of ultimate disappointment, involving, perhaps in that reaction the authentic portion also of these annals, for a time, under one general and sweeping disparagement.
It is very desirable, therefore, that, if possible, the nature, the extent, as well as the motive, for this mystification should be explained, before I advert to those portions of the PJi Annals which treat of events of greater aatiqwity than twenty-four centuries. I profess not to be able to show, either the age in which the first systematic perversion of the Buddbistical records took place, or how often that mystification was repeated; but self-condemnatory evidence more convincing than that which the PiiuAattaya and the Afthakathd themselves contain, that such a mystification was adopted ab the advent of SAnTA cannot, I conceive, be reasonably expected to exist. In those authorities, (both which are still held by the Buddhists to be inspired writings,) you are, as one of their cardinal points of faith, required to believe, moreover, that a revolution of human affairs, in all respects similar to the one that look place at the advent of SAXTA, occurred at the manifestation if every preceding BUDDHo. The question, therefore, as to whether was or was not the first disturber of Buddhistical chronology, is dependent on the establishment of the still more important historical fact ‘of whether the preceding BUDDE had any existence but in his pretended revelation. For impartial evidence on this interesting question, we must not, of course, search Buddhistical writings; and it is nR my design to enter into any speculative discussion at present.
It is, however, not unworthy of general remark that, as far aa the surviving records of antiquity will admit of a judgment being formed, the learned consider it to be established that the Egyptians and the hindus, the two nations who earliest attained an advanced condition of civilization, both preserved their chronology underauged, till about the age in which Buddhism acquired its greatest spread over the civilized regions of Asia; and that it was only then that the prvpounders of religious mysteries in Egypt and in those regions attempted to remodel their historical data, attributing to their respective nations a greater antiquity than that previously claimed by them. HanoDovus is considered to have visited Egypt about the middle of the fifth century before Christ. A comparison of the information collected by that historian, with that obtained by DLODO1WS four hundred years later, shows that the Egyptian priests had in that interval altered their traditions considerably, so as to throw the commencement of their history much furthei back. It appears to be equally proved, by th, evidenc, still extant of the information collected
