Key of Knowledge

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: ZZZ Unknown
Catalog link: https://jainqq.org/explore/006702/1

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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FIRST EDITION : JULY, 1915.

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Caufaltaisu Indian Press, Allahabad. CHAMPAT RAL JAIN.

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I AL KEY OF KNOWLEDGE BY CHAMPAT RAI JAIN BARRISTER-AT-LAW "Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye have taken away THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE: ye entered not in yourselves, and them that were entering in ye hindered."-LUKE XI. 52. "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."-MATT. XI. 28-30. SECOND EDITION (REVISED). KUMAR DEVENDRA PRASAD JAIN THE CENTRAL JAINA PUBLISHING HOUSE ARRAH INDIA.

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ALLAHABAD PRINTED BY APURVA KRISHNA BOSE, AT THE INDIAN PRESS! 1919

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PUBLISHER'S NOTE May people see 'uniformity amid diversity'! In this hope this new work is sent out into the world that they may sink their differences which are but apparent, for it is said by the ancients, 'The path is one for all, the ways that lead thereto must vary with the pilgrim. PUBLISHER.

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COYPRIGHT REGISTERED. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Permission to translate may be obtained from THE CENTRAL JAINA PUBLISHING HOUSE, ARRAH (INDIA)

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Namo arahatANaM Namo siddhANaM Namo bhAirIyANaM Namo uvajjhAyANaM Namo lAye savvasAhUNaM Namo Arahamianam. Vamo Siddhanam, Namo Airiyanam. Namo Uvajjhayanam. Namo Loye Sabba Sahunam. TO ARHATS, THE PERFECT SOULS EMBODIED, POSSESSED OF INFINITE COCNITION, KNOWLEDGE, HAPPINESS AND POWER; TO SIDDHAS, THE PERFECT SOULS IN NIRVANA, FORMLESS AND BODILESS, FREE FROM AL. KARMIC ATTACHMENT ; TO ACHARYAS, THE MASTERS OF ADEPTS IN SPIRITUALITY ; TO UPADHAYAS, THE ADEPTS, GUIDING THE SCHOLAR-ASCETICS, AND TO ALL SADHUS, THE ASCETICS DEVOTED TO THE CONTEMPLATION OF SELF; MAKE OBEISANCE HUMBLE AND PLACE AT THEIR WORSHIPFUL FEET THIS FEEBLE EXPOSITION OF THEIR PROFOUND TEACHING C.R. JAIN

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PAGE 25 40 98 112 116 119 137 168 203 219 236 250 257 266 79 268 278 "" 289 303 328 343 350 364 377 379 394 404 419 436 467 474 ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA. LINE 8th 11th 8th 10th 22nd FROM top bottom "" 39 top 7th 1st 1st 4th 4th 2nd 8th 2nd 8th 16th 11th 15th 10th 7th 5th 6th 10th 1st 17th 13th. top top of the page 10th top 3rd 3rd 2nd 6th 15th bottom top "" bottom top bottom top bottom top " 93 bottom 94 " " top bottom :: 31 bottom top 29 FOR sychic Home be culmination letter, the sanskrit I darvya enm XXI cheruliam XXVIII 40 kingdom XX to dead VII 5 sl 5 6 aphorism 3. is 24 I unparallelled desting 79 phenomena he to of omit that. expected READ. psychic Homer that culminating letter 1, the Sanskrit la dravya men XVI cherubim XXVII 42 kingdom.' XXX into the dead VI 57 61 and 63 aphorisms 10 are 25 III unparalleled destiny 379 phenomena, it is said. the at in desired

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ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA. for 475 485 488 514 524 554 560 -606 1st bottom or 11th ahahkara ahankara 10th top 15 14 top of the page 14 514 6th 7th bottom 1, 2 and 3 1 and 2 7th notet note 18th top 21 st 27th 3rd omit action 17th 10th bottom the dawn and the dawn 2nd II1,20 II.22 6th top falone alone bottom particles bodies place an * on nirvana and add the following foot note to the page : 35 643 668 695 6th 721 1st The size of the jiva in nirvuru is just a little less than that of its last earthly body which falls off the soul as the result of severe tapas, leaving the simple essence of Life as pure radiant Effulgence. This resplendent Effulgence of pure Spirit is what has been termed the Solar Body by certain mystics, and it retains its size and form permanently, because its complete separation from matter and the total elimination of its desires and passions ensure its freedom from the liability to expansion and contraction which nature imposes on all those that are involved in the wheel of samsara.' 757 2nd bottom mmortality immortality 833 in the genealogy Kai (strlfe) Kali (strife) 878 7th top insert the words with reference to the rules of right conduct between Jainism and recognises. 907 1st top sunday sundry 933 9th bottom form the form 966 12th insert are before not. 967 10th save some 971 13th bottom insert Tirthamkaras after great. 981 13th top manwade man-made 1060 unmarked unmasked. top 9th top

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PREFACE CHAPTER I. THE IDEAL II. CREATION III. GOD IV. THE FALL REDEMPTION V. VI. THE KINGDOM OF GOD VII. YOGA VIII. RESURRECTION. IX. THE HOLY TRINITY X. THE SIDDHANTA . XI. THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH XII. RE-INCARNATION. XIII. IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS XIV. RECONCILIATION XV. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION CONTENTS APPENDIX GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS AND PHRASES BIBLE REFERENCES GENERAL. INDEX READER'S OWN PAGE-INDEX PAGE XIII-XVI 1 19 114 154 204 241 373 477 566 689 779 802 885 942 1084 XVII-XXXV xxxvi-li lii-lvi lvii CIII

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PREFACE " THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE" does not claim to be a new Scripture, nor is it intended to found a new religion or a new sect. It is merely what its title indicates--a 'key,' with the aid of which all the locked doors of wisdom might be unlocked, enabling its possessor to enter into them and to see for himself the priceless treasures which have remained hidden from common view so long. Its chief value will be found to lie in its power of reconciling the numerous religious doctrines which have hitherto been regarded as irreconcilable. It is not likely that every reader would find its perusal interesting. There is a certain class of people who do not care to think on the vital problems of life for themselves, and are ever content to be guided by the thoughts of others. For such and others who take no interest in religion the book is not meant. It is meant only for those, in the first instance, who ' labour and are heavy laden' and whose souls are panting for rest and for a breath of the air of freedom. They will find the 'yoke easy and the burden light'. The book lays no claim to elegance of diction, and the critic would be wasting his breath if he merely criticised its literary merit or style. Thought-stimulating criticism is, however, always wholesome, and the author would be happy to have his errors pointed out, if any. The author does not pretend to be a learned man in any

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xiv PREFACE sense of the word. In the following pages he has merely put down the chain of reasoning which brought satisfaction and rest to his soul, in the hope that others also might be benefited thereby, if they have an earnest longing to understand themselves and the great mystery which surrounds existence. It is possible that in dealing with the vast range of subjects discussed in the book he may have unwittingly trodden upon the corns of some ; if so, his excuse is that the causing of pain is not intentional. In an earnest search for Truth, there is no room for an apology. The best method of studying the " Key of Knowledge "indeed, of every other work on enducation and religion-is to meditate on its passages, not to skip over them erratically. It would be much better not to read the book at all than to read it in a hurry. It is well to bear in mind that knowledge is like food, and becomes ours only when it is absorbed, assimilated and digested by the intellect. Serious confusion is apt to arise unless the standpoints of Idealism and Realism are constantly kept in mind. The change from the one to the other is sometimes so abrupt and without warning, that nothing but the reader's natural intelligence can come to his rescue. An endeavour has been made to point out all such changes, but the injunction is thought necessary to put the reader on his guard. A full grasp of the Jaina doctrine of Nayavada (the philosophy of stand-points) which finds its culmination in the Saptabhangi (that is, the sevenfold) system of predication is necessary to avoid all such pitfalls. Ordinarily, language fails to deal at one and the same time with any given situation in all its aspects, and is apt to mislead the unwary. For instance, the word "unknowable' is a contradiction of its own sense. Herbert Spencer could not well have meant what

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PREFACE XV the word signifies. What he meant was that which could not be fully known, not that which was wholly unknowable ; for the mere fact that we know that there is a thing, however unknowable be its attibutes, removes it from the category of the unknowable or unknown and puts it in that of the known. The Jaina method is calculated to overcame this difficulty. It maintains that full knowledge of a thing is possible only when it has been looked at from all the different points of view which exhaust the categories of knowledge. For instance, to know merely what a thing is, is not enough ; we ought also to know what it is not. But as we are not here concerned with the Saptabhangi, we need not tarry to describe it any further. It only remains to be added that the Key of Knowledge does not blindly follow the teaching of any particular sector creed, not even of Jainism to which sublime and noble faith the author has the privilege of belonging by a happy incident of birth. The views set out herein are based on a study of the nature of things, and the interpretation of the scriptures of some of the prevailing religions has been undertaken only to show that the impartial conclusions of Reason are precisely those which have been set before men in the form of doctrines and myths. The reader is, however, requested to bear in mind that the author's profound admiration for the wisdom of the ancients compared with which the much boasted knowledge of the moderns is but a mere smattering, does not allow him to launch this book into the world except with the sincerely-felt observation that whatever is beautiful, grand or sublime in the following pages comes from the sages of the past, and all the rest which is wrong and ugly is his. in dealing with the basic principles of religion it was not

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xvi found necessary to go into a minute analysis of all the existing religions of the world, inasmush as a survey of the principles underlying those actually dealt with sufficiently disposes of them all. Besides, a thorough treatment of each religion separately would have swelled the bulk of the book beyond all proportion, voluminous as it already is. HARDOI: 15th June, 1919. PREFACE C. R. J.

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Special Features of the Second Edition. 1. It embodies the results of further study on the part of the author, at the same time that it leaves out a few unimportant matters of doubtful authenticity and worth. 2. It is not a mere reprint, the whole book having been thoroughly revised and re-written. 3. Besides the important additions made to the several chapters, it contains an entirely new chapter on the scientific method of Self-Realisation as propounded by the JINAS. 4. It contains a special arrangement for a page index to be filled in by the reader if he is minded to do so. D. P. JAIN, Publisher. Oct. 23rd, 1919

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. CHAPTER 1. THE IDEAL. "They who have no central purpose in their life fall an easy prey to petty worries, fears, troubles and self-pityings."-James Allen. "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your father which is in heaven is perfect." --Jesus. A great teacher of our race has said :-- * Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you."* But, unfortunately, he did not say in clear language what should one ask or seek for, or precisely where to knock and how and when. We must, therefore, ascertain what it is that we want before setting out in search of it. As to this, however, there is no need for making a very elaborate investigation or preparing a learned thesis on the subject of human requirements, for all are agreed that the enjoyment of life and the avoidance of pain are the be-all and end-all of existence. We may, therefore, say at once and without fear of contradiction that man's only want is happiness, however vague and hazy be his idea of it. Every one in this life desires happiness; the child * Matthew, VII. 7,

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2 seeks it in the toys which are put before it; the schoolboy turns to books; the young man to making money and getting married. Thence the centre of happiness is shifted to the family. The pursuit of honour and distinction occupies the thoughts of the more advanced in age. And then? But how many think of the 'then'? For the materialist the ideal of old age, after a life of bustle and turmoil, consists in a peaceful, eternal repose in the grave. Poetically, the idea does not seem to be quite unattractive, but when we turn to enquire into the nature of the pleasure which such 'peaceful' repose can possibly afford, he has no idea whatever on the subject. Peace, but for whom? For a dead body! Just as if a corpse could enjoy peace. Perhaps the soul is to enjoy the ideal, peaceful repose. But the materialist's vocabulary of existing things contains no such word as soul. Here is the fulfilment of an ideal, but under what conditions? He who longs for it is no more when it falls into realization! What a contradiction in terms, what an ideal to cherish ! THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. A vast majority of mankind perhaps think that way. There are, however, a few who think the other way. These hold that the enjoyer survives the physical death. But then the grave ceases to be a haven of rest. Repose there might be in the grave, but who can say that it would be peaceful necessarily? And if it is not, the anguish would be all the greater, for here on earth it is given us to assist each other or to devise some means whereby suffering might be alleviated, but the probabilities on the other side of the grave are against such alleviation by mutual assistance or individual exertion.

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THE IDEAL. Theology steps in to point out that beyond the grave there is the land of the paradise where sickness and death and pain and misery are unknown, and where people pass their days in the fun and frolic of childhood, or in the voluptuous embraces of the heavenly nymphs, the houris of Islam. But it also points out that there is another region exactly the reverse of the Land of Happiness where wicked people have to go and spend their lives in awful agonies of pain. The path to the former, it is said, is hidden from the atheist, but is revealed to the worshipper of the Almighty God. He who would aspire to the attainment of heaven must follow the path of virtue, be poor in spirit, inoffensive, meek, charitable, non-injuring, and so forth. 'It is easier for a camel to pass through the needle's eye than for a rich person to tread the narrow path of bliss.' Then comes the teaching about Nirvana after death. Buddha exhorted his hearers to aspire to the attainment of emancipation in Nirvana. But one wants to be happy here and now. There is no pleasure in postponing the realisation of the ideal to a future moment of time. Why can it not be had at once ? Let us philosophize a bit. When pain comes to us we say, 'O, what have I done to deserve this suffering ?' But we make no such observation when happiness falls to our lot. Why? The reason is obvious; we look on happiness as ours by right, but on pain as something foreign and outside ourselves. Therefore it is that every one seeks his happiness first and foremost and above all other things. But the fact that search is to be made for it indicates.

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that happiness has to be sought out, in other words, is not readily available to us. Leaving aside, for the present, the question of the real nature of happiness, it is also obvious that it cannot reside in any one of the toys, books, money, family, children, honours, distinctions and the like, which man seeks one after another. Were it otherwise, tbe child would stick to his toys, the school-boy to his books, and so forth.. Volition, as a matter of fact, is the outcome of desire, and desire most distinctly points to a want which, in its turn, indicates unhappiness. One moves to secure a thing because one wants it, one wants it because it would satisfy an existing desire, and one satisfies an existing desire because satisfaction results in happiness. All straining and striving which is going on in the world is, therefore, the outcome of a thirst. for happiness, and it is on account of this insatiable thirst that ideal after ideal is conceived, adhered to for a time, and then, ultimately, when discoverd to be insufficient, discarded and replared by a seemingly better one. Some people spend their whole lives in thus trying object after object in a vain search for this Will-o'-theWisp, and ultimately descend into the grave with a broken heart. When all the customary ideals of happiness are exhausted by a person, and he is left without any tangible aim in life, he drifts about like a wreck, and dies of aimlessness. The question, therefore, arises as to what is the proper ideal for mankind to cherish? Can it be money? No, for money is a means to an end, not the end in itself, and would fail to procure happiness if put to the

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THE IDEAL. test. Can it, then, be the toys, the books, the family, children, fame and the like, which are known to have afforded pleasure in the past? Surely not, for they are also only so many means to an end, not the end itself. Should one aspire for eminent position, then ? But this, too, does not satisfy the mind, for even the best of beings are not always happy. The case with the millionaire, the poet, the philosopher and the like is also the same ; they cannot be said to enjoy unalloyed happiness in any sense. Similarly, it can be shown with respect to every other occupation and object in the world that it cannot be happiness itself. Shall we, then, turn to the world beyond the grave to see if it will furnish us with a suitable ideal ? The streams of milk and honey, the shade of beautiful trees, the voluptuous company of bewitching, ravishing houris appeal only to the sensualist; they possess no charm for the sober-minded; neither can they, taken singly or together, constitute happiness. Sorne people think that happiness is to be had in heaven because of the vision of the glory of God which is to be had there. But even this purer conception of the heaven-world implies little or no happiness for the soul, because it involves the idea of dependence on the will and pleasure of another. For, God can mar that happiness by withholding his beatific vision. Besides, the vision of another, even though that other be no other than the Supreme Being himself, cannot confer real happiness on the soul. We find happiness in the idea of our own greatness and power. One finds pleasure in such thoughts as 'I am the king,' 'I am the governor,'

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TAE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE 'I am beautiful,' 'I am brave,' and the like, not in such as another is the king,' another is the governor,' another is beautiful," "another is brave,' and so forth. So far as the element of freedom is concerned-and without freedom it is inconceivable how there can be true happiness-it is perfectly obvious that it is our own freedom which can afford us joy ; the freedom of another, when we ourselves are in bondage, can only go to deepen our anguish, however much its sight may temporarily soften our heart and thereby lighten the burden of captivity for the time being. Happiness comes not from without; it depends on ourselves. Concerning its nature Lord Avebury observes : "Money cannot make us happy, success cannot make us happy, friends cannot make us happy, health and strength cannot make us happy. All these make for happiness, but none of them will secure it. Nature may do all she can : she may give us fame, health, money, long life, but she cannot make us bappy. Every one of us must do that for himself. Our language expresses this admirably. What do we say if we have had a happy day? We say we have enjoyed ourselves. This expression of our mother tongue seems very suggestive. Our happiness depends on ourselves." This is perfectly sound, as will be shown more fully later on. For the present it is sufficient to note that happiness resides not in any outside object, but must spring up within us, if it is to be enjoyed at all. Hence, all the heavens and other worlds of bliss, put together, cannot confer it on the soul, if the latter happen to be barren in itself. *On Peace and Happiness," pp. 1-2.

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THE IDEAL. There remains the idea of Nirvana to be dealt with. Obviously, if that is a state which is reserved for the hereafter, there can be no happiness for the soul in this life on earth. Hence, if Nirvana is to be assumed to belong to the post mortem world, it is an incomplete idea in itself, and means only happiness after death, but none here in this life. The idea of jivan-mukti (salvation in this life), however, is the necessary complement, and coupled with that of Nirvana gives a complete form of happiness attainable by man. What the notion of Nirvana contains within it will be enquired into later; here at present it is sufficient to state that perfect freedom, which is the essence of happiness, cannot possibly be had till all obstacles to the freedom of will are removed from the path; and that means neither more nor less than the attainment of Godhood by the aspiring soul. God alone is all-powerful, second to none, all-knowing, blissful and free. Hence, man has to become God, if he would attain to perfect happiness. It is a big claim for man to aspire to become God, and many might regard it as the height of blasphemy and lunacy. The possibility of its attainment forms the subject of this book, and as the thesis develops in outline and acquires definiteness and certainty it will also become evident that absolutely no blasphemy is involved in this seemingly high aspiration. We may, therefore, hold that the proper ideal for mankind is God, the ever living, the all-knowing, the most blissful, the Sat-Chit-Ananda (i.e., Existence, Intelligence or Consciousness, and Bliss) of Vedanta. All

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8 other ideals fail to secure the full measure of happiness, and are, for that reason, unworthy of the soul. The aim of religion, it will be pointed out as we progress with our subject, is none other than to raise mankind to the supreme status of Godhood. It owes its origin to the quest of happiness which thinking beings have ever found necessary to pursue. When one is taken ill in the flesh one goes to physicians and surgeons to be cured of one's ailment; but since the members of the medical faculty know not of any ininerals or herbs or other medicaments with which to allay the mental suffering, the soul in its agony seeks out the sages of the day and pours forth its troubles before them. The means suggested by the sages have at all times consisted of such practices as are calculated to establish the soul in the state of Sat-Chit-Anandaship, i.e., Godhood; hence, religion, from re, back, and ligo, to bind, becomes the recognized code of means which bind the soul to God, in other words, which lead it to realize the state of Godhood for itself. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. When people talk of a high or a low religion they generally fail to understand the significance of the adjectives they employ. A high religion is one which brings the highest form of happiness to its votaries. Hence, the system which does not aspire to raise mankind to the supreme status of Godhood has no right to lay claim to be the high or the highest religion, and, not being the best, must perish, in due course of time, when intelligent men come to look into its merit. But whence did the sages learn the truth about religion? There were neither books nor tables nor

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THE IDEAL. 9 other data available in the days of primitive humanity. Whence could they have learnt it, indeed, if not from the only source from which we all learn anything that is learnt even now-a-days. Whence did Sir Isaac Newton learn the law of gravitation ? From the falling apple? Surely not, but from meditation and deliberation. All knowledge comes from these two sources. Nature is the open book of Truth, he who would meditate over it would learn the secret. The sages took the hint, and applied themselves to the study of this Open Book. With the help of the torch of Intellect and Reason they pursued their search with zeal and untiring energy, and rested not till the Almighty God revealed himself to them in his full glory. Knowledge thus acquired was gradually imparted to others who, not being so wise as their teachers, put their own interpretations on their teachings. We thus got the numerous sects and religious bodies which exist in the world. In the main, all the schools of thought fall into two great classes, namely, those which believe in the existence of the Principle of Life, that is, God, and those that do not believe in him. The former alone need be referred to here, and they are again divided into three groups. First come those who believe in a God as the creator and sustainer of the Universe, but separate from Nature and the human soul. He is regarded in this system as a capricious, whimsical, despotic monarch, easily offended at slights, however unconsciously offered, hard to please, and always to be dreaded. The highest ideal of happiness provided by this system consists in life in heaven-a sort of boarding house,

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10 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. on a large scale, managed by the Lord God where his children can indulge their animal passions to the full, in eating, drinking and, according to some, even in fornication. This is the lowest of the three classes. The second group believes that there is a God, but considers that the Universe cannot be separate from him. It maintains that creation took place in the sense of a projection, but not in the sense in which it is understood in the West, that is, a making of a something real out of nothing. According to this sect, God is himself the Creator as well as the material of which beings and things are made. Accordingly, God, Nature and the individual Soul are the three aspects of the one and the same thing. Here we have the dissolution of personality, i.e., separateness, into the one Absolute Being or Life as the ideal of the soul. This is, obviously, a slightly better form of belief than that of the first class of men ; but all the sameimperfect. The third class consists of those luminous souls who have dared to conceive the truth in its highest aspect. These regard the soul to be its own God and capable of attaining the fullest measure of perfection and bliss. This third form of belief is almost as old as humanity itself, as will be demonstrated later, and has been directly, or indirectly, ruling the hearts of men and swaying their destinies.' The belief that the soul is its own God, it is claimed, is not only the most ancient, but also the only one which gives us an ideal of Perfection neither unworthy of a rational being nor incompatible with the highest aspiration of the soul. The first man of our times who realized this great ideal in his own life and who taught

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THE IDEAL.. il the method of its realization to others, is the first great Teacher of our race and the founder of Religion in the true sense of the word. However absurd the statement may seem at this early stage of our investigation, it is certain that religion is coeval with its own necessity and also with rational thought. It is true that the phases of rational thought have undergone certain kinds of evolutionary changes, but it is also true that these changes have added little or nothing to the knowledge of the so-called primitive humanity, who were fully instructed in all the departments of Religion, and made familiar with the true principles of yoga and devotion, two important departments of the science of Self-realization. As a matter of fact, there was nothing left to be discovered at the time of which we are writing, and the task of the future generations was inerely to understand and dispense the divine knowledge in a simple, easy way to the suffering humanity. As time wore on people drifted away from the high ideal set before them by the great sages of the race, and, in consequence, became estranged from happiness, which they vainly tried to extract from the material objects in the world. Warning voices rose up from time to time to exhort them to remain steadfast to their noble and ennobling ideal. Tirthamkaras and saviours and swamies and prophets appeared and preached to the world in quick succession ; but their philosophy was of no value to the people, as they had no time left from the pursuit of sensual pleasures and riches to understand the sublime teaching of religion, while yoga and devotion, entailing, as they did, severe austerities and self-denials, equally ceased to

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12 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. attract the masses. Mankind wanted a cheap, simple recipe like a physician's draught which could be taken once a day or so to prevent or cure the disorders of spirituality, and the simpler the method the quicker were the people to respond to it. It was thus that every one who had a little smattering of religious lore managed to secure some followers to himself; and if he could perform a miracle or two in addition, his success as the founder of a religion was at once put beyond dispute. Thus, interest in religion dwindled down to a mere mockery, till at last people began to believe that all talk of God, the Ideal of Perfection, was either a pure chimera, or, if true, was a piece of news which was of no marketable value, as it could not be reduced to PS. 8. d. Mammon came into existence, and just in proportion in which it became an object of devotion, the true object of adoration and worship receded into background and became lost to view. Devil and his companions have thus become regnant where there used to be the Kingdom of God. As with the ancients, so is the case with us at present; we believe in money and the pleasures of senses, and bewail our lot when these afford us disgust. The soul is athirst for happiness and is panting for a breath of the pure atmosphere of freedom, but we still adhere to the mad worship of the god Golden Calf and its co-seducers. This is our own fault. It is not too late yet, but it will be so in a short time when Death knocks at the door to claim its victim. What will you do then ? Every moment that you neglect your opportunity for approaching God, each time that you

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THE IDEAL. 13 say that there is no hurry about it, and on each occasion that you think that your business matters ought not to suffer for devotion to the Godhead, you seal your own doom and drive an additional nail into your coffin with your own hands. Whenever in the future you chance to evolve out an inclination for God-realization, you will have to draw out each nail so driven in by you' from your coffin. If time is money and may not be wasted in business, it is still more valuable in religion. Again, you must not be vague about your ideal. You must know what you want and see that you have a clear, vivid impression of it, so that, should you come across the good angel who grants all desires, you may be in a position to tell him precisely what you want. Do not he guided by what others have thought or said on the subject, without sifting it for yourself. You would be nowhere if in reply to your request for an admission ticket into the Kingdom of Heaven the angel told you that he did not understand what you meant by that term. You must have a clear idea of the thing desired before you can ever expect to get it. This is so even in the realm of matter. A manufacturer would come to speedy grief if he did not happen to have a definite idea of the thing he intended to manufacture. One must strive for the attainment of the highest ideal. If you accept a baser substitute, you will be in need again, and will have to ask again and again, from time to time, but you cannot go on begging all your life through. Now, you want to be above want; you wish for that condition in which there never will be any need, or trouble, or misery. That condition only exists in God,

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14 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and not in any creature, or god, or goddess of a lower degree. You need not be afraid of exciting the anger of God by this seemingly audacious ambition. When you understand the nature of things, you will see that Godhood is the goal of evolution. A question which is often asked is why should one be religious at all? In other words, why should not one go on living as usual in this world and enjoying its pleasures, rather than renounce them to become religious? It is certainly a legitimate question, and religion has got to answer it, in order to maintain its claim and to sustain its position. Religion is the SCIENCE of bliss; it is the department which deals with the attainment of unalloyed happiness. It sets out with an enquiry into the very nature of bliss which it proclaims to be different from the pleasures of the world. A mere tickling of senses, worldly pleasure is essentially fleeting, transient, full of trouble in its procurement, and liable to give birth to suffering and pain in its experience. Pleasure and pain are thus opposite terms in a sense; the one is the re-action of the other, and neither can be had alone by itself. If the action is pleasant, its re-action is bound to be painful, and vice versa. Religion declares that pleasure which is liable to change and to be followed by pain is merely a counterfeit imitation, not the genuine article. Real bliss is very different from the pleasures of this world. It is that condition in which one experiences nothing but uninterrupted peace, tranquillity and joy, wave upon wave, as it were of life-giving ecstasy, the becoming rather than enjoying bliss itself which is God's eternal svabhava (nature).

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THE IDEAL.. 15 Renunciation is a giving up certainly, bui a giving up of what? It is a giving up of base imitations, of false ideals, of worthless substitutes, and, in place thereof, the acquisition of the genuine article, the living waters of eternal life and joy. 'Has any one ever acquired this bliss ? ''what is the proof that these statements are true ?' and many other like questions will naturally arise in the mind of the reader at this stage. He must, however, wait till he gets to the end of the book which will answer all of them, at their proper time and place. In the meantime, we may emphasize the point that the pursuit of worldly pleasure is, sooner or later, bound to end in ennui and disgust, because the sense of pleasure chiefly depends on (1) the capacity to enjoy which decreases with age, and (2) the novelty of the sensation which wears off with intimacy and repetition, so that when both the capacity to enjoy and the novelty of the sensation are gone, the soul, whose thirst for happiness has nowise abated, is plunged into mourning over its lost power to enjoy itself with the objects of sense. This undesirable experience comes to every one, sooner or later in life; there is no favourite of fortune who can be said to be immune from it. When this feeling of ennui, or general dissatisfaction, takes possession of the soul, nothing but religion can come to its rescue. It is, however, by this time generally incapable of understanding the true principles of religion, and totally unfit to adapt itself to the life of physical and moral severity which is necessary for the attainment of Perfection and Bliss. Many persons who turn to religion

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16 late in life, thus, derive little or no benefit from its pursuit. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. They have no idea of the effort necessary to rise to the sublime status of divinity, and rest content with the sweet delusion that the goal can be reached on the wings to be evolved out by prayer and psalm. As a matter of fact, it is the intelligent pursuit, amounting, in point of assiduity, to the whole-heartedness of worship, of the Ideal, and not a vague or fanatical doting upon an idol, which is required for spiritual progress; but so far as that is concerned, it is clearly a case of "many be calledi, but few be chosen." To the vast majority of mankind, even the very idea of worship is unintelligible and devoid of pleasure. They worship their god on account of a vague and indefinable sense of fear with which their minds are impressed, in relation with some actual or apprehended calamity. Hence, when the danger is past god is easily forgotten, as the proverb says. But worship, or devotion, in its true form, is really nothing but an imitating of the object of worship. When you worship a being, you walk in his footsteps. You must copy the object of your worship, if you wish to achieve anything. Merely flattering the Diety, or offering him food, however choice, would not do. God, surely, does not stand in need of food at any time. It will not bring you any pleasure if all the ants in your house prostrate themselves before you, praise you up to the skies, and offer you a portion of a dead cricket, or some other insect, as an ordinary or burnt offering. Similarly, our sacrifices and thanksgiving cannot possibly afford pleasure to the

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THE IDEAL. Most High. And, so far as praise is concerned, it is certainly the free appreciation of one's equals which is. pleasing to the ear, not the flattery or servile homage of inferiors. If a God were to suffer himself to be affected with pleasure, or anger, just as a creature offered him praise, or withheld it from him, he would never have peace of mind for a moment. The very idea is absurd in the extreme. The reason why idolatry is spoken of as degrading is very different from what people imagine it to be. Says the Bhagavad Gita (IX. 25) : "They who worship the Shining Ones, go to the Shining Ones; to the Ancestors go the ancestor-worshippers; to the Elementals go those who sacrifice to the Elementals; but My worshippers come unto Me." Thus the worship of a deva, a bhuta, or an ancestor can only enable you to become like them in power and disposition. By worshipping these beings you cannot aspire to rise above desire or want. But if you worship the ever-blissful God, there is no limit to the heights of bliss which you can aspire to. The Almighty God is Perfect; by taking pattern after (worshipping) him you can rise up to Perfection. As Jesus urges : "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." There is no good in seeking a condition which is not quite perfect. But while this is so, it cannot be said that an intelligent worship of the Deity, in spirit, by focussing the mind on some material form, by one who bas these principles in view, is wicked or unnecessary. The Bhagavad Gita again gives us the reason thereof : "The difficulty of those whose minds are set on the Unmanifested is greater, for the path of the Unmanifested is hard for the embodied to reach."-XII. 5. 2 17

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18 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. If you think over the matter and investigate it for yourself, you will see the force of this statement, and will then appreciate the following again from the Bhagavad Gita (VII. 20-23) : * "They whose wisdom hath been rent away by desires go forth to other Shining Ones, resorting to various external observances according to their own nature. "Any devotee who seeketh to worship with faith any such aspect, I verily bestow the unswerving faith of that Man. "He, endowed with that faith, seeketh the worship of such a one, and from him he obtaineth his desires, I verily decreeing the benefits. "Finite indeed the fruit that belongeth to those who are of small intelligence. To the Shining Ones go the worshippers of the Shining Ones, but My devotees come unto Me." Here, in a nut-shell, is given the whole philosophy of the worship of the Supreme Godhead with the aid of images. As it is difficult to concentrate the mind on the invisible Godhead, people generally make use of the visible, tangible images of Devas (Gods) to assist them in their meditation, in the beginning. Thus, by means of an intelligent use of the ladder of devotion they rise up to the highest height of aspiration. When the top is reached, the ladder is no longer required, and may be thrown away. Thus, if you find it difficult to worship the Godhead in spirit, you may use idolatry as a stepping-stone for the achievement of the object of your ambition, taking care that you do not lose sight of your high ideal and remain wallowing in the stagnation of contentment with stones only. There is sound philosophy underlying idolatry when rightly understood; but in that case 'idol' simply means 'ideal,' and 'idolatry,' 'ideal-atry.' Ignorant fetishism has no place in this system.

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CHAPTER II. CREATION " The one unborn (soul), for his enjoyment, approaches the one unborn (nature) which is red, white and black, of one form, and producing a manifold offspring." --Swetaswatara Upunishad, IV, 5, From the moment which marked the dawn of consciousness for the thinking world, man has ever found the contemplation of the Universe, of things in general, and of himself, in particular, a study of an all-absorbing interest. The problem of the origin of the World has been the greatest theme for all kinds of thinkers, from the remotest antiquity down to the present moment; and Haeckel, writing at the end of the nineteenth century, regards it as the greatest, the vastest, and most difficult of all cosmic problems. Many and various are the solutions that have been offered of this undoubtedly difficult problem; and intellectual men have not always found it easy to agree with one another on the subject. Theistic theology maintains that the first cause of the world is a spiritual Being, who is the creator of all things and of each and every individual. Mahomedans believe that the God of the Universe created it by uttering the word 'kun'(=let it be done), and all things were made, as if it were, out of ' nothing.' Somewhat similar is the Christian story of creation which is based on the account given in the book of Genesis.

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20 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Science disputes the accuracy of these conclusions and denies the very existence of a god. It reduces everything to natural causation, and replaces the notion of an anthropomorphic Architect by the 'eternal iron laws of nature.' The Hindus also endeavoured to formulate a theory about the world-process, and accounted for it in different ways. They divide themselves into two main camps, which may be called the Realistic and the Idealistic, because of the one pursuing the line of thought known as Realism, and of the other that of Idealism. To the former class belongs the system of Sankhya, which was founded by Kapila. Its teaching embraces the four great principles of good reason and science, namely, (1) that out of nothing, nothing comes, i.e., 'something' cannot come out of nothing, (2) that the effect lies in the cause, or, in other words, the cause is the potential, the unmanifested condition of the effect, (3) that the breaking up of the effect causes the unmanifested, the causal state to come into existence again, and (4) that there is an uniformity of the laws of nature throughout. As regards the origin of the world, the Sankhyas hold that the Universe is built out of the eternal cosmic matter, called Prakriti, in the sense of an evolution from the unmanifested into the manifested condition. The following account of the teaching of this school from Prof. P. C. Ray's ably written book, 'An Introduction to Hindu Chemistry,' will be found of great interest : "The manifested world is traced to an unmanifested ground, the prakriti, which is conceived as formless and undifferentiated, limitless and ubiquitous, indestructible and undecaying, without beginning and without end. The unit of this prakriti is a mere abstraction;

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CREATION it is in reality an undifferentiated manifold, an indeterminate, infinite continuum of infinitesimal Reals. These reals, termed gunas, are by another abstraction classed under three heads, namely, (1) Sattva, the essence which manifests itself in a phenomenon, and which is characterised by this tendency to manifestation, the essence, or, in other words, which serves as the medium for the reflection of intelligence, (2) Rajas, energy, that which is efficient in a phenomenon and is characterised by a tendency to do work, or overcome resistance, and (3) Tamas, mass or inertia, which counteracts the tendency of Rajas to do work, and of Sattva to conscious manifestation. The ultimate factors of the Universe, then, are (1) essence or intelligence-stuff, (2) energy and (3) matter characterised by mass or inertia. These gunas are conceived to be Reals, substantive entities, - not however as self-subsistent or independent entities, but as interdependent moments in every Real or substantive Existence." Even energy is substantive in this sense. The infinitesimals of energy do not possess inertia or gravity, and, consequently, are not 'material ;' but they possess quantum and extensivity. The gunas are always uniting, separating, and uniting again. Everything in the world results from their peculiar arrangement and combination. Varying quantities of Essence, Energy and Mass, in varied groupings, act on one another, and through their mutual interaction and interdependence evolve, from the indefinite or qualitatively indeterminate, the definite or qualitatively determinate. In the phenomenal product whatever energy is, is due to the element of Rajas, and Rajas alone; matter, resistance, and stability are due to Tamas, and all conscious manifestation to Sattva. In order that there may be a disturbance of the equilibrium, the particular guna which happens to be predominant in any phenomenou, becomes manifest in that phenomenon and the others become latent, e.g., in a body at rest, mass is patent, energy latent, and conscious manifesta

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tion sub-latent. In this way does the evolution of prakriti continually proceed, building up and then destroying the worlds. .... Similar views prevailed in the school of thought known as Yoga. The material of the universe, according to this school, consists of Akasa and Prana (Life). Swami Vivekananda thus explains the function of Akasi :-- * At the beginning of creation there is only the Akasu (ether). It is the akasi that becomes the air, that becomes the liquids, that becomes the solids ; it is the akasa that becomes the sun, the earth, the moon, the stars, the comets ; it is the alea sa that becomes the body, the animal body, the plants, every form that we see, every thing that can be sensed, every thing that exists. At the end of the cycle, the solids, the liquids, the gases all melt into the aka sa again, and the next creation similarly poceeds out of this akasa. According to the Nyaya school, the atoms of earth, water, fire and air are the material cause of the visible and tangible parts of the Universe, and are themselves. self-existent and eternal. The Vaiseshikas go minutely into the theory of atoms. The founder of their school, nick-named Kanada (literally, the atom-eater), explains the nature and aggregation of atoms in the following manner: "The mote which is seen in a sunbeam is the smallest perceptible quantity. Being a substance and an - effect, it must be composed of what is less than itself ; and this likewise is a substance and an effect, for the component part of a substance which bas magnitude must be an effect. This again must be composed of what is smaller, and that smaller thing is an atom. It is simple and uncomposed, else the series. would be endless, and were it pursued indefinitely, there would be no difference of magnitude between a

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CREATION. mustard seed and a mountain, or a gnat and an elephant, each alike containing an infinity of particles.' The ultimate atom, then, is a simple unit. Kanada next proceeds to show that the first compound consists of two atoms, and the next of three double-atoms; for one cannot make a compound by any possibility, and there is nothing to show that more than two are required for that purpose. The regular atom, however, is a compound of three double-atoms, otherwise it would not be possible to have magnitude, which would not ensue if only two such double-atoms were conjoined, the number, in this case, but not the size of atoms, making up the magnitude. Touching the qualities which manifest themselves in the effect, Kanada declares them to be the same as appertain to the integrant part, or the material cause. According to the Vaiseshikas, the universe is the result of the concourse of atoms brought about by an unseen peculiar virtue which might be the creative will, or time, or some other competent cause. 23 Thus was the creation of the Universe accounted for by the ancient Hindu sages of the Realistic school. They did not consider it to be a creation in the sense of the making of a something out of nothing, but an evolution of the gross from the fine or less gross. Out of the primitive material, possessing the property of being transformed into all sorts of shapes and forms, they held the universe to have evolved out in accordance with certain definite laws. Matter was thus recognized as one of the two most essential factors of the universe, the other being spirit, that is, the essence of souls, whose perfection is the goal of evolution.

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24 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Let us now see what modern Science has to say on the subject. Like some of the Hindu Realists, it also reduces the universe to two factors, but calls them matter and force. Under the head of matter come all the substances, whether nebulous, gaseous, liquid or solid, while force includes the various forms of energy, such as light, heat, electricity, magnetism, chemical action, and the like. It is now held that all manifestations of existence and life are caused by evolution from these two factors. Both matter and force are indestructible ; in other words, the sum total of each is a fixed quantity which it is not possible to add to, or subtract from. The force (a distinction is recognised between this term and energy; for, while force inheres in, and cannot be separated from the atoms of weighable matter, energy passes from atom to atom, and from mass to mass, its vehicle being the unweighable ethereal medium, which, it is assumed, fills the space between bodies and between particles of bodies) bound up in each atom, acting as affinity, combines atoms into molecules ; acting as cohesion, it unites the molecules into masses; and acting as gravitation, it draws the masses towards their several centres of gravity. The evolution of the organic from the inorganic substance is similarly explained ; for the difference between the most complex inorganic thing and the lowest form of organism is considered to lie merely in the arrangement of the molecules of matter composing them. In its lowest form the living germ is apparently lifeless, and so utterly devoid of structure that it is only by courtesy that one can be induced to call it an organism. According to the leading authorities on modern Science,

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CREATION. 25 the earliest form of organic life began with mere naked specks of protoplasm, non-nucleated, or with no easily recognisable nucleus, which gave rise to the so-called unicellular creatures. These were followed by those whose bodies consisted of more cells, the multicellular. In this manner the manifestation of organic life became more and more complex, till it reached its culminating point in man. The evolution of sychic functions has also been traced out very elaborately. It has been surmised that the nervous system developed side by side with the physical body, so that when the organism became multicellular, the nervous system spread out like a network of nerve wires and centres. In man this has reached a very extraordinary state of complexity, which accounts for his wonderful mental powers, though it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that the lower animals also possess the power of thinking and reasoning in proportion to the development of the brain and the nervous system. Such, briefly, is the explanation which modern science gives of our Universe. At this stage it is worth while to enquire into the nature of force itself. The question is, what is force ? There is a great diversity of opinion on this point, and men of learning are divided amongst themselves, some thinking that it must be of the nature of matter, others denying it. But, since it is impossible to look upon anything as being altogether devoid of substantiveness, force must be held to be bound up in some kind of substance. Thus understood, force becomes an aspect or function of substance ; for there can be no such thing as an immaterial entity. According to Prof. Haeckel,

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26 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "In truth these profound errors need no further refutation to-day, for experience has never yet discovered for us a single immaterial substance, a single force which is not dependent on watter, or a single form of energy which is not exerted by material movement, whether it be of mass, or of ether, or of both. Even the most elaborate and most perfect forins of energy that we know,--the psychic life of the higher animals, the thought and reason of mandepend on material processes, or changes in the neuroplasm of the ganglionic cells; they are inconceivable apart from such modifications. Even consciousness cannot be thought of as an immaterial entity, for it is affected by the state of our health, by wrong knowledge and even by certain drugs, such as tea, coffee, musk, camphor, etc." The old notions about matter and atom have undergone considerable modification since the discovery of radium. Many distinguished physicists see in its phenomena an actual breakdown of what used to be considered the indestructible atom of matter. Electrons (units. of electricty) are detached from atoms of matter at an electrode, and it is believed that these electrons are really "bits chipped off" the atom (* The Riddle Vindicated '). The question of weight does not arise under the circumstances, since it is merely a comparative term. As a matter of fact, our experiences of matter consist only in resistant force. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the established affinity between matter and force. For our practical requirements we may weigh or measure either of them, as we like, by our comparative methods. As regards the cause or causes of evolution, the scientist denies that the universe is the outcome of any one's idea or design ; he disputes with theology the hypothesis of a miraculous creation at the will of a creator, and ascribes the continuance of the universe to

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CREATION. the unchanging laws of nature. The theologically trained mind, eager to maintain the claim of its Supreme Being to be the creator of the universe, proceeds to establish it on the argument of analogy between a watch and the world, and asserts that, as there could have been no watch without a watchmaker, so there could be no world without a creator. How far this argument is sound will be enquired into later, but we might avail ourselves of the present opportunity to examine two of the points involved in the claim advanced by theology. These are the notions of a creation from nothing and of a first beginning of the universe. 27 So far as the first of these two points is concerned, the idea of nothing involves a contradiction in itself. In the popular sense, nothing is an empty concept, and, as such, inconceivable by the mind. We might describe the state of nothingness as a condition of existence when this thing, that thing, the other thing, that is, when each and every and all things, were not, but we then have merely a notion of the negation of sense objects; and when we endeavour to think away substance itself, mind refuses to obey the impulse and the lips to formulate speech. Assuming, then, a beginning of the world process, we must say that the true state of existence prior to the manifestation of the universe must have been one in which all things lay unmanifested in the bosom of Existence itself. A beautiful description of this state is given in the Book of Dzyan, from which we quote the following: "The eternal Parent wrapped in Her ever invisible robes had slumbered once again for seven eternities.

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28 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "Time was not, for it lay asleep in the infinite bosom of duration. " Universal Mind was not, for there were no intelligent beings to contain it. " The great causes of misery were not, for there was no one to produce and to get ensnared by them. "Darkness alone filled the Boundless all, for Father, Mother, Son were Once more one, and the Son had not yet awakened for the New Wheel and his pilgrimage thereon. " The seven truths had ceased to be and the Universe, the Son of necessity, was immersed in the Absolute to be out-breathed by that which is and yet is not. Nought was. " The causes of existence were no more; the visible that was and the invisible that is, rested in the Eternal Non-Being-One Being. "Alone the one form of existence stretched boundless, infinite, causeless, in dreamless sleep, and life pulsated unconscious in Universal space throughout that all presence which is sensed by the opened eye of the Seer. "But where was the Seer when the Over-Soul of the Universe was absorbed in the Absolute and the great Wheel was parentless ? (In its formless, Eternal, Absolute condition)!" The above is a fairly accurate description of the state of Nought or "Nothingness." That which really and truly exists, in and for itself, can never cease to be ; and even when the form of a thing lapses into the condition of non-manifestation and we say 'it is not,' the material of which it was made remains in existence, in some form or other. To put the same thing in different words, all things are causal possibilities before and after manifestation, and perceptible realities during manifestation, while the true cause, or causes, which give them rise, remain unaffected by their transformations. It is thus obvious that there could never have been a moment of time, in the history of duration, with reference to which

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CREATION 29 it could be said that the universe was a void and nothing existed with any degree of accuracy. The true sense of the word 'nothing' would become clear if we analyse the sense of the sentence, the world was a void and nothing existed.' Now, ordinarily, the word 'nothing,' as it is current in the English language, means the antithesis of existence, but in this sense it is incapable of being used in an affirmative judgment, inasmuch as it is inconceivable how the antithesis, that is, the absence, of existence can ever exist. This is equal to saying that existence cannot be predicated in favour of a thing which does not exist itself. Hence, the statement, ' nothing existed,' is a self-contradictory assertion. But if we do not ascribe the current sense to the word 'nothing,' and use it to mean not the absence of existence, but merely a negation of things,' i.e., senseobjects, the expression acquires sound sense, and becomes capable of being used in an affirmative judgment. The concept 'nothing' would then have a positive content, and the judgment 'nothing existed' would mean nothing, that is to say that which is no thing, existed. Now, that which is no thing is the group of causal substances or elements, the concrete aspect of the metaphysical abstraction Existence or Reality, set up as the antithesis of 'thing,' i.e., sense-objects. Hence, the true sense of the sentence, 'the world was a void and nothing existed,' is not that Existence was not, or had ceased to be, but that the space contained no sense-objects, that is, perceptible things, and the Reality, i.e., that which is no 'thing,' hence Life and other substances, existed and filled the void' of space.

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. We may pause here to notice an oft-repeated question, which is: Whence came substance itself ? Philosophically, the very question itself is absurd, for substance is existence itself, and, as such, is its own source. Besides, if we go on tracing tbe cause from its effect, we must ultimately halt at some existent substance ; otherwise the process would be unending, or would have to depend on the creation of things miraculously from the womb of nought, which would mean a lapse from reason into irrationalism. Moreover, since it is impossible to believe that all the variety of visible phenomena could possibly come out of one and the same nothing,' it follows that there must be differences even in the constitution of 'nought.' We thus have the existence of differences in a thing which has no existence itself ! It is thus clear that the attempt to posit nothing, as the antithesis of existence, in existence, is like the effort of the man who tries to jump on his own shoulders, and that the theologian who employs the word in its popular sense is very far away from truth. As regards the second point, the theologian is also wrong about his idea of a first cause or beginning. We cannot conceive a first beginning of the universe. Why should there be a change in the state of affairs which had prevailed till then? Does God also change his attitude from a non-creative to a creative one ? And what of the material of which the universe is made ? Did it not exist in some form or other, prior to the making of the worlds ? The theologian would like to answer this last question in the negative, but he fears

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CREATION. the rebuke of the Scientist who has succeeded in establishing that it is not possible to make something out of nothing. The laws of conservation of matter and energy are hostile to the notion of a first beginning, and we have to recognise that the process of world-making cannot possibly involve anything more than the restoring of a certain kind of order in an already existing state of affairs, that is, the making of a cosmos out of a chaos. But the chaos itself, when enquired into, would seem to owe its origin to a previous cosmos, which likewise must have succeeded an antecedent chaos, and so forth. Hence, instead of getting at a beginning of things, we find ourselves entangled in a circle of alternating chaos and cosmos, whence escape is possible only by abandoning the idea itself. The doctrine of the first cause may afford momentary relief to a mind baffled by a sense of vastness of the worldproblem, but it is the sort of relief which one dropping into fire from the frying pan enjoys. The man of Science has understood the world-process much better than the theologian. Says professor Haeckel :-- 31 "It has recently been strongly confirmed and enlarged by theory that this cosmogonic process did not simply take place once, but is periodically repeated. While new cosmic bodies arise and develop out of rotating masses of nebula in some parts of the Universe, in other parts old, extinct, frigid suns come into collision and are once more reduced by the heat generated to the condition of nebulae." The immense quantity of heat which is generated in the collision of swiftly moving bodies represents the new kinetic energy which affects the condition of the resultant nebula and the construction of new rotating

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THE KEY. OF KNOWLEDGE. bodies. Thus, what is the beginning to us might be the end to others in some other planets. The eternal drama goes on and on in this manner, unceasingly and for ever. On our own planet, in daily life, we see the same principle illustrated. What is the seed to-day becomes the tree to-morrow, and the seed again the day after, to become the tree once more. Can we ask, which was the first--the seed or the tree? The tree is in the seed, and the seed is in the tree. There is no question of which was the first, the seed or the tree? There is no room for a first cause in the cycle of Eternity. One can think of a beginning of forms, but what beginning can be ascribed to the substances themselves? Sir Oliver Lodge is right when he says : * We may all fairly agree, I think, that whatever really and fundamentally exists, so far as bare existence is concerned, be independent of time. It may go through many changes, and thus have a history; that is to say, must have definite time-relations, so far as its changes are concerned; but it can hardly be thought of as either going out of existence, or as coming into existence, at any given period, though it may completely change its form and accidents; every thing basal must have a past and a future of some kind or other, though any special concatenation or arrangement may have a date of origin and of destruction" ("Life and Matter'). i The notion that the universe was miraculously created only about 6,000 years ago, entertained by Christian theologians, has been demonstrated to be false by Scientific research. Haeckel sums up the result of scientific enquiry on this point in the following words :-- "To the brilliant progress of modern geology we owe three extremely important results of general import. In the first place, it has excluded from the story of the earth all question of miracle, all question of supernatural agencies, in the building of the mountains and the shaping of the continents. In the second place, our idea of

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CREATION. 33 the length of the vast period of time which has been absorbed in their formation has been considerably enlarged. We now know that the huge mountains of the palaeozoic, mesozoic, and cenozoic formations have taken not thousands, but millions of years in their growth. In the third place, we now know that all the countless fossils that are found in those formations are not 'sports of nature,' as was believed 150 years ago, but the petrified remains of organisms that lived in earlier periods of earth's history, and arose by gradual transformation from a long series of ancestors." Thus, whatever be the true significance of the sevendays 'creation given in the book of Genesis, it is clear that the theologian's interpretation of the account is not one which can be regarded as satisfactory, in any sense of the word. The science of geology has demonstrated, beyond the possibility of doubt, that the world we inhabit is not less than hundreds of millions years old, and we have no alternative left but to reject the idea of its coming into being, for the first time, some six thousand years ago. It is thus certain that there could be no beginning of the universe, which, consequently, must be taken to be eternal. But this is clearly fatal to the notion of creation which is entertainable only on the supposition of a commencement of the world-process in the midst of a continuous vacuum and inaction. Our conclusion will, no doubt, appear highly disagreeable to theism at first sight, but there is nevertheless no escape from it; for the world is crowded with features which forbid us lightly to admit a controlling Supreme Intelligence. According to Mr. Fiske, quoted by McCabe "The fact stands inexorably before us, that a Supreme Will, enlightened by perfect intelligence and possessed of infinite power, might differently have fashioned the universe, so that the suffering

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34 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and the waste of life which characterise nature's process of evolution might have been avoided." Mr. McCabe also quotes from Mallock's 'Religion as a Credible Doctrine' from which we take the following extract as having a special bearing on the point under consideration :-- "We must divest ourselves of all foregone conclusions, of all question-begging reverences, and look the facts of the universe steadily in the face. If theists will but do this, what they will see will astonish them. They will see that if there is anything at the back of this vast process with a consciousness and a purpose in any way resembling our own-a Being who knows what he wants and is doing his best to get it-he is, instead of a holy and all wise God, a scatter-brained, semi-powerful, semi-impotent monster. They will recognize as clearly as they ever did the old familiar facts which seemed to them evidences of God's wisdom, love and goodness; but they will find that these facts, when taken in connection with the others, only supply us with a standard in the nature of this Being himself by which most of his acts are exhibited to us as those of a cri. minal madman. If he had been blind, he had not had sin; but if we maintain that he can see, then his sin remains. Habitually a bungler as he is, and callous when not actively cruel, we are forced to regard him, when he seems to exhibit benevolence, as, not divinely benevolent, but merely weak and capricious, like a boy who fondles a kitten, and the next moment sets a dog at it. And not only does his moral character fall from him bit by bit, but his dignity disappears also, The orderly processes of the stars and the larger phenomena of nature are suggestive of nothing so much as a wearisome Court ceremonial surrounding a king who is unable to understand or to break away from it; whilst the thunder and whirlwind, which have from time immemorial been accepted as special revelations of his awfal power and majesty, suggest, if they suggest anything of a personal character at all, a blackguardly larrikin kicking up his heels in the clouds, not perhaps bent on mischief, but indifferent to the fact that he is causing it. , . . A God who could have been deliberately guilty of them (the evolutionary processes] would be a God too absurd, too monstrous, too mad to be credible." Such is the opinion of Mr. Mallock, who, we learn

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35 from Mr. McCabe, has throughout his life been one of the ablest opponents of agnosticism and nothing less than scornful of a profession of atheism. There is the force of conclusiveness in his remarks, and, although one might not agree with him in all respects concerning his notions about religion, still it is impossible to hold that the universe is the result of a direct volition on the part of a man-like, purposive creator. But the theologian might now shift his ground and ask, granting that the world was never created by a Supreme Intelligence, does the failure of theism to prove it to be the outcome of a creative design, or effort, on the part of a creator entitle any one to say, since an impartial study of the evolution of the world teaches us that there is no definite aim and no special purpose to be traced in it, there seems to be no alternative but to leave everything to blind chance? How do we know that there is no other alternative? We must take the position of the materialist in its entirety, and see if he can maintain it with his dead, unconscious matter and lifeless force. Is it compatible with the notion of dead existence or existences to postulate that the evolutionary agencies could take but the one direction which they have actually taken? Why could they not take any other? Where were the rails to guide the tram-car of matter and force? Such is the nature of the new ground taken up by theology from which it has to be dislodged before further progress can be made in scientific thought. The question is, what is the guiding principle which ensures regularity of phenomena in nature? A certain class of philosophers, no doubt, maintain that it is CREATION.

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36 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. chance pure and simple which accounts for all order and regularity in the world; but it seems impossible to hold that reason is satisfied with the explanation; for, while it is certain that the universe is not the result of a direct and purposive creation by a man-like architect, it is equally certain that chance could not be the cause of its existence by any means. An accident may be defined to be an exception to the general rule, but never as the general rule itself. The systematic and orderly working of the various laws of nature could not be termed accidental by any possibility. With chance at the helm there would be no certainty of verification, nor could we rely upon the recurrence of any phenomenon in Nature. The theory of an accidental spontaneity of the existence of all things, which might account for the forms and modifications of certain purely material things is, at best, a pure speculation of reason, and not a law of universal applicability. Chance and law are incompatible by nature. As Hudson somewhere points out, a series of accidents, however numerous or important, can neither cause nor adequately explain the orderly, progressive development of anything, much less the evolution of a universe, or a planet, or humanity; it requires a law to do that. Again, if the evolutionary progress is the effect of a mere random commingling of atoms or elements, what is the causation of the accident itself due to? Thus, if we go back, step by step, we must ultimately halt at an inherent, irresistible inclination in the very nature of things themselves. This we take to be the very function of substances, which none of them may refuse to per

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CREATION 37 form. This is the terminus of thought beyond which lies the impenetrable darkaless of nought where the imagination of man stands stunned with bewilderment. All further discussion here ends in metaphysical quibble, and the persistent recurrence of an ultimate boundary of thought warns us of the futility of continuing the process any further. This inherent inclination, the will to manifest, as it were, of things, or the Supreme will of nature," as it might be termed collectively, is behind all, and it is to this will to manifest' that we * Theology, no doubt, holds that the world-process is maintained by the word of its God, without whose command nothing whatsoever can take place in the universe; but then theology has no reply to give to the question : why should things be endowed with different attributes, if they can function only in obedience to the word of a god? If we do not deceive ourselves with false conclusions, we should observe that different substances exercise different functions, so that none of them can perform the function of another. If it were otherwise, water might be imagined to perform the function of fire, fire of air, air of intelligence, and so forth. But the supposition is so highly absurd that no sane mind has ever considered it possible. We must, then, assume that each substance has its own special function which cannot be performed by anything else. But what is function, if not the particular mode of existence of a substance? This amounts to saying that no substance can exist if its function be annihilated even for a moment, e.g., fire woald cease to be fire the moment it ceased to perform its specific function of burning and production of heat. Now, the supposition that the substances of nature stand in need of the command of a god to perform their function is possible only on the assumption that they do not function except when ordered to do so by him. But this is a clear case of impossibility, for a substance cannot both exist and not exist at the same time, its function being only the particular mode or manner of its existence. It follows, therefore, that no one can possibly interfere with the function of existing substances (The Practical Path, pp. 6-7, foot-note).

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38 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. are indebted for order and regularity in the world. With chance at the helm, we should be unable to predict anything, and life, instead of finding encouragement and joy in the pursuit of Science, would fritter itself away for pure uncertainty and worry. Just think of a state of existence wherein chance is the prime factor. Where is the assurance that our calculations about the time of the next visit of Halley's comet would be true? Where is the certainty that our earth, instead of going round the Sun, as science maintains, at an enormous speed, would not stop short the very next instant, destroying everything living and reducing the most solid parts of our mountains and rocks to dust in less than a second ? One cannot conceive a greater calamity, in short, than the change of the orderly working of laws into a state of chaotic chance. We must, therefore, reject the hypothesis of chance altogether. Our conclusion, however, is not to be taken as establishing the existence of an interfering deity ; for the very argument which excludes the hypothesis of chance also suffices to prove that the uniformity and regularity of the laws of nature are possible only on the supposition that no one interferes with their working. The laws of nature are not at all like the written or verbal injunctions of men which may be defeated by artifice or cunning; they owe their origin to the properties of substances which no one tries to or can interfere with successfully. It is also well to bear in mind the fact that the word 'chance,' in its scientific' import, does not mean anything in the nature of a 'lawless' occurrence, but only

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CREATION. a denial of all foreign interference of a teleological type. Says Haeckel : 39 "One group of philosophers affirms, in accordance with its teleological conception, that the whole cosmos is an orderly system in which every phenomenon has its aim and purpose; there is no such thing as chance. The other group, holding a mechanical theory, expresses itself thus: The development of the universe is a monistic mechanical process, in which we discover no aim or purpose whatever; what we call design in the organic world is a special result of biological agencies; neither in the evolution of heavenly bodies nor in that of the crust of our earth do we find any trace of a controlling purpose-all is the result of chance. Each party is right-according to its definition of chance. The general law of causality, taken in conjunction with the law of substance, teaches us that every phenomenon has a mechanical cause; in this sense there is no such thing as chance. Yet it is not only lawful, but necessary, to retain the term for the purpose of expressing the simultaneous occurrence of two phenomena, which are not causally related to each other, but of which each has its own mechanical cause, independent of that of the other." In defending the position taken up by Haeckel in the "Riddle" from the attacks of theistic philosophers, Mr. Joseph McCabe describes the only sense in which science admits "chance" events, and clearly frames the issue between it and theism. According to him "Haeckel and his colleagues hold that the direction which the evolutionary agencies take is not 'fortuitous'; that they never could take but the one direction which they have actually taken. A stone has not a dozen possible paths to travel by when you drop it from your hand. You do not seek any reason why it follows direction A instead of direction B or C. So it is, says the monist, with all the forces in the universe. The theist says the ultimate object must have been foreseen and the forces must have been guided, or they would never have worked steadily in this definite direction. The monist says that these forces no more needed guiding than a tramcar does; there was only one direction possible for them. Here is a clear issue, and in the present state of apologetics, an important one."

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40 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. There is no doubt but that this is the correct explanation, for chance is not a synonymn for 'lawlessness' in the literature of science. The materialist, however, comes to grief when he maintains that his 'tram-car of matter and force could not only guide itself so precisely as to steer clear of all turns and bends and other obstacles in its path, but could evolve out its passengers as well. For intelligence is not a product of matter, and no amount of weight of authority and glib talking would ever succeed in proving that the conscious could come out of that which is unconscious by nature. The argument put in the mouth of Bishop Butler, in the famous Belfast Address, which the late Prof. Tyndall declared to be unanswerable, has in no way been refuted since : "Take your dead hydrogen atoms, your dead oxygen atoms, your dead carbon atoms, your dead nitrogen atoms, your dead phosphorus atoms, and all the other atoms, dead as grains of shot, of which the brain is formed. Imagine them separate and sensationless; observe them running together and forming all imaginable combinations. This, as a purely mechanical process, is seeable by the mind. But can you see or dream, or in any way imagine, how out of that mechanical act and from these individually dead atoms, sensation thought, and emotion are to rise? Are you likely to extract Home, out of the rattling of dice, or Differential Calculus out of the clash of billiard-balls? You cannot satisfy the human understanding in its demand for logical continuity between molecular processes and the phenomena of consciousness." " Tyndall tried to evade the difficulty by enlarging the definition of matter to include life. He said : "If we look at matter as pictured by Democritus, and as defined for generations in our scientific text-books, the notion of conscious life coming out of it cannot be formed by the mind. The argument placed in the mouth of Bishop Butler suffices, in my opinion, to crush

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CREATION +1 all such materialism as this. Those, however, who framed these definitions of matter were but partial students. They were not biologists, but mathematicians, whose labour referred only to such accidents and properties of matter as could be expressed in their formulae. Their science was mechanical science, not the science of life. With matter in its wholeness they never dealt; and, denuded by their imperfect definition, the gentle mother of all' became the object of her children's dread. Let us reverently, but honestly, look the question in the face. Divorced from matter, where is life? Whatever our faith may say, our knowledge shows them to be indissolubly joined. Every meal we eat and every cup we drink, illustrates the mysterious control of the mind by Matter."* . . The fact, however, is that life and matter are two entirely different substances, each possessing separate and specific attributes of its own and performing functions which the other is incapable of discharging by nature. We may look into the process of the formation of the organic eye to judge the merit of the scientist's notion of evolution. Haeckel sums up the scientific conclusions on this point, in his usually terse style, as follows: " (1) At the lowest stage of organization the whole psychoplasm, as such, is sensitive, and reacts on the stimuli from without, that is the case with the lowest protists, with many plants, and with some of the most rudimentary animals, "(2) At the second stage, very simple and undiscriminating sense organs begin to appear on the surface of the organism, in the form of the protoplasmic filaments and pigment spots, the forerunners of the nerves of touch and the eyes; these are found in some of the higher protists and in many of the lower animals and plants. " (3) At the third stage specific organs of sense, each with a peculiar adaptation, have arisen by differentiation out of these rudimentary processes : these are the chemical instruments of smell and taste and the physical organs of touch, temperature, hearing and sight. The specific energy of these sense organs is not an original inherent property, but has been gained by functional adaptation and progressive heredity. * Fragments of Science,' Vol. II.

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42 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "(4) The fourth stage is characterised by the centralisation or integration of the nervous system, and, consequently, of sensation; by the association of the previously isolated or localised sensations, presentations arise, though they still remain unconscious. That is the condition of many, both of the lower and the higher animals. "(5) Finally, at the fifth stage, the highest psychic function, conscious perception, is developed by the mirroring of the sensations. in a central part of the nervous system, as we find in man and the higher vertebrates and probably in some of the higher invertebrates, notably in the articulata," This, no doubt, seems very learned, but if one reflects on the theory its defects become clear. It does not, for one thing, explain the faculty of perception itself. The eye is not the same thing as vision, nor is the organ the same as function. Besides, vision is a simple act, but none the less it involves several centres behind the eye in its performance. Unless all these centres develop internally and externally at the same time, vision would be impossible. Morever, if the organ be the cause of the function, we ought to be aware of its exercise at all times. Constantly ought the ear to hear, the nose to smell, the eye to see, and so forth. But that this does not happen always, even in waking moments, is only too well-known. In sleep the functions of sense organs are suspended even more completely. The mechanical explanation, therefore, falls short of explaining the psychic faculties. The development of identical complex organs, such as the eye, on different and divergent 'lines of evolution,' points to an internal impetus being the real cause of variation. This impetus resides in the soul, as will be proved fully a little later. According to Bergson, Life is a flux which, at a certain point of its progress into

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CREATION, 43 matter, divides itself into different branches, each of which develops into a new species, and evolves out certain characteristic features of the original impetusthe fundamental cause of variation. While not agreeing with him on every essential feature of his theory of flux and its branching off at a certain point in time. we think he is right when he says* :-- "Two points are equally striking in an organ like the eye : the complexity of its structure and the simplicity of its function. The eye is composed of distinct parts, such as the sclerotic, the cornea, the retina, the crystalline lens, etc. In each of these parts the detail is infinite. The retina alone comprises three layers of nervous elements-multipolar cells, bipolar cells, visual cells--each of which has its individuality and undoubtedly a very complicated organism : so complicated, indeed, is the retinal membrane in its intimate structure, that no simple description can give an adequate idea of it. The mechanism of the eye is, in short, composed of an infinity of mechanisms, all of extreme complexity. Yet vision is one simple fact. As soon as the eye opens, the visual act is effected. Thus, because the act is simple, the slightest negligence on the part of nature in the building of the infinitely complex machine would have made vision impossible. This contrast between the complexity of the organ and the unity of the function is what gives us pause. A mechanistic theory is one which means to show us the gradual building up of the machine under the influence of external circumstances intervening either directly by action on the tissues, or indirectly by the selection of better-adapted ones. But, whatever form this theory may take, supposing it avails at all to explain the detail of the parts, it throws no light on their correlations. "Then comes the doctrine of finality, which says that the parts have been brought together on a preconceived plan with a view to a certain end. In this it likens the labour of nature to that of the workman, who also proceeds by the assemblage of parts with a view to the realisation of an idea or the imitation of a model. Mechanism, here, reproaches finalism with its anthropomorphic character, and rightly. But it fails to see that it itself proceeds according to this * Creative Evolution, pp. 93 to 101.

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44 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. method-somewhat mutilated ? True, it has got rid of the end pursued or the ideal model. But it also holds that nature has worked like a human being by bringing parts together, while a mere glance at the development of an embryo shows that life goes to work in a different way. Life does not proceed by the association and addition of elements, but by dissociation and division. We must get beyond both points of view, both mechanism and finalism being, at bottom, only standpoints to which the human mind has been led by considering the work of man. But in what direction can we go beyond them? We have said that in analyzing the structure of an organ, we can go on decomposing for ever, although the function of the whole is a simple thing. This contrast between the infinite complexity of the organ and the extreme simplicity of the function is what should open our eyes. "If I raise my hand from A to B, this movement appears to me under two aspects at once. Felt from within, it is a simple, indivisible act. Perceived from without, it is the course of a certain curve, A. B. In this curve I can distinguish as many positions as I please, and the line itself might be defined as a certain mutual co-ordination of these positions. But the positions, infinite in number, and the order in which they are connected, have sprung automatically from the indivisible act by which my hand has gone from A to B. Mechanism, here, would consist in seeing only to the positions. Finalism would take their order into account. But both mechanism and finalism would leave on one side the movement, which is reality itself. In one sense the movement is more than the position and than their order; for it is sufficient to make it in its indivisible simplicity to secure that the infinity of the successive positions as also their order be given at once-with something else which is neither order nor positions, but which is essential, the mobility. But, in another sense, the movement is less than the series of positions and their connecting order; for, to arrange points in a certain order, it is necessary first to conceive the order and then to realise it with points, there must be the work of assemblage and there must be intelligence, whereas the simple movement of the hand contains nothing of either. It is not intelligent, in the human sense of the word, and it is not an assemblage, for it is not made up of elements. Just so with the relation of the eye to vision. Nature has had no more trouble in making an eye than I have in lifting my hand.

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CREATION. 45 "It is one thing to manufacture, and quite another to organize. Manufacturing is peculiar to man. It consists in assembling parts of matter which we have cut out in such manner that we can fit them together and obtain from them a common action. The parts are arranged, so to speak, around the action as an ideal centre. To manufacture, therefore, is to work from the periphery to the centre, or, as the philosophers say, from the many to the one. Organization, on the contrary, works from the centre to the periphery. It begins in a point that is almost a mathematical point, and spreads around this point by concentric waves which go on enlarging. The work of manufacturing is the more effective, the greater the quantity of matter dealt with. It proceeds by concentration and compression. The organizing act, on the contrary, has something explosive about it: it needs at the beginning the smallest possible place, a minimum of matter, as if the organizing forces only entered space reluctantly. "With greater precision, we may compare the process by which nature constructs an eye to the simple act by which we raise the hand. But we supposed at first that the hand met with no resistance. Let us now imagine that, instead of moving in air, the hand has to pass through iron filings which are compressed and offer resistance to it, in proportion as it goes forward. At a certain moment the hand will have exhausted its effort, and, at this very moment, the filings will be massed and co-ordinated in a certain definite form, to wit, that of the hand that is stopped and of a part of the arm. Now, suppose that the hand and arm are invisible. Lookers-on will seek the reason of the arrangement in the filings themselves and the forces within the mass. Some will account for the position of each filing by the action exerted upon it by the neighbouring filings : these are the mechanists. Others will prefer to think that a plan of the whole has presided over the detail of these elementary actions : they are the finalists. But the truth is that there has been merely one indivisible act, that of the hand passing through the filings : the inexhaustible detail of the movement of the grains, as well as the order of their final arrangement, expresses negatively, in a way, this undivided movement, being the unitary form of a resistance, and not a synthesis of positive elementary actions. For this reason, if the arrangement of the grains is termed an effect' and the movement of the hand a cause,' it may indeed be said that the whole of the effect is explained

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46 by the whole of the cause, but to parts of the cause parts of the effect will in no wise correspond. In other words, neither mechanism nor finalism will here be in place, and we must resort to an explanation of a different kind. Now, in the hypothesis we propose, the relation of vision to the visual apparatus would be very nearly that of the band to the iron filings that follow, canalize and limit its motion. According as the undivided act constituting vision advances more or less, the materiality of the organ is made of a more or less considerable number of mutually co-ordinated elements, but the order is necessarily complete and perfect. It could not be partial, because, once again, the real process which gives rise to it has no parts. That is what neither mechanism nor finalism takes into account, and it is what we also fail to consider when we wonder at the marvellous structure of an instrument, such as the eye. In reality, the cause, though more or less intense, cannot produce its effect except in one piece, and completely finished. According as it goes further and further in the direction of vision, it gives the simple pigmentary masses of a lower organism, or the rudimentary eye of a Serpula, or the slightly differentiated eye of the Alciope, or the marvellously perfected eye of the bird; but all these organs, unequal as is their complexity, necessarily present an equal co-ordination. For this reason, no matter how distant two animal species may be from each other, if the progress toward vision has gone equally far in both, there is the same visual organ in each case, for the form of the organ only expresses the degree in which the exercise of the function has been obtained." THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. " "If Vision," objects Mr. Elliot, the author of 'Modern Science and The Illusions of Prof. Bergson,'" is a a single elementary 'life tendency' which makes a certain kind of eye wherever it goes, there must either be two kinds of Visions and two separate 'life-tendencies': or else the Pearly Nautilus will have to fall back on Darwinian principles for the evolution of his eye, and if Pearly Nautilus can grow an eye on materialist lines, why not Pecten ?" But if Mr. Elliot had taken the trouble to find out the secret of vision in dreaming, when the

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CREATION. 47 natural organs of sight are closed, it is more than probable that he would not have picked up his pen in a hurry to champion the cause of materialism, or to defend Darwin from the attacks of M. Bergson. Unfortunately, Mr. Elliot does not explain how the pin-bole, camera eye of the Pearly Nautilus interferes with vision being a function of Life or Spirit. That which sees through the eye is Life, the different types of eyes merely indicating the different kinds of its movement in the direction of vision. It is thus clear that no hypothesis which ignores the element of life can ever hope to succeed in solving the world-problem. Matter is only capable of making material bodies or tenements; it will never succeed in creating * tenants' to occupy and enjoy the product of its labour. The fact is that spirit is a substance* in itself, and is * The word substance, when used in connection with spirit, is not to be confounded with matter. In philosophy, substance is that which underlies or is the permanent subject or cause of all phenomena, whether material or spiritual; the subject which we imagine to underlie the attributes or qualities by which alone we are conscious of existence (The Imperial Dictionary). Thus every thing that exists must be a substance, Hence, souls, or spirit, and matter are both substances, though of different natures, as is evident from their attributes. The Arabic se, (wajud=is-ness, or be-ing,) is eminently suited to express the sense of existence or subsistence, though it does not quite convey the same idea as the word substance, an almost exact equivalent of the Sanskrita dravya, signifying the substrate of changes, or accidents, as they are technically called. It is this is-ness, or say, which, constituting, as it does, the basis of be-ing, furnishes the only test of reality, so that whatever is found to be ,present) mwjwd with aajatd) must be really and truly) m` wjwd * hence, existing).

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48 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. synonymous with consciousness. If we remove it from the field, there is nothing left to take its place, or to account for the phenomena of perception, memory and the like which a rigid materialism endeavours in vain to explain on lines of Haeckelian thought. It is interesting to note that the materialist does not deny* the existence of consciousness altogether, but only its permanence as a separate entity or soul. Taking the ego to be the consciousness of 'I,' he proceeds to show how it cannot be eternal, and declares that it is no longer the object of the inexplicable mystery it used to be in the dark and superstitious ages of medieval civilization; for one now finds it to be the consciousness of an idea * Should any one be found bold enough to deny the existence of consciousness altogether, he can only be told that in all philosophical search after truth, we have to take the existence of the 'knower' or thinker' for granted; for it is impossible to take even a single step forward without assuming this self-evident truth. If there be no Thinker or Knower, who could think or know? As Shankara says: "The self is not contingent in the case of any person; for it is self-evident. The self is not established by the proofs of the existence of self. Nor is it possible to deny such a reality, for it is the very essence of him who would deny it." In knowing anything one knows oneself first. As a well-known. philospher maintains: "" "I think, therefore, I am,' Or, as Max Muller puts it, "I am, therefore, I think." One cannot think unless one have some kind of being. The question, do I exist?' does not arise; for it is illogical to require proof of that which has been taken for granted as a postulate, and is a selfevident truth. No one has a right to open his lips to utter this question unless he admit, at the very commencement, that he who puts it is some one that exists.

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- CREATION. gradually evolved out and developed in the individual. Certainly, if we watch the development of the sense of "I" in the child, we learn that for quite a considerable portion of its infantine existence it talks of itself in the third person and has no clear conception of his personality. Besides, personality is naturally variable. Our ideas are constantly being remodelled and changed. A grown-up man has very little of the personality of the school-boy in him; and even the latter retains but little from that of a still earlier period. When we grow old a still more radical change takes place in us; neither the tastes, nor the pursuits, nor the surroundings of the earlier phases of life have any hold on, or attraction for, us in old age. Our ideas of the self change also with the changes in our circumstances. Personality is the outcome of thought, that is, of discrimination between the self and the not-self. Hence, so long as the child's power of discrimination is not sufficiently developed, it knows no difference between the self and the rest, which constitute the not-self; but with the development of the power of discrimination comes the idea of the appropriating, bodily self, at first dimly, but later with the full consciousness of self, to the exclusion of all the rest that constitute the not-self. So far as the evolution of the idea of self is concerned, Haeckel is quite right in saying: 49 "In the important moment when it (the child) first pronounces the word I,' when the feeling of self becomes clear, we have the beginning of self-consciousness, and of the antithesis of non-ego." The phenomenon of personality appears perplexing only so long as we do not study it in all its stages of 4

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50 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. development. By looking at a fully developed being, we are led to imagine his personality to be a sort of separate entity, and begin to think of it in the abstract. This erroneous impression can be removed at once, if we look back into the history of the development of the child from the moment of its birth, and follow its growth through the early stages of its life. Professor Haeckel has very ably discussed this point in his "Riddle of the Universe" as well as in "The Wonders of Life." But he does not confine himself to the legitimate sphere of modern science, and allows his ambition to soar in an atmosphere too rarified for him to breathe. He, thus, loses his footing, and begins to flounder in the quagmires which abound so plentifully in the region of metaphysics to entangle the unwary. Concerning the Kantian dogmas, which included the immortality of the soul, it is said in "The Wonders of Life": " If Kant had had children, and followed patiently the development of the child's soul (as Preyer did a century later), he would hardly have persisted in his erroneous idea that reason, with its power of attaining a priori knowledge, is a transcendental and supernatural wonder of life, or a unique gift to man from heaven. The root of the error is that Kant had no idea of the natural evolution of mind. He did not employ the comparative and genetic methods to which we owe the chief scientific achievements of the last century. Kant and his followers who confined themselves, almost exclusively, to the introspective methods or the self-observation of their own mind, regarded as the model of the human soul the highly developed and versatile mind of the philosopher, and disregarded altogether the lower states of mental life which we find in the child and the savage." As already observed, the learned professor is undoubtedly right as regards the evolution of personality, but we must not allow ourselves to be carried away by his

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CREATION. 51 eloquence beyond that point. This great man has fallen into the error of confounding reason with consciousness itself, whereas, in very truth, reason is but a manifestation of consciousness when working through a finite body of a particular type. The true self is pure consciousness though ensouled in a 'body of matter; and just as electricity, as a power, is manifested in various forms, now appearing as light, again as heat, and yet again as power moving heavy bodies, and so forth, though it is only its manifold manifestations which are visible but never the power, i.e., electricity itself, so is the soul observable by us only in its manifestations. What is electricity in itself we do not know, though we do know that it is capable of being transformed into light by the employment of suitable means. Similarly, consciousness, when it works through the human brain, appears in the form of reason, though, obviously, it must transcend reason itself. Now, since the nature of the apparatus, or vehicle, determines the form of manifestation, the faculty of reason, which depends for its unfoldment on the development of the brain, must necessarily pass through a process of evolution such as that observed by Preyer. But just as electric light cannot be said to be a secretion of the lamp, the globe or its fittings, so cannot reason be described as a secretion of the physical brain. Hence, the soul, if it be taken to mean consciousness, cannot possibly be said to be the outcome of the human brain, but if supposed to be merely a bundle of ideas, extracted from the physical surroundings and labelled 'personality,' in any particular incarnation, must depend on reason, and, therefore, on

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52 TIC KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. its vehicle, the brain. To this limited extent Haeckel is undoubtedly rigit. But does the absence of the thought or idea of 'I' in the early stages of life prove the absence of the ego itself ? We think, not. There is no thought of 'I' also in sleep, or in a fainting fit, but does its absence then entitle anyone to say that the ego itself is non-existent under those conditions ? The animals also do not refer to or speak of themselves in the first or the third person, yet are they 'a people like unto us, as the Qur'an correctly points out. It is true that an infant just beginning to lisp refers to itself in the third person, but it is no less true that no infant ever feels pleasure or pain in the third person,' or appropriates to itself the experiences of others, or transfers to them its own. When a little one lisps 'give the baby a biscuit,' it surely does not mean that the biscuit is to be given to some one other than itself. The reference to the baby,' under the circumstances, is only a delightful instance of the infantine disregard of the rules of grammar, so pleasing to the heart of every mother. Many grown-up persons, particularly those from the lower strata of society, also refer to themselves by name, but no one ever maintains that they do not feel their own existence ' in the first person.' Those who are beginning to learn a foreign tongue, likewise, make ridiculous blunders in the use of words intended to express conventional or convenient abstractions of which the pronouns form a class by themselves. The infant hears itself spoken of as 'the baby,' and, not being particularly familiar with or skilled in the use of pronouns, fails to observe the

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CREATION 53 rules of grammar in its speech. The fact is that consciousness manifests itself in two different ways; firstly, in the form of feeling, and, secondly, as thought. Of these, the first form is uncreate and independent of evolution, in the sense in which science uses that word, but the second depends on environment and unfoldment. The same argument which leads us to the conclusion that the idea of personality is the creature of evolution, also leads us to the conclusion that the primary form is eternal, though particular types of its manifestation may differ from time to time. The study of the development and growth of the child also reveals the presence of the feeling of pain which finds expression in the first cry the little one utters, on entering the world. Is this feeling of pain, together with the sense of hunger, and all those indications of likes and dislikes which the child displays from the earliest moment after birth, also the outcome of evolution ? We shall be prepared to regard consciousness as a product of evolution only when science succeeds in demonstrating that lifeless things can be made to feel pain and cry in its laboratories. A substratum of consciousness must be allowed in the first instance before we can bring in its modifications in the course of evolution." We must endeavour to keep our minds quite clear on the distinction between 'personality and its substratum. The former is the bundle of ideas-social, proprietary, and the like, which one appropriates to one's bodily self-- hence, the sum-total of relations in which a particular body stands to other bodies in the world. But the latter, i.e., the substratum of personality, is the very power itself

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54 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. which enables these relations to be understood and determined. This power is inherent in 'life,' though not easily observable in every one of its manifestations or forms; for there must be an original nucleus before its modifications can be admitted. Hence, the substratum of consciousness can never be said to be the outcome of evolution or of the matter of the physical brain. C The investigations made by the Psychical Research Society have conclusively established the existence of the soul and the continuity of life. A mass of information has been obtained about the organization' of the soul and its two minds, the subjective and the objective. The phenomena observed have been subjected to the most rigid tests and searching enquiry, and classified and arranged on lines of scientific thought. The investigation has brought to light some of the most astounding secrets of nature, and has resulted in the confirmation of the ancient belief in the existence of souls. Things which were regarded as quite outside the range of possibility have been proved to be facts of observation, and telepathy, telekinesis, clairvoyance, and a host of other phenomena have been made subjects of experimental research. From the facts thus ascertained, it has been inferred,and rightly inferred-that the soul is quite independent of the body, and is made of a substance which completely differs from the matter of the physical organism which it inhabits. Many cases are known in which even the memory of the past lives' is claimed to have been recovered more or less fully. This overwhelming mass of evidence fully justifies the belief that the soul cannot be a product of matter,

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CREATION or a secretion of the molecules of the brain. In the main, two theories have been advanced to account for the phenomena of the psychic type. One of these is based on the fact that the law of suggestion plays the most important part in the domain of psychic phenomena, and is capable of explaining all the facts of observation, with reference to the natural powers of the soul; and the other, which in no way minimises the power of suggestion, rests on the belief that some of the observed facts cannot be explained on any other hypothesis than that of the agency of spirits. So far as recovery of the memory of past incarnations is concerned, it is conceivable that in some cases the claim might be due to suggestion, consciously or unconsciously adopted, but it is impossible to maintain that every genuine case is always the outcome of suggestion or hallucination. Amongst the instances in which the memory of past incarnations has been claimed is that of Mlle. Helene Smith, who had to her credit, in addition to a control from the planet Mars, a pre-incarnation as an Indian princess, and a second as Marie Antoinette. In dealing with her case, F. W. H. Myers observes (* The Human Personality and Its Survival of Bodily Death') : "Pythagoras, indeed, was content with the secondary hero Euphorbus as his bygone self. But in our days Dr. Anna Kingsford and Mr. Edward Maitland must needs have been the Virgin Mary and St. John, the Divine. And Victor Hugo, who was naturally well to the front in these self-multiplications, took possession of most of the leading personages of antiquity whom he could manage to string together in chronological sequence. It is obvious that any number of reborn souls can play at this game, but where no one adduces any evidence, it seems hardly worth while to go on. Even Pythagoras

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56 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. does not appear to have adduced any evidence beyond his ipse dixit for his assertion that the alleged shield of Euphorbus had in reality been borne by that mythical hero, Meantime the question as to re-incarnation has actually been put to a very few spirits who have given some real evidence of their identity. So far as I know, no one of these has claimed to know anything personally of such an incident, although all have united in saying that their knowledge was too limited to allow them to generalise on the matter. "Helene's controls and previous incarnations--to return to our subject--do perhaps suffer from the general fault of aiming too high, She has to her credit a control from the planet Mars; one pre-incarnation as an Indian princess; and a second (as I have said) as Marie Antoinette. "In each case there are certain impressive features in the impersonation; but in each case also careful analysis negatives the idea that we can be dealing with a personality really revived from a former epoch, or from a distant planet;-and leaves us inclined to explain everything by cryptomnesia' (as Professor Flournoy calls submerged memory), and that subliminal inventiveness of which we already know so much." To the student of experimental psychology the case of Mlle.!Smith irresistibly suggests the handiwork of the medium's own subjective self. It has been demonstrated that experimental hypnotism produces the same phenomena. Under the influence of hypnosis the subject is constantly amenable to suggestion ; thus, if he is told that he is the President of the United States, he will immediately accept the statement as true, and assume all the airs of importance and dignity that he may conceive to appertain to that exalted position. Similarly, if it is suggested to him that he is the spirit of some dead friend, or acquaintance, or other person, he will confidently believe the suggestion to be true, and will assume the characteristics of the deceased, and, if interrogated, give a full account of his surroundings

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CREATION. in a spirit world, albeit his account of his spirit abode will be in exact agreement with his preconceived notions on the subject. In "The Psychic Phenomena "* Mr. Hudson gives a very graphic and interesting account of an interview between a slate-writing medium and a celebrated Union general at which he himself was present. The result of that interview was that in two instances the replies came from the spirits of persons whom the medium thought to be dead, but who were actually alive, and, in one instance, in which a letter had been written to a deceased person, asking a specific question, the correct answer to which neither the sitter nor the medium could possibly know, the reply received was, "A. B. is here, but cannot communicate to-day." A. B. was the person addressed. The most obvious conclusion to be drawn from the experiment is that there was no such thing as the agency of disembodied spirits at the back of the psychic phenomena which undoubtedly occurred during the interview. In the East, and particularly in India, where spirits and ghosts are popularly believed to haunt the scenes of their former worldly activities, and where sianas, + magicians, and charmers abound and carry on a lucrative profession, the most superficial observer cannot fail to notice the fact that the so-called disembodied spirits have their origin in the hysterical hallucinations of a disorganized will. In most cases the patients are women and little children whose nervous systems are most highly strunga fact which renders them highly sensitive to all sorts * Pages 275-283. + Mediums.

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of suggestions, in particular to those about ghosts, goblins, and the like. But the most remarkable feature of the spirit, or control,' is its terror at the 'sight' of the amulet provided for the patient, consisting generally of a piece of paper with some undecipherable heiroglyphics, or a religious text, or formula, in some obsolete language which the patient does not generally understand. As a matter of fact, he is not allowed to see the writing on the paper, owing to the belief that the charm would suffer in efficacy from such an act. The question is, what is the principle of treatment in such cases ? To say that the spirit or demon is frightened by the piece of paper or the writing upon it would be childish, inasmuch as no embodied spirit is susceptible to that sort of fear in life. Nor is it possible to accept the theologian's explanation that the curative power lies in the word of God, for the word of power 'is known to fail oftener than otherwise. The true explanation is to be found in the law of suggestion. The patient is led to believe that the charin is possessed of a potency which no spirit can defy, and the subjective mind within him does the rest. It sets up strong, healthy vibrations in the body, remedying the broken-down condition of the system, with the result that the evil spirits which had come into being in consequence of the derangement of will and nerves, disappear with the disappearance of their cause. The fact that'spirits,' which, by the way, seldom fail to put in an appearance at a seance, are invariably seen clad in the clothes they used to wear on earth is

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CREATION 59 suggestive enough in itself, and gives rise to the inference that they owe their existence to the ideas of the 'living' who may be present at a sitting. The medium's soul unconsciously appropriates and assimilates these ideas by the power of telepathy, and perceives them in a materialized form. In other cases, the perception of souls in a waking state is an illustration of the work of the creative faculty of imagination with the aid of memory. Memory furnishes the impression, and imagination intensifies and projects it in visible form, as happens in dreams. Thus, a critical analysis will show the so-called spirits to be made of the same stuff as dreams are made of. This conclusion, however, does not affect the point in issue in so far as the question of the survival of the soul is concerned, since that depends on the nature of the soul, rather than on its perception by men. If the opinion of men who have devoted their lives to the study of the psychic phenomena is admissible, and the reasoned opinion of specialists and experts is always entitled to respect,---it is available in abundance to show that the soul is an undying reality, capable of maintaining a conscious existence independently of the body of matter. T. J. Hudson whose views as to the nature of the spiritistic phenomena agree with those stated above, writes in the preface to "A Scientific Demonstration of Future Life :" " In demonstrating the fact of a future life, I have simply analyzed the mental organization of man, and shown that, from the very nature of his physical, intellectual, and psychical organism, any other conclusion than that he is destined to a future life is logically and scientifically untenable."

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60 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Again, in summing up the case for the future life of the soul, in the concluding chapter of the book lastnamed, he maintains : "The fundamental axiom upon which our argument is based... is this: There is no faculty, emotion, or organism of the human mind that has not its own use, function or object. The first fundamental fact presented to view is that man is endowed with a dual mind. This has been abundantly demonstrated by the facts of experimental hypnotism, cerebral anatomy, and experimental surgery. ... The fact of duality alone, considered in connection with our fundamental axiom is sufficient to put the intelligent observer upon an earnest inquiry into the possible use, function, and object of a dual mental organism; and his first inquiry is, what possible use is there for two minds, if both are to perish with the body?' A future life, therefore, is at once suggested by this one isolated fact; and the suggestion is further strengthened by the fact that, whilst one of the two minds grows feeble as the body loses its vitality and is extinguished when the brain ceases to perform its functions, the other mind grows strong as the body grows weak, stronger still when the brain ceases to act, and reaches its maximum of power to produce observable phenomena at the very hour of physical dissolution. It is simply impossible, from these two facts alone, to resist the conclusion that the mind which reaches its maximum of observable power at the moment of dissolution is not extinguished by the act of dissolution. *** Thus we find man, as he is presented to us in the light of demonstrable facts, possessed of a dual mental organism, comprising two classes of faculties, each complete in itself. We find one class of faculties to be finite, perishable, imperfect, and yet well-adapted to a physical environment, and capable of development, by the process of evolution, to a high degree of excellence, morally, physically, and mentally, within the limits of its finite nature. We also find that the noblest faculties belonging to physical man-those faculties which alone render his existence in this life tolerable or even possible, those faculties which give him dominion over the forces of physical nature-are faculties which pertain exclusively to this life. On the other hand, we find another set of faculties, each perfect in itself, and complete in the aggregate, that is to say, every faculty, attribute, and power necessary to constitute a complete personality being present in perfection: and we

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CREATION 01. find that most important of those faculties perform no normal function in physical life. Here, then, we have a personality, connascent with the physical organism, but possessing independent powers : a distinct entity, with the intellect of a god; a human soul, filled with human emotions, affection, hopes, aspirations, and desires : longing for immortal life with a passionate yearning that passeth understanding; possessing, in a word, all the intellectual and moral attributes of a perfect manhood, together with a kinetic force often transcending, in its visible manifestations, the powers of the physical frame; in a word, a perfect being, nobly planned,'-a being of godlike powers and infinite possibilities. Is it cenceivable that there has been created such a manhood without a mission, such faculties without a function, such powers without a purpose ? Impossible! If nature is constant, no faculty of the human mind exists without a normal function to perform. If no faculty exists without a normal function to perform, those faculties which do exist must perform their functions, either in this life or a future life. If man possesses faculties which perform no normal function in this life, it follows that the functions of such faculties must be performed in a future life." Myers is even more emphatic when he writes* : "I regard each man as at once profoundly unitary and almost infinitely composite, as inheriting from earthly ancestors a multiplex and colonial'organism-polyzoje and perhaps polypsychic in an extreme degree ; but also as ruling and unifying that organism by a soul or spirit absolutely beyond our present analysis--a soul which has originated in a spiritual or metetherial environment; which even while embodied subsists in that environment; and which will still subsist therein after the body's decay......I claim, in fact, that the ancient hypothesis of an indwelling soul, possessing and using the body as a whole, yet bearing a real, though obscure, relation to the various more or less apparently disparate conscious groupings manifested in connection with the organism and in connection with more or less localised groups of nerve-matter, is a hypothesis not more perplexing, not more cumbrous, than any other hypothesis yet suggested. I claim also that it is conceivably provable,- I myself hold it as actually proved,--hy direct observation. I hold that certain manifestations of central individualities, associated now or *"The Human Personality and Its Survival of Bodily Death,' Chap. II.

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62 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. formerly with certain definite organisms, have been observed in operation apart from those organisms, both while the organisms were still living, and after they had decayed." Concerning the souls of the departed, Mr. Myers is of opinion that there is ground to believe that their state is one of endless evolution in wisdom and in love. "Spiritual evolution :-that, then, is our destiny, in this and other worlds;-an evolution gradual with many gradations, and rising to no assignable close. And the passion for Life is no selfish weakness; it is a factor in the universal energy. It should keep its strength unbroken even when our weariness longs to fold the hands in endless slumber it should outlast and annihilate the 'pangs that conquer trust...... Nay, in the infinite Universe man may now feel, for the first time, at home. The worst fear is over; the true security is won. The worst fear was the fear of spiritual extinction or spiritual solitude; the true security is in the telepathic law......As to our own soul's future, when that first shock of death is passed, it is in Buddhism that we find the more inspiring, the truer view. That western conception of an instant and unchangeable bliss, or woea bliss or woe determined largely by a man's beliefs, in this earthly ignorance, on matters which the angels desire to look into'-is the bequest of a pre-Copernican era of speculative thought. In its Mahomedan travesty, we see the same scheme with outlines coarsened into grotesqueness:- we see it degrade the cosmic march and profluence into a manner of children's play." The fact is that the moment we get rid of the erroneous notion that consciousness can be the product of the physical matter of the brain, and assign to it its proper place as a reality, coeval with matter, and endowed with functions which matter can never perform, we are left with no other alternative than that of continuity of life in both the past and the future. A necessary corollary from the established facts of continuity of life and evolution is the possibility of a consciousness of pre-incarnations in some rare and more

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CREATION. 63 advanced souls than the ordinary type of mediums. The sum-total of past experiences is preserved in the mind in the shape of tendencies, emotions, passions, and the like, but not as isolated fragments or bits of knowledge, floating on the surface of consciousness. Hence, the memory of past incarnations depends on the capacity of the soul to re-transform its mental inclinations and tendencies into the original experiences which had given them birth. That mind is possessed of the power to revivify evaporated impressions of past thoughts and deeds, is evident from the faculty of recollection. Hence, any one who can perform the task of self-introspection in an advanced degree can recover the memory of his past lives, though, in the case of ordinary mediums, who are generally passive,' this power cannot be conceded, except where the abnormality of mind unconsciously leads to the training of the will. But even in such a case the errors of belief and impurities of mind and body are sure to impart their tinge to the phenomena perceived and to make things appear topsy-turvy. One has only to read the biographies of the Holy Tirthamkaras in some of the Jaina Puranas to be convinced of the fact that a consciousness of pre-incarnations is not only not the outcome of suggestion in each and every case, but also possible of attainment for mankind at large. The present generation would not have found it difficult to believe in the anthenticity of the spiritistic phenomena, had it not been for the innumerable frauds * See Chapter IX.

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64 TIJE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. practised upon men by adventurers posing as mediums. Their success depends on fraud, which, the moment it is discovered, makes men suspicious all round. Psychical investigation, conducted with scientific skill and under test conditions, has, however, put it beyond dispute that the genuine phenomena are as different from the bogus effects of swindlers and cheats as is the king's coin froin the juggler's rupee. Thus, although there is much chicane and trickery prevailing in the world, in connection with the psychic phenomena, still, after the elimination of all suspicious elements, there is left a fairly large residue of unimpeachable testimony of eminent and honest men, like Sir Oliver Lodge, whom one cannot afford to disbelieve. It is also important to note that some of the phenomena at least can be easily verified by any unprejudiced observer. Add to these considerations the fact that the conclusions arrived at by the Psychical Research Society are generally in agreement with sound logic,--this will be domonstrated presently,and the views of the ancients, and the evidence in support of the existence of souls becomes conclusive. The fact that the soul is capable of maintaining an existence independently of the physical body is not difficult to prove, since it is a simple and incorruptible substance. That the soul is a substance, i.e., that which exists per se, is clear from the fact that it is the subject of knowledge and a condition precedent to the awareness of all things, relations, and states of feelings. All mental modifications and states of consciousness, such as sensations of pleasure and pain, and the like, pre-suppose a subject to which they belong. As a

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CREATION. 65 psychologist of note says, a feeling necessarily implies a being who feels. Cognitions and emotions cannot inhere in nothing, nor can volition be the function of a pure non-entity. Hence, they must be the states of a something which exists, consequently, of a substance. As regards the simplicity of the soul, it is sufficient to point out that it cannot be a compound, since otherwise it would be incapable of discharging the functions which it does. "Every one's experience," says Maher, "teaches him that he is capable of forming various abstract ideas, such as those of Being, Unity, Truth, Virtue and the like, which are of their nature simple, indivisible acts. Now, acts of this sort cannot flow from an extended * or composite substance, such as, for instance, the brain. This will be seen by a little reflexion. In order that the indivisible idea of, say, truth, be the result of the activity of this extended substance, either different parts of the idea must belong to different parts of the brain, or each part of the brain must be subject of an entire idea, or the whole idea must pertain to a single part of the brain. Now, the first alternative is absurd. The act by which the intellect apprehends truth, being, and the like, is an indivisible thought. It is directly incompatible with its nature to be allotted or distributed over an aggregate of separate atoms. But the second alternative is equally impossible. If different parts of the composite substance were each the basis of a complete idea, we should * Mr. Maher's idea of inextension will become clear to the reader by a perusal of the following foot-note to page 444 of his . Psychology: * The schoolmen expressed the former attribute-absence of extension or composition of integrant parts-by the term quantitative simplicity. The fact that the soul is not the result of a plurality of principles coalesciug to form a single nature (as, e.g., in their view the formal and material principles of all corporeal objects) they signified by asserting that it is essentially simple---simplex quoad essentiam,"

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66 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. have at the same time not one, but several ideas of the object. Our consciousness, however, tells us this is not the case. Lastly, if the whole idea were located in part or element of the composite substance, either this part is itself composite or simple. If the latter, then our thesis-that the ultimate subject of thought is indivisibleis established at once. If the former, then the old series of impossible alternatives will recur again until we are finally forced to the same conclusion." The same argument also proves the simplicity of the subject of judgment. Maher S. J. again points out: "The simplest judgment pre-supposes the comparison of two distinct ideas, which must be simultaneously apprehended by one indivisible agent. Suppose the judgment, 'Science is useful,' to be elicited. If the subject which apprehends the two concepts science' and useful' is not indivisible, then we must assume that one of these terms is apprehended by one part and the other by a second : or else that separate elements of the divisible subject are each the seat of both ideas. In the former case, however, we cannot have any judgment at all. The part a apprehends science, the different part b conceives the notion useful,' but the indivisible act of comparison requiring a single agent who combines the two ideas is wanting, and we can no more have the affirmative predication than if one man thinks science,' and another forms the concept useful,' In the second alternative, if a and b each simultaneously apprehended both science and useful,' then we should have not one, but a multiplicity of judgments. The simplicity of the inferential act of the mind by which we seize the logical sequence of a conclusion, is still more irreconcilable with the hypothesis of a composite substance. The three judgments-- Every y is z: every x is y; therefore, every x is 2--could no more constitute a syllogism if they proceeded from a composite substance than if each proposition was apprehended alone by a separate man." In respect of memory, also, it is not difficult to see that it cannot be the function of matter, or of a composite substance like the brain. There can be no recollection unless the identity of the person who recalls a past experience with the one who had undergone it is

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CREATION. present in consciousness. "To remember the experiences of another," says Maher, " would be to remember having been somebody else: in other words, to simultaneously affirm and deny one's own identity, a pure and absurd contradiction." Recollection, then, would be impossible for a consciousness which is constantly generated from the physical matter of the brain, and which does not, therefore, persist through life. Again, if consciousness be regarded as a secretion of matter, it must be a composite substance, in which case the consciousness an individual has of himself can only be the result of a combination of an immense number of consciousnesses. But this is contradicted by the fact that nobody feels himself as many. As to this, Mr. J. C. Chatterji, the author of 'The Hindu Realism,' observes: "Not only does an individual not feel himself as many, but if really many consciousnesses formed one individual consciousness, then the body would often be either torn to pieces or absolutely inactive. For, it is comparatively a very rare thing to find a large number of conscious entities acting together absolutely with one will and purpose. They generally have different wills and purposes of their own, and if the different members and parts of the body had each a separate consciousness of its own, and at the same time were not subordinate to some other and central consciousness, it is pretty certain that they would often disagree and try to carry on their different wills and purposes; and the result would be a complete disintegration of the body. Or, if the body did not disintegrate, then there would be an absolute deadlock of activity, inasmuch as the varying wills and purposes of the different parts of the body would neutralize one another. But, as neither this kind of disintegration nor stagnation is ever observed, we must conclude that it is not the separate consciousnesses of the different parts of the body which produce the one individual consciousness." Besides, if there were many consciousnesses in the 67

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68 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. body, mental activity would be carried on in different parts simultaneously, or at least there would be as many ideas of a single object of perception as there are consciousnesses in the body or the brain. But, since actual experience belies this supposition, it follows that the soul is an indivisible unit of consciousness. The above arguments fully suffice to prove the simplicity of the substance of consciousness. We now come to the quality of incorruptibility which is also an attribute of the soul. With regard to this, it must be evident that that which is a simple, i.e., a noncompound substance, can never le conceived as coming to an end, for the annihilation of that which exists can only mean the breaking up of a compound into its component parts. Hence, annihilation is not possible where a given substance is not a compound that might break up into simpler elements. As a result of the foregoing considerations we are entitled to say that being a substance, that is, as a something which subsists by its own nature, the soul cannot possibly be annihilated out of existence, and is an entity quite independent of the physical body which it inhabits during its earthly life. As such, it is fully capable of maintaining an existence independently of its garment of flesh. Now arises the question, whether the soul would, in any sense, retain its power of perception on shuffling off this mortal coil, the body of matter. The answer to this depends on the nature of the perceptive faculty, hence, if perception be a function of sense-organs, the eye, the ear, and the like, naturally it cannot survive the physical death. But if, on the contrary, perception is not

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CREATION 69 a function of sense-organs, but of the soul, as we maintain, then there is no escape from the conclusion that the death of the body would not mean the destruction of the perceptive faculties of the soul, Dr. Dods suggested the following experiment to prove the existence of a visual power independent of the eye : 'If you take a shilling and a piece of zinc of the same size, put the shilling against the gums under the upper lip, and then open the mouth and lay the piece of zinc upon the tongue ; by moving the tongue up and down you will touch the pieces together, and every time they come in contact you will see a flash of light. This flash is seen directly by the mind and independently of the natural organ of sight, the eye ; and the proof of it lies in the fact that you may enter the darkest room, in the darkest night, and might close or even bandage your eyes, still, whenever the pieces of zinc and silver come in contact with each other in your mouth, you will see the flash, even when one from the heavens could not be seen.' The somnambulist, surely, does not see with his eyes during the 'fit,' and yet he performs, at times, the most difficult and dangerous feats and exceedingly fine work. The wonderful phenomena of the psychic type, e.g., the perception of invisible, distant objects, also prove that the organs of sense--the ear, the eye, and the like, are not the only means, or channels of perception. So long as these phenomena remain unexplained, it is not competent to us to declare that all forms of perception are possible only with the aid of the brain, or of a central nervous system. Careful observation will show that the

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70 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. organs of sense are merely channels for the passage of vibrations from the world ; they do not, in any sense, constitute a factory for the manufacturing of will, consciousness, and reason. The eyes may be wide open, yet if the mind is engaged elsewhere they will see nothing; the ears may be physically perfect, but if the mind is not attached to them they will hear nothing; and so forth. It follows from this that the power of perception is not, in any sense, a product of the sense-organs, but inheres in the soul. Hence, the separation of the soul from the physical body, in death, would not interfere, in any way, with the perceptive faculty, though its development in the future life, or lives, will depend on the nature of the new environment, just as it does here on the quality of the brain and nervous matter. Add to this the conclusion already arrived at--that thinking and reasoning are not the functions of the physical brain, but of spirit-and the case for the survival of the soul becomes perfectly clear and incontrovertible. It would not be out of place to point out, while we are still on the subject, that the error of materialism is due to its supposition that a soul would be no soul unless it remained in one and the same state always and under all conditions, so that the consciousness which is affected by musk, coffee and the like, cannot but be a product of matter. This erroneous impression has probably derived encouragement from the teachings of certain cheap and easy-going systems of religious metaphysics which actually regard the living essence as unchanging and not liable to be affected by matter. There can, however, be no greater error than that implied in the supposition ; for

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CREATION. 7 both spirit and matter are able to influence and operate upon each other under certain circumstances. Nor is the interaction between these two substances of nature erratic or indefinite in any sense ; it has its own laws which are as rigid and inviolable as those to be met with in any of the apodictic sciences. We shall define some of these laws when we come to deal with the theory of karma; meanwhile, it is sufficient to say that the materialist has confused the issue by confining his attention to a set of wrong alternatives for an explanation of the phenomena of consciousness. The strangest thing about this is that, while he is not prepared to deny the existence of matter, in spite of the changes which it is constantly undergoing in subjection to the forces of nature, he sees nothing but non-existence of the soul the moment he discovers it to be affected by musk and the like, altogether forgetting that the gulf between the conscious and the unconscious is too wide to be bridged over by any means. As Prof. Bowne* observes: "By describing the mind as a waxen tablet, and things as impressing themselves upon it, we seem to get a great insight until we think to ask where this extended tablet is, and how things stamp themselves on it, and how the perceptive act could be explained even if they did. ... The immediate antecedents of sensation and perception are a series of nervous changes in the brain. Whatever we know of the outer world is revealed only in and through these nervous changes. But these are totally unlike the objects assumed to exist as their causes. If we might conceive the mind as in the light, and in direct contact with its objects, the imagination at least would be comforted; but when we conceive the mind as coming in contact with the outer world only in the dark chamber of the skull, and then not in contact with the objects perceived, but only with * Metaphysics, pp. 407-10.

