to be an illusion. No historical connection can possibly be admitted between the Egyptian and the Indo-European doctrines of the necessity of marriage, and all the doctrines in favour of religious celibacy may very probably turn out to be historically independent of each other. The late Professor Baur, of Tübingen, wrote an exceedingly able work, in which he endeavoured to trace the Manichean system to Buddhism.[1] His arguments were admitted by Neander and many other learned men; among others, by Dr. Pusey in this country. Admirable, however, as Baur's analysis of the Manichean system must be confessed to be, his conception of Buddhism was radically false. This is not to be wondered at, for the book was written before any authentic information on the subject of Buddhism was yet accessible, and the principles which in the Gnostic and Manichean systems were wrongly ascribed to Buddhism were taken from the Platonic, Neo-Pythagorean or some other Hellenic philosophy. And all attempts to discover Buddhist influences in Jewish or Christian theologies will, I am sure, prove equally abortive. What they have in common is human reason, working according to the same natural laws. The question, however, is one which should be decided upon strictly historical evidence, independently of all
- ↑ I have discussed this question at length in an article on "Orientalism and Ancient Christianity," in the Home and Foreign Review, July, 1863, p. 151.
