Note 46 — THE SEVEN WAYS TO NEIBBAN.

In the definition of man which is given by the Buddhist author, we find the words intelligence, capacity for reflecting, comparing and drawing inferences, &c. He who is not familiar with the revolting materialist doctrines of Buddhism would be tempted to believe that they admit of a soul or spiritual principle subsisting in man. But such is not the case. The faculty for performing all the functions which we rightly attribute to the soul resides in the sixth sense, called mano, or the heart, or the knowing principle. But this sense, in their opinion, is as material as the eye, the ear, and the other senses. It is delightful to the Christian reader to find in the midst of a heap of rubbish and fables a few fragments of the primitive revelation. We see man coming from a noble origin, appearing in this world with the most glorious privileges, which he forfeits by eating the rice called Tsale, which produced on his being the same destructive effects which the eating of the forbidden fruit caused on our first parents in the garden of Eden.