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72 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. a series of nerve changes of which, moreover, it knows nothing, it is plain that the object is a long way off. All talk of pictures, impressions, etc., ceases because of the lack of all the conditions to give such figures any meaning. It is not even clear that we shall ever find our way out of the darkness into the world of light and reality again. We begin with complete trust in physics and the senses, and are forth with led away from the object into a nervous labyrinth, where the object is entirely displaced by a set of nervous changes which are totally unlike anything but themselves. Finally, we land . in the dark chamber of the skull. The object has gone completely, and knowledge has not yet appeared. Nervous signs are the raw material of all knowledge of the outer world, according to the most decided realism. But in order to pass beyond these signs into a knowledge of the outer world, we must posit an interpreter who shall read back these signs into their objective meaning. But that interpreter, again, must implicitly contain the meaning of the universe within itself; and these signs are really but excitations which cause the soul to unfold what is within itself. Inasmuch as by common consent the soul communicates with the outer world only through these signs, and never comes nearer to the object than such signs can bring it, it follows that the principles of interpretation must be in the mind itself, and that the resulting construction is primarily only an expression of the mind's own nature. All reaction is of this sort; it expresses the nature of the reacting agents, and knowledge comes under the same head." Even that great psychologist Prof. William James, found himself forced to recognise that the l' which knows cannot be an aggregate personality, though, as a psychologist, he did not feel called upon to pronounce judgment upon the precise question before us now. He writes : "The consciousness of self involves a stream of thought, each part of which as 'I'can (1) remember those which went before, and know the things they knew; and (2) emphasize and care paramountly for certain ones among them as 'me' and appropriate to these the rest. The nucleus of the 'me' is always the bodily existence felt to be present at the time. This 'me' is an empirical aggregate of things objectively known. The 'I' which knows them cannot itself be an aggregate, neither for psychological purposes need it be con

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73 sidered an unchanging metaphysical entity like the Soul, or a principle like the pure Ego, viewed as out of time. It is a Thought at each moment, different from that of the last moment, but appropriative of the latter, together with all that the latter called its own."* CREATION. Prof. James maintains that personality implies "the incessant presence of two elements, an objective person, known by a passing subjective Thought and recognized as continuing in time." But the question is, what is this so-called subjective Thought, and where are we to look for it? The answer to this is not to be found in the books of Materialism, but in Religious philosophy, and, in the language of Swami Abhedananda, may be expressed thus: 46 Again, this Prana or life-force is inseparable from intelligence The Self has two powers, which express themselves as intelligence and as the activity of the Prana or life-force. Intelligence is that which is the source of consciousness. The life-force or Mukhya Prana is something independent of the sense-powers, but the sense-powers are dependent upon the lifegiving Prana. Where life-force is unmanifest, the sense-organs m remain perfect, but there will not be any expression of the sensepowers in the form of the perception of sensation. The eye of a dead man may be perfect, the optic nerve may be in good condition, the brain cells may be in a normal state, but as the life-force is not working in that body, the sense-organs must remain dead, without performing their functions, without producing any sensation. Thus we can see that all the sense-organs remain active in the body, because Prana, the source of all activity, is there, and because the life-force governs and regulates all the senses."-(Self-Knowledge, pp. 72, 73, 76 and 77). According to Theosophists, are identical, two names for from within and from without. consciousness; there is no consciousness without life. * See The Principles of Psychology,' Vol. I, p. 400. "Consciousness and life one thing, as regarded There is no life without

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74 . THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. When we vaguely separate them in thought and analyze what we have done, we find that we have called consciousness turned inward by the name of life, and life turned outwards by the name of consciousness. When our attention is fixed on unity, we say life; when it is fixed upon multiplicity, we say consciousness ; and we forget that the multiplicity is due to, is the essence of, matter, the reflecting surface, in which the one becomes the many. When it is said that life is ' more or less conscious,' it is not the abstraction life that is thought of, but' a living thing,' more or less aware of its surroundings" (* A Study in Consciousness,' by Annie Besant, p. 32). This, however, does not explain the part played by matter in the manifestation of conscious phenomena; but William James, whose opinion as a psychologist has been already referred to, strikes the true note when he says : "When the physiologist who thinks that his science cuts off all hope of immortality pronounces the phrase, Thought is a function of the brain,' he thinks of the matter just as he thinks when he says, 'Steam is a function of the tea-kettle,' 'Light is a function of the electric circuit, Power is a function of the moving waterfall.' In these latter cases the several material objects have the function of inwardly creating or engendering their effects, and their function must be called productive function. Just so, he thinks, it must be with the brain. Engendering consciousness in its interior, much as it engenders cholesterin and creatin, and carbonic acid, its relation to our soul's life must also be called productive function.... But in the world of physical nature, productive function of this sort is not the only kind of function with which we are familiar.. ... In the case of a coloured glass, a prism, or a refracting lens, we, have transmissive function. The energy of light, no matter how produced, is by the glass sifted and limited in colour, and by the lens or prism determined to a certain path and shape. Similarly, the keys of an organ

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75 have only a transmissive function. They open successively the various pipes and let the wind in the air-chest escape in various ways. The voices of the various pipes are constituted by the columns of air trembling as they emerge. But the air is not engendered in the organ. The organ proper, as distinguished from its air-chest, is only an apparatus for letting portions of it loose upon the world in these peculiarly limited shapes. My thesis now is this: that, when we think of the law that thought is a function of the brain, we are not required to think of productive function only; we are entitled also to consider permissive or transmissive function. And this the ordinary psycho-physiologist leaves out of his account...... As the air now comes through my glottis determined and limited in its force and quality of its vibrations by the peculiarities of those vocal chords which form its gate of egress and shape it into my personal voice, even so the genuine matter of reality, the life of souls, as it is in its fulness, will break through our several brains into this world in all sorts of restricted forms, and with all the imperfections and queernesses that characterize our finite individualities here below."-Human Immortality, pp. 28-36. CREATION. The truth is that Spirit, Life, or Intelligence, is a self-subsistent reality, and quite independent of matter and its forms; Materialism has taken a great leap in the dark in regarding it as a product of matter. It would be a mistake to imagine that we are the first in the field of research; in reality, every age has produced its thinkers who have devoted themselves whole-heartedly to the study of the problem. Perhaps it is not easy to excel certain mystic researchers in their investigation into the nature of Reality, or Life, underlying all appearances of matter. We can only admire their untiring zeal and their power of discernment. They have conceived the atom of physical matter, not to be a simple unit, devoid of parts, but to be composed of smaller fragments, and these, again, to be not simple, but complex combinations of still minuter particles.

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76 C When we get to what might appear to be the smallest unit or atom of physical matter, we are not at the end of our search, for, to our utter bewilderment at that point, the atom breaks up and reveals within itself a kind of finer matter, known to the occultists as the matter of the Astral 'world.' By continuing the process of breaking up in the Astral world,' we get to its unit of matter or atom, only to find that there is another 'world' of indescribable beauty within it. In this manner, we pass through what are described as the 'Mental,' the Buddhic,' the 'Nirvanic,' the 'Paranirvanic' and the 'Mahaparanirvanic' planes, each of which consists in a finer quality of matter than the one preceding it. Life, however, manifests itself on all these planes, which are described as interpenetrating one another. No particular kind of matter could these mystic investigators discover as the source of consciousness, and even to-day no one has been able to point out the particular kind of atoms from which reason and memory could be distilled or choice and volition extracted. Such is the problem of Life; however far we might push our enquiry into the origin of consciousness, the mystery only deepens, and we are brought face to face with the enigma of being, with all its tantalizing charm of elusiveness and insolubility. But we should not forget the one important point about it, namely, that the problem arises just because we choose to create it by refusing to accept Life or Spirit as a self-subsisting Reality. The charm of elusiveness, thus, belongs to the human intellect which creates a maze in the first instance, and then manages to lose itself in its imaginary turns and bends; and just C THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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CREATION. 77 because the perplexity is of our own making, we can allow ourselves to be as deeply entangled in its meshes as we please. * To continue with our examination of modern science, matter has been seen to be insufficient to explain the phenomena of consciousness, notwithstanding that scientists have endeavoured to evade the difficulty by exaggerating its function. This is not the only diff - culty in the way of modern science; for it has little or no knowledge of even Time and Space, though it is familiar with the ubiquitous ether, the necessary medium of motion. As regards Time and Space, some idea of the confusion of thought prevailing amongst modern writers might be formed by a perusal of the following deliberate opinion of Herbert Spencer, one of England's greatest philosophers : "We cannot conceive Space and Time as entities, and are equally disabled from conceiving them as attributes of entities or as nonentities............. The immediate knowledge which we seem to have of them proves, when examined, to be total ignorance" (The First Principles). Kant, the great German philosopher, had already, before the time of Herbert Spencer, declared Space and Time to be pure a priori forms of understanding; but this did not satisfy the English thinker who said :-- "The proposition with which Kant's philosophy sets out, verbally intelligible though it is, cannot by any effort be rendered into thought - cannot be interpreted into an idea properly so called, but stands merely for a pseud-idea. In the first place to assert that space and Time are subjective conditions is, by implication, to assert that they are not objective realities; if the Space and Time present to our minds belong to the ego, then of necessity they do not belong to the non-ego. Now it is impossible to think this. The very fact on which Kant bases his hypothesis-namely, that our consciousness of

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78 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Space and Time cannot be suppressed-testifies as much; for that consciousness of Space and Time which we cannot rid ourselves of, is the consciousness of them as existing objectively. It is useless to reply that such an inability must inevitably result if they are subjective forms. The question here is-what does consciousness directly testify? And the direct testimony of consciousness is that Time and Space are not within the mind, but without the mind; and so absolutely independent that we cannot conceive them to become non-existent even supposing the mind to become non-existent" (The First Principles). Finally, Haeckel tries to tone down the rigid idealism of Kant by acknowledging the objective reality of Time and Space, though he ultimately leaves them out of his calculation in his monistic scheme of a matter-force world. This is, however, what he says as to Time and Space: "Since Kant explained Time and Space to be merely * forms of perception '-Space the form of the external, Time of internal sensitivity--there has been a keen controversy, which still continues over this important problem. A large section of modern metaphysicians have persuaded themselves that this critical fact' possesses a great importance as the starting point of a 'purely idealistic theory of knowledge,' and that, consequently, the natural opinion of the normal healthy mind as to the reality of time and space has been swept aside. This narrow and ultra-idealistic conception of time and space has become a prolific source of error. It overlooks the fact that Kant only touched one side of the problem, the subjective side, in that theory, and recognized the equal validity of its objective side. Time and Space,' he said, have empirical reality, but transcendental ideality. Our modern monism is quite compatible with this thesis of Kant's, but not with the one-sided exaggeration of the subjective aspect of the problem" (The Riddle of the Universe). This is about all that Modern Science knows of Time and Space; and even Haeckel has nothing more to say of their nature than what is to be inferred from the statement that they possess empirical reality but transcendental ideality.

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CREATION 79 As regards the problem of the origin of movement, described as the second of the world enigmas' by Du. Bois Reymond, the last word of science must be taken to be that it is "solved by the recognition that movement is as innate and original a property of substance as a sensation" (The Riddle of the Universe). This is, however, a misleading statement to a certain extent, for, while motion is an attribute of matter, it is not a property of pure spirit, though embodied souls enjoy the power to direct their movements into particular channels at will. This will be made clear by and by; in the mean time it is evident that what enables them to do so is their will which is a distinct kind of force. Many persons will at once deny that will is a kind of force; but we need only refer to the following reasoned expression of opinion from Dr. Alfred Russell Wallace's Natural Selection and Tropical Nature to be convinced of the fact that it cannot be regarded as a non-entity pure and simple. Says Dr. Wallace :-- "We are acquainted with two radically distinct or apparently distinct kinds of force--the first consists of the primary forces of nature, such as gravitation, cohesion, repulsion, heat, electricity, etc.; the second is our own will force. Many persons will at once deny that the latter exists. It will be said that it is a mere transformation of the primary forces before alluded to; that the correlation of forces includes those of animal life, and that will itself is but the result of molecular change in the brain. I think, however, that it can be shown that this latter assertion has never been proved, nor even been proved to be possible; and that in making it, a great leap in the dark has been taken from the known to the unknown. It may be at once admitted that the muscular force of animals and man is merely the transformed energy derived from the primary forces of nature. So much has been, if not rigidly proved, yet rendered highly probable, and it is in perfect accordance

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80 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. with all our knowledge of natural forces and natural laws. But it cannot be contended that the physiological balance-sheet has ever been so accurately struck, that we are entitled to say, not one thousandth part of a grain more of force has been exerted by any organised body, or in any part of it than has been derived from the known primary forces of the material world. If that were so, it would absolutely negative the existence of will; for if will is any thing, it is a power that directs the action of the forces stored up in the body, and it is not conceivable that this direction can take place, without the exercise of some force in some part of the organism. However delicately a machine may be constructed, with the most exquisitely contrived detents to release a weight or spring by the exertion of the smallest possible amount of force, some external force will always be required: so, in the animal machine, however minute may be the changes required in the cells or fibres of the brain, to set in motion the nerve currents which loosen or excite the pent-up forces of certain muscles, some force must be required to effect those changes. If it is said, 'those changes are automatic, and are set in motion by external causes,' then one essential part of our consciousness, a certain amount of freedom in willing, is annihilated : and it is inconceivable how or why there should have arisen any consciousness or any apparent will, in such purely automatic organisms. If this were so, our apparent Will would be an illusion, and Professor Huxley's belief that our volition counts for something as condition of the course of events,' would be fallacious, since our volition would then be but one link in the chain of events counting for neither more nor less than any other link whatever."-(Natural Selection and Tropical Nature, p. 211). That will is a kind of force has been recently demonstrated by a neat little invention, with a delicately poised needle which shifts its position when subjected to the action of will. But one hardly requires a mechanical device to prove the potency of will as a force ; just stand up for a moment, and think what force it was which lifted up your fourteen stones of bodily weight, if not your will alone.

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CREATION This finishes our examination of modern science, which, as our investigation fully demonstrates, is still very far from perfection. We may now revert to Hinau Realism to enumerate the causes of the world process from the standpoint of the Vaisheshika philosophy. So far as matter is concerned, Hindu Realism is at one with the modern scientist in describing it as an atomistic substance. Modern science has been able to discover about seventy different kinds of atoms of matter, but has not yet been able to reduce them into fewer genera or species, but Kanada reduces them to four kinds only, namely, (1) those which can be discerned by sight, (2) those which can be discerned by the sense of touch or temperature, (3) those discernible by the sense of taste, and (4) those which appeal to, and are discernible by, the sense of smell. Kanada holds that there cannot be atoms corresponding to the sense of hearing, because he does not consider the emission of sound to be the property of any particular class of atoms, inasmuch as every thing can be conceived as silent. He maintains that sound arises by friction in akasa (the continuous medium, like the ether of modern science). To these four kinds of atoms Hindu Realists add five other substances, and call them the nine realities, which may be enumerated as follows :-- (1-4) the four kinds of atoms, as stated above, (5) Akasa, i.e., the continuous Ether, (6) Time, i.e., succession of moments,

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. CREATION. (7) Dik, i.e., the principle which holds things in space, (8) Mind, and (9) Soul. In strange contrast to these nine realities of Kanada are the two ultimate tattvas (existences) of Kapila, namely, Prakriti, or the root of the material and forces of nature, and Purusha, which is the principle of consciousness or Life. With respect to them the system of Kapila resembles, to a certain extent, the one known as Yoga which also reduces the universe to two substances, Akasa and Prana (life). None of these schools of philosophy, however, tries to attain to that monistic unity which is the key-note of Vedanta, said to be the crest jewel of Hindu metaphysics. It seems that a certain type of the human mind is ill-satisfied with knowing merely how many kinds of atoms, or substances, and forces there are in the world ; it wants to reduce all variety to unity, to gratify its monistic aspiration. But when the intellect is employed on purely physical lines, it may be said to reach its limit in the nine realities of Kanada and their further metaphysical reduction to the Purusha and Prakriti of the Sankhyan school. Intellect has hitherto been looking at the external world of matter and form, and cannot, therefore, get beyond the duality of the seer and the seen to attain to Monism. Kanada, Kapila and Patanjali, the founders of the Vaisheshika, the Sankhya and the Yoga philosophies, respectively, have only dealt with the universe in this manner.

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CREATION. 83 The Monist, however, affirms that a philosopher who does not try to attain to Monism must be held to have thrown up his brief. Sir Oliver Lodge thinks : "The truth is that all philosophy aims at being monistic; it is bound to aim at unification, however difficult of attainment; and a philosopher who abandoned the quest, and contented himself with a permanent antinomy-a universe compounded of two or more irreconcilable and entirely disparate and disconnected agencies-would be held to be throwing up his brief as a philosopher and taking refuge in a kind of permanent Manichaeism, which experience has shown to be an untenable and ultimately unthinkable position" (Life and Matter). Agreeably to the trend of the above argument, the Monist maintains that unity is capable of being attained by making the intellect turn on itself with a view to self-elucidation. The school of thought known as Vedanta follows the Intellect in its introspective excursion into its own self. We shall, accordingly, now investigate the nature of the world from the standpoint of Vedanta. Vedanta opens its campaign by challenging the reliability of senses, a slight alteration of the conditions of whose functioning suffices to produce false impressionsa rope is often mistaken for a serpent, the stump of a tree for a human being and a shadow for a ghost. The Vedantist, therefore, refuses to place any reliance upon these deceitful agents of the phenomenal " without." The next question which Vedanta raises relates to the nature of the world, which, it is pointed out, is so hopelessly dependent on the senses that it can hardly be said to exist independently of them. Things are as they are perceived, or inferred from those perceived. But what are perceived except extension, colour and the like, which are only sense-affections? Perception and infer

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84 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ence, moreover, depend on the condition of the senses and mind, e.g., a man with a jaundiced eye sees all things as yellow. The data of perception, thus, is sensation and sensation alone. What things are in themselves is not known; only sensations are felt and experienced, and it is these sensations which constitute the raw material of our perception. The perception, hence, the existence of the universe, thus, depends on the functioning of senses, in different language, on the states of consciousness. Berkeley maintains : "That neither our thoughts, nor passions, nor ideas formed by the imagination, exist without the mind, is what everybody will allow, And it seems no less evident that the various sensations or ideas imprinted on the sense, however blended or combined together (that is, whatever objects they compose), cannot exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving them. I think an intuitive knowledge may be obtained of this, by any one that shall attend to what is meant by the term 'exist' when applied to sensible things. The table I write on, I say exists, that is, I see and feel it ; and if I were out of my study I should say it existed, meaning thereby that if I was in my study I might perceive it, or that some other spirit actually does perceive it. There was an odour, that is, it was smelt; there was a sound, that is to say, it was heard ; a colour or figure, and it was preceived by sight or touch. This is all that I can understand by these and the like expressions. For, as to what is said of the absolute existence of unthinking things without any relation to their being perceived, that seems perfectly unintelligible. Their esse is percipi, nor is it possible they should have any existence, out of the minds or thinking things which perceive them. It is indeed an opinion, strangely prevailing amongst men, that houses, mountains, rivers, and, in a word, all sensible objects have an existence, natural or real, distinct from their being perceived by the understanding. But with how great an assurance and acquiescence so ever this principle may be entertained in the world ; yet whoever shall find in heart to call it in question, may, if I mistake not, perceive it to involve a manifest contradiction. For what are the

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CREATION. 85 forementioned objects but the things we perceive by sense, and what do we perceive besides our own ideas or sensations ; and is it not plainly repugnant that any one of these or any combination of them should exist unperceived ? If we thoroughly examine this tenet it will, perhaps, be found at bottom to depend on the doctrine of abstract ideas, For can there be a nicer strain of abstraction than to distinguish the existence of sensible objects from their being perceived, so as to conceive them existing unperceived ? Light and colours, heat and cold, extension and figures, in a word, the things we see and feel, what are they but so many sensations, notions, ideas, or impressions on the sense; and is it possible to separate, even in thought, any of these from perception? For my part, I might as easily divide a thing from itself. But my conceiving or imagining power does not extend beyond the possibility of real existence or perception. Hence, as it is impossible for me to see or feel anything without an actual sensation of that thing, so is it impossible for me to conceive in my thoughts any sensible thing or object distinct from the sensation or perception of it" (Principles of Human Knowledge). It is thus clear that the perception, and, therefore, the knowledge of the sensible world, depends on the functioning of sen ses; in other words, on the conditions of consciousness. Neither perception nor inference is, however, possible without a knowing mind, or spirit, as Berkeley calls it. Hence that which exists can exist only in relation to a knowing subject. But that whose very existence depends on its being perceived by another cannot be described as the true reality, since it is not self-dependent. Hence, the world is like a dream, which exists only in preception. It also follows from this that the true reality, which does not depend on the being of another for proof of its existence, and which is a condition precedent to the knowledge of all other things, is none other than the perceiving faculty or consciousness. Vedanta, therefore, describes the universe as

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86 a bundle of names and forms, or illusion, that is, an imaginary show. Matter, from this point of view, is only the imaginary material of this imaginary world, and exists only in relation to the mind of a percipient being or beings. In this sense we may call it the content of mind. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Further, since that which is an illusion can only exist in relation with a mind, it also follows that consciousness or mind must exist independently of matter; for it would be strange logic to say that mind is the product of a substance which itself depends on mind for its perception. This is precisely what Vedanta teaches. According to it, the one universal consciousness, or god, whom it calls Brahman, is the only real existence and all else an illusion. As regards the objection that the reality of matter is indispensable for a rigid necessity and uniformity of the laws of nature, it is easily met; for it makes no difference to experimental science whether the universe be real or imaginary, inasmuch as the laws of nature depend not on our ideas concerning the nature of the universewhether it be real or imaginary-but on the properties of what exists. From the standpoint of Idealism, Kant's explanation of the laws of nature is now generally accepted to be true. He points out: "If experience is to teach us laws to which the existence of things is subject, these laws, if they regard things in themselves, must belong to them of necessity, even outside of our experience. But experience teaches us what exists and how it exists, but never that it must necessarily exist so, and not otherwise. Experience therefore can never teach us the nature of things in themselves."-Kant's Prolegomena, by Dr. Paul Carus, pp. 50-51.

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CREATION 87 But wbile it is true that experience never teaches us why things should exist as they do and not otherwise, understanding only finds its experiences to be governed by certain well-defined rules or laws. It follows that reflection makes good the shortcomings of experience, and must, therefore, be presumed to be endowed with the code of laws itself. In this sense the laws of understanding must be said to be given a priori. But, since our experiences of things only arise from contact with the things themselves, and since these experiences tally in all cases and without exception with the laws of understanding, it follows that things in nature are also subject to the same or to a corresponding set of laws. Hence, it is impossible that the validity of the laws of nature should ever be impaired. The legitimate conclusion from all this is that the laws of nature are determined, and their validity and uniformity guaranteed and secured, by the very nature of substances of which mind and matter are the two most important. For practical purposes of life, it makes no difference to us whether matter be real or imaginary ; so long as our consciousness remains in touch with the universe, its imaginary surroundings, assuming it to be imaginary, would possess as much practical necessity and validity for us as they would have done had matter been endowed with real existence. The next important question which arises in this connection is : who is the real knower ? The man in the street says, I, so and so, let us say, John Smith, am the kpower. Is it really so ? Does Mr. John Smith really know anything by himself ? Or does he merely know

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that which is reflected on the little judge of reason within him ? Now, if Mr. Smith were the knower in his own right, he would not be a' forgetter' of things. The two functions of knowing and forgetting do not go well together. Yet the fact that John Smith can at times jog his memory and recollect some of the apparently forgotten events, shows that the knowledge is there all the same, whether it be accessible to him or not at any particular moment of time. The literature of New Psychology contains many accounts of events which were not observed by the individuals themselves, but which were within their minds all the same. The case of the lady who had dropped her key and who recollected its whereabouts under the influence of hypnotism, is an instance in point. If she had observed it falling down, naturally she would not have allowed it to be lost. Who, then, knew, in this instance, that the key had been lost, who observed it falling, and who remembered where it had fallen down ? Obviously, not the lady, but some one else. Mr. Smith will find many similar instances on record, if he wishes to satisfy himself on the point. Thus, we observe that in all these instances our friend, Mr. John Smith, is unable to stand his ground; in fact, as is evident from our first argument, he is not the knower but the 'forgetter'! Vedanta, therefore, asserts that the Knower is not the body, but the Reality within. This inner Reality which is pure consciousness, it is claimed by Vedantists, is the Sat-ChitAnanda, that is, Existence, Consciousness and Bliss, which are the attributes of God. Vedanta also regards Consciousness to be infinite and all-knowing, so that

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CREATION. wherever it is present, it must be present in all its fulness and as a whole. 89 It follows, therefore, that from the standpoint of Vedanta, the real Atman or Soul of all creatures is absolutely identical with, and in no way different from, God. Vedanta, therefore, does not hesitate to tell its follower, "THAT THOU ART." The immortal part of every being, we are further told, is consciousness itself, for that which is unchanging and beyond time and upon which depend the perception and knowledge of all other things, is necessarily above birth and death, which are both bounded, on two sides, by time. Hence, he alone who identifies himself with his inner Reality attains to immortality. As for the religious aspect of the question, the world we perceive through the instrumentality of senses has but a secondary importance among the existing realities, being dependent on the activities of the organs of sense; it is the Living Reality, that is, Consciousness, which is entitled to the foremost place in our estimation. Those who pin their faith on the forms of things are little better than those who fall in love with the objects they see in their Ireams, and come to grief. The true object of worship and adoration, the only one that can secure for the soul the peace, the happiness and the immortality which it is hankering after, consequently, is the inner Divinity, the Sachchidananda, the Self. He it is who is to be realized to be rid of the anguish which is the lot of the ignorant soul. The material universe, being dependent upon mind for its knowledge, is like a huge idea containing an infinity of smaller ideas, called bodies, in terms of material

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90 Realism. As Berkeley says: 'Bodies are but ideas; their essence is in their perception.' It is in this sense that the Vedantist understands the mystery of existence. To him the whole thing is an illusion, and the only reality is the One Conscious Existence, his own Self, which he calls Brahman and defines with the words THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. 66 not that, not that." The idea underlying this quite negative definition is that Brahman is so hopelessly beyond words that it can only be defined by the negation. of all things definable by language. This one Existence persists on all planes and cannot be denied or ignored; for he who would deny consciousness would have to be conscious himself. It is the Seer, Perception itself, and not liable to death or extinction. THAT is to be known; he who does not know the 'seer' knows nothing worth knowing. And, conversely, he who has known this Reality may well say of all the knowledge of worldly things and scriptures and sciences that they are not only not necessary but a burden. What is the need of knowledge to him who has known the Reality, not the relative reality only, but the real Absolute Reality which is immortal and eternal. As the Bhagavad Gita states, all the Vedas are as useful to a learned Brahmana as is a tank in a place covered all over with water. Vedanta tells us that this Reality is not far to seek; it is the Man within, the Atman, whose presence in each and every form is the cause of life and psychic activity. From what has been said above, it follows that, according to the philosophers of the monistic Vedanta, the only living and unchanging existence in the entire universe

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CREATION. 97 is pure Consciousness. Conceived as a quality, or essence, it never changes under any circumstances whatsoever, whether it be working on the waking, the dreaming, or the deep-sleep plane of empirical existence. This one eternal Existence, Vedanta teaches us, is also the consciousness within ourselves. Hence, we are all God. It is upon this simple foundation that the Vedantic conception of " That thou art" is built. As regards the number of souls in existence, Vedanta is rigidly monistic even as to that, maintaining that there is and can be only one soul in existence. Since all the souls, it is urged, have consciousness in common among them, it follows that consciousness is the one and the only real Soul. Pointing out certain features of resemblance between the world and a dream, the most favourite method of argument with Vedanta, the Vedantists ask: Can we call our dream-creatures spirits? If not, then where is there room for a multiplicity of souls in this dream-like illusion which it pleases us to call our real, material world ? It we refuse to dub the dream phantoms spirits, what authority have we for calling the men and women of this world by that name? With the breaking up of the dream, the actors and actresses of the dreamstage melt into thin air, the buildings, parks, cities-- nay, even whole worlds--collapse into airy nothingness, and the entire panorama is rolled away like a scroll, leaving not a multiplicity of souls, but only the one indivisible spirit of the dreamer. Similarly, argues the Vedantist, there is and can be only one spirit in this world of our waking consciousness. Ascribing the spatial type of infinity to consciousness, he asks: since

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92 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. God is but One, and within and without the universe, where is there room for a second to come in? It is in this sense that Vivekananda maintains : "There is but one Soul in the universe, not two. It neither comes nor goes. It neither reincarnates, nor dies, nor is reborn. How can it? How to die? Where to go? Where am .I' not already ?" (Swami Vivekananda on Atman.) The argument that because the contents of different minds are different, therefore, every mind is a separate entity or spirit in itself, does not find favour with Vedanta, on the ground that they differ only in respect of their contents, not with regard to their nature or essence, showing that consciousness is common to all minds, and, for that reason, only one and all-pervading. In dreaming, too, urges Vedanta, it appears that the contents of individual minds are different from one another, yet when we wake up we discover that the variety of minds and contents was an illusion, pure and simple, and that it was the mind of the dreamer which alone was the reservoir of consciousness for all the multitude of minds in the dream. Such is the nature of the argument wbich Vedanta advances in support of its philosophy. What is meant by soul in Vedanta is not a self-existent unit of consciousness, but a very fine and enduring body, the sukshma sharira, which is the vehicle of transmigration. Selfconsciousness is, however, not regarded as the property of even this extremely subtle body, but is said to be the lustre which it borrows from the Essence of Consciousness. In this manner does Vedanta proceed to establish its monistic doctrine. It first of all eliminates the

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CREATION duality of the seer and the seen, by reducing the perceptible phenomena to an illusion pure and simple, and then takes away the multiplicity of souls, leaving the perceiving faculty or power as a solitary unit-allpervading, eternal and unchanging. This is summed up in the well-known expression--eko Brahma dwityo nasti-signifying that Brahman is one and there is no second. The immutability of Brahman is made to rest on the nature of consciousness, conceived as the common property of souls, that is to say, as an abstract quality ;. for as such it is inconceiveable that consciousness. should ever cease to be itself, or become transformed into something which it is not. Hence, Vedanta is never weary of reiterating that it persists intact on all the planes of manifestation, i.e., the three states or conditions of existence known as waking, dreaming and deep sleep, to which later writers have added a fourth, namely, turiya (super-consciousness). Such is the doctrine of the monistic Vedanta, which, in one way or another, and with certain necessary though minor variations, will be found to lie at the bottom of all systems of Idealism that aim at unification. The hama aust sawgl tanto = 'all is he') doctrine of Muslim Idealism is almost a copy of the Advaita Vedanta ; it also aims at the unification of things in the unity of God. But, unfortunately for this supposed high aim of philosophy, monism is possible only by throttling common sense, since it is opposed to concrete facts..

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94 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. If we are not blinded by any pre-formed convictions on the subject, we shall not fail to perceive that the doctrine that Brahman is the only existence and all else an illusion, or maya, to use a technical term of the Vedanta philosophy, is a self-contradictory one from the very outset; since we are given the duality of Brahman and maya to start with. It is permissible to ask whether this maya be a thing which actually exists, or not? No other alternative is possible, since nothing can actually exist and not exist at the same time. Now, if we say that it is an actuality of existence, there is an end to our monistic aspiration at once ; but, if it be urged, on the contrary, that it is not endowed with existence, then it is impossible that that which has no existence whatsoever should ever be perceived. This is the dilemma from which Vedanta has never been able to extricate itself, except to its own satisfaction. The "hama aust" doctrine, similarly, is a stumbling block in the way of truth, and has caused as great mischief as the tenets of materialism pure and simple. With 'him ' alone in existence, it is inevitable that the world should be reduced to a simple dream, with 'him' as the Dreamer, and all other living beings as phantoms of imagination. Accordingly, the soul is not the Reality, but the reflection of Reality, and the summum bonum is either the destruction of the reflection, or the merging in 'him,' which also involves the annihilation of the individual.' What sort of consolation is the soul to derive from the idea of annihilation which stares it in the face, it is difficult to imagine; but it is curious that it has never occurred to the propounders

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95 of this kind of Idealism that things cannot cease to exist because of our mentally abstracting away some of their common attributes or properties. 'All is he,' is certainly a charming formula on account of its simplicity, and, if brevity be the soul of wit, it is entitled to bear away the palm. But the question is, whether brevity is also the soul of wisdom, as it is of wit? Analysis shows that the All' includes not only that which is living and conscious, but also that which is not living and not conscious. Whether we reduce the universe to mind and matter, or to consciousness and its states,-feelings, sense-affections and ideas, there is no escape from duality, for the ideas and states of consciousness are not conscious themselves, and, therefore, different from consciousness. It is not possible to get over this duality by any manner of means, as long as one does not prove-and, we fear, it will never be proved-that the ideas and states of consciousness are also endowed with understanding, memory and the capacity to feel pleasure and pain. The analogy of dreams is inadmissible here altogether, for while a dream resembles this world in many respects, it does not do so in every particular. It is merely the dramatization of the dreamer's ideas, which are soul-less and unconscious. The proof of this lies in the fact that while the dreamer, on waking up, remembers what he himself felt, or thought, he is quite unconscious of the feelings and ideas of those others whom he sees in his dreams. If it be a fact that the dreamer's mind itself becomes ensouled in the bodies of his dream-phantoms, investing them with mental equipment as a token of CREATION.

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96 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. being, they would have their individual experiences in consciousness, namely, feelings, sensations and the like, of which he cannot but be aware. But since this is not the case, it is clear that these phantoms have no individualities of their own, and merely play the part assigned to them in the drama of thought by the understanding of the dreamer. Hence, the dream-creatures are soul. less beings, and cannot be compared with men, into whose ears Vedanta unhesitatingly whispers the divine and vivifying formula of initiation, the "That thou art." * There is nothing in the nature of a dream to upset our notions of reality and life. It is merely a pictorial mode of thinking, and differs from waking hallucination in no important particular. There can be no doubting the fact that the primary mode of thought is pictorial, since words only replace images when we become familiar with langnage. Those born deaf and dumb have also no other method of thinking available to them than the one by means of images. Even the words we atter and hear give rise to images, but as practice enables us to grasp their significance with extreme rapidity, the images which they tend to invoke remain nascent, and, consequently, unperceived. It is only when our feelings are concerned in any particular idea, or train of thought, that mental images become visualised. A tyrant gloating over the downfall of his victim, for instance, can, owing to the intensity of the feeling of triumph, almost perceive the terror, the dismay, and the helplessness of the unfortunate object of his tyranny. And, when we allow ourselves to dwell upon the details of some highly agreeable or painful experience, the persons concerned in the affair seem to stand out before our very eyes, and in the positions which they had occupied at the time when the experience was an actuality. Under such circumstances, we are apt to forget our surroundings and to identify ourselves with the personality of the past, acting like the hero of the tale from the Arabian Nights, who, having built up a vast fortune, in imagination, from the proceeds of a basketful of eggs, and having successfully wooed, likewise in his imagination, the fairy-like daughter of his king, allowed himself to be angry with her, purposely to snub her for her high birth, and actually administered her' a kick which sent the basket flying out of the window, shattering his fool's paradise of a happy home along with the hopeful eggs. Our dream personality is exactly like the millionaire personality of the hero of this tale, and possesses no more indiziduality than that of a memory image visualised into perceptible form by the intensity of feelings and emotions.

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97 A possible reply to this objection is that we are also unconscious of the feelings and ideas of men in this world; but this is only begging the question, since our unconsciousness of the states of consciousness of other beings in this world might be due either to the fact that our minds are separate, or to their being merely our own thought-forms. So far as dream-creatures are concerned, we know, for certain, that they are only thought-forms of a dreamer, but, unless the possibility of the other alternative be logically excluded, the same statement cannot be made in respect of the living beings in this world. It is not given us to know, or perceive, the thoughts of another under normal conditions, so that what one perceives cannot be the thoughts or ideas of an unknown supernormal entity or being, sleeping somewhere, on some higher plane, and dreaming away. Besides, only living beings are endowed with perception, memory and understanding, which no thought-form ever enjoys. Hence, if one be only a thought-form of an eternal Dreamer, how comes it that one happens to be endowed with all the qualities of consciousness which distinguish a being from a phantom of fancy? CREATION. Unless Idealism can establish the proposition that phantoms of fancy are also endowed with consciousness, it is no use relying upon the analogy of dreams. Those who maintain that the soul is only a reflection of a conscious reality, are unable also to explain how it happens to be endowed with consciousness. Since a reflected image is never found to possess the qualities of consciousness, feelings and the like, and since all living beings in this 7

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. world enjoy these very qualities, the question arises as to the nature of the difference between the original and its reflected effect. If it be merely one of degree in respect of development, or manifestation, it is obviously no difference at all, since all living beings possess the capacity for the fullest unfoldment of knowledge, as will be shown later on. But if it be one of quality, then there is no proof that there is any other kind of consciousness than our own in existence, and without strict proof nothing can be admitted as established. Besides, if the types were different, it would not be possible for a reflection to become 'That' which is the end in view. It follows, therefore, that the idea that souls are the reflected images of one solitary being is untenable in philosophy. We need only add here that no system of thought has a right to be considered consistent which in one and the same breath professes to teach that the soul is a reflection, and yet whispers "That thou art" in its ear. Besides, if the universe be the dream of a being or power that is unchanging and immutable, it must be eternal; and if it be eternal, its comparison with one that is transient and passing is not allowed by reason. Moreover, if there be only one soul in existence, and be eternal, omnipresent and blissful, how are the feeling of pain and the longing of the individual soul to escape from the bondage of samsara to be accounted for ? Surely, he who is enjoying the blessedness of freedom and bliss cannot by any possibility be regarded as identical with those who are suffering the pains of this world or the torments of bell in some other region of the

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CREATION 99 universe. And, yet, if the real soul is only one, the beings whose experiences are only painful must necessarily be either altogether non-existent, or only the one soul. But the latter hypothesis is not only not supported by any single fact of observation, but is also actually contradicted by experience, inasmuch as no solitary individual can possibly feel himself as many, or undergo different kinds of experience in different parts of the world at one and the same time; and the former leads to an absurdity, since an absolute non-entity cannot be endowed with feelings, memory and the like, which observation and introspection certainly show to be the properties of the individual soul. Hence, it is repugnant to intellect to say that there is only one soul in existence in the universe. Furthermore, the significance of the idea of moksha can only be the annihilation of the individual, if the speculations of Vedanta, as to the existence of only one being, be accepted as correct, for it has no meaning for one who is always free and blissful,--and so far as Brahman is concerned, he is described as eternally free and blissful,--and the individual soul, who longs to attain it, is only a bundle of illusion, which is to be destroyed, so that Brahman, the solitary being, posited by the Advaita Vedanta, might remain the sole and undisputed monarch of all he surveys. Thus for the individual extinction rather than emancipation, i.e., the realisation of a life more full and abundant, is the logical consequence of Advaitism. It is this feature of the teaching of the absolute Monism of Vedanta which has led some of the European Scholars to regard it as a form of pessimism.

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100 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Lastly, from the practical side of the question, Vedanta cannot be said to have been proved to be a practical creed, since Brahman has never needed liberation, and since the individual souls, being pure, illusory forms of subjective hallucination, are debarred, by their very nature, from its attainment. Hence, no one can be said to have ever been benefited by its teaching; and, since no religion whose doctrines have never been subjected to the test of practicability can be regarded as a practical system of God-realisation, Adwaitism has no right to rank with those that have been proved to be so. Hence, its authority rests purely on the con jectures of men, and is not supported, in the leas degree, by the testimony of any one who may be said t have benefited by its wisdom. We might now even liken the world to a dream, if w like, but the result cannot be in any way different, since the termination of a dream only means the extinction, and not the emancipation, of the dream-creatures. Hence, the soul which approaches the Advaita Vedanta, with a view to obtain everlasting happiness, must prepare itself to be wiped out of existence. It is thus clear that the aspiration of Idealism to attain to a monistic culmination is foredoomed to failure. There remains the monistic aspiration of theological origin to be considered; for obsessed, as it is, with the notion of an Almighty God and blinded by its ambition to attain to unification of thought, theology has no alternative but to posit an Over Soul as the Creator of the material and all of the universe. Accordingly, the

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CREATION. 101 theologians of the Christian and Muslim persuasions do not hesitate to stifle the voice of their intellect, and to assert that matter was created from nothing, at the command, or creative fiat, of their God. Even the metaphysically inclined Hindu Deism goes the length of saying that as the spider spins out its web from within its belly, or as the dreamer's mind creates the panorama of the dream-world from within itself, so does the creator project the material, the frame-work and all of the universe from within himself; and just as the spider withdraws its web within itself, so does the creator re-absorb the whole universe at the end of the 'cosmic day. This is monism with a vengeance; but it has to be ushered into the world at the cost of rationality. Even the satisfaction which the Hindu doctrine seems to afford is more apparent than real, since it implies the acknowledgment of duality in the 'spider's belly,' in the first instance. It would be interesting in this connection to examine the Mahomedan and Christian accounts of creation to see what light they throw on the nature of the Creator and the universe. According to the Mahomedan belief, man was made from a handful of dust. Just so; but what we want to know is this : Did the dust exist independently of God, or was it also made by him some time prior to the making of man? Let us go back, step by step, tracing the source of things, till we get to the very first thing created or made by the Almighty. We have now reached a point of time when there was nothing else but God in existence, and are entitled to ask, who obeyed the first "Kun" (let it be done) uttered by the

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102 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Creator, and from what material was the first thing manufactured ? Just realize the situation for a moment. God decided to make the first thing in the universe, and gave the word of command. But who obeyed it when there was nobody but God alone in existence? Then, the thing was made, but it is of the utmost importance to find out where the material for its manufacture came from, when there was absolutely nothing else but the Creator himself? The answer to both these questions can only be that God obeyed his own command and projected the material for manufacturing the thing he desired to make from within himself. There is no getting over these conclusions by any process of reasoning, for we cannot get substantiveness out of pure nothing. There yet remains the how of the making which is described with fuller detail in the Old Testament of the Holy Bible to which, apparently, the Mahomedans are indebted for their ideas on the subject. Assuming light to be the first thing made, we shall proceed to enquire into the process which resulted in its manifestation. According to the Book of Genesis, God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. Let us see what took place at that all-important moment when God said, "Let there be light," and light came into existence. Now, the very first thing which strikes the enquiring mind in this connection is that God must have formed a mental image of light before he could have commanded it to be made, for he must have known what he desired to make. The last words of the chronicler are of tremendous import in this connection. It is recorded, "And God

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CREATION. 103 saw the light that it was good." We say that a certain thing is good only when it tallies with a certain idea, or image, in our mind. This is the common experience of mankind all the world over. It is, therefore, clear that when God saw that the light which had been made was of the same description which he had mentally determined to make, he declared it to be good. The conclusion, obviously, is that God had, before giving or formulating the word of command, formed a mental conception of light which he wanted to make, so that when light was made, he compared it with the 'image' in his mind, and finding the production good, felt satisfied and expressed his pleasure. The first step, then, in the creation of light was the mental image which had formed itself in the mind of the Lord. We have already seen that there was no one else at the time who could have obeyed his command, so that the Lord God must have obeyed it himself. This conclusion, however, renders it necessary for us to interpret the word, "said " in the text-"And God said let there be light,"- -so as to make it harmonize with the conclusions already drawn. The matter does not present any great difficulty, for, in the absence of any other being, God must have "said" to himself, which really comes to this that he thought of the existence of light, and held a mental image of it in his mind. The language of command is also significant in this connection. It was not "Do, or make," but "Let there be," indicating that it was not addressed to any one, but was a sort of soliloquy on the part of God. We also know that the material of which light was made came from the being of God him

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104 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. self, for there was nothing else at the time. Our three conclusions, therefore, are: (1) God held a mental image of light, (2) he thought of making a phenomenon after the image held in his mind, and (3) his own existence supplied the material which became our light, This is how light came into manifestation. There was the desire to create light, coupled with its image in the divine mind; and these constituted the essentials of manufacturing. The process of world-making, thus, amounted to the projection of an idea into an actuality of perception, and closely resembled the one by which our dreams are made. As a result of the foregoing analysis of the theistic theory of creation, we are entitled to say that what enables the Creator to create the universe is his power of image-making, that is, the faculty of Imagination. The Vedantist calls this image-making faculty of mind "maya ;" the Sufi calls it" kuwwat-z-khayal ;" and in English it is termed imagination. But whatever its name, it is the one and the only power that is creative in nature. Mind, or imagination, being, thus, the creative force in nature, it is easy to understand that the notion of the creation of an universe from nought would be directly strengthened by the phenomena of dreams, which immature reason is apt to regard as devoid of all pretensions to substantiveness, hence, as originating from pure nothing. It is a remarkable fact, and one which will have very far-reaching consequences, that while the

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CREATION. 105 Christian and Muslim theologians are prepared to go the length of holding matter to have been created from nothing, they do not regard it as any the less material for that reason. But if matter was created from nothing, it must be endowed with a reality born of nothingness ; and since mind or spirit is uncreate, the reality of a matter which is the progeny of nought can only be described as imaginary in comparison with that of spirit. Thus, the immediate and logical result of their belief about the origin of matter, would be the acceptance of the doctrine of Vedanta, which also describes the world as an illusion, i.e., a reality born of nothingness. As a result of the foregoing discussion, we may say that neither Idealism nor any other system of philosophy can ever hope to succeed in solving the world mystery, without first recognizing the existence of two fundamentally different kinds of substances, the conscious and the unconscious. The difficulty which stares the materialist in the face, however, is even greater than that which the Idealist has to overcome, since materialism cannot possibly aim higher than the attainment of peaceful repose in the grave, together with the extinction of all those high- and noble aspirations and hopes of the soul which alone go to make life worth living. If materialists would but push their enquiries to their legitimate end, they would not fail to see that matter, which is their only stock-in-trade, is . utterly incapable of discharging the functions of will, and force is equally helpless in carrying on the process of deliberation. We might, with advantage, refer to the following

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106 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. memorable words of one of the leading men of science, quoted by Sir Oliver Lodge " "It is worth any amount of trouble to...know by one's own knowledge the great truth...that the honest and rigorous following up of the argument which leads us to materialism' inevitably carries us beyond......If the materialist affirms that the universe and all its phenomena are resolvable into matter and motion, Berkeley replies, True; but what you call matter and motion are known to us only as forms of consciousness; their being is to be conceived or known; and the existence of a state of consciousness, apart from a thinking mind, is a contradiction in terms. I conceive this reasoning to be irrefragable. And, therefore, if I were obliged to choose between absolute materialism and absolute idealism, I should feel compelled to accept the latter alternative." The opposition to the idea that the world is a dreamlike affair arises only when we forget that the description does not affect the nature of existing substances themselves in any way, and that the difference between Idealism and Realism lies not in respect of the existence or non-existence of the world, but solely and simply in the words employed to express our notion of what exists. The denial of reality to the material world can never mean its total negation, or anything more than this that it is but a dream-like panorama composed of forms that dissolve, or begin to dissolve as soon as they are made, and of scenes which are impermanent and constantly changing. This changing and shifting aspect of things in nature is calculated to fill the mind with a sense of their impermanence, and may be likened to a dream for that reason. For, persistence being the test of reality, mind is apt to regard all that is impermanent as unreal. As Herbert Spencer points out : "By reality we mean persistence in consciousness: a persistence which is either unconditional, as our consciousness of space, or

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CREATION 107 which is conditional, as our consciousness of a body while grasping it. The real, as we conceive it, is distinguished solely by the test of persistence; for by this test we separate it from what we call the unreal. Between a person standing before us and the idea of such a person, we discriminate by our ability to expel the idea from consciousness and our inability, while looking at him, to expel the person from consciousness. And when in doubt as to the trustworthiness of some impression made on our eyes in the dusk, we settle the matter by observing whether the impression persists on closer inspection ; and we predicate reality if the persistence is complete. How truly persistence is what we mean by reality, is shown in the fact that when, after criticism has proved that the real as presented in perception is not the objectively real, the vague consciousness which we retain of the objectively real, is of something wbich persists absolutely, under all changes of mode, form or appearance. And the fact that we cannot form even an indefinite notion of the absolutely real, except as the absolutely persistent, implies that persistence is our ultimate test of the real, whether as existing under its unknown form or under the form known to us" (The First Principles). In the light of the above observations of the great English philosopher, it is easy to see that the objects of senses--whether we call them ideas or bodies--are impermanent and fleeting, hence, endowed only with a sort of relative reality as compared with the absolute persistence of substance. We may, therefore, call them mayavic (illusory), by way of a figure of speech. The error of the Idealist, on the other hand, lies in his giving undue prominence to his one-sided view of things based on a system of abstractions, and in his denial of concrete nature ; for while it is true that the universe consists of forms, i. e., bodies, which, from the point of view of the perceiving consciousness, are only sensations or ideas, it is no less true that these bodies, sensations, or ideas, differ from one another

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108 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. inter se, and, therefore, must be composed of some kind of material. And, since nothing alone can be created from nothing, this material which enters into the composition of bodies, ideas, sensations, or anything else that we may be pleased to call them, must be eternal. Hence, absolute persistence, i.e., reality, is also the characteristic of matter of which bodies are made, though not of the forms which it assumes from time to time, in consequence of the operation of the forces of nature. Thus, true Idealism, while describing the universe as an illusion, does not go the length of saying that it is altogether non-existent ; hence what it describes as an illusion is the same thing as is called the material world by the Realist. The immediate data of perception being sensation, it is immaterial whether we call the perceptible world a bundle of different kinds of sensations or of material bodies and things. It is true that sensations are only sense-affections, but it is also true that they mostly arise from the action of an external stimulus on the organs of sense. The existence of a world of some sort, apart from the perceiving consciousness, is, thus, beyond dispute, and even were we to go so far as to say that only sensations constitute the perceptible world, it must be conceded that different sensations differ inter se in respect of the elements which enter into their composition. This is but another way of saying that they are composed of some kind of material, which, for the sake of lucidity and uniformity of thought, may be called matter. Hence, when certain Idealists imagine that their philosophy implies the elimination of the

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CREATION 109 material universe, they conceive an impossibility, notwithstanding the fact that the proof of the existence of matter depends on its being perceived. '. It will save Idealism much trouble and humiliation to know that a fanatical insistence on the employment of wrong and inappropriate words in the description of things is only calculated to increase one's own difficulties, and that the use of such words as illusion and maya actually tends to shut it out from a large department of scientific thought without which truth cannot be definitely distinguished from its antithesis, the untruth. It is true that the knowledge of the soul is the primary source of the highest good from which materialism is debarred by its denial of the very existence of spirit, as a substance separate and distinct from matter ; but it is equally true that only that which is free from doubt, error and ignorance, the three constituents of falsehood, is termed knowledge, whose cause can never be furthered, but is always obstructed, by a false and vicious terminology. It is to be added that the materialist remains entangled in the meshes of delusion only so long as he does not recognise the nature of consciousness, and describes it as a product of matter. The moment he comes round to acknowledge consciousness as an independent reality, he will find the veil of matter, which is barring his further progress, torn away from before his eyes. He would then throw away his weights and measures, and scalpel and other instruments of research in the region of a purely material science, and find himself face to face with the Living Existence, and learn the truth. The Idealist

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110 imbued with the true spirit of enquiry, on the contrary, begins by owning allegiance to the Principle of Life from the very commencement, and thus avoids most of the laborious uphill work of the materialist. The one works in the light of Truth, while the other discards this method, and has necessarily to grope in the darkness of doubt and uncertainty. But the culmination or the crowning point of both the Realistic and the Idealistic philosophy, when carried to the ultimate issue, is the same, namely, "Life is God, and I am HE; or, as the Bible says, "I have said, ye are gods.' THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. First Cause. We may now take a bird's eye view of the different theories of creation which we have analyzed in the course of our investigation. The following tables will not only show, at a glance, the position and merit of each theory, but will also render the task of comparison an easy one. (A)-The Theistic account. God (a spirit). First Cause. God (a spirit). 1 (B)--The Hindu theory. Nature of the world-process. wr Creation by the word of command of a real material universe, or a making of something out of nothing. Nature of the world-process. John X: 34. Projection and final re-absorption of a real universe, in imitation of a spider's web.

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Causes. (C)-The Materialistic theory. CREATION. (1) Dead, unconscious matter, and (2) Forces of Nature. Cause. Sat-chit-ananda (consciousness). Nature of the world-process. (D-The Vedantic theory. 111 Evolution, in the course of which consciousness arises from dead matter, as miraculously as the creation of the world out of nothing. Nature of the world-process. Creation is caused by the mayashakti (the faculty of Imagination), and is consequently possessed of a dream-like reality only. Of the above, the theistic theory, set out in Table (A), is wrong because it contradicts the daily, human experience that out of nothing nothing comes. The Hindu theory, given in Table (B), is also defective, for it merely begs the question by pushing the duality of the seer and the seen into the spider-like belly of a gorging and disgorging Causa Causans of worlds. The position of the materialist, as shown in Table (C), is equally untenable. He confines his attention to the purely objective side of things, and loses sight of the subjective aspect with which Haeckel considers modern Monism to be quite compatible, and the logic of which is looked upon as simply irrefragable by Huxley. It is all very well to say that our modern Monism is quite compatible with the subjective side of the problem, but

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112 when is effect to be given to that admittedly unanswerable position? THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The Vedantic theory has already been dealt with fully, and needs but little comment here. Its monistic aspiration is foredoomed to failure, like that of the modern Monist, who claims to establish his Monism by joining matter and force with a hyphen. Even Berkeley must be supposed to have thrown up the brief when he introduced the idea of an universal mind, distinct and separate from the individual minds, though it is difficult to conceive how such an idea could ever find a place in his unbending Idealism; for the idea of the universal mind cannot but be a state of one's own consciousness, and, as such, no more an independent reality than the material world which is also known as a state of the perceiving mind. To sum up, consciousness is a reality independent of matter, and in no sense its product. It is eternal, having neither beginning nor end. The universe is eternal, too, and contains material forms which are subject to evolution and change. Matter is also uncreate and eternal. The materialistic theory, culminating in the grand doctrine of Evolution, is necessarily imperfect, one-sided and undignified. It is imperfect, because it ignores the existence of spirit; onesided, because it confines its survey to the objective side of things; and undignified, because it insults the Living Reality by treating it as a product of dead matter. The theologian is wrong, because he has no true conception of God, because he ascribes an origin to the universe, and because he insists on the creation of

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CREATION. things out of nothing. It is he who is responsible for making religion a butt of ridicule and contempt for the scientific world. When properly understood, religion and science would work hand in hand, without a possibility of friction, which is always the result of unreasonableness on the part of the former, and of a hasty, and, for that reason, necessarily imperfect investigation, on that of the latter. 113

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CHAPTER III. GOD. "He who knoweth his own self knoweth God."-Sayings of Mahomed. "Thou canst not see the seer of seeing, thou canst not hear the hearer of hearing, thou canst not comprehend the comprehender of comprehending, thou canst not know the knower of knowing."Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, 3. 4. 2. Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa used to illustrate the difficulty of God-knowledge by likening God to an infinite mountain of sugar and the sages to ants, who could not be imagined as eating up the whole mountain. "Sukhdeva and other holy sages were at best ants of the largest sort. If we say that they were able to eat up eight or ten particles of the sugar, we have said enough in their favour. It is just as absurd to say that God the absolute has been known and comprehended by anybody, as it is to say that a mountain of sugar has been carried home by some ants to be eaten up." The Hindus have always maintained that God, being the knower, cannot himself be known, because the knowing subject can never become the object of knowledge. But while it is true that God cannot be subjected to the microscope, the scalpel and other similar instruments of investigation in the phenomenal world, it is not beyond the human understanding to get a * See Max Muller's Philosophy of Vedanta,' pages 61-71.

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115 tolerably accurate idea of him and his virtues and attributes by a careful analysis and critical survey of the available facts and material. GOD, The word God is used in several different senses by mankind, though, so far as we are aware, no attempt has been made by any philosopher or theologian to explain its different significances hitherto. Some of these significances may be put down as follows: (1) the notion of Consciousness in the abstract, taken as an all-pervading Essence, or Existence; (2) the idea of a liberated Soul, and collectively of all the liberated Souls, who reside above the realm of 'illusion,' that is, high up above the universe of name and form, hence the Most High; (3) the notion of the creative principle, the 'kuwwati-khayal', or Imagination; (4) the notion of a man-like personal Creator; and (5) the conception of the creative logoi, that is, thoughts of the all-pervading, unmanifest Essence, the Spirit of God. Of these, the first two are to be found in almost all systems of religion, though generally hidden behind allegory and metaphor, the third is based on a psychological and metaphysical analysis of the functions of mind, the fourth is a pure dogma of ignorant superstition, and the last is a personification of ideas, or the collective aspect of jnana. As instances of the first type, we might mention Allah, from al and lah, the secret one,' and Brahman, the unrevealed, as distinguished from Brahma, the revealed, Godhead, the Father who cannot be known unless revealed by the Son (Luke X. 22). The *

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116 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Biblical elohim, and the Arabic ilah furnish instances of the second, and Word, Logos, Ishvara and Brahma of the fifth significance of God. The use of the pronoun 'we' with reference to God is also indicative of the second class. As regards the significance of the words elohim and zlah, we may refer to the 'Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics' (Vol. VI. p. 248), which points out: * The word Ilah (identical with the eloah of Job).........appears from its form to be originally a plural, and, indeed, of the earlier Semitic il (Heb. el), on the analogy of shifah from shaf-at, 'lip' (where the at is a feminine affix). Of ilah itself the Biblical elohim is a further plural, of which, curiously, there appears to be a trace in the Arabic vocative of Allah, viz., illahumma, which the native grammarians find the greatest difficulty in explaining." The fact that the word Allah is traceable to two different roots indicates the comprehensive nature of the derivation ; it does not contradict either of the two views which, as will be fully shown, in a later chapter, are the two aspects of truth. As a matter of fact, the primary root of the word seems to be the sound el, represented by the letter , the Sanskrit la, which is an epithet of Indra, a poetic personification of Life, the hidden Light, i.e., consciousness. According to Harold Bayley, "The word huyl is equal to heol, haul, or houl, the Celtic name for the Sun. It is seemingly from heol, the eternal El, that we derive our adjectives hale, whole, and holy. The Teutonic for Holy is hel, heli, heil, or ala, i.e., Ella, God that has existed for ever, the All and the Whole. In apparently all languages the word signifying holy has. been derived from the divinely honoured sunlight."* El, thus, like lah, is a symbol for the hidden light divine. Mr. Bayley has traced many words containing ** The Lost Language of Symbolism,' Vol. I. p. 329.

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GOD. 117 this simple sound, el, to their primitive roots, of which we need only refer to Israel here. "It is obvious," writes Mr. Bayley, " that Jeshurun or Israel' refers frequently to something more than an historic tribe of Semitic demon-worshippers, and that Israel, he or she, is sometimes a personification of the individual soul wandering in the wilderness. I suggest that the name Israel resolves itself naturally into Is, the light of,' ra, 'the eternal Sun which has existed for ever,' and El, the First Cause, the principle or beginning of all things. The poetic * Israel' thus appears as an extension of the name Ezra, 'Rising of Light,' and as another personification of the Divine Essence, Light, or Colony in the soul."* Thus, Allah is the 'hidden flame,'t the eternal, uncreate, conscious Essence, which is manifested in the Ilah or Elohim, whether we take the word to be Al-lah or a contraction of Al-ilah. As regards the notion of a plurality of Gods implied in the epithet, it would be premature to enter into its explanation at this stage ; we shall, therefore, reserve it for a more fitting occasion. Meanwhile, we may proceed with our enquiry into the general idea of God. The etymological significance of the word God is not quite clear, but in Old Norse or Icelandic, the oldest of the Scandinavian group of tongues, we find it applied * to heathen deities (neuter and almost always plural), and afterwards changed to gud, to signify God' (The Imperial Dictionary). Possibly, the word is resolvable into the following primitive sounds :(i) g, signifying gigantic, or infinite, as in Gog, Magog, * The Lost Language of Symbolism,' Vol. I. p. 284, A flame itself is the summation of a large number of luminous points.

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118 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (ii) o, expressing wholeness, or perfection, and (iii) d, meaning brilliant, as in Odin, Diana, Dyaus, and the like. According to Mr. Bayley, the letter g was understood by the mystics as meaning self-existent, o as signifying the Perfect one, and d as representing brilliancy. Hence, in mystic philology, the word God probably means an eternal, self-existent, but hidden Essence of the nature of Light, i.e., Consciousness, which is the source of inner illumination. The Persian Khuda, is really Khud-a, khud implying self and a, from 'ayinda,' a comer. The idea is that of a self-subsistent being or substance, and expresses the attribute of sourcelessness. Hence, the Persian conception of God is that of Consciousness or Life, which is its own source. The word would have also applied to matter and other existing substances, no doubt, had it not been for the fact that consciousness is entitled to precedence over them, on the ground that it is necessary for their perception. The highly interesting title or name of Jehovah (a corruption of Jahweh, literally, the living Reality),+ the epithet 'I am,' is also grounded on a similar conception of Consciousness or Life, and is an instance of what is known to the Jaina Philosophers as bhava nikshepa.++ For divinity being an * See 'The Lost Language of Symbolism.' Vol. II, pages 364 and 365. + See The Lost Language of Symbolism,' Vol. I. p. 302. Nikshepa bears reference to the method of naming beings and things, and is of four kinds as follows: (1) at random (nama nikshepa), e.g., calling a man Wolf, Krishna and the like;

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GOD. 119 inalienable attribute of Life, and Life being characterised by be-ing, God may be described as that which is. If we were to put these words in the mouth of Life, personified as God, they would become 'I am,' or 'I am that am,' that is, 'I am he who is. Accordingly, we find in nearly all the scriptures of the world God revealing his name as 'I am. Sometimes when emphasis is to be laid on the indefinable nature of Life, the 'I am' becomes 'I am that I am.' In the Zoroastrian faith, one of the most secret names of the Almighty is "Ahmi" (I am). So is "Ahmi yat ahmi" (I am that I am).* In the Old Testament, God is said to have revealed his name to Moses, saying, "I am that I am," and to have directed him to tell the people of Israel: " I am' hath sent me unto you" (Exodus, III. 14). So, also, in the Hindu Scriptures the Absolute is known by the great ineffable name of " Soham Asmi" (I am he who is).+ The Sanskrit, ' Asmi yad asmi' is literally, 'I am That I am.'i Jesus Christ also used "I am" in reference to Life (2) with reference to some special attribute previously trans ferred to the object (sthapana nikshepa), e.g., calling the pieces of wood used in chess-play knights, bishops, and so forth; (3) with reference to the potentiality residing in the thing, (darvya nikshepa) e.g., calling a raja's son raja ; and (4) with reference to function or calling (bhava nikshepa), e.g., to nickname a person devotee because of his performing devotion, * Isis Unveiled, Vol. ii, page 221 ; Avesta, XVII. 4 and 6. f Isavasya Upanishad, 16. I See The Fountain-Head of Religion' by Ganga Prasad.

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120 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. when he said, "Before Abraham was I am," meaning ""I am " was before Abraham.' Surely this is much more than an accidental concurrence of thought and expression, and betrays a substratum of sound philosophy underlying all rational systems of Religion, and, in all probability, a common origin as well. It is to be observed, however, that the original conception of Godhood, as disclosed by the etymology of the words employed as names of God, does not contain anything like the idea of a creator within it; nor do we find within its four corners aught that might be deemed to countenance the theologian's attribution of a man-like resolving and repenting personality to their deity. No wonder, then, that modern thinkers, finding the adulterated concept of the present day theology inconsistent with rational thought, have been led to reject the idea of God altogether. The controversy has centered itself round a sort of watch-maker which represents the theological conception of the Creator. Just as by seeing a watch one comes to the conclusion that there is a watch-maker who made it, so by seeing the universe, the theologian jumps to the conclusion that there is a man-like worldmaker whose handiwork it must be, and, in his eagerness to support his cause, does not hesitate to deny the evidence of his own senses. It is but poor philosophy and worse theology which has to depend on falsehood, to prove its propositions. We should fairly admit what is evident to all, and endeavour to get at truth at all costs, including even the destruction of the fondly cherished 'idols' of prejudice.

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GOD. It has already been established in the last chapter that the notion of a creation of the world is unentertainable for rational thought; but it has not yet been ascertained whether God be the creator of individuals or not? We shall, therefore, investigate this matter before proceeding any further. The first question which arises in connection with the idea of creation is, why should God take the trouble to make anything at all? This has been answered differently by different systems. One system suggests that he wanted to make the world because it pleased him to do so; another, that he felt lonely and wanted company; a third, that he wanted to create beings who would praise his glory and worship him; a fourth, that he did it in sport, and so on. But with the exception of the last one, taken in a limited sense, which will become apparent presently, none of these answers is to the point or satisfactory. It is necessary to note at the very outset that if God is full and perfect in himself, he cannot have any desires.or unsatisfied cravings in him; for blissfulness, which must be an attribute of 121 *Those who ascribe anger to their God forget that anger is not an attribute of Godhood, since God must be presumed to be happy, and since anger is the antithesis of happiness, as it only arises when things do not happen as they should, and thereby upset the equilibrium and serenity of mind. Hence, he who is angry cannot be happy at the same time. Now, if it be true that God sees all things, he must see, every moment of his life, the full panorama of human wickedness and sin, sufficient, at times, by its bare description to make one's blood boil with indignation. It would follow that if he be an irritable god, he would hardly ever have a moment's peace of mind, to say nothing of happiness, for himself. But a being who has no moments of happiness in his life, can hardly be of any use to anyone else as a God. Himself in need of happiness, he certainly cannot confer it on others. It follows, therefore, that anger can have no place in the consciousness of God.

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122 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Godhood, only means a state of consciousness in which there is not only a knowledge of perfection and fulness in one's own self, but an absence of all desires as well. Hence, if God sought pleasure in the homage of his creatures, he could not be happy in himself, since his happiness would then depend on the being and actions of others. Moreover, it is a blot on omniscience to say that it could not foresee that happiness could not be had form the company of unhappy mortals. How could an all-wise, omniscient God expect ignorant, niserable wretches, as most of us undoubtedly are, to offer him the devotion of our bleeding hearts, particularly as we know, on the authority of Deism itself, that if. he had not created us there would have been no suffering and sorrow for us? Again, if the creator be omnipotent, as he is supposed to be, why should it please him to create a world where sorrow and pain are the inevitable lot of his creatures ? Why should he not make happier beings to keep him company, if company be what he desires ? These are some of the objections to the replies given by the various systems of theology, and their force is only too evident to be ignored. The Bhagavad Gita, fully alive to the fact that desire implies a longing for making up some deficiency or filling up a gap in one's mind, and, therefore, unable to attribute even the desire for creation to its Godhead, endeavours to steer clear of the difficulty by making the creative activity a function of the Essence of God. It makes the Lord say :- "All beings, o Kaunteya, enter My Lower Nature at the end of

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123 a world-age; at the beginning of a world-age, again, I emanate them. Hidden in nature which is Mine Own, I emanate again and again all this multitude of beings, helpless by the force of Nature. Under Me as Supervisor, Nature sends forth the moving and unmoving; because of this the universe revolves. Nor do these works bind Me...enthroned on high, unattached to action." The Qur'an also declares :-- "His throne is extended over the heavens and the earth, and the care of them burdeneth him not." (Chap. II.) GOD. The idea conveyed is that creation is not the outcome of a deliberate effort on the part of God, but results from his functional activity, so that no desire can be attributed to him for world-making. In this sense it is that worldmaking is said to be the lila (sport) of the Lord. But this is fatal to theology, for the 'Lord of lila' is not a being, but a power, the same which makes the world of dreams for us while we sleep, namely, the faculty of Imagination, or the image-making function of Life. Later on we shall see that thought is a tremendous power at the disposal of man which he has only to understand and utilise, in order to have a mastery over the empire of nature. The Secret Doctrine' has it: "The one source of form--the mysterious power of thought which enables it to produce external, perceptible, phenomenal results by its own inherent energy." The author of the Gospel of St. John also writes: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.... All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made which was made....And the Word was made flesh." Concerning the derivation of the word Brahman, which is the name Vedanta gives to the Absolute, Prof. Max Muller maintains that it seems to have originally meant that which bursts or breaks forth, whether in the

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124 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. shape of thought and word, or in that of creative power or physical force (The Vedanta Philosophy, pages 22 and 142). Imagination, or Mind, taken in the abstract, that is, as a quality common to all souls, then, is the Creator of theology. For this reason almost all the religions of the mystical type describe God as an all-pervading Essence. The Bhagavad Gita also has it: "By Me all this world is pervaded in My unmanifested aspect; all beings have root in Me, I am not rooted in them. Behold My Sovereign Yoga ! the support of beings, yet not rooted in beings, Myself their efficient cause. As the mighty air moving everywhere is rooted in ether, so all beings rest rooted in Me. Thus know thou." To the same effect is the statement in the Foly Bible : "Behold, the heaven and heaven of heavens cannot contain thee" (1 Kings, VIII. 27), St. Paul, too, had the idea of divine immanence in his mind, wben he said* :-- "In him we live and move and have our being.". If we now analyse the idea disengaged from its mystic setting, we shall discover that divine immanence implies neither more nor less than the immanence of a genus or species among the individuals falling within its scope ; that is the presence of an element of abstraction among those from whom it has been separated off in thought. It is thus clear that the idea of an anthropomorphic Creator is in no way acceptable to reason. This argument would have ordinarily been sufficient to dispose of the point, but as deep-rooted prejudices have become associated with the notion of a personal creator, we * See The Acts XVII. 28.

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GOD. 125 shall examine the doctrine still further to lay bare the error of theology. The theologian, with his notions of an anthropomorphic Architect of the world, thinks that souls are made by God to inhabit the dwellings of flesh which he also makes for them. This amounts to saying that each and every soul is created there and then to inhabit an organism as it is made, so that it is in no way responsible for its being, condition and environment, having had no manner of 'hand' in their designing and making. Thus, if a soul is born ignorant, it is not its fault; for it was so created by its God. But the question is : why should an Omnipotent Creator create ignorant souls and then be constantly sending down prophets and saviours for their enlightenment, and suffer contradictory doctrines to be circulated amongst them, so that, ordinarily, it should be well nigh impossible to know the truth? This is by no means all, for the crowning act of this comedy of errors, we are told, will take place on the Judgment Day, when the same Just and Omnipotent God will sit in Judgment to judicially determine and pronounce upon the errors and shortcomings of men, and will punish or reward them according to their deeds ; and lo! the rewards and punishments shall be eternal. It would further seem that the plea of ignorance would not be allowed, so that a soul could not plead that the understanding which it had received failed to prove to its satisfaction that the teaching of Mahomed, the Prophet, was entitled to greater credence than the doctrine of Christ, the Son, or vice versa. And what of him wha dies in his mother's womb ? Alas! even he must appear

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126 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to be punished or rewarded on the Judgment Day, and to be sent to heaven or hell, for there is no third place for souls to go to in the Cosmogony of popular Theism. Why should it be sent to one place rather than the other, seems to be a matter of pure arbitrary will, in the absence of any rules for the exercise of a judicial discretion. But this is sufficiently absurd to be acceptable to reason. With due respect to our beloved brethren who put their faith in these doctrines, we are constrained to observe that notions such as these might have passed for good sense or sound philosophy in the dark days of the medieval period, but that in the twentieth century of our civilization intelligent people have a right to expect consistent reason rather than a torrent of chaotic speech from those who set themselves up as the spiritual teachers of men. : Be this as it may, the main point is, whether it is l'easonable to ascribe the creation of souls to a god ? As to this the following argument, it is hoped, might suffice to cure us of our mad infatuation for the notion of creation of simple substances which cannot be deemed to be otherwise than as eternally existing in nature. - If soul is spirit, either God manufactures it out of his own body, for he is said to be pure spirit, or out of a lump of spiritual clay' which he might possess.* But, in the first case, each created soul would go to reduce the being of God, which is absurd, since God * It is worth noticing that it is simply impossible for a real, that is to say, simple individuality or being, to divide itself, since a simple substance is not liable to division or disruption, having no parts which might be separated off from one another.

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GOD. 127 is unchanging and immutable; and in the second, that is, on the assumption that God is possessed of a lump of spiritual "clay' from which he manufactures souls, this lump of spiritual 'clay' must be either composed of atoms, or be non-atomistic in its nature. If the former, then each spiritual atom is already in existence as a spirit, and the attribution of its creation to God is purely gratuitous. Nor can it be maintained that the Almighty God forms spirits by combining several ' atoms' of this spiritual stuff, for spirit is a simple substance. On the latter hypothesis--that the spiritual clay' is non-atomistic in its structure-it would not be possible to break it up into smaller spirits, for that would be inconsistent with the nature of the substance itself. The only other hypothesis of a creation from 'nothing' is not admissible in philosophy. The nature of spirit is evident from the nature of God, who is said to be a spirit and uncreate. Now, since the nature of substances does not vary to suit individual beliefs, it follows that if spirit is uncreate in the case of God, it must be so in all other cases. Hence, all the souls are eternal and uncreate, that is, self-subsistent. It will pay us more than we may be prepared to acknowledge at this stage to know that so far as the attributes pertaining to the substance of being are concerned, divinity can differ in no particular from any ordinary soul; for just as gold is gold all over the world, whether we come across it in the Himalayas or the prairies of North America, so is spirit never anything else but spirit howsoever and wheresoever it be found. Thus, 10 difference is possible between things formed of one

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128 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and the same substance except with reference to the element of impurity which may be found to be attaching to one individual and not to another. And this is precisely the difference between God and man; the one being pure spirit, fully evolved out into perfection, and the other still weltering in the filth of sin and uncleanliness. Hence is God the ideal of perfection for the imagination of man, whose inner essence is no less pure and divine and also uncreate than that of Him whom he worships to attain salvation. We must now ascertain if God can be said to be the maker of bodies. Here also theology has nothing more than the old analogy of a watch-maker to advance in support of its doctrine, and nothing to say in reply to the objections that arise against it. To begin with, how is it that so much precious time is wasted in the course of gestation ? An Almighty God decides to make a being, but why is his order not obeyed at once? Again, God decides to make the being, but the latter comes to an end in many instances in a fatal condition. The question is, is his death due to the action of some other power, or did the Lord God change his mind in the middle of the process of manufacturing? If the former, we are landed in further difficulties, because the destroying power is apparently more powerful than the creator, as it can override his commands. If the latter, God must be a whimsical, capricious, changeable being, wanting in force of character and dignity, and devoid of respect for his own decrees. Thus, in the one case the attempt of the creator fails on account of his impotence, and in the other, owing to his fickle-mindedness.

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GOD. This alone is sufficient to show that the idea of creation is altogether an untenable one. The evidence or appearance of design, which is the strongest argument in favour of the theory of creation, is more than counterbalanced by the evidence of imperfections all round. If the pious theologian would only reflect on the problem calmly, he would soon perceive that his explanation-that God is the maker of the body-does not tally with his own notion of the dignity of his Supreme Being, whom he thus hastily puts at the beck and call, not only of every virtuous couple but of all those who sin in adultery, fornication and incest as well. If God unequivocally condemns-and theology assures us that he does -certain departures from the code of sexual purity laid down by him, how can he be accredited with the creation of children born in consequence of a violation of his own commandments? To make him bless and fructify the very act which he emphatically condemns is to put him in the category of maniacs and babes. The theologian might now take refuge behind the angels, and maintain that they are responsible for the making of the body, but the angels only do the will of the 'Father,' so that the making of the child in every case of adultery, fornication and incest must be sanctioned by him. 129 Besides, it would be interesting to know how God makes a body-with his hands, like any ordinary labourer, or without them, i.e., by a mere word of command? If we now say that he makes it with his hands, then an infinity of hands are required to make all the infinity of bodies of all kinds of living beings, in the 9

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130 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. entire universe ; but this is absurd, since he can only be all hands* and nothing else on this hypothesis. Neither is the dignity of a God enhanced or made manifest by his keeping his hands constantly for the full period of embryonic growth, in such unholyt places as some of the wombs-in such cases at least where the female does not resent the visit of the male after conception-must necessarily be. The other alternative is equally untenable, since there is no connection of cause and effect between the word of God and the making of an organism. Furthermore, if an outside agency were to create the body, it would not be an organism but a manufactured article ; for its making would proceed from periphery to centre. Hence, it is impossible for God himself to make an organism unless from within, in which case he would have to become the 'soul' of the creature itself; but that would be fatal to the position taken up by Deistic theology. Further reflection enables us to perceive that the creation of the physical organism can be ascribed to the agency of a God only in one of the two following ways: either he starts with the soul as a centre and then plasters it over with matter, or makes the body, in the first instance, in the same way as a man makes a house, and puts in the soul to inbabit it. But in either case * According to more advanced theologians God has no hands at all. This argument also disposes of the untenable notion that God's agency is needed for the doing of all that is done under the sun. We then have God not only growing grass, germinating seeds, and mandfacturing milk in the mammaries of the female, but also making such unsightly, althy things as pus, saliva, urine and faeces in the human and animal organisms! But this is too ridiculous to be entertained.

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GOD. 131 the soul would be unable to act through the body or to feel its affections as its own, since the warmth of actual intimacy would be lacking in both cases. In order that the soul should feel with the body, it must constantly expand with its growing size, so that at each moment of development there should be a complete harmony between the tenement and its tenant. The phenomenon of growth does not imply the plastering over of the soul with matter, nor does it resemble the occupation of a house by its lessee ; it is the result of absorption and assimilation of the necessary material by the tenant' himself. One has only to look at the process of growth and development of organic beings to be convinced of this fact. It follows, therefore, that the physical organism cannot possibly be made unless the soul itself becomes the builder thereof. The only other alternative left to deistic theology is to say that God only supervises the making of the body, but this also involves the acknowledgment of the soul's capacity to make its own body, since we cannot train stones into masons. Besides, when we look at the cases of malformation and deformity, to say nothing of those instances in which the child dies before birth, and of the inequalities of the material bodies in respect of physical and mental capacities, the conclusion that the making of the body cannot be the work of a perfect and impartial Architect becomes irresistible and unavoidable. These difficulties vanish from our path the moment we recognize the soul to be its own God, and the maker of its own body. Thus, while, on the one hand, the text of the Scripture-that God makes the body-loses not a tittle of its true, philosophical

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132 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. import, the imperfections of the body and inequalities of surroundings, circumstances and conditions, on the other, are accounted for by the mechanical nature of the process and the differences of 'seeds' and 'wombs' arising from the influence of past karmas of the soul. . Apart from the above, the theologian's notion of a resolving and repenting Supreme Being, making things and repenting of it is unentertainable on the additional ground of being in diametrical opposition to the idea of perfection, which is the essential attribute of the Deity. We are liable to err because of our imperfections, but he who is Eternal and Ompiscient, and to whom the past, the present and the future are like an open book, does not need experience to teach him wisdom. The fol, lowing from the " Psychic Phenomena " is relevant to the subject under consideration : "We are so accustomed to boast of the God-like reason' with which man is endowed, that the position that the subjective mind the soul-of man is incapable of exercising that function, in what we regard as the highest form of reasoning, seems, at first glance, to be a limitation of the intellectual power of the soul, and inconsistent with what we have been accustomed to regard as the highest attributes of human intelligence, But a moment's reflection will develop the fact that this apparent limitation of intellectual power is, in reality, a God-like attribute of mind. God himself cannot reason inductively. Inductive reason pre-supposes an inquiry, a search after knowledge, an effort to arrive at correct conclusions regarding something of which we are ignorant. To suppose God to be an enquirer, a seeker after knowledge, by finite processes of reasoning, is a concep. tion of the Deity which negatives his omniscience, and measures infinite intelligence by purely finite standard. For our boasted "God-like reason' is of the earth, earthy. It is the noblest attribute of the finite mind, it is true, but it is essentially finite. It is the outgrowth of an objective existence." What is said of the finite processes of reasoning also

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3. GOD. 133 holds good of experience, so that a bungling, blundering creator cannot possibly be regarded as an Omniscient God. The perfection of God which must be full in all respects is, thus, incompatible with the notion of a resolving and repenting deity, creating wretched, ignorant weaklings of humanity, and insisting on their offering him the devotion of their bleeding and unconvinced hearts. The true Godhead, therefore, must consist of a Being or Beings, who have risen above the weaknesses of the passionate, human nature which modern theology - attributes to its Deity. For the same and similar reasons Divinity can have also nothing to do with what is called the management of the world. To what earthly--or, for the matter of that, even heavenly--purpose can he whose being is the purest expression of holiness of the most exalted 'type constitute himself a manager of the world ? Governorship and holiness, surely, do not go well together, however much a flattering tongue might delight in describing certain kings as holy ; for holiness is not constituted by virtuous deeds, which mark the limit of a householder's dharma (proper conduct), and only begins with sannyasa (renunciation). Hence, no one who has not turned his back on the world--and he who actually governs it cannot be said to have done so--is entitled to be considered holy. As to God's purpose, it must surely be in the nature of a mare's nest if even with his omnipotence he has not been able to overcome the obstacles in his path by this time ; or the fault must lie with his omniscience if it has failed to warn him that he is thinking of achieving it

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134 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. a bit too soon. Neither do the facts speak much in favour of the quality of omnipotence supposed to be enjoyed by this Supreme Ruler of worlds. For what should we think of an ordinary police officer if he fail to stretch his hand to protect a man knowing that a robber is going to kill him with the sword ? To punish the guilty is certainly just, but should we justify the constable who stands by and does nothing to save the victim ? And, if it would be unpardonably wrong in an ordinary constable to behave in this manner, how much worse would it be in a being who is all-knowing and omnipotent to allow such an outrage to be perpetrated ? If we do not wilfully refuse to look at the facts, we shall perceive that life is only too full of calamities and catastrophes, most of which could certainly be avoided if nature were under the guidance of an all-knowing, all-powerful and merciful God. As Mr. Joseph McCabe tersely puts it in his Bankruptcy of Religion (p. 34), "What would you think of the parent who would stand by and see his daughter grossly outraged, while fully able to prevent it? And would you be reconciled if the father proved to you that his daughter had offended his dignity in some way?" Torrential downpours in oceans and deserts when a timely drop is elsewhere needed to avert a widespread famine, wholesale destruction of life, regardless of age, sex and innocence, by pestilence and sword, extensive devastations by earthquake and flood, causing untold suffering to living beings--all bear powerful witness to their causation being determined by natural law, but not by a Supreme Merciful Intelligence, able to crush all opposition, of any kind whatsoever, from his path. Our conclusion, then, is that the notion of the Supreme

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GOD. 135 Being as a Governor of the universe is as baseless and irrational as the wild conjecture that divinity consists in the creation of a world. We must now turn our attention to the popular misconception about the immateriality of spirit which is, as often as not, taken to mean a denial of all substantiveness to it. That the idea of absolute immateriality is contradicted everywhere by nature, needs no demonstration ; for that which exists must have a concrete existence which is unthinkable apart from substantiveness of some kind or other. Wherever there is existence in nature, there is occupation of space; and wherever there is occupation of space, there is substantiveness of some kind or other. To conceive a state of existence to the contrary is not possible for the intellect. As Herbert Spencer maintains with reference to centres of force : "Not only are centres of force devoid of extension unimaginable, but we cannot imagine either extended or unextended centres of force to attract and repel other such centres at a distance, without the intermediation of some sort of matter" (The First Principles). These observations of Herbert Spencer apply with full force to all conceptions of existence without some sort of extension ; for that which exists must exist in some part or other of the infinite space, so that what does not exist therein is a pure invention of imagination. But that which exists in space must occupy some part of it, and, therefore, must have a substratum of substantiveness as the basis of its existence. It is impossible to conceive even consciousness apart from a substratum of substantiveness. It may be that we shall never learn what the substance of consciousness is like, but to con

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136 sider it as an existence without substantiveness is simply out of the question. The word 'spirit' seems to have furnished a license for all sorts of rabid and fanciful speculation to unphilosophical theologians of the middle ages, and even to-day the vast majority of our race seem quite uncertain as to its precise significance. As a consequence of this philosophical obscurity which has gathered round the word, the term 'spirit' has become a prolific source of error and dispute. The idea that God is a spirit, when examined from the standpoint of rationalism, does not mean that he is altogether immaterial, but merely this that the substance which constitutes his being is not of the same kind as that of which the physical bodies are made. By the immateriality of spirit intellect understands, not that which is devoid of all substratum of materiality, or substantiveness, but that which is not matter in the popular sense. Hence, it is repugnant to intellect to maintain God to be devoid of all substantiveness what soever. The idea of space-occupation in the case of spirit is to be understood in the same way as that in which light occupies space. As the light of a lamp exists in space, but does not offer obstruction to other lights in illumining, hence occupying, the same space, so does spirit, being finer than light itself, occupy space, but not so as to interfere with other things; and just as the glances of an infinite number of living beings can be concentrated on a point in space, so can an infinity of spiritual entities, that is, souls, exist in one place. The idea of infinity in relation to divinity is the next to THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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GOD. 137 demand our attention. It is sometimes surmised by enm that God is an all-pervading existence, even Vedanta holding its Brahman to be actually omni-present in the physical sense. But the idea is not in consonance with reason in any sense. For none of the two ways in which we can conceive the existence of God--that is, as an individual being, or an essence--can ever make him coincide with boundless space. As regards the former, it is sufficient to say that our conception of a living being is so radically different from the notions we have of space, that it would be an act of self-deceiving legerdemain on the part of fantasy to imagine their coinciding in respect of physical extension. This objection also holds good with regard to the omni-presence of God as an essence, which is further inadmissible on the ground that it is not in the nature of a metaphysical abstraction to enjoy general pervasion in the spatial sense. However choice the words that might be used to describe its conception in our minds, howsoever elegant the phrases we might employ in alluding to it, the fact remains that our notion of the quality of consciousness is a metaphysical abstraction, out and out, and is as unthinkable as a self-subsisting substance as matter apart from the multitude of atoms which really and truly represent all that nature acknowledges to be valid in our notion of materiality, i.e., matter. And, if nature does not allow matter to have a wider pervasion than the limits of a solitary atom, would it allow consciousness to extend its dominion beyond the four corners of the soul ? The metaphysician who hopes to steal a march on this wide-awake' divinity' through

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138 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the tortuous by-paths of convenient unifications and purely wordy abstractions, may learn once for all that he can never succeed in turning the order of things as it is being observed in existence, but only in perverting his own mental vision to perceive what is straight as crooked. A slight trimming of the wick of intellectualism will enable us to perceive, though we might continue to wear the coloured spectacles of prejudice, that even this pervasion which is secured for God by means of what might be termed the mind-befogging shells of reason predetermined to unreasoning bias, is not what we have been aspiring for all along, falling short, as it does, by far, of the aimed at pinnacle of absolute omni-presence, conceived to be---rightly or wrongly, it matters not howan essential element in the constitution of divinity. For the pervasion of consciousness is limited to conscious substance which is not inclusive of matter. The classification of substance in the following tabulated form will be useful as illustrating the point for the benefit of those not having expert familiarity with the science of mental abstractionism. Substance. Conscious substance Unconscious substance, (spirit). i.e., matter, ether, etc. A glance here suffices to show that conscious substance is only a part of the genus substance, and, therefore, cannot be identified with it. Hence, even if it were possible by some method of intellectual jugglery to convert metaphysics into physics by treating a pure

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GOD. 139 abstraction as a concrete reality, the distinction between genus and species would not permit the levelling of all differences en bloc. It is thus evident that the idea of God's omni-presence is unentertainable in a physical sense. To understand the true nature of the type of infinity ascribed to consciousness, it is well to bear in mind that the word infinity is used in three different senses, namely, firstly, to denote the idea of boundlessness, as in the case of Space ; secondly, to express the sense of numerical immensity, which signifies the countlessness and inexhaustibility of number, as in the case of moments of Time, or particles of matter; and, thirdly, to convey the idea of limitlessness of Thought, so utterly devoid of anything in the nature of limits or boundary walls as to be incapable of being considered finite by any manner of means. Now, we have seen that the infinity of God is not of the first type, so the question which remains to be solved is : whether he be infinite in any or both of the remaining two ways ? But the second type is also inappropriate to him, since no one can be said to be infinite in the numerical sense of the word. This leaves us with the third kind alone, which, however, is the actual type of infinity appertaining to divinity. . The infinity of God is proved by the fact of his being pure spirit, that is, consciousness, free from all kinds of impurities in which the unemancipated souls are involved ; and the infinity of consciousness is apparent from the fact that it is endowed with the power to know all things, as well as from the nature of

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140 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. knowledge which is a synonym for it. Now, because knowledge is capable of infinite expansion and amplitude, and contains the germ of infinity in itself, consciousness cannot but be infinite by nature. Hence, the purest form of consciousness must be endowed with perfect omniscience, that is to say, with knowledge unlimited by Time or Space. It is not to be supposed that the denial of the spatial type of infinity to divinity in any way detracts from the holiness or perfection of the most High ; on the contrary, the expression would be deprived of its true meaning if applied to one who is diffused all over. Holiness and perfection, it will be seen, have no dependence on boundlessness of size-else those of a gigantic stature would all be perfect and holy--but on freedom from impurities of karmas, that is, sin. The reason for the attribution of omni-presence to God is to be found in the tendency of the human mind which delights in the employment of exaggerating metaphor. Because God's omniscience enables him to know all things of all times and of all places, he is, as if it were, present everywhere. A metaphor like this has only to become sufficiently known to be rid of the irksome demand on understanding, latent in the accompanying qualifying phrase, when the 'un-initiated' are sure to interpret it in a strictly literal sense. We must now endeavour to ascertain whether omniscience and bliss be actually the attributes of divinity, as they are said to be, or not. As to this only a little reflection is necessary to perceive that they both appertain to the nature of the individual soul, and, therefore,

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GOD. 141 cannot but appertain to God who stands for the perfection of the best in man. Firstly, in respect of perfection in knowledge, that is assured by the fact that the soul is pure consciousness whose function is to know, and because all things are knowable by nature. Consciousness being the very nature of the substance of the soul, and all things being knowable by nature, omniscience, full and perfect, must be predicated in respect of the essential nature of each and every individual. Ready assent will be lent to this proposition by any one who would give full effect to the fact that all things are knowable by nature, which means not that there is nothing unknown to us today, but that that which will never be known by any one at all is nonexistent; for that which will never be known to any one will never be known, much less proved, to be existing, and without strict proof existence cannot be conceded in favour of anything whatsoever. It is not even permissible to hold that the unknowable'signifies an agglomeration of a certain indefinite number of attributes some of which may never be known; for we shall never have any reason whatsoever for alleging the existence of any of those unknowable attributes, beyond a wilful refusal to be reasonable. Thus, there is no escape from the position that all things are knowable. Now, since the natural properties of a substance are to be found in all its units or individuals, it is obvious that what is known to one individual is capable of being known by all others. It follows from this that if there be an infinity of ideas, each of which is known to only one individual at a time, the consciousness of

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142 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. each and every soul is potentially able to know the whole infinity of them. Hence, each and every soul is potentially omniscient, that is to say, the consciousness of every living being is endowed with the capacity to know all things, unlimited by Time and Space. There is nothing to be surprised at in this conclusion, since knowledge merely means a state of consciousness, which, being an affection or modification of the substance of its being, is felt by the soul. This amounts to saying that the soul is made of pure intelligence, in different language, the jiva is a pure embodiment of knowledge. Secondly, as regards happiness, it must be obvious to every thinking being that if pain were an essential part of the nature of the soul, vain would be our desire for the joy of Gods. But that it is not is proved by the fact that its causation is always due to the presence of factors external to the soul itself. Besides, the most painful of experiences have an end some time or other, just as much as those that are pleasant. It will be seen that pleasure and pain are both in the nature of affection or modification of the soul, since nothing corresponding to them has ever been known to exist in the external world, and also since nothing but one's own states or affections can be felt by an individual. What seems to happen is that an agreeable modification of the soul-substance occasions a feeling of pleasure, while an opposite kind of sensation arises from a disagreeable affection. Both pleasure and pain are transient, as already stated, the latter being mostly the * For a further explanation of the subject, see The Science of Thought by the present writer.

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GOD. 143 lot of living beings in the world, aptly described as the Vale of Tears. Even the little pleasure that is to be had here is obtained after such a lot of worry and trouble, and is generally productive of so much suffering, that it is no exaggeration to say that it is born in pain and ends in tears. Besides, gratification only goes to augment the craving, and lust invariably leads to anguish on the impairment of senses, as in old age. Thus, if senge-gratification be the only form of pleasure to be found in Nature, perfection in happiness is not to be thought of in connection with the soul. Fortunately, however, there is another kind of joy which is possible for living beings and of which they are almost wholly ignorant. This consists in the natural 'pulsation of pure de-light, which being the very nature of the soul becomes an inseparable companion of it the moment an individual establishes himself fully in his own pure self. If we wish to understand the nature of Bliss which is the attribute of God, we must analyze the idea of joy first, as it differs from bliss only in degree. To begin with, we must distinguish between pleasure and joy. The former is merely a gratification of the senses, thus, fleeting and short-lived--some delight lasting for a time and then ceasing (Imperial Dictionary). The word pleasure, when unqualified, expresses less excitement, or happiness, than delight, or joy. Pleasure, thus, is an affair of the senses, and its actual experience is confined to the time during which they are in contact with their objects, e.g., food is palatable and toothsome only so long as the glands of taste are in actual contact with it, but

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144 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. not when the act of eating is over and it has passed into the stomach. Joy, on the contrary, is an emotion and has the element of freedom in it. It is a state of gladness or exultation, and indicates exhilaration of spirits. In religious terminology, it signifies a state of being at once glorious and triumphant, as in the passage : "Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross" (Heb. XII, 2). In order to have a full grasp of the idea of joy, we must consider some actual instance in which it arises ; for then alone we shall be able to understand its proper significance. Let us take the case of the school-boy who has appeared in his annual examination, and who hears of his success and feels joy at the news. The question is, whence does his joy arise ? What, in different language, occasions the exhilaration of spirits in him ? If we analyze the mental change, effected by the news, we should find that it is not the news itself, nor the news of the success, but the certainty thereof which is clearly the occasion of his emotion. For if the news be not authentic, the proper feeling of exultation cannot be evoked, notwithstanding the highly agreeable nature of the information. Joy, then, is a state of the mind which has its roots in mental conviction, in other words, in faith. Pleasure, it will be seen, at a glance, does not depend on faith at all, for it is not an emotion and does not spring from a mental conviction. Again, the boy feels joyous solely and simply because something lasting has been achieved, for he is assured that he shall not have to appear for that parti

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GOD. 145 cular examination any more in the future. His 'bondage,' in so far, at least, as that particular task is concerned, is now over for ever. Joy, thus, is a state of exhilaration which is manifested in consequence of some lasting and permanent good, i.e., by the removal of some fetters from the soul. The idea of pleasure cannot here keep pace, in any sense, with that of joy; for, while true joy is the sense of permanent freedom from some irksome liability or limitation, and, for that reason an emotion, pleasure is only temporary, and conveys no idea of freedom in its unqualified import. Whether we apply this principle to the case of the merchant who accumulates a vast fortune, to that of the field-marshal who, laden with the booty and honours of war, retraces his steps homewards, to that of the lover who hears the softly-whispered 'yes' from the lips of his beloved, or to any other case of success, the result is the same. In each and every instance, the emotion of joy springs up in consequence of the belief that never again need the same thing be striven for. The sense of freedom from future straining and striving, therefore, is the direct and immediate cause of joy. Man in the world is like a big school-boy in a big school, and has to pass many examinations in his life. At each examination which he passes successfully some fetters are removed from his soul, and so he feels joy at the idea of his increasing freedom. As the schoolboy puts his books aside on leaving his school, so would he put aside his discriminative intellect on leaving the world, if he has been successful in his trials. Can we then possibly form a correct estimate of the 10

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146 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. intensity of joy which our 'school-boy' would feel, when he acquires not only all the learning that there is to be taught in our worldly schools, but exhausting all the categories of the discriminative intellect masters that very faculty itself? Who can gauge the depth of the feeling, or rather the emotion, of freedom which such an one, who has mastered all knowledge and annihilated all doubts, will feel in his emancipated state? Its estimation or measurement* is surely beyond intellect, for it is emotional, and intellect does not pretend to deal with emotions. It can only be described feebly by language which avowedly follows the intellect, and clothes its concepts in words. Hence, the utmost that can be said in describing bliss is that it is a beatific state of being in which joy wells up in the soul, as wave upon wave of pure ecstasy, in unceasing succession, * Feelings naturally cannot differ from one another quantitatively, since they are psychic in their nature and cannot be measured like magnitudes. But they differ in point of intensity, that is, qualitatively, as different colours, or the shades of a particular tint, The intensity of a particular feeling depends on the greater or less exclusion of all other sensations, ideas and emotions from the mind, for the time being, and on the persistence with which mind might dwell on the details of the idea related to it. The affections and contractions of muscles which are the outward manifestations of the inner states, no doubt, vary with different feelings and sensations, and by the greater or less extent of the area involved give rise to the notion of magnitude, enabling us, in a way, to form a quantitative estimate of the quality of the inner psychical states; but this is the work of pure intellect which interprets all phenomena, in terms of magnitude in the use of which alone it is an expert. The best way to be convinced of this is to try to find out, by how much does anger weigh more than love, or by how much is virtue longer than vice, and so forth, without calling in aid their effects on the physical body.

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147 which, yet, is no succession, in the sense in which that word is commonly used by us for our worldly expression. GOD. From the foregoing analysis it is obvious that pure joy is a state which is not created temporarily by the absorption of any external material, but which is inberent in the very nature of the soul, and comes into manifestation by the removal of fetters from it. Now, the permanent success of man, in some particular enterprise, removes an idea of want from the soul and lifts it up, as it were, from the slough of despond into which it was thrown by virtue of the desire for that particular thing. Its fetters, thus, consist of the ideas of want, ie., desires, which it has collected about itself; and, as each idea of want or desire is replaced by one of fulness and success, it rises triumphant and exultant in its real inherent glory, and leaps for pure joy. The word delight itself, if analyzed, conveys a very accurate idea of the feeling of joy. It is a compound word, made up of the Latin prefix de, employed to denote the idea of increase or intensity, and of 'light,' used in contradistinction to 'heavy;' and means a state of feeling which is opposed to the care-laden, i.e., worried, or sorrowful, attitude of the soul. Thus, delight signifies mental ease, i.e., freedom from care, hence, the state of buoyancy and light-heartedness which is a necessary concomitant of release from anxiety. The word 'release' itself only means liberation or discharge from some sort of confinement or bondage, or from care, pain, or burden of some kind, or from some obligation, responsibility, or penalty, and also signifies acquittance. The idea con

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148 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. veyed is that of the removal of some sort of fetters, hence, of a gaining, or regaining, of the natural state of freedom, not of the acquisition or attainment of anything foreign, or new. When a judge pronounces judgment of acquittal in favour of a prisoner, the delight of the latter is great, because he instantly experiences, or begins to experience, a complete cessation of all the mental worries which were weighing him down, on the score of the accusation levelled against him; but the fact of his acquittal adds nothing positive to his body, mind or soul, and merely leads him to feel the status quo ante when the troubles and anxieties, consequent on his accusation, arrest and trial, had not imposed their 'fetters' on him. It is true that he did not feel so light-hearted before his accusation as he does afterwards, but the change is due to the manifestation of joy which pushes aside, for the time being, some of the other cares and worries as well. The difference between the old and the new states of liberty, then, is that, while in the former condition its enjoyment was marred by all the other existing cares and worries, in the latter it is emphasized by a sense of release from some of them, at least, for the time being. Thus, delight simply means the natural state of freedom of the soul. Amongst the men and women of the world, however, delight itself is a short-lived condition, inasmuch as their desires, i.e., ideals and pursuits, seldom leave them time to enjoy the natural joy of being; on the contrary, no sooner than is any particular burden removed from the soul they manage to impose two more on it, in its place, by their ignorant and unnatural living. Thus

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GOD. 149 it is that they find it difficult to realize that the real nature of their souls is divinely blissful and joyous. But in the course of the progress on the 'path,' these fetters are removed one after another, by the conscious exertion of a self-conscious will, leading to greater and greater experiences of the delight of freedom and joy, as earnest or foretaste of redemption ; and finally when all the fetters have dropped off the soul, it stands revealed to the ecstatic vision of the saved one as identical with God who is the enjoyer of perfect freedom, all-embracing knowledge and unchanging, unabating bliss. The difference between the joy or delight of the mortals and the feeling of pure bliss is only one of degree, for they both express the freedom of the soul; but with the ordinary, ignorant humanity their expression is soon pushed below the surface by perverse thinking and unnatural living. Thus, they come into express manifestation only when some weight is lifted off the soul, and then only for so long as an old or additional burden is not forced on it. From the foregoing explanation it is obvious that what gives us delight is necessarily that which removes our worries, and, thereby lightens the burden with which the soul is weighted down. Now, since we feel anxiety only when our personal interests are in some way concerned, it follows that anything which diverts our attention from our personality or its mediate or immediate concerns, for the time being, is a source of joy. The sight of beautiful landscapes, of majestic mountains, of works of art, and the like, are among such objects. But their disadvantage is that they only afford temporary respite.

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150 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The delight of a child at the possession of a new toy is nothing as compared with the leaping' emotion of the scientist who suddenly succeeds in discovering some hidden law of nature, and even the latter's feeling kicks the beam in comparison to the pure joy of the mystic who catches a fleeting 'glimpse of the lustre of his effulgent soul. The degree of permanence of freedom gained, thus, determines the intensity and duration of the emotion of joy. He who realizes himself to be the all-knowing, the ever free and the very source, as it were, of blissfulness itself must, therefore, necessarily enjoy bliss; for, for him there is an end of all anxieties and bondage. The relation of happiness to desire, which directly mars the manifestation of the natural delight of the soul, may be expressed mathematically as happ as desires so that if we keep on increasing the denominator our unit of happiness may be reduced to an infinitesimal fraction, but become whole by its elimination. If our analysis is correct, grief is a condition foreign to the nature of the soul, as it is caused by the imposition of some sort of restraint or obligation, hence, burden or fetters on it. We might go further and add that grief, with all its kindred feelings, such as sorrow, anguish, and the like, arises only in consequence of the conjunction of the body and the soul; for, as we have already seen, the natural state of pure spirit is one of unalloyed bliss. Taken separately, neither the body nor the soul is capable of feeling pain or pleasure, as sensations, or grief, and the like, as emotions. For the body has no feelings of its own, and the natural feeling of the soul is that of joyousness. In proof of the first of these

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GOD. 151 propositions may be adduced the fact that if the mind is deeply engrossed elsewhere pain is not felt in the body, though its causes might continue to exist with undiminished vigour and give rise to it again after a time. The second proposition needs no further proof, and is obvious from our analysis of the nature of joy. These facts entitle us to say that pleasure, and pain, and all anti-joyous emotions arise in the soul only when its attention is directed to the physical body, and becomes engrossed in its concerns. Hence, if the soul be rid of the physical body with which it erroneously identifies itself, it would enjoy its own natural feeling, that is, pure bliss. It must be now clear that so far as the place of man in nature is concerned, the ideal set before him in the first chapter is by no means too high for him to aspire to. Of the two elements of which he is composed, namely, an atman, or soul, and the body of matter, the former is fully endowed with all that is noblest and best in our conception of a God. It is true that there is little if anything at all of the divine in manifestation in his present condition, but it is no less true that none of the elements that go to constitute divinity is wanting in his soul. It is a rule with nature that the attributes and function of substances are never annihilated, however much they might remain suspended for the time being in any given condition, as is evident in the case of certain gases which lose their gaseous nature while existing in the form of water, but recover it the moment the liquid is resolved into its component parts. Similarly, whether divinity manifest itself or not, it is there,

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152 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. all the same, and in all its fulness in the humblest of living beings. It is a necessity with Life that it should be present as a whole in each and every soul; no one has yet seen being appear in fragments and parts. Consciousness is both infinite and simple and we have to recognise it as a whole, wherever and in whatever form it be found; and the conclusion to be drawn from its infinite nature is as astounding as it is true: it. means that we are the infinite ourselves; it means that the real nature of all living beings in the universe is unconditionally divine; it means that the soul is its own God. If we put this thought in mystic garb, it would read that the Absolute, i.e., the Reality, is present, in all its fulness, in each and every manifestation of life, though standing behind the veil of illusion,' that is, names and forms. And, the cause of error is the form of illusion, the physical body, which constitutes the apparent man, the real one being none other than Brahman itself, to use the terminology of Vedanta. It is the body which prevents one from looking within, by keeping the attention fixed all the time on the apparent, outward form. When man comes round to realize the nature of his delusion, he will find himself none other than God whose nature is Sat-Chit-Ananda, that is, Existence-Consciousness-Bliss, which are also the attributes of the unemancipated soul, though not manifested, in its case, in fulness and perfection. Hence, the difference between God and man amounts to no more than what distinguishes a full-blown flower from a mere bud. And, as the full height of perfection is attainable by the renunciation of desire, as has been

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GOD. 153 demonstrated to be true in the case of bliss, and as will be proved to be the case with respect to all other attributes of perfection when the subject turns up for treatment at its proper place, the difference between God and man may be said to consist solely and simply in regard to desire from which God must be perfectly free and in which man is more or less deeply involved. Thus, God is man minus desire, and man is God plus desire. But for this, the soul is a divinity, whole and entire and self-sufficient. Hence the injunction conjointly imparted by all the ancient systems of thought--"Man know thyself." To sum up: the conception of God is not that of a creator or manager of the world, nor of a being anxious to be worshipped by angels and men, nor yet of a powerful personage engaged in selfish sport and indifferent to the consequences of his acts, but of the perfection of all that is noblest and best in the constitution of Man. Trued ivinity is constituted by perfection in respect of Knowledge and Bliss and Holiness, which are, undoubtedly, the essential and inalienable attributes of each and every soul. Hence the statement:: "He who knoweth his own self knoweth God."-- Sayings of Muhammad.

