The Buddha also taught the Doctrine of Non-injury, but took pains to confine it within reasonable limits. He condemned the killing of animals even for food, but did not altogether forbid the eating of flesh and fish. A man must love his fellow-man as himself, returning good for evil and love for hatred. But this is not all. He must extend his love to the fishes of the sea and the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air.
All war is unholy.
Pioneering Lover lt is in virtue of this characteristic of the master that Buddhism is the only one of the great religions of the world that is consciously and frankly based on a systematic rational analysis of the problem of life, and of the way to its solution. Buddha was a pioneering lover of men, and a philosophic genius, rolled into a single vigorous and radiant personality. One Sword and One Enemy Not a single page of Buddhist history has ever been lurid with the light of inquisitorial fires, or darkened with the smoke of heretic or heathen cities ablaze, or red with blood of the guiltless victims of religious hatred. Buddhism wields only one sword, the sword of Wisdom, and recognizes only one enemy ignorance. This is the testimony of history, and is not to be gainsaid.