INTRODUCTION.
The first edition of this work, issued in 1893, had an unexpected success, especially abroad. In France, the eminent Sanskrit scholar, M. Leon de Rosny, reviewed it very favourably in the "XXme Siecle " in a long article that gave a digest of the subject.
He said: "The astonishing points of contact (ressemblances etonnantes) between the popular legend of Buddha and that of Christ, the almost absolute similarity of the moral lessons given to the world, at five centuries' interval, between these two peerless teachers of the human race, the striking affinities between the customs of the Buddhists and of the Essenes, of whom Christ must have been a disciple, suggest at once an Indian origin to Primitive Christianity."
And in Germany the eminent scientist, Ludwig Buchner, also reviewed it in one of the periodicals summing up thus: "There is no longer any question of the close relationship, in form and contents, of the two greatest and most successful religions of the world." This article has been reproduced in the volume entitled "Last Words on Materialism."
But the subject had already been ventilated on the continent.
In the "Revue des Deux Mondes," 15th July, 1888, M. Emile Burnouf has an article entitled "Le