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CHAPTER IV. THE FALL "Whoever associateth any other with God is like that which falleth from heaven *** *This is so."-Al Qur'an, Chapter XXII. As is evident from the heading of the present chapter, we are transporting the reader to the little-explored dark continent of mythology, where he must prepare himself for a fight with the Dragon of Superstition, whose very touch reduces all that lives to dust. This is the land of strange spectacles, of unlikely events and impossible relationships, the region where people seldom hesitate to pronounce, on little or no provocation, the most deadly and dreadful of curses which are also immediately effective on those with whom they are displeased; it is the realm of un-human men, of un-womanish women, of un-goddish gods,-in short, of all that has its raison d'etre in a sense of delight at the discomfiture and breaking down of poor, normal commonsense. In this quaint and uncanny region is distilled the terrible vintage of unreasoning, fanatical faith a few drops of which suffice to produce a life-long insensibility of wits, its sense-stealing properties not being the result of any physical processes of fermentation, but of the magnetism of the magic personality of its Brewer, the High Priest of Superstition and Myth. He who would free his soul from the effects of the

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THE FALL. 155 poisonous fumes of this harmful draught must, therefore, first of all overpower this arch enemy of mankind. The stronghold of the monster is an interminable maze of winding passages, like the Cretan labyrinth where Minos of old kept his fearsome Minotaur ; and the conditions of the combat are also not unlike those which Theseus had to accept at the time, except that there is no Minos' daughter to furnish us the ball of clue and the magic sword wherewith to destroy the fiend. We must, however, make the best of our opportunity, and bowing to the Great Sarasvati, the Goddess of Wisdom, accept the ball of clue of Cause and Effect and the sword of Discrimination which intellect places in our hands at Her bidding. Thus armed, we run no risk of being lost in the winding turns and blind alleys of the indiscriminate jumble of fiction and fact into which we are about to plunge ourselves, and shall also be spared the unholy dread of the residents of this strange land of Fantasy that constitutes the Foe. For, as we hope to make it clear by and by, mythology is mind's underground rendezvous for all those whose inability to bear the strong rays of the midday Sun of intellectualism forces them to wear the tinted glasses of poesy. They resemble the suppositional prisoners of Plato, who, securely tied to their seats in a cave, with their backs towards its entrance, have to rely, for their knowledge of the world, upon the shadows cast on the wall in their front by all that pass by their prison. Occasionally they also overhear what those in light say when passing the cave, and amuse themselves by robing the unadorned, matter-of-fact

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156 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. conceptions of truth, thus obtained, in the richest raiment of charming allegory from Fancy's flowery stores, creating, at the same time, the most picturesque scenery and realistic atmosphere for the progeny of their exuberant thought. No doubt, the modern man, conscious of his incalculable 'book-loads of learning, smiles in a superior way when confronted with ancient myth and legend ; and certainly modern learning can never hope to find a less resentful object as a butt for its contemptuous ridicule than the 'crude' religion of the B. C. days, and especially heathen Pantheism.' But we shall see that the man who is the first to laugh is not always the one to laugh the longest. For us mythology does not mean the record of humanity's childhood's thought when man may be said to be still groping his way in the dark, soon after his emergence from the monkey race, but the expression, in poetry's garb, of some of the most sober and valuable pronouncements of the only science which can raise a human being to the status and dignity of Gods. Here and there one might possibly encounter a legend or two which fall short of this estimate ; but they might be due to modification through incompetent hands. The thing to be especially guarded against is the stuff of the type of nursery tales which can be picked out almost always at a glance, on account of its not having the true ring of the genuine Aryan coinage. As regards the confusion which is likely to be caused in modern bistorical notions in certain respects, from our thesis, well, they must be altered if found to be incorrect. Our notions of the origin

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THE FALL. 157 of species, the migrations of nations and the like are not founded on a general or special revelation which cannot be altered or interfered with ; they are the outcome of human speculation, hastily formed, and must yield to truth whenever good reason ordains it thus. As for the interpretation of these myths, some of them are too plain to need elucidation ; others may be solved with a little thought; there be others still that seem to defy the unravelling skill, but are sure to yield to perseverance and study. As an instance of the first kind may be mentioned the story of Echo and Narcissus from the Greek Mythology, in which the personifications are of the plainest possible type, though by no means inelegant in a literary sense. The wood-nymph whose power of speech had been taken away from her 'unless in answer to some other voice,' is as plain a description of the phenomenon of echo, as Narcissus, who, in love with himself, comes to grief in the foolish endeavour to be embraced in the arms of his own reflection in water, is of personal vanity. The Hindu conception of Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu, is another instance of this type. She represents wealth which is a consort of Wisdom, though, in evil times, so runs the curse of Gayatri, she is not to remain stationary in one place and to abide constantly by the vile, the inconstant, the contemptible, the simple, the cruel, the foolish and the barbarian.' It would be superfluous to say that the description is not of a person, much less of a goddess, the wife of one of the greatest divinities of the Hindu Pantheon, but a pure and simple rendering

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158 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of our conception of wealth in poetical, metaphorical speech. The legend of the rivalry between Arachne, the daughter of a famous dyer in purple, and Pallas-Athene, the goddess of Wisdom, is an instance of the second type, and yields its secret on a little reflection. The legend runs that Arachne was famed for her rare skill in weaving rich and wonderful patterns on her webs, and so high rose her name that even PallasAthene, the goddess of such arts, one day came to examine her work. Now, Arachne was very proud of her skill, and denied that the excellence of her work had anything to do with the inspiration of the goddess, though men generally held otherwise. On meeting the goddess face to face, she hurled open defiance at her, on which the goddess, stung to haughty disdain, offered to match her art against her earthly rival's. This challenge was accepted, and arrangements were made for the contest which began forth with. "Two looms were set up, at which these eager rivals plied their best craft and cunning, with such swiftness that ere long on each the growing tissues shone in all the hues of the rainbow woven into marvellous devices, and shot with threads of gold. For her design Pallas chose the gods ranged upon the Acropolis at Athens, Jove's awful majesty in the midst, Poseidon smiting the rock with his trident, herself in full panoply among the rest, who was shown calling forth the olive tree that made her best gift to man. About this central group were pictured scenes of impious mortals brought to confusion, rebellious giants turned to mountains, and,

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159 for a hint to her presumptuous rival, prating girls changed to screeching fowl. Round all ran a border of olive foliage, as sign of whose handiwork this was, with which few would dare to vie ! "The irreverent Arachne, for her part, had picked cut stories that cast shame or derision upon the gods. Zeus and his brethren were seen wooing mortals in unworthy form, Appollo humbly serving, as a shepherd on earth, Dionysus playing his drunken pranks, nay, scandalous memories of old Cronos himself............all enclosed by a border of ivy leaves and flowers. But these scenes were worked in with so cunning art, that one could believe to see real animals and real waves standing out before the eye upon that accusing web, the more offensive for its truth. So Pallas-Athene felt when she rose to examine the other's work. With a cry......... ..she snatched at the too faithfully coloured cloth, tearing it to pieces, and showering blows upon the sly maker of such a masterpiece. "How might mortal maiden stand before the fairhaired goddess when her eyes blazed with wrath? Thus unfairly beaten, Arachne could not bear her spiteful shame. She stole away to hang herself in despair. Nor even then was the wrath of Pallas glutted. She bid her rival live, yet in what hateful form! For a spell was woven round her bloated body, her human features disappeared, her hair fell off, her limbs shrunk up, and thus poor Arachne hung as a spider, doomed for ever to spin as if mocking the skill that had moved Olympian envy." *The Classic Myth and Legend, by A. R. Hope Moncrieff. THE FALL.

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160 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of Wisdom and her mortal rival, the Encyclopaedia Britannica (art. indicates the superiority of Asia textile arts." Such is the story of the rivalry between the Goddess which, according to Arachne) "probably over Greece in the The italics are ours, placed to mark the contrast between the 'scholastic' view and the spiritual interpretation of the legend which we shall now proceed to propound. The rivals represent the two powers of the soul known as omniscience, which being associated with divinity is personified as the Goddess of Wisdom, and the limited faculty of Intellect appertaining to the human soul in its un-emancipated state. The difference between the two aspects of knowledge, human and divine, is well brought out in the patterns respectively woven by the competitors, one merely representing an impious conception of the world of Life after the most approved and up-to-date manner of the learned, but the other descriptive of the true nature of things, spiritual and material, and of the consequences that flow from impiety and foolish prating. With its 'free-thinking' proclivities, intellect cannot but resent the notion of the excellence of her handiwork being the result of the inspiration of the goddess, though there being only one source of knowledge which is infinite in its capacity and scope, finite thought cannot but derive its oil of existence from the original and, therefore, Olympian 'wells.' Hence, truth is only in accordance with the vox populi in this instance. Again, in so far as knowledge may be said to be a presentation of the world of

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THE FALL. 161 reality, it is like a rich pattern woven in all the variegated colours of the rainbow in the web of consciousness, which explains the etymology of Arachne's name as well as the fact of the competition being held in the art of weaving. Arachne's parentage--she is the daughter of a famous dyer in purple-serves to indicate her relation to will, which, in virtue of its high aspirations and the power to achieve its end is the only factor which can be truthfully described as the maker of kings, converting, as it does, the 'white' of colourless, indifferent commonalty into the purple' of Royalty and Power. As regards the punishment of Arachne, it is intended to describe the true nature of the faculty of finite *thought,' which, when stripped of the surplusage of false glory that has been added to it by the superabundant enthusiasm of some of its admirers, is but a simple weaver of presentations' in the warp and woof of consciousness. It is this very faculty which is described as intellect or understanding in modern thought, though we had better let Prof. Deussen explain its function to the 'uninitiated' masses. Writes the learned Professor (Elements of Metaphysics, pp. 25--29): "Every representation contains as such two supplementary halves, a representing subject and a represented object. These two make with the representation not three (as a sneering epigram of Schiller has it), but one. No representation is without a subject, none without an object. Now, nothing exists for me but representations, therefore also no subject without an object, no object without a subject. All objects of my subject are such, either immediately or mediately. As immediate objects I can never have anything else but affections of my ego, that is, sensations within me (represented physiologically as certain specific irritations of the sensory nerves extended in the organs of sense). All other objects, the whole exter

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162 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. nal world and even my own body, as far as I regard it from without, are known to me only as mediate objects: It is only through the medium of these nerve irritations that I come in contact with them. Thus all data by which I attain to a knowledge of the external world, are restricted to these affections of the nerves which are given as immediate objects. They are the only thing which comes to my intellect from without, that is, independent of itself. Consequently all else, all that distinguishes wide-spreading nature with its immeasurable riches from those scanty affections of the nerves, must come from within, that is, must originate in my intellect itself. If we compare the perceptual world, which is our representation, to a textile fabric in which subjective and objective threads intersect as warp and woof, then all that is objective, independent of myself. given a posteriori is limited to those affections of the nerves and may be compared to the thin, isolated threads of the shuttle The warp, on the contrary, which is previously, that is, a priori, stretched out to receive little by little these interweaving threads and work them into a fabric, is the natural, innate form of the subject, the totality of which forms just that which we call Understanding or brain. The task of metaphysics consists in finding out what things are in themselves, that is, independent of our intellect. We must, therfore, first of all, deduet from things that which our intellect contributes to them, namely, those forms which inhere in it originally, that is, a priori, and in which it ranges all materials furnished from without so as to weave them into experience. The following six criteria may serve to distinguish these a priori elements of knowledge or innate functions of the Understanding from those which come to it a posteriori, or through preception. They are to us what reagents are to the chemist. They may also be regarded as six magnets, by means of which we extract the iron of our a priori knowledge from the mixed ore of experience. (1) Whatever is necessary to transform perception, given as affection, into perceptual representation, and, consequently, precedes all experience as a condition of its possibility, cannot orginate in experience, but only within ourselves. (2) Whatever comes to the intellect from without, has the character of contingency, it might be otherwise, or it might even be not at all; that is, I can imagine it as non-existent. Now, in my representation there are certain elements which cannot be thought away like every thing else, from which it follows that they do not belong to that which exists inde

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THE FALL. 163 pendently of myself, but must adhere to the intellect itself. (3) For the same reason, all data given from without merely suffice to state what is there, but not that something is necessarily so and not otherwise. Perception has no tongue for the word necessity, consequently all determinations of things, with which is associated the consciousness of necessity, must originate, not in perception, but within mysell. (4) From this it follows that sciences the doctrines of which have apodictic certainty, cannot have obtained it from perception, and that consequently that part of the perceptual world to which they refer must belong to the elements originally inherent in my intellect. (5) Perception can only furnish me with sensations. These are, as such, isolated and fragmentary, for, difficult as it is to grasp at first, the materials of sensation given from without contain only the sensations themselves, but not any connection between them, for such a connection is merely the link between the different sensations and therefore not itself sensation. Consequently that faculty, which makes of the variety of perception a unity and so creates coherence between my representations, must belong to me a priori. Therefore, whatever serves to establish the continuity of nature, belongs to the innate functions of my intellect. (6) Perception can never embrace infinity. If, now, I find in my representations of things elements of which I am conscious as being infinite, it follows with certainty, that I have not taken them from perception, but must possess them as forms of intellect, wherefore, however far I proceed in representing, I can neyer get beyond them, in which precisely consists their infinity." Such is the conception of Understanding, the original of the personification Arachne, which one of the "baby" progenitors of our race--and one not known to have been an abnormal or supernormal type of the tribe of the apish man, or mannish anthropoid, to which according to our most authentic' views he must have belonged-has bequeathed to us in the form of the story of the rivalry between the Olympian Patroness of wisdom and a conceited mortal maid. It may be that after all Narcissus is not dead, since the echo of his spirit is still to be found moving on the

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164 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. face of the depthless waters of modern wisdom and wit. We must now pass on to a consideration of the legend of the fall which is the theme of the present chapter and which belongs to the most difficult type of mythical lore. But we shall first of all clear the ground by establishing, so far as is needed for our present requirements, the power of suggestion, especially of auto-suggestion, to influence the conditions of existence. It is now well-known that thought is a force of tremendous potency and has the power to materialize all mental beliefs and affections in the body of flesh. This principle is so well-known and established that it would be but a waste of time to enter into the nature of proof available in its support. The sceptic would do well to study the works of Dr. J. H. Hudson and others, where he would find ample proof of our statement. It suffices for our present purpose to point out that the living cell is moved hy mental impulses and actuated by mental stimuli. The microscope reveals all this, and it reveals the structural lines of communication between cell and cell and between the central controlling intelligence and each particular cell (Hudson). These cells are controlled by the subjective mind which has full control over the functions, sensations and conditions of the body. The subjective mind is, in its turn, amenable to control by "suggestion," which has been defined by hypnotists as "the insinuation of a belief or impulse into the mind by any means, as by words or gestures, usually, by emphatic declarations. It is not possible to deny these facts, or the conclusions.

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THE FALL. 165 they lead to, any longer. The law of suggestion is the grandest discovery of the nineteenth century for the nations of the West, though long before that it was well-known to the orientals. The subjective mind obeys the suggestion given to it and imparts it to the multitude of cells under its control, and these tiny little entities faithfully carry out, as it were, the orders of their chief, so far as it is possible to do so. The suggestion may come from outside, as from a hypnotist to his subject, or it may be what is called an auto-suggestion, which means a suggestion given by a person to himself. The subjective mind does not enquire into the truth or falsehood of the suggestion, but accepts it as correct without any investigation. Hence, it will assume any attitude, however false, which might be suggested to it. Thus, if it is suggested to a hypnotized subject that he is a dog, he would instantly assume the attitude and perform the acts characteristic of a dog, so far as it is physically possible for him to do so. In short, 'any character suggested, be it that of a fool or a philosopher, an angel or a devil, an orator or an auctioneer, will be personated with marvellous fidelity to the original, just so far as the subject's knowledge extends. The wonderful histrionic ability displayed by hypnotized subjects in personated, suggested characters has often been remarked. But it is not acting a part. It is much more than acting, for the subject believes himself to be the actual personality suggested. A suggestion that is known by the subject in his normal condition to be absolutely false will always excite, at least, a momentary opposition ; for suggestion

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166 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. acts most effectively on lines of least resistance. Repetition, however, overcomes all resistance, so that when the subjective mind is confronted by two opposing suggestions, the stronger one must necessarily prevail. It is a necessary corollary to this that suggestion becomes most effective when the subject is induced to believe in its truth in his normal condition. There is no difficulty now in our laying down the two following propositions, namely :-- (1) that as one thinks so one becomes, and (2) that belief, or faith, is the greatest factor in facilitating the materialization, or manifestation, of the suggested condition. All mental processes are forces of tremendous power, and when set in motion must produce their appropriate results, unless countermanded by similar processes of a higher and subtler quality. There is nothing strange in this, for, as Mrs. Besant points out, all round us we see habits of thought moulding the dense matter of our material bodies and stamping character on the face of the race ; virtue causing health and beauty to come into expression, and vice furrowing the features with lines of disease and ugliness. It is pointed out :-- "This is a fact so common that it makes on us no impression, and yet is significant enough ; for if the dense body of matter be thus moulded by the forces of thought, what is incredible, or even strange, in the idea that the subtler forms of matter should be equally plastic, and should submissively take the shapes into which they are moulded by the deft fingers of the immortal Artist, thinking Man." Even Western thought is slowly coming round to recognize this fact. Professor William James writes : "Mental states occasion also changes in the calibre of the bloodvessels, or alteration in the heart-beats, or processes more subtle

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THE FALL. 167 still, in glands and viscera. If these are taken into account, as well as acts which follow at some remote period, because the mental state was once there, it will be safe to lay down the general law that no mental modification ever occurs which is not accompanied or followed by a bodily change." The effect of suggestion on spirit or soul, which is pure intelligence in essence, is even more remarkable, mere thought sufficing to produce immediate depression of spirits and the like. So far as faith is concerned, the rule is that the completeness of the effect to be produced and the length of time necessary to produce it depend on the degree of belief in the potency of thought, the law being that whatever one believes one becomes. This is why Jesus and the other teachers of our race always insisted on faith. Without faith we may go on forming mental conceptions and images as much as we like, but they will. never be productive of any result; for faith is necessary to impart stability to thought, and stability of thought is a necessary condition to the materialization of mental ideas and conceptions. As regards the efficacy of faith, mental healing, Christian science and other like methods are instances of the power of mind to produce wonderful phenomena. When one comes to think that the only difference between a living being and a corpse is that in respect of mind, one ceases to wonder at the seemingly incredible claims that have been made for it by the adepts of old. Christ declared that if one had as much faith in his teaching as could be thought of in connection with a mustard seed, he could perform the most astonishing of miracles. There are many passages in the Bible, containing 'pro

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168 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. mise of power,' of which Mark XXI. 16-20 is a striking instance. These passages are now generally regarded to be either worthless interpolations, mistranslations of the original text, or even ravings of religious enthusiasts. Those of a pious turn of mind, anxious to believe their scriptures to be infallible and yet unable to reconcile the text to the stern realities of life, satisfy their intellect with the idea that the 'promise' was only intended for the ages gone by. Truth, however, lies the other way; for the promise is neither false nor limited to any particular period of time, but a real living truth, possessing as much vitality now as it did at the time of its formulation. We do not understand it, and have no faith in its truth on account of our ignorance of the science of mental power which we have hitherto considered "immaterial, airy metaphysics," and, therefore, beneath the dignity of any learned or scientific man to study. The only "material metaphysics" with us are mammon, long robes, high places, hypocritical salutes, and crocodile tears, which Christ used to comment upon unceasingly. How, then, can there be any manifestation of the truth of the word of the Saviour in our midst? Understand what Christ meant by faith, and rest not till you have found it, for it is the one mysterious power which brings about the realization of the Kingdom of God from within. Take it to heart. What faith can do, nothing else can. In the sacred literature of all religions, faith has been considered the most essential requisite for success. No disciples were made or accepted unless they passed the period of probation-usually this consisted of a number

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THE FALL. 169 of years-successfully, which meant that they had developed a capacity for faith. For the great virtue of faith is that it secures freedom from mental agitation, and furnishes a stable basis for thought. Faith has nothing in common with the wordy, windy protestations of the present-day man, and indicates a complete saturation of mind with a principle, or idea ; it is a state of belief equalling conviction. If you have faith in a thing, your mind should be utterly incapable of entertaining the condition to the contrary. Faith pre-supposes conviction, and, if destroyed, must be acquired afresh by wisdom. Such is the fundamental doctrine of faith, the failure to understand which has caused all the wickedness, godlessness and sin in the world. We shall now enquire into what is meant by the fall of man, and how and why it came about. A very graphic and instructive account of it is given in the first book of Moses, called Genesis, with which many of us are already familiar. Those who have read the account will readily confess that they were not much impressed with it, and simply remember it as a sort of nursery tale in which Adam, the hero of the story, was punished (might be a little too harshly) by the Lord God for a seemingly trivial and insignificant act of disobedience to which considerable importance was attached. This, however, is exactly the reverse of what is actually meant by the story. We ought not to pass by this legend in a summary fashion. Remember, there is a gateway somewhere in this maze through which the powers of darkness crept in once to the ruin of our race, and left a legacy of sin. The importance of the subject.

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170 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. may be judged from the serious notice which God is said to have taken of the act of disobedience. Not content with punishing the guilty, with a degree of severity which appears, at first sight, to be out of all proportion to the trivial nature of the fault committed by them, he actually condemned their whole progeny, for all eternity, to a life of suffering and sorrow on earth. Such a subject cannot be considered a nursery tale by any means, and deserves the utmost attention on our part. The failure to see that the whole secret of human wretchedness and sin lay concealed in this apparently meaningless and mythical account of the Fall of Adam has been the cause which has delayed the discovery of truth so long, and each day augmented the estrangement between man and happiness. The circumstances surrounding the tragedy need not be gone into in detail. Briefly put, Adam, by the favour of the Almighty God, was residing in the Garden of Eden with his Consort Eve. Now, the Garden of Eden contained two extraordinary trees which are of special interest to us. One of these, which stood in the midst of the Garden, was called the Tree of Life, and the other the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. It is the latter tree round which interest mainly centred in this little drama. The Lord God had commanded Adam, saying : "Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." *---- For a long time, neither Adam nor Eve thought of eating of the forbidden tree, and the legend adds:"And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed."

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THE FALL. 171 Then came the temptation. The serpent approached the woman and tempted her to eat of the tree in question. She at first refused, saying : "God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it lest ye die." With more persuasion she yielded, because she saw that it was good for food and pleasant to the eye, and a tree to be desired to make one wise. The immediate result of the transgression was that their eyes were opened. They knew that they were naked, and fearing to appear in nakedness before God, hid themselves. The result was that when God came to know of it, he punished all the three, the man, the woman and the serpent. To Adam, he said, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken : for dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return." And to himself the Lord God said, "Behold the man has become as one of us to know good and evil;" and, thinking "lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever," drove him out of the Garden of Eden, and made provision for guarding the approaches to the Tree of Life by placing cherubim and a flaming sword which turned in every direction round it. This, briefly, is the account of the catastrophe. We can best interpret it by observing the results which are said to have ensued from the act of transgression. Adam ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil, but became ignorant!* That was one result. Another result was . * That the general condition of humanity is one of ignorance will hardly be denied by any one to-day.

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172 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that he felt his nudity for the first time after the eating of the forbidden fruit. It was not the tree of sight, but the transgressors felt as if their eyes had been opened, and observed their nudity for the first time in their lives. Yet another result which ensued from the act of transgression was fear. Adam used to walk in the company of the Lord God, fearlessly and like a friend, but felt afraid to appear before him for the first time after the act of disobedience. The most fatal consequence of all, however, was the loss of immortality. Man was not forbidden to eat of the Tree of Life till the commission of sin, but after that he was simply denied admission to the Garden where that Tree stood. . Now, ordinarily, it is impossible to connect the transgression with the results that are said to have ensued from it. How strange that you eat knowledge and become ignorant, and lose your immortality also into the bargain! The true interpretation of the narrative must, therefore, be different from its apparent sense. When we dive beneath the surface of words the whole thing becomes clear and intelligible at once. This is what is actually meant by the story: Adam was happy and immortal so long as he believed himself to be one with God, the state of at-one-ment with the Lord leaving no room in his heart to feel his imaginary nudity. The overflowing joy, consequent on a feeling of being at one with his true Self, had preserved him in a state of godly innocence, and prevented all notions of phenomenal duality and differentiation from obscuring his clear vision. Notions of nudity and inferiority had not sullied the purity of his heart till then. Then, the ser

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THE FALL. 173 pent, the emblem of crookedness and impersonation of desire which is the root of ignorance and all other troubles, appeared before him and tempted him, through his wife, and led him to believe that the forbidden fruit was 'a tree to be desired to make one wise.' The inevitable consequence of this change in the mental attitude of Adam was that his faith in his previous state of happiness was lost, and he felt that he would be happier with the additional knowledge to be acquired by eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This attitude implied that he no longer believed in his own happiness and wisdom. It was a confession of being ignorant and unhappy, for there was the desire to become like Gods. The result was that by virtue of the unchanging, immutable laws which govern the forces on the mental plane, the state of this inner conviction of unhappiness and ignorance was materialized in an outward phenomenal form. Man would like to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but he must pay its price first! The mere circumstance that there is in you a desire for knowledge is a clear admission of your ignorance. This admission expresses your condition in your own words, and the law of Faith, which materializes mental impressions, is at once set in motion, and works out the rest. This is why man became ignorant to begin with ; this is why the immediate result of the eating of a little from the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil was ignorance. We have already seen that the true state of happiness for man can be none other than the consciousness of being the Sat-chit-ananda himself, that is, of his own

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174 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Godhood. This was the condition of Adam till he ate of the fruit of the forbidden tree. His confession of ignorance at once threw him down on a lower plane of existence since the Sat-chit-ananda state does not admit ignorance within it. It was truly a fall from Godhood to wretchedness and misery. Adam felt that he was not God, and believed that by eating of the tree he would become intelligent and rise to the status of Gods. He mentally put himself much below the Gods, and, thus, ceased to be their companion. The abode of Gods was not the proper place for the residence of those who did not believe themselves to be Gods, and the genius of Adam's mind consequently threw him down below with the quickness of thought. This is why Adam discovered his nudity for the first time after the eating of the forbidden fruit, and felt afraid. The metamorphosis was not what he had expected it to be. He instinctively felt that some tremendous blunder had been made somewhere, but could not see where and in what it lay. Fear, the creature of ignorance and the cause and forerunner of Death, came into existence. Man in one stroke lost his Godhood and immortality, and became mortal. We now see why it was that man was forbidden to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It was not a whimsical or capricious order, but one, the disobedience to which, it was known, would have such dire consequences for the race. Why do you want to distinguish between good and evil ? What is there to distinguish at all? The self, or soul, alone is everlasting and eternal ; and it is the self which counts.

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THE FALL. 175 All the rest is an illusion of names and forms. What is the use of your knowledge of good and evil, when there is neither good nor evil? Thus, the prohibition was one of great moment to man; the God within had pointed out the most fatal belief that could be entertained-the notion of the body being the man. Life is self-sufficient and blissful; it is above good and evil both, and has no idea of nakedness or dress. Nudity is felt only when you put limitations on the Self, identify it with tbe body of matter, and consider yourself to be other than God. When you begin to distinguish and differentiate between the outward shapes and appearances of things, losing sight of your inner Reality, you feel as if you had been stripped of your robes, as if your glory had departed from you, or as if you had been picked out of the ocean of Love, and, with a rude hand, cast away into a dreary, waterless wilderness, where there are lamentations and gnashing of the teeth. These dire consequences must inevitably follow a sense of estrangement from God, for it is the Law. It is said : "As water falling down on an inaccesible mountain-top quickly runs down, thus, seeing qualities of tbe Lord as separate, a man runs down to darkness."-(Katha Upanishad, 17. 14.) To put the same thing in different words, the failure. to realize that the Atman, i.e., the individual soul, is the true God is the cause of our nakedness. We have left our Godhood, and set up the little body of matter in its stead. What is in reality an ocean now regards itself as a drop, and must remain a drop till it begins to think itself to be the whole ocean again, because the law is 'as one thinks so one becomes.'

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176 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The coats of skin, the Lord God is said to have made for Adam and Eve, signify the limits put on their sense of individuality which they regarded as extending to their outer skin, but no further. In consequence of this sense of limitation, man regards himself as identical with the physical body, enveloped by the skin; and it is this false and erroneous sense of individuality which is at the root of all notions of duality between God and man and is the selfish), grasping, appropriating, copyrighting self-the apparent man. As regards fear, we have already observed that it came into existence with ignorance. The calamitous. metamorphosis, brought about by the loss of God-consciousness, consequent on the fatal desire to become like Gods, could not but carry conviction of their utter helplessness and degradation to the minds of the transgressors. They had hoped to acquire the wisdom of Gods, but the very first thing they became conscious of was not wisdom, but its antithesis, that is, ignorance. Fear took hold of their souls, and made them tremble for their safety against the forces of nature, as yet but dimly perceived. Belief in immortality was gone, and its place taken by a sense of powerlessness and terror. The false ego was the child of ignorance and desire, and God declined to foster it up. Man had no alternative left but to nurse it himself. Thenceforth, its bringing up and preservation from harm became the sole care of man, and brought him all sorts of conceiva able trouble and worry. It only remains to point out the physiological effect of fear. It paralyses healthy action, generates worry,

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THE FALL. 177 and is exceedingly pernicious to life. Worry corrodes and pulls down the organism; fear and worry will finally tear the body to pieces. Fear is the antithesis of self-composure, and the cause of cowardice and terror. Under its influence the countenance becomes pallid, the face is pulled down, and the chest drawn in. It paralyses all the bodily muscles and consumes the vital force. When one remembers that the fear of death is a constant terror with mankind, what wonder is there that death should actually supervene? As to the effect of the emotion of fear, Darwin observes ("The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals,' pp. 306 to 309): -- " The frightened man at first stands like a statue motionless and breathless, or crouches down as if instinctively to escape observation. The heart beats quickly and violently, so that it palpitates or knocks against the ribs... the skin instantly becomes pale, as during incipient faintness. ... The hairs also on the skin stand erect, and the superficial muscles shiver. In connection with this disturbed action of the heart, the breathing is hurried. The salivary glands act imperfectly; the mouth becomes dry, and is often opened and shut... One of the best marked symptoms is the trembling of all the muscles of the body; and this is often seen in the lips. From this cause and from the dryness of the mouth, the voice becomes husky or indistinct, or may altogether fail. As fear increases into an agony of terror, we behold, as under all violent emotions, diversified results. The heart beats wildly, or may fail to act, and faintness ensues ; there is a death-like pallor; the breathing is laboured; the wings of the nostrils are widely dilated; there is a gasping and convulsive motion of the lips, a tremor on the hollow cheek, a gulping and catching of the throat.'... All the muscles of the body may become rigid, or may be thrown into convulsive movements. ... As fear rises to an extreme pitch, the dreadful scream of terror is heard. Great beads of sweat stand on the skin. All the muscles of the body are relaxed. Utter prostration soon follows, and the mental powers fail. The intestines are 12

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178 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. affected. The sphincter muscles cease to act, and no longer retain the contents of the body." That death should result from a constant fear of it gnawing at the vitals and constantly interfering with the healthy activity of the body, is not strange at all; indeed, what is strange in the life of man is that he should live even as long as three score years or so. M. Jean Finot, analyzing the causes of death, in The Philosophy of Long Life' (pages 106 and 107) observes:--- "We do not die even centenarians. Why this premature death ? Why do we die? This is the eternal debate which has already given us so many explanatory treatises explaining nothing whatever. To attempt to give a resume of the reasons which have been given us by writers from theologians to biologists would be a task demanding hundreds of volumes, besides being completely useless. ... Let us, then, put aside the thousand and one causes quoted by our predecessors, and let us give one which deserves more honour than is generally accorded to it. This despised cause is the fear of death. Man, arrived at a certain mental state, undergoes a sort of autosuggestion of death. He then believes himself to have reached the end of his days, and feeds as much on the fear of death as on bodily foods. From this moment onward death fascinates him. He hears its call with terror everywhere and always. The philosophic and salutary consciousness of a hereafter gives place to a cowardly and nervous fear of separation from life. The victim feeds upon this fear, intoxicates himself with it, and dies of it. The man possessed by this thought eats badly and digests even worse. His nervous system is disorganised and his organism remains deaf to the stimulus of the outer life. Regrets for the life which he believes to be fading away make him waste the vital resources of his organism in a limitless sorrow and nameless maladies." No need to cite further authorities on this simple matter, which any one can observe by studying the effect of the emotion on himself and others with whom he comes in contact ; suffice it to say that the culmination is reached when the individual will is completely pata

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179 lysed and the organism left at the mercy of its natural enemies, which soon bring about its dissolution. We shall deal with the action of will on the body, and the effect of such action, in dealing with the question of immortality later on, when we come to discuss the theory of karma. Meanwhile, let us conclude our explanation of the Fall.' THE FALL. The curse pronounced on the erring couple and the tempter by the Lord God, after the transgression, is full of psychological import. If we would study ourselves, we should observe that we are endowed with two functions or psychical faculties, the will and intellect, which unite in the ego, or self, making it a complete whole. We should also notice that neither the ego nor the intellect deals directly with the outside world, and that the manas, the central organ of sensation, is the instrument, or vehicle, through which they come in contact with it. In the allegory of the Fall, Adam represents the ego, or the individualized will; Eve symbolizes the intellect (the Sanskrit buddhi); and the serpent stands for manas (the lower, or objective mind). Now, intellect is the handmaid or servant of will, and, at the same time, its preceptor. It is the servant, because it has no other function than to discover, determine and adjust the relations of will as individualized in its objective expression, the body, with other bodies, and, also, with its higher, i.e., the divine aspect; and it is its preceptor in so far as it controls and directs its activity into proper channels, and, by educating it, leads it to the realization of the Self in the highest degree, which is the final goal of education. The primary function of intellect, however,

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180 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is only that of presenting perceptions, which it spins out of the raw material of sensations furnished by the mind (manas). Hence, the word 'woman,' from the Saxon wif man (wif in Saxon, and weib in German, from weben, to weave), signifies the one who weaves, and is, therefore, fully symbolical of the faculty of intellect. Manas, also, never comes directly in contact with the self, but influences it through the intellect; hence, in the allegory of the fall, Eve is first tempted by the serpent, and then, in her turn, tempts the ego. The compiler of the Pentateuch, struck with the more intimate connection between the ego and the intellect than is represented by the relation subsisting between a child and its governess, likened it to that of husband and wife. The ego depends on the intellect as a husband depends on his wife in household matters, and the latter studies its wants and comforts, and clings to it as a woman does to her husband. With this necessary prelude we may now proceed to elucidate the nature of the awful curse pronounced by God on the transgressors. Adam, being accused of disobedience by the still small voice of intuition, at once throws the blame on the woman, i.e., the intellect ; and she, in her turn, points to the serpent as the cause of "error and temptation. The anger of the Lord flashes first of all against the manas (serpent), and the terrible curse is uttered : "Upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life." Hence, manas' goes on its belly,' z.e., lives and moves in dust, or, in other words, is confined to the phenomenal, hence, chained to matter. The food of manas is vibrations

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THE FALL which reach it through the media of the senses; therefore, it is doomed to eat vibrations, which, as such, are recognized as the irreducible units of matter, hence dust. The enmity put between the woman and the serpent psychologically symbolizes the relation between the intellect and the manas. The latter loves to wander from place to place, and is in its element when roving about; but the former needs rest for its higher work of forming concepts and judgments, and, therefore, tries to check its fiery nature and hold it on to a point. Hence, the manas bites the heels of intellect to make it dance, and the latter crushes its head to stop its prancing. This is still more pronounced in the case of the seed of intellect, which is judgment and, in the highest sense, Wisdom. Wisdom, the child of intellect, conceived in an immaculate manner, tries to break away from the manas, to regain his 'lost' Godhood, but the manas, so long as its head is not crushed, bites his heel to drag him down to the world of senses, each time that he endeavours to soar above it, for Self-realization. This is best illustrated by the story of the child Krishna subduing the Serpent-King, Kaliya, by crushing its head, in the river Jamuna (allegorically, the mind-stuff). The lesson to be learnt from the story is that, in order to attain Nirvana, or, in Christian terminology, to be redeemed, or saved, one must subdue the fiery serpent' of one's mind, ie., the desiring manas* at an early date in life. 181 * Manas is the Minotaur (man and beast) of the Greek mythology, its human element representing reason, the faculty of reflection, and the bovine, pure animalism, that is, uncontrolled sensuality.

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182 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The curse pronounced on the woman also refers to the nature of Intellect of which she is the earthly symbol. Conception and sorrow are her lot, whether we take them in their literal or their psychological sense ; for intellect is noted for its prolific production of concepts, as well as, for sorrow, that is, worry, in developing, i.e., forming and delivering judgments. She is the hand-maid of the ego, her husband, and, consequently, must surrender herself to him, at his sweet will and pleasure, and conceive for him. The identity between Eve and Intellect is put beyond doubt by Genesis, III. 20. Adam called his wife Eve, because she was the mother of all living. This description cannot possibly refer to the human female, because she cannot be regarded as the mother of all living,' in any sense ; but it is fully applicable and appropriate to the Intellect, on whose functioning as the weaver of presentations in the warp and woof of consciousness, depends the perception, hence, in a sense, the existence, of all forms. The punishment of Adam also is equally natural for the ego who exclusively employs his intellect to discriminate between the good and evil of phenomena. Since the pursuit of the phenomenal gives rise to the notion of duality, i.e., separation between God and man, and creates fear and worry, the fallen ego, personified as Adam, has necessarily to eat his bread in the sweat of his brow. Thistle and thorns, and sorrow and tears are his lot, for, as already observed, there can be no bappiness for him who is engrossed in sensual lust. The curse uttered by the Lord also foreshadowed the perishable nature of the sensual ego; yet it is not the

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THE FALL. 183 death of the ego, but of the body alone. As a pure spirit, the ego is birthless and deathless, being eternal and uncreate ; but in association with the impurities of sin, adhering to it in the shape of different kinds of vestments of matter, it is subject to birth and death both. Hence, the significance of the warning--"In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." The emphasis, it will be observed, is not on the day of death, since Adam did not die on the day that he ate of the forbidden fruit, but on the liability to death which is forced on all unemancipated souls by the companionship of matter. As matter is atomic and constantly in motion, no organism composed of it can ever be conceived to be permanent. Yet it is not the demise of the soul, but of the body alone which occurs in nature; the ego regards it as his own death, on account of having identified himself most intimately with his body. But this is a point for the future. The idea of nudity also arises with reference to embodied existence; for, as pure effulgence, spirit neither wears nor needs clothes. Thus, the legend of the fall is intended to open our eyes to the great differences between a pure, perfect soul and the ego of desires : the former is blissful and immortal, and has a raiment of glory, but the latter is nude and unhappy and is also firmly held in the clays of death. These differences, though seemingly great and unbridgeable, are nonetheless such as can be easily removed, since they are due, solely and simply, to the element of desire by the eradication of which the status of Gods can be acquired with ease.

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184 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The story of the fall of Brahma in the Hindu Puranas, which covers a larger field than the Biblical myth, is also an allegorical account of the psychic functions of the soul. It is, however, too long to be reproduced here in its entirety; but the student of mythology would find its interpretation easy, if he would bear in mind the numerous psychological aspects in which spirit appears in conjunction with matter, and which are personified as gods and goddesses in the Puranas. In order however, to explain the true nature of intellect, we shall give the ending of the legend in a somewhat abridged form. The Biblical account of the Fall,' based, as it is, on the Vedantic view of things, stops short with the utterance of the curses, and is, therefore, likely to mislead one as regards the true position of intellect, which is depicted there in its worst aspect. As a matter of fact, redemption or emancipation is simply out of the question without its guidance, since it is the only instrument of knowledge in the condition of the "fall." 6 But the weakness of intellect lies in the fact that it has no will of its own, and may not refuse to serve the ego in any way he pleases. For this reason, the Biblical legend makes the woman eat the forbidden fruit only at the will of her husband, though she had an opportunity of doing so earlier by herself. It is thus clear that it is not the intellect which is the mischiefmaker in the world, but the power of choice which determines the nature of the work the intellect is required to perform for will. As the faculty of discrimination, its function is only to impart knowledge to the ego, or will, but the kind of knowledge which it is required to

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THE FALL. 185 impart is to be selected not by itself, but by the will. As we might use a lantern to light our footsteps to a place of worship or to a gambling den, so might we employ our intellect to impart to us the wisdom which leads to bliss, or to instruct us on matters whose knowledge is fraught only with suffering and pain. As a matter of fact, whenever and wherever the intellect has been employed in the right direction, it has never failed to lead the ego to the highest heights of glory and power, and, finally, also to Nirvana. Its influence is pernicious and harmful only when the ego employs it exclusively to define and determine the relations of its body with other bodies in the world. Hence, the lesson to be learnt from the profound teaching of the Bible is that if the error of setting up the body in place of the real Man be avoided, and the intellect employed to further the progress of the soul instead of to pander to the will, it ceases to have evil influence and becomes the most potent instrument for good. It is worth any amount of trouble to understand that faith cannot possibly be acquired without a proper use of intellect, since nothing but Reason is capable of destroying our doubts. It is true that testimony is also capable of affording a temporary sort of satisfaction; but, since it is impossible for it to cover all possible points, and since its worth, reliability and interpretation have to be determined before its acceptance, it is not within its pale to remove all doubts. Hence, he who depends on testimony is like the man who builds his house on sand. It is for this reason that schisms arise endlessly when people begin to rely on the word of

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186 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. mouth of the founders of their faith, to the exclusion of rational thought. Besides, the satisfaction which testimony seems to afford is more apparent than real, because knowledge is like food, which must be digested in order to become ours. It is no use to us if somebody else eats the food, not even when it is done Brahmanalike, -in the name of and for the benefit of another. Just so with knowledge. Testimony is not only incapable of affording a solid foundation for faith, but also goes to make the confusion worse confounded, since it at once opens the door to a whole host of questions as to the possible interpretation and explanation of the statements made, to say nothing of the reliability and trustworthiness of the witnesses from whom they emanate. And, since it is not possible to settle the differences of opinion conclusively, without the discovery of the nature of things and the laws of Nature, intellect, and intellect alone, is the final judge and the sole arbitrator of the disputes of men, in the first instance. We can now follow the Puranic legend without difficulty. The story goes that Brahma, desirous of performing a sacrifice, once upon a time, proceeded to Pushkara, and made the necessary preparations. But, his divine consort, Savitri, delayed in coming, and, though the hour for the yajna approached nigh, she was not to be found by the side of her Lord. Incensed at her conduct, the god asked Indra to find him another bride, and the latter promptly brought the lovely milkmaid, Gayatri by name, who carried a jar of butter in her hand. Brahma called her the Mother of Vedas, and was united to her. Just then Savitri appeared on the scene,

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THE FALL. and, enraged at the sight of her smiling rival, pronounced diverse curses on the gods who had taken part in the ceremony. She then walked away, leaving the gods in a state of consternation. The young bride, thereupon, herself modified the curses of her divine rival, and promised all kinds of blessings, including final absorption into him, to all the worshippers of her Lord. Finally, Vishnu and Lakshmi brought back the angry Savitri, and Gayatri threw herself at her feet. Upon this Savitri, having raised and embraced her, said, "Since the virtuous wife will do nothing to displease her husband, therefore let us both be attached to Brahma." Gayatri, too, bashfully murmured in reply: "Thy orders will I always obey, and esteem thy friendship precious as my life; thy daughter am I, O goddess! deign to protect me," 187 The explanation of this legend lies in the psychological functions of the will, personified as gods and goddesses in the Puranas. There are two tendencies in the will which appear as intuition and intellect. As Bergson says: "The two tendencies, at first implied in each other, had to separate in order to grow. They both went to seek their fortune in the world, and turned out to be instinct and intelligence......Life, that is to say, consciousness launched into matter, fixed its attention either on its own movements or on the matter it was passing through; and it has thus been turned either in the direction of intuition, or in that of intellect" (The Creative Evolution). Intuition is the sense which gives rise to immediate self-awareness, and in the highest sense means omniscience pure and simple, but intellect is the faculty which deals with forms. In the Puranas the former is personified as the goddess, and the latter as the milkmaid. The jar of butter which Gayatri carries in her hand indicates

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188 her nature, for intellect extracts principles from experience, as one extracts butter from milk. Being the two distinct tendencies of will (personified as Brahma), they are described as the two wives of the god. But, since intuition has the preference over intellect, therefore, Gayatri is made to fall at the feet of her divine rival. However, since intellect is the only means of knowledge in the condition of the fall,' its personification is described as the Mother of Vedas (literally, knowledge). C Again, inasmuch as intellect alone establishes the divinity of the soul, and thereby leads it to Self-realization, and since Self-realization means the freedom of the soul from bondage and pain, therefore, intellect itself is said to have modified the curses of its rival. We give below the curses pronounced by Savitri on some of those who took part in the ceremony, and their modifications as made by her rival, together with their interpretation. Should any difficulty be experienced with these interpretations, they should be read again after the perusal of Chapters IX, X, and XI. Name of the god or goddess cursed. Brahma 6 -*** THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Nature of the curse. Not to be worship. ped in a temple or sacred place. Nature of the modification. Brahma may cease to be worshipped, but his worshippers shall obtain all kinds of blessings, including final absorption into him. Interpretation. Brahma is the revealed aspect of that which is the unmanifested, hence the personification of individuality, or soul, which is endowed with the faculties of Intuition and Intellect. Hence, Savitri, ie., Intuitive wisdom, and Gayatri, i.e., Reason, are the two wives of Brahma. Reason at first debars one from intuitive Jnana, and, thus, is the cause of the fall. Brahma cannot,

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THE FALL 189 Name of the god or goddess cursed. Nature of the curse. Nature of the modification. Interpretation. therefore, be worshipped as a world-God; but, since the soul is the true Redeemer itself, those who worship their own Self obtain all kinds of blessings, including the final release from the samsara. Indra ... To be bound in Shall not remain in Indra is life, which waxes and chains by his ene- bondage for ever, wanes in power, according to mies, and to be and shall be re circumstances and beliefs. Its confined in a leased by his son. enemies are the different kinds strange country. of karmic force, or desires. He is also to lose The strange country is the his city and sta realm of matter; and the loss tion. of city and station signifies the state of bondage. The Liberator of the soul, i.e., Life or Jiva, is Wisdom, personified as the son of the god. Agni To be a devourer "The unclean things Agni is the personification of of all things, clean shall become pure the fire of tapas (asceticism) and unclean. at his mere touch. which purifies all things Hence, the curse and its modification. Vishnu ... To be born amongst He shall regain his men, and also to wife eventually. endure the agony of having his wife ravished from him by his enemies. Vishnu is the personification of dharma or jnana which incarnates amongst men. His enemy is ignorance who steals away his wife (jnana, in its objective aspect), through the door-ways of senses. But, since an actual separation between the Knower and Knowledge is not possible in reality, and also since the soul acquires perfection in jnana prior to the attainment of nie vana, Vishnu is to recover his wife eventually, Shiva ... To be deprived of the loss of man- Shiva represents Will, the bis manhood. hood shall not in Thing in itself, which is free terfere with the land irresistible by nature. Its , * Agni is here described as the devourer of all things, clean and unclean, because it is only when the effect of its good and evil actions is burnt up by the fire of asceticism (vairagya) that the soul attains to nirvanu.

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190 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, Name of the god or goddess cursed. Nature of the curse. Nature of the modification. Interpretation. worship of the lingum, as the symbol of the god. entry into matter deprives it of its freedom and irresistibility to a considerable extent; hence, the god is to lose his manbood The lingum is the symbol of creative power, which is the function of Will: hence its worship by men. Shiva is also the impersonation of dairagya (renunciation). whose nature, as such, is fully in keeping with the curse of Savitri. Lakshmi ... Not to remain sta The goddess personifies prostionary in one perity or wealth, and her place; and to nature is only too well-defined constantly abide in the curse of Savitri to need by the vile, the any further explanation. inconstant, the contemptible, the simple, the cruel, the foolish and the barbarian. The wives To remain barren, No regret is to be The goddesses are the personiof gods and never to en- ! felt for the inabi- fications of certain abstract collectively. joy the pleasure of lity to bear chil- qualities, powers and virtues, having children. dren. and, as such, neither capable of begetting offspring nor of grieving for their barrenness. The above explanation of the mythological account of the marriage and the consequent 'fall' of Brahma, it is to be observed, furnishes a complete explanation of the nature of the faculty of intellect, and describes how moksha cannot be attained without it. The allegorical account of the sons of Adam, given in the fourth chapter of the Book of Genesis, also makes it perfectly clear that emancipation cannot be attained, except through the agency of intellect. Eve, i.e., intellect, conceives and brings forth Abel and Cain who are incompatible by nature, so much so that the former is

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THE FALI.. 191 ultimately murdered by his brother. Now, Cain is reason which deals with inert matter by the dissecting, analysing and classifying processes of induction ; hence, be is described as the tiller of soil which is a symbol for matter. But Abel is Faith which is directed towards Life itself. He is, therefore, described as the keeper of sheep, the symbol of live-stock, hence life. The Lord loves Faith, but is less inclined towards Reason, which can primarily only offer him the produce of matter as an offering. Hence, the offering of Abel is acceptable to the Lord in preference to that of Cain. This upsets Reason, which makes short work of Faith and destroys it. The curse pronounced by the all-knowing God describes the principal features of Reason as distinguished from blind Faith. The riddle of the universe is a source of worry to Reason, hence Ground is not to yield her strength unto it. Another characteristic of induction is a constant wandering in search of experience, hence is Cain to become a fugitive. Again, because all the mischief* that exists in the world is the outcome of Reason, it is called a vagabond too. And, finally, because Reason alone is affected by sleep, it is said to become a dweller in the " Land of Nod." Cain's supplication to the Lord is also symbolical of the nature of Reason. Its punishment is more than it can bear. Every one who discovers its real nature is likely to abhor it, since it leads to trouble and bond * It is interesting to note, as Schopenhauer points out, that in acknowledging a fault we endeavour to father it upon the head in preference to the heart, thus sacrificing away reason to defend good intention.

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192 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. age, and entangles one in the cycle of births and deaths. It, therefore, fears to be despised. Hence, Cain is made to say :" And it shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me." But, inasmuch as, after the Fall and the consequent destruction of blind Faith, Reason, if rightly employed, is alone capable of re-establishing the state of at-one-ment between man and God, by establishing the divinity of the soul, he wbo refuses to be guided by Reason, in the condition of Fall, must remain ignorant of his true nature and entangled in tbe cycle of births and deaths. Hence, the Lord is made to say : " Therefore, whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold" Lastly, the statement-"From thy face shall I be hid."-- is also fully appropriate to Cain as representing Reason. Taken in a literal sense, it is simply absurd to say that anything can be hid from the face of God from whom nothing can be concealed; but, philosophically, omniscience and reason are two opposite aspects of the one and the same thing, namely, the soul, the former being the function of pure spirit, and the latter an attribute of the ego involved in impurity. For this reason, so long as the soul remains in a condition of impurity it cannot exercise its natural function of omniscience; but when the impurities are removed, reason is replaced with all-embracing knowledge and godhood attained. Hence, divinity, and reason cannot exist together, which explains the speech of Cain. The third son of Adam is Seth, which means appointed, that is, he who was appointed to take the place of the murdered Abel (i.e., blind faith), hence, wisdom.

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THE FALL. 193 Seth figures as the Messiah in later Jewish tradition (Encyclo. Brit., 11th Ed., Art. Seth); and Enos (Man) is the son of Seth who calls himself (by the name of) the Lord.* Let us pause for a moment to explain the significance of the expression 'the knowledge of good and evil' as used in the Bible. Every one knows that good and evilt are only comparative terms, neither of which signifies anything in particular in itself, but, when taken in relation to some specific thing, they convey the idea of utility, benefit or advantage, in the one case, and of uselessness, harm, or disadvantage, in the other. That which determines the good or evil of any particular thing, at any particular time, is, in the first instance, our own body, or personality, so that when a thing acts, or is likely to act, on our personality, or body, in a beneficial, or advantageous, manner, we call it good, and, in the converse case, evil. Hence, knowledge of good and evil' means the knowledge of the relations in which our body, or personality, stands to the remaining bodies in the world ; in other words, the knowledge of the phenomenal. And, since the knowledge of the phenomenal is possible only through sense-organs, the knowledge of good and evil, in its ultimate analysis, only amounts to sensual experiences of pleasure and pain. As said in the Mundaka Upanishad, 'two sciences must be known, the highest * See the marginal note to Genesis, IV. 26. CJ. " It is things out of place that are bad; not things in themselves. All evil is relative, and its relation is with higher forms of goodness." Reason and Belief,' by Sir Oliver Lodge, p. 140. 13

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194 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and the lesser ;' of these, the highest is the science of the Supreme Spirit, and the lesser, the science whose object is to show the cause of virtue and vice and their consequences (Shankara ) It would be now obvious that the Bible does not condemn the intellect itself, but only its exclusive employment for the gratification of sensual lust. The third and fourth chapters of the book of Genesis, taken together, cover the entire field of the Puranic legend given above, and point to the power of intellect itself, when rightly employed, to raise up the fallen humanity. The lesson to be learnt from the doctrine of the "fall" is that those who aspire to attain to the status of God, to enjoy ever-lasting bliss, must make up their minds to control the fiery serpent of their desiring manas. They must also see that they do not make their intellect spend all its energy in pandering to the vanities, passions and tastes of the physical body, the seat of false personality, but should apply it to study the requirements of the soul, the real, i.e., immortal man. Man alone, of all beings, in this world, is endowed with the capacity, and enjoys the opportunity, to think on his destiny. He alone has the power of shaping his future, for weal or woe, as he pleases. But this capacity is so hopelessly crippled by his wrong desires, the worst of which is the desire for the sensual knowledge of good and evil of the phenomenal world, that unless he can crush the head of the hydra of his desiring manas, he has no right to hope for salvation. Man's physical concerns may, and, indeed, do come to an end with the physical death ; but the continuity

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THE FALL. 195 of the soul, after death, requires that the physical concerns alone should not be allowed to occupy the uppermost place in his thoughts. Sir Oliver Lodge is the first European to get a partial inkling of the truth of the doctrine of the "fall ; " but he seems to place the emphasis on the "management of the world". rather than on 'self-conquest.' Concerning the origin of self-consciousness, he observes : "How it all arose is a legitimate problem for genetic psychology, but to the plain man it is a puzzle ; our ancestors invented legends to account for it-legends of apples and serpents and the like; but the fact is there, however it be accounted for. The truth embedded in that old Genesis legend is deep ; it is the legend of man's awakening from a merely apimal life to consciousness of good and evil, no longer obeying his primal instincts in a state of thoughtlessness and innocency--a state in which deliberate vice was impossible and therefore higher and purposed goodness also impossible,- it was the introduction of a new sense into the world, the sense of conscience, the power of deliberate choice; the power also of conscious guidance, the management of things and people external to himself, for preconceived ends. Man was beginning to cease to be merely a passenger on the planet, controlled by outside forces ; it is as if the reins were then for the first time being placed in his hands, as if he was allowed to begin to steer, to govern his own fate and destiny, and to take over some considerable part of the management of the world." (Life and Matter). No doubt, a man brought up in an atmosphere full of worldly politics cannot but lay stress on the "management of the world," but religion only accepts those who are prepared to give up worldly politics for the sake of self-conquest. For the less advanced souls, religion does not altogether forbid political activity, but only makes it subordinate to spiritual evolution, so that the world-conquest may not interfere with the conquest of the lower self. It is no use denying the fact that our

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196 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. so-called taking part in the management of the world has hitherto been a very unsatisfactory affair, and whatever, we may say in our own praise, or in that of our civilization, it is abundantly clear that no such praise is merited, even if we do not deserve a strong condemnation for our behaviour towards animals and, in many instances, towards our own race. It is true that we can point out our material accomplishments to Mother Nature with a modest pride in our achievements, but she can always retort by directing our attention to those natural forces and means of which we are almost wholly ignorant even in the twentieth century of our civilization. What are our railways and telegraphs to the faculties of telepathy and clairvoyance lying dormant within our souls? What happiness have they brought to the race, or to any one at all ? All our vaunted boasts get ultimately reduced to this that we have succeeded as individuals, and also as nations, in amassing large fortunes, and in devising various means for squandering them at expensive hotels and card-tables, and on sickening carcasses of animals and intoxicating drinks, to say nothing of other degenerate forms of living only too nauseating to be specifically mentioned. These are practically the limits of our culture, whether we spell it with a c or a big K. But surely, it is only by a mere perversity of sense and language that one may claim the modern civilization to be the outcome of the Sermon on the Mount. In very truth, it is the violation, in every essential, of the Master's philosophy that has brought about the culmination of the modern times which it pleases us to call civilization. Without

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THE FALL. violating in letter, as well as in spirit, the Messianic command, "But whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also," no one could have ever dreamt of subjugating the nations of the world; nor without trampling down the equally forcible mandate, "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth," could any one amass wealth. The truth is that man's power of speech enables him to disguise his true feelings, not only from his fellow-beings, but, quite as often, from himself. Failing to understand the nature of the ideal set before the world by the great Propounders of Religion, the modern man seeks to hide the cancer of unhappiness at his heart by impotent sentimentality and self-deceiving ideas of his own importance and morality. The richest nation on earth may possess the most enormous amount of wealth, its country may be very beautiful to look at, and it may boast of all the luxuries of life which the ingenuity of man has ever put at the disposal of wealth, yet the question arises and must be asked, what individual happiness has been conferred upon the people constituting it? The answer in the negative is so self-evident that one need not take the trouble of recording it. It is not that we deny the great advantages of such institutions as the school, the hospital and the poor-house, but, in very truth, these very institutions furnish evidence condemnatory of our civilization. Our schools impart education, it is true, but it is also true that the education they impart tends not to advance the cause of individual happiness, but leads to atheism, impiety and godlessness. The increasing necessity for hospitals and poor-houses goes to indicate 197

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198 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that people do not live in harmony with Nature, and, consequently, suffer from poverty and disease. The greatest defect of materialism is that it prevents us from the realization of our divine nature, by unduly developing the objective and sensual sides of life. The following comparative table, taken from Hudson's 'Divine Pedigree of Man,' will be found sufficient to show the godly nature of the subjective side of Life, from the realization of which we are at present debarred by our ungodly materialism Pure Intellect. Objective Mind, :-- (Inductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning (imperfect). Memory (imperfect). Brain memories of emotional experiences. 12 GOTH LO 3 Subjective Mind. Instinct or intuition. Controlled by suggestion. 4 Deductive reasoning (potentially perfect). 5 Memory (potentially perfect). 6 Seat of emotions. 7 Telepathic powers. 8 Telekinetic energy. Some writers on New Psychology mention an additional faculty, namely, that of clairvoyance as belonging to the subjective mind; but Hudson does not assign to it a separate place in the table, holding that its phenomena are only telepathic in reality. Whether clairvoyance be regarded as a separate faculty of the subjective mind or not, the list is sufficient to convince any one, at a glance, that the nature of the human soul is essentially divine. To facilitate further comparison, the following table, also Limitations.

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THE FALL. 199 taken from "The Divine Pedigree of Man,' is given below: God. Man. UVOD. Omniscience ( Instinct or intuition. Deductive powers (potentially perfect.) i Memory (potentially perfect). Telekinetic energy. Telepathy. Natural emotions. Omnipotence Omnipresence Infinite love Love ... These comparisons leave no doubt about the human soul being the repository of all godly virtues, which only need unfoldment to bloom into perfection. By far a vast majority of mankind, however, are quite unconscious of these godly. powers of their souls, and, therefore, unable to attain the perfection which is within their reach, since conscious exertion is necessary for spiritual evolution, and since conscious exertion can only be made in the case of things which are known. Our ignorance of these great powers and virtues of the soul is to be attributed, as already stated, to the employment of intellect to pander to sensual lust. Reason being, thus, the tenure by which man holds his free moral agency, and the power which enables him to train his soul, for weal or woe, it is not difficult to see why its employment as a procuress to the will has been described in the old Genesis legend as a 'fall.' Those who deride the ancient Indian civilization should remember that that much derided civilization was founded upon the spiritual requirements and necessities of individual life and society, and was calculated, on the one hand, not only to offer no resistance to the human soul in its spiritual

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200 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. evolution, but, also, to actually advance and facilitate its progress, and, on the other, to secure the greatest good of the greatest numbers, even in respect of material peace and prosperity, in so far as these are consistent with the spiritual aspirations of the real man. The same statement cannot be made in respect of modern civilization, which, if anything, is anti-spiritual in its tendency. It is no use minimising the pernicious and harinful nature of the influence which the present-day civilisation is exerting on the souls of men, since it tends to make them disregard the teaching of religion which alone is the path of what has been described as entering into life. What with its fashions and conventions, its licensed saloons and beer-shops, its niceties and novelties in food, dress, and the like, to say nothing of the thousand and one other forms of the anti-spiritual occupations and pursuits which it provides for its votaries, the modern civilization is calculated only to pamper sensualism at the cost of the spiritual nourishment of the soul. The one most marked feature of distinction between the two forms of civilization, the ancient and the modern, is in respect of the cost of living which is going up daily, and which the majority of men find it hard to meet, in spite of devoting their whole-time labour to its procurement. Such being the case, it is not surprising that people should have neither time nor inclination for the study of religion, not to mention the practising of those methods and means which alone lead to the attainment of the ideal of the soul. The path of sensualismanother though slightly less repulsive name for animalism -- is directly opposed to that of spiritualism, and it

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THE FALI, 201 requires no great familiarity with the canons of Logic to predict that if the latter be the only means of attaining to the perfection of Gods, the former cannot possibly lead to aught but suffering and pain. The ancients could undoubtedly have given us a civilization equal to our own, but they very well knew that the moment prominence was given to the enjoyment of the senses, the cart would necessarily come to occupy the place of the horse, and, therefore, wisely kept down all those sensual tendencies of men which constantly try to break loose in the name of development and culture. We might refine sensualism as much as we like, but it would never become anything else. As black takes no other hue, so does sensualism maintain its loathsomeness, notwithstanding all the veneer of cultured refinement under which we constantly try to conceal its hideous nature. To conclude, the elucidation of the legend of the 'fall' has shown us that it is not an historical record of the actual doings of a primitive pair of human progenitors, but an illustration of the operation of certain important psychic laws, which no one, desirous of attaining immortality and bliss, can afford to ignore. The object of the ancient teacher, who took pains to leave a record of his views behind, was not to amuse us with a nursery tale, nor yet to furnish us with an opportunity to smile at his 'crude and childish simplicity,' but to bequeath to us some of the most valuable secrets of Religion, the Science of all sciences. The thirst for happiness is a natural craving with all living beings; and the man who does not long, consciously or otherwise, for the joy of Gods is yet

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202 to be born. The ancient seer knew this full well, and left a record of his views on the subject for our guidance. What we have been accustomed to look upon as an historical narrative of Adam's disobedience and punishment is, thus, a recipe for the general complaint of suffering and pain, from which all are anxious to escape. This remedy consists, as has been demonstrated in this chapter, in the realisation of the great formula of faith, the 'aham Brahman asmi' ( I am Brahman) of Vedanta. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. A word about the nature of the flaming sword and the cherubim that bar man's way to the Tree of Life, and we shall pass on to a consideration of the doctrine of Redemption. The former represents the lower mind, the ego of desires and lusts which it seeks to gratify with sensory stimulus from the external world. As restlessness is a characteristic of this mind on account of its being the seat of desires, it is described as turning in every direction. It should be borne in mind that mind is a clumsy word to be employed for the idea which is intended to be conveyed. The Sanskrit manas is the most appropriate word for expressing the sense. It means that organ which prevents knowledge from being acquired simultaneously, and which acts as a gate-keeper* at a show who lets in only *The nearest equivalent to manas in English is attention, which limits our perception of things to one at a time only, in other words. which prevents our taking cognizance of things simultaneously. If we study ourselves in the attitude of attention, we shall observe that our senses do not work simultaneously and together, so that when the mind is linked to a particular sense-organ, it ceases to work through the remaining channels of sensation. The same is the case with thinking, which also requires exclusive attention being paid to its object; and even the experiences of pleasure and pain are no exception to this rule. Attention, then, is the instrument of exclusion of knowledge. The soul is like a mirror which reflects all things which exist at the same time; but it is attention which debars us from taking cognizance of them all at once, and confines the percep

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THE FALL, 203 one at a time. The cherubim apparently stand for, and represent, sense attractions. It is, thus, the Manas and the attractions of the world which are mounting guard over the priceless Tree of Life. Immortality is the reward of him who overpowers them both, and reaches the Life-giving Tree. ment. They us after the are only differen tive function to that in which we happen to be the most interested for the time being. It follows from this that our interests alone determine the functioning of perception, and prevent us from being all-knowing. We have said that attention signifies interest, but interest itself is nothing other than desire, since we are only interested in things which we have a desire to acquire or enjoy, or which we wish to avoid. The force of desire, then, is what is meant by attention, i.e. munas It is also easy to see that desires are only different kinds of forces, since they drag us after their objects-often against our better judgment. They cannot be immaterial altogether, for the conception of a non-entity operating on the soul, and dragging it in certain directions, thus, crippling its perception and narrowing down its field of knowledge, a self-contradictory idea. It is as if the soul were possessed of a perceiving instrument, or rod-a kind of psychic monocle-to survey the world with. This mental monocle is the manas; and, since it is only the sharp end of desires, its material shape may be likened to a pencil of rays, thinned and sharpened into a point. Attention, then, signifies the current of different kinds of forces of desire, brought to a point and focussed on the object of enquiry. For this reason it is that it has been described as a serpent in the book of Genesis. Hence, he who would acquire omniscience must curb down his desires, so that his soul may put aside its knowledge-obstructing instrument of perception of which it is enamoured at present. * The cheruliam, who are to be distinguished by their knowledge from seraphs whose distinctive quality is love, probably represent the discriminative knowledge of good and evil of things, and are thus symbolical of sense-attractions.

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CHAPTER V. REDEMPTION. " On the knowledge and acknowledgment of God depends the salvation of every one."-Swedenborg. " This great, unborn, undecaying, immortal, fearless soul is Brahman : Brahman is verily fearless : he who thus knows, becomes the fearless Brahman."-Bri. Up. IV. 4. 25. In a community dominated by deistic thought, which separates God and man by an impassable gulf, it is not surprising that the conception of salvation should be no broader, or fuller, than that of forgiveness of sin by the favour of some one nearer and dearer to the Lord than man. The Christian conception of salvation is typical of this form of belief. Whatever it may be taken to represent, whether the purchase of God's favour, by the suffering and death of Christ, or the ransom and deliverance of sinners from the bondage of sin and the consequent liability to punishment for the violation of the laws of God by the atonement of Jesus, the idea of redemption in the modern Christian Church does not aspire higher than the securing of heaven for man, by the favour, compassion and mercy of an agency outside his own self, and, consequently, not only leaves him as finite, and limited, and dependent on the will of another, as ever, but is, also, utterly incompatible with the true sense of the words 'salvation' and 'redemption,' employed to give it expression. If the blood of Jesus, which was

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REDEMPTION. 205 apilt some two thousand years ago, be the sole channel and means of salvation, those for whom it was shed, and also those who claim the benefit of its having been shed, ought to enjoy the status of the redeemd from the moment they make up their minds to acknowledge his agency. Yet, none but a madman may urge that claim on behalf of the adherents of the orthodox clerical views on the subject. The fact is that the true conception of redemption, in religion, is not exhausted with the remission of sin, or escape from the liability to punishment, but contains, within its four corners, the additional idea of an enlargement of the spiritual personality, by the restoration of the powers and attributes hitherto held in 'pledge." Necessarily, then, must the conception of redemption include the idea of a life fuller and more glorious and abundant than that which is the lot of man in the state of sin. The word salvation, in its true significance, conveys precisely this sense, meaning, as it does, health, safety, and wholeness. It is not difficult to observe how lanie and impoverished has the true teaching of the Saviour become in the hands of his followers. Unable to form a clear idea of the state of consciousness which is denominated blissful, the followers of Jesus have reduced his conception of heaven to that of a locality, where, on a certain day, after the death of the physical body, men shall rise, in the bodies of flesh, and pass their lives in the enjoyment of Olympian luxuries. They fail to observe that the highest flights of their theological speculation do not rise higher than the idea of sense gratification, which is all that can be

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206 had from external surroundings and effects. Let the heaven of the preachers of the Church be never so elegant and pretty, let its grandeur be never so imposing, let its residents be never so ravishing,-let it be all this and more, yet can it be conceived, or, in any way, imagined, that true joy can accrue to the soul from an abode in Olympus? All that comes from outside the self can only pass in through the media of senses, and, for that reason, can never be anything more or less than sensation. But, since sensations are not always pleasant, and since the most agreeable of them become sickening and tormenting when too often repeated, the state of the physical man, on his resurrection, in the heaven-world, would not secure for him even freedom from the liability to experience pain. Bliss is an emotion, which, as we have already shown, is the feeling of freedom from all desires, arising from the consciousness of fulness and perfection in one's own being, and quite independently of all considerations of surroundings, environment and locality. Hence, no outside agency, whether spiritual or material, can confer it on the soul, if it happen to be devoid of the right emotion in itself. From the practical side of the question, also, it being obvious that the word of the theologian is not entitled to any greater credit than that of any other thinking being,, there arises the most important question of all as to the proof of the doctrine of redemption, as preached by the modern Church. When a man pays off a pledge, he becomes immediately entitled to the possession and enjoyment of the thing pledged, and may insist on its being restored to him at once. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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207 The same ought to be the case with redemption in the spiritual sense. If the theological interpretation of the doctrine is correct, why is it that the enjoyment of benefits arising from the acknowledgment of Jesus must be postponed to an indefinite point of time in the future? Why is it, we repeat, that we do not immediately come into the realization of the redeemed bliss, here and now ? As Tennyson says, "'Tis life, not death, for which we pant; More life and fuller that we want." REDEMPTION. * Moreover, common sense shows that redemption is possible only by paying off the pledge,, not by the acknowledgment of the pledgee, or his son, as a worldsaviour; and where the liability to be discharged consists in refraining from abandoning oneself to the knowledge of good and evil of the phenomenal things, in other words, from sensual lusts, it is absolutely inconceivable how any one else but the pledgor himself can ever acquit him of the debt. The truth is that the Church has no idea of the true significance of the doctrines of 'fall' and 'redemption,' and is, consequently, unable to give us a foretaste of the bliss of being saved which every practical religion should be in a position to do. The explanation of the mystery of the fall' has practically qualified us for a comprehension of the doctrine of redemption. For, just as fall signifies mortality, imperfection and unhappiness for the human race, so is redemption the door to immortality, perfection and joy. The former indicates a condition of existence in which the true attributes of the divinity residing in the temple of the body are suppressed on account of an all-absorbing

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208 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. sense of identity between the immortal 'tenant and his tenement, the mortal tabernacle of flesh, and the latter the state in which the tenant'knows himself as not only different from his tenement, but also as the Perfect Paramatman ---Omniscient, Immortal and Blissful. As a consequence of being involved in the state of fall, man lays all the stress, he can, on his physical body-a perishable compound of matter-and ignores the God within, thus forcing the Infinite, as it were, to vacate his throne, and placing the finite, bodily puppet in his place. Redemption implies a change of this weakening, mental attitude to enable the soul to evolve out its divine attributes in fulness and perfection. We have seen that the soul is made of pure intelligence, the substance which thinks and knows; and the relation between thought and belief is that the latter constitutes a mould for fixing the former's form. It is for this reason that the soul speedily becomes what it actually believes itself to be. It would follow from this that if it replaces the sense of its identity with the body with one in its own Godhood, it will actually become God as soon as the right kind of belief becomes fully established in its consciousness. The main thing, then, is.to acquire the belief in one's own divinity. But this is not an easy inatter by any means. In order to achieve this result, one must have faith in what has been said above. That really means that one should have absolutely no doubt about the doctrine, and that the conviction of its truth must saturate the mind through and through ; for the least doubt creeping in will neutralize whatever little faith may have been ac

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REDEMPTION. 209. quired by the soul. We must hold the idea of the self being the Paramatman constantly before the mind, and should, in every possible manner, try to strengthen it by thought, word and deed, in daily life. You will gain courage and cheerfulness very soon, for nowhere is the law that Nature-allegorically, God-helps those who help themselves more rapid in operation than on the mental plane. To put the same thing in the metaphorical language of mysticism, when you try to establish your oneness with God, he will also do the same, and just in the degree that you show your earnestness in the matter, will he also evince earnestness on his side. Mahomed expresses this very idea when he makes God declare :-- " Whoso seeketh to approach me one span, I seek to approach him one cubit; and whoso seeketh to approach me one cubit, I seek to approach him two fathoms; and whoso walketh towards me, I run towards him." ("Sayings of Muhammad.') Invisible hands will lead you, so to speak, by the hand over impassable and rocky foot-paths, invisible minds will lend you their experience and put their knowledge at your service, auspicious signs and tokens will be in evidence on all sides, and you will find whole Nature ready and eager to acknowledge the return of her Master from bondage and to proclaim him to the world mid joy and celebrations. You must not, however, falter. It is merely a question of the attitude of mind od your part. Determine to be free, resolve to shake off the bonds forged by ignorance, and your Inner Glory will shine forth as soon as you cease to stand in its way. The difficulty is felt only so long as you are entangled in the world of men, where Mammon is the object of 14

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210 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. worship, and you feel like a prisoner with all sorts of ties and bonds. The moment you rise above the world, the moment you realise that you are not the little, miserable, limited man, but the real living Existence, the SatCbit-Ananda, you will experience delights which are beyond the most extravagant expectations of men. Perfection is the goal of evolution. You are the perfect God yourself, though entangled in the meshes of illusion, and your natural perfection is struggling to manifest itself from within. The moment you cease obstructing its path, the moment you exert yourself to bring it into manifestation, it will begin to shine forth in all its glory and splendour. Your onward progress will then be resplendent with Light and Love, and drawing nearer and nearer your goal every day, you will finally pass into mukti, liberated and free, and with the full consciousness of being the Sat-Chit-Ananda. This is the true idea of Redemption. Just as by the inherent virtue of a desire to taste the fruit of good and evil man is deprived of his divinity, so by the return of faith in his Godhood would he rise to perfection and glory. The cause of our downfall is our ignorance of our divine, godly nature ; the bodily personality lies at the root of the trouble. If we wish to avoid pain and suffering, if we wish to come into our own, and to realize our divine nature, we must give up our evil notions and desires, and replace them with right beliefs and vairagya (renunciation). As Swami Rama Tirtha says: "If you bring your faith to believe that you......[are) saved, you are the saviour of the universe. If you believe that you never were the body, that you never were in thraldom, if you be as grown-up men, and not as silly children, if you realize with Vedanta that you

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REDEMPTION. 211. are the saving energy, then you are the Saviour of the whole world. ......Be no longer children. Realize yourself to be saved, and saved you are...... In you, oh man, there is something which is pure, which is not contaminated by faults, sins and weaknesses of the body ; in this world of sinfulness and sloth it remains pure...... Within you is the purest of the pure, within you is the sinless One, the Atman, which makes its existence felt, which cannot be destroyed, which cannot be dispensed with, which cannot be done away with. It is there, however faulty, however sinful the body may be ; the real Self, the sinlessness of the real Self must be there; it must make itself felt ; it is there, it cannot be destroyed...... In you is present the divine God, and in you is present the worthless body; but you have misplaced the things...... You have done things upside down; in a topsy turvy way have you put them. You have put the cart before the horse ; and that is how you make this world a hell for you.... The only ... way to really stamp out all misery from the world, -long faces and gloomy, sad tempers will not mend matters,--the only way to escape from all sins, the only way to stand above all temptations is to realize the true Self."'In the Woods of God-Realization,' Vol. I. The idea of redemption, thus, from whichever point of view one might study it, is that of fulness and perfection, which are not the characteristics of the bodily man, but the essence of the true Self. The same is the case with happiness; for it is simply impossible for any outside agency to confer true bliss on the soul, since that can only arise from within. Immortality also falls under the category of things which cannot be had from outside, since every soul is immortal by nature. It is, therefore, clear that our begging for Life and Joy-and all our prayers only refer to one or the other of them, in some form or other--from 'the Heavenly Father' is a process not only devoid of sense, but also degrading and harmful to the soul. Hence, he who promises to reward us with a residence in heaven, with the com

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212 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. panionship of beautiful nymphs, and all other pleasuregiving things after death, in lieu of devotion to himself, can be no friend of the soul, whose inner divinity cannot possibly shine forth, so long as it remains engrossed in the enjoyment of sensual attractions, be they of this or of the heavenly world. Redemption, then, is the doctrine of Perfection, not of remission of sin by another ; and the true Redeemer is the individual soul itself, not any outside agency, however great or sublime. We must now turn to the Bible itself to see what it teaches us about redemption; but we shall begin our enquiry with a study of the life of the founder of the Christian faith whose teachings constitute the major portion of the New Testament. . The very first question which arises in connection with the Bible has reference to its authenticity as a true narrative of events that happened in the past. So far as the Old Testament is concerned, it has been made apparent, at least in respect of the third and fourth chapters of the book of Genesis, that the facts recorded are not the events of history, but those invented by the imagination of man to clothe some of its most abstruse conclusions of a psychological nature. Philo (30 B. C. ---50 A. D.) and Origen (185--254 A. D.) seem to have taken a similar view. The following from 'The History of The New Testament Criticism 'is an admirable summing up of the latter's argument against an historical interpretation of the Bible: -- "He premises, firstly, that the Old Testament is divinely inspired, because its prophecies foreshadow Christ; and, secondly, that there is not either in the old or New Testament a single syllable void of divine meaning and import. But how, he asks, can

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REDEMPTION 213 we conciliate with this tenet of their entire inspiration the existence in the Bible of such tales as that of Lot and his daughters, of Abraham prostituting first one wife and then another, of a succession of at least three days and nights before the sun was created ? Who he asks, will be found idiot enough to believe that God planted trees in Paradise like any husbandman; that he set up in it visible and palpable tree-tranks, labelled the one Tree of Life,' and the other Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil,' both bearing real fruit that might be masticated with corporeal teeth; that he went and walked about the garden; that Adam hid under a tree; that Cain fied from the face of God? The wise reader, he remarks, may well ask what the face of God is, and how anyone could get away from it? Nor, he continues, is the Old Testament only full of such incidents, as no one regardful of good sense and reason can suppose to have really taken place or to be sober history. In the Gospels equally, he declares, such narratives abound; and as an example he instances the story of Devil plumping Jesus down on the top of a lofty mountain, from which he showed him all the kingdoms of the earth and their glory. How, he asks, can it be literally true, how a historical fact, that from a single mountain top with fleshly eyes all the realms of Persia, of Scythia, and of India could be seen adjacent and at once? The careful reader will, he says, find in the Gospels any number of cases similar to the above." Origen nevertheless believed that a major portion of the Bible could be relied upon as history. He said : "The passages in Scripture which bear a spiritual sense and no other are considerably outnumbered by those which stand good as history. Let no one suspect us of asserting that we think none of the Scriptural narratives to be historically true, because we suspect that some of the events related never really happened." The truth, however, seems to be that history plays no important part in the teaching of religion proper, since it is only the record of events in the life of a nation, and since religion deals not with nations but individuals primarily. To a limited extent, certainly, history is also a valuable guide, inasmuch as it enables us to observe the working out of what might be termed

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214 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the national destiny, as distinguished from individual karma, and to perceive the errors of the statesmen and politicians of the past; but it is biography which is the more valuable of the two, since with its aid we can perceive the effects of religious training on the souls of men, and determine the degree of spiritual unfoldment attained by different prophets and saints. Hence, religion incorporates only so much of history and biography as is likely to be useful to us in the study of spiritualism. Even were we to treat the Old Testament as wholly or partially in the nature of history, the difficulties which arise are such as cannot be easily brushed aside. Its earliest parts are now shown to have been compiled not earlier than 444 B. C., and are, therefore, the work of men who were, in no sense, eye-witnesses to the events they record. Besides, the Biblical compilers never allowed the feeling of regard, or reverence, for history to prevent them from making additions of their own to the bare narratives of fact whenever they felt inclined to do so. As the Encyclopaedia Britannica points out (see Art. Bible) : "The historical books of the Old Testament form two series ; one, consisting of books from Genesis to 2 Kings (exclusive of Ruth) embracing the period from the Creation to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans in 586 B. C. ; the other comprising the books of Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, beginning with Adam and ending with the second visit of Nehemiah to Jerusalem in 432 B. C. These two series differ from one another materially in scope and point of view, but in one respect they are both constructed on a similar plan; no entire book in the either series consists of a single, original work ; but older writings, or sources, have been combined by a compiler -or sometimes, in stages, by a succession of compilers-in such a

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REDEMPTION. manner that the points of juncture are often clearly discernible, and the sources are in consequence capable of being separated from one another. The authors of the Hebrew historical books, as we now have them, do not. as a rule, as a modern author would do, re-write the matter in their own language; they excerpt from pre-existing documents such passages as are suitable to their purpose, and incorporate them in their work, sometimes adding at the same time matter of their own.......Sometimes, for instance, the excerpts from the older documents form long and complete narratives; in other cases (as in the account of the flood) they consist of a number of short passages, taken alternately from two older narratives, and dove-tailed together to make a continuous story; in the books of Judges and Kings the compiler has fitted together a series of older narratives in a frame-work supplied by himself the Pentateuch and book of Joshua (which form a literary whole, and are now often spoken of together as the Hexateuch) have passed through more stages than the books just mentioned, and their literary structure is more complex." 215 The question which now arises is: why did the ancient chroniclers act in this manner at all? No one who has read the Old Testament even casually can be impressed with the idea that the narrators were anxious to chronicle historical events with the historian's veracity. There is a set purpose discernible in their writings, and it seems to be to draw upon history only in so far as it can be useful for the requirements of mythology and allegory, which had apparently become the recognised language of mystic theology in their age. If our surmise be correct, it would follow that the records of the Old Testament contain mostly the hidden and secret canons of mysticism, given out in the garb of history, so that their purport be clear to those who have been initiated into the mysteries of the Spiritual science, but remain unknown to others.

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216 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. * The same is the case with the New Testament whose different portions are no less discrepant with and contradictory of one another than those of the older Bible. None of the Gospels was apparently the work of the apostles; those according to Matthew and Luke seem to be elaborated versions of Mark, which itself was probably based on an unknown and simpler document, designated 'Q' by the critics. The date of Mark has been put somewhere after A. D. 70; and Matthew and Luke may be said to have been published between 80 and 100 A. D. The fourth Gospel is now frankly admitted to be anything but history ; and Matthew and Luke are both acknowledged to have largely drawn upon their imagination concerning the events which they record. " The evidence which convicts the third evangelist," writes Prof. F. C. Burkitt in The Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics' (Art. Gospels), " of having used the Antiquities (not always with complete accuracy) is very well brought together by Schmiedel...... The main points are: (1) the mention of Theudas in Gamaliel's speech (Acts 5*) is not only an anachronism, but further it is inexplicable if the author of the Acts drew his information from Josephus ; (2) the introduction of Lysanias of Abilene in Luke 31 as contemporary with the 15th year of Tiberius (A, D. 29) appears to be due to a similarly inaccurate use of Ant. XX. vii, 1." Some of the many Epistles incorporated in the New Testament have also come to be reckoned as pure forgeries. The Encyclopaedia Britannica concedes (Art. Bible): * It seems on the whole most probable that 2 Peter is not a genuine work, but that it came from the same factory of pseudonymous Petrine writings as the Apocalypse which bears the same name, though the one has, and the other has not, obtained a place within the Canon. This epistle was questioned from the first, and only

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REDEMPTION. 217 gained its place with much hesitation, and rather through slackness of opposition than any conclusiveness of proof......Even in the case of the two more important epistles, 1 Peter and James, we have to add the qualification * if genuine'." We may also refer to Dr. Raimond Van Marle who sums up the result of a hundred years' scientific criticism, in 'The Theosophist,' Vol. xxxv. p. 396, as follows: " The Gospels constantly contradict each other, and S. John's is so different from the other three that a division has been made by all scholars between it and what are called the three synoptic Gospels. Nevertheless,' at the end of the second century 8. John was pronounced to be authentic at the same time as the three others. Apart from the fact that S. John's way of speaking of the Christ is very different from that we find in the synoptics, he does not mention the Lord's Supper, he gives a different day for the Lord's death, speaks of three feasts of the Passover where the others speak but of one, and relates almost all the incidents of the life of Christ as taking place at Jerusalem, whereas, according to the synoptics, only the end of His life was spent there. In S. John's version the character of John the Baptist loses almost all its importance; the miracles are quite different, becoming more astonishing and, at the same time, more symbolical ; the whole character of Jesus is much more divine and more like an aspect of the LOGOS than in the synoptics; but at the same time he speaks of Jesus as the son of Joseph, and doe not mention the birth from a Virgin. There are two passages in 8. John which clearly show that the author was not a personal witness of the life of Christ, namely xix. 35, where he says: 'And he that saw it bare witness,' etc., and xxi. 24 : This is the disciple which testifieth of these things....... and we know that his testimony is true.' To several scholars it has appeared probable that the author of the Gospel according to S. John was a Jew of the school of Philo of Alexandria, who knew the Gospels, but introduced the Alexandrian philosophy into the story told by them. "But neither do the so-called synoptics agree together. To begin with, the date of the birth of Jesus is fixed by Matthew as occurring four years before our era at the very latest (under Berod). Luke makes it ten yoars later (during the enrolment), or in the year 6 A.D., yet

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218 states, further on, that in the fifteenth year of Tiberius-our year 29 A.D.-Christ was about thirty years old. The dates in S. John are in absolute contradiction with these two and make the death of Jesus much later. The miraculous birth is not related by S. Mark; S. Matthew and S. Luke give two quite different genealogies for Christ's descent, through Joseph from King David, but these, though fulfilling the Jewish traditions that the Messiah should be a descendant of David (Mark, xii. 35), are in contradiction with the story of His birth from a Virgin. Had Mary and Joseph known of the miraculous birth, would they have been astonished when Christ spoke in the Temple of His Father's business (Luke ii. 50)? The miracles related by the synoptics are much alike, but the circumstances under which they are stated to have occurred are very different, and might show that only the facts, and nothing more, were known to the authors. The greatest miracle-the raising of Lazarus-is related only by S. John. The other miracles are healing, exorcism and often allegories (the multiplication of loaves, the changing of water into wine, etc.) The names of the persons at the foot of the Cross are not given alike in two places. On the subject of Resurrection the synoptics differ considerably. What Mark says in xvi. 9-20, is an appendix added afterwards. Luke undertakes in his preface to give a historical version of the life of Christ, but fails to give a single date, contenting himself continually with such indications as on the Sabbath,' at the same time,' etc. His historical indications are false. Herod was never king, but a governor. Cyrenius, whom he brings into his history of Jesus, governed from the year 7 to 11 A.D., and had consequently nothing to do with the story. He also mentions the name of Lysanias, although he had died thirty-four years before Jesus was born. The Gospel writers cannot have been familiar with the customs of the Jews in Palestine, when they speak of baptising in a river, and especially in the Jordan, where even bathing was prohibited. In Luke we find two High Priests, Caiphas and Annas, existing at the same time which is impossible. We find Jesus teaching in the Temple where only sacrifices took place, the synagogue serving for preaching. Through Josephus (Antiq. XVIII, ii. 2) we know that on the night of the Passover it was the custom for the priests to open the doors of the Temple a little after midnight, when everybody gathered in the Temple, so that the arrest of Christ at that THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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REDEMPTION 219 time must have caused a great scandal, which the Jewish priests did not desire (else why arrest Him at night ?). There was never any question of witnesses, who appear at once at the judgment of Christ, as predicted in Psalms xxviii, 12. Executed criminals were thrown into a common trench, so that the story of the tomb which was found empty after the Resurrection seems very improbable.... If we compare the Jewish Legal Code with the Gospel stories we come across very strange contradictions. It was strictly prohibited to hold judicial proceedings on days of religious feasts, so Jesus can never have been judged on the day of the Passover. It was also forbidden to carry arms on such days, so that the chief priests would never have sent the Temple Guard to arrest Christ, and Peter would certainly not have worn a sword." Dr. Marle's observations embody the expression of opinion of men like Schleiermacher, Strauss, Bauer, Renan, Loisy, and others; and many of the advanced theologians of the English and the German schools are also in entire agreement with him. Under the circumstances, the conclusion is irresistible that if the New Testament writings narrate only that which occurred, really and truly, in the physical world, their authors must have been discharged from some bedlam to write such discrepant tales. We fancy, however, that these discrepancies are the outcome of a deliberate effort, rather than of a spirit of falsehood or exaggeration. It is not possible to lay too much stress on, or to exaggerate, the importance of a symbolical interpretation of that which is opposed to the order of nature in an historical sense. The reader should endeavour to impress on his mind the fact that the ancients would never have mutilated history purposelessly and without reason. Whoever has lost sight of this fact has invariably ended by discovering the Scriptural text to be the outpouring of the immature mind of the race, whereas, in

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220 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. reality, the truth lies the other way. As a matter of fact, the authors of our Scriptures were highly intellectual men, and possessed a more profound knowledge of things of which we are alnuost wholly ignorant, in spite of our much lauded methods of research. When the modern scientist smiles at the crass ignorance and the crude, superstitious faith of the Hindu who maintains that the universe rests on the back of a tortoise, he simply smiles at his own ignorance, although quite unconscious of the fact. The truth is, that it was never intended that this statement should be understood in its literal sense. The tortoise is the symbol of Life, which manifests itself or works through the five sense-holes, i.e., organs of sensation, just as a tortoise extends its limbs through the holes in its shield. Besides this, the tortoise possesses the power of expansion and contraction which is also a characteristic of the living substance or soul. Struck with the similarity between the functions of Life, and the holes in the bony covering of the tortoise, the propounder of the text in question employed the animal as a symbul for the soul. Thus, what is intended by the statement is not that the world, i.e., our little globe, actually rests on the back of a giant tortoise, but that the universe of matter and form is supported by the substratum of Life. Similarly, the passage (Matt. XXVII. 51 and 52)-- "The veil of the temple was rent in twain from top to bottom, and the graves were opened, and many bodies of the saints which slept arose and came out of the graves and appeared unto many (after the crucifixion of Jesus)" -- was not intended to be read in its ordinary sense. The veil which was torn from top to bottom was not the

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REDEMPTION. 221 veil of a material edifice made of stone, mortar, or lime, but the veil which obstructs the higher, that is, clairvoyant vision; and the graves that were opened were not the graves in a burial ground of men, but in the cemetery of memory. If it were an historical fact that the graves gave up their carcasses on the occasion, it would have led a vast majority of those who witnessed the spectacle to rush to the fold of Christianity, and would not have escaped the contemporary historianJosephus*. What is intended is the recovery of the memories of the past lives of the soul (Jesus), and not the appearance of some rotten and worm-eaten bodies of the dead. The nature of the mechanism of memory will be explained in a later chapter; meanwhile it is clear that the Biblical text is not likely to yield anya thing but confusion and contradiction to the modern methods of research on historical lines. In the following pages we shall endeavour to present to the reader a re-constructed version of the life of Jesus from the standpoint of religion, and shall also point out the causes of some of the more important discrepancies, which, as stated above, are due to a deliberate effort to contradict the historical interpretation. Jesus of Nazareth had a mission in life, just as every one who acquires knowledge has. It has been considered the greatest sin to know the truth and not to spread it to others. The Hindu Scriptures have it : "They who follow after Avidya (ignorance) enter into gloomy darkness ; into undoubtedly greater darkness than that go they, who are devoted to Vidya (knowledge) only, that is, who do not correct the wrong notions of others."--(Isa Vasya Upanishad). * See The Historian's History of the World, Vol. II. p. 189.

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222 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It has ever been so with mankind. It is a part of the nature of man to enlighten his surroundings by sharing his knowledge with his neighbours. He is compelled to do so instinctively, which is but another way of saying that it is his inner nature. It is this which distinguishes him from a dog on the point of temperament. Man's nature compels him to help all those who are in distress; he is made to share his happiness with the rest of his race. But the dog likes to eat up what he gets himself, and even if the food be more than he requires he will not allow any one else to take it from him. To the dog it does not matter whether his surroundings are happy or miserable, beautiful or ugly, in health or diseased ; so long as he is all right individually, he is happy, and wishes not to be bothered by, or worried about, others. But man does not find happiness in ugly, diseased or unhealthy surroundings. He cannot fly away from a bad or nauseating scene; for what may be hidden from his physical eye cannot be so easily dismissed from his mind. Since all unhealthy pictures create a feeling of repulsion in man, it becomes necessary for him to remove the causes of disgust. There was a time when there was no exception to this rule, when people were anxious to impatt knowledge to all, provided the recipients were found deserving of it, but now, since Mammon has held greater sway, over the people's hearts, we do, now and then, come across men who insist on turning everything-including knowledge--into silver and gold. Thus, the spreading of the light of knowledge has always been regarded by humanity as a divine mission. Jesus was no exception to the rule.

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REDEMPTION. 223 Like Mahavira, Buddha, and all other saviours and saints, he conceived it the one purpose of his life to dispel the darkness of ignorance by flooding the world with Light,--to exorcise the demon of superstition by the Word of Power, the Gospel of Faith. People paid little heed, however, to what he said, but were guided by what he performed. There was not room enough for goodness in their hearts, and the seed which would have yielded a harvest a thirty-, a sixty-, or a hundred-foid, had it been sown on good soil, fell by the wayside, or on stony ground, and failed to fructify. The Saviour's doctrine fell unheeded on the ears of his congregation, who cared nothing for philosophy but were ready and anxious to worship the man who healed the sick, revived the dead, and performed other miracles. Ever since the commencement of the Panchama Kala, which began about 2,500 years ago, the idea of securing salvation through the virtue of some one else has become worldwide. To work out one's own salvation, by one's own exertion, leaves no time for the worship of Mammon, and it is certainly convenient to believe that through some one else's grace, to be secured by flattery or hollow praise, the same object can be achieved with ease. The doctrine of salvation by 'blind-worship' gave rise to this wrong notion. The doctrine is perfectly sound in itself, but the error lies in its interpretation. Salvation is possible by this method, only when worship becomes the sole purpose of the devotee's life, when, like Mejnun (the hero of an oriental love story), he banishes from his heart all else but the image of the beloved 'Leila' (the heroine in the said story), that is to say, when he

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224 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. whole-heartedly devotes himself to the pursuit of the Ideal. This was the real meaning of the doctrine of Salvation by " Bhaktiyoga," which is the same thing as "worship." People had, however, no time for all. this, for if they attended to it Mammon would be neglected ; but, from their worldly point of view, the displeasure of Mammon would be a calamity unparalleled by anything else under the sun. Just in the degree that the love of money and other worldly things took hold of the hearts of men, the strictness of the true principle of worship lost in force, till about the time that Jesus appeared in the world the majority of people had come to look upon the doctrine of Salvation by worship to mean merely the saying of prayers, about once a day or so, and a little hollow praise of an unknown, unseen being, called God, if time permitted, and an occasional offering to prevent him from getting angry. In truth, the doctrine of Worship had degenerated into a common belief, shared in by almost the whole race, that it was sufficient to do something to prevent their God from feeling neglected, so that if a man offered him prayers and food, and flattered him occasionally, the Lord God could not, in justice and reason, feel aggrieved or complain. Thus it was that Jesus found his congregations unable to understand or follow his teaching. Even his chosen disciples oftener failed to grasp his meaning than otherwise. Like the rest of those who came in contact with him, they had ears and eyes only for the wonderful things done by him, and took little or no interest in the philosophy underlying his teaching. They wanted cheap salvation, and the doctrine of 'Sonship'seemed to provide the shortest cut

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225 to Heaven without individual exertion or labour. They were thus quite content to be in Jesus' company, for the sake of the miracles he wrought, and felt no interest in disputing, or comprehending, his claim to the sonship of God. It has always been the case with the illiterate masses that they ask not for the how or the why of religion, but for a sign, and when they are shown something out of the common they blindly tender their homage. On the other hand, the educated classes have tied themselves down to the letter of the Law as it was handed down to them from their ancestors, and decline to consider it in any other light. It is also customary with mankind to regard all the dead ancestors as infallible, and so great is the prejudice against innovation and reform that we readily lay violent hands on the stranger who points out our errors. We can now understand why Jesus was loved by the publicans and sinners, but despised and hated by the Pharisees and Doctors of Law. The former found in him a friend, a comforter, a god, who could heal their infirmities and provide them with material for wonderment and adoration, while the latter saw in him only a breaker of laws and a destroyer of the traditions which they had been fondly cherishing in their hearts. One of these fondly-cherished traditions consisted in the observance of the Sabbath, which was regarded as a meritorious deed. The point of merit had, however, been lost sight of long before the advent of Jesus, and from being an occasion for spiritual rest, the Sabbath had come to be observed as a day for physical idleness. As Jesus did not conform to their mode of its observance, the Jews felt angry with him, and asked him 15 REDEMPTION.

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226 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. as to why he had transgressed their Law. He did not, however, argue the point with them, but simply referred to David's eating of the forbidden ghew bread, adding, therefore the Son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath." His inference was that the Sabbath was meant for man, not man for the Sabbath. They were convicted, as it were, out of their own mouths, and, it is recorded, did not entertain any very amiable sentiments towards him. Who was this man to talk to the learned Doctors of Law of Israel in this fashion ? How dared he, a person of low birth and common origin think of arrogating to himself the right to correct the Custodians of Truth? Were not his sisters among them? Was he not the son of a carpenter ? The sin of Jesus appeared all the 'more unpardonable as they reflected on his social status. With people of that type who are blinded by their conceit and prejudices, the conclusion is always one, namely, the offender must be put to death. There is no penalty short of death suitable for a man who offends against the dignity of the whole body of the Doctors and Custodians of Law in this irreverent manner. Hence, the Pharisees sought to kill him if they got an opportunity. The attitude of Jesus, on the other hand, was very different. Having failed to gain sympathy from the learned classes, he put himself in the position of a fault-finder and seemed to delight in nonplussing them in argument. Most of the true philosophy of the Saviour remained unexplained by him, for while the publicans and sinners were happy to believe him for the 'work's sake,' and cared not to know or understand the why and the wherefore of his system, the only

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REDEMPTION. 227 section of the public which could have asked for a doctrine became estranged from him in sympathy. They cared not for his system, and were always at loggerheads with him; whereas, had their attitude towards him been that of eager questioners, the real philosophy of his faith would not have been so difficult to get at. Each party, it seems, took delight in beating the other, but the power of working miracles always decided the issue in favour of Jesus. He used to delight in violating the traditions of the Pharisees as to eating with unwashen hands, doing work on the Sabbath, non-observance of fasting, and the like ; and his replies to their unfavourable comment on his and his disciple's actions contain many truisms of unequalled merit and worth. What does it matter if you do not wash your hands when you sit down to eat? It is not the things from without; but those from within that defile a man. If the heart is pure and brave, food cannot be affected with ' unwashen' hands, nor mind with food. But where the heart is corrupt and unclean, it is idle to talk of the outward cleanliness of the hands. About fasting, however, his real views were those which he gave to his disciples when, with reference to an evil spirit, which he was finally called upon to expel, they asked him as to why they had failed to exorcise it. He then said :"This kind can come forth by nothing but by prayer and fasting." This is sufficient to show that Jesus regarded fasting as a means of training the will and of acquiring certain occult and psychic powers. Thus, the help one can get from the observations

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228 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of Jesus, which he made in the course of his dis courses with the Pharisees and others, can be fragmentary only. Nevertheless, these observations are of immense help to us, in one sense, for they enable us to test the accuracy of the conclusions to be drawn from the other available material, and, in some places, are full and clear enough to be used by themselves. Another source of help from which one would naturally expect much light on the teaching of the Master proves, on examination, to be of little value. As has already been hinted at, his disciples were men of a very inferior order of intelligence, and seem to have had a pronounced capacity for misunderstanding their master. We find Jesus often commenting on their want of intelligence and faith. The chosen twelve were happy in the idea of being the elect, and their sole object, at least, during the time that Jesus was with them, seems to have been the enjoyment of their position as such. So engrossed were they with this sense of power that they actually wanted to settle who was the greatest among them, and quarrelled about it. The matter bad to be referred to Jesus, who seems to have satisfied them with a little philosophical discourse. One of the twelve was the betrayer. Peter had not the moral courage to acknowledge his master in the hour of need, and deliberatoly lied to preserve his own precious skin intact. In short, a perusal of the Bible makes one painfully conscious of the fact that the twelve disciples of Jesus were constantly found wanting in intelligent understanding and faith. Their position, so far as the doctrine of the

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REDEMPTION 229 New Faith was concerned, was little better than that of a faithful servant on whom certain powers are conferred by the master. It is true that there is a great deal of what may be termed "mysteries " in the writings of John; but they lack both system and precision of thought, and are but little better than a collection of odds and ends of philosophic lore. One can hardly expect much help from this quarter, under the circumstances. Neither can we rely upon the later biographers; they understood little or nothing of religion and freely wrote what they liked. Add to this the confusion due to the deplorable tendency of an over-zealous mind to clothe the object of its worship in false and exaggerated glory, to add interpolations and passages to his utterances to increase their value, to leave out and remove quotations which seem misplaced, unnecessary, or objectionable, and even to support by testimony that which is either a pure invention of imagination, or has, at best, a very small fragment of truth in it, and the task of building up a theory out of such scanty material becomes immensely difficult. The next difficulty lies in the mental attitude of the reader. Those who are not of the faith are always ready and eager to believe in anything which can be said against it, without waiting to verify for themselves the truth of the statements made, while those who belong to it generally resent all endeavours to get at the truth, and feel in duty bound to refute every charge bowsoever well-founded. The correct attitude to assume in respect of these matters is that we should all suspend our judgment till we have searched for, and found, the

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230 truth for ourselves. We must, therefore, rise above our sectarian jealousies and petty prejudices of the type of the "unwashen hands," and apply and exert ourselves to understand the basic principles of religion itself. We should not forget that the true aim of religion is to bring the highest form of happiness within the reach of its votaries, not to make general or wholesale conversions at any cost. Those who are the real teachers of humanity care not for converting any one to any particular form of belief, but only to spread light and happiness, for " the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the father in spirit and in truth." It is only the man who is prepared to reject that which is not good and sound who will learn anything; prejudice and bigotry never did and never shall acquire the truth. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. We shall now take up the main features of Christ's personality and teachings one by one, and test for ourselves the merit and worth of each one separately, as well as in a cumulative sense. To begin with the personality of Jesus, the point round which the entire interest of his followers is centred, is the mystery which is said to surround his birth. No need to repeat the story here; it is well known. The matter has been fully investigated by some of the leading scholars and scientists of European fame; and the conclusions which have been arrived at cannot be lightly brushed aside. The evidence is all one way and is against the belief in an immaculate conception. Conspicuous among those who have declined to stifle the voice of their common sense stands Mr. Evanson, a curate, whose candid

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REDEMPTION. 231 criticism of the pagan fable' of the miraculous conception of Jesus ultimately brought him into conflict with the Church. He wrote (see the History of the New Testament Criticism, pp. 91 and 92): "In no one apostolic Epistle, in no one discourse recorded in the Acts of the Apostles, is the history of Jesus previous to John's baptism, hinted at even in the most distant manner. On the contrary, that baptism is repeatedly referred to and mentioned as the proper commencement of evangelical instruction; and when the eleven apostles proceeded to elect a twelfth, to supply the place of Judas, the only qualification made essentially requisite in the candidates was their having been eye-witnesses to our Lord's ministry from the baptism of John to his Ascension. These two (the first two] chapters of Luke are the daring fiction of some of the easy working interpolators, as Origen calls them, of the beginning of the second century, from among the pagan converts, who, to do honour as they deemed it to the author of their newly embraced religion, were willing that his birth should, at least, equal that of the pagan heroes and demigods, Bacchus and Hercules, in its wonderful circumstances and high descent; and thereby laid the foundation of the succeeding orthodox deification of the man Jesus, which, in degree of blasphemous absurdity, exceeds even the gross fables of pagan superstition." Of the more recent writers, Professor Haeckel sums up his conclusions on the subject in the following words (The Riddle of the Universe, Chapter XVII): "We have no authority in support of the gospel-narratives until more than a century after the death of Christ. No one who is acquainted with the growth of legends in an Oriental atmosphere can place the least reliance on documents of so late a date..... The most cherished beliefs of Christian tradition are being totally abandoned. The story of the miraculous birth of Christ is rejected by the leading Christian scholars of Germany, and by an increasing number of scholars in England, as belonging to the latest and least reliable strata of Biblical narrative-in other words, as a late and worthless interpolation. The resurrection and the ascension are now meeting the same fate. The New Testament is being broken

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232 TAE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. up like the Old Testament, and the figure of Jesus is rapidly dissolving." We are, however, not bound to accept every word of what Prof. Haeckel thinks on the subject. But when the vast majority of the cultured writers of every civilized country share his belief, when we find it to be held in common with him by some of the leading Christian clergy themselves, when men like Dr. Loofs hold frankly the natural human parentage of Jesus, and when the advanced theologians of the Christian creed angrily resent the imputation of a belief in the miracle of Virginbirth, there can be no doubt that the story of the immaculate conception of Jesus is either a mystic teaching of great value, given out in the garb of history, or a late and worthless interpolation, as Haeckel calls it, made by a man who thought that it would cast an additional halo of sanctity on the central figure of his creed. Such legends are to be found in almost all other religions of the world; and Hinduism simply abounds in them. Their true interpretation is to be sought for in the region of spiritual science, but not in the physical world. The idea of Virgin-birth will be explained in a subsequent chapter; for the present we shall content ourselves with showing that the orthodox view is not likely to commend itself to thoughtful men. The most important witness--and one of the two on whose narrative the whole controversy has risen-on the point is Luke, the supposed author of the third evangel, who writes (Luke, III. 23): "And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli." The italics are ours; but it is impossible for language

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REDEMPTION. 233 to be more emphatic and unambiguous. Luke here actually contradicts the earlier parts of the gospel after his name, and must be deemed to be acting deliberately, if the imputation of forgery is to be avoided in respect of the first two chapters of his gospel. The contradiction cannot possibly be explained away on the orthodox view, but it finds an easy solution on the hypothesis of symbolical thought. Jesus would thus have a natural human birth, while Christ would be conceived of spirit. Jesus himself never claimed an immaculate conception for his physical self; on the contrary, he said to his opponents :-- " Ye judge after the flesh; I judge no man " (John, viii. 15). This means nothing if not that they did not err in their judgment in so far as the tabernacle of flesh was concerned. The next preceding verse which reads "I know whence I came, and whither I go; but ye cannot tell whence I come, and whither I go."makes his position perfectly clear. Man consists of a physical body and a soul, though unthinking materialisms only knows him as a bundle of flesh and bones. Jesus condemns the materialist's view, not because it is untrue in respect of the genesis of the body itself, but because it ignores the soul. Put in plain language, he says : 'I know about my true Self, i.e., spirit, whence it came and whither it goes ; but you cannot tell that. Your wisdom exhausts itself with the body of flesh. I don't say you are wrong there, in your ideas about its origination and the like, but I do say that you have thrown away the substance and are grappling with a mere shadow.'

