It only remains for me to caution those who may be impressed with the beauty of some of the precepts of the moral code and its theory of perfection, as ending in Pari-nirvāṇa, against deducing therefrom too optimistic an estimate of the Buddhist system. Buddhist morality is like a showy edifice built on the sand. It is a thoroughly fair-weather structure, incapable of standing against flood, storm, and tempest.
It may be summed up in a few words as a scheme for the establishing of a paradox—for the perfecting of one’s self by accumulating merit with the ultimate view of annihilating all consciousness of self—a system which teaches the greatest respect for the life of others, with the ultimate view of extinguishing one’s own.
It must, in short, be clearly understood that if any comparison be instituted between Buddhism and Christianity in regard to the self-abnegation, or self-sacrifice which each claims to inculcate, the self to be got rid of in Buddhism is not the selfishness condemned by Christianity, but rather the self of individuality—the self of individual life, and personal identity.
To be righteous in a Christian sense a man must be God-like, and to be righteous in a Buddhistic sense a man must be Buddha-like; but the righteousness of the Buddhist is not the perfection of holiness by the extinction of sin committed against God, but the perfection of merit-making, with the view of earning happiness for himself in a higher state hereafter.
For every Buddhist is like a trader who keeps a ledger, with a regular debtor and creditor account, and a daily entry of profit and loss.
He must not take, make, or hoard money. He is forbidden to store up a money-balance in a worldly bank, but he is urged to be constantly accumulating a merit-balance in the bank of Karma.
In conclusion, let the Buddha enforce his own moral teaching in his own way, by allegory and illustration drawn from real life:—When asked by a Brāhman ‘why he did not plough and sow and earn his own bread?’ he replied to the following effect: ‘I do plough and sow and eat immortal fruit (Amata = Amṛita); my plough is wisdom (paṇṇā); my shaft is modesty; my draught-ox, exertion; my goad, earnest meditation (sati); my mind, the rein. Faith (saddhā) in the doctrine is the seed I sow; cleaving to life is the weed I root up; truth is the destroyer of the weed; Nirvāṇa and deliverance from misery are my harvest.’ (Kasi-bhāradvāja-sutta of the Sutta-nipāta.)
This may be compared with St. Luke viii. 11-15; but have we not here a contrast rather than a comparison?
Perhaps some may think that the contrast is not unfavourable to Buddhism. Nay, possibly some may complain that I have not enlarged sufficiently on the remarkable resemblance between certain moral precepts in the Buddhist code and in the Christian. I admit this resemblance—I admit that both tell us:—not to love the world; not to love money; not to show enmity towards our enemies; not to do unrighteous or impure acts—to overcome evil by good, and to do to others as we would be done by.
Nay, I admit even more:—I allow that some Buddhist precepts go beyond the corresponding Christian injunctions. For Buddhism prohibits all killing—even of animals and noxious insects. It demands total abstinence from stimulating drinks—disallowing even moderation in their use. It excludes all who aim at perfect sanctity from the holy estate of matrimony. It bids a man, if he strives after perfection, abandon the world and lead a life of monkhood. In fine, its morality is essentially a monkhood-morality. It enjoins total abstinence, because it dares not trust human beings to be temperate. How indeed could it trust them when it promises them no help, no divine grace, no restraining power?