The good abbot did not know what to say. He looked at the poor novice and pitied him for his pangs of conscience. Every one present felt that the man suffered, that there was something wrong with him; but no one could exactly say what it was. His ambition was not sinful but noble. And that he loved God was certainly not a crime. At last the abbot addressed Subhuti, Charaka's senior and teacher, and asked him: "Have you, reverend brother, noticed in this novice's behavior or views anything strange or exceptional?"

Subhuti replied that he had not.

The abbot continued to inquire about Charaka's previous religious relations and the significance of his love of God.

"I do not know, reverend sir," was the elder monk's answer. "He is not a Brahman, but a descendant of a noble family of the northern conquerors that came to India and founded

the kingdom of Gandhara. Yet he knows Brahman writings and is familiar with the philosophy of the Yavanas of the distant West. I discoursed with him and understand that by God he means all that is right and good and true in the world and without whom there can be no enlightenment."

"Very well," proclaimed the abbot, "there is no sin in loving God, for what you describe as God is our Lord Shakyamuni, the Enlightened One, the Buddha, the Tathagata;" but he added not without a suggestion of reproof: "You might dignify the Lord Buddha with a higher title than God. Gods, if they exist, are not Buddha's equals. When Bodhisattva was a child, the gods prostrated themselves before him, for they recognised the Tathagata's superiority even before he had attained to complete Buddhahood. The divinity of the gods is less than the noble life of a Bodhisattva."

Having thus discussed the case of the novice Charaka, the abbot addressed himself to the Brotherhood, asking the reverend sirs what they would deem right in the present case. Was the brother at all guilty of the fault of

which he accused himself and if so what should he do to restore his good standing and set himself aright in the Brotherhood?

Then Subhuti arose and said: "Charaka is a man of deep comprehension and of an earnest temper. The difficulty which he encounters is not for us to judge him or to advise him about. But there is a philosopher living in the kingdom of Magadha, by the name of Acvaghosha. If there is any one in the world that can set an erring brother right, it is , whose wisdom is so great that since Buddha entered Nirvana there has been no man on earth who might have surpassed him either in knowledge or judgment." So Subhuti proposed to write a letter of introduction to Acvaghosha commending the brother Charaka to his care and suggesting to him to dispel his doubts and to establish him again firmly in the faith in which the truth shines forth more brilliantly than in any other religion.