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234 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. This is very different from what one would have expected Jesus to say if he was trying to set up a virgin-birth for himself. John has preserved another little dialogue between a section of Jews and Jesus, which also throws considerable light on the situation. The Jews who were beside themselves with rage sought to provoke him, saying: "We be not born of fornication; we have one father, even God," (John, VIII, 41). Here was the opportunity for Jesus to assert his miraculous birth, but he merely replied "If God were your father ye would love me; for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself but He sent me. Why do ye not understand my speech ?"-(John, VIII. 42-43). It is noticeable that he did not tell them that he alone was the son of God; nor did he take any notice of the suggestion of illegitimacy thrown out by the Jews. He simply told them that the matter required understanding. In plain language, he meant : 'If you believe God to be your father, you must recognize him to be the father of every one, including even a child of fornication. The soul of the so-called child of fornication is not any the less a potential divinity, because of his not being born in lawful wedlock. It is only because you do not understand me that you object to my calling myself the son of God.' Here, again, the opportunity is missed for the assertion of virgin-birth, and the fact speaks for itself. If it were a fact that there was a violation of some of the laws of nature on the occasion of the birth of Jesus, we should have found some historical proof of the event. On the contrary, the most remarkable fact about it is a ---

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REDEMPTION. 235 total absence of all reference to it in the sayings of Jesus himself. If it were a fact that the wise men of the East had taken the trouble to travel all the way from their native land to pay homage to the Divine Baby,' we should have heard more of them. But they never took any further interest in him or his doings, and seem to have evaporated into thin air, as if they had never existed before. Surely an historical fact (if it had been one) like that of Herod putting all the children in his kingdom to death, for fear of Christ destroying his power, could not have been ignored by the contemporary historian. These are some of the circumstances which, render a belief in the legend utterly impossible. The advance of civilization and the immense progress made by the Natural Sciences have rendered it imperative for man to build his religion on the rock of knowledge. The opposite method of superstition and mystic rite, though at times impressive and of great service in strengthening faith, must undergo thorough overhauling and modification on scientific and philosophical lines. The tendency of the modern man is to know the reason why, before embarking on any enterprise ; and who can say that he is wrong in insisting on the point. How unreasonable we are in matters religious, becomes apparent at once when we compare our attitude towards religion with that towarels "business." No one ever invests even a small sum of money in any concern without satisfying himself as to the safety and stability of the business ; yet, the same man never troubles himself to find out whether there is any security of the concern in which he invests his whole spiritual well-being !

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236 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It is impossible to go further into the details of the argument against the miraculous birth of Jesus within the short space at our disposal ; it seems that the account is a modified version of the legend about the birth of Krishna, one of the incarnations of Vishnu in Hinduism. It is not to be supposed that it gives us any pleasure to destroy the long and fondly cherished beliefs of a section of our race; the point is not an immaterial or unnecessary one by any means, for so long as we believe in superstition and myth we stand in the way of Truth, and prevent its shining out in the world. The proper question for the enquiring mind should be, not who or what was Jesus or Buddha, or any one else, nor even what did they teach, but what is the Truth? When we proceed to work out our salvation with a firm determination to get at truth, all differences of caste and creed, superstition and myth, and sentiment and prejudice vanish from our path, and the so-called Natural Sciences, instead of standing sneering by, become our torchbearers and light our way. The criterion of truth is that it should produce immediate, certain and unchanging results. Precisely the same ought to be the case with religion, so that the system which fails to give perceptible and immediate results is not the true religion in any sense. As regards the historical reading of Christ's doings, as recorded in the four gospels, there is little doubt that much of it has to be rejected to avoid contradiction. As an instance of this kind may be mentioned the accounts in Matthew, IV. 18-20 and John, I. 35-40, which we reproduce here :

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REDEMPTION. 237 Matthew (Chap. IV). John (Chap. I). 18 And Jesus, walking by the 85 Again the next day after John sea of Galilee, saw two bre- stood, and two of his disciples : thren, Simon called Peter, 36 And looking upon Jesus as he and Andrew his brother, cast walked, he saith, Behold the ing a net into the sea : for Lamb of God! they were fishers. | 37 And the two disciples heard him 19 And he saith unto them, speak, and they followed Jesus. Follow me and I will make 38 Then Jesus turned, and saw you fishers of men. them following, and saith unto 20 And they straightway left them, What seek ye? They said their nets, and followed him. unto him, Rabbi, (which is to say, being interpreted, Master) where dwellest thou ? 39 He saith unto them, Come and see. They came and saw where he dwelt, and abode with him that day : for it was about the tenth hour. 40 One of the two which heard John speak, and followed him, was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. 41 He first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, We have found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, the Christ. 42 And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus beheld him, he said, Thou art Simon the son of Jona: thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation, a stone. Similarly, there is a great deal of confusion about the meeting of Jesus and John, and about John's opinion of Jesus. The different accounts relating to this matter are to be found in Matthew, ... ... IIL 18, 14 & 15. ... XI, 9 & 3. ... 1. 41 to 44 John, ... 1. 29 to 36. Do. ... III. 25 to 35. Do. Luke,

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238 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "Now it seems absolutely impossible," writes Evanson " that John, after being from his earliest infancy personally acquainted with Jesus, and not only in possession of all the information respecting him, which he must have learnt from the two families, but so miraculously impressed with affection and reverence for him as to exult with joy, though but an embryo in the womb, at the mere sound of his mother's voice, could at any time have entertained the least doubt of Jesus being the messiah."-- The History of the New Testament Criticism,' page 91). Even words have been put into the mouth of Jesus which, in all probability, he never uttered. Here is an instance which, if literally interpreted, is capable of a lot of mischief:-- " And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying if thou be Christ save thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked him, saying dost thou not fear God seeing thou art in the same condemnation ? And we indeed justly for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this man hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, verily I say unto thee to-day shalt thou be with me in paradise."-Luke, XXIII. 39 to 43. The italics are ours. No other gospel gives this account. On the contrary, Mark says: "And they that were crucified with him reviled him." Matthew, too, says that the thieves also cast the same in his teeth which was uttered by the Jews. Now, if both the thieves had reviled him, it is strange that he should have promised anything to one of them. It will be noticed that the number used by Matthew and Mark is plural, which clearly applies to both the thieves. A statement like the above which has been put into the mouth of Jesus is likely to do a lot of harm, for it is liable to mislead one in the interpretation of his teach*ings. There are other items which are open to similar

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REDEMPTION. 239 objections ; but as it is not the object here to point out the contradictions but to see what Jesus taught, we must leave the reader to find them out for himself. In interpreting the gospels, it is important to bear in mind that the evangelists, who chronicled the events of the life of Jesus and recorded his sayings, all, more or less, introduced their own personalities and ideas into their records. In many places it would be seen that the narratives are not the records of facts as they occurred, but of events as they should have happened. For instance, John records that Jesus carried his own cross (John, XIX. 17), while the remaining three evangelists unanimously declare that one Simon, a Cyrenian, carried it for him (Luke, XXIII. 26; Mark, XV. 21 ; Matthew, XXVII. 32). Assuming the crucifixion to be an historical fact, the only possible explanation of this contradiction seems to lie in the fact that John, who is the most philosophically inclined of the gospel-writers, departed from the truth under the belief that it behoved the Christ to bear his cross himself, while the others merely recorded the event as it had occurred, uninfluenced by his belief. Matthew and Luke, it seems, were given to mythology which they both tried to incorporate in their writings. The student of comparative mythology is aware that the * Virgin Birth,' the Eucharist,' the 'rending of the Veil,' and other such ideas prevailed in the older religions of the world, long before the appearance of Jesus in the Holy Land. These matters are not to be taken as historical facts, but as allegories and metaphors under which lie the most valuable doctrines of faith hidden

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240 from the vulgar view. That being so, the records of the life of Jesus would naturally receive some colouring from the views of the writers themselves, some of whom must have been in close touch with the teachings of the numerous occult institutions, the Lodges of the Essenes, the Nazarenes, and the like, which appear to have flourished in the land at the time. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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OHAPTER VI. THE KINGDOM OF GOD. * Hari Om! Now, within this habitation of Brahman (the human body) there is a small lotus-like chamber, and within it a minute vacuity (antarakasa.) That which is within the vacuity is worthy of search : that, verily, should be enquired after." -Ohhand. Up. VIII 1.1. "Here in the heart is a cavity, wherein he resides, the Lord of the universe, the Ruler of the universe, the Chief of the universe." Bri, Up. IV. 4. 22. There can be no doubt but that the 'message' which Jesus of Nazareth desired to communicate to the world bas not been so communicated, and there can be no doubt equally that in apportioning the blame his disciples come in for a major portion of it. For precision and consistency of thought are necessary for philosophy; and it is in respect of them that the disciples of Jesus were constantly found wanting, notwithstanding their general familiarity with the principles and tenets of mysticism, which they have freely introduced into their writings. Ernest Renan observes : "The evangelists themselves, who have bequeathed us the image of Jesus, are so much beneath him of whom they speak that they constantly disfigure him from their inability to attain to his heights. Their writings are full of errors and misconceptions. We feel in each line a discourse of divine beauty, transcribed by narrators who do not understand it, and who substitute their own ideas for those which they have only half understood. On the whole, the character of Jesus, far from having been embellished by his biographers, has been lowered by them. Criticism, in order to find what he was, needs 16

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242 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to discard a series of misconceptions arising from the inferiority of the disciples. These painted him as they understood him, and often in thinking to raise him they have in reality lowered him."--(Life of Jesus). The fact is that, while they lived with their master, the disciples of Jesus neither understood nor cared to understand the doctrine of the New Faith,' and, after their separation from him, it was too much for them to read between the lines of his fragmentary aphorisms, to sort and classify his numerous sayings, and to reduce them to a uniform system of philosophical thought. They were not only not desirous of doing so, but also had not the capacity for the work. Their ambition, be it said to their credit, never soared above their intelligence, and, thus, what in the hands of people accustomed to follow systematic thought would have been cleared up at once, became buried in obscurity and lost in confusion. The latter-day biographers tried to remove the cobwebs of superstition, and to search out the real truth ; but they failed for want of comprehension of the kind of material of which the Saviour's teachings are composed. Thus, failing to reconcile the higher truths of Spirituality with their limited knowledge of the material Universe, they lost their mental balance and ended by seeing only rustic simplicity' and 'unsophisticated candour' in the utterances of the founder of the 'New Faith. The clerics, on the other hand, could never bring impartial judgment to bear on the point, and insisted on people believing the black to be white. Thus, all sources of information are deceptive and misleading, and the seeker after the truth of the Saviour's teachings has no alternative but to proceed

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243 direct to the primary source of information, that is, the utterances themselves. These, however, have to be taken subject to the observations made in the preceding chapter. We refuse to believe that there was nothing in Jesus to distinguish him from a simple child, a visionary of God, or a dreamer of fanciful dreams of a future kingdom of heaven. We likewise refuse to credit that his kingdom of God had anything in common with a poor-house, a leper asylum, or a general infirmary or dispensary, or that it was intended to be a great social revolution aiming at the overthrow of authority, the humiliation of rank and a universal equalising of status. It does not seem reasonable to us to hold that a simple day-dreamer, with no definite notions on certain important problems of life, e.g., the immortality of the soul, could ever succeed in holding his own against powerful controversialists. We may clothe our visionary in all the most glorious raiment of elegant words and captivating phrases, we may endow him with as idyllic and gentle a nature as we like, we may even impart to him a look of that ineffable sweetness with which a certain kind of high-flown but meaningless literature endeavours to keep the intellectual eye from prying into its empty conceptions, we may do all this, yet we shall never discover him transformed into a Jesus, a Buddha, or a Zoroaster. For they were all men of greatness, though not free from delusions, nor perfect in wisdom or action. Their dreaming was serious and purposeful, just as their madness was methodical, We cannot, indeed, afford to follow them blindly; but neither can we call THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

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244 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. them deluded rustics or unmeaning simpletons. We shall not permit hollow adjectives and wordy bubbles to mar our vision. Some of the biographies of Jesus simply end by showing that the author would have done better if he had abstained from writing the book altogether. Some of these books, no doubt, are masterpieces of flowery style and beautiful diction, but as throwing any light on the true, the beautiful and the good' in the life of the person whose biography they are supposed to be narrating, they are utterly worthless and misleading. We do not think that Jesus can be said to have had no knowledge of the general state of the world; he was not illiterate. At a remarkably early period of life, he was found sitting in the midst of the doctors,' hearing and questioning them, to the astonishment of all present. The Bible assures us that he was a wise man, Luke recording:" And Jesus increased in wisdom" (Luke, II. 52). That he could write is obvious from the four gospels. Once or twice he is said to have written something on the ground before giving a reply to the questions put to him. It might be that it was merely a ruse for gaining time, but one not accustomed to write would hardly think of it. Luke (IV. 16-20) bears testimony to his reading the book of Isaiah, and thus puts the matter beyond controversy. Besides, Jesus had travelled over a considerable portion of the surrounding countries, and had actually lived for some years in Egypt, albeit as a child. What he did with himself during the period intervening between the twelfth and the thirtieth year of

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 245 his life is shrouded in mystery. According to some thinkers cogent evidence exists and has been discovered of his having visited Tibet and India. It is also said that there is a grave of his in Kashmere which he visited in his youth, and where he settled down after the * resurrection. Swami Rama Tirtha and other travellers have discovered a remarkable similarity between the names of certain places in Kashmere and of those in Palestine (see the Proceedings of the Convention of Religions for 1909, pp. 197-201). Even an old manuscript has been recovered from a Tibetan monastery in which the important events of the life of Jesus, as a traveller from Palestine, are chronicled. Add to this long array of facts the most important one of all that his teachings are undoubtedly based on a well-grounded fabric of Hindu philosophy and embody the results of a carefully sifted and well assimilated knowledge of the different views then prevailing among the numerous sects and schools in India. His retirement into forest for a period of forty days to observe fasting and other forms of austerities was in itself an event unheard of amongst the Israelites, but a common occurrence (indeed, one of the ashramas, or periods, into which the span of earthly life has been divided for the three regenerate classes of the Hindus) in India, enjoined by the scriptures, particularly those of the Jaina and Yoga schools of thought. Not only are his teachings -in some instances almost word for word--the same as are to be found in Hinduism and other religions of India, but, also, is his whole life, as the Messiah, the same as is enjoined on a Yogi, for which no parallel is

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246 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, to be found in the whole of the Old Testament anywhere. To these is to be added the significant fact that the method of illustration and explanation by means of parables is not to be found in the Biblical writings of the Old Testament time; but has been in vogue in India all along. These are matters of great importance and require careful treatment. It would be wrong to deny their weight on account of any pre-existing bias, which in the orthodox mind must naturally be very strong against the idea of Jesus having learnt his wisdom from the Indians. It is not to be supposed that we are here concerned in claiming any superiority for Hinduism or any other Indian religion, or for the Indian Philosophy in general, over Christianity, or any other creed. The grave may be a myth, the similarity of local names an accident, and the book a forgery, as we actually believe them to be, notwithstanding that we hold that Jesus acquired his wisdom from Indian sources. These he need not have travelled all the way to India to have encountered, being available nearer home in his own and the neighbouring lands. Be it as it may, we have no time to waste over the point, but are merely anxious to find out the truth, whether it comes from the Hindus or from any other source. It is, therefore, quite immaterial whether Jesus learnt from the Indians what he afterwards preached, or vice versa, or independently. To revert to the point under consideration, the numerous parables ascribed to Jesus all bear testimony to the resourceful nature of his intelligence. We regard it as impossible for any one except for a man of

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 247 wisdom and learning to be able to strengthen his argument by the use of parables. If any one doubt this, let him just try and see how many parables he can manufacture or cite himself. Jesus must bave had a goodly stock of such anecdotes and fables, in order to be able to keep up an intelligent and well-jointed system of what may be described as parabolic teaching. His dialogues had nothing of pedantry in them; he talked in short simple sentences which, however, are remarkably crisp on account of their inherent emphasis and rhetoric. Neither his eloquence, nor his speech, nor his repartee had anything of the vulgar about them ; on the contrary, there is a pronounced fragrance of refined wit and intelligence emanating from them. We thus find ourselves utterly unable to endorse the statement of some of his biographers that he was more of a simple ignorant villager than anything else. A man who could not only hold his own against the learned controversialists of his day, but could also give them points on their own ground, who could see through the subtle traps and logical snares which the best brains of the time were constantly laying out to catch him in, and who could meet them with answers that shut up opposition as well as evaded the snare, and strengthened, or illustrated his own doctrine, could not, in reason, be said to be a young rustic who saw the world through the prism of his simplicity. Jesus well understood the difference between a doctrine and the commandments of men. He burst into righteous indignation whenever he was asked to observe the traditions of men in preference to the fundamental doctrines of faith. We feel bound

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248 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to conclude that the evidence here is all one way, and that it establishes, beyond doubt, the fact that Jesus was a man of more than ordinary learning and wisdom. It being established that Jesus was a wise man, the next point to consider is his system, in which the foremost place is occupied by the doctrine of the kingdom of God. The question is: what did he mean by the kingdom of Heaven which he constantly preached and referred to in his sayings? Did he mean a kingdom of the sort which we are familiar with among the nations of men ? His disciples, like many other men, at the time thought that he spoke of the kingdom of Israel under the patronage and suzerainty of God, and so deeply was this idea engraven on their minds that they asked him even after resurrection, " Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom of Israel "(Acts, I. 6) ?.But Jesus never encouraged these notions, and on one occasion himself explained what he meant by the Kingdom of Heaven. He said : " The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for behold, the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke, XVII. 20 and 21). These words distinctly go to negative all such ideas as were held by the disciples. The kingdom, which Jesus was preaching, was not one that was to come with observation; it was not, and was not to be, an historical event, the coming of which could be observed by the people at large. Nor was it to be an affair confined to any particular locality, for no one could point it out as existing here, or there, or anywhere in the world. It was an affair strictly confined to the 'within' of men.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 249 On another occasion Jesus likened it to a mustard seed, which is infinitesimal in size, yet capable of an infinite amount of expansion and growth. He further tells us that it is something which increases like yeast or ferment. "To him who has, more shall be given, but from him who has little, even that little shall be taken away." Yet, again, Jesus likened it unto a man who had cast the seed into ground and gone to sleep, and the seed sprang up and grew, and the man knew not how. These are some of the most important characteristics of the Kingdom which Jesus invited mankind to enter; but the question is, what is this expanding and increasing, and, withal, an incipient, infinitesimal empire within us which cannot be seen or perceived by the senses, but which, if we sow its seed, will multiply like a small measure of yeast till it permeate the whole system, and from which even the outsiders (the birds of the air) can derive shelter and benefit ? When we look at ourselves from a physical or physiological point of view we come across only the blood, bones, kidneys and other similar bodily organs and things in which it would be the height of absurdity to look for the promised kingdom of Heaven. But when we look from the standpoint of higher discernment we come across, not only the promised kingdom, but, also, the real King, God himself, within us. The " Kingdom within us" of the Saviour, therefore, must mean the Spark of Divinity, the germ of Godhood, the presence of the Real, the Perfect, the Blessed One, within us. We now see what the Saviour meant by the Gospel of the " Kingdom of Heaven." "Go, preach

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250 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the gospel of the kingdom to the world,' is as much a commandment to-day as it was two thousand years ago. What a noble mission it now appears to be. "Go, tell the people that the God, they have been searching in vain everywhere, is not non-existent, nor far from but actually present within them ; tell them that his kingdom is within their sanctum, for where God is there must also be his kingdom. This is glad tidings, indeed ! Look not for an external heaven; for the heaven of heavens, the source of all bliss and blessedness, is within, nay is none other than the real Self of each and every one of us. If you want to dwell in heaven where you can enjoy undisturbed bliss, you must help in its evolution from within. All you have to do is to sow the tiny little seed of faith, and, then, like the man in the parable, you may go to sleep and rise up to find it in full bloom. It is, indeed, a gospel worthy of a Messiah. Psychologically, the kingdom of heaven is a mental attitude, i.e., an emotion. If the mental emotion be a happy and blessed one, everything will adjust itself to contribute its share of bliss to the man who puts himself in that attitude. The true nature of the soul is blissful, though it is lying buried beneath a large heap of filth and rubbish of passions and desires, so that one has not to go out anywhere in search of happiness, but has merely to remove the mass of impurity from the precious Gem already lying within, to perceive its glory. Belief in one's own divine nature will counteract the poison of the suggestion of infeiority and evil, and gradually establish a reign of desirelessness and dispassion which will bring peace and tranquillity of mind.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 251 Emotions of misery and fear arise from wrong suggestions which are accepted and acted upon by the soul. We must now determine to cure ourselves by auto-suggestions of a counter nature. Faith is the little seed which is to be sown, and it will do the rest ; for belief translates itself into action without fail. It is the faith in the presence of God, in each and every one of us, that will do the work of redemption ; belief in the existence of God as a solitary being sitting on high, and ruling the world, will be of no avail; for the suggestion of inferiority will still remain before the soul and produce its evil effect. Man must approach God from within, not from without. Such is the conception of the Kingdom of God which Jesus preached. Christians generally consider it to be an affair of the other world, where there is a geographical heaven into which all those who worship the God of Israel will be admitted on the Judgment Day, after this earth shall have passed away. How far this harmonizes with the promise of Jesus himself can be seen by a reference to one of his great sayings : * Blessed are the meek : for they shall inherit the earth." (Matt. V. 5.) Now, if the earth is to pass away before the day of final judgment, what shall the meek inherit ? The truth is that, being incompetent to understand and realize the blessedness of the Kingdom of God and the blessings which a belief in their Godhood can confer upon men, here and now, the ignorant interpreters of the word of the Saviour ascribed its fulfilment to an unseen, future world, strengthened, in their conceit, by the notion that from

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252 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that misty ground, at least, they could not be easily dislodged. Even in the promised heaven of a post-mundane type, there will be much to mar our enjoyment, if we are to be admitted there with all our emotions and feelings, and all the rest which we call our personality. Many of us are so narrow-minded and supercilious that they would rather give up their own immortality than believe that all the hosts of niggers' and coloured people that have ever been, and shall ever be, should share it with them, on terms of equality, in paradise. And yet there is no escape from the niggers,' if they happen to adopt the faith which leads to heaven! Even here it becomes obvious that happiness depends not on any particular locality for its growth, but is a plant which has its roots in the soil of hearts well-manured and dressed by the emotions of purity and love. The kingdom of heaven is not necessarily an event of the future ; it is already within us, for Jesus assures us : "If I with the finger of God cast out devils, no doubt the Kingdom of God is come upon you." (Luke, XI. 20). This is fatal to all notions of futurity, subsequent to the Judgment Day. Nor do the expressions -- "The kingdom of Heaven is at hand within reach]" (Matt. III. 2.); . * The law and the prophets were until John ; since that time the kingdom of God is being preached, and every man presseth into it" (Luke, XVI. 16); and * From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent [assiduous] take it by [will] force." (Matt. XI. 12);lend any support to the theory of heaven as propounded by the Christian theologian.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 253 The idea of heaven as a place of enjoyment, and of hell as that of suffering and pain, is not a new one, having been known to humanity from the earliest time when religion was first established among men. But it was never intended that the sojourn of the soul in either of these regions was to be eternal, or to take place subsequent to a general rising of the dead on a universal Day of Judgment. The eternity of hell is sufficiently refuted by the Psalmist when he sings: "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell."--(Ps. XVI. 10); and the idea of a bodily resurrection is not supported by authority or reason. The following passage which is generally relied on in support of the idea, is, if anything, opposed to that view : " Wherefore if thy hand or thy foot offend thee, cut them off, and cast them from thee : it is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two bands or two feet to be cast into everlasting fire. And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee; it is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire" (Matt. XVIII. 8 and 9.) Concerning the interpretation of this important passage, Mr. B. F. Barret observes (Lectures on New Dispensation, pp. 260-261): "Mention is here made, it is said, of the whole body being cast into hell. But if we are to understand it in its literal sense, that is, as denoting the material body, then we must also understand literally what is said of the right eye and the right hand. And are we to believe that literally plucking out a right eye, or cutting off a right hand, can facilitate any one's admission into heaven ? And that some actually go to heaven maimed, halt, and with only one eye, as would appear from the parallel passage in Mark (IX. 43, 45, 47) ? For this is the conclusion to which we are brought, if we interpret this Scripture in its strictly literal sense, and understand the whole

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254 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. body to mean the material body. No: the whole body means the whole man--the real, spiritual man. The offending eye and hand here mentioned, denote certain perverse propensities of the human mind, which govern the whole man. Consequently, unless these propensities be rejected or subdued (which is what is meant by plucking out the eye and cutting of the hand), the whole mind, that is, the entire and real man, is finally brought into an infernal state, This is what is meant by the whole body being cast into hell." Entering into life' means acquiring immortality without which even heaven, however attractive it might otherwise be, will, for ever, remain but little better than the mother earth with all the woes and miseries which are the lot of humanity on her surface. The word 'hell,' in addition to its accepted significance, also indicates a state of suffering, a wretched, miserable condition of mind, death, and the grave. Sin is the hell begun. In the East people generally say that heaven and hell are both on this earth : according to one's deeds does one live in either of them, here and now, in this life. Even in the Bible, the word is frequently used in the sense of a grave and death. The true sense of the passage under consideration, which becomes clear after the wrong notions about heaven and hell have been eliminated, obviously, is, that blissful immortality is the reward of those who lead the life of blessed righteousness, but misery and suffering of those who are wicked ; and, since the real self is not the bodily, i.e., the apparent man, the former's happiness should not be allowed to be marred by the latter's offensive eyes and hands, which should be plucked out or cut off, if not amenable to control and correction otherwise. Immortality must begin here and now

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD 255 in this world, if it is to be had at all ; its postponement to an indefinite and vague future, the very notion of which involves more than one contradiction in its definition, is merely begging the question. There is nothing in the passage in question to suggest that the cut-off limb shall ever be restored to its body, which would render even heaven a place where one might come across, not only that which is good, and pleasing, and beautiful, but, also, that which is ugly and maimed and halt. So far as the sense of enjoyment is concerned, a geographical heaven can but afford less pain and greater and more refined pleasure than our earth ; but, in reality, it is only in the Gem of the Sat-ChitAnanda, i.e., the soul itself, that true happiness has its centre. If the physical propensities, allegorically, the bodily limbs, offer opposition to its manifestation, they must be removed. Where Sat-Chit-Ananda shines, there is bliss and entering into life,' that is, 'heaven;' where He is not shining, there is darkness and suffering, that is, 'hell.' It must be further borne in mind that, unless happiness be the nature of man, it would be impossible for. him to enjoy it eternally, because it would otherwise be subject to change, like the pleasures of the material world. Jesus expressed this idea when he said : "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven" (John, III. 13). One can have absolutely no idea of a mental emotion, and certainly no hankering after it, unless there be a possibility of its realization. The emotion of bliss is no

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256 THE KEY.OF KNOWLEDGE. exception to this rule, and the constant craving of the soul for happiness testifies to the fact that it is capable of realizing and enjoying bliss for itself. Man's search for happiness, thus, is a search for a hidden article, not for anything new. For, however much we may deceive ourselves with false ideas and conceptions, however much we may drown our real, natural instincts in the intoxication of the transient pleasures of the world, there is no man who does not feel the poignant craving for unalloyed bliss, whenever he gets a moment to himself, for sober thinking. Whence did he get this idea of pure bliss, if not from the innermost recesses of his real blissful Self, lying hidden beneath the impurities of sin ? It is this inner or real Man who is said to be in heaven, that is, in a state of blessedness and bliss. Even if we apply the expression the 'Son of man' exclusively to Jesus, in this instance, we must come to the same conclusion, for it does not refer to the bodily Jesus, who, we know, stood in the Holy Land, and not in heaven, at the time when he uttered this great truth. Therefore, the conclusion we arrive at, even from this point of view, is the same, namely, that, while the bodily or physical Jesus was, at the time, in this world, the real Jesus was all the time enjoying the natural blessedness of the soul, that is to say, was in heaven in metaphorical speech. The very word redemption signifies this much. It is the discharging of an encumbrance from a thing which belongs to us, not the purchasing of a new article. According to the Bible, man was given the freedom of choice between the knowledge of the Self and that of good and evil of things, but, unfor

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 257 tunately, he elected to pursue the latter, little thinking of the consequences that ensue from pursuing that path, although warned against it in clear terms. The result was that he fell from the state of bliss, and lost his immortality into the bargain. But Nature still holds these treasures in trust for him, and is ready to restore them to him the moment he gives up the pursuit of the wrong path which leads to suffering and death. Such is the true significance of Redemption in the Bible. Jesus could have hardly committed the egregious blunder of preaching a future Kingdom of God, and yet all the time maintaining that the world was his (God's) footstool. Does not that which is a footstool form a part of the kingdom of him whose footstool it is ? The whole of the Gospel of St. John is full of passages establishing an identity between life and Christ. Jesus himself supported this view by such sayings as : "I have power to lay it (the life) down, and I have power to take it again" (John, X. 18). "I am the resurrection and the life " (John, XI. 25). "Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?"-(John, XI. 26). Now let us substitute 'life' for 'me,' and the promise held out reads :"Whosoever liveth and believeth in life shall never die." We already know that the only living substance or thing is spirit or soul which is the source of life. Jehovah himself said so much when he declared : "That thou mayest love the Lord thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him for he is thy life." (Deut. XX. 20). It is the belief in the existence of the Sat-Chit 17

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258 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Ananda within, which will turn this very earth into a heaven, for Jehovah ordains: "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live" (Deut. XXX. 19.) Here the choice distinctly lies between 'life' and 'death;' and its significance becomes obvious the moment we understand the passage: 'for in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die' (Genesis, II. 17). The soul is blissful and immortal by nature, but when it identifies itself completely with its body, which is perishable, it is inevitable that it should regard the dissolution of the body as its own death. Now, since the knowledge of good and evil of things is possible only by observing their effect on our own bodies, it naturally tends to 'pamper' the body at the cost of the soul. Hence, he who abandons himself to sensualism must necessarily believe the death of the body to be his own death, and in this sense may be said to die. Obviously, then, he who knows himself to be the immortal Atman obtains the resurrection from the dead. Thus, the true sense of redemption has nothing in common with the idea of a future rising of the dead on an universal Judgment Day. Why mankind cling so frantically to the notion of resurrection is, because "the best and most plausible ground for athanatism is to be found in the hope that immortality will re-unite us to the beloved friends who have been prematurely taken from us by some grim mischance. But even this supposed good fortune proves to be an illusion on closer enquiry; and in any case, it would be marred by the prospect of meeting the less agreeable acquaintances and the enemies who have troubled our existence here below. Even the

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 259 closest family ties would involve many a difficulty. There are plenty of men who would gladly sacrifice all the glories of the paradise if it meant the eternal companionship of their better hall' and the mother-in-law. It is more than questionable whether Henry VIII would like the prospect of living eternally with his six wives; or Augustus, the Strong of Poland, who had a hundred mistresses and three hundred and fifty-two children."-(Haeckel). . What can athanatism gain by the soul unless it retain its worldly personality, for according to its views all conditions minus the physical personality would be equal to annihilation ? And, yet, a personality born of evil deeds and infamous actions cannot, by any means, be regarded as anything worth preserving. One can hardly go the length of saying that all unwholesome traits would be wiped out, leaving only the pleasant and agreeable traces of the physical life adhering to the ego in resurrection. And, if this be so, one of two things must happen-either heaven itself must become hellish for the individual, or he must be turned out to undergo the sorrowful experiences and sensations which arise from evil thoughts and inclinations, elsewhere. In this connection, another question suggests itself to the enquiring mind, and it is: in what state of development will the individuals rise up and pass their eternal life? Will there be the same varieties of development in the other world as there are here? Will the child in arms never develop its latent psychic powers? Will the feeble, childish old man who has filled the world with the fame of his deeds in the ripeness of his age live for ever in mental decay? But the Theist has no answer to these and other similar questions. The idea of an eternal punishment or reward, if

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260 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. analysed, would reduce the whole doctrine to a farce. In the first place, God would find it difficult to divide the entire humanity into two groups, - the one for heaven and the other for hell,-without causing heartburning and discontent somewhere. For human beings are not alike in respect of their temperaments, passions, feelings, virtues or sins. To reduce this motley humanity into two groups without distinction of degree in respect of the form and duration of reward, or punishment, would require an equalizing process which the human understanding refuses to recognise. And, if it be imagined that there would be distinctions and degrees of reward and punishment and of their duration in the other world, we would have a spectacle resembling our own world, and, therefore, misery would not be unknown in heaven. The least-favoured would have occasion to envy the less-favoured, and the latter, in his turn, the most-favoured even in the paradise. If this be the mode of distribution and adjustment of reward or punishment on the Judgment Day, our world has enough of heaven and hell already, and, as the materialist says, is not to be despised; for here the grave puts an end to the misery and wretchedness of an earthly existence, sooner or later. In the second place, justice demands that there should be apportionment of punishment according to the degree of sin, so that those who have committed a fewer number of sins ought not to undergo the same punishment as those who have sinned all their lives through. But the orthodox belief ignores this point altogether, and indiscriminately dooms all sinners to an

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 261 eternal punishment in one and the same hell, irrespective of the number and nature of their sins. But this is clearly absurd. In the third place, to deny a chance of repentance to erring humanity and to doom them to a life of eternal torment, out of all proportion to the nature and consequences of their sins, may be in harmony with the disposition of the king of hell; but it is utterly incompatible with the mercy and dignity, to say nothing of the justice, of the Heavenly Father, as the God of the Judgment Day is said to be. Those who have been fondly cherishing the hope of becoming re-united with their wives and children and friends in the proruised land of paradise, will find the ground cut away from under their feet by no less an authority than the founder of their Faith himself. The observations which he made, while addressing the Sadducees, about the resurrection (Luke, XX. 27; Mark, XII. 18) with reference to the hypothetical case of the woman who had married several brothers in succession here on earth, are definite enough to knock all such beliefs on the head. He then said : "The children of this world marry and are given in marriage ; but they which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage; neither can they die any more : for they are equal unto the angels, and are the children of God being the children of resurrection. And as touching the dead that they rise, have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto him saying, I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not the God of dead but the God of the living: Ye therefore do greatly err." We find not only no trace of a belief in the

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262 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. resurrection of the dead in this passage, but, on the contrary, a direct refutation of all such notions. The doctrine of resurrection was not unknown to the Jews, and the Pharisees actually believed in it. Before them it was well-known to the Egyptians (see the Book of the Dead), who had probably borrowed it from the Persians. But the original of the Lord of the Judgment Day is to be found in the god Yamaraja of the Hindu Mythology, who weighs the merit and demerit of creatures on their death and disposes of them accordingly. This gentleman, the god Yamaraja, is a personification of Justice, in so far as he judges the respective merits and demerits of souls, and of karma,* with respect to the award of punishment and *The brilliant Hindu poetical genius to which we are indebted for the magnificent character of Yama, as the impersonation of Justice, that is to say, of natural Law than which nothing can be more unerring, has also given us the no less interesting 'personality' of Yami, his twin-sister, who implores him to accept her hand in marriage, but is refused with righteous indignation. She is the personification of karma-phala (the fruit of karma), as distinguished from karma, conceived in the abstract as the principle of causation inhering in the actions of living beings. Now. as karma-phala really means a modification of the condition of the soul, it cannot be thought of apart from the soul, i.e., as residing in the actions of men and other living beings, though it can never come into existence except in connection with karma. Thus, the relationship between karma and karma-phala is no more intimate than that they spring into being simultaneously. Hence, is Yama the twin brother of Yami, but not her husband. Again, as karma and karma-phala are produced by the soul only when it is in a condition of impurity and never when the impurity is gone, they are said to be the offspring of Surya, the Sun (the symbol of omniscience, hence, pure spirit), and Saranya (impurity, maya or matter) before she was forced to run away from him, on account of his excessive glory."

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 263 reward. The idea of a general rising of the dead on a certain day, at the end of the world-cycle, however, was never implied in any of these ancient creeds, though some of the passages of the exoteric teaching are liable to yield that interpretation, if twisted out of their strict sense, to suit the whims of the reader. What was meant was that as each individual died his future was determined by the operation of the Law of karma, personified as the Lord of Death, and he was sent to the region most suitable for his abode, according to the emotions evolved out by him. The sojourn of the soul in any particular region depended on the nature of its karmas, stored up in the form of tendencies or forces of a subtle type, so that when the particular tendency which secured a residence for it in a particular region was exhausted, and another one which had remained latent all along became active, it was entitled to be sent to other regions suitable for its development or growth. The idea of a perpetual punishment or reward was altogether out of the question, except in the case of Nirvana; for that meant an absorption of all traces of personality in the blissfulness of Being itself. Such was the mythological explanation of the post-mortem experiences of the soul. The Sadducees, however, understood it in the sense in which Haeckel so vehemently attacks it, and, finding it unreasonable in that sense, rejected it altogether. Coming to test the wisdom of Jesus, they propounded the problem of the woman with the seven successive husbands, which was probably a favourite and tried 'weapon' against those who believed in resurrection. in its popular sense. Jesus, in his reply, deals with both

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264 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the questions which the proposition involved, namely, (1) the significance of resurrection, and (2) the possibility of the marital institution in the world of the Sons of God. Taking up the second point first, he declared that marriage was unknown in that region; for those who were considered worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, became, by their own worth, like angels, or sons of God [in whom the sex function was conspicuous by its absence]. Hence, the marital relationship of husband and wife was not possible in those higher regions. The words of Jesus are very significant, for it would appear that the resurrection which he was speaking of was not open to everybody indiscriminately, but was limited to those only who were accounted worthy to obtain it. This is not the popular belief, according to which every one shall be made to rise up on the Judgment Day, irrespective of worth. Hence it is clear that the Messiah did not mean any such thing as a general* rising of the dead, * The notion of a general rising of the dead on a universal Judgment Day, is also contradicted by the doctrine of works' preached in the famous text: "And behold there are last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last" (Luke, XIII. 30). For if the distribution of rewards is to take place on the one and same day, it is almost tantamount to a misuse of words to talk of the first being the last and the last being the first. The plain sense of the words used is consistent with our explanation alone, and indicates that those of the aspirants who are more assiduous will outstrip, in point of time, many of their less arduous brethren who might have started on the path much earlier than themselves. Thus, many of those who start last shall be the first, and many who started first the last.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 265 but something very different from it. It is in unequivocal terms that Jesus points out the fact that the sex function has no place in the world of resurrection. People 'rise up'as angels, or sons of the Most High, who are regarded, by one and all, as sexless. How and when the transformation of sexual creatures into sexless angels, or sons of God, takes place, popular theology is unable to answer, and even if it were possible to answer it by calling in aid the power of the Almighty, it would be difficult to find a reason for his making risen bodies of the dead sexless, or for dividing the batch of angels, or sons of God, into those who are to people the heavens and those that are to become the denizens of hell. Is it not clear now that we err greatly concerning our ideas of the true sense of resurrection ? The whole thing becomes perfectly plain if we reject the idea of a universal bodily resurrection on some future day, at the end of the world-cycle. The soul is sexless by nature, but it puts on bodies of gross matter with sex-organs according to its inclinations and tendencies, so that when the male element preponderates, the body evolves out the male sex, and vice versa. Hence, the re-incarnationists believe that the same soul appears in different incarnations with a different sex, sometimes in a male body, sometimes in a female one, and at times also as belonging to the neuter sex. Those, therefore, who are considered worthy to obtain the resurrection of the dead, that is, those who pass out of the cycle of birth and death, become sexless in consequence of the sexlessness of the soul. Resurrection, then, is to be understood in a sense different from that ascribed to it by the orthodox

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266 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. creed. Since it is not open to every one indiscriminately, but is attainable by those only who are accounted worthy of it, and, also, because it enables the deserving to rise up like angels, or Sons of God, it is a conquest of death itself, not a resurrection of the gross body of matter. Those, therefore, who are able, by their own merit, to rise above death, are alone entitled to be admitted to the Land of Bliss. But this is the old Indian doctrine of transmigration once more! As regards the second point, namely, the possibility of a general resurrection, concerning which Jesus said, "And as touching the dead that they rise; have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto him saying: I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not the God of dead, but the God of the living : ye therefore do greatly err"is it not also clear that he did not, in any way, endorse the Sadducees' belief? If his words had not a deeper meaning, where was the necessity for this highly mystic and ambiguous language, winding up with the utterly inconsistent expression, "ye therefore do greatly err?" Does he not mean clearly that God, not being the God of the dead, [i.e., divinity being the attribute of the soul which is immortal by nature] cannot be considered to be the God of (that is to say, to be dwelling in the hearts of] the patriarchs, who, according to the belief of his in. terrogators, had died and were no more? In different language, what he hinted at was that the venerable patriarchs, whom ihe Jews swore by, were illusory forms of matter which had ceased to exist ages before and which could not be regarded as still living in the heaven

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 267 or in some other comfortable or uncomfortable part of the post-mortem world. The accent, it will be observed, is, in the first instance, on the death of the patriarchs, not on the Living Principle. Besides this, according to the general notion of the resurrection, which is to take place on a future day, at the end of the world, the deceased patriarchs cannot have arisen from the dead yet. And yet Luke unhesitatingly adds the most per. tinent words of all-_" for all live unto him,"--at the end of the passage in question, thus making the last sentence read : "For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him."-(Luke, XX. 38.) What does he mean if not that the souls of the patriarchs are still living in the universe, though not in their old bodies? If so, they can only live in the heavenworld or in our own; and, in the former case, either as having already had a resurrection, or in the sense of the Indian eschatology of the soul. But since resurrection has not yet taken place and is to be an affair of the future, they could not have risen from the dead in the Christian sense. Therefore, they must be either now enjoying themselves as residents of heaven prior to being re-born in this world, or must have already reincarnated in flesh and blood on our globe. The only other hypothesis of Nirvana need not be considered, since no one claims that privilege for them, though, for aught we know to the contrary, they might have attained it already Let us dwell a little longer on the denial of the Most High to be the God of the dead. This is not the only

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268 passage in the Bible, by any means, where the living God disclaims relationship with the dead. He asks (Zechariah, I. 5): "Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever?" Jesus also said : "As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me. This is that bread which came down from Heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever."(John, VII. 57 & 58,) One more instance would suffice for our purpose, though any number can be pointed out from the Holy Bible itself: THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "And I will make drunk her (Babylon's) princes, and her wise men, her captains, and her rulers, and her mighty men; and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the King, whose name is the Lord of Hosts."-(Jeremiah, LI. 57.) Babylon, probably, is the symbol, in a wider sense, of the world, but even were we to read it in its narrower sense, the above passage, from Jeremiah, unmistakably points to the impossibility of resurrection, in the popular sense. And, yet, Luke says that all live unto God, and he cannot be ignored. Wherein lies the reconciliation of these conflicting views, is a question which Orthodox theology is again unable to answer. But, if we reject the popular notions about the doctrine of resurrection, it is easy to get at the truth embedded in these seemingly conflicting utterances of the Father' and the 'Son' both. Let us put down the propositions categorically, to begin with. We get, " (1) All live in God, who is God of the living, not of the dead,

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD, 269 (2) The partriarchs are dead, (3) Some do not wake up from perpetual sleep, and (4) Some, who are accounted worthy of resurrection, become the sons of God and cannot die any more. Now, in respect of the first of these propositions, it is easy to see that death does not imply absolute extinction, in any sense ; for the substances of nature subsist by their own nature, and cannot possibly be conceived as subject to annihilation. Both the soul and particles of matter are deathless for this reason. Hence, the idea of death only applies to bodies, or organisms, which are held together, for a time, by the presence of the soul, and which begin to dissolve and disintegrate on its departure. Therefore, in so far as death implies the extinction of that which was and is not now, it only means the departure of the soul from the body of matter in which it was ensouled. Hence, the partriarchs, who were and are not now, are, in so far as their personal forms are concerned, dead, though their souls, not being perishable, still continue to live in some form or other. In plain language, the patriarchs are dead and no longer alive as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and so forth ; but their souls still exist, in some form or other, in the universe. As regards the latter part of the proposition, namely, that God is not the God of the dead, its literal reading is out of the question, for the speaker certainly could not have meant that his God was in the habit of disowning a devotee the moment he was dead. What it actually means is that Godhood, being the perfection in manifestation of the potential attributes of the soul,

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270 which is immortal and blissful by nature, hence, the very essence of immortality and joy, can never be an attribute of what is essentially perishable. Therefore, all that is characterised by death, that is to say, the personal forms of the dead, are not God; and, conversely, Godhood is not the characteristic of the dead, hence, God is not the God of the dead-which term certainly includes the Jewish patriarchs. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. 6 In respect of the third and the fourth propositions, it suffices to point out the significance of the idea of death in connection with the human soul. In association with the physical body with which it identifies itself, more or less completely, which is evident from such sayings as, 'I am old,' I am dying,' and the like, the soul appropriates to itself the conditions of the body. as if there were a complete identity between them. In reality, the soul, being immortal and undying and free from degeneration and decay, ought to think, not 'I am old,' and the like, but my body is old,' and so on. But, so great is the power of imagination, and so far-reaching the consequences of the Fall,' that by far the greatest majority of mankind seldom think themselves to be any other than the body. When the soul is obsessed with the delusion of identity between itself and its body, it is inevitable that it should imagine the death of the body as its own. Hence, when death, is about to effect a forcible separation between the immortal tenant and his perishable tenement, the ignorant soul, whose craving for life becomes stronger as the body grows weaker clings to the fast-dissolving compound of matter with all the tenacity of a drowning

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TAE KINGDOM OF GOD. 271 man. Ignorant of its own true individuality, the fountain-spring of immortality, and deluded with the false idea of the body being the man, it dreads the approach of death, and imagines it to be a complete annihilation of all that it called itself. As the coils of death tighten on the body, as the certainty of extinction becomes more and more impressed on its mind, and as the sense of its utter helplessness increases in its consciousness, it wrings its hands, as it were, in despair, at the unwelcome but inevitable calamity which stares it in the face. Its torments continue, till, at last, the cords of mental equilibrium snap under the combined strain of its terrible anguish and worry, and it is thrown into the blank and dismal void of insensibility. Nevertheless, the soul does not remain unconscious for any great length of time on shuffling off this mortal coil; for its natural consciousness speedily dispels the blankness of despair, and makes it conscious of its new surroundings which have arisen mechanically in the interval, by the operation of the force of its karmas. There is only one exception to this rule, and it is furnished by those who go to the outer darkness,' in the language of the Bible. They descend to a region of the universe which is even below the lowest hell, and pass their days in a state of existence which, though not absolutely devoid of consciousness, has yet so little of conscious manifestation in it as to deserve being called unconscious. The rest either go to heaven,* or hell, or re-incarnate immediately in this world, according to their karmas. *According to Vedanta, heavens and hells are both as much forms of illusion as is the waking world, since their immediate knowledge only consists in states of consciousness. From the

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272 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It is not to be supposed that souls pass out of the cycle of transmigration by going to heaven or hell; on the contrary, they are all re-born in the world after undergoing experiences of pleasure or pain in those regions, and remain wandering about in the cycle of births and deaths till they evolve out sufficient excellence to attain Nirvana. So far as heaven and hell are concerned, the former is open only to those who perform pious and meritorious deeds (tapas) in this life, and the latter is meant for all the rest who are cruel, vicious or unsympathetic. But, since piety includes the knowledge of God, i.e., Self-consciousness, in its definition, and since it is difficult to be pious in the absence of the knowledge of the indestructibility of the soul, it would seem that the gates of the paradise do not generally open to admit the unbelievers.' Thus, with the exception of a few " Realistic point of view, however, heaven and hell are just as real as our universe, and separate regions of space, the former being situated above and the latter below the part called the Madhyaloka, of which Jambu Dvipa, the central region, and not the little globe of our earth, as has been erroneously supposed by modern orientalists, is a continent inhabited by men. The names of the sixteen heavens, according to Jaina Cosmogony, are as follows: (1) Saudharma, (2) Aisanu, (3) Sanatkumara, (4) Mahendra, (5) Brahmaloka, (6) Brahmottara, (7) Lantaka, (8) Kapistha, (9) Sukra, (10) Mahasukra, (11) Satara, (12) Sahasrara, (13) Anata, (14) Pranata, (15) Arana, and (16) Achyuta. The seven hells are known as: (1) Ratnaprabha, (2) Sarkara prabha, (3) Valukaprabha, (4) Pankaprabha, (5) Dhumaprabha, (6) Tamahprabha, and (7) Mahatamahprabha, The region of the perfected Souls is above the heavens, on the top of the world. It is not to be supposed that there is any real difference between the teachings of Vedanta and Jainism about the nature of heavens and hells; for even if we regard them as an illusion, pure and simple, it must be conceded that the illusion only appears in certain characteristic forms. Thus, there is no dispute about the manner of existence of things, but only about their description. Christianity and Islam, too, acknowledge the existence of heavens and hells, though, unlike the purely Indian religions, they maintain that the soul's sojourn in those regions is eternal.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. individuals who might be able to perform tapas (austerities), i.e., to observe the vows or rules of conduct becoming pious or religious men, all those who have no idea of their true Self are necessarily debarred from the heavens, not to mention Nirvana-the Happy Home beyond the turbulent sea of samsara (transmigration). Now, let us also observe the change of circumstances which a belief in the existence of the ego as a separate entity would effect in the life of the soul. It would, firstly, stand by, as it were, and see the body decline and disintegrate, without being affected by the sight. Secondly, it would enjoy self-consciousness, instead of the body-consciousness, with which it was formerly encumbered, though the form of its belief about its own nature would here also affect its status in its subsequent career as an incarnating ego. If it has perfected itself in belief, knowledge and conduct, it would reach nirvana on parting company from its physical body; otherwise it would wander about from life to life, till it qualify itself for liberation. 273 It is, thus, evident that, so far as the soul is concerned, death is a mere delusion arising from the belief in its identity with its physical body. Hence, the terror of death loses its sting when the soul recognises itself as different and distinct from the body of matter in which it is ensouled. So much for the idea of death; as regards death itself, it has been already stated that the true significance of decease consists in the separation of the soul from the body to be reborn elsewhere immediately. This is due to the fact that death does not also destroy 18

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274 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the impurities attaching to the soul, which, consequently, immediately drag it into a new 'womb', in subjection to chemical affinities and magnetic forces of nature. The liability to birth and death is only destroyed at the moment of entering nirvana whence there is no return. When the soul is fully evolved out into perfection, its delusions come to an end ; and the destruction of the karmic force, the cause of its transmigration, being effected, it is put beyond the snares of re-incarnation for over. It then enjoys sleepless bliss and immortality. Hence, Luke (XX. 36) has it : "Neither can they die any more," which is capable of sound sense only on the hypothesis of re-incarnation, and means the escape of the soul from the cycle of births and deaths.+ The Sons of God, thus, are those pure and perfect Souls who have attained their high Ideal, and become God. They have destroyed the bondage of their karmas and the consequent liability to births and deaths, and are now living at the top of the universe as the Conquerors of the Dragon of Ignorance and its chief ally-Death. They are called the Sons of God, because they are, so to speak, heir to the heritage of divinity, having attained the perfection of God, which is the goal of evolution. Pure, perfect happiness, i.e., eternal, unabating bliss, the power to defy Death, i.e., immortality, omnipotence, infinite knowledge and infinite perception, called the * Sleep being inconsistent with the nature of consciousness, God, who is pure consciousness, must necessarily be free from the stupor and stupefaction of insensibility and somnolence. Cf. "From death to death goes he who perceives diversity " (Katha Upanishad, IV. 10).

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 275 ananta chatushtaya in Jaina Scriptures, are the attributes of their divine Souls. They are the true Teachers of mankind and the fountain-head of perfect Wisdom, hence Religion. Their chief characteristics, as given out by Jesus (Luke, XX. 34-38), are: (1) the possession of spiritual merit which entitles them to attain 'that world,' i.e., Nirvana, (2) freedom from sex, that is, the absence of all material bodies, (3) non-liability to death, and (4) the enjoyment of godly Status. It is not possible to lay too much stress on the words *any more' in the Messianic observation recorded by Luke (XX. 36). The statement would lose all its merit, if souls are born and die only once in their career. The fact that it was made only in reference to those Great Ones who obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, is sufficient to show that it is not applicable to all souls indiscriminately. Thus, while all those who have not perfected themselves remain liable to repeated births and deaths in the course of their evolution, those who attain the fullest degree of spiritual unfoldment are necessarily exempt from dying any more. The true interpretation of the passage about the resurrection of souls, thus, leads us to a conclusion very different from that arrived at by the orthodox Church. Not the least satisfactory feature of our interpretation is that it, at once, reconciles the teaching of Jesus with that of almost all other ancient religions of the world. Reincarnation is a truth of philosophy, as we shall see later when we come to deal with the theory of karma, and the attempt to disown its doctrine can only end in

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276 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. bringing discredit on those who raise their voice against it. Resurrection, then, is meant only for those who realise the nature of the delusion involved in the idea of death, and who apply themselves to conquer samsara (the transmigratory condition) and their lower nature. This is why Jesus repeatedly exhorted his followers to acquire the perfection of God. He could not have said : 'Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect,' unless his mind had fully grasped the possibility of attaining to the perfection of God. The idea of the 'conquest of samsara,' it must be remembered, has nothing in common with that of bringing mankind under subjugation, or of lording it over one's fellow-beings. The true conqueror is he who conquers his lower nature, not he who allows himself to be overpowered by sensuality, lust, covetousness, and the like. Hence, those who engage in warfare with their fellowmen, in vindication of real or imaginary rights and grievances, cannot be regarded as conquerors in the true sense of the word. Religion puts no value on a conquest which does not procure freedom from one's natural enemies, i.e., passions, desires, and the like, and warns us against all those pursuits and ideals which only go to increase the burden of captivity. ..When the soul becomes God and breaks away from the world to enter Nirvana, it feels the force of the saying: "There is one alone, * there is not a second; *The idea is that every soul is perfect in its own self, and, therefore, its own God, there being no external Saviour or God to confer perfection on it.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 277 yea, he hath neither child nor brother" (Ecclesiastes, IV. 8); and with the joyous words : "I, even I, am the Lord ; and beside me there is no Saviour" (Isaiah, XLIII. 11), plunges into the Ocean of eternal blessedness and bliss, in its own self. The attainment of immortality is possible for every one of the living beings in the course of one or more incarnations. If it were otherwise, it would never have been said : "Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed, and make you a new heart and a new spirit: for why will ye die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of him who dieth, saith the Lord God: wherefore turn yourselves and live ye." Nor: "If the wicked restore the pledge and give again that he had robbed, walk in the statutes of life, without committing iniquity, he shall surely live, he shall not die." About the time that the law was given to Moses, Jehovah is said to have put the matter before the people, saying: "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that thou and thy seed may live." To the same effect is the following: "I will ranson them (the virtuous) from the power of the grave. I will redeem them from death; O death, I will be thy plagues : 0 grave, I will be thy destruction; repentance shall be hid from mine eyes." As for the wicked, their paths are turned aside"they go to nothing, and perish." "As the waters fail from the sea, and the flood decayeth and drieth up : 80 man lieth down and riseth not, till the beavens be no

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278 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. more, they shall not wake, nor be raised out of their sleep." The following is equally emphatic : " Thus saith the Lord of hosts; even so I will break this people and this city, as one breaketh a potter's vessel, that cannot be made whole again." This distinctly refers to the bodily personality which cannot be made whole again. No need to multiply references; our analysis of the resurrection text suffices to explain all such passages in all the existing religions of the world. How hard it is for Materialism to understand the truth of some of these sayings needs no comment; nor were the disciples of Jesus, with a few honourable exceptions, any the better in this respect. John records that immediately after the parable of the heavenly bread, culminating in the most inysterious utterance : "He that eateth me, even he shall live by me" (John, VI. 5), many left his following, when Jesus enlightened them a bit, saying: "Does this offend you? It is the spirit that quickeneth ; the flesh profiteth nothing : the words that I speak unto you they are spirit, and they are life." (John, VI. 6.) It is easy to understand this "hard" saying if we recollect that the word 'me' in the text "he that eateth me" has no reference to Jesus, but to Life itself. But some one might ask : how are we to eat Life? The reply is : just in the same way as we devour knowledge. We can eat' Life by entering' into it, in other words, by feeling its pulsation within us, or by abandoning ourselves to enjoy its soul-enrapturing rhythm. If any one finds it difficult to understand it even now, he

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD). 279 must try it in actual practice; and if he would but persevere a little, he would not be spending his time in vain. Meanwhile, let us proceed with the sayings of Jesus. The Master often declared that if any one would keep his teaching and live according to his doctrine he would enjoy eternal life. This was the main cause of difference between him and the Pharisees. The latter could never conceive how any one could be greater in knowledge and power than their late lamented ancestors, and they forthwith told him what they thought of him : "Art thou greater than our father, Abraham, who is dead and the prophets are dead, whom makest thoa thyself ?"--(John, VIII. 53). How could this son of a common carpenter talk to them of the conquest of death when their great ancestors, who had never been surpassed, were unable to resist it ? Jesus threw them into greater convulsions by telling them that he was honoured by his Father who was their God; and as to Abraham's supposed supremacy, he added : " Your father, Abraham, rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and was glad" (John, VIII. 56). This appeared to be downright madness to the Pharisees, as it no doubt did to some of the later biographers of Jesus; for how could a man who was not even fifty years of age be said to have existed in the time of Abraham ? But Jesus coolly threw another mystic bomb into the ranks of his opponents by saying : "Before Abraham was I am" (John, VIII. 58). The Pharisees now completely lost control over themselves, and took up stones to cast at him, at which stage Jesus thought it wise to hide him

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280 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. self. It is a great pity that for the want of true knowledge of Divine Philosophy the beauty of the higher thought and teaching of the Saviour has remained unknown to the world hitherto. To us these passages do not appear to be the ravings of a lunatic, or the musings of a deluded rustic, who saw the world through the prism of his own simplicity. The Bhagavad Gita has it : "Nor at any time was I not, nor thou, nor these princes of men, nor verily shall we ever cease to be hereafter."--(Disc. II. 12.) We now know that I am 'means Life which is eternal and independent of the notion of time, so that the text, before Abraham was I am,' only means that each and every soul is immortal and has existed from all eternity in the past. As regards the statement " Abraham rejoiced to see my day and he saw it and was glad"it is clear, especially with reference to the words 'my day,' that the allusion is to the glory appertaining to the status of a 'son of God, but not to Jesus whose' day' could be seen by Abraham only if it were possible to annihilate the long centuries which separated them from one another. It is thus clear that the speech of Jesus. had no reference to his own personality, and that we go wrong when we begin to idolize Jesus, 'instead of idealizing the Messiah, or Jina (the Conqueror), as he is called in Jainism ; for, so long as we do not shake off the wrong notion that Jesus wanted our homage for his own person, we stand in the way of truth and cannot come into our own. The doctrine of Sonship is a proposition of philosophy. It is, however, applicable to the whole race and not to one particular individual alone, since every soul is entitled to become a son of God the mo

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 281 ment it evolves out its natural perfection. Hence, it was the Messiah, and not Jesus, whose day Abrahain had rejoiced to see, and the speech of Jesus had reference not to his own physical person, but to the real self, i.e., the Christos, which the soul becomes on the attainment of perfection. The Messiah also figures in Hinduism, in the guise of Krishna--the centre of a keen controversy between the Vaishnavites and their opponents, the former trying to place him on the pedestal of divinity and the latter endeavouring to pull him down therefrom. None of the disputants, however, seem to understand the real nature of the divinity associated with Krishna, and are spending their energies in a fruitless dispute over empty words and concepts. There can be no doubt that there was a great personage of the name of Krishna, since a nucleus is always necessary as a foundation for the superstructure of deification ; and the fact that some of the Jaina Pura nas contain a plain narrative of the principal event of his life, sufficiently proves him to have been an historical personage. It is this historical Krishna whom the Vishnu Purana and the Bhagavad Gita have clothed in the poetical garments of the Messiah. The luring of gopis from the beds of their husbands in the darkness of night, the giddy, moon-light dance on the banks of the Jamuna, the stolen kisses and embraces, and the like, all of which would be highly condemnable from a moral point of view, if ascribed to the historical Krishna, are fully appropriate to the Messiah or Christos. As such, Krishna is the divine Ideal for the soul (gopi) to pour forth all her affection upon. She must wander out, in

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282 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the solitude of night (when mind is not occupied with worldly things), on the banks of the placid Jamuna (mind-stuff, hence, mind), disregarding both her love for her husband (worldly attachments) and the fear of society. When she stands before her Lord, stripped of her clothes (i.e., worldly possessions), when she gives up even the last vestige of feminine modesty and standing upright joins her hands above her head, disregardful ofher nudity and the rules of worldly decorum, then is the notion of duality between the Lover and the Object of Love dispelled from the mind, and the fruit of Love enjoyed. The hopes and fears of the love-lorn gopis, their neglect of their household duties, their abandonment of their children and husbands, their passionate yearning to be enfolded in the arms of the Beloved-all these are pure allegories describing the degree of devotion or zeal necessary for the realization of the great Ideal of Perfection, personified as Christos, or Krishna, the Redeemer. The Song of Solomon, no less immoral from the worldly point of view, is a similar allegory of Love between the Ideal and the individual soul. Jesus, too, likened the soul to a maiden in the parable of the ten virgins (Matt. XXV. 1-13) These circumstances of the identity of thought, doctrine and method lead us to think that Jesus must have received his early training from the Indians. Judaism, too, seems to have piayed no small part in moulding hischaracter, and the Egyptian culture must have also had a share in his training, if it be true that he had visited that land in his childhood. Egypt has always been famous for her mystic ritualism ; and, although her civil

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* THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 283 ization was fast declining about the time of the visit of Jesus, the atmosphere of the land must nevertheless have been thoroughly saturated with the tenets of mysticism and dogmatic theology. Although Jesus was very young at the time, still the early impressions of such an atmosphere could not be lightly effaced from the impressionable mind of the child, and their further and fuller development, in the future, depended merely on favourable opportunity. His interest in the Jewish faith was just the sort of stimulus required to keep his early impressions alive, and it only needed a chance acquaintance with the Indian philosoply to fan the spark into a flame. His teachings, thus, form an epitome of the views of the diverse schools of divine knowledge which had, so to speak, filtered through his great mind. Jesus might, no doubt, have worked out his system independently of the Hindus and others, but the probability to the contrary is so great as to be almost conclusive on the point. A glance at the contents of the New Testament is sufficient to show that they are not only repetitions of the doctrines of the earlier creeds, but also do not possess any of those characteristicslogical inference, sequence of causal law, systematic presentation, and the like-which one naturally expectsto find in an intellectually thought out system of philosophy. Most of its passages are only full of dogmas and myths. Rather than furnish an explanation of the nature of things, they themselves stand in need of being explained to be understood. The policy of observing secrecy might be responsible, to a certain extent, for

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284 these features of imperfection, but it is impossible to say that it accounts for them all. It is not to be supposed, however, that Jesus did not possess great wisdom and insight, since one may be a wise man without being the founder of a system of philosophy. His discourses bear ample testimony to the ready wit and resourcefulness of his mind. To read his teachings from a purely materialistic point of view is to do him the greatest injustice; they have to be read in the light of the lamp of "Vedanta," literally, the end, i.e., the last word of knowledge. To revert to the teaching of Jesus, another point which throws considerable light on the doctrine of the 'Kingdom of God," is the nature of the qualifications which are necessary for an admission into heaven. On this point it is pleasant to note that there is quite a wealth of material, although most of it is a repetition of the same principle over and over again. Without going into unnecessary detail, the young Master declared that the Kingdom was intended for the poor, the meek, the merciful, the peacemaker, and for those who mourned, or hungered for righteousness, or were pure in heart. In the parable of the supper, the guests who were ultimately invited were the poor, the maimed, the halt and the blind. To literally construe the doctrine would be to put the Kingdom on a par with an alms-house, a dispensary or an infirmary where poverty and rags and deformity and disease might form the most prominent qualifications for admission. To think that it was this idea which the Saviour was preaching to the people, and over which he was con 66 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 285 stantly quarrelling with the Pharisees, is to insult our own understanding more than anything else under the sun. Obviously, the Kingdom of Heaven was not meant to be a place where wretchedness and imperfection could revel, or disease display its disgusting ugliness. 'Blessed are the poor in spirit,' not because of their material poverty, but because of their deliberate acceptance of it on spiritual grounds. It is those and only those who are the poor in spirit that will be ad. mitted to the Kingdom. There is no room for poverty indiscriminately there, but those who remain content with their lot, and those who are poor in spirit, that is, not arrogant but peaceful, not easily offended, but humble, and, above all, those who are happy and cheerful and virtuous are alone to be blessed. Heaven is to be claimed by the poor, the hungry, and the thirsty only when the hunger and thirst are for righteousness. There is no room there for any one who has a grumbling disposition in the least. The principle illustrated is that, if one longs not for material things, and renounces them by choice (not by force of circumstances over which he has no control), he is blessed, for the renunciation of wealth is a means of attaining to the emotion of bliss. Search for righteousness, provided it is sincere, procures peace and freedom from desire, and enables the hidden state of ananda to come into manifestation. For, except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.' From the earliest time when Man applied his mind to explore and lay bare the mysteries of Time, Space and Existence,

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286 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. renunciation has been regarded as the only means of liberation ; and the Sermon on the Mount furnishes abundant proof of the teaching of Jesus being identical with that of the great Indian Sages who had flourished and taught before his time. It is true that renunciation appears very unattractive and unpleasant at first, and few, indeed, there be who can or do appreciate its merit; nevertheless, without renunciation no progress is possible in any department, physical, mental or spiritual. It is always confined to the giving up of such practices as hinder the onward progress of the individual. The child, who would acquire knowledge, must give up toys and go to school; the young man, who would make money, must abandon the habit of late rising; the general, who would conquer the enemy, must take leave of his hearth and home, and so forth. Similarly, he who would tread the path which leads to bliss, must retrace his steps from that which goes hellward, for they lie in opposite directions. Our analysis of the emotion of joy would suffice to show that there is a marked difference between the giving up of certain habits to acquire certain material advantages, and the practising of renunciation for God-Realization. In the former case, the soul grumbles from the very start at the idea of giving up its old pursuits, and is not allowed to enjoy the pleasures of delight, for, as soon as one burden is taken off it, two more are, at once, put on its back; but, in the latter, the removal of each obligation only leaves it more and more joyous and free, since it is not made to bear, or carry, the weight of any additional

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287 obligations and tasks. Hence, as Patanjali puts it, desirelessness is the consciousness of supremacy in him who is free from thirst for objects, either perceived by himself, or heard from others.' From one more point of view it remains for us to consider the doctrine of the Kingdom of God. We have to see how any one desirous of getting an admission into Heaven was to proceed. The Saviour declared that everything was possible by faith. But the question is: what did he mean by faith? Was he only seeking mental acquiescence in his own miraculous birth? Surely not, for he does not say so anywhere himself. We have read the Bible over and over again in search of any remark of Jesus showing that he claimed any superiority for himself on the ground of his immaculate conception, or desired that he should be worshipped for his personality; but, needless to say, in vain. As regards the allegation that he was the Son of the Most High and on that ground entitled to worship, we think absolutely no case is made out for that view. Jesus nowhere said that he alone was the Son of God. On the contrary, over and over again do we come across the assurance that if a man kept his sayings he, too, would become the Son of God. In the Sermon on the Mount he declared (Matth. V, 16): THE KINGDOM OF GOD. "Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in Heaven" About half a dozen times, at least, is the expression, your Father which is in heaven," employed in the course of that memorable discourse. There is no distinction or reservation made in favour of any particular 66

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288 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. individual. Jesus, claimed the status of divine Sonship for the whole of the human race; the worldly distinca tion of birth was not only not authorized, but was actually denounced by him. Such petty, hypocritical distinctions vanish before great minds. Thus, those who lived according to the Divine commandments were truly the Sons of God, while those who followed the principle of Evil, that is, who lived in defiance of the commandments of God, were the Sons of Devil. The whole thing was merely a question of how one lived. The expression, 'Son of Man,' is generally printed in the Bible with a capital "S." Why this emphasis on the word "Son?" Anyone who is at all familiar with the oriental way of describing races and individuals would never think of attaching any importance to it. It is but very rarely that the expression bears reference to Jesus himself. "Son of man'has no greater inherent rirtue in it than the son of fairy,' the 'son of deva,' and the like. In the Persian language, adam-zad means son of man, pari-zad son of fairy, and deva-zad son of deva (demon.) What is there in the expression, son of man (adam-zad in Persian), to reflect any distinction on Jesus? The reason why Jesus rarely used the first person singular for himself is obvious to any one who has studied his life and teachings. He understood fully that happiness, spirituality, and power are meant for him who wipes out his egoism, and offers his little bodily self as a sacrifice on the altar of the highest and the only true Self. So long as a man clings to the distinction of mine and thine, he remains a fallen creature, but the moment meum and tuum drop out of consi

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289 deration, he takes his place amongst Gods. It is a spiritual law of universal applicability that whosoever shall save his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose it, shall find it. Jesus 'lost his life' and became Christos. He could not have remained Jesus and become a Christ, at the same time, for the law is 'as one thinks so one becomes.' Thus, if you regard yourself to be a miserable sinner, you must ever remain so; on the other hand, if you forget your small self, the ego of desires, and believe yourself to be God, you will soon actually become the enjoyer of the status of God. But so long as the consciousness of the bodily self is present in your mind, it will be impossible for you to realise your high ideal. You must, therefore, sacrifice your little self as an offering to propitiate the higher Self. Jesus sacrificed himself, became a Christ, and forthwith declared himself to be one with God. This is the secret of success; and it is for this reason that the advanced ascetics and saints who have understood and realized the truth neglect the first person singular, and always endeavour to preserve what may be described as a state of impersonality in their speech. It was this consideration which led Jesus also to be impersonal' in his conversation. A failure to understand this little truth has been the cause of a large number of beautiful maxims and aphorism being thrown into the waste-paper basket, so to speak. As an instance of this kind may be cited the following passage from the fourth gospel : "What and if ye shall see the son of man ascend up where he was before?" Here if the expression is to be taken to refer to 19 THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

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290 Jesus, it can only be at the cost of philosophical merit. Similarly, the declaration, " Verily I say unto you there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom (Matthew, XVI. 28), can have absolutely no reference to Jesus, except as a member of the human race. Mark records the statement as well, but he gives it thus: THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "Verily I say unto you, that there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death, till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power."-(Mark, IX. 1.) "" Luke, also, puts "The Kingdom of God" in place of the "Son of man in his kingdom." It lands us in all sorts of absurdities to think that the "Son of man means Jesus, and the Kingdom of God" heaven after resurrection in some other world. The true and natural sense is that as by the fall of Adam is understood a state of fallen degeneracy, so by the coming of the son of man into his kingdom' is meant the attainment of Godhood by the soul. This is what Jesus referred to when he said, "What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before?" It is the realization by man of his glorious, divine nature which is spoken of here. " Ascension does not mean a going up to heaven, body and all, but something very different. We shall, however, reserve a consideration of this doctrine for a later and more appropriate occasion; for the present it is sufficient to point out that it is impossible that Jesus could have ascended to heaven in the way which a literal interpretation of the Bible would suggest. Stripped of the false surplusage of mythology, the two passages about the ascending of the son of 29 66

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291 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. C man up to where he was before,' and of 'the coming of the Kingdom of God' (which last, according to Matthew, is the coming of the Son of man into his Kingdom'), have reference to the whole race, and predict a regaining of the 'lost paradise' by those who constantly live according to the true teaching. They point to an entry into the 'Garden of Eden' from which 'Adam' is now shut out. They epitomize the doctrine of redemption, but furnish no excuse for the element of personal worship of Jesus. The following utterances of the great Master himself put the matter beyond dispute: "And why call ye me Lord, Lord and do not the things which I say." "Blessed are they that hear the Word of God and keep it." "Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish." "I receive not testimony from men: but these things I say that ye might be saved." "I receive not honor from men." (6 My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God or whether I speak of myself."-(John, VII. 16-17). "If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed. And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free."(John, VIII. 31-32). "And I seek not mine own glory."-(John, VIII. 50). sent me. "He that believeth on me, believeth not on me but on him that And he that seeth me, seeth him that sent me. I am come a light in the world that whosoever believeth on me shall not abide in darkness. And if any man hear my words and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world but to save the world. He that rejecteth me and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day. For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say and what I should speak. And I know that his commandment is life

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292 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak."-(John, XII. 44-50). So far as the idea of the 'Father' is concerned, it can be best understood by putting ourselves in the attitude of Philip, one of the twelve disciples, who said to Jesus (John, XIV. 8): "Lord show us the Father, and it sufficeth us." Jesus, however, did not show the Father 'bodily' to Philip, but simply left him to draw his own conclusions from the following statement : If you have seen me you have seen the Father, for I am in the Father and the Father is in me. I do not speak to you of myself, but the Father who dwelleth in me doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me.'-(John, XIV. 9-11). It was the old doctrine of the one in the many and the many in one that Jesus taught, his disciples. A somewhat similar doctrine is propounded in the Bhagavad Gita in the following words : * Without and within all beings, immovable and also movable; by reason of His subtlety imperceptible; at hand and far away is That. Not divided among beings and yet seated distributively; That is to be known as the supporter of beings. He devours and He generates."-Disc. XIII, 15-16). But the resemblance is only superficial, for while the Bhagavad Gita makes the divine immanence absolute and universal, Jesus only regarded it as limited and qualified. According to the one, God's pervasion is already and eternally complete, but according to the other it has to be established. This will be easily seen to be the case with reference to the parable of the true vine, which Jesus propounded in the following words : "I am the vine, ye are the branches, he that abideth in me and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit, for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 293 is withered; and men gather them and cast them into the fire, and they are burned."-(John, XV, 5-6). And most clearly, again, in the following from the same gospel: "If a man love me he will keep my words; and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him."-(John, XIV. 23). " C "C (The italics are ours in both instances.) It will now be obvious that the difference between the two views lies in the fact that, while one of them would have nothing less than the one in all and the all in the one,' the other would not go beyond the one in the many and the many in one.' But it is also possible to put another and a narrower interpretation on the passage from the Bhagavad Gita, by defining the one as the potential or latent divinity common to all souls, and by limiting the scope of the "all" to animate nature. In this case it would simply convey the same idea as is to be found in the famous text-"all live unto him "-of St. Luke, which we have already had occasion to quote. It is, however, certain that the principle underlying the three passages quoted from the fourth evangel is different from and, therefore, not to be confounded with the doctrine of divine immanence set up in the Bhagavad Gita and elsewhere in the Holy Bible itself. The difference is great and is an index to the nature of the two conceptions of divinity, which in one case is conceived as pure existence common to all living beings,- and according to some, to all nature, animate and inanimate-and in the other as the realization of the ideal of perfection to be attained by the soul. Hence, the pervasion of divinity varies with our conception of its nature, being absolute and unquali 39

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294 fied when conceived as existence pure and simple, limited to all living, as the potentiality of perfection, and to a still smaller class as the actual manifestation of all that is divine in the soul. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It might be that we have been somewhat ruthless in breaking up the old idols of cherished beliefs by showing them to be grounded on purely mental abstractions; but it is certain that it is the knowledge of things as they actually exist, and not our fanciful beliefs concerning their nature, which can be helpful to the aspiring soul. If we ever think of asking how the Father and Christ will come and make their abode with the man who 'keepeth the word,' we shall perceive the absurdity of the literal interpretation-that two or more individuals can come to abide or to dwell and do the works in another. It is thus obvious that Jesus was not speaking of himself, but of Christos, the true 'Redeemer,' which must be born' in the soul to enable it to attain the perfection of Gods. C Similarly, no element of Jesus-cult is to be found in the following (John, XII. 35-36): -- "Yet a little while is the light with you, walk while ye have the light with you lest darkness come upon you, for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. While ye have light believe in the light that ye may be the children of light." In vain shall we be told that 'light' means Jesus. and nothing but Jesus; for the passage has nothing to do with any personage, big or small, but refers to intellect, the light of life, or spirit, which is the source of all good, and alone capable of guiding the soul to its goal. The emphasis is here laid on the opportunity furnished by the human birth which, according to religion, is the

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295 only starting point for Nirvana. While we live we have a chance of correcting our errors and of adopting the truth; but when once this life comes to an end, who can say how long afterwards shall one have another such opportunity? Hence the messianic exhortation : "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Jesus truly offered the highest religion to mankind when he said : * THE KINGDOM OF GOD. "Believe in the light that ye may be the children of light [Life]." Humanity has always been hankering after a perpetuation of life, and the Master declared (John, V. 24 and 26): "Verily I say unto you, he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life. For as the Father hath life in him; so hath he given to the son to have life in himself." The Christos within is never wearied of proclaim ing: "Verily I say unto you, He that believeth on me has everlasting life. I am that bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever. This is the bread which came down from heaven, not as your Fathers did eat manna and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever."-(John, VI. 47-51). The same note is struck when it is said "I am the light of the World: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."-(John, VIII. 12). The Teacher may also justly maintain "Verily I say unto you, if a man keep my saying he shall never see death."-(John, VIII, 51). So also: "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."-(John, X. 10), A certain class of ascetics even maintain that physical

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296 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. death is not an unavoidable calamity, and that it is possible to prolong life as long as one likes to do so. Swami Vivekananda urges (Raja Yoga, page 158-160):-- "The Yogis even hold that men who are able to acquire a tremendous power of good Samskaras do not have to die, but even in this life can change their bodies into God-bodies. There are several cases mentioned by the Yogis in their books. These men change the very material of their bodies; they re-arrange the molecules in such fashion that they have no more sickness, and what we call death does not come to them. Why should not this be ?............AII the bodies in the Universe are made of tanmatras, and it is only in the arrangement of them that there comes a difference. If you are the arranger you can arrange that body in one way or another. Who makes up this body but you? Who eats the food ? If another ate the food for you, you would not live long. Who makes the blood out of it? You certainly...... You are the manufacturer of the body, and you live in it. Only we have lost the knowledge of how to make it......... We are the creators and we have to regulate that creation, and as soon as we can do that we shall be able to manufacture just as we like, and then we shall have neither birth nor death, disease or anything." To what extent this view is correct will be enquired into later ; but it is clear that it was not any claim to personal worship, or adoration, on the part of Jesus which was the point in issue between him and his opponents, but the power of the soul to attain to immortality. Hence, he did not claim any special and exclusive privilege for himself when he said "I am the light of the world, he that followeth me shall not abide in darkness, but shall bave the light of life." The Pharisees, who misunderstood him as usual, told him that he lied, for he bore testimony to his own record. But Jesus replied that, although he bore testimony to his own record it was true, because his assertion was in agreement with truth, but their denial was based on

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 297 ignorance ; for, while they could judge of the body, where it came from and whither it went, they had no knowledge of the cosmology of Life,' as he had. He cited the Father, i.e., the real Man, as a witness in his support, meaning thereby that they would acknowledge his miracles as indicating the perfection and divinity of the soul ; but the Pharisees again failed to understand this, and enquired of him, "Where is thy Father?" But they could only be told in reply, " If ye had known me [i.e., the real man in me), ye would have known my father also." 'It is always the case with those who do not exert themselves in the investigation of truth that they evince a tendency not only for misunderstanding others, but, also, for endeavouring to conceal their own ignorance by a perversion of sense. The assertion of Jesus need not have been an occasion for misunderstanding, for he did not claim for himself any superiority over others when he said 'I am the light of the World.' In answer to an anticipated smile of incredulity on the face of some of our readers, we need only refer to the Sermon on the Mount wherein the same Jesus said to his congregation in unmistakeable terms :"Ye are the light of the World." The difference between Jesus and Christ explains the rest. When man removes the bushel from the 'lamp' of life and allows his inner light to shine forth in the world, so that the works of the Father within are seen by men, he becomes a Christ, and realizes the force of the observation, "I and my Father are one." " Ye are the salt of the earth," does not apply to the body of flesh, for that is of earth, earthy, but to the indwell

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298 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ing essence of Life, that is, soul, or atman, as it is called in Sanskrit. All this is simple enough, yet must it ever remain unintelligible to those who do not take the trouble to meditate on the problem of Life itself. Many wish to acquire faith without having the least idea of the difference that exists between the word of mouth and the emotion of belief. He who only hears of a thing and forces himself to put faith in it, is liable to have it destroyed when assailed by doubt, the arch-enemy which cannot be killed except with the sword of discrimination. Man must, therefore, build his house on the rock of reason which alone can withstand the severest storms and squalls of scepticism. Besides, unreasoning faith seldom fails to degenerate into fanaticism and superstition, which are the forerunners of the worst types of evil. Moreover, knowledge and its application are two different things; and, obviously, it is the capacity in respect of the latter which determines the extent of the former. Hence, those who only hear the words of wisdom from others, without meditating on them for themselves, are like the Pharisees who were unable to form a true idea of what spiritual freedom signified. It was for this reason that they resented the statement,"Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." Taking the expression to mean national captivity, they angrily retorted that Abraham's seed was never in boudage to any one; how, then could he say, "Ye shall be free"? One has only to turn to the doctrine of transmigration of souls to understand the full significance of the messia

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299 nic speech. In consequence of ignorance, soul is liable to repeated births and deaths, and to the suffering and pain attendant upon them. This is the bondage; and it continues until the power to condition its circumstances is acquired by the soul. With the acquisition of mastery over its destiny, the soul becomes what is known as the 'son of God,' and ascends, emancipated and free, to the topmost part of the universe to reside there, for ever, in the enjoyment of different kinds of perfection, including those in respect of knowledge and bliss. Now, because mastery over one's destiny cannot be acquired except by the doing of the right thing at the right moment, and because the selection of the right thing and the right moment is not possible by dependence on chance, that is, without a knowledge of what is right and what is not so, it follows' that knowledge is a condition precedent to the obtainment of freedom from the liability to birth and death, known as the bondage of karma. This is precisely what Jesus said on the subject. The parables which he spoke on the occasion are very instructive in themselves. All who commit sin are the servants of sin. The principle of evil is not everlasting, but goodness is eternal. That which is merely a transitory state of existence must depart when the principle of goodness is established in the heart, for the latter is eternal. Evil is darkness, ignorance; goodness is light and wisdom; where the light of wisdom shines, darkness cannot remain. Life is the Light of Wisdom itself, and, accordingly, proclaims : "I am the way, the truth and the light," To those who misinterpret the true doctrine, Life THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

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300 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. has nothing but condemnation to offer. Their fate is foreshadowed in the words of Jesus addressed to the Doctors of Law : "Woe unto ye lawyers, for ye have taken away the key of knowledge: ye entered not in yourselves, and them that were entering in 'ye hindered."--(Luke, XI. 52.) We do not know what Jesus would have said to the modern preacher, who has not only not entered in himself and stood in the way of those that were entering in, but has, also, actually misled and turned away many a well-guided soul from the right path, to follow what religion never preached, but that which is the most abominable perversion of the true doctrine. Alas! that the world should have its Pharisees in every age. John, whose sense of delight at the discomfiture of the Pharisees is remarkably refreshing, records yet another discourse between them and his Master. He makes Jesus say: "Verily I say unto you, if a man keep my saying he shall never see death"-(John, VIII.51). This was too much for the patience of the poor, ignorant Jews, who forthwith demanded : "Abraham is dead and the prophets; and thou sayest, If a man keep my saying, he shall never taste of death. Art thou greater than our father Abraham which is dead ? and the prophets are dead : whom makest thou thyself ?"-(John, VIIT. 52-53). If Jesus and the Jews had been merely talking of the resurrection of the dead in the World to come, it is difficult to see how such a misunderstanding could arise between them. It is impossible to construe this dialogue in any manner other than this, that the doctrine of Jesus was so startling and new to his congregation that they

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 301 were utterly unable to comprehend it, and were thus constantly at cross purposes with its propounder. The attitude of the Jews was not strange either. It was the attitude which ignorance always assumes under such circumstances. Whenever any new doctrine is preached or any new possibility discovered and made known, people say: 'Our ancestors did not believe in it, nor practised it; art thou greater than they ?' There has always been what is called public opinion against all new discoveries and sciences. It was in consequence of his miracles that Jesus increased the number of his followers, and it was due to his doctrine that he generally managed to lose them, as John records.* There was that in his doctrine which led many persons to consider him of unsound mind. Even his own brothers did not believe him to be sane. Yet when we sit down coolly to understand the real sense of those very passages which were the main causes of misunderstanding, we find them not only consistent with one another, but, also, with the highest form of thought which it has ever been the privilege of mankind to know. Shall we sacrifice Truth for the sake of a false pride in our misplaced belief in the "traditions of men"? Shall we reject the Light of Wisdom, because it was taken from India and did not originate in Palestine ? Shall we reject Jesus, because he had learnt what he preached at some time from some one else? Or shall we uncover our heads and show reverence to the real living Truth, irrespective of the channel whence it flows? We ought to rejoice that, instead of being estranged and divided * John, VI. 66.

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302 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. amongst ourselves, we have discovered a real bond of one-ness of thought and creed between us and a vast section of our race. Those upon whom we have hitherto looked as strangers have been revealed to be near kinsmen. It is true that the old ideals are shattered to pieces, but in place of an idol of ignorant superstition and misunderstood myth, we have the God of real, living Truth before us to worship, and adore, and idolize. We may now take up the question, how one desirous of getting into the Kingdom of God was to proceed? It is gratifying to observe that on this point there is a mass of injunctions and prohibitions which in some instances are quite explicit and complete in themselves. Before proceeding to discuss them, however, we would avail ourselves of the present opportunity to repeat that Jesus himself never desired to be worshipped, for otherwise all these directions and injunctions would have been quite useless and unnecessary. The fact that his discourses are full of instruction on the subject of emancipation, is the strongest indication that he was misunderstood. It was his word' that he wanted the people to believe in, not his person. He never told them that they were cleansed because they had seen, or worshipped, or lived with him, but he did say to them: "Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you." * He loved only those who kept his word, and said :"If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love (John, XV. 3). Ye are my friend if ye do whatsoever I command you (John XV. 14). He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me, and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father (John, XIV. 21). If you love me, keep my commandments (John, XIV. 15). And we will come unto him and make our abode

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 303 with him (John, XIV. 23). Blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it. Why call me, Lord, Lord and do not the things which I say (Luke, VI. 46)? Not every one that sayeth unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven (Matt. VII. 21). Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock (Matt. VII. 24). And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand (Matt. VII. 26). And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me" (Matth. X, 38). These passages leave not the least doubt in one's mind that the admission into the Kingdom of God depended not on the personal adoration and worship of Jesus, but on the faithful observance of the "word" which he preached. Thus, the most essential part of the qualification was the "doing" or "keeping" of the teaching Now let us see what those things were which Jesus pointed out should be observed or avoided. On this point the Sermon on the Mount is rather interesting, as .containing many instructions for the tyro. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are they that mourn. Blessed are they which hunger and thirst after righteousness. Similarly, blessed are the merciful, the peace-makers, and the pure in heart. Thou shalt not only not kill, but shall also not be angry with any one. Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her commits adultery with her in his heart. Thou shalt not swear. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as well as thy enemy. Thou shalt not resist evil, but whosoever smite thee on thy right cheek, thou shalt turn to him the other also. And, if a man claim thy coat at law, give him thy

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304 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. cloak also; similarly, if thou art compelled to go a mile, offer to go twice that much.' Such is the purport of the memorable sermon. The question is : what did Jesus mean by all this? Why are the poor in heart blessed ? Why should one mourn ? Why should our enemies be loved ? We have seen that the wretched condition of the soul is the result of a desire to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. It has also been seen that the state of bliss is the natural inherent condition of the soul which is hidden beneath the mud of desires ; and it has been observed that the bringing into manifestation of this hidden state of blessedness is the Ideal of the soul. What we have, therefore, now got to do is to remove the mud of desires to let the inherent state of bliss shine forth. To put it in different words, the state of desirelessness is the true ananda which becomes an actuality of experience only by giving up all desires, one after another. When you give up the desire to be rich you become poor, and because you have done so to bring out your spiritual Self from beneath the filth of desires, you are said to be poor in spirit. The expression refers to one who has deliberately given up riches and preferred poverty ; it does not apply to all the poor indiscriminately. There is no room for one who grumbles anywhere in this system; nor is the making a virtue of necessity to be commended. By becoming poor, by choice, we give up a number of desires, lessening the burden of worldly filth and bringing into manifestation, in due proportion, our natural state of desirelessness which is bliss. Hence, anything which tends to make us desireless also

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 305 tends to make us blithesome, that is, blissful. This is how blessedness results from spiritual meekness. The same principle underlies all other injunctions of Jesus ; they all tend to make one" perfect even as the Father which is in heaven is perfect." Evil increases by resistance. Wickedness and villainy cannot bear reprimanding or remonstrance, however well meant. Hence, there is no good in criticizing the actions of the malevolent. They only feel angry and irritated when told to desist, and might become bitter enemies. The adept deals with them as does the Lord of the Day deal with those who grumble at him. He simply goes on shining and radiating and smiling, and does not withhold his light from any on the ground of enmity. The wicked are, however, unable to stand the higher vibrations of goodness and light, while the good thrive in them. The one dies of his wickedness, but the other thrives by his virtue. The fundamental basis of morality is not sentiment, or regard for public opinion, or any poetical sense of the words virtue and vice, but the principle we have just enunciated. Wickedness is short-lived, and cannot last long, however much it may seem to prosper in certain cases occasionally. He who aspires to become perfect like God must not only think of becoming so, but must also act like a God. Just as God does not allow wickedness to mar his ananda, and regards both the good and the wicked with equanimity, so should the aspirant after bliss look upon all beings alike; he should be a well-wisher of all, but a hater of none. Harsh words and ill-timed disputations can only create friction and discord ; they give rise to 20

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306 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. anger which interferes with the spiritual harmony of the soul. Hence, the adept would give away his coat and cloak, both, to prevent spiritual discord, even though the claim be in respect of only one of them. It is rather hard to realize the force of this doctrine so long as one is steeped in materialism. The fact is that the Messiah gave out only a fragment of the philosophy of this 'hard' doctrine. If he had further added that when one becomes firm in the practice of this great principle his will acquires that degree of irresistibility which no mortal can thwart, the sense of the doctrine would have been easier of comprehension for and more acceptable to the masses. In very truth, as the force of ignorance, which reduces the native vigour of the soul to a state of demoralization and impotency, weakens with the acquisition of truth, will begins to regain its pristine power, so that, by the time perfection is attained, it is developed to such an extent that it may not be thwarted by any one, whether man, beast or ghoul. No one will then be found willing or anxious to drag such an one into a law court. People walk miles to visit an adept rather than ask him to go a mile with them. The adept knows the Law, and unhesitatingly practises the teaching. The ignorant alone raise the question : what would happen in the world if wickedness were humoured in this fashion ? Unable to understand the full consequences and the increase of power which result from the practice of the teachings of great Masters, men have come to reject them altogether. We should put it to practical test, in all sincerity of the heart, and see if Religion does

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307 not lead to the results that we have claimed for it. Spiritual laws are meant to be practised; they will yield no good if repeated even a thousand times a day by rote. A start should be made, and though the full measure of fulness and perfection be not realized all at once, a change for the better would be observed to take place from the very commencement, making it evident that good intention and perseverance are all the conditions necessary for our unfoldment in the fullest possible measure. How is a beginning to be made in respect of proper conduct? Jesus does not tell us anything definite as to this, but wants us to purify our intention. This will keep us from coveting another's property, and will also destroy our illusions. Will in itself is free and irresistible, but, being enmeshed in the net of ignorance, identifies itself with its body, and imagines itself to be limited and finite in power, in consequence. This is the illusion, or bondage. Hence, anything which is calculated to dispel the illusion must also restore the will to its native glory and power. Dharma (religion) or Law, so beautifully summarized in the Sermon on the Mount, aims at this goal, and, if put into practice, proves its own worth. Nor is the working of the Law less striking in the material world. Every wicked thought causes two things to come into existence, namely, fear and worry. We have already seen what these two arch-enemies of mankind are capable of doing. Worry eats away living tissue, and fear renders one susceptible to all evil conditions, physical and mental. The great medical and scientific authorities of Europe and America have at last begun to realize that mental conditions such THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

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308 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. as fear, anger, jealousy, worry, and the like, act upon the physical body as powerful poisons, and produce complicated diseases which defy the best skill at times. The state of health (we ought to call it disease) called nervous prostration is simply the materialized effect of worry. Have you ever thought why so many people in the world are ugly, or look wretched ? Surely, they were not all born with the stamp of wretchedness on their features. The reason is to be found in the principle which we are discussing now, that is, as one thinks, so one becomes. The outward ugliness, or wretchedness, is the result of the ugly thoughts on the mental plane within. This is why we find all the great Teachers enjoining their disciples to avoid such ugly feelings as anger, jealousy, worry, and so forth. The body is the expression of the mind ; whatever thought we hold in our mind, whether good or bad, must therefore appear in an externalized condition in the body. This is especially so with the subtle or the soul body. Jesus said :-- "For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; neither hid that shall not be known. Therefore, whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in light ; and that which ye have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon the house-tops" (Luke, XII. 2-3). This it is that explains the difference between the looks of the civilized races and their uncivilized brethren. Man has yet to understand that he shall have to give an account of, i.e., to suffer the consequences of, every idle word he speaks, for "by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." The whole thing is that in our blind materialism we have neglected to consider the only important thing

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 309 that is to be known, namely, the Science of the Soul. We have considered the physical encasement superior to everything else, and are doing our best to study its comforts, forgetting that the real enjoyer is not the body at all, but something of which the body is merely an objectified expression. If the body were the enjoyer, it ought to go on enjoying its comforts even after death, but it is obvious that no dead body is ever anxious to be propped up on cushions, or to be clothed in purple and silk. We should not find it difficult now to comprehend why every one who looks at a woman with lust is as much guilty as if he had actually committed adultery with her. Mere entertaining of a lustful thought suffices to set up harmful vibrations which must produce their full effect, unless countermanded, in time, by more powerful vibrations of holy thought. The actual commission of adultery would have added but one more of such evil influences to those already called into existence. This is how every thought is punished or rewarded. You entertain evil thoughts, and you suffer for them, here or hereafter. If, on the other hand, your thoughts are healthy, you get your reward in the increase of vigour and life. As you sow, 80 shall you reap. This is how the punishment of sin* * The secret of sin is well-expressed in the following from the Akaranga Sutra:-"Certainly that man who engages in worldly affairs, who practises many tricks, who is bewildered by his own doings, acts again and again on that desire which increases his unrighteousness. Hence the above has been said for the increase of this life." And the commentator adds : "For sinful acts injure the bodies of living beings; therefore they are increased by oui abstaining from sin."-(Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XXII.)

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310 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is death ; and this is why one should receive the 'gospel" as a little child, the emblem of innocence and trust. Thus, the only way of getting into the Kingdom of Heaven is the giving up or renunciation of desires, which will make the innermost condition of desirelessness (true bliss) shine forth as a light freed from the covering of a bushel. All the Tirthamkaras and Saviours and sages are agreed as to this. This is what Lord Mahavira preached, this is what Moses taught, this is actually what Jesus repeated in the Holy Land, and this is what Science is soon to discover and proclaim to the World from house-tops. People do not realize the full force of their error on this point. When these subjects become better known, sinlessness will increase, for then mankind would learn that they have to shape their own destiny, as they think fit. The ancient sages of the East while realizing that man was himself the Sat-Chit-Ananda-the condition he wanted to attain to--did not lose sight of the fact that, although the matter was theoretically simple, its practical attainment was hedged in by certain difficulties inherent in his very constitution, of which the restlessness of mind was the most troublesome and annoying. To overcome this difficulty they prescribed mental concentration. The idea is that in order to be effective force must be persistently applied to one particular point. So long as one does not understand the dynamics of force, one can produce but little effect. Just as the rays of the Sun, when diffused and scattered about in space, will not produce the requisite amount of heat to ignite a piece of cotton, or charcoal, but when

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 311 brought to a focus will do so at once, so will not the individual will, i.e., mental energy, have any effect unless it is also brought to a focus and concentrated on one point. For all our achievements are due to concentration. Even knowledge is possible by concentration of thought, that is, meditation, not otherwise. Those who hear the doctrine and do not meditate on it for themselves, are best described in the parable of the sower, as the wayside, the stony-ground, or the field of thorns, where the seed either does not take root at all or is choked up soon after. But that alone is good ground which produces a thirty- , a sixty- , or a hundred-fold harvest. As seed sown on the wayside, the stonyground, in a field of thorns, or in a plot where it is choked up by the weeds, produces little or no harvest, but on good ground multiplies thirty- , sixty- , and even a hundred-fold, so does knowledge increase in a thoughtful mind. When one hears the 'word' and meditates on it, it multiplies enormously. We may, for instance, take the little aphorism, 'the wages of sin is death.' In itself it consists of only six words, but it embraces within its scope the possibility of an enormous amplitude, that is, the entire range of knowledge. If we bring our concentrated thought to bear on the aphorism, we shall solve the riddle of the Universe ; but if we merely content ourselves with saying, " how true it is," or "it is quite wrong," and the like, we shall not understand anything. The difference between the adept and the average man lies in the power of concentration; and the whole science of Yoga is a commentary on this one principle. It is a matter of daily experience that even

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312 in affairs of terrestrial importance a certain amount of concentration of mind is absolutely necessary to bring an undertaking to a successful end. The necessity to stop the wandering of the mind becomes all the more important when it has to deal with such subtle and fine forces as compose the fetters of the soul. All the Saviours of mankind are agreed on this principle. Jesus, too, says : "The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thy eye is single, thy whole body is also full of light; but when thine eye is evil thy body also is full of darkness" (Luke, XI. 34). We should not allow our evil eye to scatter away the light of the body; nor should the mind be permitted to dissipate away life by its uncontrolled restlessness. The Bhagavad Gita has it : THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "The determinate buddhi is but one pointed; many branched and endless are the thoughts of the irresolute. (Disc. II. 34). When thy mind, bewildered by the scriptures, shall stand immovable, fixed in contemplation, then shalt thou attain unto Yoga (Disc. II. 53). Even here on Earth everything is overcome by those whose minds remain balanced" (Disc. V, 19). This is why Jesus was constantly telling his hearers not to take thought for their food, or clothing, or other worldly matters. Why worry over such trifles? Is not there a higher power that looks after these things? Behold, the birds of the air think not, yet they are provided for! Look at the lilies of the field; they never worry themselves about what they should wear, yet the pure white robe in which Nature has clothed them might well be envied by the great and glorious Solomon. What is the good of your worrying yourself over such matters when no amount of worry will add 'an inch to your stature? Is not life more than meat and body

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 313 more than raiment? Why, then, kill yourself by worrying over such trifles ? It was the true principle of renunciation which Jesus taught his followers. The aspirant after spirituality must even give up home and become houseless. "Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head. No man can serve two masters; ye cannot love both God and mammon. Lay not up treasures for yourselves on earth, but in heaven, where the moth and rust do not corrupt, and where thieves break not through and steal. Provide neither gold, nor silver, nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats, nor shoes, nor yet staves : for the workman is worthy of his meat. Just as a man who finds a treasure-trove in a field, and goes and sells all he possesses, and buys the field, so he who has found the kingdom of heaven must offer his all to acquire it. In the same way, when a pearl merchant comes across an invaluable pearl, he sells off all the small ones he owns and purchases that one. Do not be covetous, for a man's life consists not in the abundance of things he possesses. 'Sell off all ye possess, and give it away in alms, and provide yourself bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens that faileth not. Neither seek ye greatness before one another, for it is so only among the gentiles whose princes and nobles exercise dominion and authority over mankind; it shall not be so among you : but whosoever will be great among you let him be your minister, and whosoever will be a chief among you let him be your servant, like unto the Son of man who came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give

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314 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. his life a ransom for the sins of the many.' These and many other similar sayings of the Saviour all point in one direction alone, namely, that it is necessary for mankind to practise renunciation to get an admission into the kingdom of Heaven. His condemnation of the traditions of men, such as salutation in markets, sitting in high places, wearing long robes, uttering long and elaborate prayers, swearing, noiseful charity, 'washing the exterior,' and other like acts is based on the same principle. We must now endeavour to go more deeply into the root of ethics and morals to understand the full significance of the teaching of the Saviour and to make out the true sense of such sayings of his, as 'love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good #0 them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.' All the energy in the universe of matter and form comes from the forces of attraction and repulsion, which appear as Love and Hatred in relation with the soul, and are governed by desire. Desire to possess a thing is love for or attraction towards it; desire to avoid it is hatred or repulsion of it. Love, being constructive and preservative, brings a sense of expansion, i.e., of 'moreness,' which means pleasure for the being; hatred, on the other hand, causes shrinkage or contraction, that is, a sense of 'less-ness,' and, consequently, also of pain; hatred ultimately destroys the organism. All our desires assume the one or the other of these two forms. Leaving the complex forms of emotions out of consideration, as foreign to our purpose for the moment, we can easily

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315 see that the effect of desire in every single instance is either to draw something towards or to drive away someching from us. Desire gives rise to emotion, that is, a notion towards an object or away from it, in mind. Emotion, from e, out or up, and moveo, to move, is, therefore, the resultant of mental energy plus desire, and implies a moving of the mind or soul (The Imperial Dicionary). The following table will show the classificaion of a few of the most important emotions : Attraction (Towards superiors) Reverence goodwill (Towards superiors) Fear { worship veneration respect tender ness THE KINGDOM OF GOD. choler WILL OR DESIRE. 1 (Towards equals) Love friendship apprehen- terror horror sion (Towards equals) Hatred T rage (Towards inferiors) Benevolence I pity 1 (Towards inferiors) } Repulsion passion com passion Scorn or pride 1 1 supercilious contempt disdain ness wrath

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316 The following tabulated statement will show a few of the traits of character the above emotions, or feelings, give rise to : Reverence. (Obedience. Fear. Truthfulness. Trustfulness. Loyalty. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Love, Love (attraction). i Confidence. Candour. Contentment. Anger. (Honesty. Hatred (repulsion). (Fury. Servility. Lying. Treachery. Rebelliousness. Exactingness. Now, the rule of the correspondence of emotions is that they ordinarily tend to excite similar emotions amongst others. Every emotion produces in the mind of the man excited a characteristic vibration, and this vibration tends to set up similar vibrations in the minds of all others who happen to be in his vicinity, setting up like emotions in them. This kind of susceptibility, however, mostly depends on the character of the person to be affected, for, 5 "if the latter person has a peculiar individuality of his own, then, instead of allowing himself to be governed by the conditions set up by the other, he will meet them with others, and stronger ones, created by himself, and so change the former's mood, instead of being changed by it; that is to say, for example, if the vibrations of anger Misunderstanding. Benevolence. Unkindness. Moroseness. Pride. (Holiness. Tenderness. Charity. Toleration. * In proof of this statement of ours we may cite the universally observed fact that the cheerful company of young persons dispels the gloom of moroseness and sorrow, while the society of those in extreme grief acts as a damper on all who come in contact with them. (Hypocrisy. Malignity. Prudery.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. from another's aura touch his, he will call up the mood of friendliness, initiate corresponding vibrations in his own aura, impose them strongly on the other's, and produce the mood of friendliness in the other's mind in place of anger. "It would be possible to put the how of this* in terms of physical matter also, if there were more knowledge extant on the subject. But the experiments now being made with reference to the ptomaines, toxins, antitoxins, lysines, antilexines, perspirations, etc., or secretions generally, produced in the human body under various conditions and emotions-these experiments seem likely to show, later on, that the poisonous tamasa secretions, for instance, which cause a headache after a fit of anger suppressed by fear, etc., are counteracted and neutralized by the antitoxic sattvika secretions produced by the generous and beneficent emotions called up by reading a book of high and holy thoughts and deeds."-(The Science of Emotions, by Bhagwan Das, M. A., pages 155-6). There can be no doubt whatever that emotions affect the physical body and, ultimately, tho health of the individual, for good or bad. Protracted grief effects. perceptible changes in one's looks. "In grief the circulation becomes languid, the face pale, the muscle flaccid, the eyelids droop, the head hangs on the contracted chest, the lips, cheeks and lower jaw all sink downward from their own weight. The whole expression of a man in good spirits is exactly the opposite of the one suffering from sorrow (Darwin). Blushing and pallor are usually caused by the dilation or contraction of the vessels supplying blood to the head, and it is our daily experience that blushing and pallor are caused by strong mental emotions. Commenting on the emotion of fear, Professor Metchnikoff maintains: dr "Fear and cold alike cause contraction of the superficial bloodvessels, and, in man, excite the contraction of the minute rudiment 317 *The words the how of this 'in this quotation have been transposed from their original positions to suit our requirements.

