We must allow that the Talapoins confer a truly invaluable benefit upon the people of these countries by keeping up schools, where the boys resort for the purpose of learning to read, write, and acquire the rudiments of arithmetic. In this respect they are eminently useful, and the institution, though to a certain extent burthensome to the people, in this respect deserves well of the country. The many abuses that at present attend it are almost fully atoned for by the great service its members gratuitously render to their countrymen. There are no other schools than those under their management. The tyrannical governments of Siam and Burmah do not take any steps to propagate instruction among their subjects, whom they look upon as slaves, fit only for bodily labour. The houses of Talapoins are so many little seats of elementary learning; and as they are very numerous throughout the country, every facility is afforded to male children to learn to read and write. The female children are excluded from partaking of this great boon by the strictness of the monastic regulations. It is a great misfortune, much to be lamented, as one half of the population is thus doomed to live in perpetual ignorance. Owing to the gratuitous education given by the Buddhist monks, there are very few men throughout the breadth and length of Burmah who are not able to read and write. It is true that too often the knowledge thus acquired is very superficial and incomplete. But as regards the other half of the population, it may be stated that scarcely a woman among thousands can be found capable of spelling one word.
The Talapoins being much addicted to sloth and indolence, the schools are undoubtedly miserably managed. The boys are often left to themselves without regular control or discipline. When a boy enters the monastery as student, his teacher places into his hands a piece of blackened board, whereupon are written the first letters of the alphabet. The poor lad has to repeat over and over the name of the letters, crying aloud with all the powers of his lungs. He is left for several weeks at the same subject, until his instructor is satisfied that he knows his letters. In the next step the boy is directed to study the symbols of the vowels which are to be joined with consonants so as to form syllables and words. When this is done he is initiated into the art of uniting together and articulating properly the several consonants with the symbolic characters. He slowly shapes his course through the apparently much-complicated system of all the combinations of letters, so as to be able to spell correctly all the words of the language. Owing to the lack of order and method on the part of the teachers, boys spend a long time, sometimes one or two years, in mastering those difficulties, which, if properly explained, would much shorten the time usually devoted to such a study.
The Burmese alphabet, with the various combinations of letters and symbols for making words, is based on a most perfect and scientific methodical and simple process, borrowed from the Sanscrit. The method is plain and easy, as soon as it is understood. Any person that has received some education, and whose mind is somewhat developed, will be able, with the occasional assistance of an intelligent master, to go all over the various combinations in less than two months. The results derived from the method adopted by the Burmans are so great and complete that, after having gone over the general alphabet with attention, the beginner is able to read all the Burmese words he may meet with. We do not mean, of course, to say that he will be able to pronounce every word correctly. This is another thing altogether. But it is no less evident that the system used by Burmese in the combinations of letters leads to results infinitely more satisfactory than those obtained through the system of elementary reading and spelling used in Europe.
Unacquainted with the rules of grammar, the teachers are incapable of imparting any sound knowledge of the vernacular language to their numerous pupils. Hence writing, as far as orthography goes, is extremely imperfect; the spelling of words, having no fixed standard, varies to an indefinite extent. As soon as the scholars have mastered the difficulties of the long and complicated alphabet, some portions of the sacred writings are put into their hands for reading. The result is that the Burmese in general acquire some knowledge, more or less extensive, of their religious creed. Though none among them can be found who understands comprehensively the Buddhistic system, yet most of them are possessed of a certain amount of more or less limited information concerning Buddha and his law. In this respect they are perhaps ahead of many nominal Christians in several countries of Europe, who dwell in large manufacturing towns and remote country districts and belong to the lower classes, and who live without even a slight acquaintance with the essential tenets of the Christian creed.
In addition to the eminently useful task of teaching youth, the Buddhistic recluse devotes occasionally some portion of his time to the useful labour of copying manuscripts on palm-leaves, either for his personal use or to increase the small library of his monastery. The work is considered as a very excellent one, deserving of great merits, and much recommended by the rules of the society. It is a matter of regret that the native laziness of the Phongyies, as well as their total want of order in acquiring knowledge, thwart to a great extent the practical working of the wise provisions made by the framer of the rules. Were it not for such causes, copies of all the best and most interesting works on the religious system of Buddhism would be greatly multiplied, and could be easily procured; whilst now they are exceedingly scarce and hardly to be had at all. The few copies to be had with much difficulty are to be paid for very high. All the books are made of palm-leaves. The leaves are about twenty inches in length, and from three to four in breadth. On each face of the leaf from seven to nine or ten lines are written. A copyist uses a style of iron by way of pen. With the sharp point he scratches the epidermis of the leaf to form the letters. In order to render the letters perfectly visible, he rubs over the page just written with a piece of rag some petroleum, which, penetrating into the parts scratched by the style, causes the letters to become quite distinct and apparent.
