THE PHENOMENAL AND THE SUPRAPHENOMENAL

Anica vata sankhara,
Uppadavaya dhammino;
Uppajjitva nirujjanti;
Tesam vupasamo sukho

BEFORE entering upon an exposition of this stanza which I have selected for the subject of this morning's discourse, I wish to make a short preliminary remark concerning Buddhism generally.

In the study of Buddhism, one important thing which should be borne in mind by scholars is that the religion of Buddha has nothing to do with supernaturalism. Adhering to facts and their plain statements, Buddhists are always reluctant to give themselves away to personal authority or supernatural--which is, in fact, unnatural--revelation. Buddhism may therefore appear to some people rather flat, prosaic,

and unentertaining, lacking in the fertility and brilliancy of imagination--though this is by no means the case--and they call it sometimes a sort of ethical culture society and not a religious institution. For they think that no religion can exist without a belief in something extraordinary, miraculous, or supramundane which cannot be logically proved and individually experienced. But Buddha most emphatically insists that what he teaches is nothing unusual, being simply the recognition of a plain fact which can be attested by every mortal, that truth is not revealed to us from an unknown source, but is discovered by ourselves through the exercise of a faculty that can be acquired by all self-conscious beings, and that Buddhism is to be believed rationally and not blindly, to be believed because it is true and not because it has been proclaimed by some mythical personage. Whatever defects the teaching of Buddha may possess, I consider its rationality and matter-of-factness as one of its most characteristic and important features, distinguishing it from many another religion.

Further, this rationality of Buddhism is perhaps one of the many causes which make Buddhists remarkably tolerant and broad-minded toward their rival religionists. It is the pride of every conscientious Buddhist that the history of his faith is perfectly free from the stain of blood. When we of modern days turn over the pages of religious cruelty and barbarism, we are

struck with a bitter sense of irony. It seems incredible that a religion proclaiming the gospel of love could practise such inhumanity. But I regret to say that even to-day there are some who are so hopelessly dogmatic and fanatical as to think that the rose could be sweet and fragrant only under its own name, that truth loses its worth and verity when known by any other name than their own, and that they would fight even unto death in order to replace one set of superstitions with another.