They had apostolic founders; the manners which
distinguished the immediate apostles of Christ; scriptures
divinely inspired; the same allegorical mode of interpreting
them, which has since obtained among Christians, and the same
order of performing public worship. They had missionary
stations or colonies of their community established in Rome,
Corinth, Galatia, Ephesus, Phillippi, Colosse, and
Thessalonica, precisely such, and in the same circumstances,
as were those to whom St. Paul addressed his letters in those
places. All the fine moral doctrines which are attributed to
the Samaritan Nazarite, and I doubt not justly attributed to
him, are to be found among the doctrines of these
ascetics."[423:3]

And Arthur Lillie says:

"It is asserted by calm thinkers like Dean Mansel that within
two generations of the time of Alexander the Great, the
missionaries of Buddha made their appearance at
_Alexandria_.[423:4] This theory is confirmed--in the east by
the Asoka monuments--in the west by Philo. He expressly
maintains the identity in creed of the higher Judaism and that
of the _Gymnosophists_ of India who abstained from the
'sacrifice of living animals'--in a word, the BUDDHISTS. It
would follow from this that the priestly religion of
Babylonia, Palestine, Egypt, and Greece were undermined by
certain kindred mystical societies organized by Buddha's
missionaries under the various names of Therapeutes, Essenes,
Neo-Pythagoreans, Neo-Zoroastrians, &c. _Thus Buddhism
prepared the way for Christianity._"[424:1]

The Buddhists have the "eight-fold holy path" (Dhammapada), eight
spiritual states leading up to Buddhahood. The first state of the
Essenes resulted from baptism, and it seems to correspond with the first
Buddhistic state, those who have entered the (mystic) stream. Patience,
purity, and the mastery of passion were aimed at by both devotees in the
other stages. In the last, magical powers, healing the sick, casting
out evil spirits, etc., were supposed to be gained. Buddhists and
Essenes seem to have doubled up this eight-fold path into four, for
some reason or other. Buddhists and Essenes had three orders of
ascetics or monks, but this classification is distinct from the
spiritual classifications.[424:2]

The doctrine of the "_Anointed Angel_," of the man from heaven, the
Creator of t