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318 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ary muscles inserted at the roots of the hairs. Goose-skin' is caused by the contraction of these muscles, the condition being a functional rudiment, no longer serving to warm the skin nor to make the body appear larger............ Fear, which is occasionally able to excite the contraction of the involuntary muscles, also stimulates other muscles against the will. Under the influence of emotions that powerfully affect the nervous system, and particularly under that of fear, contractions of the bladder and intestines may be so violent that it is impossible to prevent the voiding their contents. Accidents of this kind are not infrequent in the case of youthful candidates at examinations."-(The Prolongution of Life, page 196). Mr. Banaji, quoting Hufeland, says :" Certain habits or dispositions of mind not only deprive the body of its vital powers, but as they incessantly sharpen the gall, they are continually preparing a secret poison, and by the general irritation of the gall increasing in an extraordinary degree selfconsumption, "To these belongs that malignant disposition of mankind known by the name of peevishness. Nothing can so much blast the bloom of life, shut up every access to pleasure and enjoyment, and change the beautiful stream of life into a stagnated puddle, as this disagreeable habit. I advise every one who regards his life precious to fly from this deadly poison (peevishness) and never to suffer it even to approach."--(The Greatest Discovery of Psychology, page 54). The Saviour's philosophy now becomes clear. Obviously, the seeker after immortality and bliss must shun the emotions of hatred and cultivate those of love. He must meet harmful emotions from another with nobler emotions of his own, and transmute evil into good in the crucible of love. In a sacred Scripture it is said : "Moksha (Nirvana) lieth not hidden on the back of the heavens, or on the surface of the earth, or in the depths of Patala (lower world) : the dissolution of ahamkara (egotism) on the disappearance of all desire--such is moksha." Moksha will come only after the birth of Christ, that

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 319 is, Wisdom and Love blended together, has taken place, The 'little child,' that is, Wisdom and Love, united to high intelligence, is the Spiritual Ego, the true Inner Man, the Ruler Immortal ( A Study in Consciousness, by Annie Besant, page 385). By a domineering, supercilious demeanour all that one can expect to gain is a temporary sense of greatness over certain members of our race, but surely it can mean pleasure only to the most degraded intellect. There are others who are superior to us and who can treat us in the same manner. When we reflect on the harm these hateful emotions are apt to produce, we inust recognize that the temporary sense of triumph, or superiority, over one's subordinates is no compensation for the evil wrought in one's own system. It is in our power to avoid the generation of the poison of hatred, and we must exert ourselves to do so, if health and happiness are to be attained. Man would find that, as he cultivates the emotions of Love, he is spared most of the headaches and other ills which the flesh is said to be heir to. Mrs. Annie Besant writes (A Study in Consciousness, page 367) : "Since the nature of the Self is bliss, and that bliss is only hindered in manifestation by resisting circumstances, that which removes the friction between itself and these circumstances and opens its onward way must lead to its Self realization, i.e., to the realization of bliss. Virtue does this, and therefore virtue is a means to bliss. Where the inner nature of things is peace and joy, the harmony which permits that nature to unveil itself must bring peace and joy, and to bring about this harmony is the work of virtue." Therefore, the Saviour's teaching about meeting evil with good, anger with kindliness, and persecution with

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320 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.. prayer for the welfare of the persecutor, is not only beautiful from a moral point of view, but is, also, perfectly in accord with the scientific truths about the hygiene of life and the attainment of the beatific condition called Bliss. Nirvana is open unto him alone who brings this teaching into daily practice ; unto none else. It is even possible to work out the effect of the emotions of love and hatred with mathematical precision, so far as the attainment of bliss is concerned. Since its attainment depends upon an unshakable conviction of the godly nature of the soul, no one who contradicts its attribute of divinity by thought, word, or deed can ever hope to reach the goal. Now, when one abuses one's neighbour one cannot be said to be showing respect to the attribute of divinity in his soul, and, therefore, must be taken to have fallen from one's high faith, for the time being, at least. Besides, since, in so far as he shows disrespect to the divine in him whom he abuses, he must be taken to be actually travelling in a direction opposed to the one in which lies the goal in view. Furthermore, when one does not show respect to Life in other bodies, one cannot also regard one's own Life as. divine, since they are alike in all essential respects. Thus, whether it be love for one's neighbour, friends, relations, other human beings or animals, in loving them, one really loves one's true Self, realizes one's inner divinity, and speedily acquires bliss; while in hating any one, even enemies and lower animals, one only moves away from the goal, hence, stands in the way of one's own progress, and comes to grief. Thus it appears that those

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 321 who laid down" bless them that curse you, pray for them that persecute you" were not lunatics, but men given to very exact and sober thinking. Divinity of the Self is to be realized for attaining Bliss; man should, therefore, always strengthen his belief in the Godhood of the soul by thought, word and deed. It can now be seen why the slaughtering of animals is forbidden by the higher religions. None who kills the humblest of these dumb creatures, and discards their mute appeal for mercy, can ever hope to come into the realization of Life eternal, for Love is necessary for the acquisition of bliss, but killing can only go to destroy the sense of union and harmony with the Self. In practice, Love will be found to be a great power 'for subduing evil, whether in a family, in society, in a nation, or amongst mankind generally in the world. While hatred would separate, Love would unite. The former causes the downfall of nations by digunion; but the latter binds mankind together in one brotherhood, however unlike they may be in other respects. History has, over and over again, proved and illustrated the fact that the biggest and most powerful nations have come to grief through the principle of hatred and contempt, which they had adopted as their guide in their dealings with others. Unfortunately, it has been ever so with our race, and still we are blind enough not to learn the lesson which History teaches. There are two ways of living in the world :(1) by leading the life of selfishness, and (2) by carrying out the principle of love in our lives. The former path leads to pride, covetousness, tyranny, and to a short career of 21

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322 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. selfish prosperity during which the seeds of disintegration germinate and grow apace. Then begins the reverse process which involves the selfish in trouble, wars, humiliation and defeat, and, finally, also in destruction. The path of Love, on the other hand, is free from such disasters. It is one smooth, ever-peaceful, ever-joyous existence, with an ever-widening circle of friends, ever-increasing in power and glory, with no fear of loss or disharmony anywhere. We may apply these principles to small families and societies, or to great nations and empires; their working is uniform throughout. Let there be mutual hatred between husband and wife, and very soon home would cease to be happy ; let the feeling of mutual distrust take possession of the hearts of men, and it would soon disperse society ; let disunion creep in among men in a nation, and soon there would be civil wars; similarly, let ihe various races constituting an empire hate each other, and it would very soon become convulsed with wars and struggles, and shaken to its very foundation, even if not destroyed. It is against the law of nature that hatred should be prosperous beyond certain limits which are determined by the energy of the hater himself, and, because in hatred energy is dissipated needlessly, loss of power must ultimately result. We should ever try to live peacefully and happily with the other members of our race, always trying to establish a real brotherhood of man in which everyone contributes his or her share of goodwill towards the common good. Let the father not only love his family, but the whole society and brotherhood of man all over the world ; let the

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 323 elders propagate the interest not only of their limited community, but of the whole of the human race ; and let the king protect not only his own nation, but all the races in his empire and, also, the interests of mankind in general, although outside his own kingdom. When the ideal is realized, there would be one continuous millennium of unbroken peace and prosperity all over the world, in which even the animals would not be grudged an enjoyment of life which is dear to all. This seems to have been the ancient Indian ideal as the Puranas record. In more recent times, however, knowledge dwindled and selfishness took hold of the hearts of men, with the result that with the splitting up of the brotherhood the Mahomedans appeared on the scene, and easily established their empire in the land. They tried to rule the country with the principle of hatred, and so the world witnessed their downfall, in the fulness of time. Let us now cast a glance at Europe where the principle of love prevails, at least, so far as national life is concerned. There, even such small nations as the Dutch, the Spaniards and others have not only held their own, but have also extended their empires to other countries where the dissensions engendered by hatred have given them a foothold for establishing themselves. History, thus, teaches us the important lesson that it is Love which builds, establishes, and makes secure, and hatred which disunites, disperses, and destroys. This is a law of nature, and all the endeavours of mankind to defy it are vain. It is said in "The Universal Text-book of Religion and Morals " (pages 176-7): " The study of past history may convince those who are not

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324 readily accessible to reasoning, that Brotherhood, in very truth, is a law in nature. For a law proves itself as completely by the destruction of that which disregards it, as by the support of that which is harmonious with it. Nation after nation, State after State, has fallen into ruin by the ignoring of the Brotherhood: where the strong oppress the weak, instead of protecting them; where the rich exploit the poor, instead of aiding them; where the learned despise the ignorant, instead of educating them; there the inexorable finger of nature writes over the civilization: Doomed. But a little while, and it has passed away. Only when Brotherhood is practised shall a civilization rise that shall endure." THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, It is open to us to so behave towards our fellowbeings as to establish the brotherhood of man or to thwart nature in her evolution towards that ideal. In the one case, we receive our share of joy under the Rule of Love, but in the other, we must be prepared for the slow but sure justice which nature has prepared for those who violate her purpose; for the Ideal of Nature is like a stone which the builders rejected, but which nevertheless was intended to be the head of the corner; and woe unto him who falls foul of it, for :-- "Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder."-(Luke, XX. 18.) Perhaps in the present state of human society it is somewhat difficult to bring the ideal of brotherhood into realization all at once, but because it is difficult to do so at once furnishes no excuse for not advancing, however slowly it may be, towards it. It only requires an endeavour from us all, the rulers and the ruled, alike. The proper attitude for rulers and kings is to spread the light of Truth and Knowledge among their subjects, so that they may be able to cooperate consciously for the realization of the brother

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 325 hood, while the ruled cannot do better than to advance the cause of the ideal with selfless, intelligent co-operation with their rulers. When both, the rulers and the ruled, work harmoniously together for an amelioration of the condition of the whole of the human race, the misunderstandings that so often form the causes of deeds of bloodshed, iniquity and oppression, which have disfigured the pages of the history of almost all nations in the past, and which are, after all, due to a simple ignorance of the laws of nature, will cease to exist, and mutual goodwill and trust and fellow-feeling will take their place. The idea of fear has no room bere, for fear requires the maintenance of prestige, power and favouritism and cannot do without them, while love abolishes differences, turns enemies into friends, and unites the several sections and classes of society into one harmonious whole. The idea or feeling of superiority is also a form of the emotion of hatred, and a piece of hateful falsehood, whether it be of one's physical, mental, or moral attainments. If we are superior to some, in some respects, sure enough there are others who are superior to us in others. Real superiority lies in the development of one's spiritual nature, but in that case it takes the form of humility, not of arrogance, or hauteur. Jesus was one of the meekest of men of his age. He used to squat down on the ground, eat with his hands, and dress just as the poor people do to-day, in the East, but many a preacher of his gospel now looks down upon this simple mode of life, and considers those who live in the way the great Master did as socially and men

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326 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tally inferior to himself. The difference is that Jesus preached the Kingdom of Heaven, but the latter preaches that of civilization alone, although there is a mechanical repetition of the great sayings of the Master in his speech. Need we wonder at civilization, rather than salvation, being the ideal of mankind in our day? A mercenary, compromising attitude of priesthood is responsible for this deplorable change, all over the world. The Brahmana is no exception to the rule. Formerly the temporal power sought guidance of the church in all matters, but now the church has been separated from, and, in many instances, rendered subservient and servile to, the state. The result is exceedingly deplorable, inasmuch as while formerly the moral side of things was always kept in view, now that side comes in either when it does not clash with the point of view of the world, or to hide the evil deeds of men under the folds of its cloak of hypocrisy and shame-faced-ness. The church, finding its power dwindling, tries to retain its. hold by pandering to the evil tastes of men and by sanctioning their unrighteous deeds. What has brought this about is the lack of true knowledge, for knowledge is power which none can defy. We care not what creed the priest belongs to, but, in many cases, it will be seen that the forcible remarks of Jesus addressed to the Scribes and Pharisees are fully merited and deserved by him. When a man is not certain of his own ground and is corrupt, he cannot but be a hypocrite ; he certainly cannot preach with authority.' Perhaps the woman who was taken before Jesus for his sanctioning her being stoned, would, if taken before the priesthood of our own time, meet

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 327 a very different fate from the one she did at his hands. In politics, as in all other departments of life, we shall find that it is impossible to make any real progress except by working in harmony with the divine laws. A glance at the pages of the world's history shows that empire after empire was formed by men, in all nations, each one trying to surpass, in solidarity and strength, all others that preceded it, but the ultimate fate of each and everyone of them, without a single exception, was the same, namely, destruction. The reason for this lay in the principle of hatred which governed the hearts of kings and rulers of men. So long as they adhered to the principle of love in their dealings with mankind, their kingdoms flourished to their own and their subjects' advantage ; but the moment they allowed their hearts to be swayed by the feelings of pride and self-aggrandizement, they were swept away from existence. Thus, it was the failure to observe the law of brotherhood which was the cause of their downfall, for pride and self-glorification give rise to the worst kind of dishonesty, hypocrisy and intrigue, and, ultimately, also lead to tyranny, the mother of destruction. The true principles of good governance have been laid down by the great moralist and poet, Sa'di of Sheeraz, in the two following couplets : r`yt chw byn st w slTn drkht w drkht y psr bshd z byn sh (1) br khwry (2) dwstn dl r`yt dwkht st gr prwry * bkhm [Tr. (1) The people are like the root, and the king like the tree; the strength of the tree depends on the root, my son !

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328 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (2) The people are like a tree from which, if thou nourishest it, thou canst enjoy fruit to thine own and thy friends' satisfaction.] These are the true principles of sound government, and wherever they have been put into practice they have never failed to afford happiness and joy to all those concerned. It is well to bear in mind that the aim of existence is not to fill our own pockets to the detriment of all others of our race, nor to lord it over mankind, but to so live in the world as to allow ourselves and all others to attain to the fullest measure of peace, harmony and happiness which are available here and hereafter, and to evolve out into perfect Gods which is our ultimate destiny. It is also well to remember that each step we take in the wrong direction, unless retraced in time, takes us 'nearer the yawning abyss of destruction, and that after a certain number of wrong steps have been taken it will be out of our power to retrace them at all. . Even to-day our politicians are trying to govern the world with the rule of hatred, and are leading its nations into sure destruction. They aim at world power' for the glorification of their own nation, forgetting that man cannot run counter to the laws of nature with impunity. The past history of great nations is there to convince all, who might be open to conviction, of the fact that stability and permanency of kingdoms is possible only when they are founded on the solid and sure basis of Love, and that in the matter of world-conquest or government, no amount of diplomatic skill, heavy armament, or ships and soldiers can possibly avert the doom which follows a disregard of the spiritual Law of Love.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 329 One consequence of the ambition of world-conquest is the severish competition which has been going on among the different nations of the world, each one dreading the rivalry of others, and making greater and greater sacrifices to ensure superior efficiency, with the result that peace has become possible only by being armed to the teeth. Even now there is no guarantee that this system is likely to work satisfactorily, for the strongest army may be able to crush a single power, but it is too much to hope that it will be victorious against the whole world. The fear of a strong combination of enemies constantly spurs us to raise the standard of strength and efficiency of our forces, and necessitates the expenditure of large sums of money every year. But where is all this money to come from? Taxation engenders internal discontent, and, unless kept within reasonable bounds, must lead to strikes, agitation, rebellion, and even civil wars. It is bad politics, indeed, which prepares the national defences by impoverishing the people. The 'mailed fist' policy, thus, cannot be expected to lead to any lasting peace and bappiness, and its success may be said to depend on the constant dread, on all hands, which prevents open rupture, till some one feels stronger than some one else, so that, instead of enjoying a sense of security and peace, we live in a state of perpetual dread, which we try to meet and counteract by spreading fear among others, in our own turn. It is painful to observe the enormous sums of money which are annually spent in providing and manufacturing special types of engines of destruction. Already men are groaning under the weight of

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330 taxes which they have to pay as the price of peace, and the cost of living is going up daily. Yet the surface politicians who are responsible for this kind of government fail to see that they can never establish internal and external peace and harmony by the rule of Dread, and blindly follow the course chalked out by themselves for the management of the world. If Love had been the guiding principle of political life, there would have been no such dread anywhere, and nations would have lived side by side, and co-operated with one another as friends; for Love is the power which binds together and effectively destroys fear. Where Love reigns there is no room for distrust. Religion points out that a king should fight in defence of his people and empire, using only righteous means and weapons which do not inflict harm on non-combatants; and the ancient Records (Puranas) are full of accounts of glories won on the battle-field by chiefs and warriors of old. But it does not countenance the mad policy of world-conquest, or the plunging of nations into war for the personal gratification of kings. The whole doctrine is based on the principle of Love, which is described as the real basis of true greatness and permanency. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Since love gives rise to confidence and amity, and hatred to fear and a sense of revenge, it follows that peace and harmony, internal and external alike, are to be had only under the rule of Love. In the reign of the ideal King, Sri Ramchandra, there was no such thing as fear, and the epoch was noted for internal and external peace and happiness for his subjects. The account of

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 331 this reign may or may not be history ; it is sufficient that it is the ideal. Even to-day if we change our point of view, and try to replace hatred with love, we shall find that there will be peace and plenty for the whole of the human race. Under the government of Love there can never be any discontent, and the need for heavy armament and armies disappearing, the money allotted to that department of national defence can be utilized for the general welfare of the masses. The science of modern politics is at war with the science of peace, and must be modified to suit the conditions which an advancing civilization demands. Despotism is already at an end, but the system of representative government, which seems to be better suited to modern times than absolute monarchy, has not been perfected as yet. The most enlightened form of government should mean a sort of modified socialism in which the different races of man* kind, the yellows, the reds, the blacks, and the whites, all live in a family-like union, in which no special privileges are recognized in any particular individuals, and where the sole test of the capacity to manage the affairs of the state consists in nothing other than love combined with competence. Such seems to have been the original scheme of the Christian Church at the time of the apostles. Let us not be daunted by its failure, but rather try to remove the causes which brought it about. When people like Ananias and Sapphira are drawn to the church, not by the power of Love, but by a sense of fear excited by the miracles of the apostles, the cause of the church is not advanced in the least thereby. True love rests on wis

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332 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. dom, and knows no hypocrisy; and it is true love that is required to turn the reign of powder and shot, the rule of dread, into the kingdom of God. So long as this principle is not kept in view and made the goal of all human politics, no kingdom of man, however well-backed by artillery and military skill, can be permanent, for the great Master declared : " Therefore say I unto you, that the Kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof." In this one sentence was summed up the whole philosophy of political science two thousand years ago. Its meaning is that political greatness depends and follows the morality of the heart, and soon begins to vanish with the departure of the spirit of goodwill. So far as its application is concerned, we find actual instances in history illustrating its fundamental truth. The case of the Jews is strongly in point. Somehow the Hebrew nation had imbibed the idea of being the chosen people, and desired to remain so exclusively. Pride soon brought about their fall. The Indians, too, adopted a policy of reserve and indifference in respect of truth, and did little or nothing to practise or preach it to the world. The result was that they became divided amongst themselves and lost their independence. Their first conquerors, the Mahomedans, also failed to avail themselves of the true teaching of religion, and, for that reason, were vanquished by the English, in their turn. In discussing the principle of political freedom, it is to be observed that national independence does not

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 333 always signify individual freedom, for, while it is true that national independence presupposes the freedom of individuals, it is no less true that national freedom is more illusory than real where the element of fear has not been eliminated altogether, so that where people live in a constant dread of their neighbours, where individual freedom is subordinated to the demands of national Militarism, and where life and liberty might be jeopardized any moment at the mere wish of one's neighbour, and have nothing more solid or substantial to depend upon than powder and shot, there the state of the people can hardly be said to be free. On the other hand, it is quite conceivable that full liberty might be enjoyed by the members of a subject race, if the relations between them and their rulers are based on the principle of neighbourly love. It follows from this that the political emancipation of our race depends not on our ability, as a nation, to beat off all enemies, but on our capacity to turn these very enemies into friends. The practising of universal Love, then, is the true guarantee of peace and freedom. We can now understand why every rational religion lays considerable stress on its observance, though each gives different reasons for it. For instance, Vedanta bases it on the unity of Self, which is fully emphasized by Prof. Deussen in the following from 'The Aspects of Vedanta' (p. 124) : "The gospels fix quite correctly as the highest law of morality: Love your neighbour as yourself. But why should I do so, since by the order of nature I feel pain and pleasure only in myself, no my neighbour? The answer is not in the Bible (this venerable book being not yet quite free of the Semitic realism), but it is in the Veda, is in the great formula 'tat twam asi,' which gives in three words

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334 THE KET OF KNOWLEDGE. metaphysics and morals altogether. You shall love your neighbour as yourself,- because you are your neighbour, and mere illusi makes you believe that your neighbour is something different from yourself." The fact, however, is that the principle of neighbourly love depends entirely upon the Law of Karma which teaches us that in injuring or belittling others we do more injury to our own souls than to the object of our hatred. For the effect of actions--whether mental or physical or those originating in speech-is preserved in the constitution of the ego and bears fruit in certain characteristic forms, virtue leading to desirable and happy results and vice to all that is unpleasant, undesirable and painful. And so far as the temporal world is concerned, it is easy to see that all manifestations of the emotion of true Love carry with them a feeling of expansion, or "more-ness,' and actually go to increase the vigour of life, while the opposite kind of feelings give rise to a sense of shrinkage, or 'less-ness,' and oppression in one's own self, and also produce mutual distrust among men; and it is a characteristic of this kind of distrust that it seldom fails to lead to the state of tension which can only be described as "armed truce. The freedom of one's neighbour, then, is the measure of one's own. He who would be free himself must, therefore, set his neighbour free in the first instance. The advantage of Love over the opposite kind of emotion appears clearly in the life and death struggle of nations for their independence, for, while a settlement brought about by the agency of the former involves neither bloodshed nor an estrangement of relations

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335 between two contending nations, and is actually a source of strength to them both, the one arrived at through the instrumentality of the latter is only bought at the cost of blood and money, and also entails the maintenance of an armed encampment in the future. It follows from this that the political emancipation of the world is not to be achieved by forming any community for deeds of aggression and bloodshed, but by imparting true knowledge to mankind, so that when the spiritual perception of the race is awakened and the masses become convinced of the unreality and instability of the materialistic life, and of the reality of their own godly nature, they would, of their own accord and free-will, proceed to take the necessary steps to establish the principle of equality between all classes of men. Thus will be abolished, once for all and for ever, the invidious distinction between the different sections and communities of men. THE KINGDOM OF GOD. From the rise and fall of great empires in the past we might also learn the important lesson that justice is the principle of solidarity and power, for justice begets confidence, and confidence unites individuals into colonies, colonies into states, and states into empires. Where justice is wanting, there is no trust; without trust, there is no identity of interest; and without an identity of interest, there can be no esprit de corps, which is the root of power. It is only in the absence of justice that arbitrariness with its inseparable companion, favouritism, comes into vogue. The unjust tries to fortify himself against his enemies by the exercise of favouritism. But Nature never countenances this

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336 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE method, and though the clouds may seem to disperse for the time being from the horizon, they are forced back only to gather more thickly a little later. For favouritism leads to inefficiency and to rivalry of a mean sort, and no empire can hold together when the units composing it lack in efficiency and fitness to take part in the 'struggle for existence. There is no exception to this rule. The downfall of all forms of autocracy is due to this simple law of Nature. Justice, it will be seen, goes a long way to counterbalance fear, for it inspires the heart with confidence, and maintains peace and balance in the mind; it is the mother of goodwill and order in communities, and makes concord between husband and wife and love between master and servant. As Colton said, "if strict justice be not the rudder of all our other virtues, the faster we sail, the further we shall find ourselves from the Haven where we would be." If we look around us, we cannot fail to be impressed with the remarkable fact that the ruling races and nations in the world are those which practise the great virtue of justice, and are composed of individuals who have implicit confidence in one another, while the rest, whose main characteristic is want of confidence in one another, simply exist as slaves. Need we wonder at this result? A house divided against itself cannot stand ; for morality is the great force which solidifies families as well as nations and unifies them into a well-organized whole. And the first principle of morality is justice, which springs from truthfulness. Where truthfulness is lacking, there is no self-respect; and in the absence of respect for one's own self, there can be no respect for any

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 337 other, except the lip-respect of a time-server, for the time being. To the races which aspire to occupy their proper place in the council of nations, we would advise the practising of truthfulness, under all circumstances. They need not do anything else. This one virtue alone would bring about an adjustment of all their relations, of its own inherent force. Shakespeare rightly says: "To thine own self be true, And it must follow as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man." But it is not the whole truth, for we ought to add to this : 'when thou art true to thine own Self, it must also follow that none can then be false to thee.' Truthfulness is the power which binds nations together. Not only is its disregard fraught with national calamity and degradation, but individually, also, it can only lead to ruin. We might work out its consequences from the points of view of Spiritualism and materialism both. Firstly, as regards Spiritualism, falsehood directly produces impurity of heart, perverts and deadens the higher instincts, converts the nobler emotion of love into that of hatred, and renders the ego unfit for higher forms of evolution. It makes the intellect cloudy, and replaces the serenity of mind with worry and anxiety, thus directly robbing the ego of ananda, or bliss, the acquisition and enjoyment of which is the sole aim and aspiration of the soul. The liar wants to be happy, but does the very thing which directly gives birth to unhappiness! It is like pulling out the foundation to build the superstructure with. Spiritual progress is

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338 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. impossible without peace of mind, and peace of mind cannot be had till the heart be purified; hence, lying is an immediate obstacle on the path of emancipation. Secondly, so far as material prosperity is concerned, it is also easy to see that untruthfulness even here ultimately leads to ruin. We resort to falsehood to gain a cheap advantage by dishonest means. But dishonesty never flourishes in the long run, however much may be the immediate advantage to be gained thereby. If it were otherwise, all the thieves, and dacoits and forgers, in the world, would be millionaires in no time; but happily such is not the case. National prosperity is no exception to this rule. India, probably, is the most degenerate country in this respect, and, undoubtedly, her children are the worst off as a nation. The short-lived triumph, which falsehood and dishonesty secure for their votary, in some instances, is too feeble a recompense for the life-long anguish and fear which inevitably follow in their wake. The liar cannot look into an honest man's face; his features bear the stamp of wretchedness and sin; he shuffles and cringes. and loses his self-reliance. Prosperity in business is impossible with such qualifications as these, and the health of the body, depending, as it does, on mental strength and purity, also suffers in consequence. This is not all; for those whom the liar defrauds, become his enemies when the fraud is discovered, and hunt him down sooner or later. Are these conditions worth purchasing in consideration of some temporary gain by falsehood and deceit? We venture to hope that no man in his senses will answer in the affirmative.

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 339 Truthfulness and Justice will also be found sufficient to establish peace and harmony wherever the interests, of individuals and nations may clash, for they beget love, which, in the case of the body in power, takes the form of sympathy, and of loyalty in that of the other. * Every ruling nation must rely on the loyalty of the subject race, if it wishes its own rule to be perpetuated. But what does loyalty mean? Does it mean a gramophone-like reproduction of what has been put into the terrified mouth by some overbearing agency, or does it mean a spontaneous gush and bubbling up of that indefinable feeling, or emotion, of confidence in which love and respect are blended together in a heart which delights in giving expression to its natural feeling, of its own accord ? It is always possible to bully any one into an expression of a forced sentiment of loyalty, but the statesman who relies upon this kind of loyalty in his calculations would very soon find himself getting into deeper water. True statesmanship aims not at removing or suppressing the symptoms of 'dis-ease' or friction temporarily, but at stamping out their causes. We have said that loyalty is an emotion, so the question now arises, how to engender it in the human heart? A study of the laws which govern human emotions reveals the fact that they spring from mental conviction, and since conviction, in its turn, depends on the opinion one forms on mature deliberation, they may be said to depend on the opinion one is led to entertain concerning an individual or a state. Now, the emotion of loyalty, like that of friendship, belongs

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340 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to the class of the emotions of Love, and, consequently, arises in the heart only when it is convinced of the relation of love existing between itself and the body in power. But, since the mind naturally entertains a feeling of hatred for all those who impose restriction of some kind or other on it, the emotion of loyalty is opposed to the inmost nature of the heart. Luckily enough, there is a single exception to this rule, and it is furnished by Love itself. Hence, when the person who imposes restraint on another happens to be actuated by a feeling of love, the manifestation of which takes the form of action rather than of words, the heart willingly sacrifices its natural resentment and accepts the obligations and restrictions in the name of Love. We find this principle illustrated in all the dealings of mankind ; whether it be the relation subsisting between parent and child, master and servant, superior and subordinate, lover and beloved, or that between the king and his subjects, it is love and love alone which induces one to cheerfully acknowledge the authority of the other. Hence, loyalty depends directly on the nature of the acts performed by the king. How little of the psychology of emotions do those statesmen who try to exact it from the people know, is obvious from our analysis. As a matter of fact, the very act of forcing the tongue to give expression to an emotion of love goes to engender hatred in the heart, because the heart rosents pressure of every kind whatsoever. By violence, or the fear of violence, you may force the tongue to utter and the pen to write a veritable encyclopaedia on loyalty ; but no amount

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 341 of force can compel the heart to endorse a single word of what the tongue utters or the pen writes, for, as we have said above, hearts are impervious to the heaviest artillery, and respond only to the gentle and soothing influence of love. Modern politicians are sometimes led to think that the principle of divide et impera' is the best method of maintaining order in the land. We shall see how far this policy is consistent with good administration. Now, rule means harmony, good government, and the existence of friendly relations among all classes and communities in the country, and its value lies in the peace and prosperity which it aims at securing for the people. But the essence of the idea underlying the policy of " divide and rule" is to set people quarrelling with one another, hence to create friction, illwill, internal lawlessness, general chaos, and political paralysis-in plain English, misrule. Thus, to govern by the principle of divide and rule' means the creation of trouble for the people and the government both, in the first instance. Now, since the creation of trouble for one's self is always suicidal, he who advises any government to adopt, or adhere to, a policy of divide and rule has no right to be considered wise. The true value of this principle is to be found in its application to one's enemies in the time of war. When our enemies are thrown into a state of political confusion and paralysis by internal dissensions, it becomes easier to conquer their country. Hence, we adopt such methods as are likely to bring about mutual misunderstanding among them, although even at such times these means are not considered

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342 . THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. honourable by religion. This is because it never allows the worldly ambitions of men to mar the prospects of their souls. Therefore, the policy of weakening the enemy by creating misrule in his country, if permissible at all, is suited to a time when there is a conquest to be made, never in dealing with one's friends or proteges. Good government necessitates the blending of all interests in the interests of the government, hence a reconciliation of all the elements of discord and disharmony. Spiritual blessings are not meant for a country where lawlessness is the ideal set to the people to aspire to. Besides, one can hardly hope to find in the world any people so foolish as never to see through the thin veil of this policy, and the moment they come round to recognize what the real game is, confusion must necessarily become worse confounded. It works only so long as the people do not recognize that in the general good of all alone lies the good of each and every individual. Another error which modern politicians commit, at times, is the laying of too much stress on prestige. The relations between the king and the people, however, cannot improve so long as errors of the ruling bodies are shielded on this false principle. Prestige is the creature of fear; but it is love, and not fear, which generates loyalty. Fear creates discontent and provokes resentment. Under its influence people express their resentment in whispers, and form secret alliances to undermine authority. Where, therefore, the aim is to build up a stable empire, prestige should not be lightly invoked to protect the wrong-doer, or to

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343 perpetuate the wrong done. The undoing of the wrong done, with a graceful acknowledgment of the blunder committed, would at once conquer the hearts of the people and secure their active co-operation. The latter also ought to do their best to co-operate with the governing body for the preservation of Law and Order; for their own prosperity depends on the maintenance of peace in the land. It was for this reason that it was said: "Render unto Caesar the things that be Caesar's and unto God the things that be God's" (Luke, XX. 24). It should never be forgotten that fault-finding is a means of reform only when the object of criticism happens to be one's own self; to reform others, it is necessary first to make them feel their shortcomings by example rather than precept. It is no good to raise one's voice in denunciation. The voice which makes itself heard is not the voice of many persons uttering incoherent, inconsistent, selfish, bigoted or offensive speech, but the voice which speaks for all, steady, clear, inoffensive though firm, neither over-polite to border on flattery, nor lacking in courtesy to savour of rudeness or impertinence, the voice, in short, not of any particular caste, or creed, or section of men, but of sober Reason. THE KINGDOM OF GOD. Spiritual influence would, thus, be found to be the most potent means of removing the existing evil from all the departments of life. The problem of reclaiming criminals would also be found to be one of spiritual morality. It is no use hoping to suppress crime by the enforcement of penal laws, nor is there any lasting good to be had out of the preventive methods of binding over men for good

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344 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. behaviour, and the like. These are merely temporary measures, and succeed on account of the fear which they excite for the time being. Now, if we can agree as to the cause or causes which lead a certain number of hitherto honest men to turn criminals, we can lay our hand at once on the means of reclaiming them back to society and moral life. Analysis will show that the principle of morality is here also at the bottom of the trouble, for no one imbued with good moral ideas is likely to take to a dishonest mode of living. Hence, the process of reclamation must embrace moral education to be of any effect. It is, thus, perfectly clear that no system is worthy to be called an administration, in the true sense of the word, in which either moral education is conspicuous by its absence, or is of a nature which turns honest men into criminals; and it is equally clear that in all good administrations provision must be made for imparting wholesome ideas on morality to convicts. Mere imparting of knowledge whereby they might earn a few pence per day, is of no avail. The prospect of a few 'coppers' at the end of a whole day's hard work is so utterly devoid of attraction that, unless the will be strongly imbued with the principle of honesty, the earliest chance of securing a moderately small fortune, without labour, would suffice to turn the scale in favour of dishonesty. Fear of punishment is too feeble a check under the circumstances, for all criminals know that punishment follows detection, but none where there is no trace left, and they, consequently, spend their energies in maturing their plans, so as to reduce the chances of detention to the harast nnocihiliter

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345. Fear of punishment, thus, instead of being an incentive to good, virtuous living, acts in an exactly opposite manner. So far, then, as moral obligation is made to rest on the laws of society and government, its force is exhausted the moment one can discover some method of defeating detection. It must, therefore, be made to rest on a foundation where detection cannot be prevented, nor punishment avoided; and that foundation is furnished by religion alone. In order to reclaim criminals, it is necessary for the state to arrange for their religious education, so that they may begin to understand the nature of their true Self and realize the consequences which arise from a disregard of Spiritual Laws. Society is expected to help the state in this task by example rather than precept, and since the elite of society is always constituted by the persons in power, the rest of the public merely mimic them-the duty cast on the higher officials is to see that the noblest and the best of the traditions of high morality and virtue are maintained by them in their daily life as members of society. THE KINGDOM OF GOD. Without spiritual help one may for ever go on trying to remove the existing evil by newer and newer methods, but we shall discover that each newly invented remedy, while partially suppressing the old existing evil, brings two other forms of it into existence. In all departments of life we see this unfortunate result following human endeavour for the removal of evil; we try to suppress some existing evil by legislation, but are then called upon to remove the harmful results of the new enactment itself. This is because divine inspiration is not always. our guide in the selection of remedies for the removal

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346 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of evil. We not only ignore such inspiration at times, but often work in defiance of it; and some of us are so brought up and educated that there is little room in their hearts for spiritual tenderness. Spiritualism inculcates the principle of the universal brotherhood of man based on the solid foundation of love, and demands that equality and justice be extended to all human beings, irrespective of caste, creed or nationality; but we, in our ignorant materialism, think that their application should be confined to those cases only which do not affect our individual, racial or communal interests. No one who has such narrow ideas of equality and justice can ever hope to establish a reign of peace for his own nation, or for the world; for nature does not countenance these notions, and although we may not see the punishment following evil deeds immediately with our limited vision, still the far-sighted amongst us discern in them the beginnings of causes of great retribution, which is, in the fulness of time, sure to overwhelm humanity and shake the very foundation of the world. The science of true politics aims, from the very commencement, at rooting out evil and establishing the reign of peace and plenty, and has breadth of view enough to include the whole world in its beneficent scheme. To revert to the sayings of Jesus, those who are pure in heart do all good acts in secret; but the hypocrites do them in public, so that they might be considered great and holy by their fellow-beings. The hypocrite's way is, however, not the way of salvation, for it is a perverse nature that finds pleasure in the insincere praise of mankind. It is high time that those who are

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347 under the impression that spiritual merit consists in the testimony of one's neighbour, corrected their wrong belief. No one certainly will be admitted into heaven on the production of a certificate of good conduct from his neighbour. THE KINGDOM OF GOD. "" 66 "" 'Be perfect like the Father.' Remember that life is more than meat, and the body more than raiment. "Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself (Matt. VI. 34). And seek not ye what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, neither be ye of doubtful mind' (Luke, XII. 29). "But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you' (Luke, XII. 31). Have faith, and all will be well. The main thing to be avoided is attachment to the objects of senses. Have no love for the outward shape or form of a thing, for that is impermanent. If you attach yourself to a thing that is not lasting, you must come to grief. Be attached to the in-dwelling Atman alone which is eternal. There is no mother, nor brother, nor sister, nor any other relation of the soul in the World. One's true relation is one's own Self. All the other relations are false and elusive, like the Will-o'-the-Wisp; and the love of the false is ever fraught with evil. Hence, the Messiah declared: "He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me (Matt. X. 37). To the same effect is the statement: * 27 "If any man come to me and hate not his father, and mother, and wife and children, and brethren and sisters, yea and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple" (Luke, XIV. 26). dr

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348 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The reply which Jesus gave to some one, who had pointed out to him that his mother and sisters were standing out, waiting to speak to him, shows that he (Jesus) lived what he preached. He then said that only those who did the will of the Father were his relations, none else. It was in accordance with this principle that he told the disciple who wanted leave to bury his father : *1 "Follow me and let the dead bury their dead "* (Matt. VIII, 22). In the Gospel according to John is actually recorded an instance when Jesus addressed his mother by the undignified title of "woman" (John, XIX. 26). The Yogis say : "The afflictions are nescience, egoism, attachment, aversion and love of life," Similarly, it is written in the Bhagavad Gita : "Affection. and aversion for the objects of sense abide in the senses; let none come under the dominion of these two; they are obstructors of the path (Disc. III. 34)..........He who regards impartially lovers, friends, foes, strangers, neutrals, foreigners and relatives, also the righteous and the unrighteous, he excelleth" (Disc. VI. 9). The love of the body is likewise a source of trouble, and an obstacle to true liberation. One must realize the Ideal, regardless of everything else. Jesus always said to every one who asked him about the means of salvation: "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me (Matt. XVI. 24).+ "9 Only those who are willing to pursue 'Truth' at all * Cf. "The wise grieve neither for the living nor for the dead."Bhagavad Gita (Disc. II. 11). + Of. "And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me' (Matt. X. 38). 19

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349 costs can get to it. If you love your little personality, you will never reach it, for its path is obstructed by the love of 'Non-Truth.' Be ready to crucify the little carnal self for the sake of the real Self, and your emancipation will come at once; for the law is that whosoever shall save his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose it shall find it. There is no need for propitiating any cosmic or extra-cosmic deity; the whole thing is a question of laws, of which not a tittle shall be broken. It does seem at times that villainy and deceit score a victory against virtue and honesty, but in reality this is not so. The apparent villain might have done one good act, and the virtuous and honest man one that is bad. Shall the laws of Nature cease to operate for good in favour of the former, and for harm against the latter because of their general reputation or habit to the contrary? The laws do not recognize any such thing as a generally good man or a habitually bad one; they are simply concerned with each individual thought or act by itself. Every thought, whether good or bad, sets certain forces in motion which must have their due effect. In the morality of laws good and bad do not exist. The same nature which has pointed out that the proper food for man is a fruit and nut diet has pointed out living flesh to be the only diet of tigers, wolves and other beasts of prey. Where is the principle of mercy, then, in nature? This, however, is not meant to furnish a plea for the slaughter of poor dumb animals to tickle the palate of the epicure. No wise man who has understood the laws of nature will ever think of eating meat.' * See 'The Jain Philosophy,' pp. 143-153. THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

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350 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. For him the evil consequences arising out of such a diet furnish a sufficient argument against its use. If one only knew what evils arise out of it, one would shun it as poison. Is not its disgusting, nauseating sight, in its uncooked state, a sufficient reason for its discontinuance? The Bhagavad Gita declares : " The foods that augment vitality, vigour, health, joy and cheerfulness, delicious, bland, substantial and agreeable are dear to the pure. The passionate desire foods that are bitter, sour, saline, overhot, pungent, dry and burning, and which produce pain, grief and sickness. That which is stale and flat, putrid and corrupt, leavings also and unclean, is the food dear to the dark." To revert to the point of morality of laws, it is certain that Nature respects not our ideas of virtue and vice. With her it is all a question of causes and effects--as you sow, so shall you reap. Neither is she a respecter of persons. According to the Bible, Adam, the Son of God (Luke, III. 38), violated one of the laws, and was promptly turned out of the Garden of Eden, while Jesus, a man (John, VIII. 40), by living in harmony with the Law, became Christ. If you are unhappy, who cares for it in the Universe ? There are bundreds and thousands of others who are more unhappy than you. It is your own look-out whether you would be happy or miserable. There is no punishment or reward outside the range of the laws of nature; and every moment is the Judgment* Day with these unfeeling laws. When we violate the law we come to grief, but when we live in harmony with it we thrive. The * Of. "The Just Lord is in the midst thereof, he will not do iniquity: every morning doth he bring his Judgment to light, he faileth not; but the unjust knoweth no shame."-(Zeph. I. 5).

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 35.1 Sat-Chit-Ananda state is within us, and it is our own look-out whether we bury it deeper and deeper within us by our ignorance and vicious living, or, by chiselling off all impurities, like a sculptor, bring the hidden treasure into view. The only way, then, of securing freedom and happiness is the renunciation of the objects of desire, which produce delusion and tighten the bonds. The Vedantic simile of a dream, which is invaluable as a means for engendering the spirit of vairagya in the soul, might be availed of here for the purpose, though not quite appropriate otherwise. For just as in the state of dreaming we perform action in imagination, so might we be said to be dreaming now and acting in a huge dream. While dreaming, do we not perceive the objects created by our mind as if they had the same reality as ourselves ? *Do we not associate with our dream-phantoms, as if they were real beings ? Aye, we treat them as real existent beings, and eat and drink and make merry with them! We fall in love with them, just as we do on this plane; and feel grief, and break our hearts when we find the course of true love not running smooth even there. We experience all sorts of sensations of joy and sorrow in the dream-land just as we do here. Sometimes the sensations are frightful : we fear, as we do on this material plane, run for our lives, hide ourselves from our enemies, and beg for mercy when unearthed and dragged out of the place of hiding. At times we feel the hand of the assassin rise ; we see the gleam of his dagger. Presently, it comes in contact with the skin, its sharp edge penetrating deep into the

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352 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. heart; death now stares life full in the face ; its grip tightens ; the piercing scream of agonized terroris uttered ; hope is gone, and consciousness is departing, when, all of a sudden, a something snaps, and we find ourselves comfortably lying in our bed, in this material world of ours, laughing at our own dream. What is it? Is it not an index to what you are doing here in this World ? When the mind changes this chapter of incidents, would you not be lying in your proper bed, the luxurious bosom of Eternity ? Let us think over the scene in the dream-land. Who was its creator? Was it not the result of the activity of your own Mind? Did it not exist in your Imagination alone ? But did you not, all the same, consider it so real and life-like as to actually live it in your own consciousness ? All these questions must be answered in the affirmative. The dream-scene was actually created by your own Imagination, the creative faculty, the Holy Ghost, so to -speak, of your Mind, which also created a new light form for your own good self to perform action through, on the dream stage. Your Imagination was the supporter and the sustainer of the world of your dream, and was within and without the whole dream-creation. Why were you unhappy then? What did your fear? Were you afraid of the creatures of your own Mind ? It is a startling pronouncement, but it is true none the less : you were afraid of the creatures of your own Mind, and were frightened by their monstrous looks. You had liked the scene and desired to take part personally in the drama which was to be enacted; you had, so to speak, forgotten in the excitement of the play that your own

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 353 Mind was the Creator of it all. So, when you found yourself in difficulties, you were unable to extricate yourself from them. You had, as it were, put off the Creative Power' at the time when you fell in love with the fair heroine of the play and entered the lists to chastise the villain. Had you known, that is to say, remembered, that your mind possessed the power of life and death over your adversary, his dagger would never have tasted your blood; but as it never occurred to you that neither the fair dream-land fairy, nor the villain, nor anything else had an objective reality outside your Imagination, the Creative Power, which you bad put off, stood aloof, and the scene brought to you all the misery and wretchedness and pain that it could, and finally terminated in 'death,' at which moment of extreme agony you turned round and found the 'put off' Creative Principle within you, smiling placidly at your error. The Holy Ghost,' the Creative Principle,' had never left but was within you all the time : it was merely the fault of your memory that failed to remind you of it, and for this reason you could not connect yourself with it. You had placed yourself, mentally, on the same plane with the dream-images and had thus voluntarily accepted an inferior status for yourself. It was under the influence of such thoughts that you entered the lists to chastise the villain. You fancied him to be a more powerful being than yourself, whereas you ought to have looked upon him as one created by you. The 'Creative Principle' which was looking on the scene obeyed your thought, and manifested the condition of your belief in your dream body. This is why you were overpowered by the villain. 28

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354 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Do you now see the secret of your unhappiness? You have forgotten your real Self and are searching outside in the world for that which is within you. The source of eternal happiness is within you ; it is the desire to win the fairy of the stage which stands between you and the spring of happiness within. When you put yourself on a level with the John, Brown and others of your dream, you disconnect yourself with the Creative Power,' and must share the fate of those imaginary others of your own making. In this world also the Creative Will' is capable of achieving the most wonderful feats ; and that will is also yours! The moment you look upon the world as a stage, and on men and women as actors in disguise, you rise above it and occupy your proper place, or, in the words of Jesus, " you ascend to wbere you were before." It is the forgetfulness of your true nature which is causing you all the unhappiness, and misery, and sickness, and disease. When you know your real Self, you will not make yourself miserable in the pursuit of the pleasures of this world of shadows. Such is the lesson to be learnt from the beautiful simile of a dream. The Bible also teaches that when you cease acting and become a spectator, then would the Christ (your Life) plead for you with the Heavenly Father within, saying : " They are not of the World, even as I am not of the World. Sanctify them through truth : thy word is truth" (John, XVII. 16-17). Then it will be that if you ask yonder mountain to 'cast itself into the sea,' it will. When you can say with the Saviour, "In the world. ye shall have tribulation : but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world" (John,

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355 XVI. 33), then, indeed, would the prophecy,-" They shall speak with new tongues, they shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover" (Mark, XVI. 17-18)-be fulfilled. This is all the redemption. Once more remember that, as in a dream you became an actor by virtue of the desire to win the fair heroine, so, in actual life, on this globe, it is the desire of the attractive things of the world which is the cause of your fall. You are Great and Glorious, and the Creator of your own sphere of thought; the Universe is the illumination of your own Idea.* Do not belittle yourself. Consider your Self above all the fair objects in nature; do not humiliate yourself by coming down to their level. Do you not laugh at the idea of your love for the fair Rosalind of your dream? Is it not because you think it ridiculous for the Real to fall in love with the false, the unreal, the transitory? By doing so you fail to recognize your Self, which is the Truth, and run after the Non-Truth. This is the only sin which shall be punished with death, and which cannot be forgiven. Jesus also says:-- THE KINGDOM OF GOD. "Verily I say unto you, all sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewithsoever they shall blaspheme: but he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation" (Mark, III. 28-29.) How can it be forgiven? You have no faith in the very Power which decrees forgiveness and restores the status quo; what forgiveness can you ask for theu ? *Because all things are reflected in the Kevala Jnana (omniscience) of the Siddhatman (God', therefore, the universe is here said to be the illumination of the Idea (knowledge in a comprehensive sense) of the true self (pure spirit).

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358 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The 'Creative Power' in man begins to re-arrange the molecules of the body and brain, and to re-mould the emotions, when there is a sincere repentance of sin. The process of elimination of wickedness, however, requires a belief in the ability of the Creative Power' to accomplish this beneficial change. Hence, when you have no faith in the ability of this Power itself, how can you invoke its aid, or allow it to do you any good ? In plain language, spirit or soul is an entity which is capable of attaining the highest ideal of perfection as well as of falling into the lowest state of degradation and helplessness. Pure consciousness, i.e., intelligence, by nature, it is affected by its beliefs, so that its attainment of its high and sublime Ideal is really dependent on its own faith, which may electrify the individual will into omnipotence to sweep away all obstruction from its. path, or throw it into the gutter of impotence and ineffectiveness, according as it is inspired by true wisdom or by false and untrue notions about itself. Will being, thus, the source of all good, it is impossible to undo the effect of belittling its power; for an impotent will is. incapable of doing good, and nothing but impotence can result to will hy holding it in derision. It is, therefore, the only sin which cannot be forgiven, and the punishment of which is eternal 'damnation, that is, being lost in the ocean of transmigration. The notion of baptism, which we now proceed to consider, is also a profound doctrine. The world now merely looks upon it as a sacrament; but it was something so difficult to understand that one of the Pharisees, a man Nicodemus by name, who was a ruler of the Jews,

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 357 was nonplussed by it. John the Baptist had declared: "I baptize you with water unto repentance, but he who is coming after me shall baptize you with fire." When Jesus referred to the subject, saying, "Except a man be born again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God," Nicodemus felt puzzled at this new birth and enquired, how could a man be re-born when old ? Was he to enter a second time into his mother's womb to be born again? The reply to this was: "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again." The idea conveyed is that of a birth from darkness into light i.e., of a spiritual birth, without which redemption from sin is not possible. The idea of a second birth is well-known among the Hindus and Jainas. The three higher castes, namely, Brahmanas, Kshatriyas and Vaishyas are called 'twiceborn,' or regenerate. The investiture of the sacred thread is the ceremony which is the outward symbol of the second birth. By birth all men are considered like unto Sudras, but the second birth is the re-generation in spirit. It is said by one of the ancient Hindu sages : ." Brahmanas by birth are, however, regarded by the wise to be equal to Sudras until they are born in the Veda (i.e., learn the sacred literature), but after that, (that is, the second birth) they are deemed Twice-born." It is the knowledge of one's own divinity which burns up sin, and purifies and prepares the soul to manifest God-life; hence, no one who has not been purified by

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358 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the fire of knowledge can aspire to get into the Kingdom of Heaven. The first birth is the birth of man in the world, but the second birth, spoken of by Jesus, is the God-birth, or the birth of man into Godhood. The Bhagavad Gita declares : "Verily there is no purifier like wisdom in this world. As the burning fire reduces fuel to ashes, so doth the fire of wisdom reduce all actions to ashes" (Disc. IV. 37-38). With the seed of ignorance burnt up by the fire of wisdom, the neophyte is born in faith, the only gateway to the Realm of Light and Life to which he was hitherto 'dead.' This entering into Life, or the birth of the soul in faith, i.e., the second birth, is the basic principle of the doctrine of being born again which was propounded by Jesus and which Nicodemus failed to understand, at least, in the first instance. It will not surprise modern theology a little to be told that its error of regarding God as a maker is ultimately traceable to the notion of the second birth, which, as seen above, is grounded on the doctrine of baptism, i.e., initiation into the secret science of the soul. If modern theologians would but reflect on the matter, they would not be slow to realise that the fatherhood of the clergy, which prevails in almost all the ancient religions of the world, can have reference, not to the physical body but to the initiation of the soul into the mysteries of the spiritual side of Life, poetically described as the birth of man in spirit, or, simply, as the second birth. It is with reference to this second birth that the idea of the fatherhood of the clergy is associated; for the guru (spiritual preceptor) who

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 359 brings it about and who is entitled for that reason to all the respect if not to greater reverence tban what is due to the progenitor of one's physical person, is its cause, or author, and must be described as 'father,' to keep up the metaphor. Now, because the Tirthamkar * (God) is the greatest and the most worshipful guru of all, nobody is better entitled than He to the title. This was the original idea ; but when the true teaching of religion was lost sight of in the underground mazes of mythology, and the conception of divinity replaced with erroneous notions of the latterday theology which insists on reading the mysterylanguage of its scriptures in a literal sense, the purity of the original conception of the fatherhood of God also came to be replaced by the coarse and undignified notion of a maker in the physical sense. That the clergy should have remained unaffected by the errors affecting divinity is not surprising under the circumstances and is precisely what was to be expected; for they have never passed through the melting pot of mythology to give rise to misunderstanding, though many people are now ignorant of the precise reason why they should be addressed as 'father,' and take the appellation as merely a term of respect. Such is the secret of baptism. As the cause of unhappiness is ignorance, so that of redemption must be wisdom to be acquired by study and meditation. The illumined sage, consequently does not pray to any one for help, but devotes his time to study and meditation, * For the explanation of the term, See Chapters X and XIII.

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360 . THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. relying on the power of his soul to effect the necessary change from within. We are told over and over again by Christian theologians that salvation in Christianity is a matter of grace, and that God's favour is to be sought by prayer and praise, but not to be bought by works. But we have seen how grievous a misinterpretation such a supposition actually is of the teaching of the founder of their faith, whose every word breathes nothing if not the doing of works which bear a causal connection with the ideal of perfection he set before them in his memorable Sermon on the Mount. The text of Matthew, XI. 12 is a further refutation of all such notions, and may be taken to be the last word on the subject. This is how it reads : " From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force." Luke also puts it equally forcibly when he says :-- "The law and the prophets were until John; since that time the kingdom of God is being preached, and every man presseth into it" (Luke, XVI. 16). The truth is that it is a doctrine of combating with and overpowering the forces of sin by hard spiritual work, not of getting into heaven by a movement of lips and knees in supplication. The messianic statement-- "But many that are first shall be last, and the last shall be first" (Matt. XIX. 30) can hardly be said to accord with the dogma of prayer, or grace, but is fully intelligible on the hypothesis of works. As the materialist says, prayer is an old-womanish shedding of tears of impotent helplessness, and

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 361 amounts to waste of time pure and simple, notwithstanding the sense of relief which arises in some cases of fervent praying. There is no such thing in Nature anywhere as a department for receiving and disposing of the countless millions of unreasonable, impious and self-contradictory prayers which are poured forth daily by the human race. How could any one-even a God-constitute himself the Superintendent-in-charge of what might be called an universal Prayer Bureau, and yet remain happy? We have seen that ananda (bliss) is altogether inconsistent with such actions. Besides, if there be an all-wise Ruler of the Universe, and he an omniscient God, how could he be influenced by our prayers? It would be monstrous to imagine that our suffering and wants have to be repeatedly brought to his notice before he might be expected to move in the matter, and yet our constant praying cannot mean aught else. An omniscient Ruler Divine must be further presumed to know all that is to happen in the future, and, consequently, to have a fixed creative purpose and scheme of governance of the world, from which it would be vain for anybody to endeavour to draw him away. Moreover, a being who is also described as a loving Father must further be deemed to grant as much as he can prudently give to his starving and otherwise needy children, without waiting to be pestered by them with petitions of appeal for his help. And if that be so, why pray at all ? The truth is that prayer is an indication of a lapse from rationalism, for science and prayer are hostile to one another, so that the latter begins where the former, or rather our individual knowledge concerning it,

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362 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ends. Prayer is nourished by superstition in the bosom of ignorance, and withers at the first touch of reason. Born at the night-time of jnana (knowledge), it shines at her best in the house of Mysticism, the author of her being; but pales and withers if dragged into the powerful Sun of Intellectualism. It is for this reason that no one ever thinks of praying so long as he believes that he can reach his object through a chain of causes and effects, beginning with an effort on his part and ending at the goal. For example, we do not pray that our food might be cooked, our house built, letters. posted, and so on. A superstitious man will, however, immediately fall on his knees to pray the moment there is a break down of the causal connection between the means employed and the end to be attained. Accordingly, we do not pray in times of war that God might send our projectiles to a greater distance than the guns are able to throw them, or that a hundred enemies be killed with each stroke of the sword; but we do pray for victory when all we could do has been done, so far as our knowledge extends; and this because the causal connection between the efforts of men and victory depends on factors far more numerous than we are able to take into our calculation. So far as the feeling of relief which arises from prayer is concerned, it is the outcome of a spirit of resignation. Just as the litigant who has well nigh worried himself to death over the intricacies of his lawsuit experiences a sudden feeling of soothing consolation on placing the matter in the hands of the most competent lawyer in the country, in the same way, and

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 363 precisely for the same reason, or reasons, does the devotee, who prays for divine assistance, experience a feeling characteristic of relief. If we analyse his feeling still further, we shall find it to consist in the cessation of mental agitation coupled with a sense of satisfaction and resignation, resulting from the belief that the best that could be done has been done under the circumstances. The response to prayer, which the superstitious seldom fail to attribute to their deity, proceeds from one of the following sources, namely, (1) the soul itself, (2) some other living being, affected by our distress and moved by sympathy to help us out of our difficulties, and (3) co-incidence. In the first case, the soul itself perceives the solution of its difficulties, or secures its objective ; in the second, it is assisted by some one from outside; but in the third, it is obliged to what might be termed chance, pure and simple. All cases of response to prayer, as a matter of fact, really fall in the third category, for the very idea of response is a pure fiction of unreasoning faith.* * The facts of the modern European War may convince those who are not readily accessible to reasoning of the utter groundlessness of the belief in the existence of a beneficent Ruler of the Universe, both competent and anxious to grant the prayers of men. Its borrors have lasted not a few short weeks or months, but for several years continuously, in the course of which towns have been depopulated, countries devastated, kingdoms overthrown and hearth and home destroyed on a wholesale scale, plunging the whole world into misery, and transforming Europe itself into a regular shambles, reeking with the blood of no less than twenty million human beings, to say nothing of innocent beasts and birds. Tt is a record, in modern times,

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364 So far as chance is concerned, it does not mean that the occurrence of the event constituting the alleged response is brought about in violation of the natural Law, or what is the same thing in different words, by way of a miracle, but that its relation to the suppliant's wish rests upon nothing more or less than its co-existence with it in point of time. The event was bound to happen, and would have happened, as an independent happening, whether any one prayed for its occurrence or not, so that even its synchronism with prayer cannot be said to be due to the interference on the part of a prayer-granting agency in heaven. There are many such coincidences always occurring in nature which even the most unreasoning deism would refuse to regard as instances of divine response to the outpouring of the human soul, e.g., the occurrence of the death of an enemy or of some other form of calamity to his person or property. But if we are debarred from regarding these dark coincidences as response to prayer, because of their tendency to leave a stain on the honour and character of their 'perpetrators,' THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of prolonged, unbearable privations, of unparallelled suffering and of bloody deeds of all conceivable shades of frightfulness, sparing neither sex nor age nor even innocence. All this, we repeat, has gone on under the very nose, as it were, of our omniscient, omnipotent Ruler of the world, and yet he has not seen it fit to stir himself even to save defenceless women and innocent babes, or to put a speedy end to this world-wide calamity. It is not that his aid has not been invoked or his intervention resented; on the contrary, all conceivable forms of supplication-ordinary and special prayers, hymns, intercession service and the like-have been repeatedly employed by men, all over the world, to move him in the matter. These facts speak for themselves, and prove, beyond the possibility of doubt, that the management of the world is not a function or concern of divinity, consisting as it does, in the perfection of vairagya (renunciation), that is, desirelessness. For the same reason, the granting of boons to a worshipper or follower is not an attribute of godhood.

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365. what is our warrant for ascribing any other to the agency of a God? THE KINGDOM OF GOD. The origin of the idea of prayer, it may be pointed out here, is to be found in the daily meditation of the Jainas, known as the samayika vow, which is directly calculated to enable the soul to attain to its high ideal in the shortest possible time. The samayika consists in an endeavour to refrain from the commission of all kinds. of sin for a certain period of time-usually for an antaramuhurta (about 48 minutes-every day. During this. period one should remain cheerful and engaged in subduing the element of mental disturbance arising from personal likes and dislikes, and should dissociate. oneself, in one's mind, from all kinds of interests and undertakings of which our worldly personality is made up. The most valuable gain from samayika is the cultivation of an ever-growing feeling of equanimity, that well-balanced state of mental quietude and serenity which is the foremost attribute of divinity. The necessity for samayika will be apparent to any one who will ponder over the nature of the wide gulf which separates the actual from the potential; for he who would become a God must first learn to behave as a God before he can be allowed a seat in the Assembly of Gods. Samayika aims at the attainment of divinity through perfection in conduct, which, consisting, as it does, in the purest and most complete form of renunciation, is the sole and the immediate cause of salvation, that is wholeness and freedom from the pain and misery of samsara (births and deaths). The layman who has just entered the path observes

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366 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the samayika meditation but once daily in the morning, for he is not able to tear himself away froin business and pleasure at that early stage in his spiritual career to be able to perform it more often ; but as he progresses onward, he takes to its observance three times-- morning, noon and evening-every day, gradually extending its duration also from one antara-muhurta to three times as much at each time. The ascetic who has successfully passed through the preliminary stages of renunciation, as a householder, is expected to be an embodiment of desirelessness itself, so that his whole life is, as it were, a continuous samdyika from one end to the other. The quality or nature of meditation also varies with the progress of the soul, though its general features remain the same, so long as its type is not changed from what is known as dharma dhyana (religious meditation) to that called shukla dhyana, which is pure self-contemplation in the highest sense. The samayika consists in, 1. repenting for the faults committed in the past, 2. resolving to abstain from particular sins in the future, 3. renunciation of personal likes and dislikes, 4. praise of Terthamkaras (Perfect Teachers or Gods), 5. devotion to a particular Tirthamkara, and 6. withdrawal of attention from the body, and its being directed towards the soul. Of these, the first two aim at the elimination of evil, or sin, the third at the development of a spirit of renun

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 367 ciation, the fourth and the fifth at impressing the soul, by referring to the lives of the Holy Ones, with the fact of its own divinity, and the last at the correction of the error of the body being taken for the mar, as well as at the subjugation of 'flesh.' Prayer, as it is understood in deistic theology, it will be seen, is incapable of achieving any of the happy results which flow from the observance of the samayika meditation ; for prayer is not connected with the goal in view by any such thing as a chain of causes and effects which alone can be relied upon for securing an object of desire. In the following table we give the analysis of the modern idea of prayer as well as that of samayika, side by side, for facility of comparison. Prayer. Samayika, Begging for forgiveness of sins and other boons from another. Exerting oneself to avoid sin ning, by repenting for those already committed, and by rew solving not to commit others in the future. Renunciation of likes and dis likes, which is the cause of mental equanimity and leads to blissfulness of being. 2 Praise of a wrathful creator, 13 Praise of Tirthamkaras, who have jealous of his unity, by one attained to the status of perwho can never aspire to fection by their own exertion, becoming his equal. Devotion to one particular Tir thamkara whose biography is to be taken as furnishing ingpiration for our own soul, the Perfect One having risen to the status of Divinity from the ordinary position of a sinful soul. Correcting the prevalent error of the body being taken for the man, and the conquest of flesh,'

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368 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. A glance at the left hand side of the table suffices to demonstrate that the two chief characteristics of prayer are: 1. one's dependence upon another than one's own self, and 2. the denial of soul's divinity. That there is nothing commendable, but everything objectionable, in these elements will, we think, be quite plain to anyone familiar with the nature of the soul and the effect of evil suggestion on its career. The samayika, on the other hand, is the very process which is directly connected with the end in view in a causal way, and is, for that reason, the true method of meditation. But there is every reason to suppose and none to oppose the fact that the modern conception of prayer does not coincide with that of the ancients, but has arisen, like all other errors of deistic theology, from a misinterpretation of its Scriptures, except where they are of too recent a date to be free from modern imperfections. For it is impossible to believe that those very beings whose mythology shows them to have been fully aware of the divinity of the soul could have been so inconsistent with themselves as to immediately preach that it was not. As to the efficacy of prayer in those cases where the desired good is done by the soul itself, its why can be easily understood if we recall to mind the fact that the Subjective Mind is amenable to the law of suggestion, so that any suggestion which may find its way to the adytum of the inner divinity would be at once carried

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 369 out by it in so far as it is physically possible to do so. Jesus, who was well acquainted with the laws governing psychic phenomena, points out the proper method of praying,' when he says : "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them" (Mark, XI. 24.) His miracles furnish ample illustration of his teaching. He invariably asked those who came to him to be cured of their ailments and deformities, if they believed ; and never failed to tell them, after the cure, that it was their own faith which had wrought the miracle. It is recorded that when with his own people, in his own country, he could do no miracle, and marvelled because of their unbelief. Thus, if one has no faith, neither God nor Christ nor any one else can do anything for him. As regards the prayer known as the Lord's prayer, which was taught by Jesus to his disciples, that has nothing in common with the idea of an appeal for help which has been found to be objectionable, being nothing other than a form of mental renunciation in reality. Its best interpretation is to be found in the works of Swami Rama Tirtha from which we may quote the following: - "Man shall not live by bread alone,' Look here! In the Lord's prayer we say, "Give us this day our daily bread,' and here we say that man shall not live by bread alone. Reconcile these statements; understand them thoroughly. The meaning of that Lord's prayer, when it was stated, Give us this day our daily bread,' is not that you should be asking, the meaning of that is not that you should be craving, willing, and wishing; not at all. This is not the meaning. The meaning of that was that even a king, an emperor, who is in no danger of not having his daily bread, even a prince who is sure that the daily bread is guaranteed to him, even he is to offer that prayer. 24

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370 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. If so, evidently Give us this day our daily bread,' does not mean that they should put themselves in the begging mood, they should ask for material prosperity; it does not mean that. That prayer moans that everybody, let him be a prince, a king, a monarch, anybody, he is to look upon all these things around him, all the wealth and plenty, all the riches, all the beautiful and attractive objects as not his, as not belonging to him, as God's, God's ; not mine, not mine. That does not mean begging, but that means renouncing. Look here. Give us this day our daily bread.' That does not mean begging and asking, but it means rather renouncing and giving up; giving up: renouncing unto God : that was the meaning of that. You know how unreasonable it is on the part of a king to offer that prayer, Give us this day, etc., if it be taken in its ordinary sense. How unreasonable? It becomes reasonable enough when the king, while he is offering that prayer, puts himself in the mood where all the jewels in his house, the house itself, all these he renounces, as it were, he gives them up, as it were, he disclaims them. He breaks his connections with them, so to say, and he stands apart from them. He is the monk of monks. He says this is God's; this table, everything lying upon the table is His; not mine; I do not possess anything. Anything that comes, comes from my beloved One. He realizes it that way. And if you take the meaning of Give me this day, etc.,' as explained just now by Rama, then you will find it consistent with Man shall not live by bread alone.' Then you will find it consistent with it; otherwise inconsistent." It is, thus, obvious that to the illumined sage prayer is a meaningless term. Who is there beside his own Self to pray to? Whose help to ask? Who can help the Lord of the Universe ? Who but your own Self could have helped you in your love affairs in the dreamland? You have created your surroundings yourself ; if they are not what they should be, you must change them yourself. There is absolutely no good in weeping or wailing. Even when you say that God helps you, he only helps you from within yourself. The help really comes from your own soul, though you erroneously as

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THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 371 cribe it to an outside God. There is no without, so to speak, to a self-sufficient soul, from where any help could come. You are the master of your own destiny, however much you may be ignorant of your powers. Even the final liberation will come through your own exertion, though you might be now hoping to attain it through the grace of another. As Vivekananda says, you are like a prisoner lying inside a prison, barred and chained from within, waiting for the arrival of the Liberator. You have called him, begged him, prayed to him to come, and are anxiously awaiting his arrival. With faith you are sitting down, full of eager expectation and belief. When the time for redemption comes, you hear a rap on the door. You get up, open the door and peep out. There is no one without. You come back to your seat; the rap is repeated. You again go to the door. Again there is nobody without, but your faith is still working from within. The prison door is now open, but there is no redeemer without, for you have opened it yourself. Thus, all search after the gods and goddesses brings us back to the point whence we had started, that is, to our own self, and man finds that 'the God for whom he was searching in every little brook, in every temple, in little churches, in worse heavens, that God whom he was even imagining as sitting in heaven and ruling the World, is his own Self.' I am He, and He is Me. Verily, "I am in the Father, and ye in me and I in ye" (John, XIV. 20). None but "I am" is the God, and this little, bodily 'I' is only the cause of confusion.

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372 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "I heard a knock-a hard, hard, hard blowOn my door and cried I: 'Who is it? Ho!' I wondering waited entranced, and lo! How soft and sweet Love whispered low, 'Tis thou that knockest, do you not know?" Ancient evolutionists declare that the true secret of evolution lies in the inherent inclination for the manifestation of perfection which is already within every being, and that this prefection is barred and the infinite tide behind is struggling to express itself. In the child the man is concealed and suppressed. The moment the door is opened, outrushes the suppressed man. So in man there is the potential God, kept in by the bars and locks of ignorance. When the 'Key of Knowledge' is applied to the locks, the bars and bolts fly back, and Adam stands revealed in the full glory of "I AM," the God, the SAT-CHIT-ANANDA.

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CHAPTER VII. YOGA. "Each soul is potentially Divine. The goal is to manifest this Divinity within, by controlling nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship, or psychic control, or philosophy, by one, or more, or all of these, and be free. This is the whole of religion. Doctrines, or dogmas, or rituals, or books, or temples, or forms, are but secondary details."-Raja Yoga by Vivekananda. The foregoing treatment of the subject, it is to be hoped, has prepared the ground for further investigation into the nature of the methods that have been prescribed by different religions for the realization of the great ideal of perfection and happiness. We have now arrived at a point in our investigation into the nature of the Self when theoretical speculations must be replaced by practical achievements, when Self-realization must be brought within the domain of actual practical experience. We are now on the borders of Yoga which is the bridge between God and man. With its aid man can, not only catch mental glimpses of the goal in view, but also cross the yawning abysm and enter the precincts of the heaven beyond in his own proper person. It is not our purpose here to enter into a detailed description of the numerous methods prescribed and the rules laid down for the initiation and guidance of the novice. We shall merely content ourselves with

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374 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. enquiring into the nature and practicability of the science, and with making brief, but general, observations on the subject, which are to be understood as giving merely the most rudimentary and elementary principles. of the practical side of Yoga. It is said that Yoga is the science which raises the capacity of the human mind to respond to higher vibrations, and to perceive, catch and assimilate the infinite conscious movements going on around us in the Universe ; and it is claimed that all the miracles performed by the numerous company of saints, saviours, and sages, in all times and countries, were due to the knowledge of this--the grandest of all sciences. It has been shown in the preceding pages that the cause of unhappiness, bondage and misery of the soul is purely and simply ignorance. It was on account of ignorance that Adam, instead of 'walking in the company of the Lord God in the Garden of Eden', was turned out of it, and it is due to ignorance that'heaven' has hitherto remained lost to us. It has been also seen that almost all the redeemers and saviours of the race, who have appeared in various ages and countries, have pointed out the primary means of redemption to consist in the knowledge of the Self. But this is true only in a general way, since it is one thing to know the truth and another to realize it; for the very first requisite for realization is a firm, unshakable belief in the Truth. One must possess what Jesus would have called an unassailable, undying Faith ; and the only test of faith is that one should not hesitate to risk one's life on it. It is only so long as faith is weak and the germ of

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YOGA. 375 doubt has not been annihilated that the pupil asks for leave to 'bury the dead.' When the heart becomes saturated with belief in Truth, one would understand that no man'having put his hand to the plough, and looking back' (Luke, IX. 62) is worthy of the kingdom of God, and would leave the dead to bury its dead,' without more ado. Who is there to be buried, the "T," or the body? The man is, indeed, the "I," and the body is merely a carcass of dead matter ; but the "I" never dies, nor does it ever need a burial. Hence, he who wishes to enter into Life must leave such things as the burial of corpses to those who are spiritually dead, though they might be alive physically. Yoga aims at imparting the knowledge of Truth, and, at the same time, at building up an unchanging, undying faith in the heart. It means union, or the linking together of man to God, or, more correctly, disunion, or separation from sense objects, that is, from the phenomenal world (Max Muller). It is the science which leads the initiate by easy steps or gradations to the loftiest heights of Self-realization, till be stand face to face with the object of his search. This is the best proof he can have of the truth of the doctrine. But, unfortunately, it can be had only when the disciple has crossed the thorny path and landed in safety at the goal, so that he has ultimately to depend on his intellect till such time as Omniscience shall arise in his soul. If he has succeeded in grasping the truth, he will find his progress in Self-realization comparatively easy, and signs and omens and other occurrences of a mysterious' nature will constantly keep up his spirits and cheer up

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376 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. his heart. There is no dark mysticism in this statement. The "Fall" is due to ignorance, so the removal of ignorance must reinstate us in power, glory and joy. According to the Biblical tradition already examined, Adam was hypnotized by the serpent to believe that he was not so wise as Gods, and was led to entertain the desire to become like Them. This unfortunate belief of his has spelt out calamity and disaster for the whole race, and even now we are under its influence. Indeed, the force of the suggestion has deepened and augmented every time that it has been imparted afresh by parent to child, or by a tutor to his pupil. Under the influence of the accepted suggestion of identity with the outer encasement of matter, the physical body, he who is the Lord of the universe, in the purity of his nature, is acting as if he were a slave; the Master is doing the work of the coolie in his own house, and resents being told that he is the Master! What is to be done to remove this fatal bondage ? Yoga teaches us that knowledge is the only means whereby the spell can be broken. Obviously, it is the state of one's belief which has to be affected, so that one might be able to purge the mind of the wrong impression of inferiority and duality.' But belief cannot be changed except by reason, that is, knowledge. Hence, it is clear that knowledge alone is the weapon which can attack wrong impressions and destroy false beliefs. Let us take a couple of practical instances to illustrate the principle. Suppose that a child sees a rope in a dark room and fancies it to be a serpent, and is afraid to go into that room. How will you

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YOGA. 377 remove the erroneous impression of the child ? Would you not lift him up in your arms, and take him to the fancied serpent, and let him satisfy himself in every manner that his belief was a mistaken one ? Suppose, again, that a man is hypnotized to believe that he is haunted by a devil, and is consequently in a terrible plight. What would you do for him ? Would you not' wake' him up and let him see that the devil, which was haunting him, was the merest illusion ? The human race are similarly hypnotized into the belief that they are wretched ignorant beings, evil by nature and birth, and doomed to suffer all sorts of rebuffs and disappointments at the hands of desting and the forces of Nature. What is your duty here? Would you not treat them as you have treated the two previous cases? Just wake them up, so that they may see for themselves that the whole thing is a delusion. Like the child in the illustration, man believes that there is, in the chamber of his heart, the black serpent of Evil, and is unbappy thereby. There is only one way of removing the wrong impression from his mind, and that is to convince him that there is no serpent, but God Himself in his heart. Your assuring him that his present belief is wrong, on the authority of any, or all, of the Buddhas, Christs, Mahomeds and others will be of no avail at all. You must remove all doubt from his mind, but that can be done only when he has been led to think and experiment for himself, to his utter satisfaction. Says Swami Rama Tirtha : "If the sun should say to the mangoes of Bombay, as I revealed my warmth and light to the birch and cedar trees of the Himalayas,

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378 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. I will not do so to you, you must grow and flourish on my revelations of goodness and power to those beautiful mountainous giants, the Bombay mangoes would be no more. Neither could the lilies of the field live on the sun that shone upon the garden-apples, nor could Shakespeare, Newton or Spencer live upon a revelation made to Buddha, Christ or Muhammad. So have we to solve our own problems and to begin to see with our own eyes, rather than to continue peeping through the eyes of our most venerable Seers and the Sages of the Past gone by." It is impossible to satisfy the child by quoting authority. Perfect conviction follows only a total annihilation of doubt, which necessitates an exhaustive investigation to one's own satisfaction. A child is liable to regard his most loving authority as capable of erring; so is man. As to the degree of perfection and permanency of faith and to the value of auto-suggestion based on mental conviction, Hudson well says (The Law of Mental Medicine) :-- "Nevertheless, faith is as essential to success in healing by scientific methods as by any other. But there are three advantages in this regard which are incident to scientific methods. The first is that the requisite faith can be acquired by study and reasoning; the second is that the faith is perfect, for the reason that it is acquired through knowledge and confirmed by reason; and the third is that the faith thus acquired and sanctioned becomes at once a permanent possession, because there can arise no adverse auto-suggestions from the objective mind to weaken its potency. * * * Hence it is that suggestions which are based upon scientific truths, other things being equal, are necessarily the most potent in their influence and permanent in their effect." Yoga insists on each man working out his salvation himself. Every one according to this system has to stand on his own legs ; none may claim any support from his neighbour. If one person out of half a dozen is demesmerised, it is not of any value to others who do not

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YOGA. 79 undergo the unwinding' process themselves. Each one must discover and apply the 'Key of Knowledge 'to his own heart where the serpent of darkness is supposed to be in hiding. You must remove your own doubts, one by one, for no one but your own self knows what your doubts are. This is the very first principle. It will, in due course of time, bring its reward, which is self-reliance. Its development is the first sign of success. The wonderful success of the man of science is due to his self-reliance. The next essential is meditation, without which no knowledge is possible. One may believe the conclusions. arrived at by others to be correct, but this is merely a second-hand method. Unless you have thought over the thing yourself, you can never be certain of the result, and the germ of doubt cannot be said to have been killed. The only way of effectively destroying doubt is to revolve the thing to be meditated upon, in all its bearings, in mind, that is, to dissect it, to analyze it, to cut it to pieces, and to pry into it from all possible points of view. When an opinion is formed as the result of the foregoing processes, it will never admit of doubt. The difference between a conclusion arrived at by yourself and one heard from another is precisely that between a house founded on rock and one built on sand. Meditation is the process of classification and generalization of facts into principles, and it is obvious. that no sound grounding of knowledge can be possible without it. But meditation depends on concentration, which is the greatest secret of success. We have already seen what is meant by concentra

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380 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tion. Here we would add a few words more about it. Concentration means the focussing of force on a point, the mobilization of the army on the frontier of the territory to be attacked. If we wish to make a conquest of Russia, we must bring our forces to bear against her on a point. It would not do to send a million soldiers to St. Petersburgh, individually, and one after another; for it would require only a handful of the Russians to kill each soldier as he emerges on the scene. A handful of soldiers properly handled will achieve great victories, but their energies must not be dissipated in all directions. Says a learned writer : "How has all this knowledge in the world been gained but by concentration of the powers of mind ? Nature is ready to give up her secrets if we only know how to knock, to give her the necessary blow, and the strength and the force of the blow come through concentration. There is no limit to the power of the human mind. The more concentrated it is, the more power is brought to bear on one point, and that is the secret."--Vivekananda. The question now arises, how to concentrate one's mind ? A number of methods have been suggested for this purpose which Hinduism deals with under four heads, namely, Hatha Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, Raja Yoga and Jnana Yoga. These are prescribed according to the capacity and qualifications of the aspirant. Hatha Yoga aims at producing the desired attitude of concentration hy controlling the physical body, and at purifying and uplifting the mind by restraining the senses. Its severe practices prepare the Yogi for the higher methods of Raja Yoga. Bhakti Yoga is the path of Love of the Divine, through which man becomes merged in the beatific state of a vision divine in his own soul. He

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381 thus discovers the real side of Life, and reaches the same point of indifference to the objects of senses as does the follower on the path of Hatha Yoga. Then comes Raja Yoga, the science of God-realization by the control of the mind itself. The most important one of all these methods, however, is what is known as Jnana. Yoga, that is, the Path of union through knowledge, which deals with the great questions regarding Life and what lies at the back of all manifested existence. It is the science of the Real, which, by showing the hollow nature of the objects of senses, enables one to renounce them with ease. YOGA, Of all the four systems of Yoga enumerated above, the aspirant should select the one which is the most suitable to his inclination and surroundings. It is Jnana Yoga alone, however, which is the real path of God-realization; for knowledge of the Reality alone can destroy the germ of doubt and engender overwhelming faith in the heart. In a general sort of way, however, it has been said that the educated classes would find the Jnana and the Raja Yoga paths more suitable to their needs than the other two. The nonscientific, or the less educated people, who cannot find time enough for the severe austerities of Hatha Yoga, on the one hand, and whose pursuits in life, leave them with but little inclination and time to proceed along the paths of the Jnana, or the Bhakti Yoga, on the other, will find the path of Raja Yoga, the best means of progressing towards the goal. Bhakti Yoga is the most suitable method for the average men and women of the world; while all the rest, who can afford to bear and

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382 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. undergo the austerities and hard practices of Hatha Yoga, may proceed along that road. Such is the general scheme of the process of realization to be gathered from the Hindu Scriptures. The classification of the method under the four heads, Jnana Yoga and the like, is, however, quite arbitrary, and one not founded upon any scientifically valid grounds, notwithstanding the fact that it seems at first sight to provide a suitable method for different kinds of temperaments. For the truly scientific process, like all other scientific processes, can be but one, irrespective of the question, whether it suit the fancy of all men or not? Furthermore, little or no good can ever come out of abandoning the strictly scientific path to suit different temperaments, for while all endeavours to humour individual idiosyncrasies invariably fail to develop second-rate talents, or capacity, on the one hand, the validity of the means employed is also vitiated at once hy a compromising spirit, on the other. We may compare the strict enforcement of disciplinary rules of Yoga with the training of men for the army, where it would be disastrous to humour individual whims. Thus, the pursuit of the scientific method is alone calculated to succeed in the realization of an ideal--and this is the case especially with the training of the will--not the fostering of human weaknesses and shortcomings. Artificial as the above classification of the subject has been seen to be, it is nevertheless one which is eminently useful for our requirements, since it furnishes a fairly suitable basis for the comparative study of the principles underlying the different methods of

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383 self-realization laid down by the several religions of the world. To proceed with the subject, the object of concentration differs in the four systems. The jnani (he who follows Jnana Yoga) has the self directly as the object of his concentration. The follower of Raja Yoga aims at the attainment of 'Samadhi'-a state in which the purity of mind enables the soul to acquire perfect jnana, and to enjoy the bliss of being, arising from the expulsion of all elements of desire from its consciousness. The bhakta's intense, undivided, impassioned love of the Teacher (God) constitutes his concentration;* and the physical austerities of the Hatha-Yogi, practised with a view to curb down the desiring manas (mind), are sufficient concentration for him. But all this diversity of method also is merely one of form, the real object of spiritual concentration throughout being one and the same, namely, the realization of one's identity of status with God, in other words, the establishing of the individual soul in the state of Sat-Chit-Ananda-ship. Many people find it difficult to concentrate their minds on religious subjects, and, on that account, are inclined to find fault with it. The fault, however, does not lie with the mind, but with the association of ideas which we form for ourselves. For concentration is not opposed to the nature of the mind which always entertains one idea only at a time. The difficulty which novices experience in concentration is, thus, due, not to the lack of the power of concentration in the YOGA. *"Love concentrates all the powers of the will without effort, as when a man falls in love with a woman."-Vivekananda (in 'The Inspired Talks').

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384 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. mind, but to the lack of suitable associations. It is the association of ideas which determines the point of concentration, that is to say, the point on which the mind is generally concentrated, or on which it can be fixed with ease. A tradesman, for instance, finds his mind as a rule absorbed in matters pertaining to his particular trade, and experiences no difficulty in concentrating it on the details of his business, yet the sametradesman does not, generally and without special causes, find it easy to apply it to the business of another, and would find it difficult to interest it even in his own if the more immediate personal interests be centred else-where, e.g., if he happen to fall in love. In the lastmentioned case, his mind would refuse to linger on the detail of his business, and would run away towards his more absorbing love affair. Nor does he need any instructions in the art of concentration, which comes spontaneously with love. It is clear from this that the subject on which the mind dwells the longest is neces-sarily the one which excites the liveliest interest, for the time being; in other words, the subject of concentration is determined by the most paramount inclinations, emotions, and passions in every individual case. And, since our inclinations, emotions and passions depend on. the association of ideas, it follows that change of association is all that is required to interest the mind in any particular subject. Those who wish to develop the power of concentration on any particular subject should, therefore, change their old mode of thought, and cultivate suitable associations for the new subject. Therefore, the company of swamis, devotees and others, who.

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385 have renounced the world for God-realization, is about the best means of turning the mind Godward. The same result can be achieved, though with greater labour, by a constant perusal of books which deal with subjects pertaining to God-realization. YOGA. Another thing to bear in mind is that the subject of concentration is neither the name, nor the form, nor the size of a thing, but its significance, or purport. Mind cannot, for long, be concentrated on a subject the paucity of whose detail renders it unworthy of contemplation. A chess-player, for example, would soon get tired of looking merely at the chess-board and 'men,' but would go on playing the game, unmindful of time and most other things, without finding his interest flagging. In this lies one of the chief objections to idolatry. If the subject for concentration be only the name and form of the devotee's idol, obviously there is nothing of much value to be obtained by such devotion; for mind having speedily mastered the few physical details thus presented to it for concentration of thought, gradually loses all interest in the idol and wanders away from it. Few, however, are degenerate enough to worship the blocks of stone in temples or pagodas. What is actually worshipped in most cases is the Paramatman-whether the devotee has a true conception of the Godhead or not, is a different matterwhose symbol the image in stone becomes on consecration. It follows from this that the subject which presents the greatest variety of detail is the one on which mind can be concentrated without ennui. Hence, the Infinite* *The Self is called the Infinite, not because He is infinite in extent, like space, but because He is possessed of infinite knowledge and endowed with an infinity of divine attributes. 25

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386 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, is the only subject in which mind can find food for meditation and entertainment enough for all eternity; and if we recollect that the soul is the Infinite itself, we can easily understand the emphasis on Self-knowledge in the old injunction, "Man know thyself.". To revert from the digression, all the founders of the existing religions of the world have laid stress on some one, or other, or a combination of some, of these Yoga methods, according to their lights and the need of the moment. Mahomet pointed out the path of Resignation to the * Resignation to the will of the Almighty means a complete effacement of the personal will. The bhakta has ears and eyes only for the Lord; he readily and cheerfully obeys all divine commands, however strongly opposed to his own personal interests. Something like the spirit of Abraham who is said to have got ready to sacrifice his son, at the command of Jehovah, is required for resignation. There must be no grumbling or murmuring against the harshness of fate, or the injustice of the commandment. The ideal devotee does not enquire into the reason why, but cheerfully, even blindly. obeys all injunctions, believing that he would thereby reach his goal. Sri Krishna declared : "Flee unto Him (Brahman) for shelter with all thy being; hy His grace shalt thou obtain supreme peace, the everlasting dwelling place, Merge thy mind in Me, be My devotee, sacrifice to Me, prostrate thyself before Me, thou shalt come even to Me" (Bhagavad Gita, XVIII. 62 and 65). The devotees hold that when the soul gives up self-interest, subdues self-conceit. crushes out all notions of self-importance, and tears out, from its heart, the very idea of egotism, the burden of salvation becomes the burden of the Self, and, like the mother ever watchful over the child. which is completely resigned in her arms, he looks upon it as his duty to do everything for the man who has so completely resigned himself into his hands, for "verily the devotee is dear to him" (Bhagavad Gita, XVIII. 65). Such is the attitude of resignation. which, in its true import, is tantamount to lofty devotion to the great spiritual Ideal.

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YOGA. 387 will of the Almighty as the means of getting into Heaven. Jesus preached Knowledge, Faith and Renunciation for bringing the Kingdom of Heaven into manifestation. Other saviours and sages have laid down, more or less, the same rules. In each and every instance stress is laid, directly or by necessary implication, on concentration, which religion does not hesitate to describe as thkey-note of success. As already shown, the wretched condition of our race is due to our failure to realize the divinity of Self and to the belief in duality which implies the impossibility of the attainment of Godhood on the part of the soul. Hence all we have got to do is just simply to give up the existing notion of the helplessness of the soul, and to replace it with the belief in its Divinity. It follows from this that the object of concentration should be, firstly, the denial of duality, which means a denial of the imaginary unbridgeable gulf, set up by modern theology between God and man, that is, of the supposed, eternal, unqualified inferiorty of man and of his inability to attain to Godhood, and, secondly, the positive assertion of the Divinity of the Self. This should be the real aim and object of concentration. Whenever you find time for it-and the oftener you do it the betterjust settle down to concentrate your mind on these two points, and, if you have faith in the teaching, you will very soon begin to feel that you are on the right path. A few moments' concentration, with faith, is all that is required to show you that your labour has not been in vain. It is the best proof that you can ask for, or that can be furnished by any system. As you persist in con

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388 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. centration of mind on your being the Sat-Chit-Ananda, you will realize that what you have considered happiness hitherto is a condition foreign to the very idea of bliss. The modern man looks upon the Yogi as an idle fanatic of chimerical ideals, but that is because he has no true notion of what happiness implies. Just think over what it means. What is happiness? Whether accumulating wealth, surrounding one's self with all sorts of furniture and nick-nacks, eating dinners, holding interviews, forming courts and becoming courtiers, fighting law suits, engaging in warfare and shedding the blood of one another, giving oneself airs of importance, belittling others, losing one's self-composure in the vindication of real or supposed grievances, always putting off self-realization till money is made, constantly seeking but never finding happiness in sensual excitement, and, finally, in sheer desperation, drowning the senses in temporary, artificial stimulation, and seeking consolation in each other's impotent sympathy --whether all or any of these constitute happiness, or do breaking through the fetters of conventionality, rising above the feeling of impotent helplessness, securing freedom from mundane anxieties and worldly cares, being at peace with each and every and all creatures and fellow-beings under the sun, radiating good-will and Love all round, unrestrained, free, enjoying nature's highest gift, that is, Life, here and now, being master of death, disease and destiny ? Need we repeat which of these two sets of circumstances is to be considered happy ? Taking an Indian ascetic as an embodiment of idleness, an advocate of modern civilization once de

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YOGA. 389 manded of Swami Rama Tirtha when he was visiting America : "Why do you import your Asiatic laziness to America ? Go out. Do some good."* * As to the basic principle of " doing good " of which our brethren in the West like so much to speak, it is exhausted with helping the needy, aiding the injured, and protecting the undefended till such time as they can regain strength, or stand upon their own logs, to enter into the deadly struggle for existence, which is character istic of life in the West. Two features at once stand out in bola relief before us in the most flattering picture of the humane work of philanthropy, and these are : 1. the inability of the poor to participate in the work, and 2. the temporary nature of the relief afforded. Now, as to the first of these, it is obvious that one without time or money cannot indulge in it to any great extent, so that those who have to earn their livelihood by daily labour are debarred, by no fault of theirs, from participating appreciably in the doing of good; and, as regards the second, it is obvious that the aim is not to put the object of philanthropy altogether above want, but, at best, to point out the way whereby he might earn a living. Besides, the good that might result from such acts of philanthropy is confined to the material side of life. The philanthropist is as incapable of finding a cure for the mental ailments and spiritual disorders of the soul as is the doctor, or the professor. It is religion and religion alone which can and does help suffering humanity in the last-named kinds of disorders, and whatever sympathy, peace, or cheerfulness philanthropy is able to evoke, or inspire, in the patient, is due to the straggling notions of religion which the mind of the philanthropist might be impressed with. Hence, philanthropy as an ideal is neither open to all alike, nor productive of permanent good. Kill the element of religion to which she is wedded, and philanthropy will sacrifice herself over its funeral pyre. She exists by religion, and for religion. But she is utterly incapable of taking the place of religion, which aspires to make men not fit enough to enter into the deadly strife of existence, to kill out all their unfit brethren, but to raise them all, the fit and the unfit alike, to the supreme status of Godhood. Hence, however commendable philanthrophy be in itself, -and it is certainly noble work-it is confined to a narrower sphero of activity and usefulness than religion in its purest form. Thus, while a life devoted to religion necessarily comprises philanthropic activity in all its phases, philanthropy might not always be based on the sound principles of religious piety and virtue.

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390 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The Swami replied : "As to doing good, is not that profession already chokeful, over-crowded ? Leave me alone, I and my Rama (God). Laziness did you say? Oriental laziness? Why, what is laziness? Is it not laziness to keep floundering in the quagmire of conventionality and let oneself flow down the current of custom or fashion, and sink like a dead weight in the well of appearances and be caught in the pond of possession and spend the time, which should be God's, in making gold and call it doing good? Is it, not laziness to practically let others live your life and have no freedom in dress, eating, walking, sleeping, laughing and weeping, not to say anything of talking ? Is it not laziness to lose your Godhead? What for is this hurry and worry, this break-neck, hot haste and feverish rush? To accumulate almighty dollars like others, and what then? To enjoy as others ? No, there is no enjoyment in running after enjoyment, o dear dupes of opinions, why postpone your enjoyment ? Why don't you sit down here, in this Natural Garden, on the banks of this beautifal mountain stream, and enjoy the company of your real blood relations-free air, silvery light, playful water, and green earth-relations of which your blood is really formed ? Hide-bound in caste are the civilized nations. They separate themselves from fellow-beings and exile themselves from free open nature and fresh, fragrant natural life into close drawingrooms,-dens and dungeons. They banish themselves from the wide world, excommunicate themselves from all creation, ostracize themselves from plants and animals. By arrogating to themselves the airs of superiority, prestige, respectability, honor, they cut themselves into isolated stagnation, Have mercy, my friends, have mercy on yourselves. The wealth swept out of the possession of the more needy and added to your property by organized craft will enable you simply to have sickening dinners of hotels and taverns, and furnish you with pallid countenances and conventional looks, will imprison you in boxes called rooms choked with the stink of artificiality, will keep you all the time in the restlessness of mind excited by all sorts of unnatural stimulants, physical and mental. Why all such fuss for mere self-delusion? In the name of such supposed pleasures lose not your hold on the real joy. No need of beating about the bush ; come, enjoy the Now and Here. Come, lie with me on the grass."

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YOGA. How well does the Yogi poet sing : "The moon is up: they see the moon. I drink Thine eyebrow's light. Big fair they hold, full crowded soon. I watch and watch Thee, source of Light. Nay, call no surgeons, doctors, none, For me my pain is all delight. Adieu, ye citizens, cities good-bye! Oh, welcome, dizzy, ethereal heights! "O Fashion and custom, virtue and vice, O Laws, convention, peace and fight, O Friends and foes, relations, ties, Possession, passion, wrong and right, Good-bye, O Time and Space, good-bye; Good-bye, O world, and Day and Night, My love is flowers, music, light. My love is day, my love is night, Dissolved in me all dark and bright. Oh, what a peace and joy! Oh leave me alone, my love and I, Good bye, good-bye, good-bye."- Rama. Such is the good-bye of the Yogi when he renounces the false world to be absorbed in the Real. It is the music of the soul which has realized the illusory nature of this world of births and deaths, and caught a glimpse of the happy home beyond the Vale of Tears. Robed in the beautiful white trousseau of spirituality, veiled in the halo of virgin purity, blushing with the hope of the realization of the sweetest of expectations of a maiden passion, forgetting the father, the mother, the brother, the sister, and other distracting ties of the world, having turned her back on the toys and things and other attractions of childhood's state, immersed gopika-like in the sweet meditation of the Cow-herd's* * Krishna or Christos. 391

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392 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. all-absorbing love, with the bouquet of the orange blossoms of pure thoughts in one hand, and the lamp of jnana (true wisdom), ever trimmed and ready to guide her steps towards the Bridegroom, the moment he comes, in the other, the Soul of the Yogi prepares herself for her union with the Lord. She has no fear, no uneasiness, no doubt about his coming; and the lamp is kept constantly burning, lest he turn away on seeing the bridal chamber plunged in darkness. The very idea of the wastage of oil is foreign to the notion of love. Better that all the oil in the world be consumed, in waiting and watching for the Lord, than that there should be the least disappointment in Love. The Bridegroom wants only undivided love; he is highly jealous in his love affairs, and does not allow idols of cupidity and attachment to prevail against him. At the faintest idea of calculating commercialism he turns his back on the bridal chamber. If the bride fears the loss of oil, or allows her laziness to have the better of her love, the Bridegroom also fears the contamination of such a bride. "Therefore, take ye heed, watch and pray for ye know not when the time is" (Mark, XIII. 33). Such is the beautiful lesson to be learnt from the parable of the ten maidens propounded by Jesus (Matthew, XXV. 1-12). If you want real happiness, it will come to you by the right use of concentration alone. So long as you do not give up your false ideals of bustling worldly life, you stand in your own way and debar yourself from true joy. When rightly understood, the individual forces of mankind can be rendered of invaluable assistance for the uplifting of each other, and even our modern civilization

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393 can be utilized as a means of further progress, if we only direct its future evolution on lines which are compatible with the spiritual requirements of the real Man. We do not decry civilization at all so far as its own sphere of action is concerned. It has its good points, and has gone a long way to improve the condition of the masses in certain particulars. But we must not lose sight of the distinction between racial and individual interests nor confound sanitation and hygiene with salvation. The fall has to be reversed by each and every one of us individually; racial civilization cannot aid us much in this direction. Civilization will not take any nation into paradise in a body; for its doors are opened only for individuals, not for races. All our boasted railways, telegraphs, and scientific instruments and inventions, which constitute our civilization, or, at least, a major portion of it, are merely for national aggrandizement; to the individual they cannot be said to have brought anything like unalloyed happiness. And if we add to these considerations the long list of those unfortunate creatures who have fallen victims to the march of civilization, and of those who have been crushed under the wheels of the Juggernaut car of science and culture, we shall learn to estimate modern progress properly. There is no doubt, however, that civilization can be made to uplift both the individuals and masses, and to benefit large bodies of men collectively. The idea of collective worship explains how this is possible; for the power of concentration increases with the increase in the number of persons of one mind. Public worship YOGA.

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394 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. owes its origin to this idea of collective concentration. A simple illustration of the power of collective concentration is to be found in the phenomenon of table-rapping. Another is to be found in the second chapter of. the Acts in the Holy Bible, which opens with a description of the attitude of concentration on the part of the apostles of Jesus, who were in one place with one accord, and closes with the description of the wonderful phenomena which took place on the day of Pentecost. Similar phenomena used to occur on the occasions of yajna. In explaining this kind of phenomena, Swami Rama Tirtha observes : "Rama tells you that what your Scriptures say about the Gods becoming visible on the occasions of Yajna ceremonies is indeed literally true. But that simply proves the power of collective concentration. The latest researches of psychology show that the effect of concentration increases, as the square of the number of one-minded people present on the occasion. That is the virtue of Satsanga. Now, if Rama alone can materialize any idea he pleases, how much more could the hundreds and thousands of people of one mind, chanting the same hymn, thinking the same form, help materializing it?" The reason why our collective worship is incapable of achieving any great results now-a-days, is to be found in the fact that people are lacking in the power of concentration. Of the scores of persons who generally pray in mosques, or unite in worship in churches, no two individuals can be said to have their minds concentrated on the same idea. Of Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh faith, it is said that he was one day invited to accompany certain Mahomedans to a mosque to join them in their prayers. On getting there, however, he stood aloof and did not join them in their orisons; and when asked to explain his mysterious

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YOGA. 395 conduct, he replied that he was not in the habit of praying with those whose minds were busy selling horses in Africa during their prayers. Thereupon his questioner admitted that his mind was not in his prayers, but was indeed with his horses in Africa. The moral of the anecdote is that it is no good praying unless you can bring your mind to discard all other thoughts for the time. When your horses' cannot wait for the brief space of a few moments, God will not wait for you either. Is it not the want of faith in religion and a little too much interest in the horses in Africa' which is the cause of evil amongst us? So long as we suffer ourselves to drift away from God, it is the merest mockery to attend the church. When we go to worship God, let it be with the purest heart and undivided attention. When we attend the House of God, we ought not to insult Him by bestowing our attention on ungodly things? It is worth while to understand the reason why temples, churches and other places of worship came into existence. The following from 'The Raja Yoga' will be found to contain a fair explanation of the matter : "Those of you who can afford it will do better to have a room for this (Yoga) practice alone : do not sleep in that room, it must be kept holy; you must not enter the room until you have bathed, and are perfectly clean in body and mind. Place flowers in that room always; they are the best surroundings for a yogi ; also pictures that are pleasing. Barn incense morning and evening. Have no quarrelling, or anger, or unholy thoughts in that room. Only allow those persons to enter who are of the same thought as you. Then by and by there will be an atmosphere of holiness in that room, and when you are miserable, sorrowful, doubtful, or your mind is disturbed, the very fact of entering that room will make you calmer.

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396 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. This was the idea of the temple and the church. ... The idea is that by keeping holy vibrations there the place becomes and remains - illumined." How many of the places of worship can be said to have preserved their holiness up to the present day, need not be asked. It is no use talking of our holiness when it is well known that the Sunday visit to the church is purely an act of Pharisee-hypocrisy with the object of being considered holy by our fellowmen. When in the church men look round for pretty feminine faces, and the eyes of the fair sex are, more often than otherwise, fixed criticisingly on the new hats and dresses of their fair neighbours, it is then the merest mockery to attend the House of God. We may now proceed to a consideration of the principle of non-attachment to the fruits of action. Here, again, the object is to rid the soul of its worldly desires. Work we all must perform to avoid stagnation, but it is essential that we should not make our happiness dependent on its result. The significance of work, in religion, is very different from what we ordinarily understand by the word. By work, in its religious sense, is not meant the plodding drudgery of the toiler after riches, nor the performance of labour, whether mental or physical, for the sake of gain. "Work in Vedanta," says Swami Rama Tirtha," always means harmonious vibrations with the Real Self and attunement with the Universe. This unselfish union with the One Reality which is the only real work, is oftentimes labelled and branded as no work, or idleness." Spiritual' work,' certainly, does not mean labour for some worldly gain. The real significance of work in religion is the contemplation

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YOGA. 397. of one's own pure Atman, and in the earlier stages of discipleship, the conquest of the lower nature, i.e.; passions and lusts. According to mysticism : "The condition of Arhatship is unceasing activity without any personal return; the Arhat must give light to all, but take from none. In the upward climbing, one desire after another must be unloosed, desire for personal enjoyment, personal pleasure, personal gain, personal loves, personal attainments, and last and subtlest of all, desire for personal perfection, for the personal self must be lost in the One Self, that is, the Self of all that lives." It is only a labourer who works for gain to satisfy his vulgar cravings. The Master never labours for worldly gain; his enjoyment of his true Self is sufficient work for him. The object of work is the renunciation of desires, since they keep us entangled in delusion. In the story of Adam and Eve, it was the desire for the knowledge of good and evil which was the immediate cause of the Fall. Desire is a confession of being wanting in fulness, and by force of the law, as you think, so you become," materializes the condition of deficiency in the perceptible, phenomenal World. The Whole cannot have a desire in him. Our present, wretched condition is the result of our wrong beliefs and confession of weakness, and will vanish the moment we realize our own Godhood or Sat-Chit-Anandaship. The natural perfection of the soul remains hidden only so long as we do not renounce attachment to the fruit of action. When you come round to take the right view, you will look upon worldly attachments as love of the fair but false objects in dreams. Remember, the love of the unreal is bound to be productive of suffering and sorrow. Knowing this, should you fall in love with them? This is

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398 the secret. Work done impersonally is of the highest merit. The moment we stake our happiness on the result of the work in hand, mind loses its tranquillity, and intellect its foresight. This is an old principle, and is well brought out in one of Lytton's interesting novels, entitled, Zanoni. So long as Zanoni looked on the World as a mere spectator, he could read the destinies of the race, and shape the events to his liking; but the moment he fell in love with the fair but frail and doubting Viola, he came down to her level, lost his command over the Powers and Elements, and was unable to keep the hideous monster, the Dweller on the Threshold, from obtruding itself on his thoughts. In practice, the principle of non-attachment to the fruit of action must signify the curbing of passions and desires, if it is not to become a licensefor free indulgence of senses, in the name of duty and dharma. For, individual motives being the main-spring of all human activity, it is idle to talk of non-attachment to the fruit of action where evil action itself is. not altogether abandoned. As a matter of fact, no man ever performs what he is not interested in doing in some sort of way, so that the continuance of evil actions must he ultimately traceable to individual interest. and desires. Besides this, it is also incumbent on the soul, at a certain stage of its spiritual progress, to rise above the sense of worldly duty, to attain to the highest good. The aspirant cannot then afford to return to the world even to bury a dead parent (Cf. Matt. viii. 22), notwithstanding that the sense of worldly duty unmistakeably points that way. It is, thus, the curbing of THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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YOGA 399 passions and desires which is intended by the doctrine, not their free indulgence in the guise of religion. In dealing with this subject, it is worth while to: understand the truth about sensual enjoyment. The question is: is the sense of enjoyment in the objects of senses, or in the mind ? In different words, is the sensation of pleasure or pain one experiences in connection with the sense-objects in the mind, or outside it? Now, if the sense of enjoyment, or suffering, i.e., pleasure and pain, were the property of objects, it is obvious that every one would be affected by them in one and the same manner; but it is well-known that all persons are not affected by the same object alike. The most delicious food tastes insipid on a full stomach, and bitter and repugnant in disease ; while hunger acts as a sauce to an indifferently cooked dish. "Tastes differ," is a very old saying, but its validity is not impaired by its age. If 'taste' were a property of food, there would be no differences in its enjoyment among men. But, since all persons do not enjoy the same article of food in the same way, it follows that taste is not in the food, but in the attitude of mind towards it. What is true of the enjoyment of pleasure or pain with reference to the sense of taste, is also true of all other forms of sensual enjoyment. Out of one and the same object different persons derive different experiences of pleasure and pain. One man esteems a beautiful woman with the reverent love of a dutiful son, another looks upon her as a daughter, a third loves her as his wife, while a fourth, fascinated by her charms, entertains thoughts of lust for her. Obviously, then, the pleasure each of

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400 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. these persons derives from her person is different from that of the others, and yet the object of enjoyment is one and the same. Again, all the pleasure one derives from her changes into disgust if she happen to display nasty temper, or become unchaste. Sometimes in dreams one experiences such pleasures that the sense of enjoyment lingers behind a long time even in the waking state. The Yogi, therefore, holds that pleasure and pain are not in the objects of senses, but in the mind alone,* and are determined by the attitude which it assumes towards them. Knowing this, he discards the pursuit of the pleasures of the world, and becomes absorbed in enjoying the enjoyments of the source of true joy itself. Sense attractions only go to keep the sense of life confined to the physical body, which we have to break away from. We must refuse to identify ourselves with the body ; and should mentally claim the Regal position which is our own by right. If we can put ourselves in this attitude, even for a brief space of time, we shall realize that the Yogi's bliss cannot be equalled by all the pomp and pageantry and display of power of all the kings in the world. It is now easy to understand the sense of the saying, "Every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or * We are not to be taken as denying certain physical properties and chemical action to material things; what is meant is the denial of the attribution of pleasure and pain as appertaining to them independently of the mind whose affections they both are in truth.

