means of avoiding the troubles of the mind, of removing the dust of desire, of destroying the causes of revolt, and of obtaining transcendental wisdom.*

The ninth of the Thirteen Ordinances is called Rukhamúlikanga, from rukha, a tree, and mula a root. The priest who keeps this ordinance must avoid all tiled houses, and live at the root of a trec (the root being defined to be the space within which the leaves fall on a calm day, or on which the shadow of the tree falls at noon); but trees of the following kinds are prohibited: a tree at the limit of a country; a tree in which any déwa resides who receives offerings from the people; a tree whence gum is taken, or edible fruits are gathered; a tree in which there are owls, or a hollow tree; and a tree in the midst of the ground belonging to a wihára. The priest who keeps the superior ordinance may not live in a place that is pleasant or agreeable. From the spot in which he resides he must put away the leaves with his foot. He who keeps the middle ordinance may live in a place prepared by others. He who keeps the inferior ordinance may call a novice to prepare a place for him, by sprinkling sand, and putting a fence round, as if it were a house. The priest must leave the tree, if ever there should be a festival near it. None of the three can live in a house without breaking the ordinance; and it is also broken if the priest goes to any place where there is a concourse of people. When he sees the leaves falling he is to think of the impermanency of all things. This ordinance was much commended by Gótama Budha. It was at the root of a tree that he received his birth, became Budha, preached his first sermon, and died.

The tenth of the Twelve Sacred Observances of the Chinese is called vrikchamoûlika. The mendicant who has not attained to wisdom amidst the tombs ought to meditate under a tree, and there to search out reason, as did Budha, who accomplished under a tree the principal circumstances of his life.†

The tenth of the Thirteen Ordinances is called Abbhókásikanga, from abbhi, open, void, and okása, space. The priest who keeps this ordinance may not live in a place where there are people, or at the root of a tree; but in an open space. He may enter the wihára to hear bana; and he may go to hear bana, or to say bana to another, if called for that purpose; as may the priest who observes the preceding ordinance. He may enter the refectory, or

the place where water is warmed for the priests to bathe, when going to hear or say bana; he may also go inside to place a seat for a superior priest, if there be not one previously; when going along the road, if he sees an aged priest carrying the alms-bowl, or any other requisite, he may carry it for him to relieve him, or even for a young priest, if he be weak; when it rains he may go for shelter to any place in the middle of the road, but he may not leave the road for that purpose, nor is he allowed to run; but when carrying the requisites of another he may go quickly, and may seek a place of shelter, even though it be not in the middle of the road; yet he may not remain when the rain is over. The same rules apply to the priest who observes the preceding ordinance. The priest who keeps the superior ordinance cannot live near a tree, or a rock, or a house; but in an open space he may put up his robe as a screen. He who keeps the middle ordinance may remain under an overhanging rock. He who keeps the inferior ordinance may live in a cave into which the rain percolates, a threshing-floor when the people are gone, a shed made with leaves or with talipot, or a lodge made for the purpose of watching the rice-fields. Any of the three who lives in a place where there are people, or at the root of a tree, and not in an open space, breaks this ordinance.

The eleventh of the Twelve Sacred Observances of the Chinese is called âbhyavakâshika. The mendicant, remaining under a tree, and partly covered by its shade, minds not the cold. It is true that the rain and humidity reach him, that the dung of birds defiles him, and that he is liable to be wounded by venomous beasts; but he is at liberty to exercise meditation. Remaining upon the ground his spirit is refreshed; the shining of the moon seems to purify his mind; and he can more readily become entranced.*

The eleventh of the Thirteen Ordinances is called Sosánikanga, from sosána, a cemetery, or place where the dead have been deposited, or where dead bodies have been burnt. The priest who keeps this ordinance must always reside in a cemetery, and it must not be near a village. Until twelve years have passed over from the time a body is burnt, the place may be regarded as a sosána. The priest may not make a place like a court of ambulation, nor frame a hut; he may not sit in a chair or recline on a couch; and he is forbidden to provide water, as if it were a priest's regular dwelling. This is a very difficult ordinance, and must be observed

* Remusat's Relation.

with much sorrowful determination. When walking, he must turn his eye in part towards the cemetery; and when he enters it, it must not be by the principal road, but by an unfrequented byepath. When walking in the day-time, if he sees a tree or an anthill, he must mark what it is, and he will then not be afraid of what he may see at night. He may not cast stones at the devils he may see or hear. He may not remain away from the place a single night; he must always be there at midnight, but at dawn may leave it; he must not eat any kind of food that is agreeable to the devils or that is made with sesamum, mée, flour, flesh, or sugar (lest evil should befall him from the wish of the devils to possess these things for their own benefit); he must look out for the bones left by dogs and other animals. He may not enter any house, as he lives in the midst of the smoke arising from the funeral pile and of the stench proceeding from dead bodies. The priest who keeps the superior ordinance is always to remain in some place where there is the burning of bodies, the stench of corruption, and weeping for the loss of friends. He who keeps the middle ordinance may remain in the place where there is any one of these three. He who keeps the inferior ordinance may remain in any place where a body has been deposited within the space of twelve years. The priest who remains away from the sosána a single night breaks this ordinance.

