o Buddhism; for the principles of Buddhism, were
those of early Brahmanism.

But Brahmanism became corrupted. Like the Mosaic Law, under the sedulous
care of the sacerdotal orders it ripened into a most burdensome
ritualism. The Brahmanical caste became tyrannical, exacting, and
oppressive. With the supposed sacredness of his person, and with the
laws made in his favor, the Brahman became intolerable to the people,
who were ground down by sacrifices, expiatory offerings, and wearisome
and minute ceremonies of worship. Caste destroyed all ideas of human
brotherhood; it robbed the soul of its affections and its aspirations.
Like the Pharisees in the time of Jesus, the Brahmans became oppressors
of the people. As in Pagan Egypt and in Christian mediaeval Europe, the
priests held the keys of heaven and hell; their power was more than
Druidical.

But the Brahman, when true to the laws of Menu, led in one sense a lofty
life. Nor can we despise a religion which recognized the value and
immortality of the soul, a state of future rewards and punishments,
though its worship was encumbered by rites, ceremonies, and sacrifices.
It was spiritual in its essential peculiarities, having reference to
another world rather than to this, which is more than we can say of the
religion of the Greeks; it was not worldly in its ends, seeking to save
the soul rather than to pamper the body; it had aspirations after a
higher life; it was profoundly reverential, recognizing a supreme
intelligence and power, indefinitely indeed, but sincerely,--not an
incarnated deity like the Zeus of the Greeks, but an infinite Spirit,
pervading the universe. The pantheism of the Brahmans was better than
the godless materialism of the Chinese. It aspired to rise to a
knowledge of God as the supremest wisdom and grandest attainment of
mortal man. It made too much of sacrifices; but sacrifices were common
to all the ancient religions except the Persian.

"He who through knowledge or religious acts
Henceforth attains to immortality,
Shall first present his body, Death, to thee."

Whether human sacrifices were offered in India when the Vedas were
composed we do not know, but it is believed to be probable. The oldest
form of sacrifice was the offering of food to the deity. Dr. H. C.
Trumbull, in his work on "The Blood Covenant," thinks that the origin of
animal sacrifices was like that of circumcision,--a pouring out of blood
(the universal, ancient