The Beginnings of Buddhist Art and Other Essays in Indian and Central-Asian Archaeology c9.147

c9.147

Why then — and this is the last point on which we are conscious of owing the reader some explanation — why has it been so tardily and so laboriously recognized, whilst its three pendants were identified long ago and at first sight? To this question we may reply, first of all, that the *mahā-prātihārya*, especially in the preaching form which had prevailed, does not lend itself, as we have abundantly experienced, to anything more than a picture almost void of movement, if not of picturesqueness; to effect its instant recognition, it has neither the exceptional role of the monkey or the elephant, nor the characteristic decoration of the triple ladder : and here we have, doubtless, an excellent reason. There is room, in our opinion, for adding another. We are so accustomed to utilize the archæological information of the Chinese pilgrims in India, that we no longer think of being grateful to them for it; in order to measure the value of their help, we have to be once without it. That is the case on this occasion : Fa-hien and Hiuan-tsang, so explicit as regards the three other episodes, scarcely mention the one which interests us here. The places where Çrâvastî and the Jetavana had been, the favourite sojourn of the Master, evoked too many remembrances pell-mell for the « Great Miracle » not to be swamped in the crowd of those which on all sides, through the mouths of the guides, solicited their devout interest. We must likewise reckon with the fact that the story of the rivalry between the Master and the Tîrthyas was on the spot inevitably entangled with the calumny of the novice Ciñcâ, or with the assassination of the courtesan Sundarî : and these dramatic stories could not fail to encroach upon the miracle of Buddha, which was after all so neutral and quasi-passive. Thus, when the pilgrims finally arrive at the temple which marked the locality of the purely doctrinal and magical conflict, they both specify indeed that a statue of the Blessed One was seated (¹) there ;