er, visited Ceylon in the sixth
century, records that there was then the most extended toleration, and
that even the Nestorian Christians had perfect freedom and protection
for their worship.

Among the Buddhists of Burmah, however, "although they are tolerant of
the practice of other religions by those who profess them, secession
from the national faith, is rigidly prohibited, and a convert to any
other form of faith incurs the penalty of death."--Professor WILSON,
_Journ. Roy. Asiat. Soc._ vol. xvi. p. 261.]

[Sidenote: A.D. 209.]

This characteristic of the "religion of the Vanquisher" is in strict
conformity, not alone with the spirit of his doctrine, but also with the
letter of the law laid down for the guidance of his disciples. Two of
the singular rock-inscriptions of India deciphered by Prinsep, inculcate
the duty of leaving the profession of different faiths unmolested; on
the ground, that "all aim at moral restraint and purity of life,
although all cannot be equally successful in attaining to it." The
sentiments embodied in one of the edicts[1] of King Asoca are very
striking: "A man must honour his own faith, without blaming that of his
neighbour, and thus will but little that is wrong occur. There are even
circumstances under which the faith of others should be honoured, and in
acting thus a man increases his own faith and weakens that of others. He
who acts differently, diminishes his own faith and injures that of
another. Whoever he may be who honours his own faith and blames that of
others out of devotion to his own, and says, 'let us make our faith
conspicuous,' that man merely injures the faith he holds. Concord alone
is to be desired."

[Footnote 1: The twelfth tablet, which, as translated by BURNOUF and
Professor WILSON, will be found in Mrs. SPEIR'S _Life in Ancient India_,
book ii. ch. iv. p. 239.]

[Sidenote: A.D. 209.]

[Sidenote: A.D. 248.]

The obligation, to maintain the religion of Buddha was as binding as the
command to abstain from assailing that of its rivals, and hence the
kings who had treated the snake-worshippers with kindness, who had made
a state provision for maintaining "offerings to demons," and built
dwellings at the capital to accommodate the "ministers of foreign
religions," rose in fierce indignation against the preaching of a firm
believer in Buddha, who ventured to put an independent interpretation on
points of faith. They burned the books of the Wytulians, as the ne