To where the lost of Niria dwell In Zabudiba's rocky hell! Thence from such legends vaguely vast, He told, how from its fearful frame -They thought no God the world created.† inferior to man; secondly, that of the Preitta; and thirdly, that of the Assurighe. The tenants of these two latter states endure nearly the same punishments; and, till we are made aware of the horrors of the fourth, we should conceive that imagination had exhausted itself in the tortures they contain. The fourth, or Niria, is in reality the Boudhist's hell: it is situated in the caves of the southern island Zabudiba. * The Universe receives the name of Logha, or Loka, which signifies destruction and reproduction. + The evils in the world, and its repeated destructions, (taught by the creed of Boudha,) are sufficient, in the opinion of these religionists, to prove that it was not the work of a Supreme Being. But from the whole, again arose *The followers of Boudha, who make one of the three hundred and thirty-nine heretic sects among the Hindoos, believe the soul perishes with the body; and yet, by a metaphysical contradiction, that from the materials of both arises a new being, rewarded or punished according to the deeds in the former life; and they suppose, that these said and same materials, having passed through various orders of Nat, or superior beings, ultimately gain the Nieban, or state of perfect happiness. Thus, curiously enough, they at once deny the immortality of the soul, yet make it progressive; terminate it with life, yet load it with the most tremendous responsibilities. The fact is, that they themselves are irretrievably puzzled and confused in a maze of allegories; and that we, in decyphering their riddles, are ten thousand times as much in the dark. One thing is quite clear, the Boudhists are not, as they have been accused of being, Atheists. They allow gods enough, in all conscience; and give to them, or to their agents, the direction of the world; they only deny, that a divinity created the world. To be sure this denial has in all times been confounded with Atheism; but it is a very different thing-as different, for instance, as tithes from religion. And these the Indian loved to paint, In one true faith, but, vague and mixed, His fancy pleased, or judgment fixed : And formed them into one, which schooled, The calm opinions hush'd within him ; But-like the holiest-rarely ruled His deeds, when Passion sought to win him. Ah! would that those divine desires, That Thought exalts, or Heaven inspires, Could grow at once instinct and rife, Breath'd into acts-and made our life! END OF CHAPTER II. BOOK III. |