The ninth of the Twelve Sacred Observances of the Chinese is called s'mâs'ânïka. To dwell among the tombs brings to the mind of the mendicant just ideas relative to the three things that are the first gate of the law of Foe, "l'instabilité, la douleur, et le vide.” He here sees the spectacle of death and of funerals. The putridity and corruption, the impurities of every kind, the funeral piles, the birds of prey, generate within him thoughts relative to the impermanency of all things and hasten the progress of that which is good.*

The residences of the priests in Ceylon are usually mean erections, being built of wattle, filled up with mud, whilst the roof is covered with straw, or the platted leaves of the cocoa-nut tree. Their residences in Burma appear to be of the same description, but those in Siam are much superior, having richly-carved entrances, and ornamented roofs. None of the fervour of the original institution is now manifested among the Singhalese. About the year

* Remusat's Relation.

1835 there was a priest near Negombo who professed never to reside in a house, and to subsist entirely upon fruits. From the singularity of his appearance, and the mystery of his life, he was an object of great terror to children. Though regarded by some persons as sincere, his conduct was generally condemned, and he was thought to be of weak intellect.

This mode of asceticism is of too striking a character not to have had many imitators in the west. Mary, of Egypt, resided in the desert beyond the Jordan forty-seven years. During the first four years of the penance of Hilarion he had no other shelter from the inclemencies of the weather than a little hovel, made of reeds and rushes woven together. He afterwards built a little cell, still to be seen in the time of Jerome, which was only a little longer than his body, four feet broad, and five feet in height. Martinianus lived many years upon a rock surrounded by water, in the open air. James, of Nisibis, chose the highest mountains for his abode, retiring to a cave in the winter, and the rest of the year living in the woods, in the open air. Martin, of Tours, had a cell built of wood, his monks having generally cells of a similar description, whilst some resided in various holes dug in the sides of the rocks. In the sixth century it was customary in some places for a monk, celebrated for his virtues, to be chosen, who was afterwards to lead the life of a recluse, walled up in a cell, and spending his whole time in fasting, praying, and weeping. Marcian shut himself up in a small enclosure, out of which he never went, his cell being so low and narrow, that he could neither stand nor lie in it without bending his body. But the most singular residence was that of Simeon Stylites, who passed thirty years of his life upon the top of a column, which was gradually raised from nine to sixty feet in height.

Even in our own inclement country, the zeal of these ancient ascetics has been emulated. Simon Stock, a youth of Kent, in the twelfth year of his age, retired to the forest, and resided in the hollow of a large oak tree. When the anchorets of England retired from the world, the ceremony of seclusion was generally presided over by the bishop. Their cells, twelve feet square, had three apertures, one for receiving the housel, another for food, and the third for lights. The door was generally walled up, and the anchoret was not permitted to come out, "but by consent and bencdiction of the bishop, in case of great necessity."

XIV. OBEDIENCE.

The yoke of the recluse must in many instances be exceedingly painful of endurance. Far away is he from all the amenities of the world, though formed by the hand of God to seek their enjoyment; he is often alone, and has much leisure, by which the melancholy circumstances of his situation are almost continually presented to his mind; the silence and solitude that are around him people themselves with shapes that appear to him with mockery and gibe, until his own spirit seems to add its powers to the number of his persecutors; and in the place where he expected to find peace there is only disappointment and vexation. Yet if he be a cocnobite also, there are occasional opportunities of intercourse with other men, all of whom are enduring the same piercing of the soul by that which is more cruel than the serpent's tooth; and if permitted the exhibition of the slightest symptom of dissatisfaction, or to communicate to each other their individual wocs, the heaviest bar and the strongest wall would be insufficient to retain them within the bounds by which they are circumscribed. The gloomy abstractedness, the sunken eye, channelled brow, hollow cheek, pallid countenance, and attenuated frame, with which the painter delights to present to us the monk, are the faithful semblances of a sad reality; and these emaciations are too frequently the result of painful exercises of discipline imposed by an imperious master, and not from vigils and penances self-imposed, that the body may be subdued, and the whole man be soul. The code of discipline to which he is subject is therefore most severe and stringent in all that relates to intercourse with members of the same fraternity: to his superior, he must be in every respect submissive; to his equal, reserved; and to his inferior, distant. The necessity of implicit obedience is therefore insisted upon in all monkish canons. It is one of the eight things requisite to monastic perfection, and is called "the cardinal virtue of monks." In the monasteries founded by David, the patron of Wales, the candidates for admission had to wait ten days at the door, during which time they were tried with harsh words and repeated refusals, in order that they might learn to die to themselves; and they were afterwards required to discover their most secret thoughts and temptations to the abbot. In the Regula Benedicti, cap. 5, it is said, "Primus humilitatis gradus est obedientia sine mora ;" and in the first chapter it is said that