Generally this child, at most but five or six years old, comes forth victorious out of all these trials. He answers accurately all the questions that are put to him, and makes without any embarrassment the inventory of his goods. “Here,” he says, “are the prayer-books I used; there is the japanned porringer out of which I drank my tea.” And so on.
No doubt the Mongols are often dupes of the fraud of those who have an interest in making a Great Lama out of this puppet. Yet we believe that often all this proceeds on both sides with honesty and good faith. From the information we obtained from persons worthy of the greatest credit, it appears certain that all that is said of the Chaberons must not be ranged amongst illusion and deception. A purely human philosophy will, undoubtedly, reject such things, or put them, without hesitating, down to the account of Lama imposture. We Catholic missionaries believe that the great liar who once deceived our first parents in the earthly Paradise still pursues his system of falsehood in the world. He who had the power to hold up in the air Simon Magus may well at this day speak to mankind by the mouth of an infant, in order to maintain the faith of his adorers.
When the titles of the living Buddha have been confirmed, he is conducted in triumph to the Lamasery, of which he is to be the Grand Lama. Upon the road he takes, all is excitement, all is movement. The Tartars assemble in large crowds to prostrate themselves on his way, and to present to him their offerings. As soon as he is arrived at his Lamasery, he is placed upon the altar; and then, kings, princes, mandarins, Lamas, Tartars, from the richest to the poorest, come and bend the head before this child, which has been brought from the depths of Thibet, at enormous expense, and whose demoniac possessions excite every body’s respect, admiration, and enthusiasm.
There is no Tartar kingdom which does not possess, in one of its Lamaseries of the first class, a living Buddha. Besides this superior, there is always another Grand Lama, who is selected from the members of the royal family. The Thibetian Lama resides in the Lamasery, like a living idol, receiving every day the adorations of the devout, upon whom in return he bestows his blessing. Everything which relates to prayers and liturgical ceremonies, is placed under his immediate superintendence. The Mongol Grand Lama is charged with the administration, good order, and executive of the Lamasery; he governs whilst his colleague is content to reign. The famous maxim, _Le roi règne et ne gouverne pas_, is not, therefore, the grand discovery in politics that some people imagine. People pretend to invent a new system, and merely plunder, without saying a word about it, the old constitution of the Tartar Lamaseries.