The Talapoins spend the best part of the day sitting in a cross-legged position, chewing betel and conversing with the many idlers that are always to be found in great numbers about their dwellings. When tired of the vertical position, they adopt the horizontal one, reclining the head on pillows and gently submitting to the soporific influence of good Morpheus. They have always in their hands a string of beads, on which they are wont to repeat certain devotional formulas. The most common is the following, “Aneitsa, duka, anatta;” meaning that everything in this world is subjected to the law of change and mutability, to that of pain and suffering, and to that of entire and uninterrupted illusion. There is, indeed, an immense field opened to a reflecting mind by these three very significative expressions for carrying on serious and prolonged meditation; but none of the Talapoins, at least of those I have been acquainted with, are capable of understanding comprehensively their meaning. They often repeat the forty great subjects of meditation, and the rule enjoins them to be zealously addicted to contemplation, which is pronounced to be the chief exercise of a true follower of Buddha. But how can there ever be expected from weak and ignorant persons the habitual practice of so high an exercise, requiring an intellectual vigour of the very first order? They must repeat on their beads at least a hundred and twenty times a day the four following considerations on the four things more immediately necessary to men, food, raiment, habitation, and medicine: “I eat this rice, not to please my appetite, but to satisfy the wants of nature. I put on this habit, not for the sake of vanity, but to cover my nakedness. I live in this kiaong, not for vainglory, but to be protected from the inclemency of the weather. I drink this medicine merely to recover my health, that I may with greater diligence attend to the duties of my profession.”
ARTICLE VII.
RELIGIOUS INFLUENCE OF THE PHONGYIES—RESPECT AND VENERATION PAID TO THEM BY THE LAITY.
When we speak of the great influence possessed by the religious order of Buddhist monks, we do not intend to speak of political influence. It does not appear that in Burmah they have ever aimed at any share in the management or direction of the affairs of the country. Since the accession of the house of Alomphra to the throne, that is to say, during a period of above a hundred years, the history of Burmah has been tolerably well known. We do not recollect having ever met with one instance when the Phongyies, as a body, have interfered in the affairs of the State. They also seem to remain indifferent to family or domestic affairs. The regulations they are subjected to, and the object which they have in view in entering the religious profession, debar them from concerning themselves in affairs that are foreign to their sacred calling. But in a religious point of view alone, their influence is a mighty one. Upon that very order hinges the whole fabric of Buddhism. From it, as from a source, flows the life that maintains and invigorates religious belief in the masses that profess that creed. We may view the members of the order as religious, and as instructors of the people at large, and principally of youth. In that double capacity they exercise a great control and retain a strong hold over the mind of the people.
There is in man a natural disposition and inclination to admire individuals who, actuated by religious feelings, are induced to leave the world and separate from society in order to devote themselves more freely to the practice of religious duties. The more society is corrupted, the more its members value those persons who have the moral courage to estrange themselves from the centre of vice, that they may preserve themselves from contamination. In fact, religious are esteemed in proportion to the extent of the contempt they have for this world. The Phongyies occupy precisely this position in the eyes of their co-religionists. Their order stands in bold relief over the society they belong to. Their dress, their mode of life, their voluntary denial of all gratification of sensual appetites, centre upon them the admiring eyes of all. They are looked upon as the imitators and followers of Buddha; they hold ostensibly before ordinary believers the pattern of that perfection they have been taught so fondly to revere. The Phongyies are as living mementoes, reminding the people of all that is most sacred and perfect in practical religion. No one will deny that the view of a body of religious existing in a community, keeping an intercourse with its members, must ever have a powerful tendency to foster religious feelings in the mind of a half-civilised people as the Burmese are. It is in this manner that the Phongyies command the respect and veneration of the people, and exercise a considerable amount of religious influence over the masses.