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401 lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life" (Matt. XIX. 29). It simply means that by giving up the pleasures of the senses and the ties with which we are bound to the world, we become heir to the hundred-fold joy of Selfrealization, and come into life eternal. Modern psychology has demonstrated the fact that the same stimulus when applied to different nerves of sensation produces the specific sensations peculiar to them, e.g., when an electric current is made to act on the auditory nerve, sound heard, when applied to the gustatory nerve, a sensation of taste is experienced, and so forth. It has also been demonstrated that the application of different stimuli to the same nerve invokes sensations peculiar to that nerve, as for instance, whatever be the nature of the stimulus which may be applied to the optic nerve it will only perceive colour and form. Besides this, will is also capable of affecting the sensory nerves by inner concentration. In proof of this, we may mention the familiar instance of the sight of a steaming dish which makes the mouth water. In cases of great hunger even the actual flavour of the food which is being cooked is felt and relished in the mouth. Similarly, the mere mention of the name of the beloved sends the blood tingling through one's veins, and, at times, also causes the same sensation YOGA. *The word Jesus' signifies the soul (see the next chapter); hence the sense of this passage is that everyone that hath forsaken home, relations and other worldly things for the welfare of his soul shall enjoy a hundred-fold prosperity in his future incarnations, and finally also obtain nirvana, 26

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402 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of electric' thrill which a contact with her usually gives rise to. The Yogi well knows all this, and can produce any sensation he likes at will. But his ideal raises him above mere sense-affections ; he loves only the thrill of delight characteristic of Wholeness and Perfection. In the conscious enjoyment of real joy he finds it difficult, as it were, to keep back the words," happy, happy ; I am happy," which constantly rise to his lips. No royalty under the sun can lay claim to any such experience. The world reads, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven,' but it is the Yogi who realizes and enjoys it. Men only vaguely talk of God, but the Yogi knows himself to be the enjoyer of the divine status, and feels his own heart beating in harmony with the divine Heart.' This is the very last stage of progress. When the aspirant gets established in this state, he is said to have attained to samadhi (i.e., the ecstatic trance). "When thou hast reached that state, the portals that thou hast to conquer on the path fling open wide their gates to let thee pass, and Nature's strongest mights possess no power to stay thy course." (The Voice of The Silence). He has touched the summit of attainment, and, like a conqueror, stands triumphant, his mind like a calm and boundless Ocean spreading out in shoreless Space, holding the powers of Life and Death in his hand. What the World regards as miracles are the most ordinary manifestations of his powers. Virtue flows from his person towards all ; he becomes the centre of radiation of goodwill and peace all round. All the wonderful miracles performed by the past redeemers of mankind were

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YOGA. 403 performed with the aid of the powers developed in Yoga. We now-a-days ridicule the idea of miracles altogether, because we see none; but there is nothing to shy at except our own ignorance. Man's ignorance makes the supernatural ; in reality, all is natural. When the causes of an effect are hidden and unknown, the world considers it a miracle ; when they are known, it is regarded as a natural occurrence. Why should we decry miracles at all ? What is impossible under the sun ? Look around you, are not all things, the faculty of understanding which enables you to acquire a knowledge of and mastery over nature, nay your very life, miracles ? A century back we would have regarded wireless telegraphy as a great miracle, but we do not look upon it in that light now. There is a story about a couple who were, for certain reasons, forced to live among people quite innocent of the art of reading and writing. One of them happened to be in his field away from his home, and while engaged in some work required a certain tool from his house, There was nobody about who could be trusted to remember the name of the tool, or to describe it to his wife. So he took a small splinter of wood, scribbled a message on it with a piece of charcoal, and asked a man to deliver it to his wife. Consider the astonishment of the man when, on showing the splinter with the scribbling on it, he was handed the very tool which was needed. He was so much astonished that he wore the wonderful chip round his neck by attaching it to a thread! Our sense of wonder and incredulity for the miracles of saints seems to be of the same sort ; for just as communication by writing was regarded by the people in the story

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404 as miraculous, so do we, the civilized people of the twentieth century, regard certain deeds of Mahavira, Jesus and others as supernatural? Might it not be that just as the cause of the marvel by the people in the story was their backwardness in the art of reading and writing, so are our wonder, incredulity and doubt caused by our ignorance of the force, or forces, of Nature employed by sages and saints in performing their wonderful feats? Does not the man of Science astonish us by the exhibition of the mysterious virtues of Magnetism and Electricity? Those who are familiar with the wonderful powers of these two forces of Nature will not find it difficult to concede that if one could only establish full control over them one would be able to perform most of the miracles ascribed to the Saviours of our race in the ages gone by. When we remember that the untold millions of tons of rock, earth and other solid matter which constitute our world are suspended in Space merely by the force of attraction, we shall not marvel at the possibilities open to a magnetic' personality. And, after all, what is magnetism other than a change of arrangement of the particles of a substance? When a bar of steel is magnetized, it exhibits certain properties which were not active in it before magnetization, and yet nothing has been added to, or subtracted from, it. We are taught that - THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "the difference between the arrangement of the particles in a magnet and an ordinary piece of steel, or iron, might be likened to the difference in the packing arrangements of two boxes of eggs-in he first (corresponding to the magnet) the eggs are carefully packed, lying side by side, parallel to each other and to the sides of the box, with their small ends all turned in the same direction, and therefore

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YOGA. 405 touching the larger end of the adjoining egg ; while in the second (ordinary iron or steel), badly packed, the separate eggs lie in all sorts of positions with regard to each other, and at all angles of inclination to the sides of the box."* Every particle of iron in an unmagnetized bar is supposed to contain equal quantities of two magnetic fluids, called positive and negative, which have a mutual attraction for one another ; but these fluids are intimately united in the particle and neutralize one another. This is one of the two theories of magnetism known to science. The other, known as the theory of Weber, is that the particles of iron are always magnetic ; that is, the extremities of every particle are always magnetic poles, but in the ordinary state of iron these poles are turned in all directions, so that they neutralize each other's effect. Magnetization, on the first hypothesis, is caused by the separation of the two fluids and their being pushed to the two poles; but, according to the second, is the effect of the re-arrangement of all the particles composing the bar, like the systematic arrangement of the eggs in the box, as described above. Thus, whichever theory be regarded as correct, it is clear that the extraordinary, phenomenal powers of the magnet are the result of a systematic arrangement of the parts composing it, with regard to each other, and the sides of the box.' A similar change takes place in the human mind under the influence of Yoga. In the untrained state the power of the mind is neutralized owing to the bad arrangement of the particles of matter; but under the influence of Yoga, these particles are * The New Popular Encyclopaedia, Art. Magnetism.'

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406 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. brought under proper, magnetic arrangement, and a real, living magnet of tremendous power is the result. The act of one-pointed concentration causes these mindparticles to re-arrange themselves on the magnetic principle. In its natural purity Life is like an immense magnet with all its constituents arranged in the proper order, so that the moment one arranges one's mind on the magnetic principle, one comes into harmony with the Whole, and may claim the full benefit of the entire magnet. But the ordinary mortal is like any one of the particles of the unmagnetized bar, running counter to the lines of magnetic force. A mere drop in the river, in so far as the body is concerned, he tries to swim against the current of the whole stream, and in doing so receives knocks and kicks and cudgelling from his neighbours, and suffers all sorts of pain and misery. His unhappiness is the result of his own ignorance and desires. The former deprives him of the knowledge of his real Self, and the latter lead him to the pursuit of objects not always in the straight course, and necessitate his turning round against the current. But in this simple act lies all the mischief. So long as you swim with the current you have the support of the whole stream, but the moment you reverse your movement, or change your direction, the whole tide turns against you and mercilessly destroys you. All the ills. of the mind and body are the result of your endeavour to swim against the current' of Life. You must give up the pursuit of the shining objects. which has brought you all the ills and unhappiness

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YOGA. 407 which the flesh is heir to. It is only delusion which makes you think that happiness is to be bad from outside ; when you wake up from your dream, you will find yourself to be the source of bliss itself, and wonder how you could have forgotten yourself to such an extent as you did. Your whole nervous system is made up of polarized cells, and the mind is the great steel bar in which, under your present condition, the particles are so badly arranged that the psycho-magnetic 'fluid' in one is neutralized by the opposite kind of 'fluid 'in the others. Re-arrange the particles of the mind, let the positive poles of all the cells of the mind-stuff point, like the needle in the mariner's compass, in the same direction, and let this direction be that of Life, and there will be no limit to your power and happiness. This is the secret of health and power and wonder-working. During the waking hours the nerve-cells of the human system of the brain lose their magnetic arrangement under the pressure of will and fall into disorder, thus neutralizing the magnetic effect of one another, and demagnetizing the system to a certain extent. Poisonous secretions take place in consequence of the disturbance in the arrangement of the cells. Hence, arise the worry, restlessness and fatigue which are experienced after hard mental work. But during sleep the cells are left to themselves, and, being free from the harmful influence of human thought, naturally return to their original positions, like the needle in the compass, and re-arrange themselves in the proper magnetic order. This is why sleep is so beneficial and refreshing. It is not possible to deny the effect of thought on the

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408 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, mind and, through it, on the physical matter of the body. The phenomena of post-hypnotic suggestion furnish the strongest basis for this belief. The most extraordinary feature of this kind of thought-influence is that, even after complete 'waking up,' the subject carries out all orders given him in the hypnotic state, at the appointed time and place, although he remembers nothing about them and has no idea of the action he is about to perform, in obedience to the order of the operator. The question is, by what power and in what manner is the obedience of the subject secured by the operator's will ? Now, there are two salient features which distinguish the hypnotic state from the normal condition. In the first place, there is no deliberation, i.e., freedom of choice, in the state of hypnotic trance, and, in the second, there is the functioning of the higher faculties of the soul, that is to say, of the subjective mind following on the abdication or un-seating of reason. Hence, whatever be the true explanation of hypnotic influence--whether it be due to suggestion pure and simple or to the agency of a magnetic fluid--it is certain that the suspension of the function of deliberative faculty has to be effected, before proper hypnotic condition can be induced in the subject. Thus, the whole problem resolves itself into the simple question, how is the dethronement of the faculty of discrimination brought about ? Further analysis reveals the fact that it is the excitation of will itself which suspends the function of deliberation, for, when it is carried away by an idea, it often leads the individual to perform acts which he deeply

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YOGA. 409 regrets in his calmer moments. When people are mixed up in a crowd they often act in this manner. Perusal of literature which readily commands the assent of one's will, is another illustration of the principle. In both these instances it is the emotional nature which is appealed to, and which excites the will and makes it discard the warning of intellect. Independently of the above, will is also freed from the dominion of intellect whenever it is stimulated into exaltation by internal stimulis, such as in Yoga, or when the intellect is unable to meet the situation, as in case of some grave, immediate danger, or when its vehicle, or tool, i.e., the brain, is exhausted, whether by the poisonous secretions of brain-cells, or the over-stimulation of the sensory nerves by means of some mechanical device, or otherwise. There is, however, an important distinction between those cases in which the suspension of the discriminative function is accomplished through the exaltation of will, and those in which it is brought about by the stupefaction or gagging of intellect, or the paralysis of will itself; for, in the former case, will is conscious of its supremacy, and itself dispenses with the services of intellect; while in the latter, it is deprived of its guidance by some outside cause. Hence, it is not only not conscious of its supremacy in the latter condition, but is also affected by the paralysis of the intellect, more or less. Fascination is an instance in point. Now, an impression of the hypnotic sort is, psychologically, a phenomenon of the same class as any other kind of idea. The difference between a suggestion given by one to oneself, that is, a mental resolve to do a certain act on a future occasion, and that

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410 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. given by the operator in the hypnotic state, lies in the fact that in the former case it reaches the individual will through the portal of intellect, and, for that reason, is the result of the exercise of deliberate choice ; while in the latter, i.e., in hypnotism, reason is beld in abeyance, and, thus, not in a position to know of what passes directly between the operator and the will. Hence, the individual remains ignorant of what takes place in the hypnotic trance, unless the operator intend otherwise. This being the only difference between the act of deliberate choosing and the hypnotic suggestion, obviously, the execution neither of our own resolution nor of the operator's command can have anything to do with the faculty of reason, except in so far as will chooses to avail itself of its assistance; and since there is no other force capable of voluntary activity, it is will and will alone which is concerned in carrying out the idea which it adopts in one of the two ways described above. Now, because the same faculty, namely, will, is concerned in carrying out its own as well as the operator's suggestion, it is legitimate to infer that it adopts the same procedure in both cases. Hence, the same mechanism would be employed in both instances, so that, if we could know its modus operandi in one case, we should know it in the other as well. Now, when we wish to do some act on a certain date in the future, we form some mental scheme of the process which would culminate in the desired act. This may be done deliberately, or merely by linking the idea of the end to some habitual act, which is to be performed

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YOGA. 411 about the same time, and of which the end in view may be a natural culmination. In either case, the scheme is an association of more or less complex processes. In carrying out the hypnotic suggestions of the operator, will adopts a similar procedure, though unaided by reason. It links the idea of the end in view to some particular group of processes which tend that way, and leaves it to the habitual discharge of its own involuntary energy to do the rest. That will is capable of doing all this seems wonderful, but then hypnotism itself is no less wonderful! Will is not a blind or unconscious force, as it used to be supposed till very recently by certain materialists. Its inherent, wonderful nature is revealed only when it is freed from the tutelage of reason which holds it in leading strings. Traces of its knowledge are ordinarily to be seen even in its automatic activity where each movement is not only precise and proper, but also prefigures the end to be attained,--and all this without the accompaniment of deliberating reason. Will is an aspect of the subjective mind and, therefore, all-knowing potentially. It can take cognizance of its environment by means independent of physical senses. As Hudson points out, - "it performs its highest functions when the objective senses are in abeyance. In a word, it is that intelligence which makes itself manifest in a hypnotic subject when he is in a state of somnambulism, In this state many of the most wonderful feats of the subjective mind are performed. It sees without the natural organs of vision ; and in this, as in many other grades, or degrees, of the hypnotic state, it can be made, apparently, to leave the body, and to travel to distant lands and bring back intelligence, oft-times of the most exact and truthful character. It has also the power to read the thoughts of others, even to the minutest details ; to read the contents

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412 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of sealed envelopes and closed books. In short, it is the subjective mind which possesses what is popularly designated as clairvoyant power, and the ability to apprehend the thoughts of others without the aid of the ordinary means of communication. In point of fact, that which for convenience I have chosen to designate as the subjective mind appears to be a separate and distinct entity and the real distinctive difference between the two minds seems to consist in the fact that the objective mind is merely the function of the brain, while the subjective mind is a distinct entity, possessing independent powers and functions, having a mental organization of its own, and being capable of sustaining an existence independently of the body. In other words, it is the soul." The subjective mind also possesses the power to move ponderable objects without any visible physical contact, but its power and activities are inversely proportionate to the vigour of the objective mind. It controls the functions, sensations, and conditions of the body, and is itself amenable to control by suggestion. "Science teaches us," says Hudson, " that the whole body is made up of a confederation of intelligent entities, each of which performs its functions with an intelligence exactly adapted to the performance of its special duties as a member of the confederacy. There is indeed no life without mind, from the lowest unicellular organism up to man. It is, therefore, a mental energy that actuates every fibre of the body under all its conditions." The physiology of the action of the two minds, the subjective and the objective, is thus explained by the author of the Medical Hypnotism : " Under normal conditions, our concepts of ideas and actions are derived from two sources ; one from the automatic instinctive or sub-conscious department, the acts which are done without any reasoning, without our consciousness of the acts; the other from the so-called conscious department, the acts which are reasoned and controlled by the sensory facclties. The former are the crude, natural, unchecked automatism of the brain of the child and savage, which is governed by fictitious conception of imaginative impulse of the

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YOGA. 413 sub-conscious state ; the latter are the refined, regulated sensory actions and ideas of the brain of the grown-up and civilized man, which are developed by education and are therefore reasoned, moderated and controlled. Reason imposes a check upon brain automatism, and creates a rational state of consciousness. Nevertheless, we notice the phenomena of automatic brain activity manifested daily in the waking state, even in the rational and educated man. We walk in a mechanical way, to such an extent, that we often pass the limits assigned by the creative will of the mind, which directed our first-step. We swim or we play on the piano, our fingers wandering mechanically on the keyboard without stopping, and very frequently we converse while playing, swimming or even writing, and allow ourselves to be absorbed by foreign thoughts while doing something else. The child is impulsive and chaotic. It protects itself from injury instinctively. We raise our hands, close our eyes, on the slightest provocation, reflexly and automatically. The child jumps, screams and laughs, according to one or the other impression which it receives, We dance, make involuntary motions of our body and limbs, when a familiar melody is suggested to our mind by the harmonious accord of music. We see in our dreams existing realities, and rejoice in happy, and weep in horrible, imaginative scenes. We are made victors and victims in our dreams. Poor human reason is carried by the current stream of imagination ; the proudest mind thus yields to hallucination, Real and imaginative images appear before our closed eyes, and during this sleep, that is to say, during over a quarter of our existence, we become the plaything of the dreams which imagination calls forth. Even in the waking state we notice many analogical actions and thoughts. The soldier in the army submits to orders of his superior officer, performs bodily movements, commits terrible acts mechanically, automatically, and without any reason. At the command 'fire,' his conscious faculties are paralyzed and he fires automatically. There exists,' says Dr. Despine, an automatic brain activity which manifests itself without the occurrence of the ego ; for all movements possess, in accordance with the law which governs brain activity, an intelligent power without any ego and without any personality. Under hypnotic suggestion, psychic faculties are made to manifest their inherent automatic functions to their utmost capacities. That there is a nexus between the two

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414 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. minds that enables them to act in perfect synchronism when occasion requires, is necessarily true.' It is to this synchronism that we are indebted for what is designated as 'genius.' It is also in evidence on occasions of great importance to the individual, as when danger is imminent, or some great crisis is impending." According to the most authoritative views, the subjective mind is an intelligent enti'y which is invested with full control over the vital fu' tions of the body,-- which accounts for the mysterious and wonderful phenomena of hypnotism and the like. Hypnotism itself may be defined as the induction of a peculiar psychical condition which releases the subjective mind, for the time being, from the dominion of the lower, or the objective mind. The conscious 'mind is, in a sense, the guard or sentinel on the sub-conscious, with reason as a check imposed on the brain automatism. It thus becomes clear that we must overpower and vanquisli the sentinel of reason, if we wish to release the subjective mind from its dominion. Dr. Ram Narain maintains (see the Medical Hypnotism) : "Suppress consciousness, suppress the voluntary brain activities, and you have a case of somnambulism which, according to Despine, is characterized physiologically by the exercise of the automatic activity alone of the brain, and the paralysis of the conscious activity of the brain which manifests the ego." It is in this condition that the formation of blisters full of serum results from the application of postage stamps or plain paper to the body of the patient,' regarding whom the Medical Hypnotism records : "At your suggestion he smells the strongest ammonia as camphor and eats quinine with the same relish as sugar, and what is most strange is the fact that he gets no harm at all. When the objective mind has retired from the scene,

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415 or crawled into its shell and 'pulled in the lid' after it, suggestion takes effect and materializes the suggested condition in the body of the patient. The subjective mind does not reason; it accepts the suggestion as true and performs its functions accordingly. It is perfectly obvious, therefore, that any wrong suggestion given to the subjective mind will produce evil effect, which will continue to exist, so long as it is not removed. The immunity of animals and idiots, many of whom eat enormously of whatever they can get, from the diseases of the digestive organs is due to the fact that they are beyond the reach of suggestions adverse to health. Some one has well said that if the current dietetic suggestions could reach the mind of an ostrich, he would soon be unable to eat a boiled potato. Such is the conclusion drawn by the modern Science of new Psychology. The cure of ills and ailments, therefore, most obviously, lies in a reversal of the wrong process. Two things have to be done to counteract the evil effects of the wrongful, harmful suggestion, and these are: (1) the removal of the existing evil, and (2) the prevention of its recurrence. The first requires the removal of the suggestion which is the cause of trouble, and the second necessitates our being on guard against all possible evil and harmful suggestions in the future. The task of removing the existing trouble is, however, enormous, as it cannot be accomplished till we know what is the wrongful, harmful suggestion which is its cause. The difficulty lies in the diagnosis, but when it is got over once the rest is easy enough; for the evil can be speedily got rid of by giving the opposite kind of healthy sugges YOGA,

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416 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tion to counteract its effect. The suggestion of wholeness' may be made by one person to another, as by a mental healer to his patient; it may also be made by the patient himself, in which case it is known as autosuggestion. In the words of Hudson, " Other things being equal, an auto-suggestion is more potent than a suggestion from an extraneous source, for the simple reason that an auto-suggestion is generally backed by the objective convictions of the patient, whereas a suggestion by another may directly contravene the patient's objective reason and experience, not that the latter may not be effective when it is made with force and persistence, but that the former is more easily and naturally effective, either as a moral or therapeutic agency." As regards preventive suggestion, the same writer maintains : "It is always easy to prevent an adverse suggestion from taking effect in the mind; and that is by not allowing it to find an entrance, To that end one should never allow himself to think, much less to talk, on the subject of the wholesomeness or digestibility of food that is set before him." What is true in respect of physical health is, also, equally true in respect of mental well-being, the rule governing them both being the same, namely, 'as one thinks, so one becomes.' We see the power of thought conspicuously in evidence during epidemics, when more persons suffer from fright than from the epidemic itself. Prevention and cure of evil, therefore, lie within the power of all, the certainty and permanency of results depending on the degree of knowledge and its legitimate use. Mr. Hudson is seemingly right in saying : "When that knowledge is attained, every mother will have in

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YOGA. 417 her own hands an easy and absolutely certain means of controlling the energies of her children and directing them into whatever channel of activity she mary elect. It is axiomatic that knowledge is power,' and 'know thyself' is a time-honoured injunction to mankind. Combining them, it may be truly said that to know thyself is the certain means of obtaining power and dominion over others." * This is precisely what the Yogis say, and is exactly what is meant by the symbology of the 'Fall' in the book of Genesis. According to the former, all power including that of controlling death, disease and destiny comes to him who brings his little ego (i.e., the objective mind) under his control, and establishes himself in the beatific state of samadhi (trance of Self-realization); and according to the latter it is the sentinel of the 'flaming sword which turns in every direction' that stands between man and Life'more abundant and full.' Immortality is to be obtained by him who overpowers this sentinel and reaches the Tree of Life, and immortality, includes all powers. Religion summed up the entire subject ages before the dawn of modern civilization, and sent it to the World, from time to time, now in the form of the symbology of the "Fall," again in the condensed truism, "That thou art," and yet again through the lips of Mahavira, Zaroaster, Moses, Jesus, and others. Different teachers have used different words, indeed, but the sense and substance have always been the same, whenever and wherever the utterances have proceeded forth from the lips of the truly illumined sages; for religion is neither a sect, nor a scripture, nor, indeed, anything other than Truth itself; and, although the books that contain its teachings may not be very 27

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418 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ancient or old, so far as their writing is concerned, it is, in very truth, older than the oldest writing extant, more ancient than the most ancient sage who opened his lips to discourse upon its eternity, or the earliest saviour who preached it to humanity-in fact, it is. Eternal. Unfortunately for man, his love of money and other worldly things has so hardened his heart that he has lost the power of benefiting himself by the teaching of the Saviours, and has drifted farther and farther away from truth with the advance of time.. He respected these Teachers for the miracles they wrought, but there ended his interest in them and their teachings. By considering these God-men supernatural beings he has reduced himself to a status of wretched helplessness, altogether forgetting that what one man can do all others can achieve also. The most elementary study of the Spiritual Laws suffices to show that the God-ren of the past were super-human only in the sense that they had developed the super-conscious powers of their souls, and, for that reason, were enabled to perform feats which, to the ordinary mediocre being, appear to be miraculous. Almost all the miracles of the past saviours of mankind can be explained with the aid of the mental laws. already known. Here is one of them. A little before the breaking out of the great Mahabharata war, and at the time when the five Pandava brothers were living in seclusion, in the forest, with Draupadi, the wife of Arjuna, a certain Rishi, Durvasa by name, once visited their secluded habitation with an enormous crowd of chelas (disciples) and others, numbering close upon ten

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YOGA. 419 thousand. For certain reasons, he timed his visit to an hour when it was not possible for the Pandava brothers to entertain the party to a feast; and it was well-known that the muni's displeasure brooded ill far beyond the power of ordinary mortals to bear, Draupadi, seeing consternation depicted on the faces of the Pandava brothers, prayed for deliverance to Krishna, who responded by appearing in person before her. The tradition" has it that the Almighty Krishna himself put a little particle of some boiled herb, which was the only edible available at the time, in his holy mouth, and, chewing it with great relish, declared that his hunger was appeased. The rishi and his followers, who had been bathing in the beautiful Jamuna, in the pleasant expectation of a princely feast, now felt as if they had gorged themselves with food, and, fearing the displeasure of the Pandavas, fled away, and would not return when asked to do so. It does seem wonderful that Krishna ate the particle of the boiled herb, and Durvasa lost his hunger ; but there is nothing supernatural in it. The attention of the reader is invited to an interesting experiment made by Dr. Coche which is quoted in the Medical Hypnotism, in his own words, as follows:-- "Placing a screen between myself and my subject, 'I made my assistant serve her a glass of water, and while fixing my thoughts on her I put some cayenne pepper on my tongue. No sooner had * It is not possible to vouch for the historicity of this account, in view of the mythological nature of the Mahabharata, and the Hindu works in general. Besides this, the Jaina Puranas which also give a historical account of the events which occurred during the life of Krishna do not endorse the Hindu account in this particular. The narrative is, however, interesting, in so far as it shows that the ancients were fully familiar with the law of suggestion.

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420 the subject brought the water to her lips than she exclaimed: 'Some one has just put pepper in my mouth.' As nobody knew of my having put pepper in my mouth the experiment was certainly conclusive." The difference between the miracle of the boiled herb and the experiment of Dr. Coche is only one of degree, the intensity of the concentrated thought of a modern investigator being to that of Krishna as a spark to the Sun. Dr. Coche could affect only his subject' with his own taste, but the sovereign power of the Lord of Yoga manifested itself on a much larger scale. " THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The views held by modern writers on Mental Sciences, concerning the miraculous healing performed by Jesus Christ, may be summed up in a few sentences. There is nothing supernatural in the miraculous cures effected by Jesus. On the other hand, mental healing is a science; and the power that heals resides in the patient. This was the doctrine taught by Jesus and epitomized in the expression, "thy faith hath made thee whole." The whole art of mental healing consists in inducing faith in the patient; and suggestion is the most potent means for that purpose. What Jesus did others can do also, as he himself declared : : "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my father" (John, XIV. 12). It will be foreign to our purpose to embark upon a minute investigation of the conclusions arrived at by modern authorities; suffice it to say that these ideas are now held by some of the ablest thinkers of modern times, and their accuracy has been guaranteed by all those agencies, and means, and tests, which science knows

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YOGA. 421 80 well to employ and handle for acquiring accurate knowledge. The agreement between the Hindu Scriptures and the Holy Bible on this point might be shown by a single quotation from the 'Yoga Vasistha': "Through right enquiry, the object of enquiry can be found like the essence in milk. One who has equality of vision through the enjoyment of the final beatitude will wear it as his foremost ornament; will never degrade himself from that state ; will be able to digest all things taken in-like sugar-candy by a swan, whether such things are polluted or mixed with poison or are injurious to health or adulterated. Whether they swallow virulent poison* or counter-poison or milk or sugarcane-juice or food, they will preserve a perfect equanimity of mind. Whether one plants his dagger deep in their head or preserves it, they will regard them neither as friends nor as foes. Since persons of equal vision will look upon all equally, their hearts will be filled with bliss." Perhaps the class of miracles ascribed to Jesus and other saviours which one finds most difficult to believe is that of which the case of the daughter of Jairus forms a typical instance. The question, however, is not whether any one can perform them to-day, and thus put their occurrence beyond the possibility of doubt and dispute, but whether the revival of the dead is an event which is altogether beyond the range of possibility ? It would be harsh logic, indeed, to say that, because the secret is not known to us, therefore, it does not exist in nature at all; for it might be only waiting to be discovered by us, as it was discovered by the ancients. It might be that the conditions for the successful performance of the miracle are so rigid, that the secret, although known to and practised by * Oj. Mark. XVI. 18.

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422 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. certain initiates of the higher order and imparted by them to their immediate disciples, could not be utilized by their remoter followers of a less developed spirituality. It might also be that the power cannot be exercised in certain cases at all, as in decapitation, where the continuity of the system is completly severed once for all. From a short paragraph which appeared in the "Practical Medicine" for March 1908, it appears that, at least, in one class of cases the modern Science of Electricity has succeeded in demonstrating the possibility of the restoration of the dead to life. The original paragraph runs thus : "The current number of the Electrical Magazine' publishes an illustrated account of the work of French scientists in the use of the electric current as an anaesthetic. Not only is it proved that a particular degree and form of electric shock will produce total insensibility to pain,' says the Electrical Magazine,' and ensure certain recovery without any deleterious after-effects, but the remarkable fact was observed that electrocuted' animals can be restored to life by the rhythmical application of electric currents. It has been proved beyond doubt that respiration and heart beatings-life itself-can be definitely and permanently reinstituted in a body from which, by accepted medical evidence, life had departed." This is a startling revelation of the power of electricity, and, if true, opens out a vast field for future scientific investigation. Perhaps it would necessitate a thorough overhauling and remodelling of our modern views of life and death. There seems to be the same relation between the soul and the physical body as that between a central spring and the fields to be irrigated by it. This will be clear on a little reflection. The physical beginning of the individual organism may be taken to be the fertilized

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423 YOGA. ovum which is a single cell formed in the body of the female parent, and fecundated by the spermatozoon in the father's seed. Before conception, however, neither the ovum nor the spermatozoon is complete enough in itself, and, for that reason, neither is capable of development or growth as an embryo. The fusion of their nuclei results in the formation of a complete cell which becomes the starting point of a fresh incarnation for the migrating soul. The cell now immediately sets out on the path of embryonic growth, and the formation of the organisin begins. By the process of successive divisions, new cells are formed from this single primitive parent,' and come to occupy their proper places in the system. This process continues till the organism grows into a colony of cells, with numerous centres of control to regulate their function and movement. As new cells are formed and put in their proper positions in the body, life flows out from the centre to cover them up with its ramifications, and thus brings them under control. This is how the subjective mind of the individual controls and governs the functions of the cells which constitute the body. As regards health, the rule seems to be that so long as this central spring is overflowing with the fluid of life, and its 'waters reach the vital orgays of the body, health and youth are maintained ; but when, owing to some cause or other, obstacles spring up which prevent the living waters from reaching the bodily cells, then such of them as receive no supply or only an insufficient quantity of it, decline to contribute their share to the general well-being of the organism, setting up all sorts of disease and other forms of unhealthy complications in

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424 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the system. Hence, the choking up of the central spring must mean death to the individual. In diseased conditions, such as paralysis of limbs, the subjective mind is unable to exercise control, wholly or partially, over the affected limb, and the same thing happens in cases of atrophy, in which the affected part dries up, for want of a proper supply of the living waters of life. When a sudden shock of a violent nature occurs in the experience of the individual, and the central spring is affected with its violence, there occurs a dislocation in some one or more of the many pivots connected with the channels of communication, and the connection between the central organ and certain vital parts of the body is cut off. This is wbat seems to occur in the case of persons put to death by electrocution. Now, if we can induce the subjective mind, which has full control over the cells of the body, to re-establish the broken communication once inore, the dead might be revived. The action of the heart, which stops owing to the deranged and ruptured condition of the channels of the nervo-vital fluid, may also, it would seem, be restored by rhythmical vibrations of the same kind which produced the fatal shock. By this means the 'dislocation 'caused in the chamber of the heart will gradually yield to the treatment, and healthy action will be ultimately restored. This is probably how the electrocuted animals referred to in the 'Electrical Magazine' were revived. Their restoration to life is conclusive evidence of the fact that life had not altogether departed from their bodies, although its manifestations had ceased 80 completely as to induce medical specialists to declare it to have become extinct.

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YOGA. 425 The case of the daughter of Jairus, however, was not subjected to this kind of treatment. It was not necessary for such a spiritual personality as Jesus' to employ any scientific appliances to effect a cure. Modern Science does not know how to control the mind without the aid of drugs and instruments ; but Jesus' spiritual power rendereu their use quite unnecessary for him, as he could influence the subjective mind of the maiden by a mere word of command. We shall analyze his procedure to understand his method better. At the very outset, he assured the father of the maiden that she was not dead, but merely asleep. Since Jesus never spoke an untruth, his words could have been addressed only to keep the subjective mind of her father (who in all probability was in telepathic rapport with her) from affecting her injuriously any more. Next, he turned out the minstrels and others who were creating a disturbance, and thus exerting harmful influence on the subjective mind of the 'dead' girl. For the same reason, he turned out her weeping relatives and friends from the death chamber. He then took three of his most spiritually developed disciples into the chamber, to aid him in influencing the subjective mind of the maiden, and finally raised her with a powerful suggestion. She was then given something to eat, probably with a view to remove all doubt from her mind as to her revivification. This was the most difficult case of raising the dead *Cf." To sleep is to become disinterested. A mother who sleeps by the side of her child will not stir at the sound of thunder, but the sigh of the child will wake her. Does she really sleep in regard to her child? We do not sleep in regard to what continues to interest us." -Bergson on Dreams.

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426 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. for Jesus; for probably the girl had not known him personally before. In the case of Lazarus the difficulty was not so great, because Lazarus had known Jesus, and, in all probability, had great faith in him, which rendered the task of raising him up all the easier. 'Lazarus, come forth,' uttered in a loud voice, sufficed to bring him back to life, in spite of the protestations of his sisters. It is said of Shams Tabrez, the poet and mystic, that he revived the dead child of a king in a similar manner. The procedure adopted by Jesus points unmistakably to the fact that the death of the individual organism, at least in some cases, is merely synonymous with the breach of communications between the central fountain of life and some vital part of the body, and that the work of restoration to life depends upon the restoration of the broken communications. The law of suggestion works here just as effectively as elsewhere, and it is undoubtedly suggestion which is the cause of premature death in many cases. A life-long scepticism of the powers of the soul and a constant fear of death must produce their effect, sooner or later, on the body; so that when some illness, more serious than any other which it has been the patient's lot in life to suffer from, supervenes, he grows suspicious of life and believes that the time for death has come. Add to this the effect to be produced on the mind by the visit of specialists, the whispering of anxious friends and relatives, the solemn and scared looks of attendants, and the enquiries of the family lawyer for the making of a will for the disposal of property, and it can be easily seen how the combined influence of them all, to say nothing of a number of

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427 other depressing and dispiriting incidents and events, will act as a most powerful suggestion for death, which the subjective mind would have no alternative but to adopt. The effect of such a forcible suggestion is that it renders the mind unconscious of its own operations, paralyzes the brain, and breaks up nervous connections. This is death, if the rupture of communications is accompanied by the departure of the soul from the body. But it is quite conceivable that the soul may not immediately leave the organism in certain cases, notwithstanding the cessation of functions of the vital organs. Probably the channels of communication in these cases are not completely destroyed, but only become clogged, and the cessation of function of the bodily organs is not immediately followed by the departure of the soul from the body. In such cases at least it would seem possible to restore the dead to life by removing the clogging obstacle from the channels of communication. This might be done by suggestion, as in the case of the daughter of Jairus, or by rhythmic vibrations, as in the case of the electrocuted animals, or by artificial breathing, as in cases of drowning, or by any other suitable means. YOGA. We may, therefore, conclude that the restoration of the dead to life is not, by any means, a matter which we should be justified in considering to be altogether beyond the range of possibility. Among minor miracles we might refer to those of swami Rama Tirtha who was amongst us only a short time ago. While living, in seclusion, in the Himalayan forests he often encountered wild beasts,

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428 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. but they did him no harm. Once five bears came face to face with him, but they walked away without molesting him in the least. On another occasion a wild wolf came near him; and again a tiger encountered him in the same jungle. The great swami himself explains the reason of his remaining unmolested by these wild beasts. "Why was it ? Simply on account of fearlessness. Rama was filled with that spirit: I am not the body, I am not the mind; the Supreme Divinity I am, I am God; no fire can burn me, no weapon wound me. They (the wild beasts) were looked straight in the eyes and they ran away." We could cite many similar instances from ancient records, but it would serve no useful purpose to quote them here. But for the corroboration these statements have received from modern psychical research, the sceptic would have raised his voice against them, and proclaimed them to be beyond the range of possibility. He is, however, compelled to hold his peace now that the great authorities on mental science have declared their belief, on scientific grounds, in such phenomenal occurrences. Says Mr. Hudson : " Facts of record are not wanting to sustain the proposition that man in a subjective, or partially subjective condition, is safe from the attacks of wild beasts. One of the first recorded instances, and the one most familiar, is the story of Daniel. Daniel was a prophet, a seer. At this day he would be known in some circles as a spiritual medium ; in other words, as a mind reader, a clairvoyant, etc.according to the conception of each individual as to the origin of his powers. In other words, he was a man possessed of great subjective powers. He was naturally and habitually in that state in which, in modern parlance, the threshold of his consciousness was displaced,

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YOGA. 429 and the powers of his soul were developed. In this state he was thrown into the lion's den, with the result recorded. The sceptic as to the divine authenticity of seriptures can readily accept this story as literally true when he recalls the experiments made in Paris a few years ago. In that city a young lady was hypnotized and placed in a den of lions. The object of the experiment is not now recalled; but the result was just the same as that recorded of the ancient prophet. She had no fear of the lions, and the lions paid not the slightest attention to her. The adepts of India, and even the inferior priests of the Buddhistic faith, often display their powers by entering the jungles, so infested by man-eating tigers that ordinary man would not live an hour, and remain there all night, with no weapons of defence save the God-given powers of the soul." --(The Law of Psychic Phenomena). Religion teaches that what was done once can be done again, and by each and every one of us; and Dr. Coche's experiment is a practical demonstration of its eternal truth. When man becomes perfect, like the Father,' he will have the power of performing all the miracles which have been ascribed to the numerous Godmen of the past. But the acquisition of the 'Father-like' perfection depends, as has been seen before, upon the dominion one acquires over one's objective mind, which will set the subjective intelligence free, and enable the soul to realize its latent godly powers and divine potencies. The secret of success lies in the removal of the wrong impressions which are now guiding our conduct in the numerous walks of life, and which have formed deep-rooted habits of thought with us. Religion points out that the initial cause of misery is the belief in one's identity with the body, and prescribes a renunciation of all those thoughts and deeds which encourage, or confirm, this kind of belief. Suggestion must also be harnessed into service, since it is one of the most potent

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430 means of subjugating the lower mind. The value of suggestion is coming to be recognised on all hands. M. Jean Finot observes in 'The Philosophy of Long Life ':-- THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. us. "It is suggestion ill-employed which undoubtedly shortens it [life]. Arrived at a certain age, we drug ourselves with the idea of the approaching end. We lose faith in our powers, and they abandon Under the pretext of the weight of age upon our shoulders, we take on sedentary habits. We cease to busy ourselves with our occupations. Little by little our blood, vitiated by idleness, together with our ill renewed tissues, open the door to all kinds of diseases. Premature old age attacks us, and we succumb sooner than we need in consequence of a harmful auto-suggestion. Now let us try to live by auto-suggestion instead of dying by it. Let us have ever before our eyes the numerous examples of robust and healthy old age. We must store up in our brains healthy, serene, and comfortable suggestions." The Yogis insist that we must first rub off the store of recorded unhealthy suggestions from our memory, and re-arrange our ideas in the light of the knowledge of Truth. This, however, cannot be accomplished without enormous mental labour, inasmuch as memory is not a thing which can be taken out, cleansed and put back in its place by any known process. Severe mental drilling, necessitating the closing up of old and deeply-rooted tracks in the nervous matter of the brain and the spinal column, and the opening up of new paths, in place thereof, is required for that purpose. As Vivekananda observes: "We will find later on that in the study of these psychological matters there will be a good deal of action going on in the body. Nerve currents will have to be replaced and given a new channel. New sorts of vibrations will begin, the whole constitution will be remodelled as it were. But the main part of the action will lie along the spinal column, so that the one thing necessary for the

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431 posture is to hold the spinal column free, sitting erect, holding the three parts-the chest, neck and the head-in a straight line." YOGA. Any one cultivating the habit of spiritual concentration will perceive subtle changes taking place in his nerves, particularly in those of the head and face. It is due to these changes that the face of the Yogi becomes calm and shining, his features refined and beautiful, and his voice melodious and musical; and it is also due to these changes that the development of the higher faculties takes place in him. It is no longer disputed that there are certain regions, or centres, within the human brain which perform specific functions. The faculties and powers of man are due to the development of these centres, or regions, and his shortcomings also are to be traced to an undeveloped, or atrophied, state of one, or more, of them;* The Yogi can develop any or all of these centres at will; hence, there is no limit to his powers. The only thing necessary to do is to re-arrange the nervous matter and to stimulate it into activity. A word of warning seems necessary here about practising the methods of Yoga. Involving, as these practices do, many important changes in the arrangement of the brain cells and nerve currents, the tyro, unless he has thoroughly understood and mastered the subject, and is extremely cautious in his method, is likely to do himself great injury by practising Yoga exercises without being duly instructed by a qualified teacher. A slight error in * Injury of the motor regions in the head, for instance, causes what is known as aphemia or motor aphasia, which is not the loss of voice nor paralysis of the tongue or lips, but the inability to utter any words at all, or the utterance of a few meaningless stock phrases, as speech, mispronouncing, misplacing, and misusing one's words in various degrees.-(Prof. James).

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432 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. some apparently trifling detail, a little misapprehension of the natural ease of posture, and even a slight overdoing of some particular exercise have often been known to have had a most calamitous ending. Many persons have gone mad for want of proper guidance in their Yoga practice. It is for this reason that the guidance of a guru (preceptor), who knows the practical difficulties which the novice generally encounters, and who can help him to get over them, by means of practical suggestions learnt in his own novitiate, is considered and prescribed as indispensable. Except in rare circumstances, no one can afford to ignore this piece of advice of the ancient rishis, who founded this Science. But this difficulty, it is said, does not stand much in the way of the followers of Jnana Yoga who aim at the attainment of right knowledge, leaving all other details to adjust themselves. Says swami Rama Tirtha: "There is no necessity of your retiring into the forests and pursuing abnormal practices to realize Vedantic Yoga. You are the father of Yoga, Siva Himself, when you are lost in activity or merged in work." As ignorance of the godly nature of the soul has been the cause of trouble, in the past, the change of belief, in the right direction, now, must bring about the state of at-one-ment with the Self. All the Yoga that need be performed by the jnani, therefore, consists in an unshakable conviction in the truth of the Atman, i.e., the soul, being the Paramatman, that is, God. Feel this, and you are free. In practice, however, it will be found that the strengthening of faith is a much harder task than many would imagine it to be. There are thousands of men in

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433 India who know and theoretically believe their souls to be Gods, yet they are hopelessly involved in delusion and utterly helpless against its temptations and snares. These men have no idea of what the actual enjoyment or realization of God-consciousness means. The acquisition of God-consciousness depends on such a degree of unshakable, unchanging conviction of Truth that one should be prepared to stake one's all, that is, to risk one's very life, if necessary, in its cause. Such a conviction necessitates a complete saturation of mind with belief in one's Own God-hood and in the harmfulness of the objects of senses. This is the standard of faith which all those who aspire to be saved have to attain to. An early endeavour, it will be observed, is made in every rational religion to strengthen the devotee's faith by various means. The constant reading of works like Puranas, which in simple, easy language teach and illustrate the great truths of the divine philosophy, the recitation of kathas (biographies of saints and deified beings), the constant meditation on the sense and philosophy of shastras, the daily chanting of hymns and holy mantras such as Om, and the fixing of the mind on certain nervous centres, not with the object of acquiring psychic powers, but with the sole aim of realizing the great and beatific condition of liberation from the bondage of flesh and maya, are some of the many means suggested by religion. The curbing of evil emotions and unholy passions, the giving of suitable gifts to learned and deserving men, the daily devotion and meditation, all tending to destroy personal hopes and ambitions, which owe their origin to the flesh, no YOGA.

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434 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. are also acts well-calculated to lead the mind to overthrow the dominion of matter and the thraldom of senses. The doctrine of the Eucharist, too, was intended to serve the same purpose, although many regarded it as a 'hard' saying even in the days of Jesus. As a matter of fact, it is in the very hardness' of the philosophy of the Eucharist that its gist is to be found. As a rule, a rude and irritating remark lingers longer in and makes a deeper impression on the mind than any ordinary philosophical maxim, or complimentary speech ; and, for this reason, makes the task of meditation easier of accomplishment. If Jesus had said, 'the bread ye eat and the wine ye drink have been provided by God,' no one would have found the statement difficult to digest,' and the matter would not have excited any controversial spirit. Knowing the human nature full well, he gave them a problem of philosophy in the form of a 'hard' saying, and offered them bread and wine, the quality of which was so very unpalatable that they could not be readily swallowed. His object was to make the literal sense of the words employed so highly repugnant and mysterious that their minds should turn from it and become interested in searching the hidden interpretation of the doctrine, thus deepening the impression each time that bread was broken or wine tasted. All this would have indirectly acted as a strong stimulus to right meditation, but, unfortunately, none of his uninstructed hearers understood him in this light. Some of his disciples even grumbled at it, although their great admiration for his wondrous powers prevented them from leaving his following.

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YOGA. 435 If the true purport of the Messianic utterance had been understood by men, the Lord's Supper would have been acknowledged as one of the most potent means of practising holy meditation and strengthening the faith, instead of being relegated to the realm of vain mysticism and fruitless, ceremonial sacrament. It would have reminded men of the real nature of things, each time that they broke their bread, thus confirming their faith and bringing them nearer to the realization of the Kingdom of God. In order to understand the truth about bread being the flesh and wine the blood of the Lord, we must remember that the entire universe is conceived to exist as the body of Logos, who, in his cosmic aspect, must be thought of in the Universal form, which is said to have been manifested to Arjuna, on the battlefield of Kurukshetra." The following observations of one of the leading English scientists of our own day may be profitably read in this connection : "It has been surmised,...that just as the corpuscles and atoms of matter, in their intricate movements and relations, combine to form the brain cell of a human being; so the cosmic bodies, the planets and the suns and other groupings of the other, may perhaps combine to form something corresponding, as it were, to the brain cell of some transcendent Mind. The idea is to be found in Newton, The thing is mere guess, it is not an impossibility, and it cannot be excluded from a philosophic system by any negative statement based on scientific fact."-Life and Matter, p. 112. The idea of an Universal Mind, however, is quite untenable in philosophy, being a pure personification of Life; but the statement loses not a tittle of its merit * See the Bhagavad Gita, Disc. XI.

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436 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. on that ground, since the aim of Jesus was to develop the habit of meditation of his hearers. The fundamental basis of the personification is the analogy between this world and a dream which Vedanta never tires of reitera ting. The universe is conceived to be the body of Logos, in the same way as a dream may be said to be an embodied unfoldment of an idea. The analogy is then pushed to the contents of the idea, which represents the body of the Logos. Hence, the bread and wine which we sometimes eat and drink in a dream are conceived as lying within the mind of the dreamer, and for this reason described as his flesh and blood. Now, suppose the dreamer becomes enlightened, while dreaming, as to the nature of his dream, and recognises himself, agreeably to the tenets of Vedanta, as identical with the Over Soul' of the dream. Would he not be justified in speaking of the imaginary bread and wine of the dream as being his flesh and blood ? Precisely the same is the position of those who describe the things of this world from the standpoint of a rigid, unbending Idealism. The sage who identifies his consciousness with the consciousness of 'All,' and who, consequently, looks upon the entire universe as his body, generally propounds the world-mystery from this particular standpoint. He is then forced to regard all material things as his flesh and blood; for, when he looks upon the whole universe as his body, he cannot but regard bread and wine also as parts of his body, and, as such, his flesh and blood. In this sense it was that Jesus described bread and wine as his flesh and blood, intending that the repugnance of the idea shoulp

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437 stimulate the thinking faculty of his hearers, and lead them to meditate upon the true philosophy of the utterance. If mankind would only think of it when breaking their bread and tasting wine, they would find that the effort to understand the truth of the doctrine would tend to bring them nearer to the Kingdom of God, by deeply impressing upon their minds the illusory nature of the objects of the senses. It would give them a correct idea of God which is the only means of salvation, for, in the words of Swedenborg : "On the knowledge and the acknowledgment of God, depends the salvation of every one; for the universal heaven, and the universal church on earth, and, in general, all religion, has its foundation in a just idea of God; because hereby there is conjunction, and by conjunction, light, wisdom and eternal happiness." The repugnance is felt only when the body is taken to be the man, and not the Atman. The hearers of Jesus thought that the speaker was none other than the physical man, standing, in flesh and blood, before them, and fell into error on that account. The real speaker, however, is that subtle, invisible power or substance which is variously styled, Life, Soul, Atman, and the like. YOGA. "" The same it was who uttered, 'This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me" (Luke, XXII. 19.) The mouth employed to give utterance to the idea, no doubt, happened to be that of Jesus, but the Speaker was not he, but Life, personified as the Cosmic Self, or the Over Soul. Another important means of strengthening faith is *The Apocalypse Revealed, n. 469 (quoted in Barret's New Dispensation, p. 118).

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438 the chanting of holy mantras, i.e., religious formulas, or texts, of which the monosyllabic aum or om, is the most potent, since it is indicative of the five orders of spiritually evolved beings, arhats (perfect beings), asariras (liberated souls), acharyas (spiritual guides), upadhyayas (religious preceptors) and munis (holy men). According to Hinduism, om is the most appropriate name of the Deity. He is called OM, because he pervades all, because he protects all and because the three letters, a, u, and m, of which the word is composed, denote supremely excellent, supremely high, and supremely wise; for 'a' indicates bliss or ananda, au' signifies power, or aujas, and ' ma' means supporter or protector. Thus, Om has a triple significance, and denotes the three-fold attributes of Brahman. Firstly, he is all-pervading, allprotecting and all-knowing; secondly, he is supremely, excellently high and wise; and thirdly, he is blissful, almighty and all-supporting. From its perfect applicability, and definite and comprehensive character, the word 'Om' is said to be the most emblematic name of the Supreme Being. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Now, since chanting is merely a means to an end, and is resorted to with the sole object of establishing the human mind in divine, godly vibrations, by virtue of the holy ideas of virtue and goodness of God, which the word chanted conveys, it follows that the term which contains the most exhaustive enumeration of the divine powers and attributes would form the best means of * See the 'Jaina Philosophy,' by V. R. Gandhi, pp. 85-86, See, the Sacred Books of the Hindus, Vol. III, part 1.

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439 uplifting the soul. For this reason there is no other name of the Deity which can claim precedence over Om. Concerning the magic potency of the term, swami Rama Tirtha writes: YOGA "To realize this idea [the divinity of the soul], and to dehypnotize into the Real Self, a beginner gets a great help from the syllable Om. While chanting the syllable Om, to the Vedantin, the sense, the meaning attached to it is: I am the Light of Lights; I am the Sun, I am the real Sun, the apparent sun is my symbol only. I am the Sun, hefore whom the planets and all the bodies revolve. For my sake all the heavenly as well as the human bodies undergo their movements, do everything. I am immovable, eternal, the same yesterday, to-day and for ever. Before me does this whole globe, this whole universe, unfold itself. It goes on turning round and round to bring out before me all her parts-to show me everything that is hers. The earth revolves upon her axis to lay open before me all her sides; the universe does! all sorts of things for me; the sun sheds lustre for my sake; the moon shines for my sake, before me.'" Chanting the praises of the Self, thus, is the most potent means for changing the negative rhythm of the soul into the positive one. For, will is omnipotent, but unreasoning, and, for that reason, amenable to suggestion. So long as it is imbued with the idea of powerlessness and impotency, it cannot manifest its divine powers. The singing of its praises, consequently, is the most potent means of purging the individual consciousness of the harmful idea of its supposed weakness, and of lifting it out of the slough of despond and negativity. It immediately responds to the chant, and the joyous vibrations of power which are set up by holy mantras, such as the mono-syllable 'Om,' furnish the strongest practical proof of our statement. But let it be distinctly understood that mere counting of beads is time absolutely wasted

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440 away. Good lies only in meditation on the qualities and attributes of Godhood, but not in the words, the rosary, the beads or the thread on which they are strung. He alone who knows and meditates on his soul as God is to derive any benefit from the practice. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. We may now turn our attention to Bhakti Yoga which is supposedly the easiest, and, therefore, the most popular, path of Self-realization. Unfortunately, however, there is no direct causal connection between devotion or love and salvation, so that Bhakti must give place to some other method, if it is ever to lead to Nirvana. Nevertheless, Bhakti is said to lead to God-vision, which is regarded as the goal of evolution by the school of devotional Mysticism. What this notion of God-vision means may be gathered from a little discourse by Sri Ram Krishna Paramahamsa, a Hindu saint, who flourished in recent times. Asked by a disciple as to whether it was possible to see God, he replied:-"Certainly. These are some of the means by which one can see God: (1) going from time to time into solitude, (2) chanting His names and His attributes, (3) discrimination, and (4) earnest prayer, with a yearning for the Lord. Thou mayest see God, if thy love for Him is as strong as the three attachments put together, viz., the attachment of a worldly man to things of the world, the attachment of the mother to her child, and the attachment of a chaste and devoted wife to her husband. The thing is, in order to see God, one must love Him, heart and soul." Here also no attempt whatsoever is made to establish any causal connection between the vision of God and individual salvation, nor is any explanation offered of

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YOGA. 441 how the sight of another is to afford true and everlasting joy to the soul. The fact is that Mysticism aspires to soar above reason, and is, consequently, not very particular as to the data upon which it rests its conclusions. Hence, the greater the sense of mystery and louder the condemnation of reason in a discourse, the more it will be applauded by the devotee. Here is a sample of a milder type of protest against the voice of intellect: - "Only love for the Supreme Lord is true Bhakti. To the true bhakta all the philosophical distinctions are mere idle talk. He cares nothing for argument, he does not reason, he senses,' he perceives. He wants to lose himself in the pure love of God, and there have been bhaktas who maintain that this is more to be desired than liberation; who say, 'I do not want to be sugar, I want to taste sugar.' I want to love and enjoy the Beloved." This is just one of those passages which serve the purpose of Mysticism better than a thousand arguments, and furnish authority for discarding the voice of intellect. There is no true devotee who does not have his fling at reason when beaten in argument. With the voice of intellect silenced once for all, we need not feel surprised at the sayings or doings of mystical saints, some of whom even recommend the worshipping of God as one's own child, so that there might remain no feeling of awe or reverence to mar the fulness of love. This is, however, the extreme view, for the idea of devotion is not founded upon the element of fear, and does not recognize the existence of a god, or goddess, to be propitiated or appeased.

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442 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. There can be no fear in love, nor can bhakti be said to begin so long as one is afraid to approach its object. But the remedy for fear does not consist in regarding God as one's child, but in transferring one's attention from an unnatural to the natural object of adoration ; for while no one can eternally entertain a feeling of love for an enemy or a chastising dignitary, however much one might 'respect' him for his might, the heart is immediately and inalienably drawn to the true object of love, the moment it is proved to be worthy of adoration. Similarly, there is no room in bhakti for begging or bargaining with the Beloved. The idea of begging for favours is a sacrilege to the bhakta. He will not pray for help, health, wealth, or even to go to heaven. He who wishes to embark on the path of Love must give up all such desires, and fill his mind with holy thoughts. He who desires to come into the presence of the Beloved must make a bundle of all shop-keeping religion and cast it away from him before he can be allowed to set his foot within the shrine. It is not that you do not get what you pray for, for that depends on the working of certain laws of nature; but it is low and vulgar,-a beggar's religion. Fool, indeed, is he who living on the banks of the Ganges digs a little well for water. Fool, indeed, is hie who coming to a diamond mine begins to search for glass beads. These prayers for help, health, wealth and material prosperity are not bhakti; they are the lowest form of karma; and they stand in the way of realization of the soul's. great Ideal. Love is an emotion, not an exchange of goods, or

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YOGA 443 bartering of property ; it has nothing in common with the spirit of bargaining. The true bhakta cheerfully sacrifices everything for the object of his love, and would willingly give up home, family, wealth, and all else that ho might own, to catch but a fleeting glimpse of his Love's resplendent, glorious' face. He has ears and eyes only for the object of his love, and takes no interest in the concerns of men. He avoids the company of those engrossed in the affairs of the world, and becomes a wanderer on the face of the earth in search of his Beloved, unmindful of the requirements of the body and of the inclemency of seasons. He disregards both the taunts of men and the importunities of his own lower nature. In a word, he becomes mad with love. When his love reaches this supreme state of forgetfulness of the world, when his mind is purged of all desires for sensuous enjoyment, and when the consciousness of his own personality has become merged in the emotion of pure love for his true Self, then is the veil lifted up from the ravishing face of the 'Beloved' and he is allowed to drink deep at the very fountain of love and bliss itself. He then realizes the full force of the great saying, "What shall a man profit if he gain of the abundance of worldly goods, but lose his own soul ?" With the dropping of the scales from his eyes, his vision becomes clarified; he hears the mellifluent, melodious voice of love softly whisper in his ear the sweet and vivifying formula - that thou art-of divine wisdom ; he realizes the joyous import of the words, what thou beholdest beauteous creature is thy Self;' his heart leaps up with delight; and, with one bound, as it were, of the

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444 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ecstasy of super-consciousness, he plunges into the ocean of Joy in his own Self! We might call this intense love of the bhakta madness, if we please, it is certainly disregardful of what 'soul-less' humanity regard as sound intellectualismbut we must remember that it takes us not to tears, and sorrow, and darkness in the grave, as worldly wisdom undoubtedly does, but to the Land of Joy and Love and Immortality. Can the love of Mammon lead us an inch beyond Turkish carpets, motor cars, palaces for residence, and the like, all of which tend to expedite the approach of death, but can in no case confer immortality? Blessed is the madness which ends in bliss; who cares for the 'sanity' that leads to the grave? Those who wish to study the nature of Love from the standpoint of mysticism, will find it beautifully described in the Narada Sutra. We shall here give an extract of a few of its passages from an excellent translation of it by Mr. E. T. Sturdy. Love is of three kinds, namely, (1) where the only motive is to seek pleasure, to take all and to give nothing, (2) where there is exchange, and the loving depends on being loved-'I love thee, because thou lovest me,' and (3) where there is unconditional devotion, the giving everything and seeking nothing,no recognition, no return. The first is the love of the sensualist, the second that of the ordinary worldly man or woman, but the third is that of the real devotee. Love has been defined by Vyasa, as devotion to worship, by Garga, as devotion to hearing about the Atman; Sandilya considers it the unbroken feeling of the Universal Self in one's own self, and Narada refers to it as the -

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YOGA, 445 surrendering of all actions to God, and feeling the greatest misery in forgetting him. Narada further declares that it is greater than work, knowledge, or yoga, because it is its own reward, or end,- not merely a means to an end, as, he maintains, is the case with knowledge. Love emancipates the heart from impurity. It has no rights or property of its own ; neither does it tolerate the spirit of copy-righting. Wealth, strength, abilities--all must be held in trust for the world, at the service of every straggling manifestation of Life. The fruit of Love is enjoyed by him who avoids evil company, who associates with those of great mind, who gives up all sense of possession, who frequents lonely places, who uproots the bondage of karmas, who abandons all anxiety as to livelihood, who renounces the fruit of works, who gives up even the Vedas, and looks upon all living beings with equanimity. The true 'lonely place' is in the depths of the heart, where, with all the doorways of interruption through the senses fastened, the devotee sees, in unbroken solitude, nothing but his own pure Self as the 'one without a second.' "How are these doorways, through which distractions enter, to be closed ? For the bhakta, through Love, Love, and yet again Love; by driving away everything from his thoughts, but sympathy, compassion and those ideas and emotions which lead up to a perfectly impassioned Love-quixotic it may be --reckless, ridiculous to us in its fervour, but unconquerable and unrelenting. Giving it full play, never checking it, weeping, it may be, for the miseries of the world and the sense of separation from the one Ocean of Life and Love, day and night, in public or in

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446 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. solitude, caring for nothing, but attaining the realization of That : chastising himself through remorse and reproach for every shortcoming in Love, at length he reaches a great calm, a great serenity; he stands on the other shore.' He knows, he feels : his shoulders may become marked with the stripes that fall on those of others, but he suffers no longer : he is ever happy and satisfied. No words can explain that state, and because it cannot be expressed, except by negations, it is a mystery--the peace which passeth all understanding.'" When this all-powerful, all-conquering devotion, producing Love for friend and foe alike, springs up in the heart, it becomes pure, and is then prepared for God-vision. Ardour in the worship of the Self, constant contemplation of his glory, the dedication of all actions to him, and the feeling of extreme misery in losing him from memory, are some of the signs of true Devotion. It arises from knowledge, in the first instance, and itself leads to the perfection of Wisdom. As to the why and the wherefore of bhakti, Love is said to arise as the climax of a course of evolution. According to Srirupa Goswami : "First arises faith ; then follows attraction, and after that adoration. Adoration leads to suppression of worldly desires; and the result is single-mindedness and satisfaction. Then grows attachment which results in ebullition of sentiment. After this love comes into play." The above is the quintessence and general summary of the views of the devotional schools of religion. We shall now proceed to investigate the nature of the main principles underlying this particular branch of Yoga. To begin with, bhakti, being a form of the emotion of

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447 love, cannot possibly arise in the heart so long as it remains unconvinced of the special claim of the object of devotion to one's worship. Certainly no one can force himself to love another against his heart. It follows from this that genuine bhakti is not possible where reason is given the go-by before it has pronounced its benediction on the idol to be installed in the sacred temple of the heart. Fanaticism may, no doubt, flourish in the absence of the light of intellect, but, then, fanaticism has no foundation of truth, and the pursuit of untruth is not to be desired. It is not that one cannot be devoted to a false object, for that is a matter of personal belief, but that the worshipping of the false god, or ideal, is like a structure without a solid foundation, and is sure to lead to trouble sooner or later. Thus the first essential on the path of bhakti is the ascertainment of the true object of devotion. It is also important to know that spiritual love or devotion has little, or nothing, in common with the vehement, unreasoning ardour of a sensualist's passion, and that the men who endeavour to imitate the fullgushing, standard lover of an oriental love-story have no idea whatever of the kind of love implied in devotion to God. Love certainly does not signify unreasonableness, and irrational frenzy may be a characteristic of lunatics and fiends, but not of the worshippers of God. The truth is that the nature of devotion has been entirely misunderstood by the generality of men, who, unable to form a rational conception of the kind of love implied in bhakti, have been led to confound it with the mad impetuosity of sensuality. Some have even YOGA.

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448 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. likened it to a moth's fatal attraction for light, and oriental poetry revels in depicting the sensation of ' painful delight' which the tiny insect-lover is supposed to experience in the closing inoments of its life on the burning altar of love. Many persons are misled by these charming flights of fancy, and begin to interpret their own confused sensations and mental affections and the manifestations of psychic phenomena they might come across in all sorts of fanciful ways, always bent upon finding a confirmation of their own views in each and every occurrence. That this is not bhakti but a form of madness, is evident from the very nature of love which is an essential ingredient of devotion. As pointed out in the last chapter, love is of three kinds, according as it is (1) for the superior, (2) the equal or (3) the inferior. Of these, the first takes the form of respect for learning and age, respectful affection for the parent, reverence for the tutor, loyalty for the king and devotion or worship for the Tirthamkara (God). The second denotes equality of status, and manifests itself in the form of friendship, amity, passion and the like ; and the third assumes the form of benevolence, patronage and other similar emotions. Sexual love is a form of the second type, though one of its most complex phases, since it implies the engrafting of the idea of sexual relationship on the stock of amity and good fellowship. Love of the first type is founded on respect, of the second on mutual amity, and of the third op protection or watchfulness. It is thus clear that bhakti belongs to the class of emotions of love of the first kind, which are distinguish

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YOGA. 449 able from its remaining types on account of the element of respect. It would follow from this that neither the emotion of benevolence which is characteristic of love for an inferior, nor the full-gushing, impetuous ardour of the hero of a love-tale can be the appropriate form of love for the true God, thari whom no one has a better right to our respect. Nor is there room in devotion for the type of passion that exhausts itself in empty professions and protestations, and the only form that is admissible in religion is the intellectual which demonstrates its unbounded love and respect for God by intelligently walking in the footsteps of the Teacher and by understanding His word. It would seem that the confusion of thought, which has arisen among the followers of Mysticism on this point, is due to a failure to discriminate between the different kinds of love which have been enumerated above, and to a vague notion of the moth type of passion being the most. perfect. But it is clear that no one ever dreams of loving his parent, tutor or king after the manner of a moth ; and it is also evident that God cannot be likened to a silly, empty-headed coquette who judges the merit of her different suitors according to the amount of vehemence put in by them in their protestations of love. The fact is that love is a motive power grounded on belief, and manifests itself by becoming translated into action, the manifestations of its activity taking different but appropriate, typical forms, according to the nature of relationship in which the object of love stands to him who loves. Thus, we offer devotion and worship to a Tirthamkara (God), reverence to a tutor, loyalty to a 29

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450 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. king, friendship to our equals, and protection and patronage to those who are inferior to us. But we do not offer devotion to a king, patronage to a tutor, or worship to a child. Every one of these has his particular form of love, and must be loved in that very form. This is the rule of Love, tbe breach of which cannot but be fraught with evil consequences. One has only to picture to oneself the consequences of approaching a parent, tutor or king with the romantic sentiments of a Romeo to realize the absurdity of the situation and the amount of evil resulting from a disregard of this rule. The case with God is no different; He has His own appropriate form of love, and must be loved in that very form. The idea of putting the all-knowing, ever blissful Godhead on a par with every love-sick Juliet of romance is absolutely disgusting; and it does not improve matters a bit if we reverse the role of relationship. For, while the idea of God as a Romeo, madly in love with the human soul, cannot be deemed to present a picture of divine perfection either in knowledge, bliss or power, on the one hand, the disparity of class and incongruity of type is not done away with, on the other. It is thus clear that the true significance of love in reference to God has nothing in common with the idea of passion between the two sexes, nor can God be loved as one's child. Devotion to God really means a devotion to the attributes of divinity, which the devotee wishes to develop in his own soul, and consists in the blending of the fullest measure of love and respect for those who have evolved out those very attributes in perfection. Thus, bhakti in its true sense means devotion to an

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YOGA. 451 ideal, and, incidentally, the worshipping of those who have already attained to its realization. The causal connection between the ideal of the soul and the worshipping of those who have already realized it is to be found in the fact that the realization of an ideal demands one's whole-hearted attention, and is only possible by following in the footsteps of those who have actually reached the goal. : The analysis of the nature of bhakti entitles us to say that no one who does not excite, in the fullest degree, the feelings of love and respect in our hearts is entitled to our devotion. This amounts to saying that the heart does not offer its devotion to any but the being who happens to be its greatest sympathiser and well-wisher. Now, since these qualifications are to be found in the Tirthamkara alone who preaches the dharma (religion or path) that leads to the Perfection and Bliss of Gods, in other words, who enables the soul to attain to the sublime status of Godhood, none but He is entitled to or can command the full adoration of the heart. According to modern theologians, however, bhakti implies devotion to a Supreme Being on the ground of his being the creator of the world and the maker of souls and their bodies. But this is quite untenable, firstly, because the notion of a creator of the world and of the maker of souls and their material bodies has been seen to be illogical, and, secondly, because an act of this kind performed voluntarily in the past is incapable of engendering the emotion of love, much less of devotional love, though it might possibly give rise to a feeling of

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452 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. gratitude on the part of those born with a silver spoon in their miouths. But even this sense of gratitude would be entirely wanting, and might be counter-indicated by a strong feeling of hatred in the case of those unfortunate ones who find themselves placed, for no fault of theirs, in unsuitable and painful surroundings, and of those who are created to people the hell,' as the holy Qur'an asserts. The case with those who believe in the existence of a creator, but make his creative activity subservient to the principle of karma is even worse, since on their hypothesis the creator becomes merely an artificer of karma, without a voice of his own, so that neither praise nor blame can ever be earned by him. It follows from this that no one can ever feel grateful to such a creator for his creative activity. We may now turn our attention to the teaching of Mysticism which maintains that God should be worshipped to obtain his vision, or to become absorbed in him. This view also is not tenable, since the vision or contact of another cannot possibly afford anything more than a passing sensation, which is as different from true happiness as a piece of stone from bread. As a matter of fact, true joy is the natural attribute of the soul, and becomes an actuality of experience the moment one gives up the idea of extracting it from things outside his own Self. Hence, so long as one expects to find joy in things outside one's own soul, true joy cannot come into manifestation. It is thus clear that neither the vision nor the contact of another can ever take the place of true happiness which the soul is athirst for.

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YOGA. 453 The idea of absorption in God has also nothing to commend itself to common sense, for two simple and indestructible substances or realities can never become fused into one by any possibility; and since both the souls and God are indestructible by nature, it is clearly impossible for either of them to become merged in the other. The analogy of the absorption of a drop in the sea, which Mysticism relies upon in support of its proposition, is beside the point, because analogy is no argument. It, however, actually refutes that which it is supposed to prove, since the sea, is not a unit, but only a collection of drops, so that the additional drop only goes to increase the number of those already there. Apart from this, it is permissible to ask : what may be the effect of the chemical operation of absorption ? Would the soul survive the event, or be wiped out in the process ? No mystic has yet succeeded in giving a satisfactory reply to these all important questions, but we can see for ourselves that in the former case the idea of absorption is more imaginary than real, and in the latter the dismal prospect of extinction suffices to rob the operation of the very last vestige of attractiveness. Those who have realized the weakness of their mystic creed on the point have tried to evade the difficulty by arguing that love is its own reward or end. But this, too, does not advance their case any further, and is clearly an endeavour to throw dust in the eyes of reason, because the end is not love but happiness. Now, since it so chances that happiness and love are not

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454 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. synonymous words, the use of the one for the other is not permissible in philosophy or rational literature. As already observed, the only being who is entitled to the fullest measure of our devotion is the Teacher who preaches the 'Path' that leads to the perfection and joy of Gods. He is worshipped not because worship or devotion is the end in itself, but because He is the only true guide to the Goal, so that devotion is primarily centred round the Ideal of the soul. Here, again, we observe that idealatry and not idolatry is the path to nirvana. Thus, in its primary sense, bhakti really means devotion to the Ideal of the soul, and, in a secondary one, the worshipping of those Great Ones who have already attained to its realization, and who are, therefore, best qualified to instruct and guide others. It is this great Ideal of the Soul which demands our whole, undivided attention and full devotion. It is this which has been personified as Christos or Krishna in the mystery-language of mythology, and it is this which explains the element of unreasonableness in the mystic creeds. For what has been seen to be childish and unreasonable in love, in relation to a Supreme Being, is quite appropriate to the Ideal of Life personified as god. The rationale of bhakti can now be described with logical precision. First arises discernment or insight, called faith; this changes the outlook of life, transforms loose conceptions and stray notions about dharma into right knowledge, and is followed by an intense desire for the realization of the Ideal. This is devotion or love, and leads to the worship of the Tirthamkara. Finally, when conduct is purified and becomes perfect

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455 under the combined influence of knowledge and love, the binding force of karmas is destroyed and the soul is set free to enjoy its natural omniscience and bliss. As regards the statement that purity of the heart enables one to have God-vision, the truth is that the effect of an intense craving for the realization of the Ideal is to make the mind one-pointed by preventing its restiveness and wandering after the sense-objects in the world. This leads to purity of consciousness which then reflects its own natural effulgence-the glory of God. Just as in a storm one cannot see the objects lying at the bottom of a pond, owing to the disturbed and muddy state of its water, so is not the vision of the inner Divinity possible so long as the individual consciousness remains muddy and disturbed by the uncontrolled, tempestuous fury and mad impetuosity of a desire-ridden will. And, just as the objects at the bottom of the pond can be clearly perceived when the storm abates, so is the vision of the Self obtainable with ease when the surface of the lake of human consciousness is rendered calm and smooth by the subsidence of the activity of the desiring manas (lower mind). When the heart is rid of the taint of attachment to the things of the world, it reflects the natural effulgence of the soul and enables it to see itself. Hence, the statement that the pure in heart shall see God. This finishes our survey of the path of Bhakti. * YOGA. As regards the remaining departments of Yoga, the analysis of the methods of Jnana and Bhakti practically disposes of them also; for they also aim at concentration, although the Raja-yogi tries to attain it by the

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456 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. control of mind itself, and the follower of Hatha Yoga by the restraint of the physical body and the avenues of the senses. Neither Raja Yoga nor Hatha Yoga, if taken by itself, can, however, achieve any great results, since the scientific method consists neither purely in the control of mind nor exclusively in the subjugation of the body, but in the doing of the right thing at the right time, as will be seen in a subsequent chapter. So far, however, as concentration of mind is concerned, all the departments of Yoga which have been examined here are at one on laying emphasis on it. The reason for this is obvious. If we look into the nature of the power which is exerted in all cases of concentration, without a single exception, we shall not fail to discover it to be our will. Hence, we may say that Yoga is the science which directly develops the will. - Now, inasmuch as the emancipation of will from the bondage of sin, and the possession of life more full and abundant, are the aims of the soul, obviously that whose every step is calculated to increase the power of the individual will is the only channel of liberation. In this sense, Yoga, certainly, is the science of liberation par excellence. The chief obstacle on the path of Yoga, which beginners have to get over, lies in the mechanism of habit which the easy-going will likes to adhere to. It is not to be supposed that the actual, practical science of Yoga is characterized by anything resembling the ease with which we have been discussing it here. We know, from practical experience, how hard it is to break through any deep-rooted habit. How difficult it is to give up drinking, for instance, when once the craving

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YOGA. 457 for liquor has become a habit with will ? Yoga has to get over not one or two of such habits alone, but over all those traits and tendencies and inclinations which lead in the wrong direction; and their number is legion. Few, indeed, there be who aspire to rise above the smoothrunning, though destructive, mechanism of habitude, and they alone are benefited by Yoga. For the rest, whose minds are steeped in the materialism of the world, neither Yoga' nor any other method can do anything. Hence, Yoga accepts only those disciples, in the first instance, in whom zeal and earnestness have been emancipated from the thraldom of slothfulness of habit, by viveka (discrimination), vairagya (non-attachment), tyaga (renunciation) and faith. If we ponder over these last-named qualifications, we shall discover that without their aid it is not possible to enter upon the steep path of salvation. Obviously, there can be no desire for liberation unless there be present to the mind a keen sense of discrimination between the reality of the state of Nirvana and the transitory, shadowy nature of the world. Hence, the first essential is the discrimination between the Real and the unreal.' Next, it is also easy to see that unless the desire for liberation is intense enough to overcome all other desires which tend to prolong the bondage, it will be overpowered by them. Hence, unless the will of the Yogi is fortified by such powerful virtues, as non-attachmeut, renunciation and faith, it is not likely to overcome the weaknesses of flesh, or attain to any appreciable success. Therefore, no one who, having entered the path, looks behind at the world on which he has turned his back, is worthy of Yoga. It was for

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458 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. this reason that Jesus reprimanded the disciple who wanted leave to bury the dead. These principles appear foolish and silly only so long as we do not look deep into the cause of success itself. Whatever be the ideal to be attained, it is inconceivable how success can result without perseverance and concentration of mind ; and it is equally unimaginable how concentration and perseverance can be harnessed into service without the giving up of those attractions and pursuits which distract away attention from the goal. Yoga, therefore, rightly insists on the possession of the above-mentioned virtues. From being accepted as a disciple to the full realization of the Self, that is, the attainment of bliss, eight steps are pointed out by Patanjali, the venerable codifier of this science; and they are, 1 Yama, 2 Niyama, 3 Asana, 4 Prarayama, 5 Pratyahara, 6 Dharana, 7 Dhyana and 8 Samadhi. Of these, yama signifies truthfulness, nonstealing, continence and non-receiving of gifts ; niyama means cleanliness, contentment, study and surrendering oneself to God; and pranayama conveys the idea of controlling the vital force. The first two mean the moral training of the soul, but the third, namely, pranayama, is a very different thing. We shall first of all take up the question of morality. Morality is the basis of Yoga, and it has been said, in so many words, that without it no one can attain to Nirvana. Of all the religions in the world there is none in which perjury, theft, murder, adultery and all other offences are not condemned in strong terms. They differ, however, in degree. In some, for in

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YOGA. 459 stance, non-killing is enjoined in respect of mankind alone ; while in others, as in Jainism, it is said that mercy shall not be for man alone, but shalI go beyond, and embrace the whole world. The question naturally arises that, although all the rational religions, which have swayed in the past and are now swaying the destinies of hundreds of millions of human beings in the World, are agreed as to the things to be performed and the deeds to be avoided, why is it that their behests are trampled under foot and disobeyed ? How is it that the Hindus now do not entertain the same respect for animal life as they did in the past? Why is it that the Christians no longer live the life delineated in the Sermon on the Mount, or the Mohammedans abide by the doctrine of complete resignation to the will of God ? By morality the Yogi does not mean the modern lip-morality of the world, which regards the Messianic injunction,_"whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek turn to him the other also," ---as meant only for the high-flown style of pulpit oratory, and as quite inapplicable to the affairs of practical life, but a real, live code of Ethics which does not brook violation of its least commandment, and which, consequently, must be respected and obeyed. The difference lies in the fact that, while the Yogi aims at perfecting himself, by bringing into manifestation the good, the true, and the beautiful in his own soul, the ambition of the man of the world does not soar higher than dominion over the world and bags of gold and silver. The latter, not knowing the uses of what the former regards as a useless commodity, and not knowing where and when to stop, goes on

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460 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. seeking and piling up wealth, till he kills himself in its pursuit. The former, knowing the true worth of money, cares not to soil his happiness by coming in contact with it, and thus avoids all the worries and flurries and doubts and disappointments of the money-maker, courteously nick-named the city-magnate. Now, mark the different results of the two pursuits. The city-magnate might possess heaps of gold in his safe ; he might have a large balance to his credit in one or more banks; he might be able to purchase, or otherwise procure, all the paraphernalia of luxury which constitute the pleasure of the worldly-minded ; but all this can be boast of at the cost of health, beauty and youth, to say nothing of true happiness, which, it would seem, is beyond his understanding. While he has been busy in the pursuit of riches, dyspepsia, gout, and rheumatism have been busy in his pursuit; and by the time that he lays his hold on money, these lay their hold on him. So is the case with ugliness. No one, whether a city-magnate or not, can, with impunity, spend hours of mental torture, or toss, night after night, from side to side, in bed, in racking his brains for devising newer methods of amassing more gold, or of making good the losses already incurred. Mental anguish must leave its visible, ugly marks behind, in the shape of a wrinkled forehead, distorted features and wretched looks. Just think over it, was man born to be a wretched, miserable being, a living, burning libel on personal beauty and a victim to all sorts of ghastly and incurable diseases, or does he make himself so? The millionaire makes his pile, it is true ; but it

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461 is not in his power to enjoy it. The money which perhaps would have been more useful to some poor, needy peasant, now lies buried in his iron safe, free from the contamination of poverty; but it carries its own curse with it, the man who made it is not to enjoy it! It is true that the man of money sleeps in his mansion, and his couch consists of the most luxurious, springy bed that human ingenuity can devise, while the Yogi lies down on mother earth, but it is no less true that the latter gets up in the morning, saying, 'uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,' and the former feeling it. YOGA. When man understands that every little departure from the strict code of morality, as laid down by Religion, goes to stamp the features with ugliness and misery, renders the system sensitive to the infection and onslaught of disease-bearing germs and also tends to shorten life, to say nothing of its evil effect on the future career of the soul, he will come to estimate the scathing condemnation of the Scribes and Pharisees by Jesus at its proper worth. The Yogi is not against your making money, provided you do not lose sight of the real aim. The true principle is to do whatever work is natural or congenial to one's station in life, but to do it unconcernedly, always remembering that wealth is not the be all and end all of existence. One need entertain no fear of poverty, or starvation, by working in this unconcerned manner. One fears only so long as one does not understand the truth. The moment you give up theorizing and put the statement to practical test, you will find the Master's words, "Seek ye first the Kingdom

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462 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you" (Matth. vi. 33), a piece of literal truism. This is the fundamental basis of morality. There is no Supreme Being to get angry with us for our transgressions; but they carry their punishment with them; and each time that we violate the least commandment we are punished with ugliness and disease, and that most coveted possession of saints and sages, which Yogis call peace of mind, is denied us, for a shorter: or longer period, according to the nature of the sin and the atonement we might have made subsequently, consciously, or otherwise. When the accumulated deposit of disease' assumes such dimensions as preclude the idea of redemption, in the particular incarnation, death destroys the body, and, thus, graciously puts an end to the physical suffering and torments of a worn out, diseased, and dilapidated organism, the owner of which has signally failed to utilize his chance of life eternal. Morality in religion means a God-like attitude of Purity and Love towards all beings. It aims at turning men into Gods, and there is no room in it for the hollow sentimentality of the world which exhausts itself in wordy protestations of goodness and virtue. It is not an admirer of wolves in sheep's skin, who for securing the good opinion of their stupid and insincere neighbours go down on their knees and offer up long and elaborate prayers in public, who give a small pittance of their wealth with all the noise and fuss that they can make for a mention in the press, who place large sums of money at the disposal of royalty to secure a title, or who shed crocodile tears to excite the respect of their

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YOGA. 463 kind. Religion sent its condemnation of the hypocrisy of the world 2,000 years ago, through Jesus. Morality, in religion, means the purification of the inner as well as the outer nature. Let no thought which is not pure and God-like ever enter the heart; let the mind dwell on nothing but what is good, and true,' and beautiful. Purify the heart; talk of nothing but God; think of nothing but God ; let purity surround you within and without. The Vedantist puts it: "When thy consciousness dwelling in pure light and pure love, does not admit any other thought but that of thy beloved, thy Real self, then how is it possible to think of good or bad, of the dual throng? Then you sing nothing but thyself. Then you are speaking nothing but God's music. Then you chant nothing but God's beauty. Then you feel nothing but God's hand in all hands, God's eye in all eyes, God's mind in all minds, God's love in all loves, God's virtues in all virtues, God's presence in each and every thing."-Rama Tirtha. The next step is Asana, i.e., posture for contemplation. Steady posture is necessary to keep the body motionless, else its unchecked restlessness would distract the mind and dissipate the energy of will. The asana that is generally adopted by yogis is a sitting posture, with legs crossed, after the manner of the images of the Jaina Tirthamkaras. When the asana becomes firm and is no longer a source of distraction to the mind, pranayama may be practised with ease. The word pranayama really signifies the controlling of energy, though it is generally taken to mean the regulation of breath. According to yogis, it means the controlling of the cosmic energy. Says Swami Vivekananda : "Just as akasa is the infinite, omnipresent material of this

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464 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. universe, so is this prana, the infinite, omnipresent manifesting power of this universe. The knowledge and control of this prana is really what is meant by the pranayama. This opens to us the door to almost unlimited power." The primary object of pranaya ma, according to Yoga, is to control the numerous activities of the body, so as to be able to prevent the uncontrolled dissipation of energy in all directions, and to acquire the power to direct it in any particular channel, at will. Breathing is the main source of absorbing pranic energy from the atmosphere, and is to the physical body what a fly-wheel is to machinery. As the motion of the fly-wheel causes the rest of the machinery to move, so does the motion of the lungs impart energy to the rest of the organism, With each breath we inhale a certain amount of prana (electricity or vital force) from the atmospheric air. This electricity is absorbed by the blood, and is stored up in the nervous system. The yogi aims at controlling this vital force by regulating his breath. Ordinarily, respiration is an involuntary act, although it can be partially brought under the dominion of volition, as in speaking, singing, and the like. Its movements are under the special control of that portion of the cerebro-spinal axis which is known as the medulla oblongata. By controlling the respiratory action the Yogi establishes control over the vital forces in his body. He begins by correcting the normal breath. According to Yoga, the proper method of breathing is neither exclusively clavicular, nor thoracic, nor even diaphragmatic, but a combination of them all. The object is to remove the condition of passivity from the system, and that can be accomplished by (1) in

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YOGA. 465 haling a large quantity of the vital breath from the atmosphere, and (2) by employing it for energizing, the nervous centres of the spinal column and brain which control the whole system. The lung capacity increases with practice, but it also requires certain other aids. The food must be pure, wholesome and non-irritating, so that the body should acquire purity and elasticity. Smoking and drinking must be given up with animal diet, as they actually produce the very conditions which it is the aim of Yoga to remove. Along with the regulation of diet, certain purificatory exercises in breathing have also to be practised for rendering the nerves supple and light. This generally takes a few months, at the end of which sufficient control is obtained to will the prana to any particular part of the body. This enables the Yogi to get rid of many kinds of disease from his system. Rhythmical breathing is also a powerful ally in gaining control over the vital forces of the body. The Yogi declares that rhythm pervades the universe. In all vibrations is to be found a certain rhythm, so that all cosmical movements and manifestations of force are rhythmical. Our bodies are as much subject to the law of rhythm as are the notes of music, or the feet of a poem. Says the author of "The Hatha Yoga" : "You have heard how a note on a violin, if sounded repeatedly and in rhy'thm, will start into motion vibrations which will in time destroy a bridge. The same result is true when a regiment of soldiers crosses a bridge, the order being always given to break step'on such occasion, lest the vibrations bring down both the bridge and regiment. These manifestations of the effect of rhythmic motion will give you an idea of the effect of rhythmic breathing.

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466 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The whole system catches the vibrations and becomes in harmony with the will, which causes the rhythmic motion of the lungs, and, while in such complete harmony, will respond readily to orders from the will. With the body thus attuned, the Yogi finds no difficulty in increasing the circulation in any part of the body by an order from the will, and in the same way he can direct an increased current of the nerve force to any part of the organ, strengthening and stimulating it." . In this manner the Yogi catches the swing, as it were, and is able to absorb and control a large amount of prana from his surroundings. The secret of rhythmic breathing is that it sets every fibre of the body vibrating with vitality, so that when all the motions of the body become rhythmical, the body itself becomes, as it were, a gigantic battery of will. In rhythmic breathing the main thing to be grasped is the idea of rhythm. To quote again from " The Hatba Yoga" : " The yogi bases his rhythmic time upon a unit corresponding with the beat of his heart. The heart beat varies in different persons but the heart beat unit of each person is the proper rhythmic standard for that particular individual in his rhythmic breathing. Ascertain your normal heart beat by placing your fingers over your pulse, and then count: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6; 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, etc., until the rhythm becomes firmly fixed in your mind. .... The yogi rule of rhythmic breathing is that the units of inhalation and exhalation should be the same, while the units for retention and between the breaths should be one half the number of those of inhalation and exhalation." When the novice has mastered these exercises, he will be able to will the vital prana in the body to any part of it, banishing and destroying the causes of disharmony from his system. The training of the will by pranayama gives a push to the mind, which, in due .course of time, acquires the capacity to respond to higher

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YOGA. 467 vibrations, and becomes, what may be called, super-conscious. Such is the object of pranayama in the science of Yoga. The whole scope of Raja Yoga, in the words of Vivekananda, is really to teach the control and direction of prana on different planes. It is said in the Yoga Vasistba that - "If the motion of Praga and therefore the mind be arrested, both internally and externally, then will death and dotage fly to a great distance. Then will abide in the body dhatus (spiritual substances) such as will never be expelled at any time. Those only can be said to have truly cognized the Reality who, walking in the path of Atman Jnana, eradicate their desires, render thereby their intelligence clear, and tear asunder all the bonds of the mind. As the fluctuating mind arises through its gradual association with objects, births and deaths also arise. It is only when the mind quits all, without any attraction or repulsion towards objects, that it will cease to exist. If thoughts are destroyed through the extinction of vasanas (desires), then quiescence will result and the mind's destruction will ensue. If there is no thought of any worldly object or of any place, how can the mind exist (separate) in the void of akasa ? ... The wise say that the mind denudes itself of its form, even though engaged in actions, if it, after dissolving all things unto itself, becomes as cool as ambrosia." Touching the effect of the control of prana, we are further told : "The control of prana is tantamount to (or leads to) an abdication of external vasanas. With the giving up of rasanas the mind does not exist; the same result accrues with the control of prana. Through a long practice of prana's control and through the initiation by a guru, asana (posture), diet and dhyana (meditation), prana is controlled, But the vasands will be extinguished through the performance of actions without any attraction (or desire), the non-contemplation of samsara (or the absence of love for this mundane life) and the seeing of all things of form as formless. If there is an end to the life of our antagonist, the vasanas, the mind too will not arise. Should the winds cease to blow, will particles of dust be seen floating in the atmosphere? The fluctuation of prana is that of the painful mind.

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468 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Therefore, the control of prana should be the natural and unfailing duty of all spiritually-minded persons of wisdom." To put it in terms which are easily comprehensible to the modern mind, the object of Yoga is to remove the impurities of sin that have entered into the constitution of the soul, and have thrown it into the condition of negativity. The pursuit of Yoga enables the soul to develop its will, which speedily consumes and destroys. the accumulated deposits of sin. When this is done, the soul rises up like a balloon freed from its moorings, and enters Nirvana. Prandyama enables the soul to develop its will, and is, for that reason, a necessary part of Yoga. But it is useful only up to a certain stage, for otherwise it will itself constitute a distraction to the concentration of mind on the Self. Besides, will is also developed by other means, independently of pranayama, as for instance, by knowledge ; hence, those who can develop their wills by other means need not concern themselves. with the regulation of breath. After pranaya ma comes pratyahura, which means gathering towards," that is, checking the outgoing energy of the mind, and freeing it from the thraldom of the senses. Next comes dharand, that is, the holding of the mind on a certain point, to the exclusion of all others, e.g., the fixing of attention on the heart. Dhyana is the next step in Yoga, and means contemplation of the Self, so that when the mind is freed from the thraldom of the senses, and does not wander outwards, it can be easily employed in the contemplation of the Atman. This will naturally lead up to Samadhi, the state in which the soul enjoys its own

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YOGA. 469 inherent, natural bliss. Why samadhi is the realization of the ideal of the soul, is because in that state all taint of attachment for the outside world, together with its concomitants, pleasure and pain, is transcended, intellect is left behind, and the soul is set free to feel its own glory and bliss. When this stage is reached, the soul no longer argues and disputes ; it simply knows. It then enjoys the bliss and blessedness of perfection. What this state means, cannot be put in words ; for it is one of feeling, and neither language, nor intellect is capable of accurately depicting, or describing feelings. However, the following description from the pen of the present President of the Theosophical Society would be found lucid enough to convey a fairly good idea of the sublime state of ecstasy : * There are moments, supreme and rare moments, that come to the life of the pure and spiritual, when every sheath is still and harmonious, when the senses are tranquil, quiet and insensitive, when the mind is serene, calm and unchanging ; when fixed in meditation the whole being is steady and nothing that is without may avail to disturb; when love has permeated every fibre, when devotion has illuminated, so that the whole is translucent ; there is a silence, and in the silenco there is a sudden change; no words may tell it, no syllables may utter it, but the change is there. All limitations have fallen away. Every limit of every kind has vapished : as stars seen in boundless space, the self is in limitless life, and knows no limit and realizes no bound : light in wisdom, consciousness of perfect light that knows no shadow, and therefore knows not itself as light; when the thinker has become the knower; when all reason has vanished and wisdom taken its place; who shall say what it is save that it is bliss ? Who shall try to utter that which is uputterable in mortal speech, but it is true and it exists." * Many instances of such ecstatic joy are to be found * The Self and its Sheaths, p. 71.

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470 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. in the lives of mystics, and Prof. James mentions some in his "Varieties of Religious Experience." Beyond the reach of speech, it cannot be expressed in words ; it is a state on the emotional side of consciousness, and must be felt to be realized. It remains to be said that from time immemorial an interesting controversy has been going on in respect of the practical merit and worth of the Jnana and Bhakti methods of Self-realization. The subject has been discussed in the instructive little pamphlet, entitled the "Fourth Book of Practical Vedanta," by Pt. G. K. Sastri. The book is, however, not likely to interest many persons, as it does not deal with the subject philosophically. A similar intellectual controversy, it seems, prevailed amongst the several sects and schools of practical religion in the Holy Land. "Can any good come out of Nazareth ? "--was the common expression of ridicule and contempt with which the followers of the path of knowledge (J nana) were wont to look down upon the devotees of Bhakti (Love). This did not mean that the Jews were actually foolish enough to think that the little village of Nazareth was too insignificant to be the birth-place of a World-Teacher. It is sheer prejudice which has led some of us to ascribe such crass. ignorance to the Semitic race. As a matter of fact, the custodians of the wisdom of the Kabbala were intellectual men and could not be credited with the belief that greatness depended upon geographical limits, or the dimensions of towns and villages. " The name Nazir," says Dr. Paul Carus, " has nothing to do with the village of Nazareth. Etymologically, the word means a devotee.

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YOGA. 471 Nazareth must have been a very unimportant place, for it is not mentioned at all in the Hebrew literature, and we do not even know the Hebrew spelling of the word. This has given rise to the idea entertained by some hypercritical minds that a village of that name did not exist in Christ's time. In all probability, it is the place now called en-Nasira, a little village in Galilee. *** That Jesus was a Nazarene (or, according to the Hebrew term, a Nazir) we have canonical testimony. The Nazirim *** are known, through a statement in the Acts, to have been a communistic sect who held all things in common. *** They kept the Mosaic Law and believed in Jesus as the Messiah " (The Age of Christ). Paul, though not a Nazir himself, associated with them (The Acts, XXIV. 5). The early Christians were called Nazarenes, and their descendants are still known in the East as Nasaras, or Nasarees. Dr. William Benjamin Smith writes : "The epithet Nazaraeus is not derived from a city called Nazareth; there was, in fact, no such city at the beginning of our era. The epithet is an appellation primarily of a Deity; it is formed after the analogy of Hebrew proper names ending in iah, as Zachariah, the ish representing Jehovah and is derived from the familiar old Semitic nazar, meaning keep, guard, protect, so that the Syriac * Nazarya' is very nearly Guardian-Yah. The names Jesus and Nazaraeus differ about as Salvator and Servator. The Nazarenes (or Nasarees) were in all likelihood the worshippers of Nazarya, and according to Epiphanius were before Christ and knew not Christ.'"'* The sect in question did not originate with Jesus, nor did the expression--"Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth ?" (John, I. 46) acquire currency, for the first time, during his career. Samuel and Samson who preceded Jesus by at least a few centuries were both followers of this sect. There is a mention of the vow of the Nazarite in the Book of Numbers (chap. VI. * The Lost Language of Symbolism, by Harold Bayley, vol. II., P. 286, foot-note.

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472 2), and the rules of conduct becoming a Nazir are also given in the Bible. There can be little doubt that the word Nazareth in the contemptuous expression, "can any good thing come out of Nazareth," referred to devotion, not to an actual village of that name, which might or might not have existed in the Holy Land, and is expressive of the ridicule in which the followers of Jnana Yoga held those of the path of Bhakti. In order to enter fully into the spirit of the controversy, it is necessary to revert to the precise nature of Moksha, or redemption, concerning which there does not seem to have been much difference of opinion, in the earlier days, among the ancients. It was recognized to be the attainment of the Ideal of happiness-whatever might be the views of the different schools as to its precise nature-on all hands. Hence, the difference of opinion was confined to the merit of the various means employed to achieve that devoutly wished for end. Now, since bhakti is not even possible where its object has not been determined by knowledge, it is clear that the bestower of moksha is knowledge alone, in the first instance, that is to say, that without right knowledge Nirvana cannot be attained, all other efforts to the contrary notwithstanding. That being so, Raja Yoga, bhakti and other methods (if any) are obviously insufficient to meet the situation, though, if properly practised, medidation is sure to lead to knowledge, without it being necessary for their adherents to go to school to study philosophy. Knowledge inheres in consciousness, and because consciousness is the function of the soul-substance, it (knowledge) also necessarily becomes THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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YOGA. 473 innate in each and every soul. Hence, knowledge arises from within, and education is a drawing out, from e, out, and duco, to lead. Many of the past sages and prophets were quite innocent of the art of reading and writing, and yet some of us still marvel at their knowledge and insight. All this goes to show that knowledge needs only meditation and concentration to rise to the surface.' Thus, wherever there is concentration of thought, wisdom is sure to reveal itself there, sooner or later. Hence, the bhaktas hold that Brahma (Wisdom) himself comes to teach them Truth, preparatory to their admission to Nirvana. The least commendable form of Yoga, the path of physical austerity, such as standing on one leg for a long time, was also intended as an aid towards concentration. The conclusion is that all the methods of realization examined here are calculated to lead to knowledge, if there be sufficient concentration and meditation. The real difficulty in respect of the question which has given rise to this discussion arises, however, when we come to look into the difference between knowledge and belief. All the scriptures are unanimous in declaring, 'believe and be baptized,' but none actually maintains 'know and be saved.' Psychologically, there is a great difference between superficial knowledge and belief, since motor effects are apt to follow the latter, but not the former. Hence, it is belief in one's Godhood, not mere superficial acquaintance with that idea, which leads to Nirvana. When meditation has led to the knowledge of identity between the self and the Self, it becomes incumbent

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474 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. on the soul to raise that knowledge to the point of belief. Right belief being acquired, speedy realization is possible by combining the path of knowledge with that of proper conduct. The path of the "Jinas" (Masters) is three-fold, according to Jainism, and consists in Right Insight or Faith, Right Knowledge, and Right Conduct. So far as faith, or insight, and knowledge are concerned, we need not dwell any further on their nature; but it is clear that right action, hence conduet, is the very essence of all rational methods of attaining the desired end, for no process which consists in a series of inactions, or things done wrongly, i.e., in a topsy-- turvy manner, can ever be relied upon to lead us to any expected results. Right action, thus, is the most essential element of success, and the systems which ignore, or minimize, its importance have no right to be considered rational. If we seriously think over the matter, we shall soon learn that there is no difference between the spiritual and any other kind of ideal in respect of the principles governing the method of realization. Analysis would show that the successful achievement of an object of desire depends on (1) the belief in the possibility of its attainment, (2) the knowledge of the means of its attainment, and (3) the doing of the right thing at the right moment. These three essentials of success give us the why and the wherefore of all scientific methods, and constitute the standard with which we may judge and determine the true nature and merit of each of the several paths, Jnana Yoga and the like.

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YOGA. 475 Thus, neither jnana, nor bhakti, nor mental control, nor physical asceticism is by itself sufficient to translate the ideal into an actuality of experience. These are all valuable adjuncts along with one another, but, taken separately, they all lack that causal validity of scientific thought which is the hall-mark of practicability. It will be seen that knowledge and salvation are not actually synonymous terms, while bhakti (devotion) is not even possible where the object thereof is unknown. Hence, bhakti may be said to begin truly when knowledge reaches the degree of certitude implied in faith, and devotion to an ideal marks the first stage of progress when knowledge is translated into action. To sum up, the real Yoga for man is to know and realize his own divine nature, and to establish himself in the beatific state of blessedness and bliss by subduing and mortifying the little, self-deluded, bodily self. The process of realization is threefold, and consists in Right Insight or Faith, Right Knowledge, and Right Conduct, that is to say, in singeing the wings of sin, .., ignorance, by the fire of Wisdom, in destroying the delusion of duality by faith in the Godhood of the Self, and in radiating peace and goodwill and joy to all beings in the universe ; in short, in settling down to the enjoyment of one's true Self, here and now. Let the world call it idleness, if it likes ; what does it matter to the soul ? Neither Mahavira, nor Jesus, nor any other Saviour of the race kept shop, or sold merchandise. Yet, who ever dared consider them idle ? What is the value of the opinion of the worldly mortals to him who depends not on the opinion of others or

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476 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. his happiness, but who knows and feels the Self to be the very fountain-head of bliss itself? "I tell you what is man's supreme vocation. Before me was no world, 'tis my creation. 'Twas I who raised the Sun from out the sea, The moon began her changeful course with me."-Goethe.

