" *
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* Op. cit., p. 203.
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The confession is significant. It is pleasant to find such a ring of
sincerity in a European Orientalist, though it does seem quite ominous
for Indian archeology. The initiated Brahmans know the positive dates
of their eras and remain therefore unconcerned. What the "Adepts" have
once said, they maintain; and no new discoveries or modified conjectures
of accepted authorities can exert any pressure upon their data. Even if
Western archeologists or numismatists took it into their heads to change
the date of our Lord and Glorified Deliverer from the 7th century "B.C."
to the 7th century "A.D.," we would but the more admire such a
remarkable gift for knocking about dates and eras, as though they were
so many lawn-tennis balls.
Meanwhile, to all sincere and inquiring Theosophists, we will say
plainly, it is useless for any one to speculate about the date of our
Lord Sanggyas's birth, while rejecting a priori all the Brahmanical,
Ceylonese, Chinese, and Tibetan dates. The pretext that these do not
agree with the chronology of a handful of Greeks who visited the country
300 years after the event in question, is too fallacious and bold.
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