rnation and karma: they are Indian,
not specifically Buddhist. In fact, of all Indian systems of thought,
Buddhism is the one which has the greatest difficulty in expressing
these ideas in intelligible and consistent language, because it denies
the existence of the ego. Some writers have gone so far as to suggest
that the whole doctrine formed no part of the Buddha's original teaching
and was an accretion, or at most a concession of the master to the
beliefs of his time. But I cannot think this view is correct. The idea
is woven into the texture of the Buddha's discourses. When in words
which have as strong a claim as any in the Pitakas to be regarded as old
and genuine he describes the stages by which he acquired enlightenment
and promises the same experiences to those who observe his
discipline[428], he says that he first followed the thread of his own
previous existences through past aeons, plumbing the unfathomed depths of
time: next, the whole of existence was spread out before him, like a
view-seen from above, and he saw beings passing away from one body and
taking shape in another, according to their deeds. Only when he
understood both the perpetual transformation of the universe and also
the line and sequence in which that transformation occurs, only then did
he see the four truths as they really are.

It is unfortunate for us that the doctrine of reincarnation met with
almost universal assent in India[429]. If some one were to found a new
Christian sect, he would probably not be asked to prove the immortality
of the soul: it is assumed as part of the common religious belief.
Similarly, no one asked the Buddha to prove the doctrine of rebirth. If
we permit our fancy to picture an interview between him and someone
holding the ordinary ideas of an educated European about the soul, we
may imagine that he would have some difficulty in understanding what is
the alternative to rebirth. His interlocutor might reply that there are
two types of theory among Europeans. Some think that the soul comes into
existence with the body at birth but continues to exist everlasting and
immortal after the death of the body. Others, commonly called
materialists, while agreeing that the soul comes into existence with the
birth of the body, hold that it ceases to exist with the death of the
body. To the first theory the Buddha would probably have replied that
there is one law without exception, namely that whatever has a beginning
has a