China, Japan, Burmah,
Tibet, Mongolia, and Tartary; and though it was known that the
Buddhist literature in all these countries professed itself to be
derived, directly or indirectly, from India, and that the technical
terms of that religion, not excepting the very name of Buddha, had
their etymology in Sanskrit only, no hope was entertained that the
originals of these various translations could ever be recovered. Mr.
Hodgson, who settled in Nepal in 1821, as political resident of the
East-India Company, and whose eyes were always open, not only to the
natural history of that little-explored country, but likewise to its
antiquities, its languages, and traditions, was not long before he
discovered that his friends, the priests of Nepal, possessed a
complete literature of their own. That literature was not written in
the spoken dialects of the country, but in Sanskrit. Mr. Hodgson
procured a catalogue of all the works, still in existence, which
formed the Buddhist canon. He afterwards succeeded in procuring copies
of these works, and he was able in 1824 to send about sixty volumes to
the Asiatic Society of Bengal. As no member of that society seemed
inclined to devote himself to the study of these MSS., Mr. Hodgson
sent two complete collections of the same MSS. to the Asiatic Society
of London and the Societe Asiatique of Paris. Before alluding to the
brilliant results which the last-named collection produced in the
hands of Eugene Burnouf, we must mention the labours of other
students, which preceded the publication of Burnouf's researches.

[Footnote 54: The late Abbe Huc pointed out the similarities between
the Buddhist and Roman Catholic ceremonials with such _naivete_, that,
to his surprise, he found his delightful 'Travels in Tibet' placed on
the 'Index.' 'On ne peut s'empecher d'etre frappe,' he writes, 'de
leur rapport avec le Catholicisme. La crosse, la mitre, la dalmatique,
la chape ou pluvial, que les grands Lamas portent en voyage, ou
lorsqu'ils font quelque ceremonie hors du temple; l'office a deux
choeurs, la psalmodie, les exorcismes, l'encensoir soutenu par cinq
chaines, et pouvant s'ouvrir et se fermer a volonte; les benedictions
donnees par les Lamas en etendant la main droite sur la tete des
fideles; le chapelet, le celibat ecclesiastique, les retraites
spirituelles, le culte des saints, les jeunes, les processions, les
litanies, l'eau benite; voila autant de rapports que les Bouddhistes
ont avec nous.