A History of Hindu Chemistry from the Earliest Times to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century A.D. v2.c32.79

v2.c32.79

throughout his career, a characteristic Indian . . . . . he was the greatest and wisest and best of Hindus.”—ibid, p. 117. The same high authority puts it more tersely when he says: “This is partly, no doubt, because we call them Buddhists, and imagine them, therefore, to belong to a separate class, quite distinct from other Indians of that stock. The Buddhists were, as a matter of fact, characteristically and distinctly Indian.”—“Buddhist India,” p. 165. Cf. “Buddhism, in fact, may be regarded as a reformed phase of Hindu religion and ethical activity. The Buddhistic doctrine of the vanity of the world had been thoroughly disseminated by Yájnavalkya (in the Satapatha Bráhmana) and with it the practice of subsistence upon alms as Pravrájaka or Bhikshu; and a fruitful soil had thereby been prepared for Buddhism.” Weber’s “Hist. Sans. Lit.” trans. 3rd Ed. (1892) p. 285. Again “This teaching contains, in itself, absolutely nothing new; on the contrary, it is essentially identical with the corresponding Brahminical doctrine; only the fashion in which Buddha proclaimed and disseminated it was something altogether novel and unwonted.”—ibid, p. 289.