Pali Canon - Online

The idea is to go back to the root.  Find the beginning.  Who said what first.  And how do we know.  From a linear standpoint, what is the truth?

I have always had this thought in terms of my own practice - it doesn't matter who said what first, or how authentic it is because what comes your way is what is supposed to come your way.  Now that I am entering into the world of scholarship in Buddhist studies, and I find myself researching different foundational concepts in order to, not only present them to my students who may or may not have had exposure before, understand how ideas developed in a linear way. 

Why?  I am not sure - academia seems to be linearly (historically?) oriented.  Maybe this is my own education speaking, but when one is not presenting proper context (historic or otherwise), the class could be taken as "less serious" or "ungrounded." 

Thus, here is the Pali Canon online - supposidly the original words of the Buddha remembered by his deciples and passed down orally over generations.  Someone wrote it down (i'm not yet sure who) and now it is translated into English.  Lucky Us!