II. The Ideal
The truth of the eightfold path
The ethics of Buddhism is summed up in the formula of the truth of the eightfold path.[277] The truth of the eight-membered way is this: the only path which leads to the quieting of pain is the eightfold holy path—right belief, right resolve, right speech, right behavior, right occupation, right effort, right thought, right concentration.[278]
The essence of all this expressed in familiar ethical phrase is that the demands of morality are right thoughts, right words, and right deeds. As the eight requirements are interpreted and expounded by Buddhist teachers, they demand a mind free from all evil passions and unholy desires (and, according to the thoroughgoing Buddhist, of every desire whatsoever)[279] and “a heart of love far-reaching, grown great, and beyond measure.” This is the path leading to deliverance from transmigration, this the path leading to the quieting of pain, this the path leading to the sweet rest and peace of Nirvana.
It will be worth our while to note with some attention some of the special primary duties and virtues which are included in these general demands of self-conquest and unmeasured love.
Particular virtues and duties of the ideal
One of the primary duties of the true Buddhist is to seek knowledge, for true knowledge, insight, is the cure for desire. This knowledge which quenches all craving thirst is best attained, so Buddha taught, through meditation.[280] One must meditate on the transitoriness of life, on pain, on death, on truth, on gentleness, on love. It was through profound meditation under the Bo tree that Gautama became the Buddha, “The Enlightened.”
Another cardinal virtue of the Buddhist ideal of character is universal benevolence. By no other ethical system has such stress been laid upon the duty of gentleness to everything that has life. The animal world is here brought within the sanctuary of morality and safeguarded by ethical sentiment. It is of course the doctrine of transmigration, which Buddhism inherits from Brahmanism, which gives animal ethics the prominent place it holds in Buddhist morality.[281]
Still a third requirement of the true Buddhist is toleration, which follows as a corollary from the virtue of universal benevolence. In the prominent place assigned this virtue in the ideal of character, Buddhism stands alone among the great world religions.
A fourth cardinal duty of the ideal is to make known to all men the eightfold way to salvation. Buddha’s command to his disciples was, “Go ye now and preach the most excellent Law, explaining every point thereof, unfolding it with diligence and care.” This is a duty which brings its own reward; for the exercise of compassion and charity produces that serenity of spirit which is the aim of moral striving; and hence nothing advances one more rapidly on the way to salvation than preaching the good tidings and laboring to lessen the sorrows and lighten the burdens of one’s fellow creatures. The moral requirement to preach to all the most excellent way made of Buddhism a missionary religion. In a few centuries after the death of Buddha devoted missionaries had spread the new faith throughout the Far East.