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CHAPTER VIII. RESURRECTION "Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead."- Romans. "But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen. And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ : whom he has not raised up, if so be that the dead rise not."--St. Paul. In his first epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul, the most philosophical of the apostles of Jesus, unhesitatingly bases the whole of the 'new' doctrine on the power of the soul to rise from the dead, for if there is to be no conquest of death in the experience of the aspiring jiva, vain, indeed, is the teaching of religion, and equally vain the promises of a life more full and abundant and everlasting in nirvana. But what does this conquest of death, without which religion would be reduced to a sorry farce, signify ? Paul gives us no learned dissertation or discourse, but merely cites the instance of Jesus in proof of his statement. He does not, however, claim for his Master any extra credit for any special, or divine birth, but puts him on a par with the rest of mankind, claiming no more justification for his resurrection than that of any other man

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478 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Paul's argument is condensed in the simple state ment: "For if the dead rise not, then is Christ not risen."-(I Cor. XV, 16.) The resurrection of the dead, then, is clearly the point in controversy, and the resurrection of Jesus himself would depend on the finding which may be arrived at on it. To Paul's mind the matter did not present any difficulty; he clearly saw the connection between the doctrine of the fall' and that of resurrection. He based the claim to resurrection on the power of 'Man' to triumph over death, and declared : - "For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive."-(I Cor. XV. 21 and 22.) It is, then, the doctrine of the 'fall' which shall also throw light on that of resurrection, and to that doctrine we must, accordingly, return to understand the precise sense of resurrection. We shall, therefore, now proceed to complete the symbolism of the 'fall' in the life of the Messiah, to find out its significance for the human race. We shall not go into the merits of the Christian belief separately, but shall consider its claims as we proceed with our own views on the subject, and shall see how far they are well-founded. The grotesque view of modern scholarship which perceives nothing but savage simplicity and childlike wonder on the part of the 'primitive' man at the phenomena of nature as the real grounding of ancient mythology, is entitled to be dismissed with little or no ceremony. Its absurdity has been noted ere this and will

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RESURRECTION. 479 also be made more and more evident as we progress with our investigation. It would have doubtless amused the ancients if they could have read what modern scholars have to say about their mental development. We shall leave the reader to determine for himself the worth of the modern view as contained in the following extract from Mr. Joseph McCabe's otherwise excellent work, the Bankruptcy of Religion (p. 167): - "This is not the place to inquire into the real origin and nature of these [crucifixion and resurrection] myths. It has been widely believed that they refer, ultimately, to the annual death (or enfeeblement) of the sun as winter approaches, its re-birth at the solstice, and its resurrection (usually preceded by a dramatic representation of the death) in the spring. The seasons differ so much in different latitudes-the sun is so differently regarded in a tropical and a temperate clime-that confusion of dates is quite intelligible. In Egypt the annual fall and rise of the Nile was the chief factor. Sir J. G. Frazer, however, contends......that these myths refer to the annual death and re-birth of the spirit of Vegetation; a much more conspicuous case, to the ignorant mind, of death and resurrection. Probably both spectacles have had a share in inspiring and shaping the myths.... What is clear is that the naive philosophy of primitive man, his child-like wonder at the annual death and rebirth of sun and flowers and corn, is the real root of the stories that still engross millions of our neighbours at Christmas and Easter." The real justification for the view of the moderns, if there can be any justification for the loss of the sense of relevancy and such unmitigated ignorance, is to be found in the intellectual shabbiness and bankruptcy of the counter-hypothesis put forth by the theologian, who is, however, as much a moderner as the critic of the ancient lore himself! To proceed with our explanation, it was seen in the chapter on the "fall" that the wretched condition of

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480 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. man was the result of a longing for sensual enjoyment on the part of the typical man-Adam. Man, it will be remembered, was not punished because he had violated some arbitrary and whimsical command of an Almighty Ruler of the world, but the punishment had come because it was the necessary consequence of a desire for knowledge of good and evil. God, in his infinite goodness, had, so to speak, pointed out the fatal result of the transgression beforehand, but his friendly counsel was not heeded when the temptation came. Death was pointed out as the inevitable penalty for a thirst for the knowledge of good and evil, for it was said, 'in what day soever thou shalt eat of it, thou shalt surely die.' Without going twice over the ground already covered in our earlier chapter, it is sufficient to say that the fall of Adam contains the sublimest secrets and teachings of inestimable value for mankind. It is a warning against a purely sensual existence; for, while the development of the faculty of discrimination is necessary and desirable, it is nothing short of downright madness to employ it. solely to determine the values of objects with respect to the amount of pleasure they are likely to afford to the senses. By making the power of discrimination to pander to sense-gratification we deprive ourselves of wisdom, which results from its proper employment. The man who aspires to attain immortality must devote himself unreservedly to the God within; he must deny all other claims on his attention. He should perceive only one reality in all phenomena, and understand and realize the force of the statement, "I and my father are one;" for the Upanishad teaches:

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RESURRECTION. 481 "If a man sees no other (besides Himself), hears no other, knows no other, that is infinite; if he sees, hears, knows another, that is the finite. The infinite is the immortal, the finite is mortal." (Chhandogya Upanishad, Chap. VII. 24). To a man immersed in the world of senses all this is and must ever remain to be as great an absurdity as the notion that the moon is made of green cheese. He should wait patiently till the Divine in him quickens him from within, and in the meanwhile he cannot do better than assume the attitude of the great rishi Narada* who, in spite of having read all the Vedas, and almost all other material sciences, declared that he did not possess the knowledge of the Real, and actually sought out Sanatakumara to learn it from him. He will also do well to remember that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, and that to deny, merely on the strength of learning derived from sciences whose range does not extend beyond matter, the teaching of religion and the sanity of its founders is to play with sharp-edged tools. To proceed with our investigation. The history of the ancestor is the history of the individual, and the so-called sin of Adam is repeated by each and every one of us. It is not true to say that the ire of an Omnipotent Almighty God was excited and kindled by Adam's eating of a fruit to such an extent that he not only punished the guilty, but also their whole progeny ad infinitum. The fathers have eaten the sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge, not because a just and merciful God decreed it that way, but because * The legend is valuable only as suggesting the true attitude of enquiry; it is not intended to be read as a narrative of facts. 31

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482 of the wrong suggestion which parents impart to their offspring, and which moulds their lives in the wrong way. It is, however, comforting to know that the leaders of rational thought in the world have unequivocally condemned the imputation of such cruel, unfatherly and ungod-like vengeance to the deity. Eminent men from amongst the orthodox Christians themselves are now beginning to form a more accurate and dignified notion of divinity, and there is every reason to hope that in the near future such fables as that of the uncontrollable fury of the Almighty will only make us smile at our own ignorance and credulity. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. As the idea of the punishment of the innocent is foreign to our notions of the dignity, the justice and the mercy of God, so is the idea of the vicarious atonement of Jesus, a pure dogma of ignorant faith. We agree with Mr. Bernard Lucas when he says: "In the moral realm to substitute the innocent for the guilty is a conception which subverts the moral idea. To conceive of the punishment of the just for the unjust is not only an outrage on the moral sense of humanity; it is a subversion of the moral character of God. The suffering of the innocent for the guilty presents difficulties to our moral nature and to our belief in a beneficent God, but its arbitrary infliction as a penalty is a conception from which the modern mind absolutely revolts. The conception of the solidarity of the race may throw some light on the problem of suffering, but it throws no light on a suffering which is a penalty arbitrarily inflicted on the innocent in order that the guilty may escape. That which is bad morality cannot be good theology. That which the highest and best within us repudiates and condemns, God cannot approve and adopt. Vicarious punishment marks a lower stage of man's moral development, in which it presented no difficulty to the moral sense. At the present day it would be an outrage to civilization. Our theology must transcend our morality, not fall below it. One can

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483 no longer regard the sufferings of Christ as in any sense a penalty which He endured in order that we might escape."-(Christ for India). RESURRECTION. "The revelation in Jesus, says Mr. Lucas, "has shown us not only God as he has manifested himself in Human life; but it has shown us man as conceived by the divine mind. He has shown us of what humanity is capable when its life is lived, not in isolation or opposition to God, but in harmony with him." Those who have attentively followed the previous pages of this work need not be reminded that within every man there are two principles, namely, the Subjective, or Divine, and the objective, or personal, i.e., the lower self. Of these, Christ stands for the Divine element, which is buried deep under huge deposits of sin. This hidden divinity is to be purified and released from the grip of sin, when it will reveal itself as a God. Jesus not only taught and preached the doctrine of the "Key of Knowledge" to dispel ignorance and to bring into manifestation the hidden Divinity within, but, also, actually demonstrated it in his own life. And he invites us to follow his example to regain the Paradise lost, which signifies what is described as entering into Life. For one's Divinity is real the moment one can consciously and conscientiously say, from one's heart, "I and the father are one" (John, X. 30). In different language, Godhood is at one end and animalism at the other of existence, with the middle point denoting freedom of action, hence choice of paths, occupied by man. When the animal nature acquires ascendency in this see-saw of life, the God-element goes down, and vice versa ; and 99

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484 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. exactly in the proportion in which the one is forced down does the other acquire ascendency. This is the doctrine of the Cross -- crucify the ego of desires and you become divine ; suppress the real Self and you immediately fall to the level of brutes, and become an heir to the full heritage of wretchedness and misery pertaining to an animal existence. It is the sense of the body being the man which is the cause of our downfall. A story is told in the Yoga Vasishtha of a war between devas and the powers of darkness. The leader of the latter forces one day created, by his power of maya, three asuras without ahankara, and sent them to fight the devas. The latter fought hard against them, but in vain. Their egoless opponents had no fear of destruction on account of the absence of ahankara, and proved invincible. The devas thereupon sought the advice of Brahma who told them that their enemies could not be killed unless they developed ahankara within them. When asked as to how they were to proceed to create ahankara in their enemies, he suggested that they should constantly draw the asuras into the battle-field and then retire before them. The reason assigned for this queer method of warfare was that by their constantly pretending to fight and running away the vasand of ahankara will begin to reflect itself in the minds of the dreaded asuras, as a shadow in glass, and they would be caught, like rats, in the trap of egoism. The devas carried out the advice of Brahma to the letter; and a long period of time elapsed during which this queer warfare was carried on to the great chagrin and irritation of the asuras. Gradually, the

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RESURRECTION. 485 sense of egoity stole in the minds of demons, and fear took hold of their hear as no longer found them invulnerable, and speedily overpowered them. The lesson to be learnt from the story is described in the Yoga Vasishtha, in the following words : "In the three worlds there are three kinds of ahankaras. these, two kinds of ahankaras are always beneficial and one alt condemnable. That jnana which after discrimination ena us to cognize that all the worlds and Paramatman are oursel that the self or 'I' is eternal and that there is no other to meditated upon than our self is the Supreme Ahankara. Thatj which makes us perceive our own Self to be more subtle than tail-end of paddy and to be ever existent, exterior to (or at all the universe, is the second kind of Ahankara. These kinds of ahankaras will certainly be found in the Jivan-mt and will enable them to attain Moksha after crossing Samsara; will never subject them to bondage. That certain knowledge w identifies the 'I' with the body composed of the hands, feet, is the third kind of ahankara. This is common to all persons of the world and dire in its results. It is the cause of the growth of the poisonous tree of re-births. It should be destroyed at all costs. Dire, very dire are its effects. The sooner you annihilate this ahankara through the above-mentioned two kinds of ahankaras, the sooner will the Brahmic principle dawn in you. Then if you are firmly seated in that seat where even these two kinds of ahahkaras are given up, one by one, then such a state is the ripe Brahmic state seat. The non-identification of the I' with the visible body (or the visibles) is the Nirvana proclaimed by the Vedas." Such is the teaching of the Yoga Vasishtha. We can now easily understand what Jesus meant when he said : "He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it." In plain language, it means that he who identifies his life with the lowest, i.e., the third kind of ahankara,

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486 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. spoken of above, shall lose it, but he who sacrifices the lower ahankara, that is, the sense of "I-ness" or egotism, for the sake of the higher, or the Christ principle, would find Nirvana (in himself). It is the sacrifice of the lower which brings the higher Self into manifestation. While it is true that religion offers all desirable good, including peace, immortality and bliss, to its followers, it is equally true that its boons are to be had only on payment of a price. The price to be paid is not money, or its equivalent, neither false praise, nor pretended devotion, but nothing other than an annihilation of the lower personality, that is, the total destruction of the false, personal self which sets itself up in place of the real Man and holds Him in tight bondage. Thus, it is the sacrifice of one's own lower nature, not that of another's life, which can be the means of liberation. It is worth any amount of trouble to understand the true sense of sacrifice. We find in all religions, excepting Jainism, the injunction to offer sacrifices to the Lord God. Even the Vedas have become, in the hands of an ignorant and greedy priesthood, the source of bloodshed and slaughter of dumb and defenceless animals. The Holy Bible, too, is not unsullied in this respect. The question is, do these Scriptures really enjoin the shedding of the blood of innocent animals for the glorification and redemption of the human race ? We venture to think not. It would be unnecessary to critically examine all the Scriptures extant on the point. We think that an examination of the teachings of the Holy Bible itself would suffice to show that the

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RESURREOTION. 487 true sense of all such injunctions has been grossly misunderstood by mankind. In vain shall we plead the cause of our mute fellow-beings on the score of morality. When mind is steeped in selfishness and ignorance, it is not liable to be influenced by any considerations of tenderness and mercy. We, therefore, turn to the Holy Bible to see how far is the idea of an animal sacrifice supported by the authority of Jehovah and Jesus themselves. It will be noticed that the first recorded Biblical sacrifices are those of Abel* and Cain, but, as has been already demonstrated, they are not to be taken literally. There seems to be no divine injunction in support of the institution. According to Revd. F. Watson, D. D. (see the Cambridge Companion to the Bible) : " No divine command can be quoted for the institution of sacrifice, but from its adoption in the earliest times by all nations, its diving origin may be inferred." But we shall see that, far from being supported by divine commandments, the practice of shedding the blood of innocent beings is actually condemned in the Bible. Samuel was among the first few who raised their voice against the animal sacrifice. In his mild language, "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, * The reason why Cain's sacrifice was not while Abel's was acceptable to the Lord lies in the very nature of the faculties which they signify and represent. Cain is reason engaged in the study of the World of matter and form, hence of the not-Self. As such, it is opposed to the well-being of the ego; hence, the Lord, .e., the inner Divinity, is not pleased with Cain's offering. But Abel is Faith which aspires to attain the perfection of Gods and leads to freedom and bliss. It enlarges the spiritual ego, and leads to the development of will in the right direction. Its sacrifice, or offering, that is, the fruit of its labour, is, accordingly, accepted by God.

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488 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. as in obeying the voice of the Lord ? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams." -(1 Sam. XV. 22). Through the mouth of the Psalmist, Jehovah declared : "I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he-goats out of thy folds. For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof. Will I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God thanksgiving; and pay thy vows unto the most high."-(Ps. L. 9-15). Surely David does not use ambiguous language when he says: " Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise. For thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it: thou. delightest not in the burnt offering."-(Ps. LI. 15 & 16). Even the compiler of the book of Proverbs unhesitatingly maintains : "The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord : but the prayer of the upright is his delight."-(Pro. XV. 8.) Similarly, "To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice." -(Pro. XXI. 3). Isaiah is equally emphatic and unequivocal in proclaiming the will of the Lord : "To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats...Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto me; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot sway with; it is iniquity even the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them. And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood"(Is. I. 11 to 15.) Can there be anything more emphatic than the

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RESURRECTION. 489 above, yet has Isaiab not done with the subject, and says towards the end of the book named after him. (LXVI. 3): "He that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man, he that sacrificeth 2 lamb, as if he cut off a dog's neck : he that offereth an oblation, as if be offered swine's blood; he that burneth incense, as if he blessed an idol. Yea, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delighteth in their abominations." No less emphatic is the language used by Jehovah. when he spoke through the mouth of Hosea : "I desired mercy, and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than the burnt offerings."-(Hosea, VI. 6.) Jeremiah also proclaims the word of the Lord in unmistakable terms : "To what purpose cometh there to me incense fron Sheba, and the sweet cane from a far country? Your burnt offerings are not icceptable, nor your sacrifices sweet unto me."--(Jer. VI. 20). Yet, again, is Hosea told (Hos. VIII. 13.): "They sacrifice flesh for the sacrifices of mine offerings, and eat it, but the Lord accepteth them not : now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins: they shall return to Egypt (bondage)." Through Amos we have it :"I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies. Though ye offer me burnt offerings, and your meat offerings, I will not accept them : neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts."-(Amos. V. 21 & 22.) There can, thus, be little doubt that when Moses enjoined sacrifices he did not mean the slaughter of defenceless, innocent animals ; for were it so, these expressions of abhorrence and disgust, on the part of the Lord, would be meaningless, and he would not have further declared : Put your burnt offerings unto your sacrifices, and eat flesh. For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings.

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490 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. or sacrifices : bat this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people : and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you."-(Jeremiah, VII. 21-23). Here we have the authority of the Lord himself to show that the passages which seem to enjoin sacrifice, in their exoteric sense, are not to be read literally, but in a hidden or higher sense. Surely, it is poor theology to maintain, and that in defiance of the dictum of one's own God, that he loves the flesh and blood of his animal creation, and is pleasurably affected by them. David understood this much better than the moderns. Addressing his deity, he sings: " Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire ; mine ears hath thou opened: burnt offerings and sin offering hast thou not required."-(Ps. XL. 6). With the New Testament the spirit of sacrifice altogether changes. Jesus said :"I will have mercy, and not sacrifice."-(Matthew, IX. 13 & XII.7). It will be noticed that the animals selected for sacrifice were invariably the bull, the ram and the he-goat. Now, if we can understand that the ancients saw a remarkable resemblance between the signs of the Zodiac and the chief limbs of the human body, and employed the zodiacal symbols to conceal their true philosophy from the profane, it would not be difficult to grasp the hidden sense of the passages whose exoteric and vulgar significance leads to a slaughter of the innocent lives of animals. Three of these Zodiacal signs are of special importance for our purpose, for their symbols happen to be identical with the three animals mostly selected for sacrifice, although, in later times, other

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491 animals also came to be included in the category of sacrificial beasts. These three are Aries (the ram), Taurus (the bull) and Capricornus (the he-goat). It is laid down in the Brihajatakam of Varaha Mihira that "each sign of the zodiac is characterized by a special part of the human body; thus; Mesa is represented by head; Vrisa by the face...Makara by the knees."-Sacred Books of the Hindus, Vol. XII, pp. 6 & 7. RESURRECTION. We have omitted the description of the other parts of the body, as we are not concerned with them here. The Sanskrit Mesa, Vrisa and Makara are the equivalents of the Aries, Taurus and Capricornus, respectively. Thus, the ram, the bull, and the he-goat, also represent the three important limbs of the microcosm, the human body, which, as the mystics are never tired of teaching, is a perfect epitome of the macrocosm, i.e., the universe. Now, since we have the authority of Jehovah himself to show that he never commanded the burnt offerings or sacrifices (Jeremiah, VII. 22), we must try to find out what the prophets meant when they enjoined those sacrifices, for that they did enjoin some sort of sacrifice is beyond doubt. Let us see what light can be thrown on the situation by divine commandments and declarations. Here are some of them: "But this thing commanded I them, saying, Obey my voice, and' I will be your God...and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you."-(Jer. VII. 23). "I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings."-(Hosea, VI, 6). The Psalmist chants : "I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify him with thanksgiving. This also shall please the Lord better than an ox or bullock that hath horns and hoofs."-(Ps. LXIX. 30 and 31).

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492 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. " The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise."--(Ps. LI. 17) The bullock that has horns and hoofs is not acceptable, but the one that has no horns and hoofs is desired -- the pride of the face must be sacrificed ; the strong neck must bend before God. In the book of Proverbs we are told : "To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice."-(XXI. 3). Jesus puts the case still more emphatically. when he says: " And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul and with all the strength, and to love his neighbour as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."-(Mark, XII. 33). Finally, Paul gives up all attempt at secrecy and divulges the long preserved secret in his epistle to the Romans. He writes : "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that yo present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service."- (Rom. XII. 1). Just as in the astronomy of the ancients, the ram, the bull and the he-goat stand for the head, the face and the knees of the zodiacal man (the Kala Purusha), so do they represent, ahankara (egotism), pride of power and carnality* in the science of symbolical correspondence. Hence, the sacrificing of the lower ahankara, pride and carnal desire is what is enjoined by the prophets, not an offering of the dead or dying bodies of animals, slaughtered in the name of the most merciful God himself. He is pleased with him only who offers **Goat typified Generative Heat or the Vital Urge' (The Lost Language of Symbolism, Vol. I. p. 347),

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493 his body as a living sacrifice.* A broken spirit, with all traces of pride and carnality crushed out, is the sacrifice which is immediately acceptable to the Lord. We must, however, see that this is not done in the spirit of Pharisee hypocrisy. When the devotee offers his little personality, or ahankara, with bowed head, bent neck and bended knees, the sacrifice cannot but be accepted, and the sacrificer is rewarded with life eternal as its reward. RESURRECTION. Why this is so, is easy enough to see. The soul inflated with the pride of personality, i.e., ahankara, has wound round itself a number of coils of desires, and suffers from the tightness of the 'cords.' And the strangest thing about it is this that, although it smarts and shrieks, and yells from pain, its pride is not lessened, but goes on increasing, and the cords of ignorance cut deeper and deeper into its 'flesh.' Hundreds and thousands of beings are born and die in this condition, never caring to know the reason why of their excruciating pain; and yet the cure is simple enough the moment the diagnosis is made. The cords cut deeper and deeper into the skin, because it is inflated from within. The cause of this is ahankara. Need we prescribe the cure now? To the thoughtful it is apparent. Take off a little of the air from the ahankara, and relief would come instantaneously. Remove the ahan * Cf. "The camels slain for sacrifice have we appointed for you as symbols of your obedience unto God.........Their flesh is not accepted of God, neither their blood; but your piety is accepted of him." (Al Koran, Chap. XXII.) Now, the camel is noted for its long neck; hence, bending one's neck in obedience to the command of God, is what is intended by its sacrifice.

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494 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. kara completely, and the pain is gone. It is for this reason that the great teacher Shankaracharya says, somewhere in his writings, that the Samadhi (trance) of self-realization removes in a few minutes the sins of a hundred years. Suppose we tightly wind a cord a couple of miles long round an inflated body, and then try to take it off as quickly as possible. There are two principal ways of doing so : one is the tedious method of removing the coils one by one, but the other, and by far the quicker, method, is to take out the air from the inflated body, when all the coils would fall off at once of their own accord. The same is the case with sin, the accumulated deposit of evil karma on the soul. There is this difference between an inflated body and the soul that, while the former is filled with extraneous wind, the latter is puffed up with its own vanity, since ahankara is only the pride of personality. Evil karmas bind the soul hand and foot with the cord made from its notions of 'my' and 'mine;' and it feels greater and greater pain as its sense of meum and teum becomes enlarged in its consciousness. . God is, however, ready, so to speak, to help it in its trouble, but cannot do so till a sacrifice is offered. The ignorant suggest the *slaughter of dumb animals, but the God within desires not blood, for that can only tighten the coils of evil karma, in consequence of the cruelty involved in the act of sacrificial butchery. Thus, the only sacrifice which God can accept is that of the head, the neck (or the face) and the knees of the soul's ahankara, which the ancients symbolized by the ram, the bull and the hegoat, respectively. This brief analysis, let us hope, will

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RESURREOTION. 495 put a stop to the unnecessary and barmful butchery which takes place in the name of the merciful God, on the occasions of religious festivals. To the Jews and Mahomedans we would recommend a serious consideration of the declarations of their God contained in the Old Testament and the Qur'an. To those of the Hindus who indulge in this inhuman ceremonial, we suggest a perusal of their own Scriptures, which, in their esoteric, or true sense, do not enjoin the sacrifice of life on any account. How could the ancient Rishis whose precision of thought makes them ask at the very commencement: 'who is the God to whom we shall offer sacrifice ?,' and finds him to be the dweller in the hearts of all beings,-how could such Rishis, we ask, enjoin any animal sacrifice to such a God? Again, how could they prescribe renunciation, so complete and full as to destroy one's ahunkara, and yet insist on the performance of bloody sacrifices for the well-being of that very ahankara ? * It is obvious to any one who has studied the Vedas that the words employed in the text in connection with animal sacrifices are capable of an exoteric as well as an esoteric interpretation. For instance, the word ashvu signifies not only a horse, but also the mind. The manas drags the body just as the horse moves a car. 'Now, because the body is symbolically represented by a chariot, that which drags it about may well be called an ashva (horse). Hence, the horse is the symbol of the desiring manas. In like manner, the word "aja" means & ram, or he-goat, exoterically, but esoterically it means carnal nature. Hence, the injunction to sacrifice the horse and the he-goat esoterically meant only the sacrificing of the desiring manas and carnality without which moksha could not be attained. The gomedha of the Hindu Scriptures, similarly, means self-denial, go icow) being a symbol for prana, or lifo, in the sense of cuis (animalism).

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496 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It is in no ambiguous terms that the Vedas themselves point out the identity between the sacrificer and the sacrifice. The following texts may be cited as relewant to the point under consideration :-- 1. <Page #518
497 the uppermost place in our hearts. It follows logically from this that no amount of others' blood can bring the blissful Godhood into manifestation, so long as the lower end of the see-saw remains above the threshold of consciousness; and it further follows that the only sacrifice which can ever succeed in securing for us the realization of our own true nature is none other than the destruction of the sense of egotism. RESURRECTION. To complete our explanation of sacrificial symbology, we have to observe that the zodiacal man consists of positive and negative parts, like everything else in nature (Brihajjatakam). Of the four kinds of tendencies represented by the four quadrupeds, the lion (Leo), the ram, the bull and the he-goat, the only positive one is fearlessness, symbolized by the lion. Now, since the object of sacrifice is the attainment of one's hidden Godhood, therefore, only those tendencies which are negative, that is to say, which produce negativity, hence, weakness, are to be destroyed. For this reason were the ram, the bull and the he-goat, the symbols of negative, i.e., weakening tendencies, in the nature of the soul, selected by the ancients for sacrificial offering, to propitiate the higher Self. The higher Self is pure Will which comes into manifestation only when the weakening tendencies are brought under control. Hence, anything which removes weakness from the soul directly goes to develop the Will; in other words, Will can only be developed by a deliberate eradication, i.e., sacrificing, of all those tendencies, inclinations and emotions which act as obstacles on the path of emancipation. It is thus clear that sensuality, pride, 32

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498 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. greed, and all like inclinations and emotions have to be offered as a sacrifice to propitiate (develop) the higher Self (Will). We may, therefore, say that the sacrifice of another's life can never be the means of salvation; on the contrary, it is sure to engender the worst kind of karmas for the vain sacrificer, for will can never be developed by the sight or smell of blood. It is passions, and passions alone, which increase and are strengthened by it; but passions only go to obscure the intellect and harden the heart. Neither knowledge, nor purity, therefore, can spring out of animal or human sacrifice. As pointed out in an earlier chapter, resurrection means the conquest of death and the realization of the natural purity of Atman, i.e., the Self. Now, because the realization of this natural perfection depends on one's own exertion, and not on the merit, grace or favour of another, is inconceivable how any outside agency can possibly lead to the emancipation of the soul from the clutches of death. All that another can possibly do for one, in this respect, is to call one's attention to the powers and forces lying hidden and latent in the soul; and to this extent it is permissible to take instruction from a properly qualified teacher. But neither sacrifice nor vicarious atonement tends, in the remotest degree, to draw the attention of the soul to its own powers. For this reason, both are equally devoid of merit and the seeds of rebirth. Arrived at the status of manhood, the jiva has the choice, hence, the power, to attain salvation by the right use of his divine will. He may direct his energies in the

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RESURRECTION 499 direction of the phenomenal, and lose himself in the pursuit of the knowledge of good and evil, or, resolutely turn his back upon the world, and become absorbed in the realization of his immortal, blissful Self. The first path leads to trouble, sickness, death, and hell, but the second is the moksha-marga proper--the road to bliss and blessedness unabating. The attainment of bliss is possible only for those who push the animal-end of the see-saw of existence below the level of neutrality, and, thus, raise the God-end up. Accoding to the Bible, Adam strove for the acquisition of the power of objective discrimination, and thereby developed his lower nature, with the result that the God-end of the see-saw went down and the animal-end became uppermost. Jesus, understanding, as he did, the secret of the Genesis legend, began to push the lower end down, and succeeded in doing so at the Place of Golgotha. The blood of the Christ within, but not of the historical Jesus, is on our hands. The ideal for the realization of which we ought to give our heart's blood is being slain by us; and it is the guilt of this crime which hangs heavy on our souls. It is only when the lower nature is slain that the higher acquires ascendency. "Jesus' must suffer, so that Christ might appear; and even Christ must give way to God, so that the full blaze of the glory of the * Father' may be brought into manifestation. Christ here stands for God-man, or the state in which the traces of the lower nature are not altogether destroyed, although they are all, more or less, suppressed. This is, however, a very different thing from what the clerics

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500 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. would have us believe is the real doctrine of the New Testament. Those who take the teaching of the Bible in the clerical sense would do well to ponder over the weighty observations. of Mr. Lucas, the author of the Christ for India, which we reproduce here : " The modern mind frankly recognizes that the basis of its theology is not the Bible, regarded as an infallible book whose words and thought-forms are the moulds into which its religious thoughts must be pressed, but the religious experience of the race, and supremely of Jesus, the highest manifestation of the thought and mind of God. It finds in the Bible the richest religious experience of humanity, but it recognizes that that experience has been expressed in thoughtforms which are essentially temporary, representative of the age in which the writers lived, and coloured with views of the universe which the present age has outgrown. The religious experience is of permanent value, but the expression of it is, of necessity, archaic. The religious experience can only be made a living reality for the modern mind in proportion as the expression of it is altered by replacing obsolete thought-forms by those in current use. To preserve the Biblical expression is often to sacrifice the reality of the religious experience, with consequences which are fatal to present day religion." There can be no doubt that this is the correct attitude of the really zealous mind. Religion must agree with common sense (not necessarily with the common sense of the city magnate, or the materialistic professor, but with the common sense of the sages of the race); it can never be true when it assumes a hostile attitude towards rationalism. When we look upon the Bible as a collection of the thoughts of the various prophets and seers according to their light, and not as constituting an infallible record of historical or religious events, or experiences, we cannot go wrong. None of the Biblical prophets can be regarded as infallible, and the only useful purpose

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501 their writings serve for us lies in the fact that we are enabled to form an estimate of the degree of drone manifestation with their help, and, also, to check the conclusions we might ourselves draw from the facts within our knowledge. Man must take the religious records as he finds them, and should try to understand the truth for himself. He should be prepared to reject that which is not compatible with the facts of experience, or with good, sound common sense. It is only then that he will be able to understand religion. The orthodox theory of vicarious atonement by the first and the only begotten Son of God, if taken literally, comes to grief at the very commencement. God declared (Isaiah, XLIII. 11): "I, even I, am the Lord; and beside me there is no saviour." RESURRECTION. To the same effect is the following from Ecclesiastes, IV. 8: "There is one alone, and there is not a second; yea, he hath neither child nor brother." It would be waste of time to dwell upon the subject any longer; suffice it to say that there is not a word of proof in favour of the orthodox theory either in the Bible or outside it. If a real Son of God (in the sense in which orthodox Christianity uses that expression) had come down to the world to save mankind from sin, and to sacrifice his life so that humanity might be saved, he would have behaved in a manner quite different from that of Jesus. The very first point of difference lies in the method of teaching. One can understand why Jesus spoke in parables and short, pithy aphorisms which are remarkable for their hidden meaning. The reason is to be

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502 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. found in the old formula of sages, especially ascribed to Hermes, namely, that 'the lips of wisdom are sealed except to the ears of understanding.' This course was rendered necessary because : (1) the ultimate truth is so astounding and so utterly beyond the comprehension of the generality of mankind that it was thought hardly worth one's while to see that they too understood it; (2) the sneering attitude of ignorant unbelief has been known to injuriously affect the mind of many a less-advanced teacher, and (3) the preacher was generally subjected to violence and lynch law, and, at times, also, paid the penalty with his life. The attitude of the Jews towards Jesus was the same as ignorant fanaticism has always assumed towards enlightened sages; and the Bible bears testimony to their murderous intention and evil designs against his person. Jesus, being well-versed in the ancient teaching of the sages, understood the principle of secrecy well, and openly taught it to others. He declared : "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you." Now, it is obvious that none of the above reasons will hold good in the case of an Almighty God or in that of his Son, and one would, therefore, naturally expect a real Son of God to speak the highest truth, without fear or favour --- a quality in which Jesus was certainly found wanting

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RESURRECTION. 503 Then, again, a real Son of God would not have been found making distinctions and differences as are: only too obvious from such observations of Jesus as the following : "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel." "It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs." In the eye of God, surely, all his creatures are alike, and the nution of the 'favoured nation cannot but be looked upon as a piece of savage self-conceit and barbarous seil-glorification. If we, however, take into account what Jesus said on another occasion, his position becomes clear. "For the Son of man has come to save that which was lost," gives us a clear insight into his attitude towards the rest of mankind. He knew that there were many who were not lost, and for them he could not have come. The people from whom he had learnt his gospel were there, and he could not be presumed to be teaching his own teachers. Whatever view we may take of the teaching of Jesus, it is certain, beyond the possibility of doubt, that he was preaching nothing new to the world, and, therefore, those who knew the truth bad no necessity for his help, or guidance. His position as regards the woman of Canaan also becomes clear now, and, plainly put, amounts to this that his mission in life was to carry enlightenment to those who were in the dark, but out of them those who could be considered better 'soil' were his first care, for there the seed would yield a thirty-, a sixty-, or even, a hundred-fold barvest quickly, as, he thought, was the case with the Israelites. Jesus

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504 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. believed that the doctrines of Moses and the commandments of Jehovah had, so to speak, prepared the ground in Israel for the reception of the seed of Truth, and for that reason applied himself to their uplifting. The task of preaching the philosophy of Life to those who were strangers to spiritual metaphy sics did not appeal to his mind; nor does it always appeal to the mind of any other person. We find this principle working even in our ordinary lives daily. If an ignorant, illiterate rustic and an educated person were to apply for instruction to some leading professor, say, in higher mathematics, it is obvious whom he would accept as his pupil. The former would be rejected not because the Professor cannot teach him, but because he must go elsewhere to acquire a fair grounding in elementary mathematics, by way of a preparation for the higher course, while the latter, presenting in his previous education the goodness and fertility of the soil,' would be readily instructed. Acting on this principle, Jesus refused to pay heed to the lamentations of the woman of Canaan, till her highly pertinent answer--"Truth Lord : Yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table"- convinced him that she had a great capacity for faith in her heart. It requires but a comparison with the Saviour's attitude to show us the absurdity of the modern religious missionary. The former professed to save the lost sheep only, but the latter, in his blind zeal, presumes to teach even those who are more enlightened than himself. What respect can he, then, hope to command from those who have a profound knowledge of matters with which he is, at best, most

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RESURRECTION. 505 superficially and inadequately acquainted ? Even in the ranks of the Christian clergy themselves there are to be found men, like Kevd. H. E. Sampson, the distinguished author of " The Progressive Christianity," who have realized the weakness of the orthodox interpretation of their creed, and have burnt midnight oil in a brave and manly endeavour to put it on a higher and rational basis. He has established the fact that re-incarnation is a fundamental part of the true doctrine of the church, and, although many errors have crept into the book for want of accurate knowledge of the divine philosophy, one cannot refuse to recognize the signal service he has rendered to Christendom at large. As a matter of fact, Mr. Sampson does not bestow on the doctrine of fall' that consideration which its importance demands, and believes the origin of sin to Jie in a violation of the law of segregation of species. We regret we are unable to agree with him, also, when he tries to interpret religious dogmas from the standpoint of a historian. It is impossible to criticise his elaborate reasoning, at length, in the present work, but a few of the arguments against his theory may be briefly stated as follows: (1) the fall of Adam, or the origin of sin, is a typical affair, not an historical event, in the physical world, and, therefore, cannot be explained on historical lines ; (2) if the fall were due to unlawful intercourse, whether sanctioned by any matrimonial tie or not, botween the Sons of God and the daughters of men, the condition of humanity prior to the act of transgression

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506 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ought not to have been a fallen one; but the Bible itself leaves no room for doubt on this point; (3) it is not easy to see the unlawful nature of intermarriage between the Sons of God and the daughters of men; (4) sexual promiscuity fails to explain the origin of the evil tendency in the Sons of God which prompted them to come in unto the daughters of men; and (5) racial sin by intermarriage, or fornication, leaves no room for individual salvation, and would make redemption itself dependent on the possibility of racial regeneration, It is not the prevention of intermarriage that would lead to the redemption of mankind, but celibacy. The particular passage in Genesis (VI. 1-6) on which Revd. Sampson has based his theory of sexual segregation, has. nothing to do with the idea of Nirvana, or with that of the fall. It merely shows how sexual lust perverted the hearts of men at a certain period in the history of the world, and led to the shortening of the duration of life, from a thousand years or so to 'an hundred and twenty.' To this extent the passage in question may be said to be historical. The doctrine of the fall, as well as the first recorded' sacrifices of Abel and Cain, however, are purely allegorical and have no historical basis. To read them historically, therefore, can only lead to confusion. *It is interesting to compare this period of longevity with the long lives of men at the time (about 86,500 years ago) of Sri Nemi Nathji Bhagwan, who, according to the Jaina Puranas, resided at Dwarka with His cousins, Sri Krishna and Balaram, and lived for a thousand years in this world.

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RESURRECTION. 507 Sexual promiscuity, fornication, incest, over-indulgence, and all other abuses of the sex-function only go to excite and strengthen evil passions and tendencies, and, thus, actually produce weakness of will. Even the least objectionable sex-relation of husband and wife is an obstacle on the path of Nirvana, since it diverts attention from the higher to the lower self. Therefore, so long as sexual passion is not brought completely under the control of will, it acts as an impediment to the realization of perfection and bliss, which are the ideal in view. Control of tbe sex-passion, rather than the segregation of species, then, is the means of developing the will. It is for this reason that all rational religions enjoin sexual abstinence, in the end. All the great Teachers also practised absolute celibacy, and enjoined it on their followers. Of all the poisons in the universe, kama-exciting, feminine beauty is the most fatal. Physical contact is not necessary for its action ; its mere sight, even thought, is sufficient to affect the mind. Phctographs, paintings, and even verbal description of beauty bave been known to excite the sexual passion. It is also more lasting in its effect than the other known poisons, since they only affect the physical body, which the soul leaves behind on death, while its evil influence becomes incorporated in the individual character, and persists through future incarnations. Moreover, since passion is the actual cause of mental impurity, and since redemption cannot be had so long as the mind is not purged of all impurities, it follows that no one who aspires to obtain moksha can afford to abandon himself to voluptuousness, or sexual love, in any

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508 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. form. Even thoughts of lust must be completely banished from the inner atmosphere of the soul. Totale abstinence and self-control are rigidly enjoined on all who aspire for liberation in the course of one earth-life. For the rest, partial control is necessary, if they would avoid hell and ugly, tormenting scenes after death. Partial control consists in the proper selection of a bride, and in the observance of the nuptial vow. The marriage-bed must be maintained pure and inviolate. The idea of a bedmate other than the married spouse should never be allowed to sully the purity of the heart; sexual fidelity should under no circumstances be jeopardized even in thought. The husband and wife should both have the same ideal of life in common; they should share each other's beliefs and aspirations. Diversity of ideals is compatible with friction, not with co-operation, and even when people try to 'pull on' together, in a highly commendable spirit of toleration, the differences of opinion are not reconciled thereby. Hence, active co-operation for the realization of each other's ideals is out of the question under the circumstances. It is, thus, clear that where the selection of the nuptial-partner is determined solely by the physical charms, or some material advantage, e.g., money, marriage becomes a lottery in which more "blanks' are drawn than 'prizes.' It is, now, easy to interpret the Messiah's teaching in respect of the types of eunuchs amongst men. There are eunuchs born, eunuchs made of men, and eunuchs who bave become so for the Kingdom of Heaven. The first class needs no comment; in their

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509 case impotence is congenital. In the second group fall. all those unfortunate captives of war, slaves, and others, whose masters, or guardians, have them operated upon to deprive them of their manhood. But the third class. consists of those pure and divine souls who have completely subdued their sexual passion to enter into LifeEternal. These alone are blessed; for they have adopted the life of celibacy of their own free-will and choice, not by force of circumstances beyond their control, nor from worldly motives. Theirs is the purest motive, and, naturally, theirs, also, is the bliss of Nirvana. RESURRECTION. So far as marital relation is concerned, two ideasare involved in its proper functioning, namely, the element of physical necessity and that of spirituality. The former alone is recognized, and forms the basis of society in Europe and among non-Indian races, where marriage is taken to be a civil contract, more or less binding on the parties, according to the requirements of the society to which the wedded couple belong. True marriage,. however, means all that it means to these races of men, and, in addition, the union of souls for uplifting the condition of the participants for their mutual, spiritual advancement. There is no room for brute carnality here, and although it is not necessary to crush out, or subdue, the natural demands of human nature, the parties remain unmoved by the presence of each other, except with the common idea of co-operating with the laws of nature, and for the unfoldment of the best within them. And, if the law be as Jesus declared it to be- 66 Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as

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510 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven" - who can doubt the efficacy of such a spiritual union of the participants, when all the most powerful psychic forces of both the husband and wife are directed towards one common end, when they both work in one direction, with one mind, for the realization of their most closely connected, and inseparably fused and united, interests ? It is in respect of such marriages that one unhesitatingly thinks, 'marriages are made in heaven ; those whom God has joined let no man put asunder' (Mark, X. 9). To revert from this lengthy digression, if the only begotten' Son of God had come down from heaven, he would have declared at once what he meant by a 'rising from the dead,' and not left the matter enshrouded in mystery for even a single moment. Assuming, for the sake of argument, that Jesus was a real Son of God, we can easily imagine what would have been the most natural course of conduct for him. He had come down for at least three distinct purposes, namely, (1) to reveal the glory of the Father to mankind, (2) to redeem humanity from sin, and (3) to establish his claim to Sonship of God by rising from the dead. His most obvious procedure would be to tell mankind his position in as plain a language as possible. If people failed to understand him, it was not their fault; it was failure on the part of the Son of God to express himself. If the Son of God fails to make people understand him, there is an end of the matter ; for there is a distinct confession of weakness, which is hardly in

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RESURRECTION. keeping with the notion of an all-knowing, all-powerful God. The question is, why did Jesus use ambiguous, unintelligible language when referring to his resurrection from the dead? Why did he not tell them plainly what he meant, instead of using language which, to say the least, was misleading? Now that the events are over, and we look into the sense of the various Messianic references to his death and resurrection, we may find them quite intelligible; but that before the event no one-not even the chosen twelve-had the least idea on the subject is absolutely certain from passages like the following, in the four gospels:: t "The people answered him, we have heard out of the law that Christ abideth for ever: how sayest thou, The Son of man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man ?"-John, XII. 34. "For he shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and spitefully entreated, and spitted on: "And they shall scourge him, and put him to death and the third day he shall rise again. "And they understood none of these things and this saying was hid from them, neither knew they the things which were spoken."Luke, XVIII, 32, 33, & 34. "And they kept the saying with themselves, questioning one with another what the rising from the dead should mean."Mark, IX. 10. 511 "For he taught his disciples, and said unto them, The Son of man is delivered into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and after that he is killed, he shall rise the third day. "But they understood not that saying, and were afraid to ask him."-Mark, IX., 31 & 32. No need to multiply references; it is not a case for interpretation, for we have here the actual testimony of the chosen disciples themselves that they did not understand what was meant by these sayings. In particu

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512 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. lar, the two expressions, "the Son of man " and the "rising from the dead," were unintelligible to them, We have already had occasion to look into the meaning of the former of these two expressions, and the latter shall be dealt with presently. Meanwhile, it is obvious that Jesus did not choose to enlighten his congregations on the subject, and preferred that they should remain ignorant of it. The question is, why? But before proceeding to explain this point, let us formulate another question similarly arising out of the mysterious conduct of Jesus, as that is also inextricably mixed up with this one. It is recorded in the gospels that Jesus not only evinced fear at the very last moment before his final preparation for glorification, but also actually prayed that the 'cup might be taken away from him.' It is also written that before his arrest he often hid himself from fear, when he found that the intentions of the Jews were all but friendly towards him. " Then from that day forth they took counsel together for to put him to death. "Jesus therefore walked no more openly among the Jews : but went thence to a country near the wilderness, into a city called Ephraim, and there continued with his disciples."-John, X1.53 & 54. "Then took they up stones to cast at him : but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them and so passed by."-John, VIII. 59. The display of such fear by the Son of God is most un-God-like. Nor do we imagine it becoming the dignity of such an Exalted Being to assure his disciples : " My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even anto death."-(Matthew, XXVI. 38).

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RESURRECTION, 513 It is considered a virtue amongst civilized races to display a manly spirit of resignation in the closing moments of life, and a manifestation of old-womanish horror of death is looked upon as a sign of pagan barbarism. Why, then, did Jesus forget himself so far? In endeavouring to find an answer to these questions, we must begin by frankly recognising the irrepressible fact that our ideas about the personality of Jesus are hopelessly wrong and the sole cause of our errors. There can be no such thing as a Son of God, to begin with. In order that there should be a son, there must be a wife first. But the God of the Christian Church cannot have a son, for he has no wife. All these difficulties vanish from our path when we reject unreasonable dogmas, and look at things from a rational point of view, for then the conduct which bas been seen to be inconsistent with the dignity of the Son of God b: comes quite appropriate for Jesus. The early life of Jesus has shown us that he was a man of more than ordinary learning, well versed in the knowledge of the different religious systems of the world, and acquainted and familiar with the most secret truths and occult doctrines which have mostly become lost to mankind in this age. He not only possessed a sound theoretical knowledge of the various religions, but had probably also acquired great practical experience, and had developed his occult, psychic forces to a degree which made him almost a superhuman being, far above the level of the average humanity of his day. He selected the people of Israel for his mission for two reasons : firstly, because the land of the patriarchs 88

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7V 14 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. appeared sufficiently manured soil where the seed might multiply thirty-, sixty-, or a hundred-fold with ease; and, secondly, because of his early associations and of the facilities afforded by his intimate knowledge of the Jewish language, customs, traditions, and, above all, by his familiarity with their scriptures. Jesus was not ignorant of the weakness of human nature, and knew that his doctrines were such as could not be easily accepted by the Jews, all leaven of truth in the writings of the prophets notwithstanding. Just realize how difficult is the task of preaching the Godhood and immortality of the soul even to-day when the world-wide idea of religious toleration permits us to express our ideas with perfect freedom and without fear. Two thousand years ago there was no such thing as toleration known among the generality of men, and the punishment for blasphemy' was nothing short of death. Jesus knew the difficulties which beset his path, and although he had ample guarantee of immortality in his own increasing powers, still, the risk was too great to be incurred unnecessarily. He knew full well that the moment he preached man's immortality openly, everybody would offer to test the truth of the doctrine on the person of its propounder, for, as his own teaching shows, he knew' men would not believe, even though one rose from the dead.' He pondered over the situation, and concluded that immortality only meant the conquest of death, not the rising up of the dead, on some future occasion, by the favour of another. He rejected the idea of dying to be brought to life again, and understood that the conquest

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515 of death implied nothing less than the acquisition of power to maintain a conscious existence, under all circumstances. This is what he set out to preach. But how was this to be proved to the unbelieving masses? Jesus had, in all probability, never studied religion from the scientific and metaphysical points of view; his knowledge had not been acquired in schools of logic and philosophy, or on lines of inductive or causal research. Perhaps the scriptural texts and practical experience were the sole foundation of his wisdom. But these do not suffice for every one; something more than pure dogmatic assertion is necessary to convince the masses. This was the difficulty which stared the Master in the face. No difficulty can, however, permanently stand in the way of a great soul; hence, no sooner than did it arise, its solution also presented itself to his great mind. He solved the problem by adopting the bold plan of illustrating his doctrine in his own person. He would preach his doctrine at all times, but RESURRECTION. "I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world," so that those alone who had ears to hear and eyes to see could realize its truth, and apply for further instruction. As for the enlightenment of the lower strata of society, he selected humble men whom he intended to initiate into the mysteries of his faith and to bring up after the manner of the other religious orders in the East. The power of working miracles, also, he relied upon to strengthen the faith of his followers. But, unfortunately, his doctrine did not appeal to the people, and whatever success he achieved, in his own time, was

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516 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. due to his super-human power of curing disease and working miracles. Even his disciples, as has been seen before, developed very little capacity for faith, at least during the time that he was with them, and displayed a marked tendency to remain content with the miraculous in him. It thus became necessary to give a public demonstration of his doctrine of immortality, under circumstances which would leave no doubt as to its truth. It was to serve a twofold purpose for him. Firstly, it would be proof positive of his teaching, and, secondly, it would remove whatever imperfections were still left in him. That he regarded himself as imperfect before his crucifixion follows from his own words : "And he said unto them, Go ye, and tell that fox (Herod), Behold I cast out devils, and I do cures to-day and to-morrow, and the third day I shall be perfected."--(Luke, XIII. 32.) Thus, his plan was intended to serve the twofold purpose, that is, the practical demonstration of the truth of the doctrine to the public, and the attainment of perfection for himself. But it was essential for its success that he took no one into his counsel. It was a matter of life and death, and with such men as Judas Iscariot among his disciples, the safest course was to impart the secret to no one. Yet a reference to the matter was necessary, so that when the experiment passed off successfully, it could be pointed out as constituting the strongest item of proof in support of the doctrine. It would be the height of folly to reject Jesus as an artful designer, because we should then have to reject every one in whose conduct we might see traces of design.

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RESURRECTION. 517 Wherever we see parents laying out and carrying into execution schemes for the betterment of the condition of their offspring, we should have to face the same ugly situation. The very Son of God, in the popular sense of the expression, would be open to the same blame. Even the Supreme Father who laid designs for the sacrifice of his only begotten Son in our behalf, and who "concealed certain truths from the wise, but revealed them to the babes," in such a fashion that none of them, at least during the lifetime of Jesus, could understand them, would not escape condemnation for designing. It is pure prejudice which can possibly take such a view of the great sacrifice which the noble soul of Jesus undertook to make in our cause. To risk one's life purely for the sake of others, so that they might be saved, is one of those heroic deeds with which history is ever proud to ornament its pages. He had discovered the secret of human woe, and its remedy was so astounding that the wisest of the age, although beaten in argument, merely shook their unconvinced heads at it, leaving him to prove its truth, if he so chose, by a practical demonstration on his own person. But, be it said to his everlasting glory, that he did not, for a moment, shrink from the task set to him to accomplish. How can one doubt his claim, "I am the way, the truth, and the life?" He was the truth,' because he set it before men; he was the 'way,' because he undertook to guide them along the most difficult portion of it; and he was the 'life,' because he rose from the dead, and demonstrated * Here 'he' refers to the Speaker, not to the body which was inhabited by the Speaker on the occasion.

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518 its triumph to the world. Adam was punished, because he had busied himself in the pursuit of good and evil, with the result that the Divine in him became buried below his lower nature. This was the truth that the heromartyr of the Place of Calvary preached to the world. The way to ascend to the right hand of Power lay in a complete overthrow of the 'man,' metaphorically, in his crucifixion, so that the God-end of the see-saw be released from the bondage of ignorance and rise up to the top. Jesus possessed the knowledge, knew the way, and pointed it out definitely, by his own example, to the world. One can understand this. But where is the sense in the sacrifice of the only begotten Son, if the lesson to be learnt by humanity was to be non-productive of any practical result? If there is a resurrection of the dead in the hereafter, men would have risen all the same, whether the Lord God sacrified the life of his son, or not. There is point in our explanation, but none in the orthodox view. Why could not the Lord God think of some other and less tragic way to save or inform his creatures? Are not all things possible with him? And, after all the ceremony comes to a childish farce, when we remember that there was no sort of danger incurred in the so-called sacrifice. It was positively certain that the Son of God was not to die altogether. Even assuming that he actually died on the cross, the sacrifice by God of the life of his Son, when stripped of all poetical clothing, amounts to a suspension of animation for the space of three days! Can we compare it with the heroic devotion of Abraham, who offered to sacrifice his son's life in real, deadly THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RESURRECTION. 519. earnest ? And, yet, even the conduct of Abraham sinks into insignificance before that of Jesus. Abraham merely wished to win the favour of his god, while Jesus was actuated by motives of the purest love for erring humanity! Such was the nature of the sacrifice which Jesus voluntarily undertook to offer for humanity. We can now follow him more closely in his ideas. We shall now find that that which seemed mysterious and inexplicable in his conduct was not only natural, but also most appropriate and becoming under the circumstances. His tactics in hiding himself when the Jews proposed to lynch him are no longer beyond the pale of rational explanation. While he was desirous of demonstrating the truth of his doctrine on a suitable occasion, he was not going to put it to test at the mere will and pleasure of his audience. And yet, his occult powers enabled him to escape from harm in a manner becoming his dignity. He did not beg for mercy, or run away from his persecutors, when they took up stones to kill him ; neither did he resort to any of those mean tricks which ordinarily suggest themselves to a less stout heart when one is in danger of one's life. He boldly passed through them, and no man dared harm a hair of his head! A single look from him probably sufficed to freeze the blood in the veins of his assailants. The moment chosen by him for public demonstration had not yet arrived, and he was perfectly justified in defending himself by his occult powers. The gospel narratives leave no doubt as to the plan of Jesus. That he had decided to demonstrate his

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520 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. immortality on the cross is clear from his own sayings. The following statement of his is too definite to need comment: "Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be betrayed unto the chief priests, and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles to mock, and to scourge and to crucify him: and the third day he shall rise again."-(Matthew, XX. 18 & 19). He was all along aiming at it, so that whenever he was asked by the people for a sign, he would reply that no sign but that of the prophet Jonas would be given them, for as Jonas was for three days and nights in the belly of the fish, so would the Son of man remain for a similar period in the heart of the earth (Matthew, XII. 40 and XVI. 4). This was repeated in Galilee to his disciples (Matthew, XVII. 22). On another occasion he put it: "I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am straitened till it be accomplished."-(Luke, XII, 50). John (XVIII. 32) lends confirmation to this view, if any were necessary. So determined was he on his purpose that when Peter unwittingly rebuked him, saying: "Be it far from thee Lord: this shall not be unto thee," he (Jesus) turned on him (Peter) so fiercely that he had to hold his peace, in spite of the liberty he used to take with the Master (Matthew, XVI. 22 & 23). The next question that arises in connection with the scheme of Jesus for a practical demonstration of his immortality is: how could he know beforehand the manner in which the Jews would put him to death? In other words, how could the Jews be compelled to further his scheme by selecting crucifixion as the only

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521 mode of death? A little thinking will enable any one to see that it was not a matter of any great difficulty. In the days of Jesus, Judea was under the Roman rule, and Pontius Pilate was its governor. The following additional information from an authoritative source is highly relevant to the point under consideration: "It was the custom for the procurators to reside at Jerusalemduring the great feasts to preserve order; accordingly, at the time of our lord's last passover Pilate was occupying his official residence in Herod's palace. As the power of life and death was in the hands of the Roman Governor, our Lord could not be crucified by the Jews without the sanction and command of Pilate (John, 18. 31; 19. 16)".The Westminster Bible Dictionary, by the Revd. T. J. Shepherd, D. D., page 411, under the heading 'Pilate.' RESURRECTION. Our next quotation from the same work at page 147, under the heading 'cross,' throws further light on the situation:--- : "Cross, a gibbet made of two beams of wood placed transversely in the shape of a T or X or +, on which criminals were executed. This mode of punishment was not practised by the Jews; among the Romans it was reserved for slaves or the most atrocious criminals." The situation now becomes perfectly clear. Jesus chose that moment, for the practical demonstration of his doctrine, when Pilate's presence at Jerusalem would make it impossible for the Jews to take the law into their own hands, and, therefore, selected the time of the great feast of the Passover. Now, it was certain that the Jews would desire to inflict the most ignominious punishment, that is, crucifixion, on him whom they believed to be guilty of the worst possible form of blasphemy, and the report of such expressions as the 'Kingdom of God' was not unlikely to brand him as a most dangerous seditionist in the eyes of their Roman Rulers. Probably

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522 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. it was the report of the expression, "Blessed is the king of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord" (John, XII. 13), used by some of his overzealous followers, at the time of his last entry into Jerusalem, which disinclined the Roman soldiery to show any regard for his person, when once it was decided to yield to the demand of the Jews. Thus, so long as no one knew his object, there was hardly any chance of error, or room for mishap, left anywhere in his scheme; and, even if the worst came to the worst, it was always within his power to 'hide himself and pass through their midst,' as he had done before. The irresistible power, acquired by the development of the subjective forces within him, could always be relied upon to enable him to effect his escape at the last moment, if he found that events were not shaping themselves to suit his plan. That he knew his power well is put beyond the possibility of dispute by his own declaration, which, in the words of the author of the gospel of St. John, reads:-- "No man taketh it (life) from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father." " " By this time, no doubt, Jesus had been fully convinced of his intended laying down of life and its taking up again in the interest of the sheep as a divine commandment, so that there should be only 6 one fold and one Shepherd.' If any authority were needed to prove this, we have it in the following from the third gospel : : And truly the Son of man goeth, as it was determined."--Luke, XXII. 22).

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RESURRECTION. When Peter drew out his sword to resist the arrest, Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels ? but how then will the scriptures be fulfilled that thus it must be ?" He all along felt that the 'Father' within was powerful enough to protect him from all harm; accordingly, he said to his assailants : 523 "When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me: but this is your hour, and the power of dark ness," The only time when he showed signs of fear was when he set out to prepare himself for the trial. Then alone did his indomitable courage seem to give way for a moment; but it was not anything more than a mere passing exhibition of the inborn, human weakness, so natural in the stoutest heart, at the possibility of death and extinction in the impending ordeal? Is it any wonder that Jesus should retire into solitude, to look over the events of the past three years of his career, as the teacher of the race? In the undisturbed solitude of the place of Gethsemane, he looked back, through the vista of time, to the solitary couple of typical humanity, and, in his mind's eye, saw them walking in the company of the Father, and beheld their happiness unmarred by any of the incidents common to humanity in his own day. The vision of paradise lay stretched before him. The garden of Eden, with all its beautiful, soulenrapturing scenery, lay pictured before his mental gaze, with the figures of Adam and Eve standing out, in bold relief, in the foreground, the former with a countenance radiating, in manhood's glory, like noonday

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524 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. sun, and the latter, in the fulness of womanhood's charms, surpassing the shining orb of the Queen of night, at the zenith of her majestic grace. He looked at them with awe and admiration, and his delight knew no bounds when be beheld their radiant faces lit up with the beatific glory of at-one-ment with the Lord God, whom he had learnt to look upon as Father.' The scene held him spell-bound for a moment. Then his eye wandered over to where the Tree of Life itself stood in the midst of the garden, and he presently beheld the two human figures walking leisurely towards it, and saw them stretch out their hands and eat its golden fruit, which, even as it stood on the tree, seemed to be overflowing with the nectar of immortality. There was not a single withered leaf on that tree, nor anywhere else in its vicinity, while the heavenly fragrance of its blossoms carried life and joy to all, as it was wafted on the breeze. Entranced and enraptured, he allowed his gaze to wander from it to a still more beautiful tree in the garden. " With root above, branches below; its leaves are hymns, virtue and vice its flowers, and joy and grief its fruit. Downwards and upwards spread the branches of it, nourished by the qualities; the objects of sense its buds ; and its roots grow downwards, the bonds of action in the world of men." --(Bhagavad Gita, XV. 1, 2 and 3). Jesus was fascinated ; something within him seemed to point it out as the tree of knowledge of good and evil. He was still looking at it, when he suddenly noticed that a dark slimy object had glided up to its trunk and threw its venom into it. He instinctively

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RESURRECTION. 525 shuddered from its sight, and allowed his gaze to wander away still further, when in a quiet retreat he beheld the sweetest woman, fairest of the fair, her beauteous countenance bathed in the smiles of joy, her eyes sparkling with the light of innocence and love, a perfect inodel of feminine grace and beauty, tripping gaily, and, in the intense lightness of her heart, born of the sense of freedom and power, hardly seeming to touch the ground which she trod. Presently he beheld the dark slimy creature coming up to her from behind, and noticed that her fair face showed signs of instinctive repulsion at its approach. Eagerly did he strain his nerves to catch their conversation, but in vain. He only beheld a shaking of the head on the part of the fair one, and a nodding, as if in emphasizing a point, on that of the other; and then it seemed as if some understanding had been arrived at between them, for he beheld them parting company with a nod of their heads. His gaze now followed the figure of the woman, who, passing through some beautiful walks and flowerbeds, rejoined her lord. There was some conversation between them which he could not overhear, but he saw signs of anger and incredulity succeed each other on the face of the man. Next he beheld them proceeding in the direction of the attractive but poisonous tree, and it appeared to him that their talk had some reference to it, for the man shook his head vigorously when they reached it. At last the woman raised her beautiful, sym. metrical hand to point out its beauty, at which her companion seemed at first to hesitate, and then finally to agree with her.

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526 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Then all of a sudden the heart of Jesus sank within him. He saw the woman pluck the fruit of the tree. He made as if to rush forward to warn them that the tree was poisoned, but before he could realize what had happened, the woman had eaten a piece herself and had given another to her lord and master, the man. Jesus did not want to look in that direction any more. He knew what the inevitable result of that fruit was. Then he turned his gaze towards Jerusalem, and saw, as if by the power of clairvoyance, the chief priests and elders gathered together, planning and plotting his own destruction. He saw Judas Iscariot sitting in their midst with what looked like some pieces of silver before him, and heard the arrangement arrived at between them for his betrayal. But the scene did not affect him in the least; he was only amazed (Mark, XIV. 33) at their short-sightedness. His mind had already been made up; the temporary fit of weakness had passed. In the whole of the holy land of Palestine he was the one man who knew the secret of sin. Should he allow the handful of purblind fools of the Scribes and Pharisees to stand between him and his duty to the whole race ? When at the end of his forty days' austerities in the forest he had not yielded to the voice of temptation, which had pointed out that all the pomp and power and greatness which man can possibly desire in this world was his, if he would but use his powers for their acquisition, and had preferred to carry out his ministry, how could he now be swayed away from the course which he had chalked out for himself ? That settled the point,

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RESURRECTION. 527 once for all. Having arrived at this conclusion, he became once again the Master that he was. After the fit of momentary human weakness had passed away, Jesus applied himself to testing his powers. He exerted himself to such an extent in what seemed to his disciples the act of praying, but which, in reality, was the act of concentration and display of will-power that' his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.' Three of his most powerful disciples, namely, Peter, James and John, felt overpowered, and could not keep awake, and fancied that an angel from heaven had come to strengthen him. Thrice he told them to keep awake and watch with him, but each time they fell asleep, and did not know what reply to give (Mark, XIV. 40) when reprimanded by him. The test was entirely successful, for if three of his well-instructed and most advanced disciples, like Peter, James and John, could not resist the influence of, but yielded to, his subjective forces, and were dumbfounded in addition, he had nothing to fear at all at the hands of his persecutors. So he stepped out of his solitude, being, now, fully prepared for the coming ordeal. He no longer said 'the spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak.' The weakness of the flesh was a momentary sensation, which the spirit had never succumbed to. There was no longer the fear of any mishap, or calamity; he felt the power of his spirit welling up within him. The 'man'in him was completely subdued ; and, rising like the divine Master that he had now become, he declared, "Rise up, let us go," to meet the assassin. It seems but a waste of time now to show, in detail, that the three purposes for

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1528 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. which the Son of God could come down from heaven, namely, (1) to reval the glory of the Father to mankind, (2) to redeem humanity from sin, and (3) to establish his claim to Sonship of God, by rising from the dead, were much better performed by Jesus as a member of the human race than could possibly be performed by him as the Son of God, in the orthodox sense of the word. There is no difficulty now in our understanding him when he declares : "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow me." When the voice of the crier, 'repent for the Kingdom of God is at hand,' is heard and meditated upon, the path for the coming of the Saviour is straightened out. Then comes the higher teaching, to the effect that he who will save his life shall lose it, but he who loses it, for the sake of the Christ within, shall find it. It is the practical observance of this teaching, culminating in the crucifixion of the bodily self, that leads to Godhood. But the love of the lower nature is the cause of sorrow ; for, so long as it is in power, the Godhood of man must remain hidden below the threshold. Therefore, so long as a man clings to his animal nature, and has a longing to participate in the pleasures and joys which the world of senses affords, he cannot save his life; but if he gets ready to sacrifice his lower self, so that the Christ within may come into his own, he soon becomes the fountain of life eternal. Just as by the destruction of his lower nature Jesus became Christ, the fountain of immortal life, so

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529 would every one, who would but crucify the beast in him, attain to immortality. The western nations have found the teaching of Jesus difficult to understand, because they had only his solitary example before them; but in the East there have been hundreds of thousands of men who have risen to Godhood. The twenty-four Tirthamkaras of the Jainas had set the example before the nations of the East centuries before the advent of Jesus, and had succeeded in acquiring the perfection of Gods by neglecting, mortifying, and, finally, by totally destroying their lower nature. Even now-a-days, there are men who are trying to live on this principle. This is the only way to rise above death, sickness and sorrow. RESURRECTION. So far as resurrection is concerned, the ground has now been prepared, by the facts and conclusions already established and drawn, for a proper understanding of what took place after the crucifixion of Jesus. Only a few other incidents are required to fill in the remaining details of the scene at Calvary. Among these, the first to be noticed is that Jesus was crucified at the sixth hour and was dead by the ninth. This was so strange and unexpected that Pilate marvelled if Jesus were already dead (Mark, XV. 44). Usually death by crucifixion is a slow, lingering process. The Westminster Bible Dictionary (page 147) has the following comment on the subject: "Death pains thus inflicted were not only excruciating, but lingering, the unhappy person often surviving for several days." Even the malefactors, if we believe them to have been crucified with Jesus, were found alive and had to be killed by a further breaking of their legs, in ac 34

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530 cordance with the Jewish tenets (John, XIX. 31; Deuteronomy XXI. 23). Another point to notice is that Jesus refused to drink the stupefying mixture consisting of vinegar and gall, which was usually given to victims to deaden pain. According to Matthew (XXVII. 34), 'when he had tasted thereof, he would not drink.' THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ""* The last and the most important point to take note of is the manner of his death.' He is said to have yielded up the ghost with the twice repeated cry, "My God, My God, why hast thus thou forsaken me.' This is the account given by Matthew (XXVII. 46 & 50). Mark (XV. 34 & 37) corroborates him almost word for word. Luke, however, narrates the story with a strong variation. According to him, Jesus, having cried with a loud voice, gave up the ghost, saying, 'Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.' On the other hand, John, who claims to have been present on the spot, and whose anxiety to be considered truthful the gospel after his name makes no endeavour to hide, tells us :-" When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, 'It is finished': and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost." John also introduces the mother of Jesus on the scene, and drags him down at that supreme moment of his career so much into the world of men as to make him say to her, "Woman behold thy son," and to 'that disciple,' "behold thy mother!" *The Secret Doctrine (Vol. III, pp. 146-8) shows that the meaning of this verse, in the original Hebrew MS., is not as it is given in the English Version, but: 'My God, My God, how dost thou glorify me.' This is certainly more to the point,

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RESURRECTION. 531 None of these statements is compatible with the dignity of the Son of God, nor are they quite consistent with the attitude of Jesus crucifying the man within him. The nature of the contradictions involved in them is such that no reliance can be put upon them, and it is more than probable that the disciples of Jesus had taken to their heels, at the earliest opportunity, after his arrest, except possibly Peter. Touching the account of the resurrection of Jesus, as contained in the New Testament, we shall let Dr. W. Wenzlic, M.D., state his views on the subject. In 'The Greatest Good of Mankind' (pages 205, 206 and 207), he writes : "An angel descending from heaven amid an earthquake to roll away the stone from the tomb of Christ, witnessed, according to Matthew, by Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, is certainly something so remarkable that if it had occurred, Mark, Luke and John would also have recorded the miracle as a prelude. "Instead of merely omitting the testimony, these apostles, three of them, testify to the contrary; Luke, XXIV. 2, says:And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb and no angel outside bat one within the tomb, and that 10, Joanna was with the two Marys.' John, XX, however, says, Mary Magdalene alone went to the tomb. Mark, XVI. 4, mentions no angel from heaven, but They see that the stone is rolled away.' " Thus the four records contain four different accounts. " While the one young man angel of Luke was sitting on the right side, XVI. 5, two men in dazzling apparel stood by them according to Luke XXIV. 4: but John says, XX. 12, Magdalene beholdeth two angels in white sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. "If these several recorders were so particular in the number of angels and their postures, why do they contradict one another as to the number of witnesses that gave the testimony : Matthew sayin:

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532 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that the two Marys went, Luke that Joanna was alone, and John that Magdalene alone went to the tomb. "Matthew says that the two Marys met Jesus on their way to the disciples and that he spoke to them. On the appointed time Jesus met the eleven on the mountain and gave instructions. Nothing is mentioned of vanishing or rising up to heaven. His last words in this chapter are: 'I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.' "Mark records, XVI. 9, that Jesus when he was risen appeared first to Magdalene, 12, then in another form unto two that had been with him, afterwards to the eleven themselves. 19. After he had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven and sat at the right hand of God. "Luke XXIV. 13, narrates that Jesus first appeared unto two that were journeying, but they knew him not until they had supper: 31, and then he vanished out of sight. 34. He appeared unto Simon, 36. Then he stood in the midst of them. 39. It is I myself: handle me and see; for a spirit hath no flesh and bones, as ye behold me having. 50. He led them out: 51. While he blessed them, he parted from them, and was carried up into heaven. "John has Jesus appear to Magdalene in the tomb after she spoke to the angels, but she knew him not. 17. When she knew bim, Jesus said, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended unto the Father. 19. On the evening of the first day of the week he appeared to the disciples in a closed room. 26. After eight days he came again, the doors being shut. 27. Then saith he to Thomas, reach hither thy hand and put it into my side; John XX. 15-27. In XXI. 24, Jesus manifested himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberias on the beach and filled the nets with fishes. He sayeth not how he vanished, and we know that his witness is true.' "Jesus showed himself alive after his passion by many proofs, appearing unto the apostles by the space of forty days, says Paul in Acts I. 3-9. And when he had said these things, as they were ooking, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they were looking steadfastly into heaven as he went, behold two men stood by them in white apparel; which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye looking into heaven? This Jesus, which was received up from you into heaven, shall come again in like manner as ye behold him going into heaven.

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RESURRECTION. 533 "Paul says, that Jesus appeared to Cephas; then to the twelve : then he appeared to above 500 brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain until now; 7, then he appeared to James; then to all the apostles, and, last of all, as to one born out of all time, he appeared to me also ; I Cor. XV. 5-7. "The ascension as witnessed by the apostles is described in the Acts with all the accessories such a spectacular event would imply, whereas Mark and Luke only say that Jesus was received in heaven; Matthew, John, and Paul, in Cor. I., say nothing about so great a miracle." * Order of appearance." * Jesus appeared in the following order: "To Mary and Magdalene, then to the 11 apostles, according to Matthew. " To Magdalene, then to the two apostles, then to all.--Mark. "To the two apostles, then to Simon, then to all.- Luke. "To Magdalene, then to the disciples, in 8 days again in Tiberias. --John. "To the apostles in 40 days.-Acts. "To Cephas, then to the 12 apostles, then to the above 500.--I Cor. "To Paul, and James. "No two records agree as to the number of witnesses, nor as to the order of meeting Jesus. "Slight variations in the testimony of witnesses would strengthen evidence if they express merely the differences of personal impressions, but the essentials must agree. In the above the essentials not only disagree, but contradict one another. This holds good also with reference to what was spoken by Jesus and his disciples. If closely examined it will be found that the relevant as well as the irrelevant vary with each version, Exempli gratia; Luke, XXIV. 39, the evening of the first day, See my hands and feet, that it is myself; handle me and see: for a spirit hath no flesh and bones, as ye behold me having. In John, XX. 17, Jesus says to Magdalene, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended unto the Father. Again, eight days later, verse 27, he asks Thomas to touch and examine him ......We are left to draw our own conclusions." There are obvious traces of falsehood and interpolation about the events which took place subsequent

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534 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to the crucifixion of Jesus. Matthew makes the Pharisees obtain the permission of Pilate to make the sepulchre secure, on the second day, fearing that the deceiver might rise up again ( Matthew, XXVII. 62-66). This does not read well with what John says in his gospel (chapter XII, verses 32, 33 and 34). It is hardly likely that Jesus would be so careless with his speech that what remained unintelligible to his friends and disciples would become plain to his enemies. Moreover, if the Jews had entertained any fears with regard to him, they would have shown more promptitude and earnestness while his body still lay on the cross, or, at the latest, that very night. No other gospelwriter corroborates Matthew on the point. The strongest reason against the story about securing the sepulchre lies in the fact that the Jews had absolutely no knowledge of the resurrection of Jesus, or there would have been some signs of activity, or repentance, on their part. It is unlikely that such an event would have passed by without causing a tremendous stir, the absence of which the fable of a bribe is too feeble to explain. The account, no doubt, suffers from the fault of aiming too high. Matthew closes his gospel with some of the disciples of Jesus still doubting his resurrection, although they 'saw and worshipped him' (XXVIII. 17). According to Luke, the resurrection and the vanishing took place the same day. Certain women went and saw the empty grave, and when they had carried the news to the disciples, Peter also ran to see what bad happened, and was astonished to find the linen clothes

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RESURRECTION 535 lying in the grave, but not the body of Jesus. The same day Jesus met two of the disciples, talked to them, dined with them in the evening, met the remaining body of them about an hour later, and, finally, leading them out to Bethany, parted from them, and was carried up to heaven. According to John, both Peter and the other disciple' ran to see the sepulchre, and, although the other disciple' outran Peter, the result was that they both found the grave empty, except that it contained linen clothes and a napkin. John's anxiety to be believed practically makes it impossible for one to believe in his narration of the mysterious events which he records in connection with the resurrection of his Master. Further, if it be true that some of the eleven entertained doubts about his resurrection, notwithstanding that they had seen and worshipped him, the conclusion seems to be that the longer and more detailed accounts of the appearance of Jesus among his disciples are, at all events, not intended to be read in their historical sense. But, while rejecting the accounts of the gospelwriters, one finds oneself unable to reject the fact of resurrection altogether. While it is true that most of the disciples of Jesus have little, or nothing, to show in the shape of any new or special training, in spite of the fact that some of them record that their understandings were opened by the Saviour after he rose from the dead, still it is impossible, for that reason alone, to disbelieve in the power of Jesus to raise himself up. Nor is it logical to hold that his non-appearance

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536 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. before his enemies necessarily precludes a belief in his resurrection, for he might bave had some good reason for not courting their notice, after getting out of the grave. It all depends on what view we take of his "death. If one believes that he actually died on the cross, then, certainly, there is an end to the resurrection; but if, in harmony with our previous conclusions, we accord to him the power to put himself in deep trance, there is no difficulty about the matter. Rejecting the Biblical narratives about his doings after the crucifixion, we shall construe the events in our own way. The first thing to see is whether there is any evidence of the power claimed by the higher adepts of Yoga and other mystics to enter, at will, into a state of trance, and become dead to all appearances. That there have been cases of suspended animation no one will seriously deny; and it may be surmised from this that some lamentable burials have taken place in the past in which the persons buried were supposed to be dead, though actually alive and in a trance. Dr. Drayton, M.D., refers to the case of Revd. William Tennant of New Jersey why several times became entranced, and was twice prepared for the grave, his physicians even concluding that he was dead (Human Magnetism, page 59). On the same page he says : "Many other cases are recorded of suspended animation,' which, it is claimed, can be induced almost at will. The stories told of East Indian fakirs who have voluntarily entered into the trance state and remained apparently dead for even months, have their *witness' testimony, and it is of a character that skepticism respects." In the 21st chapter of the Law of Psychic Pheno

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RESURRECTION. 537 mena,' Hudson discusses the subject at great length, and shows the genuine nature of the phenomenon. On page 312 of the book last referred to he writes : "One of the most clearly attested instances of the kind alluded to is the experiment of the fakir of Lahore, who, at the instance of Ranjit Singh, suffered himself to be buried alive in an air-tight vault for a period of six weeks. The case was thoroughly authenticated by Sir Claude Wade, the then British resident at the Court of Ludhiana. The fakir's nostrils and ears were first filled with wax; he was then placed in a linen bag, then deposited in a wooden box which was securely locked and the box was deposited in a brick vault which was carefully plastered up with mortar and sealed with the Raja's seal. A guard of British soldiers was then detailed to watch the vault day and night. At the end of the prescribed time the vault was opened in the presence of Sir Claude and Ranjit Singh, and the fakir was restored to consciousness." We also learn from Dr. Drayton that Sir Monier Williams, at one time Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford, also testified to the accuracy of these details, and that Dr. McGregor, the then resident surgeon, also watched the case. "Every precaution was taken to prevent deception " (Human Magnetism, pages 59 and 60). Sensations of pain are generally absent in trance, and the immunity from them becomes more marked when a suggestion to that effect is given by the person himself before entering that state, or, afterwards, by another, as in hypnotism. Says Prof. James in his 'Principles of Psychology,' at page 606 of the second volume : "Real sensations may be abolished as well as false ones suggested. Legs and breasts may be amputated, children born, teeth extracted, in fact, the most painful experiences undergone, with no other anaesthetic than the hypnotizer's assurance that no pain shall be felt."

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538 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It would be useless to multiply further authorities; the evidence in support of the phenomenon is more than sufficient, and, consequently, there is no room for doubt. As regards the inhibition of pain, it is now regarded as quite an established rule that a suggestion adopted by a person, in the waking state, is generally more potent than one given, by another, after the induction of hypnotic sleep. We may now resume the thread of our narrative of the great sacrifice Jesus had determined to make for the welfare of humanity. How he was betrayed, arrested and taken to the Chief Priest are narrated in the Bible, and so we need not tarry to describe them in detail. It was, however, discovered that there was no evidence worth the name to charge him with an offence. Only two persons seem to have deposed against him, and even their testimony was so discrepant that it was not considered safe to rely upon it. The Chief Priest and his companions were perplexed, and did not know what to do. Here was the very man for whose destruction all the plotting and planning had been done, but just at the very moment when they thought that he was in their power, he seemed to be escaping out of their hands, for want of good evidence. In sheer desperation the priest resorted to the device of bullying the prisoner into making some incriminating statement against himself. Turning to Jesus, he demanded :: "Answerest thou nothing? what is it which these witness against thee ?" (Mark, XIV, 60). Jesus held his tongue, but a moment's reflection enabled him to see that his silence might be the undoing

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539 of his plans; accordingly, he decided to help his enemies, so that when the wily priest returned to the attack, saying, "Art thou the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?" (Mark, XIV. 61), he replied, "Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven."-Matthew, XXVI. 64. This was enough for the Chief Priest and other accusers of Jesus, who, after subjecting him to various forms of ignominy, marched him off to the residence of the Governor, and accused him of high treason against the Roman Emperor (Mark, XV. 12; Luke, XXIII. 2). In his statement .before Pilate, Jesus did not like to suffer him to remain under a wrong impressign, seeing that he was a righteous man, and told him that his kingdom was not of this world, whereupon Pilate was inclined to release him; but fearing that his releasing Jesus in the face of such a tumultuous clamour for his death, as Caesar's enemy, might implicate him in the eyes of his own Emperor, he had to yield to their demand, for they had openly threatened to denounce him, saying: RESURRECTION. "If thou let this man go thou art not Caesar's friend: whosoever maketh himself a king speaketh against Caesar."-(John, XIX. 12), Here, again, we find the nobility of Jesus' disposition asserting itself. For the sake of truth and to avoid misleading a righteous man, he risked everything, even the very success of his plans, at the last moment. If Pilate had declined to crucify him, all his plans. would have been frustrated, but better that than the misleading of a righteous man. From the judgment hall he was taken to the place

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540 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of Golgotha, and nailed to the cross, the inscription at its top showing that he was crucified for high treason. The story of the two malefactors being crucified with him seems to have been invented, so that the event might come to pass' in fulfilment of the prophecy which said: 'and he was numbered with the transgressors' (Mark, XV. 28). Unfortunately for the fulfil. ment of this ancient saying, as an actual historical event, the facts point unmistakably in the opposite direction. Luke is the most garrulous of all the gospelwriters on this point. He makes one of his malefactors revile Jesus, but lets the other chide him for his impiety, at which Jesus is pleased to such an extent that he promises the God-fearing evil-doer a lift to the paradise that very day (Luke, XXIII. 39-43). Matthew and Mark both unhesitatingly declare that the thieves, also, who were crucified with Jesus, reviled him, and naturally omit all further details, since, as they had both reviled him, there was nothing to be said in the shape of a promise from Jesus to any one of them (Matthew, XXVII. 44; Mark, XV. 32). John, not knowing what to do with the contradictory and mutually quarrelsome malefactors of Luke, thought it quite enough to bring them on to the scene ; accordingly, be contented himself with merely recording the event of three persons being crucified together, one of whoin wae Jesus. Under such circumstances, the testimony of the disciples is quite insufficient to establish the fact, and is more than counterbalanced by a desire to show the fulfilment of as many of the prophetic utterances of the veteran Isaiah and other prophets as they found it

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RESURRECTION, 541 convenient to do. The circumstantial evidence is all against it. Till the malefactors were actually crucified, nobody seemed to know anything about their very existence, so much so that one is tempted to imagine that these venerable gentlemen determined, of their own free will and accord, to join Jesus in death, so that Isaiah's word might not be broken. Luke, indeed, does say that the malefactors were also led with him, but he is too loquacious on the point, and had best he left out of the witness-box. There is nothing in the language of Pilate to suggest that there were any other persons besides Barabbas and Jesus to be crucified. Matthew (XXVII. 17) gives us the exact words used by him (Pilate) on the occasion, and they were : "Whom will ye that I release unto you? Barabbas, or Jesus which is called Christ ?" There is no reference to a third prisoner in this speech. Besides, it is highly incredible that persons whose only fault was that they had been guilty of theft (Matthew, XXVII. 38 & 44; Mark, XV. 27) would be put to death, but Barabbas, who was a notable prisoner, as he had taken part in an insurrection against the established authority, and was also guilty of murder (Matthew, XXVII. 16),-a murderer and an insurgent (Mark, XV. 7), a seditionist and murderer (Luke, XXIII. 19),--and a robber (John, XVIII. 40), should be released. Thus, from the standpoint of the historian, the intrinsic evidence furnished by the Bible itself is sufficient to prove that the two malefactors were not men of flesh and bone.

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542 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. To pass on to the final act in the tragedy of the Cross, John's account of the termination of the proceedings is probably correct. Pain was out of the question for such a strong personality as that of Jesus. Soldiers generally, and other persons less accustomed to suffer physical injuries, sometimes undergo serious operations, without showing any signs of terror and without feeling much pain. Subjects under hypnotic suggestion are free from it; and Adepts and Yogis of a higher order are above it. It mattered nothing to Jesus whether his hands and legs were pierced or not. By the power of his all-conquering will he was just as happy there, on the cross, as he would have been on Mount Olive, or anywhere else. He took his own time, and, knowing that he would not be allowed to linger on the cross, after the day had drawn to a close, waited till a sufficiently long time had elapsed, and, without making any fuss, or raising a hue and cry, or calling on Elias or any one else, threw himself into the state of Yoga Samadhi (trance), so that when he bowed his head 'it was finished' (John, XIX, 30). People who were looking on thought that he had given up the ghost ; but what they thought to be an act of giving up the ghost was, in reality, the act of drawing' or 'pulling' it 'in.' The incredibly short time which elapsed between his crucifixion and 'the giving up of the ghost' amply confirms this view. With his crucifixion, his career as a teacher necessarily came to an end. He could never be a preacher of the Gospel any more; his life's mission was finished; he had dilivered his message to the world.

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543 To conclude the account, he was removed from the cross and tenderly laid in the grave. When once there, free from further molestation and risk, he came round. With his powers of miraculous healing, the healing of his own wounds required but a thought to be effected. His triumph was now complete; he had risen from the dead. He had been carried to the grave as the slave of death, but he left it as its master. It was truly a resurrection, but not in the sense in which it is generally understood. It was the resurrection of Godhood from the clutches of ingorance and sin. A master hand had applied the Key of Knowledge,' and had opened the way to Truth. The powers of darkness and death were no more for such as cared to follow the Saviour on the path. RESURRECTION. How and when Jesus came to himself is not known; nor is it material for our purpose. It seems probable that he did not see many of his disciples after his resurrection. Certainly, he did not appear unto the public, or to any of his enemies. It is a circumstance much to be regretted. What were his reasons for thus disappearing from the scene altogether, it is impossible to say; it is only open to us to conjecture about them. It might have been that he thought that his reappearance on the scene would not necessarily convince his enemies of the truth of his doctrine. He might have thought that they would ascribe the phenomenon to the art of necromancy, and would propose another and possibly a severer test. Possibly, he thought that the evidence furnished by the empty grave and the linen clothes and napkin was proof evident to any one who

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544 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. cared to think for himself, without bias or bigotry. Again, the unexpected spear thrust in his side, on the cross, might have been responsible, in some way, unknown to us, for his avoiding publicity. In the region of occultism, no single thought goes unpunished, so that the spear thrust was, in all probability, the result of the doubt and weakness displayed by Jesus at the place of Gethsemane. Peter's sinking in consequence of doubt (Matthews, XIV. 31) is an illustration of the point so well put by Jesus in the famous text* Whosoever shall say to this mountain be thou removed, ...and shall not doubt in his heart,...shall have whatsoever he saith' (Mark, XI. 23). There is yet the possibility of the accuracy, in some particulars at least, of the accounts of Matthew and Luke, although the way in which they narrate the events, renders it well nigh impossible to put faith in their historical veracity. Probably Jesus paid a visit to his followers immediately after his rising from the dead,' and spent a few hours in their company, but finding that his resurrection was doubted even by his chosen disciples, in spite of the proofs afforded by direct perception and touch, withdrew himself altogether from that country. The crucifixion of the 'man-element' in him had so far lessened the sense of the reality of the world that he did not care to force himself into contact with it again. In the absence of any record left by Jesus himself, as well as in that of any reasonable explanation from his disciples, or any of his followers, it must be confessed that all the explanations suggested above are pure speculations, and must be taken for what they are

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RESURRECTION. 545 worth. All or any one of them might have been the true cause or causes which actuated Jesus, but no defi nite opinion can be ventured. What became of him afterwards is also enshrouded in mystery. Some people think that he is now residing, as one of the Masters, on Mount Lebanon ; others, who claim to have discovered his grave, that he died in Kashmere ; but according to Mahomedans, whose version is certainly more natural than both these, he perished on the Cross, and is now living in one of the heavens. So far as the existence of the grave is concerned, it would seem to be supported by little or no evidence ; but even if it were, it would not prove the further and the most crucial fact that it ever contained a dead body. There is a similar grave of Guru Nanak, but it is claimed that no dead or living body has ever lain in it. The story of this empty grave is rather interesting. On the death of the venerable Guru a dispute arose amongst his chelas (disciples) as to the disposal of the corpse. The Hindus proposed to cremate him, but the Mahomedans insisted on his burial; and so great was the enthusiasm of the disputants that neither party would yield. The matter had finally to be settled by a miracle. While the parties were still arguing with one another, the cloth which had been thrown over the dead body sank down all at once, and lay flat on the floor. Its removal disclosed that there was no body under it, dead or alive; and the chelas settled their dispute by dividing it in two. The Hindus burnt their half share, and the Mahomedans buried theirs, so that the grave of the Guru has never contained anything more than half a sheet of linen. 35

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546 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Again, Jesus might have simply changed his physical body into a subtler one. The power to effect such a change is unhesitatingly claimed by the yogis, and seems to have been exercised by a number of other saints and sages. Some of the passages of the New Testament itself would be meaningless unless on the hypothesis of this power, e.g., "And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them,...... but they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit."-(Luke, XXIV. 36 & 37). It was the phenomenon of materialization' which terrified the apostles. Jesus was already with them, though invisible; his assumption of the physical form in their midst took away their breath, and frightened them all. John also describes a similar phenomenon (Chap. XX. 14 & 15), and records another instance of Jesus' materialization into the physical form from some subtler, invisible, and unknown body. It was this power, apparently, which enabled Jesus to enter rooms and places with closed doors (John, XX. 26). Very naturally, it is not expected that our mere word would suffice to convince materialists of the existence of this great secret. It is not easy to prove it to the satisfaction of the present day man of science; but so far as actual testimony is concerned, no religion is wanting in it. Our ancestors were fully convinced of the existence of a secret which enabled one to change one's body into a finer one. Many instances are given of the phenomena of materialization in the records of occultism. We may, then, take it that the secret of this kind of metamorpho. sis was known to ancient occultists, but has been lost to

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547 us by the lapse of time. Perhaps the best thing for the average man to do under the circumstances is to suspend his judgment as to the possibility of such a secret in nature. To deny it would be rash, on the one hand, and to admit it, on the other, would be tantamount to substituting assumption for proof. But the ancient records and scriptures are to be read in the light of the beliefs of the ancients, however much they might remain unverified by us. The ancients undoubtedly have the merit of truthfulness in their favour; and we see no reason to disbelieve them when they are unanimous in the description of things which were of a fairly common occurrence in their time, simply because our own inferior faculties and powers of observation do not corroborate their statements. RESURRECTION. The residents of the heaven-world, called devas in Jainism and Hinduism and angels in Christianity and Islam, are also said to possess the power of making themselves invisible to men at will. This goes to show that the matter of their bodies is of a type which readily obeys the impulses of their will. The difference between devas and men with respect to this wonderful power lies in the fact that while the former enjoy it in consequence of their birth, the latter have to acquire it by the practising of renunciation and severe austerities. In addition to this miraculous power, the devas also enjoy the memory of their earth-lives, and the power to descend to this world; and some of them have been actually known to have come down in the past to their earthly friends. So far, then, as Jesus is concerned, it is also conceiv

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548 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. able that he might have given up the ghost, as John records, assumed the deva-body in one of the heavens, and thence descended to this world to hold converse with his disciples. Nor is there anything in the nature of an impossibility in this idea on the score of time, for the process of being born in heaven does not resemble that of birth in this world, inasmuch as the deva-birth takes place without conception and instantaneously, and is like the waking up of an individual from sleep. Thus, this explanation also is not altogether beyond the range of possibility, though, in the absence of any reliable historical record, the subject must necessarily remain enshrouded in mystery. The fact is that the number and nature of the contradictions which abound in the accounts of the resurrection of Jesus leave no doubt in the mind that they are the outcome of design, and suffice to show that the narratives were not intended to be read historically Passing on to a consideration of the alleged ascension, we notice the same kind of discrepancies about the event as are to be found in the description of most other incidents in the life of Jesus. How many of the disciples. of Jesus understood the true sense of the doctrine is not easy to determine. The evangelical accounts are all full of discrepancies and contradictions, though this is a circumstance which leads us to infer that the discrepancies are the outcome of design rather than of perjury, or fabrication. The fact is, as we have repeatedly stated before, that the gospels were never intended to be read in an historical sense. I Matthew and John, it will be seen, do not lend support to the

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RESURRECTION. ascension myth as given in the other two gospels; and it is unlikely that they would have kept silence on such a glorious event, if it were an historical fact. This circumstance alone is sufficient to show that the 'rising up to heaven' is a doctrinal allegory,* rather than an actual event, in the life of Jesus. The true import of the allegory will become clear when we come to deal with the Jaina view of moksha; here it suffices to point out that ascension only implies the attainment of the status of Godhood, i.e., Nirvana, or the rising up of the God-end of the see-saw of existence to the top. 549 Probably the substratum of truth underlying the physical aspect of the ascension of Jesus is not more wonderful than the phenomenon of levitation. Finding That the doctrine of resurrection is not an original Christian doctrine, or tenet, is well-known to students of comparative theology; but those who are not familiar with the subject will find the following observations of Mr. Joseph McCabe full of interest (see The Bankruptcy of Religion, p. 164): "The death and resurrection of Christ are probably to the average believer the central and unique truth of the Christian religion. Now, every well-informed theologian has known for ages that in the Roman' world in which Christianity arose, the annual commemoration of the death and resurrection of a god was the most common religious feature. The Egyptian cult of Osiris, the Babylonian cult of Tammuz (or Adonis), and the Phrygian cult of Attis had celebrated this annual solemnity for unknown ages, and had, in the fusion of nations in the Roman Empire, spread it over the whole eastern world. The Greeks adopted the festival centuries before Christ was born; the Persian cult of Mithra also adopted it. It is safe to say that there was not a city of that old world, before the time of Christ, which had not one or more temples, of different religions, attracting full public attention to the annual celebration of the death and resurrection of a god."

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550 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. his own disciples doubting his resurrection (Matthew, XXVIII. 17), Jesus led them out as far as to Bethany (Luke, XXIV. 50), and there was parted from them and carried up (Ibid. 51). Walking in the air is a phenomenon falling in the same class as walking on water; they both depend on what has now come to be known as the power of levitation, which is developed by certain well-disciplined souls. Psychic research shows that such a power exists, although its manifestation in the limited circle to which the modern research is confined is extremely rare. The adepts of old possessed the power of levitation,* and could fly from one place to another in the air. An adept of the stamp of Jesus must have possessed it, too, in a highly developed degree. When he disappeared from view and did not return, it was naturally thought that he had gone up to heaven. * There does not seem to be anything in the nature of an impossibility inhering in the power to walk through air. What stands in the way of man, in that respect, is the force of gravitation ; but it is obviously not an uncontrollable force, since the birds can fly, and, also, because he himself walks, jumps and dances in utter defiance of it. What enables him to do this is his will. It would seem that some magnetic law comes into operation on these occasions, enabling man to override the force of gravity, so that when the will is negative, as in sleep, he is unable to break away from the force of gravitation, but when it becomes positive, it is easy to act in defiance of it. Now, since man is able to partially override the force of gravitation in the movements he makes, and since these movements flow from an act of simple volition, it follows that the full development of will must be characterised by mastery over gravitation to a still greater extent. Hence, to the indomitable will of an adept of the type of Jesus, flying in the air would be but a child's play.

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RESURRECTION. 551 Mythologically, the allegory is now complete. Its chief features, in their proper sequence, are: (1) the Godhood of jiva, i.e., soul; (2) the temptation to eat of the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil; (3) the fall, whereby the God-element went down and the lower element became uppermost; whereby, also, the Immortal became the mortal ; (4) redemption by the 'Key of Knowledge;' (5) crucifixion of the lower element; (6) resurrection, or the regaining of the lost immortality; and (7) ascension, or the final triumph, i.e., the going up of the God-element to the top. The idea is so complete and full in all its details that it leaves no room for doubt as to its being the true essence of the Biblical religion. It is now possible to reconcile many of the old prophecies contained in the Old Testament in the light of our knowledge of mythology. Even the idea of the virgin-birth of Christ becomes intelligible now. When the Holy Ghost, or the spirit of Vairagya (renunciation) quickens the germ of Godhood lying dormant within the soul, it is called the birth of man in spirit, not a re-entering into the mother's womb a second time, as Nicodemus thought, but a birth of the saviour within each and every human being, as Jesus taught. Truly is the teaching of the master : "That which is born of fiesh is flesh, and that which is born of spirit is spirit. Marvel not that I said unto thee ye must be born again"-(John, III. 6 and 7),

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552 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. quite in accord with the utterance of the prophet: "Behold a virgin [Intellect] shall bring forth a child [wisdom] and his name shall be Immanuel [Saviour]." Thus, the first birth of man is of flesh, in the manner of flesh, but the second is that of Christ in him; and since the birth of Christ is the result of the brooding of Spirit over Intellect, having no manner of resemblance to the process of procreation of man in this world, therefore, is called the virgin-birth as well. Jesus was born of flesh, in the manner of flesh; but Christ was conceived of the Holy Ghost. The failure to observe this distinction has caused a lot of mischief in the world. Isaiah's prophecy referred to Christ; but it bas been erroneously ascribed to Jesus. The result is that, instead of throwing light on the true doctrine of the Messiah, its attribution to Jesus has actually gone to cast the aspersion of illegitimacy on a legitimate child. In all probability Jesus was born of duly wedded parents, and has to thank his own followers for the aspersion of illegitimacy flung at him by his opponents. That the prophecy in Isaiah (VII. 14 and 15) does not refer to Jesus is perfectly clear from the contents of the chapter in which it occurs. Its opening lines are: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel. Butter and honey shall he eat, so that he may learn to refuse the evil." So far as Jesus is concerned, the prophecy cannot be said to have been fulfilled in him, for he ate not butter and honey, but fish and bread. As he himself puts it, the Son of man (C came eating and drinking, and they say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a wine bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners" (Matthew, XI. 19). Besides,

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553 Jesus was never called Immanuel at any moment of his life; and, lastly, there was wanting that setting to the fulfilment which had been prophesied by the ancient seer, and which is to be found recorded in the subsequent verses of the very same chapter which contains the prophecy. RESURRECTION. What is not applicable to Jesus is, however, most appropriate to Christ which is always conceived of the Holy Ghost, in an immaculate fashion. Butter (wisdom, i.e., that which is extracted from the milk of experience) and honey (ananda, i.e., bliss) shall he enjoy, whenever and wherever he is born. The true significance of the Virgin birth, in plain terms, is the birth of the individual soul in dharma (right faith); and the conceptions of Krishna, Christos and Christ are intended to convey no more than the bare idea that the acquisition of the right faith by the soul soon transforms it into a Messiah or Redeemer, who is to attain to Godhood on the crucifixion of the lower self. When we look out for the fulfilment of symbolical prophecies as facts of history, we must come to grief. We should always search for the hidden, that is, the true sense of the teachings, beginning always with an enquiry into the attitude of the prophet, or seer, from whom they emanate. In order to understand a man, it is necessary to enquire into the state of his belief first. A failure to keep this injunction in mind has caused a lot of confusion in theological speculation, and for this very reason the statement of Jesus as to the coming of the Son of man has not been understood by the Christian world. We shall explain its significance after dealing with cer

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554 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tain preliminary and important matters in the next two chapters. Before closing this chapter, however, we should like to point out that many of the passages touching the life of Jesus which have been rejected by us, from the point of view of the bistorian and the biographer, contain important lessons of high mystical value, when read in the light of occultism. In most cases, the true import of psychical powers and spiritual functions has been cleverly concealed, under suggestive names, by the gospel writers. Such, for instance, is the story of the two thieves who are said to have been crucified with Jesus. They apparently represent the two currents, Ida and Pingala, of the vital 'breath,' which passes through the two chains of the sympathetie ganglia, in which is preserved the residue of the bodily tendencies, that is, the essence of the passions, emotions and thoughts of the individual. For this reason, they have also been personified as the angels who write and keep up to date the karmic ledger of the soul. These are also the two angels, who, according to Al Koran, are deputed to take an account of a man's behaviour, "one sitting on the right hand, and the other on the left : he uttereth not a word, but there is with him a watcher, ready to notet it" (Chapter L.). These two currents of the vital force are called thieves, because, being forms of breath, they are constantly engaged in robbing us of our 'life-breaths,' which, according to the popular view in the East, are predetermined and numbered for each individual in advance. They have to be subdued, that is to say, to be brought under the

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RESURRECTION. 555 control of will before God-consciousness can arise in the soul ; in different language, they have to be crucified with the lower self in the place called Golgotha, literally, the human skull, i.e., the important nervous centre in the head which is the seat of personality.* The friendly and pious thief of St. Luke is believed to be the current, which, in conjunction with kundalini, the current of life passing through the shushumna, i.e., the spinal canal, in the advanced stages of Yoga, leads to the rousing of the higher centres and, consequently, to the development of the spiritual powers of the soul. Hence, Jesus promises paradise to it along with himself. Even according to Mahomedans, "the angel who notes down a man's good actions has the command over him who notes his evil actions" (The Koran, by Sale, p. 384). Thus understood, these passages acquire great significance, but in the historical sense they only go to create confusion. * The darkening of the sun referred to in Luke XXIII. 45 also bears reference to the lower personality. There is nothing in the crucifixion of a human or superhuman being to cause the darkening of the solar orb; but, in the language of symbols, sun represents knowledge which is either full and perfect and all-embracing, i.e., omniscience, or partial and incomplete. The former of these is independent of tbe senses and mind, and arises only when their activity is completely stopped by spiritual meditation. The latter is the knowledge arising from the functioning of the senses and mind. It is the withdrawal of the little gleam of consciousness working through the mind for the acquisition of the inferior kind of knowledge which is signified by the darkening of the sun ; for mind is then plunged in darkness, so to speak. Thus, the darkening of the sun' always accompanies the loss of the lower ahumkara, symbolised by the crucifixion of Jesus.

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556 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. We may profitably utilize the present opportunity to look into the nature of the discrepancies which have gathered round the personality of John, the Baptist, whose figure is one of the most puzzling in the whole Bible. The discrepancies which are found to exist in connection with him are so serious that it is impossible to look upon his doings as historical events, though it is not quite impossible that there should have been a man of the name of John who went about preaching the doctrine of repentance. He is the cousin of the Messiah, to begin with, and jumps up with delight, while yet an unborn babe, on hearing the voice of his cousin's mother, though shortly afterwards he forgets all about him and actually sends his disciples to find out if he be the one who was to come (Matt. XI. 3). This is all the more remarkable, in view of the fact that John was fully aware of the status and dignity of Jesus at the time when he was asked to baptize him. According to Matthew (III. 14), he had refused to baptize Jesus at first, saying: "I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?" It was only when he had been assured that it behove Christ to be baptized of him, "Suffer it to be so now : for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness."-(Matt. III. 15),-- that he proceeded to baptize him. Upon this the heavens were opened unto Jesus, and the spirit of God alighted on him in the form of a dove. John actually saw all this, and declared: " And I saw, and bear record that this is the Son of God."-(John, 1.34).

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RESURRECTION 557 The next day John pointed out Jesus to two of his disciples, saying : "Behold the Lamb* of God."-(John, I. 36). Thus, John knew the nature of the personality and mission of Jesus full well about the time of his baptism. That he should have forgotten the evidence of his own senses in less than three years of his witnessing these great things, and in spite of his own mission, is certainly noteworthy under the circumstances. John's mission in life seems to be confined to straightening the path of the Lord by the baptism of water and the doctrine of repentance. He is also the witness to the coming Messiah, whose shoes he acknowledges himself to be unworthy to bear. Asked to explain the baptism of Jesus, he declared : "He that hath the bride is the bridegroom : but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice : this my joy is therefore fulfilled. He must increase, but I must decrease. He that cometh from above is above all : he that is of the earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth : he that cometh from beaven is above all."- (John, III. 29-31). * There is nothing in the expression to reflect any special or unique distinction on the person of Jesus ; on the contrary, it is clearly one which has been borrowed from 'Pagan' creeds. Later Christians have been struck with the close resemblance between Biblical legends and "Pagan fables," and some have even ascribed the authorship of the latter to the Evil One out of a spirit of rivalry to Christianity. As pointed out by Mr. Joseph McCabe (The Bankruptcy of Religion, p. 197)-- "The resemblance to the Christian celebration in the Mithraic temples it went so far that the resurrected god was hailed as the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world' - was so disturbing to Firmicus Maternus that he believed that the Devil had conveyed these legends to the Pagans in order to distract them from embracing the true (Christian) version of the death and resurrec tion !"

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558 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The above description of John leaves no doubt as to his original. He stands for repentant intellect, just as the Messiah represents Life triumphant. The one represents the lower ego, but the other the higher Self; hence, is John the cousin of Jesus. When the lower self is tired of the pursuit of worldly pleasure and has reached the end of its tether, it begins to reflect on its destiny, and realizes that neither friends, nor riches, nor position, nor physical prowess, nor anything else can come to its rescue or relieve it of the impending gloom of death and extinction, which stare it in the face. It then cries out in the anguish of its loneliness in the world, and, becoming disgusted with the pleasures and joys of the mortals, which had hitherto diverted its attention from its real nature, gradually learns that the source of all bliss, blessedness and immortality is none other than its own true Self. This is the stage which is likened to the voice of one crying in the wilderness, saying, 'Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.' Now, because the activity of intellect is exhausted with the purification of the body alone, which can be accomplished by means of water, and since will, rather than intellect, is the real cause of the progress of the soul, the baptism of intellect is necessarily that of water. The intellectual self is of the earth, earthy; but the Soul is from heaven, therefore, heavenly. Hence, intellect is made to say that it is unworthy to loosen the latchet of the shoes of the Messiah. Again, because it is only through the intellect that one can become convinced of the existence of the higher Self, it is the solitary witness to the coming Messiah at whose

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559 birth it leaps with joy. But, in so far as wisdom is a necessary attribute of the Christos, he cannot do without the baptism of intellect, in the first instance. Intellect is not the enjoyer of bliss, hence, not the bridegroom, but it is natural for it to feel joy at the bridegroom's voice, for he is to turn the wilderness into a veritable paradise. And, lastly, because the freedom of the soul means the attainment of omniscience which arises by the destruction of the lower mental equipment -intellect, memory, and the likee--as will be explained in the following chapters, intellect is described as saying, ' he must increase, but I must decrease.' The sending of his disciples by John to ascertain whether Jesus (soul) is the Messiah, i.e., the Redeemer, in spite of the fact that he had exulted with delight at his mother's voice, is in keeping with the nature of intellect, which always doubts and hesitates, and is seldom satisfied with its own conclusions. It is, thus, clear that the personality of John, the Baptist, is typical of the intellectual self of the man who has become conscious of the fuller Life of the higher Self. Similarly, Barabbas stands for the bodily, or the lower self, whose passionate nature is the cause of all sorts of evil deeds and crimes. The preference of the Jews for Barabbas is suggestive of the nature of humanity who prefer to love the body and to do away with Spirit, which in its individualized aspect is Jesus,' the soul. The passage in Sura Baqr (Al Koran) RESURRECTION. * Cf. "Soul or spirit was used in several senses in Arabic, e.g., life (animal and plant), consciousness, revelation, the Arch-Angel, Jesus Christ."-Philosophy of Islam, p. 30.

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560 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. " When God said, O Jesus, verily I will cause thee to die, and I will take thee up unto me, and I will deliver thee from the unbelievers," -- and the one in Sura Nisa which reads-- "Yet they slew him (Jesus] not, neither crucified him, but he was represented by one in his likeness." are capable of sound sense only if we read them in the light of the above observation. In this sense, not only do they become intelligible, but also avoid the misunderstanding which has arisen between the followers of Christianity and Islam. The Essence of Life, the Soul, is immortal and undying; hence, it can neither be killed, nor crucified. It is only the body, the objectification of will, as Schopenhauer calls it, hence the likeness of the Essence," the Barabbas of the gospel-writers, that can be killed and crucified. The likeness between Life, or Spirit, or Will and the body is also insisted upon in the first chapter of the book of Genesis, the 21st verse of which reads : s God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him." When people do not take the trouble to understand each other, they indulge in mutual recrimination, of which the following expression of opinion by Dods, quoted in "Selections from the Koran " (page 132), is a fair sample : " His Muhammad's] knowledge of Christianity was so meagre and confused, that it is difficult to understand how even the most illite * Muslim philosophers have always insisted upon the physical body being in the likeness of the soul. The following from the Kimiya-i-Saadut,' quoted in The Philosophy of Islam,' may by cited in proof of our statement : "Verily, the creation of spirits is by God. Their forms are like the forms of their bodies."

