to the Mallya princes and their
followers.

99. Q. _At day-break what happened?_

A. He passed into the interior condition of _Samadhi_ and thence
into Nirvana.

100. Q. _What were his last words to his disciples?_

A. "Bhikkhus," he said, "I now impress it upon you, the parts and
powers of man must be dissolved. Work out your salvation with
diligence."

101. Q. _What convincing proof have we that the Buddha, formerly
Prince Siddhartha, was a historical personage?_

A. His existence is apparently as clearly proved as that of any other
character of ancient history.

102. Q. _Name some of the proofs?_

A. (1) The testimony of those who personally knew him.

(2) The discovery of places and the remains of buildings mentioned in
the narrative of his time.

(3) The rock-inscriptions, pillars and dagobas made in memory of him by
sovereigns who were near enough to his time to be able to verify the
story of his life.

(4) The unbroken existence of the Sangha which he founded, and their
possession of the facts of his life transmitted from generation to
generation from the beginning.

(5) The fact that in the very year of his death and at various times
subsequently, conventions and councils of the Sangha were held, for the
verification of the actual teachings of the Founder, and the handing
down of those verified teachings from teacher to pupil, to the present
day.

(6) After his cremation his relics were divided among eight kings and a
stupa was erected over each portion. The portion given to King
Ajatashatru, and by him covered with a stupa at Rajagrha, was
taken, less than two centuries later, by the Emperor Asoka and
distributed throughout his Empire. He, of course, had ample means of
knowing whether the relics were those of the Buddha or not, since they
had been in charge of the royal house of Patna from the beginning.

(7) Many of the Buddha's disciples, being Arhats and thus having
control over their vital powers, must have lived to great ages, and
there was nothing to have prevented two or three of them, in succession
to each other, to have covered the whole period between the death of
the Buddha and the reign of Asoka, and thus to have enabled the latter
to get from his contemporary every desired attestation of the fact of
the Buddha's life.[8]

(8) The "Mahavansa," the best authenticated ancient history known to
us, records the events of Sinhalese history to the reign of King
Vijaya,