Page:Leaves from my Chinese Scrapbook - Balfour, 1887.djvu/230

TRUBNER'S ORIENTAL SERIES. THE FOLLOWING WORKS HAVE ALREADY APPEARED:— Third Edition, post 8vo, cloth, pp. xvi.— 428, price i6s. ESSAYS ON THE SACRED LANGUAGE, WRITINGS, AND RELIGION OF THE PARSIS. By MAETIN HAUG, Ph.D., Late of the Universities of Tubingen, Gottingen, and Bonn ; Superintendent of Sanskrit Studies, and Professor of Sanskrit in the Poona College. Edited and Enlaeged by Dr. E. W. WEST. To which is added a Biographical Memoir of the late Dr. Haug by Prof. E. P. Evans. I. History of the Researches into the Sacred Writings and Religion of the Parsis, from the Earliest Times down to the Present. II. Languages of the Parsi Scriptures. III. The Zend-Avesta, or the Scripture of the Parsis. IV. The Zoroastrian Religion, as to its Origin and Development. " ' Essays on the Sacred Language, Writings, and Religion of the Parsis,' by the late Dr, Martin Haug, edited by Dr. E. W. West. The author intended, on his return frpm India, to expand the materials contained in this work into a comprehensive account of the Zoroastrian religion, but the design was frustrated by his untimely death. We have, however, in a concise and readable form, a history of the researches into the sacred writings and religion of the Parsis from the earliest times down to the present— a dissertation on the languages of the Parsi Scriptures, a translation of the Zend-Avesta, or the Scripture of the Parsis, and a dissertation on the Zoroas- trian religion, with especial reference to its origin and development." — Times, Post Bvo, cloth, pp. viii. — 176, price 7s. 6d. TEXTS FROM THE BUDDHIST CANON COMMONLY KNOWN AS " DHAMMAPADA." With Accompanying Narratives. Translated from the Chinese by S. BEAL, B.A., Professor of Chinese, University College, London. The Dhammapada, as hitherto known by the Pali Text Edition, as edited by FausboU, by Max Mtiller's English, and Albrecht Weber's German translations, consists only of twenty-six chapters or sections, whilst the Chinese version, or rather recension, as now translated by Mr. Beal, con- sists of thirty-nine sections. The students of Pali who possess FausboU's text, or either of the above-named translations, will therefore needs want Mr. Beal's English rendering of the Chinese version ; the thirteen above- named additional sections not being accessible to them in any other form ; for, even if they understand Chinese, the Chinese original would be un- obtainable by them. "Mr. Beal's rendering of the Chinese translation is a most valuable aid to the critical study of the work. It contains authentic texts gathered from ancient canonical books, and generally connected with some incident in the history of Buddha. Their great interest, however, consists in the light which they throw upon everyday life in India at the remote period at which they were written, and upon the method of teaching adopted by the founder of the religion. The method employed was principally parable, and the simplicity of the tales and the excellence of the morals inculcated, as well as the strange hold which they have retained upon the minds of millions of people, make them a very remarkable stwdj. "—I^mes. " Mr. Beal, by making it accessible in an English dress, has added to the great ser- vices he has already rendered to the comparative study of religious history."— Academy. " Valuable as exhibiting the doctrine of the Buddhists in its purest, least adul- terated form, it brings the modern reader face to face with that simple creed and rule of conduct which won its way over the minds of myriads, and which is now nominally professed by 145 millions, who have overlaid its austere simplicity with innumerable ceremonies, forgotten its maxims, perverted its teaching, and so inverted its leading principle that a religion whose founder denied a God, now worships that founder as a god himself."— Scotsman.