from the fact, that the Buddhists have ten incarnations of Buddha, the same as the followers of Cristna, and, what is remarkable, called by the same names.[1] Mr. Ward says, “Vishnu had ten incarnations, and Buddha had the same number.”[2] These ten incarnations, thus noticed by this missionary, we shall find of the very first importance in our future disquisitions.
The Rev. Mr. Maurice has given a very long and particular account of these ten grand Avatars or incarnations, of the God of the Hindoos. The accounts of the Brahmins consist, to outward appearance, of a great number of idle and absurd fables, not worth repetition. The only fact worthy of notice here is, that Buddha was universally allowed to be the first of the incarnations; that Cristna was of later date; and that, at the æra of the birth of Christ, eight of them had appeared on the earth, and that other two were expected to follow before the end of the Cali-Yug, or of the present age. But the Brahmins held that 3101 years of it had expired at the period of the birth of Christ, according to our reckoning.
Between the Brahmins and the Buddhists there exists the greatest conceivable enmity: the former accusing the latter of being Atheists, and schismatics from their sect. They will hold no communication with them, believing themselves to be made unclean, and to require purification, should they step within even the shadow of a Buddhist. Much in the same way the Buddhists consider the Brahmins. The ancient histories of the Hindoos are full of accounts of terrible wars between the different sectaries, which probably lasted, with the intermissions usual in such cases, for many generations, and extended their influence over the whole world; and we shall see in the course of this work, that, in their results, they continue to exercise an influence over the destinies of mankind.
Buddha is allowed by his enemies, the Brahmins, to have been an avatar. Then here is divine wisdom incarnate, of whom the Bull of the Zodiac was the emblem. Here he is the Protogonos or first-begotten, the God or Goddess Μητις of the Greeks, being, perhaps, both male and female. He is at once described as divine wisdom, the Sun, and Taurus. This is the first Buddha or incarnation of wisdom, by many of the Brahmins often confounded with a person of the same name, supposed to have lived at a later day. In fact, Buddha or the wise, if the word were not merely the name of a doctrine, seems to have been an appellation taken by several persons, or one person incarnate at several periods, and from this circumstance much confusion has arisen. But I think we may take every thing which the Brahmins say of the first Buddha to his advantage, as the received doctrine of his followers. They hate all Buddhists too much to say any thing in his favour which they think untrue.
5. The mother of Buddha was Maia, who was also the mother of Mercury, a fact of the first importance. Of this Maia or Maja the mother of Mercury, Mr. Davies[3] says, “The universal genius of nature, which discriminated all things, according to their various kinds or species—the same, perhaps, as the Meth of the Ægyptians, and the Μητις of the Orphic bards, which was of all kinds, and the author of all things.—Και Μητις πρωτος γενετωρ. Orph. Frag.” To this Mr. Whiter adds, “To these terms belong the well-known deities Budda and Amida. The Fo of the Chinese is acknowledged to be the Fod or Budda of the Eastern world, and the Mercury of the Greeks.” He then gives the following passage from Barrow’s Travels: “The Budha of the Hindūs was the son of Maya, and one of his epithets is Amita. The Fo of China was the son of Mo-ya, and one of his epithets is Om-e-to; and in Japan, whose natives are of Chinese origin, the same God Fo is worshiped under the name of Amida. I could neither collect from any of the Chinese what the literal meaning was of Om-e-to, nor could I decipher the characters under which it was written.”
