But let us glance at the life of the founder of Buddhism. He is called Gaudama, Siddartha, or Buddha. Gaudama was the name of his family; Siddartha his own individual name, and Buddha, “the enlightened one,” the surname he acquired by his wisdom. He was born about the year 500 B.C., at Kapilivastu, a few days’ journey from Benares, near the base of the Himalayas. His father was an Indian prince, and ruled over a tribe called the Sakyas. Buddha is described as of a gentle, ardent, pensive, philanthropic nature. He was reared in the lap of Oriental luxury, but his earnest nature became weary with pleasure. Intimations of the wretchedness of the peasantry of India penetrated even the palace walls. The winds soughing through the strings of the Æolian harp, seemed to whisper in his ear the miseries of mankind.
“We are the voices of the wandering wind, Which moan for rest, and rest can never find; Lo! as the wind is, so is mortal life, A moan, a sigh, a sob, a storm, a strife.
“O Maya’s son! because we roam the earth, Moan we upon these strings; we make no mirth, So many woes we see in many lands, So many streaming eyes, and wringing hands.”[17]
The desire to be a savior takes possession of his breast. Four ominous sights contribute to fix his purpose. He sees in his pleasure-grounds an old man, broken and decrepit; again, he meets a man smitten with a malignant disease; again, his eye rests upon a corpse. He learns that such are the destinies of himself and of all his fellow-beings. At last he sees a mendicant monk passing by with his alms-bowl. The young prince resolves to leave his father, his wealth, his power, his wife, and child, and become a homeless wanderer, that he may search out the way of salvation for himself and his fellow-men. He first became a Brahminical ascetic, and gave himself over to the severest penance and self-torture. Afterward he abandoned this altogether, and at last, while in profoundest meditation under the bo-tree, he discovers the way of life. He spends his remaining days in travelling through India, preaching his gospel, and gaining many disciples. He revisits his home at Kapilivastu. He lives to be an old man, and at last dies with the words on his lips: “Nothing, nothing is durable!” The eminent French savant, M. Barthélemy St. Hilaire, says:
“Je n’hésite pas à ajouter, que, sauf le Christ tout seul, il n’est point, parmi les fondateurs de religion, de figure plus pure ni plus touchante que celle du Bouddha. Sa vie n’a point de tache. Son constant héroîsm égale sa conviction; et si la théorie qu’il préconise est fausse, les exemples personnels qu’il donne sont irréprochables. Il est le modèle achevé de toutes les vertus qu’il prêcha; son abnégation, sa charité, son inaltérable douceur, ne se démentent point un seul instant; il abandonne à vingt-neuf ans la cour du roi, son père, pour se faire religieux et mendiant; il prépare silencieusement sa doctrine par six années de retraite, et de méditation; il la propage par la seule puissance de la parole et de la persuasion, pendant plus d’un demi siècle; et quand il meurt entre les bras de ses disciples, c’est avec la sérénité d’un sage qui a pratiqué le bien toute sa vie, et qui est assuré d’avoir trouvé le vrai.”[18]
But one eagerly inquires, What was the _way of salvation_ that Buddha discovered under the bo-tree, and spent half a century of his life in preaching? Observe successively the _point of departure_, the _goal_, and the _way_.
Buddha starts out with the idea that misery is the indispensable accompaniment of existence—sorrow is shadow to life. The foundation of his philosophy rests in the densest pessimism. While we are bound up in this material world, we are a prey to disappointment, disease, old age, death. We find ourselves “caught in this common net of death and woe, and life which binds to both.” There is no way out of the vast and monotonous cycle of transmigration except into _Nirvana_—the _blowing out_—that is, total extinction.
The highest _goal_, therefore, to which we can attain is utter annihilation. That this is the meaning of _Nirvana_, or _Nigban_, seems established beyond a doubt. The most eminent authorities on Buddhism, Barthélemy St. Hilaire, Bigandet, Eugène Burnouf, Spence Hardy, and Max Müller, all agree with the view presented by Mr. Judson many years ago, that _Nirvana_ or _Nigban_ is nothing less than a total extinction of soul and body. It is the final blowing out of the soul, as of a lamp; not its absorption, as when a “dew-drop slips into the shining sea.”
It is
“To perish rather, swallowed up and lost, In the wide womb of uncreated night. Devoid of sense and motion.”