tolerant and showed extreme patience with all kinds of mythologies, even utilizing the superstitions of his age to the enhancement of his religion, but he was merciless in his rejection of metaphysicism and dualism.

ANTI-METAPHYSICAL.

After Buddha had surrendered the old dualism, the traditional formulation of philosophical problems lost their meaning; they became what we now call illegitimate questions; and whenever Buddha was confronted with such illegitimate questions, he either refused to answer them or declared openly: "The question is not rightly put.' His refusal to answer such questions, which on his plane of thought had become unmeaning and irrelevant, nay, even mis

* See, for instance, Warren, Buddhism in Translations, pp. 167 and 312.

leading, can be interpreted as agnosticism, or as a dodge and attempt at straddling, only by those who utterly misconceive the spirit of Buddha's doctrines. When bored with questions by a wandering ascetic, one of those frivolous wranglers who dispute merely for the sake of discussion, Buddha refuses to answer, but when afterwards Ananda accosts his master he explains why the wandering ascetic received no reply. The reason is here again the error involved in the wrong formulation of the question. Thus if he had replied in the negative, saying that the âtman does not survive death, the wandering ascetic would have said "the Buddha teaches that there is no after-life"; and if he had replied in the affirmative, saying that the âtman survives death, the implication would have been that Buddha believed with the Vedanta philosophers in the existence of an âtman.

Buddha's monism is not materialism; he does not identify soul and body, he only denies the separate existence of soul-entities. There is soul and there is body. There are consciousness-forms and bodilyforms, and both are changing and developing, both are subject to growth and decay. The body is dissolved, and consciousness passes away, yet their forms reappear in new incarnations. There is death and rebirth, and there is continuity of life with its special and individual types. If the soul were identical with the body, it would perish with it; if it were a distinct entity and an immutable âtman, it would not be affected by conduct and there would be no use in leading a holy life. In either case

there is no need of seeking religion. Buddha's solution is, that there are not two things (1) an âtman and (2) the deeds performed by the âtman, but there is one thing—a soul-activity (karma), which operates by a continuous preservation of its deed-forms or samskâras, which are the dispositions produced by the various functions of karma. There is not a being that is born, acts, enjoys itself, suffers and dies and is reborn to die again; but simply birth, action, enjoyment, suffering, and death take place. The lifeactivity, the deeds, the karma, the modes of motion in all their peculiar forms, alone are real: they are preserved and nothing else. Man's soul consists of the memory-forms, or dispositions, produced by former karmas. There is no self in itself, no separate âtman; the self consists in the deed-forms, and every creature is the result of deeds.

The disciples propose to the Blessed One in the Samyutta-Nikaya this question :

"Reverend Sir, what are old age and death? and what is it has old age and death?"

The Blessed One replies:

"The question is not rightly put. O priest, to say: 'What are old age and death? and what is it has old age and death?' and to say: 'Old age and death are one thing, but it is another thing which has old age and death,' is to say the same thing in different ways.

"If, O priest, the dogma obtain that the soul and the body are identical, then there is no religious life; or if, O priest, the dogma obtain that the soul is one thing and the body another, then also there is no religious life. Both these ex

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tremes, O priest, have been avoided by the Tathâgata, and it is a middle doctrine he teaches: On birth depend old age and death."" (Buddhism in Translations, p. 167.)

But considering the practical importance of personal effort in moral endeavor, how can the denial of the existence of a separate self as the condition of personality be useful in religion?

The answer is, that the denial of the existence of a separate self, an âtman, is not a denial of the real self such as it actually exists in man's personality. There is no chariot in itself, but there are chariots; there are no persons in themselves, but there are persons. Buddha does not intend to wipe out the personality of man, but only the false notion of the metaphysical character of personality. Not only did Buddha always endeavor to adapt his teachings to different personalities, but we find generally in Buddhism as much stress laid upon the personal relation of a disciple to the master, as by Luther, who used to say that "it is not enough for a Christian to know that Jesus Christ is the Saviour, he must experience the fact in his heart and must be able to say, 'Jesus Christ has come to save me individually.'"*

There is a similar aspiration in Buddhism, which

* 66 'Darum ist's nicht genug, dass einer glaubt, es sei Gott, Christus habe gelitten., u. dergl., sondern er muss festiglich glauben, dass Gott ihm zur Seligkeit ein Gott sei, dass Christus für ihn gelitten habe, etc." (Quoted by Küstlin in his Luther's Theologie.) Similar passages are frequent in Luther's writ

Buddhagosha, in his comments on the Dhammapada, expresses as follows:

"Now when a Supreme Buddha teaches the Doctrine, those in front and those behind, and those beyond a hundred or a thousand worlds, and those even who inhabit the abode of the Sublime Gods, exclaim: 'The Teacher is looking at me; The Teacher is teaching the Doctrine to me.' To each one it seems as if the Teacher were beholding and addressing him alone. The Buddhas, they say, resemble the moon: as the moon in the midst of the heavens appears to every living being as if over his head, so the Buddhas appear to every one as if standing in front of him." (Buddhism in Translations, p. 470.)

Far from being an obliteration of individuality, the denial of the âtman actually involves a liberation of individuality from an error that is liable to stunt all mental growth and hinder man's free development. Buddha takes out of life the vanity of self, which is based upon the dualism of âtman and karma as separate realities. There is no need of bothering about an âtman, but it is important to be mindful, thoughtful, and energetic in all that a man undertakes and does, for the karma is the stuff of which a man is made. One's own personal endeavor and achievements constitute one's personality, and this personality is preserved beyond death, as we read:

"But every deed a man performs

With body, or with voice, or mind,
"Tis this that he can call his own,
This with him take as he goes hence.
This is what follows after him

And like a shadow ne'er departs."*

* Buddhism in Translations, p. 228.