GAUTAMA, afterwards known as Buddha, waa born more than five hundred years before Christ and, like Christ, left no written record. Yet

Indian life to-day is not so utterly different from what it was in his time that we are wholly unable to imagine the life he led. From the Hindu sacred books which are still in use to-day as they were in his time we know the kind of spiritual food upon which he was nourished. From the oral tradition of his teaching which was handed down by his disciples we know with a high degree of accuracy the general principles which he sought to inculcate. And from the innumerable figures of him which we see in Buddhist countries, and from the lives of the most saintly of his followers, we can gather the general impression he made upon mankind. With these elements let us create a picture of this great Hindu reformer who unintentionally founded a new religion Buddha was born a prince, the son of a King-in other words, of a Maharaja.