What is it then, which makes me say what in deepest seriousness and a full knowledge of its truth I have said? What is it that makes me not only cont… - Henry Steel Olcott

32. Q. But have not many men given up all earthly blessings, and even life itself, for the sake of their fellow-men? A. Certainly. But we believe that this surpassing unselfishness and love for humanity showed themselves in his renouncing the bliss of Nirvāna countless ages ago, when he was born as the Brāhmana Sumedha, in the time of Dīpānkara Buddha: he had then reached the stage where he might have entered Nirvāna, had he not loved mankind more than himself. This renunciation implied his voluntarily enduring the miseries of earthly lives until he became Buddha, for the sake of teaching all beings the way to emancipation and to give rest to the world.

The neophyte is never in greater danger of falling a victim to delusion than when he has subjected his grosser passions and begun to develop his psychic sight, hearing, and touch. He is like the newborn babe getting its first lessons of cisuterine life, grasping at the pretty silver moon, clutching at fire and lamp, miscalculating distances, tottering upon its feeble legs.

19. Q. Tell me again when Prince Siddhārtha was born? A. Six hundred and twenty-three years before the Christian era.