t of compressing a free discourse into
numbered paragraphs and repetitions: the living word of the Buddha was
surely more vivacious and plastic than these stiff tabulations. But the
peculiarities of scholars can often be traced to the master and the
Buddha had much the same need of mnemonics as his hearers. For he had
excogitated complicated doctrines and he imparted them without the aid
of notes and though his natural wit enabled him to adapt his words to
the capacity of his hearers and to meet argument, still his wish was to
formulate a consistent statement of his thoughts. In the earliest
discourse ascribed to him, the sermon at Benares, we see these habits of
numbering and repetition already fully developed. The next discourse, on
the absence of a soul, consists in enumerating the five words, form,
sensation, perception, sankharas, and consciousness three times, and
applying to each of them consecutively three statements or arguments,
the whole concluding with a phrase which is used as a finale in many
other places. Artificial as this arrangement sounds when analyzed, it is
a natural procedure for one who wished to impress on his hearers a
series of philosophic propositions without the aid of writing, and I can
imagine that these rhythmical formulae uttered in that grave and pleasant
voice which the Buddha is said to have possessed, seemed to the
leisurely yet eager groups who sat round him under some wayside banyan
or in the monastery park, to be not tedious iteration but a gradual
revelation of truth growing clearer with each repetition.

We gather from the Pitakas that writing was well known in the Buddha's
time[621]. But though it was used for inscriptions, accounts and even
letters, it was not used for books, partly because the Brahmans were
prejudiced against it, and partly because no suitable material for
inditing long compositions had been discovered. There were religious
objections to parchment and leaves were not employed till later. The
minute account of monastic life given in the Vinaya makes it certain
that the monks did not use writing for religious purposes. Equally
conclusive, though also negative, is the fact that in the accounts of
the assemblies at Rajagaha and Vesali[622] when there is a dispute as to
the correct ruling on a point, there is no appeal to writing but merely
to the memory of the oldest and most authoritative monks. In the Vinaya
we hear of people who know special books: of monks who