their strong feeling for the importance of the teaching lead them to neglect the figure of the teacher and present a portrait which seems to us dim and impersonal.  Indian saints are distinguished by what they said, not by what they did and it is a strong testimony to Gotama’s individuality and force of character, that in spite of the centuries which separate us from him and the misty unreal atmosphere which in later times hangs round his name, his personality is more distinct and lifelike than that of many later teachers.

Most of the stories of his youth and childhood have a mythical air and make their first appearance in works composed long after his death, but there is no reason to distrust the traditional accounts of his lineage.  He was the son of Suddhodana of the Kshatriya clan known as Sakya or Sakiya[297].  In later literature his father is usually described as a king but this statement needs qualification.  The Sakyas were a small aristocratic republic.  At the time of the Buddha’s birth they recognized the suzerainty of the neighbouring kingdom of Kosala or Oudh and they were subsequently annexed by it, but, so long as they were independent, all that we know of their government leads us to suppose that they were not a monarchy like Kosala and Magadha.  The political and administrative business of the clan was transacted by an assembly which met in a council hall[298] at Kapilavatthu.  Its president was styled Raja but we do not know how he was selected nor for how long he held office.  The Buddha’s father is sometimes spoken of as Raja, sometimes as if he were a simple citizen.  Some scholars think the position was temporary and elective[299].  But in any case it seems clear that he was not a Maharaja like Ajatasattu and other monarchs of the period.  He was a prominent member of a wealthy and aristocratic family rather than a despot.  In some passages[300] Brahmans are represented as discussing the Buddha’s claims to respect.  It is said that he is of a noble and wealthy family but not that he is the son of a king or heir to the throne, though the statement, if true, would be so obvious and appropriate that its omission is sufficient to disprove it.  The point is of psychological importance, for the later literature in its desire to emphasize the sacrifice made by the Buddha exaggerates the splendour and luxury by which he was surrounded in youth and produces the impression that his temperament was something like that reflected in the book of Ecclesiastes, the weary calm, bred of satiety and disenchantment, of one who has possessed everything and found everything to be but vanity.  But this is not the dominant note of the Buddha’s discourses as we have them.  He condemns the pleasures and ambitions of the world as unsatisfying, but he stands before us as one who has resisted and vanquished temptation rather than as a disillusioned pleasure-seeker.  The tone of these sermons accords perfectly with the supposition, supported by whatever historical data