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RESURRECTION. 561 rate and mystified sectary fed on apocryphal gospels could have conveyed to him such notions of the gospel. Of the great and enlightening history of Israel as a history, he knows nothing, and has merely caught up some childish tales from the Talmud and some garbled legends of the Hebrew Patriarchs and great men." A writer who does not understand even the sense of the word which became the name of the founder of his own creed must be excused if he falls into error. The word 'Jesus' is derived from the root 'IS' which, in Hebrew, becomes 'jes,' and means 'esse,' i.e., 'to be,' in different words, that which is, or Life, that is, Atman. " The name of Jesus," say the authors of The Perfect Way' (p. 111), "at which every knee must bow, is the ancient and ever Divine Name of all the Sons of God-- Iesous or Yesha, who shall save, and Issa the Illuminated, or Initiate of Isis. For this name Isis, originally Ish Ish, was Egyptian for Light-Light, that is, light doubled, and the known and the knowing made one, and reflecting each other." The author of the "Lost Language of Symbolism" also observes :-- " The name Isis was understood by Plutarch as meaning knowledge. In Lapland the goddess corresponding to Isis was worshipped under the name Isa, and this word must be related to Isia, a Greek variant of Isis, signifying, according to Plato, Holy One,' Intelligence,' and 'Perception. The ambiguous Issi, Yessi, Isse, or Issa is related to Esse, the Latin verb to be', and from esse is derived the word Essence, a philosophic and poetic synonymn for the soul or Light within.' It would thus appear probable that the Odyssey is to some extent an allegory of the Soul, and that Odysseus, the wanderer, is truly Noman, no historic personage, but like Cindrella, a personification of the soul, the spark, the God Within,' or 'Dweller in the Innermost.' The word-play upon Issi, the Light, and Issi, * himself,' is comparable to Cindrella's amazed awakening to the fact that the glory of her dazzling radiance is herself,'" , 36

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562 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Isa is also the name of Ishwara as well as of the individual soul, according to Hindu Scriptures. Mr. Harold Bayley, the author of "The Lost Language of Symbolism,' points out that the word 'Isse' or 'Ishi' appears to have anciently meant Light in many directions. This radiating Light is the Light of Intelligence, which is the soul. It must be now obvious that the word Jesus simply means the soul, which is certainly incapable of being slain. Hence, the enigmatical statement of the Sura Nisa already quoted. For these and similar reasons, the release of Barabbas, the securing of the sepulchre, and other such allegories, all tend to emphasize the fact that ignorant humanity care only for the body, and altogether ignore the soul, - a point which is well brought out in the account of the initiation of Indra, the deva, and Virochana, the asura, in the Upanishads. Modern Orientalists fail to understand the merit of religion, because they try to study it on lines of historical research. But to interpret religious records in the light of history is to put the cart before the horse, oftener than not. The nature of the contradictions which exist in connection with the life of Jesus, when we try to study it from the standpoint of the historian, is so deliberate and determined, that no single fact can be seized as an actual event in the world of men. There is piling up of allegory upon allegory and metaphor upon metaphor, on the one hand, and a delightful determination to violate the order of events, invent personalities, defy facts, disregard chronology, and, in every possible

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RESURRECTION. way, act as if history was only meant to be topsy-turvy, on the other. The inference is plain: the narrators were anxious to guard against being understood in an historical sense, and took every precaution to set it at nought. The gospels, thus, constitute the records of the spiritual progress of Jesus,' the soul, rather than so many editions of the 'Life and Teachings of Jesus, the man,' written by so many writers.* That there was a * 563 * Cf. the following from "Christianity and Mythology," by the Hon'ble J. M. Robertson, M. P., page 276: "If the foregoing pages in any degree effect their purpose, they have shown that a number of data in the Christian gospels, both miraculous and non-miraculous, held by Christians to be historical, or at least accretions round the life and doctrine of a remarkable religious teacher and creed-founder, are really mere adaptations from myths of much greater antiquity; and that accordingly the alleged or inferred personality of the Founder is under suspicion of being as mythical as that of the demi-gods of elder lore. ......Broadly, the contention is that when every salient item in the legend of the Gospel Jesus turns out to be more or less clearly mythical, the matter of doctrine, equally so with the matter of action, there is simply nothing left which can entitle any one to a belief in any tangible personality behind the name. "Such a view, as scholars are aware, is not new in the history of criticism, though the grounds for it may be so. In the second century, if not in the first, the "Docetoe" had come to conceive of the Founder as a kind of supernatural phantom, which only "seemed " to suffer on the cross; and many Gnostics had all along regarded him as an abstraction. One or other view recurs in medieval heresy from time to time. A "Docetic" view of Jesus was professed by the secret society of clerics and others which was broken up at Orleans about 1022; and in England, as elsewhere, in the sixteenth century, sectaries are found taking highly mystical views of the Founder's personality. In the eighteenth century, again, Voltaire tells of disciples of Bolingbroke who on grounds of historical criticism denied the historicity of Jesus; and in the period of the French

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564 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. great yogi or mystic--possibly, too, he was known as Jesus-who preached the doctrine of the kingdom of heaven is not improbable, though he would seem to have been the ingenious author of, rather than the chief actor in, the immortal Drama of Life, which, in all probability, would never have seen the light of day if it could have been foreseen with reference to it that it might pass current as a narrative of actual facts. It is to be noted that we are not dealing here with a case where an historical nucleus is needed to account for subsequent deification; the documents before us are purely mythological in their nature, and cannot be construed as history. The only real personage at the back of this huge tangle of mythical lore is the composer of the original work which seems to have furnished the source and substratum of the elaborate and mutually contradictory accounts of the gospels; but unfortunately he has not deemed it fit to reveal himself to the world. That he was a man of considerable wisdom and enlightenment and familiar with some of the most abstruse doctrines of mysticism and yoga is evident from his work, though, for obvious reasons, we are precluded from regarding the gospel-narratives as his auto-biography. Assuming, however, that he was the central figure whom the gospel-writers vied with each other in covering over with wreaths of beautiful allegory, the historical substratum Revolution we have not only the works of Volney and Dupuis, reducing the gospel biography to a set of astronomical myths, but the anonymous German work mentioned by Strauss as reducing it to an ideal which had a prior existence in the Jewish mind, though admitting divergences."

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RESURRECTION. 565 of the facts of his life could not have been much different from what has been described in these pages. To sum up, the doctrine of resurrection has revealed to us the most important secrets of life. It has shown us that immortality, which every soul bankers after, can be attained by following the true teaching of religion. It has also shown us that true progress always depends on individual exertion, never on the favour of another. Nothing short of the sacrifice of the lower nature, the greedy, lustful, appropriating self, can ever be the means of entering into Life. Arrived at the status of manhood, the soul has the power to claim its divine heritage of immortality and bliss, and to become the God which it already is in potency. If this opportunity is not availed of, it again falls into the cycle of births and deaths, with varying intervals of life in heaven or hell, according to its deeds on earth. While it has life, it has the chance of turning back from the path of evil, to follow in the foot-steps of the Masters; but once the vital spark departs from the frail, mortal frame of matter, the privilege attaching to the human birth is lost, and may not be had again for a long long time to come. Neither friends, nor relations, nor teachers, nor possessions, nor, yet, name, fame, and the like, can be of any use to the soul in its post mortem existence. How true are the words of the Prophet of Islam, when he says : "Dread the day wherein one soul shall not make satisfaction for another soul; neither shall any intercession be accepted from them, nor shall any compensation be received, neither shall they be helped.-(Sura Baqr). "No soul shall acquire any merits or demerits but for itself : and no burdened soul shall bear the burden of another."--(Sura Anam).

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CHAPTER IX. THE HOLY TRINITY. " Tao must not be distributed. If it is, it will lose its unity. If it loses its unity, it will be uncertain ; and so cause mental disturbance, from which there is no escape."-Confucius. Hitherto we have referred to the Essence of Life in general terms, calling it soul, spirit, mind, consciousness and the like; but it now becomes necessary to dive still further into metaphysics to get an insight into the significance of certain mystic doctrines whose purport it is not always easy to comprehend. To this class belongs the Christian dogma of the Holy Trinity whose paradoxical nature is evident from the theologian's triumphant asseveration placing it beyond the comprehension of the finite reason of man. Reason, however, does not endorse the dictum of theology in this respect, and has a complete explanation to offer of the metaphysical fiction on which the doctrine in question is grounded. We shall, therefore, now proceed to unravel the secret of Trinity from the standpoint of rational thought. But in order to do this, it will be necessary, first of all, to make some further abstractions of the most abstruse kind, necessitating the attainment to heights of metaphysical thought which some of us might find a little too giddy to climb at the first attempt. We can, however, assure the reader that the result will amply repay the labour and trouble involved in the process.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 567 The subject pertains to what is known as psychology ; but, unfortunately, that department of knowledge is yet far from being a science, psychologists being still bent on constructing a science of the soul (psyche) without the soul itself. We must, therefore, proceed to investigate the subject ourselves, and shall, accordingly, now begin our study with an analysis of imagination, with special reference to its function of dream-making. To any one who will take the trouble of looking into its nature, it will be apparent that imagination consists of (1) consciousness, (2) ideas, and (3) mental energy which operates on ideas. Let us turn to dreams for a moment. The question is, how is a dream created ? Is it not the illumination of an idea, or of more ideas comprised in one single psychosis or thought, just as the magic lantern display is an illumination of its slides? In the magic lantern the apparatus consists of three parts, namely, (1) a lamp, or an illuminator, (2) a number of slides, or films, and (3) the energy supplied by the operator who pushes the slides before the lamp. Similarly, the apparatus of the living bioscope of Mind consists of the identical three parts. Consciousness is the illuminator, living ideas, that is, memory, furnish the 'films,' and will supplies the necessary energy. It is an apparatus perfect and complete in itself, and stands not in need of an outside operator. Such, briefly, is the mechanism of the apparatus of dreams, which may be said to consist of consciousness, memory and will. But as the psychologists and philo

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568 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. sophers are not quite agreed as to the nature and functions of the several components of mind, and as precise knowledge of these mental faculties is an absolute necessity for the elucidation of religious traditions and myths, we shall endeavour to ascertain the truth for ourselves. To clear up the confusion, it is first of all necessary to understand the nature of will which is the subject of a keen controversy between different writers. According to some, that which really and truly exists is will, while according to others, will is but a product of the original Essence in the third or fourth degree of its descent into matter. Notably amongst the latter class of persons stands Vivekananda, who expresses himself thus : "I will here remark that there is one difference between Schopenhauer and Vedanta. Schopenhauer says the desire, or Will, is the cause of everything. It is the will to exist that makes us manifest, but the Adwaitists deny this. They say it is the intelligence. There cannot be a single particle of Will which is not a reaction. So many things are beyond Will. It is only a manufactured something out of the ego, and the ego is the product of something still higher, the intelligence, and that is a modification of 'indiscrete' Nature, or prakriti."-(Jnana Yoga, Vol. II, pp. 53 and 54). But it seems to us that the whole confusion is due to an indiscriminate use of the word 'will' which has more than one significance. It would appear that the German philosopher mostly used this word in the sense of what has come to be known as the thing in itself in modern European philosophy, but not in the limited sense of the human will." However, the word 'will'itself *A couple of extracts from The World as Will and Idea' will make this perfectly clear. It is said at page 142 of the 1st volume : "Phenomenal existence is idea and nothing more. All idea, of

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 569 indicates that it cannot be identical with what might be termed blind' force, so that it would be a misuse of language to use it otherwise than with reference to an intelligent being, though the sort of will with which we are familiar, in our experience of mankind, is undoubtedly a product of spirit and matter. Thus, in the one case, will is a necessary aspect of the thing in itself, but in the other, is that very aspect manifesting itself through the limitations imposed on it by matter. So far as the human will is concerned, it is clearly not a being or thing, but a process --the act of selfassertion. It is a pure abstraction of thought which the word 'will' signifies when used as a noun, for in the sense of pleasure, determination or choice, it cannot but imply an attitude, condition or modification of the soul. But in this sense, clearly, it can never be regarded as the thing in itself. Harald Hoffding well brings out the difference bet whatever kind it may be, all object, is phenomenal existence, but the will alone is a thing in itself. As such, it is throughout not idea, but toto genere different from it; it is that of which all idea, all object, is the phenomenal appearance, the visibility, the objectification. It is the inmost nature, the kernel, of every particular thing, and also of the whole. It appears in every blind force of nature and also in the pre-considered action of man; and the great difference between these two is merely in the degree of the manifestation, not in the nature of what manifests itself." Again, at page 145: "The will as a thing in itself is quite different from its phenomenal appearance, and entirely free from all the forms of the phenomenal into which it first passes when it manifests itself, and which therefore only concern its objectivity, and are foreign to the will itself."

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570 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ween the two aspects of will (Outlines of Psychology pp. 99-100): Activity is a fundamental property of conscious life, since always a force must be pre-supposed, which holds together the manifold elements of consciousness and unites them into the content of the one and the same consciousness. Independently of this, the most fundamental form of the will, the word will is used in two different senses, a narrower and a wider. In the narrower sense, as the power of choosing between different possibilities, the will is only the product of a mental development, not an original factor. But if will is understood in the wider sense, as all activity determined by feeling and cognition, it may be said that the whole conscious life is gathered up in the will as its fullest expression. The development of the conscious individual proceeds from will in the wider sense) to will in the narrower sense." This is true so far as it goes, but unfortunately it does not go far enough to enable us to understand the nature of will. We are accustomed to deny consciousness to will even in its highest aspect, that is, as the Thing in itself; but if we would reflect on the point we should not fail to observe that the confusion of thought, in this respect, is due mainly to the wrong definition of consciousness with which we have allowed our minds to be obsessed. As a matter of fact, all mental activity, whether it assume the form of feeling, willing, or thinking, is always associated with consciousness. In common parlance, however, men generally ascribe consciousness to thinking alone, and so great is the force of habit that when we come across those manifestations of mind which do not need the guidance of reason, we promptly designate them unconscious. A close study of our mental operations, however, reveals the fact that each and every act of will has always an idea for its

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571 motive, whether that idea be consciously present in the mind, or unconsciously lying at the bottom of some state of feeling. There is always the idea of the end to be achieved which precedes the action of will, so that wherever we encounter determination or choice, we must expect to find intelligence behind it. When a bird builds its nest it proceeds to do so with a determination, not haphazard. The difference between the act of the bird in building its nest and that of a man in making his house is not in respect of will, for the determination to build is present in each instance, nor in respect of the end to be served by the act, since this also is present in both instances, in one felt as a kind of sensation of necessity, and in the other perceived as an idea, but in respect of the power of deliberation observable in man and presumably absent in the bird. The end and the determination to achieve it are, thus, the same in either case, but the difference lies in respect of the idea into which the feeling of necessity for building a place of shelter is translated in the case of man, but not in that of the bird. The knowledge of the bird, then, consists in the feeling of necessity, while that of man also includes the idea of the house into which that feeling is translated by his superior intellect. THE HOLY TRINITY. What is commonly understood by knowledge, however, does not include feelings and mental tendencies within its scope. We are accustomed to apply that word exclusively to our ideas or dry facts and formulae of logic and other kindred sciences, though, strictly speaking, knowledge is preserved in the modifications

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572 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of feelings and mental tendencies. Hence, we may say that knowledge exists in two different ways in the soul, namely, in the shape of mental tendencies, or feelings, and as ideas. In the former case, it determines our instincts and tendencies, that is, disposition, and in the latter, leads us to conscious deliberation in thought. It will not be difficult to understand how knowledge can be preserved in the shape of tendencies and feelings, if we study the effect of education on ourselves. A child is, by nature, of an explosive temperament, and devoid of scruples and consideration for others. But a grown-up man is generally a very different being, and has little of the savageness of the child about him. The difference between these two states of man is undoubtedly due to education received as a member of society. But the question is, what is that faculty, or organ, which is modified in consequence of education ? The materialist points to the brain as the repository of education; but that cannot be. For the brain is essentially perishable, while the effects of education linger in the soul, even when the intellect has fallen into decay. In order to be of any service to the soul, education must first modify disposition ; for it is character and character alone which outlives the intellect. But disposition cannot be modified purely and simply by the dry formulas of knowledge; it yields only to experience, since we adopt what is pleasing and avoid the unpleasant. Hence, education can be effective only when it assumes the shape of experience. We thus get the clue to the nature of the faculty in which the results of edu

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 573 cation are retained. It is that which feels. Now, feelings are quite independent of reason and spring from will, appearing as life in an organism. Schopenhauer recognized this when he said : "The complete difference between the mental and moral qualities displays itself lastly in the fact that the intellect suffers very important changes through time, while the will and character remain untouched by it... The advance of age, which gradually consumes the intellectual powers, leaves the moral qualities untouched. The goodness of the heart still makes the old man honoured and loved when his head already shows the weaknesses which are the commencement of second childhood. Gentleness, patience, honesty, veracity, disinterestedness, philanthropy, etc., remain throngh the whole life, and are not lost through the weaknesses of old age; in every clear moment of the worn-out old man they come forth undiminished, like the sun from the winter clouds. And, on the other hand, malice, spite, avarice, hard-heartedness, infidelity, egoism, and baseness of every kind also remain undiminished to our latest years... The only alterations that take place in our inclinations are those which result directly from the decrease of our physical strength, and with it of our capacities for enjoyment. Thus voluptuousness will make way for intemperance, the love of splendour for avarice, and vanity for ambition; just like the man who before he has a beard will wear a false one, and later, when his own beard has become grey, will dye it brown. Thus, while all organic forces, muscular power, the senses, the memory, wit, understanding, genius, wear themselves out, and in old age become dull, the will alone remains undecayed and unaltered; the strength and the tendency of willing remains the same. Indeed, in many points the will shows itself still more decided in age : thus, in the clinging to life, which, it is well-known, increases; also in the firmness and persistency with regard to what it has once embraced, in obstinacy; which is explicable from the fact that the susceptibility of the intellect for other impressions, and thereby the movement of the will by motives streaming in upon it, has diminished..........Great age, illness, injury of the brain, madness, may deprive us of memory altogether, but the identity of the person is not thereby lost. It l'ests upon the identical will and the unalterable character of the

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574 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. person. It is it also which makes the expression of the glance unchangeable. In the heart is the man, not in the head. It is true that, in consequence of our relation to the external world, we are accustomed to regard as our real self the subject of knowledge, the knowing I, which varies in the evening, vanishes in sleep, and in the morning shines brighter with renewed strength. This is, however, the mere function of the brain, and not our own self. Our true self, the kernel of our nature, is what is behind that, and really knows nothing but willing and not willing, being content and not content, with all the modifications of this, which are called feelings, emotions and passions. This is that which produces the other, does not sleep with it when it sleeps, and in the same way when it sinks in death remains uninjured. Everything, on the contrary, that belongs to knowledge is exposed to oblivion; even actions of moral significance can sometimes, after years, be only imperfectly recalled, and we no longer know accurately and in detail how we acted on a critical occasion. But the character itself, to which the actions only testify, cannot be forgotten by us; it is now still quite the same as then." * Character, indeed, has little in common with intellect, but depends on will; for the former is the faculty of judgment and the latter of action. It is in willing that character discloses its qualities, not in deliberation; hence it is possible for a highly intellectual man to possess a bad heart, and for a man of excellent character to have a dull head. Character, then, is preserved in will itself, and is the sum-total of all the different activities of life manifested in the form of feelings, emotions, passions and disposition; it is the product of education. We may thus say that desires are modified by experiences of pleasure and pain, and, in their turn, determine the future attitude and tendencies of the soul. But will can be considered unconscious only when regarded as force, not when * The World as Will and Idea, Vol. II, pp. 456, 457 and 460.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 575 taken to be the repository of character, which is nothing other than the sum-total of all the different tendencies of the soul. For, a tendency is an inclination towards a certain end, and points to a conscious or sub-conscious awareness of the object to be attained. Remove this end from the mental horizon, and you at once reduce will to pure energy, devoid of all those characteristics indicative of the presence of mind which are the concomitants of desire. But will is nothing is not energy inclined towards and determined to achieve a definite end. Hence, unconscious will is a contradiction in terms. It is true that the ego does not proceed with the assistance of deliberation in the act of willing, but it is no less true that all acts of willing depend on character, which is the outcome of past experience. Where the course of conduct is already determined, the act of willing is sub-conscious, but where it is to be worked out according to circumstances, which may, or may not, present themselves, as obstacles in the path, consciousness appears in the shape of intellect to guide the footsteps of will. Besides, there can be no act of willing where there is no awareness of a desire of some sort or other, so that awareness is a condition precedent to willing. But awareness and consciousness are merely two different names for the same thing; hence, every true act of willing is a conscious act. Further, if will is 'blind'in itself, how can it possibly be benefited by the 'lantern' (intellect) which it employs for the guidance of its steps? Either, then, will itself becomes the 'lantern,' or there is some one else behind it who rides on will,

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576 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and carries the lantern in his hand. But when we posit the will as the thing in itself, we deny existence to every thing else; hence, will, on Schopenhauer's own theory, must itself perform the function of lighting its own path. Moreover, if will can be educated, that is, controlled by knowledge, there must be a latent capacity for education in its own nature, since we cannot educate stones by packing them together in one case with works on knowledge, say, the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Hence, will, when looked at as the thing in itself, can be nothing other than consciousness which alone can be the repository of knowledge. Will, when looked at as force, is the rhythm of life, in different words, the energy of functioning, of the thing in itself, i.e., consciousness. The truth is that Schopenhauer allowed himself to be misled by his wrong nomenclature, and, in the confusion which resulted from it, forgot the sound conclusion which he had already arrived at. In his 'Essay on the Fourfold Root of Sufficient Reason' he had already held (p. 169) : "Now the identity of the willing with the knowing Subject, in virtue of which the word 'I' includes and designates both, is the nodus of the Universe, and therefore is inexplicable. For we can only comprehend relations between Objects; but two Objects never can be one, excepting as parts of a whole. Here, where the Subject is in question, the rules by which we know Objects are no longer applicable, and actual identity of the knower with what is known as willing that is, of Subject and Object-is immediately given. Now, whoever has clearly realized the utter impossibility of explaining this identity, will surely concur with me in calling it the miracle, in the highest degree." Reflection shows that even feelings are not unconscious states of existence, though they are invariably free from the companionship of intellect, and at times also tend to make it cloudy.

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THE HOLY TRINITY, 577 This will be evident on a little reflection. The question is : what is a feeling* in itself ? Is it merely another name for pure activity or energy ? Surely not, for analysis reveals the fact that feelings differ inter se as much as ideas, so that the emotion of hatred is radically different from that of love. And yet activity is common to both. If we were to express this idea in the form of a mathematical equation, we should have to say that the emotion of love = energy+the ideat of love, and the emotion of hatred = energy+the idea of hatred, and so forth. Feelings, then, differ from one another not in respect of energy, but solely and simply in respect of the ideas which tinge our mental activity by saturating the mind with their essence. Hence, an emotion is an idea converted into feeling, just as action is an idea liquified into a process and carried into effect by the ego. Emotions and feelings are thus sub-conscious tendencies of life, not because consciousness is not present at the time, but because it is neutralized in consequence of the feeling whose presence leaves no room for a conscious chuice, or deliberation, in the mind, so long as it remains in possession of the field of consciousness. " When we mechanically perform an habitual act," writes Bergson (Creative Evolution, pp. 151-2), "when the somnambulist automatically acts his dream, unconsciousness may be absolute; but this is merely due to the fact that the representation of the act is held in check by the performance of the act itself which *A feeling might be defined as that in our in ward states which cannot by any possibility become an element of a percept or of an image (Hoffding). | The word 'idea' is here used in its most comprehensivo senso, and signifies what is known as instinctive consciousness as well as intellectual thought. 87

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578 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. resembles the idea so completely, and its it so exactly, that consciousness is unable to find room between them. Representation is stopped by action. The proof of this is, that if the accomplishment of the act is arrested or thwarted by an obstacle, consciousness may re-appear. It was there, but neutralized by the action which fulfilled and thereby filled the representation. The obstacle creates nothing positive ; it simply makes a void, removes a stopper. The inadequacy of the act to representation is precisely what we here call consciousness. Where many equally possible actions are indicated without there being any real action (as in a deliberation that has not come to an end), consciousness is intense. Where the action performed is the only action possible (as in activity of the somnambulistic or more generally of antomatic kind), consciousness is reduced to nothing. Representation and knowledge exist none the less in the case if we find a whole series of systematized movements the last of which is already prefigured in the first, and if, besides, consciousness can flash out of them at the shock of an obstacle," Confusion is apt to arise in the mind by the statement that knowledge is necessarily included in the thing in itself, inasmuch as the human mind insists on the question, whence came this knowledge in the first instance ? Strictly speaking, the question itself is illogical, since in its true nature, the thing in itself, as conceived by philosophers, is pure consciousness and eternal, so that the idea of a time limitation cannot affect it in the least. And, so. far as awareness is concerned, consciousness cannot be said to have been devoid of it at any time. In other words, we cannot conceive of a point of time when consciousness may be said to have dawned in its own mind for the first time, just as we cannot conceive energy springing into being, as a new manifestation, for the first time, in the universe. As a matter of fact, knowledge merely consists in the states of consciousness itself, and in respect to

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THE HOLY TRINITY, 579 these every soul has an infinite capacity, as has been demonstrated in an earlier chapter. We shall see later on that this infinite capacity for knowledge is obstructed by our individual larmas, and becomes actual as soon as the soul frees itself from their evil influence. The consciousness of pure spirit, then, can only be pictured as full and perfect ; and, even if we think away the material universe, which we are capable of doing in thought, we must perforce accord the consciousness of his own states and being to an omniscient soul. The knowledge possessed by a Perfect Soul would, then, consist in the knowledge of all that its own nature is capable of revealing ; it would, to a large extent, not be knowledge of things actually existing, but of the forms of all things as lying in the womb of possibility. In the knowledge which a pure spirit has of itself is included, therefore, the knowledge of all that is, or ever can be ; and if we remember the distinction between the necessary and contingent action, which Leibnitz clearly saw, it would be seen that even the freedom* of the human will can present no possible objection to the perfection of the knowledge of God. * The present opportunity may be availed of to look into the question of pre-determinism. Will is free by nature ; it is frecdom itsell, and possesses the power of freeing itself from its bondage. Hence, every bound soul must become free if it exert itself for the destruction of its bonds. Here is the destiny of the soul which by the force of its nature is predetermined for it. But this very freedom of the soul implies the power of its electing for itself whether it will free itself from bondage, or continue in it. This amounts to saying that it is all a question of desire. When the soul is satiated with the fruits of sensual desires, its free nature leads it to self-knowledge, i.e., the knowledge of its natural freedom, which, dawning upon it, enables it to destroy its fetters

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580 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Such is the nature of will which has given rise to so much confusion of thought. The cause of error, as otherwise no one interferes with its choice. The knowledge of Self comes, we may say, by the force of destiny, for sensual pleasures do not make up for bliss; and, as a person who knows himself to be capable of great deeds grumbles when thrown in unsuitable environment, so does the naturally blissful soul feel ill at ease even in the midst of worldly prosperity and joy. The soul is like a man who enters his family in the guise of a menial, and, in consequence of the excitement caused by acting the part of a servant in his own house, identifies himself with his disguise and work, and forgets that he is the master. Now, it is evident that the termination of his servitude is a simple question of his choice; and that nobody can force him into it against his will. But whether he will ever recover the memory or knowledge of his true condition, depends on the nature of the forces which debar him from it. It is, however, to be inferred that, because the excitement of the new position is not bliss itself, his own inner nature would, sooner or later, make him dissatisfied with the monotony of servitude. As the same routine of work with the same old sensations falls to his lot, his inner nature, more blissful than all the joys of servitude put together, is sure to rouse him to a sense of his destiny and set him meditating on it. This is the commencement of yoga. Here is destiny, but a destiny which no one from outside imposes on him; it is a part of himself. Those who range themselves in opposition to determinism forget that unless the future be capable, at least to some extent, of being encompassed by our intellect and brought home to us in terms which are not vague or indefinite, vain would be the inner craving of the soul for freedom, and equally vain the teaching of religion and the exact calculations of science, Even when an artist sets himself to work to paint a picture, he has an idea which he tries to produce on the canvas. He is free, no doubt, to alter this idea as much as he likes, but, in practice, he is controlled by his artistic instincts, and would not, though he could, allow the picture before him to differ from that in his mind. Further analysis reveals the fact that the mental idea is composed of the elements of past impressions, preserved in the mind as notions, beliefs, tendencies and emotions. Will also, thus, harbours its enemy at home, i.c., has its

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 581 already pointed out, lies in the wrong nomenclature, for it is not permissible to talk of will except in reference to limitations in its own nature. The true sense of the word freedom with reference to will, therefore, is that it cannot be imposed upon against its own choice. In dealing with the question of freedom of will, the thing which is generally ignored by philosophers is the element of desire which determines its sphere of activity and makes it exert itself. It is under the influence of this element that will becomes manageable by intellect. Hence it becomes possible to calculate its operations even with mathematical precision, provided it be possible to know all its circumstances and motives. But this is impossible for ordinary humanity, though easy for those in whom omniscience or the true kind of clairvoyance has dawned. We fear, we are differing from Bergson in laying down the above views on the question of individual freedom. But Bergson's fear of determinism, and his anxiety to keep the door closed against it, have carried him off his legs. He declines to define what his idea of freedom expresses, for the reason that that would ensure the victory of determinism against free will. The utmost that this acute thinker has committed himself to comes to no more than saying that freedom is the relation of the concrete self to the act which it performs.' But he is careful enough to add immediately that this relation is indefinable, just because we are free. Thus, in spite of his fine analyses of the ideas of duration, extensity, multiplicity, and the like, one is entitled to dismiss him from mind, simply because he does not enable us to understand his notion of freedom. But taking the word in its ordinary significance, i.e., as implying an absence of restraint or necessity, it is obvious that the notion of absolute freedom is a purely imaginary concept. Even the gods' are not free from all kinds of necessity whatsoever. Fire must burn, water must flow, activity must ever remain opposed to inaction, and so forth. On Bergson's own showing, even pure duration itself is doomed to experience any particular sensation only once, in all its eternal enduring. But freedom means the power to do anything at will, and would be robbed of all its fascination and value if there remains a single must to bend its volition; for such a must would be clearly a symbol of necessity pure and simple. What, then, is the meaning of freedom of will?

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582 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. & conscious being, so that its employment as a term expressive of pure force cannot but lead to confusion If we analyse the idea of necessity which attaches itself to things, we observe it falling into two categories. First comes the class in which it is only functional, as in the above instances. But the second includes all those cases of necessity where it is not functional, but a something, a check or restraint, imposed by environment and circumstances, external to the organism, or nature. It is in the second class of necessity that the idea of restraint is located, for that which is functional can hardly be called a restraint. Hence, the ego, conceived as pure flux, i.e., duration, must be regarded as free. Pure duration is, however, determined by its very nature to endure, which amounts to saying that it cannot refuse to do so. Here is the triumph of determinism again which Bergson justly dreads. The highest conception of freedom is conceivable only in connection with God, and yet even He is predetermined to certain acts, 2.9., He must exist, because existence is His nature. Man can and may commit suicide, but this does not appear to be a prerogative of the Deity. But, since the performance of an act to which one is predetermined by nature is not the cause of pain, rather, on the contrary, is its free performance a source of ease and joy, we do not regard it as a restraint on freedom. Besides, volition always seeks pleasure as its motive, and the highest form of pleasure is compatible only with the performance of action which is most agreeable to one's nature, Freedom, then, may be said to remain unaffected by the performance of action in agreement with one's nature. In so far, then, as the ego acts, it may be said to be free, for all activity is the manifestation of will, and will is determined to activity by its very nature. Again, inasmuch as all acts are performed by will, we may go further and say that every act is a free act on the part of will. We must, however, bear in mind the distinction between deliberation and acting. The resolve to act and the actual performance of the act, howsoever strictly in accord with the resolve, are two different things, since in the former freedom is more illusory than real. If one is free to resolve in any way, why deliberate at all? Deliberation is mainly directed towards individual advantage, and, of all the

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 583 sooner or later. It is curious that so simple a truth should have escaped the notice of men like Schopenhauer, possible methods, suggested to the deliberative consciousness, the one chosen is that which seems to secure the utmost advantage, under given circumstances. Circumstances, then, determine the future activity of rational beings. But what can the circumstances possibly mean unless ideas, desires, motives, interests, and the like? Compulsion, whether moral or physical, stops short here, for the very fact of deliberation is an indication that in a great majority of cases the will enjoys something more than what is termed Hobson's choice. Besides, when once the mind is made up and the resolution formed, action itself is performed by the ego of its own volition, however much it might have been predetermined to it by the previous mental determination. The act, or rather the impulse, which leads to activity, depends, for its inition, on the volition of the cgo itself, and cannot possibly be started by any external force. The utmost that outside force can achieve is to lead the ego to deliberate over the advantage, or disadvantage, of the move which it is desired to make, and thus secure its assent, by argument, or some other intellectual method of persuasion; but the performance of action depends exclusively on the volition of the ego itself. Thus, every act of the ego, as known to us in the process of willing, is free. But since, at the moment of vacillation, the choice of possible paths is determined by individual circumstances, and since action is merely a carrying out of the final resolve previously made, determinism may claim to have established the fact that only one path was possible for the ego, for it could not but be guided by its ruling passion and motive. The supporters of free will may, however, retort by saying that deliberation was the act of intellect, not of will. But even this does not advance their cause any further, inasmuch as will faithfully carries out the final resolutions of intellect, except in so far as they are modified by the intellect itself, at subsequent stages of activity. Moreover, intellect and will are merely two aspects of the same thing, being different functions of the soul. It follows that true freedom belongs to him alone who is not concerned in calculating the advantages or disadvantages of his actions. Therefore, he alone can be free who cannot be affected by

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584 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. whose conception of will as the thing in itself is formed regardless of the distinction between the conscious and the unconscious, as is evident from the following from "The World as Will and Idea" (Vol. I. pp. 141-142):-- " Whoever has...gained......the knowledge that his will is the real inner nature of his phenomenal being, which manifests itself to him as idea.... will find that of itself it affords him the Key to the Knowledge of the being of the whole nature; for he now transfers it to all those phenomena which are not given to him, like his own phenomenal existence, both in direct and indirect knowledge, but only in the latter, thus merely one-sidedly as idea alone. He will recognize this will of which we are speaking not only in those phenomenal existences which exactly resemble his own, in men and animals as their inmost nature, but the course of reflection will lead him to recognize the force which germinates and vegetates in the plant, and indeed the force through which the crystal is formed, that by which the magnet turns to the north pole, the force whose shock he experiences from the contact of two different kinds of metals, the force which appears in the elective affinities of matter as repulsion and attraction, decomposition and combination, and, lastly, even gravitation, which acts so powerfully throughout matter, draws the stone to the earth and the earth to the sun,-all these, I say, he will recognize as different only in their phenomenal existence, but in their inner nature as identical, as that which is directly known to him so intimately and so much better than anything else, and which in its most distinct manifestation is called will." But this surreptitious levelling of differences is possible only in the region of abstractism pure and simple ; so far as concrete nature is concerned, she does not lend 'circumstances'; in other words, freedom is the essential attribute, henco the nature, of him alone of all beings, who is self-sufficient. The cmancipated soul alone is free in this sense, thereforo. The unredeemed ego, when looked at as will, is subject to the dominion of his ideas and motives, that is, desires, and cannot be said to be free. We thus como back, in this round-about fashion, to the old Indian doctrine of bondage, which can be overthrown only by sacrificing desires, as the Scriptures teach.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 585 herself to Schopenhauer's scheme of reducing everything to one differenceless existence or force, the will to be as it has been called. Whether it was the Kantian philosophy or the Upanishads which were the cause of his error, we do not know; but it is clear that chemical affinity, gravitation and will are not quite the same thing. It may be urged that as substances exist by themselves and independently of any outside cause, they should be deemed to be existing by virtue of their own will, which, for this reason, must be termed the will to be; but the argument completely breaks down in the case of an atom of matter which cannot be supposed to be forming a mental resolve to continue to exist from moment to moment. In any other case also the supposition is not supported by any valid argument. To revert to the nature of will, further light is thrown on its constitution by the faculty of memory, which consists in the reproduction of facts of experience already undergone. It rests on perception, which, in its turn, depends on the reaction of will on the sensory stimulus, in consequence of which it assumes the form of that which it cognizes. This is necessary, because otherwise there would be left a gap between the object and the mind, which cannot conceivably be bridged up by anything else. This amounts to saying that the only means of cognition available to the mind is the faculty of feeling, which appears in five different forms, namely, sound, touch, sight, taste and smell. So far as visual perception is concerned, some one has well said that sight is but another form of touch. In reality, 38

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586 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. mind becomes luminous when vibrating at a certain pitch, and thus feels colours. When the sensory excitation reaches the mind, it encounters and challenges the will in the centres of perception. The shock, i.e., the sensation, caused by the disturbance, then rouses attention, which, summoning to its aid the powers and forces residing in the sub-conscious region of the will, proceeds to tackle the situation. Of the elements wbich appear on the threshold of consciousness, those that bave the same rhythm with those in the arrested sensation vibrate in sympathy with the external stimulus, as if welcoming their brethren from the outside, and thus give rise to perception. These elements exist in the mind not in the form of ready-made images, but as a heterogeneous mass of seething active potentialities, or forces, held, as it were, in solution. They are not separable from one another like things juxtaposed in space, but interpenetrating. Hence, when a certain number of them are thrown into vibration, the rest become, as it were, suppressed. The result is that the vibrating elements stand out in the field of consciousness as illuminated outlines in an unilluminated field. Thus is formed the image which is projected outwards in the direction of the stimulus. Hence the statement that mind itself assumes the form of the object which it cognizes. The awareness of the internal reaction on the external stimulus is what is called perception. It will be seen that general, or detail-less, perception precedes the knowledge of particulars, for detailed cognition is an intellectual process and begins with the isolation of parts from the undivided

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 587 unity of perception. With the aid of the innate forms of understanding, attention cuts up the perceived mass into individuals, and these into organs and parts. It then resolves them into the different elements of which they are composed, and thus learns their composition. It is thus evident that the simple elements of which a mental image is composed exist in the mind; the only purpose wbich the outer stimulus serves is to set them in vibration. But for the existence of these elements in the mind, we should never be able to recall a past perception, since the recalled impression comes only from within Any work on psychology will show that sensation is not a simple element, but is the name given to the external excitation, after it has been admitted into the inner domain of mind and been there operated upon, i.e., conditioned, by the then prevailing attitude of will. For instance, if we dip our right hand into hot, and the left one into cold, water, and then plunge them both into a basin containing lukewarm water, the former will find it cold, and the latter hot. Here, obviously, the external excitation remains the same in the case of both the hands, yet are they affected by different sensations. This clearly shows that the external excitation is conditioned by the sensations prevailing in the two hands respectively. Similarly, when the rays from a section of the external world impinge on the eye, they originate certain movements in the nerves of the brain. These movements, or vibrations, together with the then prevailing feeling of the organism, constitute the sensation which

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588 the ego feels and becomes aware of. If this sensation is a commonplace one, and does not interest the ego sufficiently to engage its attention, the movements are allowed to discharge themselves into motor reactions with which they are associated, through habit; otherwise the ego arrests them in the course of their progress and invites the intellect to determine their cause or causes. Attention* then comes into play, and lays itself bare to THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. *Some psychologists see in attention the consciousness of an attitude, rather than an attitude of consciousness, but they seem to lose sight of the important fact that both the body and the mind act and react on one another, so that it is possible to secure the attention of the ego, by throwing the body into some particular attitude, just as it is possible to make the body assume that very attitude by an act of volition. In the latter case, the visible attitude of the body is all that there is to indicate the state of the mind, and may give rise to the inference that attention is always preceded by the bodily attitude. In reality, however, will itself is capable of throwing the body into the attitude of attention. With Bergson, we may say that the elementary work of attention may be compared to that of a telegraph clerk who, on receipt of an important dispatch, sends it back word for word, in order to check its accuracy. The analytical work of attention is only an endeavour to attain to a more perfect synthesis. It is impossible to explain the whole range of the phenomena of attention on the materialistic hypothesis, or the effect-theory, as William James has termed it; we can only satisfy our understanding by saying that the soul's interest, in the movements going on around it, causes it to turn its mind and attend attentively to any particular object, or detail. The power of the soul to countermand and override the inclination of attention, which has not received due consideration at the hands of materialistic psychologists, is, in no sense, capable of explanation on their hypothesis. If attention is the effect of, and called for, by the afferent stimulation, or ideas connected therewith, how is its inhibition by an act of willing, on the part of the ego, to be explained? Prof. William James is himself inclined against the effect-theory, as he distinctly says, on p. 448 n, of the

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589 be operated upon by the object outside in the world. This results in the formation, in the already familiar way, of the mental image which is projected outwards. Thus, perception arises in consequence of the reaction of mind on the afferent stimulus. But for such reaction, the stimulus would only exhaust itself in the shape of movements; it might impart motion to the brain cells, but can never give rise to a knowledge of the object, that is, to a sense of awareness of its presence. Suppress the mental reaction, and you reduce the awareness of the object to its photo on the retina and the movements in the brain, with no one to perceive, or to cognize them. THE HOLY TRINITY. The act of perception takes place only in the mind, not by the mind going over 'bodily' to the spot where the particular object seen is actually lying. If the latter were the case, we should never see the whole of any object at a time, inasmuch as attention could then be directed only to a small portion of its surface, and because it is distance alone which widens the field of vision. Moreover, distant objects would appear very different from what they do, if the faculty of perceiving actually went over to them. Illusion would also be impossible then; for it arises in consequence of a misapprehension of the nature of the stimulus. Besides, 1st Volume of his Principles of Psychology. In its nature, attention signifies the convergence of the inner forces of life to a point, constantly moving in the present and forming the medium of sensation and action between the individual organism and the outside world. It is the point of mental concentration, and implies an attitude of will when it may be said to be at tension.

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590 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. things would not appear large or small, as the distance varied. When we look at the slides of the realistiscope, through that ingenious little instrument, we feel convinced that perception cannot take place on the object; for if it did so take place, there cught to be no difference between the double picture in the instrument and the object cognized by the mind. Not only is this not the case, but, on the contrary, there is hardly any resemblance between them. There is a double picture in the instrument, but the mind sees only one object"; and, in place of the small plane surface which the picture presents to the naked eye, a life-sized, life-like object is seen by the mind. If perception took place on the object, it is difficult to conceive how this deception could be caused. Illusion may be due to a hasty glance at an object; but here the more intently one looks at the picture, the clearer becomes the deceptive image in the mind. Neither the glasses of the realistiscope, nor its pictures, are, at all, like the fused and magnified image which the mind actually perceives. Clearly, then, the act of perception does not take place on the pictures. Neither can it take place on the glasses, because there is no image on them. Besides, if visual perception were to take place on them, they, at least, ought to be visible. The fact is that the mind has a tendency to project all visual perceptions into external space. "This appears to be due, to a large extent, to habit. Those who have been born blind, on obtaining eyesight by an operation, have imagined objects to be in close proximity to the eye, and have not had the distinct sense of exteriority which most individuals possess. Slowly, and by a process of education, in which the sense of touch

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 591 plays an important part, do they gain knowledge of the external relations of objects. Again, phosgenes, when first produced, appear to be in the eye, but when conscious of them, by an effort of imagination, we may transport them into space, although they never appear very far off." (See the article on Vision, in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition). The effect of the ingenious device employed in the realistiscope is to modify the light rays transmitted by the pictures, so as to make them resemble those which emanate from the original object. Hence, when the image from such modified rays is formed on the retina, mind, guided by the resemblance between the realistiscopic excitation and that from the normal object, operates upon it in its usual way, thus, projecting into the external space the mental image of a life-sized object capable of being the original cause of the sensation actually felt. Concerning the power of mind to project these mental images in the external space, Schopenhauer observes : "If seeing consisted in mere sensation, we should perceive the impression of the object turned upside down, because we receive it thus; but in that case, we should perceive it as something within our eye, for we should stop short at the sensation. In reality, however, the understanding steps in at once with its causal law, and as it has received from sensation the datum of the direction in which the ray impinged upon the retina, it pursues that direction retrogressively up to the cause on both lines; so that this time the crossing takes place in the opposite direction, and the cause presents itself upright as an external object in space, i.e., in the position in which it originally sent forth its rays, not that in which they reached the retina." * The localization of the object is determined by the * The Four-fold Root and Will in Nature, page 68.

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592 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, quality of the excitation, which varies with circumstances. Consequently, mind, at times, perceives big objects as small and vice versa. It is, however, not the object which becomes big or small, but only its mental counterpart, the nature of which is determined by that of the excitation, e.g., the moon we see is not the real moon at all, but its mental-image projected by the mind. Since a small moon at a little distance would cause the same sensation as a bigger one at a proportionately greater distance, the perceiving faculty is satisfied the moment the coincidence between the inner vibrations and the external excitation is attained. Hence, the size and distance of the projected mental-image are determined by the nature of the excitation. This explains why little children imagine the moon to be near at hand, and babies in arms vainly try to seize it. As Bergson says:-- " Distinct perception is brought about by two opposite currents, of which the one, the centripetal, comes from the external object, and the other, the centrifugal, has for its point of departure that which we term pure memory. The first current alone would give a passive perception with the mechanical reactions which accompany it. The second, left to itself, tends to give a recollection that is actualized - more and more actual as the current becomes more marked. Together, these two currents make up, at their point of confluence, the perception that is distinct and recognized." (Matter and Memory, p. 163). The fact that the illusion of the realistiscope continues, in spite of the awareness of its nature, proves that reason has nothing to do with the perceptive work of understanding, for otherwise the mentally projected image ought to resemble the slides on disillusionment. It is thus clear that nothing but the quality of the external vibrations determines the nature of the mental image.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 593 Passing on to a consideration of memory, it will be seen that it differs from perception only in so far that the stimulus which occasions it does not proceed from an object in the outside world, but arises within the mind itself. The self-same mental elements that vibrate in perception are also thrown into vibration in recollection, the imperfections of which are due to the very nature of will itself. For, in will impressions blend and interpenetrate to such an extent that often it is impossible to isolate and recall any particular sensation whole and entire. Hence, the images which are constructed with the aid of these recalled sensations are generally mutilated, wrongly grouped, and full of false detail. This should not happen if there was a place where memory-images were stored, as pictures in a gallery, or photos in an album. Besides, whenever there is inner excitation of the senses, as in intense concentration, mind forms and projects into external space such distinct and life-like images as deceive the individual. These are known as hallucination, although to the individual concerned they are quite real, the most striking cases being those in which the senses of sight and touch are excited at the same time. Whence could these hallucinatory images arise, unless they be made there and then by the mind ? Even the complementary after-image, which is seen after looking at an object with a certain amount of attention, only goes to show that it owes its existence to the activity of mind, and is formed there and then. It certainly does not prove the preservation of memory in the form of images in the brain substance. 39

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594 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. What, then, is memory? Is it a store-house of facts and figures, as such, or a register or record of past experiences and events? That the past is preserved in the mind, in some form, is beyond dispute, since glimpses of it; are caught now and then even after a supposed obliteration. The wonderful memory of hypnotic subjects and men who have undergone the experience of drowning, suffices to prove the preservation of every event in the past. Memory means nothing if not the recollection of a past event, i.e., the recurrence, in consciousness, of an experience already undergone, or of a sensation already felt. Hence, the difference between perception and recollection lies only in this that, while the excitation which occasions the former comes from without, that which brings the latter originates within the mind itself. When the causes of sensation lie outside the organism, mental images resulting from the reaction of mind go out to overlie them, and occasion visual perception ; but when they originate from within, they give rise to forms, which, finding nothing substantial, outside in the world, to feed upon, remain evanescent and fleeting--the shadowy ghosts of events, rather than actualities of perception. Observation will show that the past is preserved in two entirely different ways, namely, firstly, in the form of modification of disposition or character, which, as we have seen, is the repository of education, and, secondly, in the form of motor mechanisms that are 'set in motion as a whole by an initial impulse, in a close system of automatic movements which succeed

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TIE HOLY TRINITY. 595 each other in the same order, and, together, take the same length of time ' (Matter and Memory). The learning of a lesson by heart is an instance of this kind. As Bergson observes, this memory is nothing else but the complete set of intelligently constructed mechanisms which enable us to adapt ourselves to the present situation. It is very common among those lower forms of life which are solely guided by their instincts. Habit rather than memory, it acts our past, but does not call up its image. As for the other form of memory, it is obvious that will is principally concerned where the past is preserved in the form of modification of disposition or character, for it is directly affected by experience. And this will be found to hold good with respect to all kinds of mental impressions, in so far as such impressions imply experience and are a source of education to the will. For no mental impression is altogether devoid of effect, so that it is impossible for it not to affect or influence one's instincts or character in some way. This is sufficient to show that memory is almost exclusively an associate of will. * In will also lies the initial difficulty which is experienced when we try to learn anything new ; for it is not easy to make it respond to particular ideas or to force it into particular attitudes against its inclinations and temperament. Hence, so long as attention is fixed elsewhere, no amount of repetition would make any lasting impression on the mind. The process of learning also throws considerable light on the nature of memory. When one bears a

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596 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. complex phrase in an unknown foreign tongue, one is not able to repeat it there and then ; but its repetition becomes easy, if it be broken up into the simpler sounds composing it. The reason why we can repeat a word, or phrase, when its composition is known and not otherwise, lies in the fact that the simpler 'elements' of all sounds exist in the soul, as different capacities for vibrating, but not as ready-made words and phrases, so that the articulation of words is really the articulation of certain simple sounds in quick succession. Hence, the moment the practical knowledge of the composition of words is known, pronunciation thereof becomes easy. These facts warrant the inference that the difference between a new born babe and an adult, in respect of phonetic reproduction, lies not in respect of the capacities of the soul, but, solely and simply, in education, i.e., the knowledge of the analytical and synthetical processes which govern those capacities. In this sense, memory is the faculty of combining the simpler elements of the mind into complex forms, the frequency of repetition enabling the will to perform the operation with astonishing rapidity, as if without effort. When the rhythm of the new form becomes firmly established in the mind, we call it habit or disposition; and it is this habit, or disposition, which offers opposition to the admission of anything new. The easeloving nature of will makes it averse to leave the beaten track and strike out into new paths. It loathes trouble of every kind, but delights in roaming over familiar ground. Hence, things with which it has not become sufficiently familiarized are liable to be forgotten. Knowledge acquired by pure cramming,' therefore,

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 597 is as good as the waste of valuable time. Hence, ideas which are associated with familiar ideas are more lasting than fragments of knowledge forced on the will. The characteristic of mind is that it can be conscious of only one idea, or state of consciousness, at a time, though this idea, or state, need not be a simple one, but may be as complex as imagination can picture, provided that it is a compact, well-connected whole. Hence, any fact, or state of consciousness, which does not find its appropriate place in the idea, or feeling, in possession of the field of consciousness, will not be readily admitted, or remembered. It is this peculiarity of the will also which explains its dislike to be burdened with stray thoughts, or odds and ends of knowledge. The close connection between the faculty of recollection and will is further evident from the fact that when we jog the memory to recall some forgotten event, it is the will alone which is put to the strain, that is, reflected. Some people think that recollections share the nature of mental concepts which, they maintain, exist in the brain. What is precisely meant by this statement is not easy to comprehend, unless it be that concepts and ideas exist somewhere in the matter of the brain, with their definite outlines and 'individualities,' in other words, as ready-made images. It thus becomes necessary to see what a concept can possibly mean. Proceeding from the material object perceived in the physical world, we get first of all the object itself whose representation in the mind is called percept. In the absence of the object, its recollection is a memory image which lacks the concreteness of the percept.

Page #619
598 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. This memory image is, however, not to be confounded with the concept, for it has, as an image, its clear cut outline and contour, as they were seen in the original object at some particular moment of time. A concept, on the contrary, is what the understanding conceives from what it has perceived. It is an idea robbed of all else but that which appertains to its kind, so that it would hold true of the whole class, but not represent any individual in it, except in so far as it shares, with the other members of its fraternity, the features distinctive of the whole class itself. As a modern psychologist says, in a concept the identity is removed from its concrete setting and viewed by itself. For instance, the concept 'man' would be true of every man, whether tall or short, fat or lean, young or old, whether existing now, or having existed in the past, or yet to be born. In other words, a concept is the symbol of thought, defining an object by pointing out those features of resemblance which are common to all the members of its species or class, but omitting those in respect of which it differs from others. It is clearly impossible for it to be an image of each and every individual, though they may all be said to exist in it rolled up in some way; for an image is nothing if not the likeness of a particular object as it appeared to us on some particular occasion. Many of the concepts must, obviously, be without form, e.g., time, for we can mentally endow with forms only such objects as have been perceived by us, but never those which are beyond perception itself. Therefore, the notion that concepts and ideas float in consciousness,

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 599 can only be applicable, if at all, to the abstractions made from the percepts of visible objects. Here Berkeley's famous illustration of the concept triangle proves itself useful. It is not a concept of any particular kind of a triangle, nor of any triangle of a particular size or dimensions, but purely and simply of tri-angularity. If the concept triangle be an image, surely it ought to be easy to reproduce it on paper ; but the moment we set out to do so, we discover that our drawing is either a right-angled, or some other kind of triangle, with certain definite dimensions, and not the general idea of a triangle, in any sense of the word. We thus see that the concept triangle cannot possibly be an image, but is a quality of images; it can only represent the attribute of tri-angularity, but nothing more. Abstract away all the features of distinction from a number of individuals belonging to a class, or from the numerous phases of the same individual, and you have, in one case, the concept of the class, and, in the other, that of the individual object. Now, since the original concrete perception arises from mental reaction, that which is left after the elimination of the features of distinction, must necessarily be the diagram of just as much reaction as is common to the class to which the object belongs. Hence, concepts and ideas exist in the mind, not as images, but as 'liquid' possibilities which may be actualized in thought at will. Ewald Hering maintains (On Memory and The Specific Energy of The Nervous System): "Our concepts appear on the stage of consciousness only transiently; they quickly disappear behind the scenes, to make place for others. Only on the stage are they conceptions, as an actor is king only on the stage. As what do they remain behind the scenes ?

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600 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. For that they exist somehow we know; a cue only is needed to inake them reappear. They do not continue as conceptions, but as certain dispositions of the nervous substance by virtue of which the same sound that was produced yesterday can again be evoked to-day." We may also quote Dr. Herman T. Lukens, who observes : "When we recall to mind an act we have done or a sensation we have experienced, the similarity between this and the original doing or feeling is so great as to leave but little doubt that the same parts of the nervous system are concerned in the mental reproduction as in the previous physical production. We know that every action leaves the parts of the body with a disposition to the same action again, thus making the second performance more easy. This fact lies at the foundation of habit, and it would seem the same fact is the basis of memory."-(Thought and Memory, pp. 45-46). We have already pointed out how and where the concepts are preserved, and need not dilate any further on the point. The fact that in certain diseases and also in old age memory is impaired, goes to suggest its dependence on the organism, though it does not necessarily lead us to the conclusion which some writers have drawn from it, namely, that there is no possibility of the survival of memory after the injury to the brain or the somatic death of the individual. The brain is the vehicle of manifestation, not the organ of preservation; hence its destruction merely affects manifestation, but does not touch the faculty of preservation itself. For the foregoing reasons, we must reject the hypothesis of the preservation of memory in the shape of images, and hold that all memories are preserved in the shape of habits, tendencies, feelings and emotions in the will. The bundle of these inental tendencies and incli

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 601 nations is not wiped out with the death of the physical body, but constitutes the nucleus which passes from life to life, as will be shown more fully later. Bergson has clearly shown that the human body is a sensory-motor organism ; by its activity it keeps the attention confined to the present, and thus inhibits reflection. But whenever action is undetermined, opportunity is afforded to the faculty of reflection of going over past experience in search of the principle of guidance in the present emergency. We then reflect, (re, back, and flexio, to bend, or turn), that is, we turn our will back on its own past experience, thus making it vibrate at different rhythms, till the required memory is secured. The past, then, is preserved* in the mind not in the * Cf. "Memory, as we have tried to prove, is not a faculty of putting away recollections in a drawer, or of inscribing them in a register. There is no register, no drawer; there is not even, properly speaking, a faculty, for a faculty works intermittently, when it will or when it can, whilst the piling up of the past upon the past, goes on without relaxation. In reality, the past is preserved by itself, automatically. In its entirety, probably, it follows us at every instant; all that we have felt, thought or willed from our earliest infancy is there, leaning over the present which is about to join it, pressing against the portals of consciousness that would fain leave it outside. The cerebral mechanism is arranged just so as to drive back into the unconscious almost the whole of this past, and to admit beyond the threshold only that which can cast light on the present situation or further the action now being prepared-in short, only that which can give useful work. At the most, a few superinous recollections may succeed in smuggling themselves through the half-open door. These memories, messengers from the unconscious. remind us of what we are dragging behind us anawares. But, even though we may have no distinct idea of it, we feel vaguely that our past romains present to us. What are we, in fact, what is our character, if not the condensation of the history that we have 40

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602 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. shape of images, but as tendencies of the soul. All knowledge is stored up that way. Bergson is right in holding that we act with our entire past, for knowledge implies the training of will by altering and modifying its impulses which determine the automatic activity of the soul. We might now turn our attention to the problem of the association of ideas. The question is : what is the force which drags out impressions and recollections of the past from the depths of the unconscious ? We have said that perception is the reaction of the mind on the incoming stimulus, and but for it would be reduced to pure mechanical movements set up by the external excitation. The intensity and pitch of the vibrations coming from without set the mind vibrating in about the same way as a violin string is set in sympathetic response by its note being struck in its vicinity. This gives us resernblanco, which is felt rather than thought, in the first instance. But mind is not a solitary chord in the organism ; it is a centre of force which implies the pencilling of an infinite number of interpenetrating currents of different intensity and rhythm at a lived from our birth-nay, even before our birth, since we bring with us prenatal dispositions ? Doubtless, we think with only a small part of our past, but it is with our entire past, including the original bent of our soul, that we desire, will and act. Our past, then, as a whole, is made manifest to us in its impulse; it is felt in the form of tendency, although a small part of it only is known in the form of idea.... We could not live over again a single moment, for we should have to begin by effacing the memory of all that had followed. Even could we erase this memory from our intellect, we could not from our will."- Creative Evolution, pp. 5 and 6.

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TDE HOLY TRINITY. 603 point. Were it a solitary chord, it could never vibrate in response to all sorts of different notes and melodies. Hence, we have to divide the mind into five sections or types of rhythm, corresponding to the specific sensations of the five senses, and then to sub-divide these sections into a number of chords which can reproduce the exact quality of vibrations as come from without. Now, suppose the eye falls on a group of men. The currents passing through the retina would set a certain number of mental chords, which are attuned to their pitch, in vibration. Suppose these chords happen to be A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, .........to A, of the visual section A. Obviously, the next time that the eye falls on any of the members of the group, it would set some of these very chords in vibration, and these, in their turn, would tend to evoke resonance from the rest which had vibrated with them, as a whole, at the time of the perception of the group of which the man subsequently seen was a member. Hence we may lay down that the association of similarity arises from the sameness or similarity of the response, while that of contiguity depends on the connection which springs up from having vibrated together. As Bergson says, association is not the primary fact; dissociation is wha twe begin with, and the tendency of every memory to gather to itself others must be explained by the natural return of the mind to the undivided unity of perception (Matter and Memory). Each time that one opens one's eyes, they take in the whole of the visible panorama before them at a glance, mechanically ; and it is reserved for attention to carve out individuals from this heterogeneous mass, or the unity of perception,

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604 Hence, contiguity is given already at the very outset ; it is obscured by the attentive dissociation of an 'individual' from other contiguous individuals, so that one has only to relax the tension of attention to develop the entire picture. The following diagram, taken from Bergson's Matter and Memory, and modified to suit our requirements, may be studied with advantage to understand the mechanism of association by contiguity: THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. P A A =00 B w B S is the point of sensory-motor activity, which travels unceasingly from P to F, i.e., from the past to the future, in the universe, represented by the plane U in the diagram. The cone ASB represents the entire capacity of memory which fills up its' records' at S, the point of sensory-motor activity, hence, of attention. Between the summit S and the base AB of the cone, then, there is room for all the modifications which the faculty of recollection receives unceasingly from the outer world. In this space are ranged, layer upon layer, all the im U

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 605 pressions which the soul has brought over with itself from the past, each layer or record consisting of all whole impressions formed at one time. A'B' and A' B' are tivo such records. Now, suppose that the activity at S is inhibited on the plane U, and attention, withdrawing itself from the field of action, travels inward, in the region of memory, in search of a past experience. It would then have to travel backwards and forwards among these layers of its past impressions, till it recover the memory it is searching for. If, however, there were nothing to guide it in its pursuit of the phantoms of the past, its labour would be enormous, and oftener than otherwise in vain ; but, fortunately, the principle of similarity at once comes to its rescue, and, in the manner already pointed out, enables it speedily to get hold of a similar impression in one of the innumerable records, in the region of memory. Similarity having fixed the layer, attention no longer travels up and down between the summit and the base of the conical tower' of memory, but busies itself in exploring the storey which has been reached through similarity. Now, because all the impressions which had presented themselves together, in a single act of perception, are stored up in this particular storey, on account of contiguity in space, they all pass under the search-light of attention, yielding the required 'image.' In this manner is the process of recollection carried on, consciously or unconsciously, in the mind. The recovered impression is an affection of the ego, like perception, and is termed a recollection for that reason. So far as the functioning of the faculty of recollection is concerned, the rule is that it is obstructed by action, inasmuch as activity is

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606 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE only memory lived out, and you can either live out your memory or have it before you in the form of images, not both. But whenever the mind action vacillates between two or more alternatives, the knowledge which would have been acted out, becomes solidified into representations, there and then, by the mere circumstance of reflection. Memory thus is set free to display its content by the relaxation of the tension of activity, and arises by the turning of the current on itself, whereby the reflected part becomes illuminated, and stands out, as it were, against a background of the unilluminated portion of the current of life's inclinations and tendencies. The more the attention is disengaged from action, the greater would be the reflection, and richer the memory. Hence thinking and acting lie in opposite directions, and inhibit each other. In other words, relaxation of tension spreads out the contents of the current of activity into memories, and the performance of action liquefies recollections into actuating tendencies. The exigencies of the physical life, however, seldom allow man to disengage his attention so completely from the present as to enable him to spread out his whole past before him; hence it is almost impossible for him who is deeply engrossed in the world, to attain to that degree of relaxation which would bring him perfect knowledge. But, whenever and wherever a master has turned his back completely on the world and become merged in Self contemplation, memory has never been known to withhold any secrets from him. The statement in the Scriptures that all the knowledge of one's past lives is stored up in the soul is thus literally

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 607 true. Man is ignorant of the vast store of knowledge entombed in his memory, because of the sensual tendencies of his soul, summed up in the lower mind, which, thinned and sharpened like the point of a pencil, leads him by the nose in the pursuit of worldly lusts. But the rishis turned their backs resolutely on the world, and acquired the memory of their past incarnations, that is, lives. The difference between the capacious memory of an illumined saint and our faulty faculty of that name lies in the fact that in us it remains in a sub-conscious state, owing to our inability to set the attention free from slavery to the senses. Experimental hypnotism has, however, revealed the fact that even our stumbling memory is capable of performing wonderful feats, whenever attention is disengaged from one's worldly concerns and made to dive into the depths of the sub-conscious, also called the subjective mind. Even knowledge of the future is possible to the being who withdraws his attention from the body. It is known that the munis not only perceived the past lives of men, but their future incarnations as well. The difficulties which seem to surround this kind of knowledge vanish the moment we recognize the fact that all changes of disposition or character, which is the sole cause of future births, are stored up in the form of modifications of the substance of the soul, so that if one's vision were keen enough to penetrate through the veils of matter and perceive these changes, one could without difficulty discover the nature of the seeds of rebirth. Further, since Nirvana is only the establishing

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608 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of the soul in its own nature, that is, the purity of essence, and since every action which modifies character, the seed of rebirth, leaves its characteristic mark behind, the whole range of future rebirths must be readable in the karmic ledger of the soul. This explanation also holds good with respect to the past, which, as already stated, is likewise preserved in the shape of modifications of character. Hence, he who develops clairvoyant vision, keen and penetrating enough to perceive the modifications of the lines of force which connect an individual with his past, can easily point out the previous incarnations of the soul. We have said that the current of the tendencies of life is, owing to the necessities of the physical environment and the ego's action therein, thinned and sharpened to a point which is constantly pressing against the future, and from which radiate motor impulses in all directions in the body, enabling it to act on the surrounding bodies in the world. But suppose this radiation is inhibited. The result of the inhibition will be the stoppage of the outgoing energy and the consequent expansion of the point. If the process were to stop short here, only a feeling of fulness and expansion would be experienced by the soul; neither action nor reflection would ensue. But if the pent-up force is allowed to escape outwards, bodily action will inevitably follow its discharge ; and if reflected back on itself, attention will travel away further inwards and will be scattered over the triangle formed by the very act of reflection. This triangle whose apex is the sensory-motor point and whose base an imaginary line drawn across the cur

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 609 rent to mark the extent of reflection, is the form of thought, through it is precipitated, in the form of memory and recollection, the experience of the past which was gathered up in the liquid dynamic stream. The process is like that of the breaking up of a ray of light into the colours of the spectrum, but it is not automatic. It depends on the will, for when two or more directions are open to the activity of the ego, and it select one of them, the element of choice is there to contradict the hypothesis of automatism and chance. Intellect, the faculty of reflection and analysis, thus arises simultaneously with the creation of differences.' But it is a genesis, or creation, only if we start from the point of view of action. The triangle, the differences, * The point and triangle of Esotericism can mean no more than this. The first Logos is Will, the energy of consciousness, conceived as engaged in unceasing activity of life, and is, accordingly, symbolized by a point in a circle. This point is next conceived as expanding, but not so as to reflect the current back on itself. This signifies the state of feeling which is the primary function of consciousness, and is represented by a diameter in a circle. The third step constituted by the act of reflection, resulting in the reversal of the current, and is represented by the cross, or the Greek tau, i.e., the letter T. Sometimes the cross is replaced by a tetrahedron, consisting in the figure of four equal and equilateral triangles. The old symbolism of a serpent entwined round a cross is another way of expressing the three movements of spiritual energy. The serpent stands for the upward going current, the energy of a self-conscious will; the transverse piece of the cross represents the idea of the diameter in the circle, as shown above, and the vertical bar points to the current being thrown back on itself. The symbol is thus designed to convey a full explanation of the origination of the universe, on the analogy of a dream, and also points to the three functions of consciousness, that is, feeling, willing aud reflecting. 4L

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 611 with material impurities that it cannot be reflected back on itself. As we rise higher in the scale of being, some sort of crude and imperfect reflectiveness becomes apparent in some of the five-sensed animals -monkeys, horses, elephants, and the like--indicating that the load of impurities carried by their souls is considerably lessened, though not sufficiently so to enable reason to have full play. These are the two main types of life in the animal kingdom ; apart from them, there is a third, the lowest -metals, plants, and the like -- which are characterised by the purely vegetative function of life. They have only the sense of touch, and spend their whole life in a mechanical way, as if heavily drugged. They have neither memory nor reflection, nor even instinctive consciousness. According to Jainism, living beings are either sangi (having a mind, i.e., the organ of reflection or thought) or asangi (a=not to sangi, hence the mindless). The sangi enjoy the power of deliberation, and are able to learn if taught; they respond when they are called, and can also be trained. The organ of mind (dravya mana) is a body of fine matter which is the instrument of reflection or thought. As already stated, every living organism is not endowed with it, the asangi having neither true volition, nor judgment, but only the power of sensation and of responding to the external stimulus in an instinctive or mechanical way. All living matter, it will be seen, is irritable and contractile, and capable of responding to the external excitation in a mechanical, instinctive way. The simplest organisms are of this description; as we rise higher

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610 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and also the perceiver thereof were all there already in the current, only in a latent, that is, unmanifested state ; they only needed the turning away of attention from immediate action to come into the field of consciousness. We must dwell a bit longer on the nature of the current of life's tendencies to be able to understand the psychology of what is called the lower mind. Obviously, these tendencies, being different in different individuals, cannot all be regarded as natural to the soul. This means that they are modifications of the natural impetus, impulse or feeling of pure spirit. But, since impulses cannot be modified by aught except force, and since force is inconceivable apart from some kind of matter, the tendencies of life must be the effect of the fusion of spirit and matter, for there is no other substance to combine with souls. This amounts to saying that desire, memory and reflection, the three most important characteristics of the finite mind, are the product of the union of spirit and matter. So far as the faculty of reflection is concerned, it is only possible where the outgoing current is susceptible of being thrown back on itself; hence, where uncontrolled passions or sensualism are the dominating trait of existence, reason, the faculty of 'reflection, must be conspicuous by its absence. Accordingly, all lower forms of life, which are constantly engrossed in action and sensation in their wakeful moments, are unreasoning beings, though their souls are in no way inferior to the most perfect specimens of pure spirit in respect of its natural qualities. The current of tendencies in their case is so much loaded

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612 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. in organic life, a division of labour is found to exist; nerve cells appear diversified and grouped together in a systematic way. Bergson observes : "When a foreign body touches one of the prolongations of the amoeba, that prolongation is retracted; every part of the protoplasmic mass is equally able to receive a stimulation and to react against it: perception and movement being here blended in a single property, contractilily. But, as the organism grows more complex. there is a division of labour; fanctions become differentiated, and the anatomical elements thus determined forego their independence. In such an organism as our own, the nerve fibres, termed sensory, are exclusively empowered to transmit stimulation to a central region whence the vibration will be passed on to motor elements. It would seem then that they have abandoned individua) action to take their share, as outposts, in the mancuvres of the whole body. But none the less they remain exposed, .singly, to the same causes of destruction which threaten the organism as a whole; and while this organism is able to move, and thereby to escape a danger or to repair a loss, the sensitive element retains the relative immobility to which the division of labour condemns it" (Matter and Memory). The dravya mana is composed of very fine material, and marks the limit of the specialization of the function of nervous matter and nerve cells. It is not conscious in its own right, since consciousness belongs not to matter of which it is composed. As a matter of fact, this mind is, in a way, the instrument of limitation of knowledge, because it narrows down the field of consciousness to what is actually the subject of attention at any particular moment of time. To elucidate the point, full and unqualified omniscience is the nature of each and every soul ; but this is so only potentially in the case of those that are still involved in transmigration; for in their case the purity of spirit is vitiated, more or less, by the contact of matter, there being no transmigrating soul which may

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TIE HOLY TRINITY. 613 be said to be altogether free from the pollution. Just as the intimate union of hydrogen and oxygen deprives those gases of their aerial freedom, so to speak, reducing it to bare fluidity of liquids, in the same way is the fusion of spirit and matter responsible for the loss and linnitation of the all-knowing faculty of the soul. Where the association with matter is of the worst type, as in the case of the lowest forms of life-metals and plantsknowledge is reduced to bare sensations of touch and a mechanical response to the external stimulus. In less unfortunate cases, other sense organs also appear, but deliberation, i.e., reflection and memory (except what is known as habit memory), do not appear, unless the soul acquires the central organ of reflection and the power to check the headlong rush of the torrential current of animal passions and desires. The organ of reflection is like the central telephone exchange of the nervous system where all the nerves--sensory and motor both-have their terminal endings. The clerk in charge of the office is the soul, the self-conscious force, whose self-consciousness directly depends on and is affected by the nature of his tendencies, desires and passions. These desires and tendencies are all of them powerful forces originating in the constitution of the soul by virtue of its union with matter. They clog the mental stream with rubbish, and prevent reflection. The point of this current of tendencies, the head of the serpent manas, is attention, which tests the quality of the incoming sensory stimulus by laying itself open to its vibratory impulse, and which sets a motor nerve in motion by the augmentation of energy at its inner terminal.

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614 It is the application of attention, the connecting of the object without with the point of the mental stream, which is the two-fold cause of the detailed knowledge of a thing as well as of the closing of the door against all other senses than the one which may be actually functioning. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The amount of consciousness which watches over the actions of life where intellect is not shedding its illuminative lustre, consists in the sparks given out, from time to time, at the sensory-motor point, in consequence of friction with the incoming stimulus, or of resistance to action. But the glow produced by reflection is the intellectual gleam with which reason carries on the adjustment of the soul's inner relations with the outer. The control of the mind is exercised through the brain which is interposed between it and the nervous system. The centripetal impulses coming from the periphery pass through the brain, just as the motor impulses originating with the will find their way to the desired channel of activity through it. This is because the brain is superimposed, as a loop, over both the sensory and motor systems, through which the ego comes into touch with the physical world. Bergson thus describes the function of the brain : "In our opinion the brain is no more than a kind of central telephonic exchange; its office is to allow communication, or to delay it. It adds nothing to what it receives; but, as all the organs of perception send to it their ultimate prolongations, and as all the motor mechanisms of the spinal cord and of the medulla oblongata have in it their accredited representatives, it really constitutes a centre, where the peripheral excitation gets into re. lation with this or that motor mechanism, chosen and no longer prescribed."-Matter and Memory, pp. 19-20.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 615 The brain is, however, not the choser, since choice belongs to the ego, and also since the brain is composed of matter which is unconscious by nature. What connects the ego with the brain is the central organ of mind which is composed of too fine a material to be visible except to clairvoyant vision. The nature of the matter of which this central organ (the dravya mana) is composed, is evident from the fact that it is in touch, at one end, with the finest nervous fibres of the brain, and, at the other, with the subtile and superfine substance of will which is absolutely beyond the reach of sense-perception. The dravya mana is distinguishable from manas, which is but another name for the individual will as appearing in the form of desire; for while the physical mind is only an instrument in the hands of the ego for deliberation, training, voluntary motion and intelligent speech, the desiring manas represents the dynamic energy of the ego itself inclined in a particular way or ways. In different language, the manas consists in the energy of life bent on seeking gratification in respect of the four generic forms of desire, namely, dhara (food), bhaya (fear), maithuna (sexual indulgence) and parigraha (attachment to worldly goods), and laden with the impurities deposited by the four kinds of passions-anger, pride, deceit and greed-which arise from and are rooted in desire. The dravya mana, on the other hand, is not characterized by passions. It is intended, like a system of switches, to regulate the traffic between the ego and the outside world, and discharges its function by transmitting different kinds of movements. But it does not originate motion, for that is the function of

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616 will. And the work of will in producing these movements is of the simplest description: it has simply to dwell upon an idea to produce motion in any desired manner; As William James points out, every idea tends ultimately either to produce a movement or to check one which otherwise would be produced. But what is an idea in itself? Is it not the mental counterpart of a sensation pure and simple? William Jamest tells us : THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "The lower centres act from present sensations alone; the hemispheres act from perceptions and considerations, the sensations which they may receive serving only as suggesters of these. But what are perceptions but sensations grouped together? and what are considerations but expectations, in the fancy, of sensations which will be felt one way or another according as action takes this course or that? If I step aside on seeing a rattle snake, from considering how dangerous an animal he is, the mental materials which constitute my prudential reflection are images more or less vivid of the movement of his head, of a sudden pain in my leg, of a state of terror, a swelling of the limb, a chill, delirium, unconsciousness, etc., etc., and the ruin of my hopes. But all these images are constructed out of my past experiences. They are reproductions of what I have felt or witnessed. They are, in short, remote sensations, and the difference between the hemisphereless animal and the whole one may be concisely expressed by saying that the one obeys absent, the other only present, objects." Such is the process of deliberation: the reminiscences of the past are awakened and re-grouped in different ways till fancy's approval is obtained; and these regroupings constitute what is known as a train of thought. Thus is the function of the central organ of mind discharged by means of simple movements. The The Principles of Psychology, Vol. I. p. 24. Ibid, page 20.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 617 druvya mana is a kind of an operating board which is connected at one end with the brain, by means of levers and bars of nerves. Its operator, too, is connected with it at the other end, and cannot break away from it during life. It is because of this inseparable association between the levers of movement and the ego that every immediate act of will is also an immediate act of the body, except when the motion is allowed to be dissipated by the brain. In the latter class of cases, the motion is communicated to certain parts of the brain where it evokes only nascent or potential movements, and is probably ultimately absorbed by the serous fuid surrounding that organ. This is why deliberations produce no bodily movement, though every true act of the will is also an immediate act of the body, as already stated. As to the origin of motion, reflection reveals it to be the result of a purely mechanical process on the part of will. The ego is affected by its sensations, perceptions and considerations and thrown into a state of agitation in consequence. These affections or agitations of the will are communicated to the nerve terminals embedded in the dravya mana, producing characteristic movements of the body or brain cells. Where the element of selection comes in is in the choice which opens one track rather than another to the motor impulse. But this is the work of the ego, and cannot be performed by matter which is not endowed with judgment. Deliberation, similarly, cannot be a function of the brain, though it bears the full weight of the ego's activity when engaged in thinking; for no amount of the motion of that which is devoid of consciousness can ever become 42

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618 thought by any conceivable chemical or mechanical process. The train of thought is really a series of affections or states of consciousness of the ego, which arise from reflection and are felt by the soul. It is true that a sensation of dulness is felt in the brain after hard mental work, but the brain is by no means the thinker. As a matter of fact, apart from the motion of certain of its cells, the brain is not concerned in deliberation and is not even the seat of the central organ of reflection, or of the ego, whose headquarters are undoubtedly located in the heart. This is evident from the fact that the heart and not the head is directly affected by one's passions and emotions, which remain quite unaffected by the degeneration and decay of the brain in old age. Moresince passions and emotions also interfere with the proper exercise of the function of deliberation, they must be connected with the dravya mana itself, which, for this very reason, must be located in the same place with will, that is, in the region of the heart. As Schopenhauer says, in the heart is the man, not in the head. The explanation of the feeling of dulness or heaviness experienced in the brain after hard mental work probably lies in the fact that the parts of the brain concerned in the process become heated and over-worked after a time. Just as a feeling of fatigue arises in the fingers in consequence of excessive work, though the ego's headquarters are not located in the hands, in the same way certain portions of the brain show signs of fatigue when put to excessive strain. over, Though not the thinker itself, the dravya mana is indispensable for deliberation, because thinking consists in a series of nascent movements or 'sensations' THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 619 which are not possible in the absence of the brain and the central nervous organ interposed betrreen it and the will. Hence it is that all the lower forms of life which are not endowed with the brain and the central organ of choice and control, are also devoid of reflection. Incapable of controlling their activity, they are also incapable of deliberation. Their actions are all determined by their instincts; they live in the present and are incapable of judgment and choice. The advantages of deliberation are obvious, and are clearly brought out by Willam James in the following passage which occurs on pp. 21 and 22 of the 1st Volume of his Principles of Psychology :-- " Take the prehension of food as an example, and suppose it to be a reflex performance of the lower centres. The animal will be condemned fatally and irresistibly to snap at it whenever presented, no matter what the circumstances may be; he can no more disobey this prompting than water can refuse to boil when a fire is kindled under the pot. His life will again and again pay the forfeit of its gluttony. Exposure to retaliation, to other enemies, to traps, to poisons, to the dangers of repletion, must be regular parts of his existence. His lack of all thought by which to weigh the danger against the attractiveness of the bait, and of all volition to remain hungry a little while longer, is the direct measure of his lowness in the mental scale. And those fishes which like our cunners and sculpins, are no sooner thrown back from the hook into the water, than they automatically seize the hook again, would soon expiate the degradation of their intelligence by the extinction of their type, did not their exaggerated fecundity atone for their imprudence, Appetite and the acts it prompts have consequently become in all higher vertebrates functions of the cerebrum." What is true of the advantage in respect of food, holds good with regard to all other functions in the exercise of which prudence is a virtue. The animal devoid of the brain and the dravya mana cannot pause,

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620 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. postpone, deliberate, compare or nicely balance one motive against another. But it is not the absence of these necessary organs of rational thought that debars him from these advantages ; on the contrary, their absence itself is to be laid at his door. For, whatever the moderns may say to the contrary, it is not the brain which manufactures the ego, but the ego who organizes the brain, so that the absence of the brain is to be accounted for by the grossness and lowness of the tendencies of the organizing ego or will itself. It is not the brain or the central mana which makes us pause and deliberate, but the force of the purer instincts of life which were developed undoubtedly in some pre-natal state or states. When the body came to be organized in consequence of those instincts, the brain and the central organ were evolved out in due course of things. The physical brain is, no doubt, a necessary part of the machinery of rational life, and injury to its substance is invariably accompanied by a corresponding impairment or loss of the functions of the mind, but it is not characterized by individuality which is the most indispensable trait of our psychic being, and cannot, for that reason, be regarded as the seat of consciousness or soul. It is like a shunting yard at a railway junction, and altogether incapable of regulating the movements of the mental rolling-stock. The same observations apply to the dravya mana which stands to the brain in the same relation as a signal-box does to the railway lines in the shunting yard. It, too, is unconscious, and, therefore, incapable of regulating the mental impulses originating in the will.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. The mana, chitta, buddhi and ahamkara of the Indian philosophy, for which it is not always easy to find suitable equivalents in different tongues, are the four different aspects of the mental outfit,' mana (the same as manas) being the point of the current of life's tendencies, i.e., attention, chitta the bed of the mental stream, so to speak, buddhi, the faculty of reflection, the same as is termed intellect, and ahamkara, the sense of "I-ness," that is to say, the clerk in charge of the central exchange.' The whole of this current is full of memory records preserved in the form of living, that is, active tendencies, called samskaras (impressions) in Sanskrit. Now, because we cannot have even an impression that is immaterial, the samskaras must have some sort of a material basis, that is to say, they must be composed of some kind of fine matter, though, as observed before, they do not exist as photos in an album, but in a fluid form in the current of life, and have a tendency to become fixed and solidified by reflection. ( " 621 As regards their formation, it is necessary to go back to perception. In mindless beings, whose consciousness is too much vitiated by the influence of matter, perception never rises to the dignity of cognition, and is confined to a feeling of sensations to which response is made in an automatic way. But the case with those who are endowed with a central mental equipment is very different. In their case, we have first of all a vague detail-less sense of awareness. This is called darsana (pure excitation or sensing) and is followed, if the soul so wishes, by avagraha, which means the singling out of an object with reference to its class

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622 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. only, that is to say, the knowledge or awareness of its general properties, e.g., to know an object as a man. Then comes iha, which signifies an attitude of enquiry. The soul now exerts itself to acquire detailed information concerning the object of perception, brings its memory to bear upon the stimulus, and proceeds to compare and test its nature and contents with the aid of its menta) reagents. This process, which is dependent on the soul's interest in any given object, may be prolonged as long as it is desirable to continue the investigation. The important thing to know about this state (iha) is that perception here ceases to be mechanical and becomes volitional with the soul. The formation of the percept, consisting in the weaving of the incoming stimulus, in its appropriate place in the warp and woof of consciousness, is the result of iha. This is known as avaya, which is tantamount to the filling in of the detail in the general presentation or outline of an object in consciousness. The material basis here also is the mental stream, consisting of all conceivable kinds of reagents,' which enable the intellect to test the properties of a sensation. The last stage is dharna (literally, grasping), which means retaining or conceiving. By dwelling upon the nature of the object perceived, intellect strips off the presentation all that it has of excitation, leaving it a pure mental diagram which, as we have already seen, is not an image, but an evaporated outline common to images, a tendency of mind, or a kind of nascent action, which, if allowed to develop, would yield an image, as happens in dreams.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 623 With regard to the phenomenon of retention, it is to be noticed that the difference between the living mind and a looking-glass in respect of perception and memory consists in two points, namely, firstly, the power of the mind to feel its affections, and, secondly, its ability to retain the impress even after the object is gone. Hence, while the mirror is incapable of knowing and retaining the impression of what it reflects, the living mind performs both these feats. It achieves the former because of its natural property, and the latter, by absorbing some of the material of the different stimuli which reach it from outside. These impressions, however, are not lasting, and are liable to be obliterated in course of time, though the effects of the original perceptions as well as of conceptual thought are preserved in the form of modifications of the soul's constitution, and may be read, as an open book, by those endowed with super-sensuous faculties. All samskaras, i.e., impressions, are material in nature, no exception being made even in the case of those formed from the data of the senses other than vision as well as those formed by the mind alone. The rule is that a very fine kind of matter flows towards the soul with every thought, word and deed, so that there is nothing surprising in the fact that some of this material should be utilized for the formation of memory. Indeed, the surprise would be all the other *But for this, it would be impossible for us to know anything, for the human consciousness cannot know anything from a distance, Thusa material agent is required in each case to reach the finite mind before it can be conscious of an object.

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624 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. way, should it be urged that a memory impress is devoid of materiality altogether. The richness of our recollections in colour and other sensible qualities, testifies to the amount of matter in association with the soul, and proves the material basis of memory, though not in the same manner as a materialistic psychology, bent on denying or ignoring the existence of the soul, would have it. For us memory is a faculty which pertains neither to pure spirit nor to pure matter, but to a soul vitiated by the absorption of matter. For pure spirit is endowed with omniscience, which is inconsistent with limited knowledge like recollection ; and matter is unconscious, hence devoid of memory. It is necessary to emphasize the distinction between omniscience and the productions of the lower mind to which memory appertains, especially as it has been utilized by the ancients in the building up of their mythological Pantheons. The knowing faculty in both cases, it will be seen, is the same, whether it know things directly or through the medium or instrumentality of mind; for knowledge is the very nature of the soul," and consists in the feeling of its own states, that is, the states of its own consciousness. These states of consciousness are also in their nature nothing but modifications of the soulsubstance, since spirit is pure consciousness in essence. Thus, the being who knows is one and the same; in the one case, that is, when free from the defilement of matter, he knows directly all that his own states * See The Science of Thought' by the present writer,

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THE HOLY TRINITY, 625 have to reveal, which is infinite and all-embracing knowledge, and in the other, he is aware of as much as his drugged and stupefied will is capable of evoking from him ; for every impression through the mind must produce an affection of the soul, in other words, must excite a state of consciousness, before knowledge can be said to have dawned.. As regards the nature and form of omniscience, the soul being an individual, i.e., an indivisible unit of consciousness, the idea of knowledge in reference to it is that of a state of consciousness which is neither the whole, nor a separated part of its substantiveness or bulk, but an infinity of interpenetrating and inseparable phases or aspects, each of which is pervaded by the all-pervading consciousness of the self. In different words, every soul is, by nature, an individual Idea which is itself the sunimation of an infinity of different, but inseparable, ideas, or states of consciousness. But, since all these ideas or states of consciousness are not simultaneously present in the consciousness of each and every soul, some of them must necessarily exist in a sub-conscious or dormant condition, whence they emerge above the level whenever conditions are favourable for their manifestation. Thus, knowledge is never acquired from without, but only actualized from within. This is so even when we perceive a new object or are impressed with a new idea for the first time; for the soul can never know anything except through the states of its own consciousness. Hence, unless the soul be endowed with the capacity to assume a state corresponding to the stimulus from without, it will never 43

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626 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. have the consciousness of the outside object. This capacity really means the power to vibrate in sympathy with, that is to say, at the same rhythm* as the incoming stimulus. It will be now evident that an impression in or on consciousness differs from a statue in marble, in so far as it does not signify the chiselling off or removal of any part of its bulk, but resembles it, inasmuch as it is brought into manifestation from within the soul's being itself. Thus, while all impressions may be said to lie dormant in the soul, in the same manner as all kinds of statues remain unmanifested in a slab of * That an impression is in reality a kind of rhythm is clear from the nature of recollection which implies a revived impression, Memory, it has been seen, is not a picture gallery containing ready-made photos or reprints of past events. If any one still doubt the truth of our proposition, let him reflect on the fact that the images that arise in recollection are, in many instancos, bigger than the perceiver thereof. This is especially the case with dreams which, at times, reproduce large cities, oceans, and the like. This shows that recollections do not lie stored up in the form of ready-made images in the body or brain, but are formed and projected outside, there and then. But the only other thing that visual memory can be, if not a collection of roady-made images, is the capacity to produce images, that is to say, the power to mould the material which enters into the composition of memory-images into characteristic shapes and forms. This means neither more nor less than the capacity to vibrate at different intensities or rhythm which by acting on a kind of very fine matter give rise to forms. The same is the casc with respect to the recollection of impressions formed through the media of the senses other than sight. They are not images in their inception, and cannot but exist in memory as so many different kinds of potencies or possibilities of recollection. It is these potencies of recollection which we have designated as different kinds of rhythm for want of a more suitable term.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 627 stone, they cannot be described as being created in the same way. There is no question of carving out anything in the case of an impression on the soul-substance, but only of a' waking up of a dormant state, or a setting free of that which was previously held in bonds. Hence, all kinds of impressions, or states of consciousness lie latent in the soul, and only need the removal* of causes which prevent their coming into manifestation to emerge from the sub-conscious state. For the foregoing reasons, sense-perception implies no more than the resonance of an already existing impress, or idea-rhythm, set free to vibrate in response to the incoming stimulus. It is this responsive resonance of its own rhythm, hence, a state of its own consciousness, which is felt by the soul at the moment of cognition. It should be stated that the soul has no other means of knowing its own states than feeling them; though the word feeling is here used in its widest sense, and includes sensations of touch, taste, smell, sight and hearing The differences of knowledge among beings of different classes and kinds, as well as among individuals belonging to the same class, are due to the operation of the Law of Karma, for the potentiality for infinite knowledge, that is omniscience, being the very nature of the soul, some outside * It will be seen that impressions arise not only from perception, but also from the activity of thought; since, whenever a new idea is formed as the result of perception or inference, a new impression is discovered' to enrich the stock of one's knowledge.

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028 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. influence is needed to prevent its becoming an actuality of experience. The nature of this external influence, that is, the force of karmas, is fully explained in such works as the Gommatasara.* It follows from this that knowledge really arises from within, and education is merely a drawing forth (from e, out, and duco, to lead) from the depths of consciousness. As the bondage of karma is loosened, nem impressions are set free to manifest themselves, widening the field of perception and knowledge by bringing the soul into touch with something to which it had remained irresponsive hitherto ; and, finally, when all the perception- and knowledge-obstructing bonds. of karma are destroyed, omniscience is attained by the potential becoming the actual.+ * The Gommatasara is a Jaina work of great authority on the doctrine of karma, but unfortunately it has not yet been translated into English. Those who cannot liave access to it are recommended to read the author's Practical Path' which deals with the main features of the subject at some length. There can be no getting away from the fact that the soul can never know anything unless it be endowed with the knowing faculty. The senses only give us impressions, photos or images of objects, but not the knower to cognize them; and it would be a miracle if they could create the knower, for they are unconscious themselves. There can be equally clearly no doubt but that the soul primarily only perceives its own conditions or states of consciousnessjin knowing anything else, for very often that which it knows is very different from what is actually perceived, and in many cases what is known is never really perceived with the senses, e.g., ether, which is invisible to the eye. The existence of a capacity to know, then, is a condition precedent to the consciousness of the soul; and it is evident that this capacity to know is not anything foreign to it, or to be acquired from without, but its very nature, for, as we shall see later, the separation of jilana (consciousness) from the jnani (knower)

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 629 The rhythm, that is to say, the energy of functioning, of the soul, is of a very complex type, for it knows is fatal to both. It is also evident that there can be no limit to the knowing capacity of the soul, for neither reason nor imagination is liable to be limited by aught but the impossible; and though the senses of each and every living being do not embrace the whole range of phenomena, still there can be no doubt but that different beings take cognizance of different things, so that what is invisible to one soul does not necessarily remain unperceived by all. Owls, for instance, perceive objects in the dark ; and it is obvious that the minute little insects which are quite invisible to us must be known at least to the members of their own fraternity, for they breed and multiply. The inference is that, while the soul is the knower in its own right, its knowing capacity is obstructed, more or less, in the case of different beings, though consciousness with its special properties-individuality and knowledge-being common to all, there can be no differences of quality or quantity in respect of the potentiality of knowledge among them. This conclusion is fully supported by the facts or phenomena of clairvoyance and telepathy, of the very existence of which men are almost wholly ignorant in this age, but which have been fully proved to be the natural functions of the soul (see the Proceedings of the Psychical Research Society). The nature of the soul being pure intelligence, thought (knowledge) or consciousness, the differences in the degree of its manifestation among the different kinds of beings, as well as among members of the same species, must be due to the influence of some outside force, or agent, whose association or union with the conscious substance (soul) has the effect of depriving it of its pure clarity of knowledge. Unconscious matter is just such an agent, which, as described in "The Practical Path,' enters into union with the soulsubstance and thereby cripples its knowing powers, more or less according to tho type of bondage (the state of fusion of matter and soul). Thus, the differing types of consciousness depend on the operation of the knowledge-obstructing energies of karma, so that, where they are actually in full play, the manifestation of the knowing faculty of the soul may be reduced to the sense of touch, as in the case of one-sensed beings (metals and the like), while in the

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630 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. itself in addition to the object of knowledge at one and the same time, and also because its capacity to know converse case, that is, where they are totally eliminated, the full blaze of omniscience must be the reward of the conquering jiva (ego). All the intermediate degrees of manifestation of consciousness between these two extremes, it can be seen in a general way, also owe their existence to the destruction or quiescence, or partial destruction and partial quiescence, of these energies of knowledgeobstructing karmas; for knowledge being the very nature of the soul may be covered over by the veil of ignorance and uncovered' as often as it may, but it cannot be acquired or developed anew, or engrafted on an originally unconscious stem. If we ponder over this statement, we shall not be long in realizing that no originally unconscious substance can, by a process of centralization, that is, mirroring of the incoming stimulus in a central part, convert it into a sensation and itself into a knowing being. The gulf between the conscious and the unconscious is too wide to be bridged over in this manner, and no intellectual jump or acrobatic feat of imagination can even faintly suggest the method by which or the manner in which such a miracle might be effected. The soul, then, is the knower in consequence of its nature, the purity of which is defiled by the absorption of the unconscious substance-matter. It follows from this that the tearing asunder of the veil of matter, by destroying or checking the energy of karmas, which interfere with the knowing capacity of the soul, is the real means of increase of knowledge. Observation shows that passions and emotions considerably interfere with one's knowing capacity and clarity of intellect; and the effect of bias or prejudice on the faculty of judgment is too well known to need comment. Thus, our personal likes and dislikes, as well as passions and emotions, are the causes which interfere with the dawn of jnana, They cause the inflow of matter into the conscious substance, and the fusion of spirit and matter prevents the soul from exercising its natural function in full measure. Another cause of obstruction is the interest in the physical concerns of life which narrows down the zone of knowledge to what is regarded as the immediately useful for the requirements of the physical body. Attention here acts as a porter at the gate, and admits only the desirable, thus shutting the

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 631 things embraces the whole range of possibility, that which it can never know having no manner of claim to existence. It follows from this that the natural energy of the soul, as pure spirit-a condition in which no interests or motives or other forms of obstruction remain to shorten the range of consciousness--is of the most complex type in which the rhythm of self-awareness holds together, in an interpenetrating manner, all other possible rhythms of knowledge, none of which is denied freedom of functioning and operation. As such, the soul resembles a great melody in which the rhythm of the tune hovers over the rhythms of the notes that enter into its composition, and in which each of the notes, though a separate entity in itself, is nevertheless only an indivisible and inseparable part of the whole. Now, since rhythm is but another word for an idea in connection with the soul, because knowledge consists in the states of one's own consciousness, by putting the above in the simple language of philosophy, we may say that each perfect, or fully-evolved Soul, being pure consciousness freed from the blinding influence of matter, is actually an all-comprehensive Idea which sums up, as it were, and includes all other possible ideas without a single exception. Hence, the fullest door against all ideas other than those presenting themselves in response to the invitation of the desiring manas (lower mind, the seat of desires). We, therefore, conclude that the functioning of consciousness is obstructed by certain kinds of energies, springing into being from personal likes, dislikes, interests, passions, emotions and desires. These energies have been classified under four different heads by the Jaina acharyas, and constitute what are known as ghatiya karmas (see chapter xiii).

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632 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. possible knowledge, unlimited by Time or Space, is always the state of consciousness of a deified soul. In other words, the emancipated soul is simply jnanamayee (embodiment of knowledge), being pure consciousness in essence. We must now attend to the part played by memory in our dreams. As to this, we have already seen in a general way that the psychic apparatus of dreams consists of (1) consciousness, (2) ideas and (3) the energy of mind which operates on the ideas; but we must look a little inore deeply into the mystery of that strange condition of our consciousness to be able to understand its causation properly. The very first question which arises in this connection is, why should one dream at all? In other words, what relation does the dream bear to the normal process of perception? In answering this, we must confine ourselves to the normal ego to be able to get at the mechanism of dreams in the natural state of its working. Analysis shows that a dream differs from waking perception mainly in so far as it is not accompanied by full consciousness, that is to say, the will is more or less reluctant to rouse the intellect at the time, and is easily satisfied with the presentations which memory puts up before it. As Bergson says: "When we are sleeping naturally, it is not necessary to believe, as bas often been supposed, that our senses are closed to external sensations. Our senses continue to be active. They act, it is true, with less precision, but in compensation they embrace a host of subjective' impressions which pass unperceived when we are

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 633 awake - for then we live in a world of perceptions common to all men-and which reappear in sleep, when we live only for ourselves. Thus our faculty of sense perception, far from being narrowed during sleep at all points, is on the contrary extended, at least in certain directions, in its field of operations.... To sleep is to become disinterested. A mother who sleeps by the side of her child will not stir at the sound of thunder, but the sigh of the child will wake her. Does she really sleep in regard to the child ? We do not sleep in regard to what continues to interest us...... The formative power of the materials furnished to the drcam by the different senses, the power which converts into preciso, determined objects the vague and indistinct sensations that the dreamer receives from his eyes, his ears, and the whole surface of the interior of his body, is the memory.... These impressions are the materials of our dreams, but they are only the materials, they do not suffice to produce them...because they are vague and indeterminate .... The birth of a dream is...no mystery. It resembles the birth of all our perceptions. The mechanism of the dream is the samo, in general, as that of normal perception. When wo perceive a real object, what we actually see the sensible matter of perception-is very little in comparison with what our memory adds to it. When you read a book, when you look through your newspaper, do you suppose that all the printed letters really come into your consciousness? In that case, the whole day would hardly be long enough for you to read a paper. The truth is that you see in each word and even in cach member of a phrase only somo letters or even some characteristic marks, just enough to permit you to divino the rest...... Thus in the waking state and in the knowledge that we get of the real objects which surround us, an operation is continually going on which is of quite the same nature as that of the dream. We perceive merely a sketch of the whole object. This sketch appeals to the complete memory, and this complete memory, which by itself was cither unconscious or simply in the thought state, profits by the occasion to come out. It is this kind of hallucination, inserted and fitted into a real frame, that we perceive. It is a shorter process: it is very much quicker done than to see the thing itself. Besides, there are many interesting observations to be made upon the conduct and attitude of the memory images during this operation.

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634 It is not necessary to suppose that they are in our memory in a state of inert impressions. They are like the steam in a boiler, under more or less tension....I believe indeed that all our past life is there, preserved even to the infinitesimal details, and that we forget nothing, and that all that we have felt, perceived, thought, willed, from the first awakening of our consciousness, survives indestructibly. But the memories which are preserved in these obscure depths are there in the state of invisible phantoms. They aspire, perhaps, to the light, but they do not even try to rise to it; they know that it is impossible, and that I, as a living and active being, have something else to do than to occupy myself with them. But suppose that at a given moment, I become disinterested.........in other words, that I am asleep. Then these memories perceiving that I have taken away the obstacle, have raised the trap-door which has kept them beneath the floor of consciousness, arise from the depth." THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It should be noted that the psychic force, the will, is not in an active state during sleep, and that the consciousness of the sleeper is then rid of the mental tumult arising from the din and bustle as well as the worries and anxieties which absorb attention during the waking hours of life, so that many of the movements which pass unnoticed during the day impinge on his mind with great force. Similarly, sensations originating in parts and changes of the body of which one is unconscious during the waking state, burst on the drowsy consciousness with great force. It is for this reason that a slight sensation of heat is felt as walking on fire, and so forth. If the stimulus continue, attention is finally roused from the lethargy of somnolence into activity to remove the cause or causes of irritation; otherwise the dream comes to an end, and the sleeper lapses once more into the deep-sleep state without actually waking up.

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THE HOLY TRINITY, 635 As regards the contents of dreams, the stimulus which sets the dream-machinery in motion either comes from (1) the outside world, or (2) consists of bodily sensations, ie, of excitations originating in some bodily organ. It is then blended together with the prevailing, subjective states, which mean such of the thoughts as, centred round paramount wishes, have strongly agitated the individual and lent their colouring to the aggregate of feelings in the will. During sleep these psychic states consist in potential, that is to say, nascent movements, and only need suitable impulsion to be developed into perceptions. The arrival of the stimulus just furnishes the impulsion that was needed, and the sensation is woven into the framework of consciousness, just as an ordinary excitation in the waking hours. This results in dream-perception with which we are all familiar. So far as the type of a dream is concerned, it would appear to be determined by the nature of the prevailing feeling at the moment of dreaming; for instance, if we remove a corner of the sheet covering him and allow cool air to play on a part of his body, the sleeper, if he does dream at all, would dream of scenes in the Alps, with falling snow, intense cold, and the like-all details tending to emphasize the fact that a feeling of cold is present in consciousness. Similarly, if the heart happens to be weighted down by the hand or by anything falling on it, the sensation excited by pressure gives rise to a feeling of fear, and leads the creative imagination to picture scenes in which accent is laid on that feeling. Thus, it is the feeling which

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636 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. determines the type of our dreams, and the differences of scenery, in dreams of the same type, are probably due to the differences in the quality, or intensity, of the feeling itself, e.g., when the pressure on the heart is slight, there will be but slight fear, and the resulting dream will also be only slightly frightful in its aspect. Dreaming, it will be observed, takes place at a time. which is marked by the withdrawal of attention from the physical world. In deep sleep, the ego withdraws itself away from the plane of action and sensation, although it still remains within call. Hence, when an antagonistic sensation opposes the state of tranquillity and repose, will reacts on it and rouses the individual consciousness into activity. This it accomplishes by forcing the excitation down on to the plane of understanding, which gathers it up in the moulds of its thought-forms, thus enabling the soul to perceive its feelings in a pictorial way. Now, the function of intelligence in the body is to preside over its actions so as to preserve it from harm; but, generally, experience renders its vigilance unnecessary whenever and wherever the surroundings are familiar. When its vigilance is not needed for adjusting the relations of the body with other bodies in the universe, it turns away its attention from the outside world, and, like the captain of a ship, leaves the bridge when the danger is over. This happens more completely in deepsleep when the management of affairs is left in the hands of the involuntary system, with will watching over noddingly. The mechanism of life is sufficient under

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 637 such circumstances to carry on the routine work of the organism. The automatism of will itself then acts as a sentinel, and mounts guard over the system, so that when any discordant element tries to penetrate into the organism, or when danger is imminent, it offers resistance, and thereby creates sufficient disturbance to attract the attention of intelligence, which again mounts the bridge to take the direction of events into its own hands. The above is a somewhat metaphorical description of what actually takes place at the time. In reality, the will itself becomes transformed into reason on being disturbed, like a person roused into activity from the torpor of sleep. There is no question even of the withdrawing of attention from the outside world on the part of the ego in dreaming, for dreams occur when the torpor of deep-sleep caused by the benumbing influence of matter on the soul is somewhat lessened. Deprived of its natural 'vigour,' the ego is also then deprived of deliberate choice and voluntary action. So far as the blending of the inner psychic states with the physical stimulus is concerned, Freud points out that "the dream activity is under a compulsion to elaborate all the dream stimuli which are simultaneously present into a unified whole. ............... When two or more experiences capable of making an impression have been left over from the previous day, the wishes which result from them are united into one dream; similarly, an impression possessing psychic value and the indifferent experiences of the previous day are united in the dream material, provided there are available connecting ideas between the two. Thus the dream appears to be a reaction to every thing which is simultaneously present as actual in the sleeping mind............... The stimuli which appear during sleep are worked over into the fulfilment of a wish,

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638 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the other component parts of which are the remnants of daily experience with which we are familiar," As regards the distortion in dreams of the idea associated with a wish, the explanation given is : " Wherever a wish fulfiment is unrecognisable and concealed, there must be present a feeling of repulsion towards this wish, and in consequence of this repulsion the wish is unable to gain expression except in a disguised state............... We should then assume in each human being, as the primary cause of dream formation, two psychic forces (streams, systems), of which one constitutes the wish expressed by the dream, while the other acts as a censor upon this dream wish, and by means of censoring forces a distortion of its expression." In the light of our knowledge of the mental equipment and of the processes of perception and memory, the censorship in dreaming results from the distorted mental impressions formed in the mind in connection with wishes which are revolting to one's conscience or taste, such distortion occurring not at the time of dreaming, but some time previously, that is, when they are discovered to be reprehensible. These distorted impressions linger in the deeper strata of the mind, called the sub-conscious, and, in combination with some sensation which cannot be ignored, rush up in time to occupy the central position in the scene whose type is determined by the incoming stimulus. As Mr. Maurice Nicoll of Dr. Jung's school of thought, which does not accept the Freudian hypothesis in its entirety, observes in his 'Dream Psychology' (p. 176), the more this repressed material is charged with emotion, the more will it seek expression. The drowsy, somnolent will which is really the author of the being of these repressed wishes is neither able

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639 to hold them down, nor quite unwilling that they should have their way once in this quiet manner. Intellect, no doubt, objects to their appearance, but, then, the intellect is still unawakened, and the will, on whose reflection its waking up depends, is both passive and by no means anxious to rouse it into activity. Intellect is fully aroused only when the will is unable to meet the situation, and turns on itself in its difficulty. It is in this sense that we like to understand Freud when he says:-- THE HOLY TRINITY. "The dream is the guardian of sleep, not the disturber of it.... Either the mind does not concern itself at all with the causes of sensations, if it is able to do this in spite of their intensity or their significance, which is well understood by it; or it employs the dream to deny these stimuli, or, thirdly, if it is forced to recognise the stimulus, it secks to find that interpretation of the stimulus which shall represent the actual sensation as a component part of a situation which is desired and which is compatible with sleep. The actual sensation is woven into the dream in order to deprize it of its reality.... The correct interpretation, of which the sleeping mind is quite capable, would imply an active interest and would require that sleep be terminated; hence, of those interpretations which are possible at all, only those are admitted which are agreeable to the absolute censorship of the somatic wish...It is, as it were, confronted by the task of seeking what wish may be represented and fulfilled by means of the situation which is now actual." The two chief characteristics of dreams, namely (1) incoherence and (2) the abolition of the sense of duration, have an important bearing on the point. They both arise primarily from the same cause, the loss of interest in the world of action. This brings about the mastery of time and space which cannot be conquered so long as the physical body is interposed between them and mind to make it impossible for fancy to jump over the contiguous in duration and distance. Where

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640 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. attention is not linked to action that is actual, there the mind is left free to plunge into the past or even to make an excursion into the future, regardless of the presence of the contiguous. When this happens, the form and flow of ideas are determined by the similar, except where the very exigencies of thought determine otherwise. These are the laws of reverie ; in dreaming, too, disinterestedness is almost complete, and the will is loth so to speak, to exert itself in any way. Hence, an idea has only to rise above the threshold of consciousness to be woven into a dream-content. As Bergson says, in perception we choose, with extreme precision and delicacy, among our memories, rejecting all that do not suit the present state. But in dreaming the selection of memories is made without any real interest, or, to be more precise, is left to be made, to a great extent, to the mechanism of memory itself, the interests of the ego disposed to sleep being opposed to fine work of precision and judgment. Bergson further tells us :" The incoherence of the dream seems to me easy enough to explain. As it is characteristic of the dream not to demand a complete adjustment between the memory image and sensation, but, on the contrary, to allow some play between them, very different memories can suit the same sensation. For example, there may be in the field of vision a green spot with white points. This might be a lawn spangled with white flowers, it might be a billiard-table with its balls, It might be a host of other things besides. These different memory images, all capable of utilising the same sensation, chase after it, Sometimes they attain it, one after the other. And so the lawn becomes a billard-table, and we watch these extraordinary transformations. Often it is at the same time, and altogether that these memory images join the sensation, and then the lawn will be a

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 641 billiard-table. From this comes those absurd dreams where an object remains as it is and at the same time becomes something else. As I have just said, the mind, confronted by these absurd visions, seeks an explanation and often thereby aggravates the incoherence," As regards the abolition of the sense of time, Prof. Bergson points out: "When we are awake we live a life in common with onr fellows Our attention to this external and social life is the great regulator of the succession of our internal states. It is like the balance wheel of a watch, which moderates and cuts into regular sections the undivided, almost instantaneous tension of the spring. It is this balance wheel which is lacking in the dream." To sum up the conclusions arrived at by us concerning the psychic apparatus of dreams, we may say that the same mental faculties are concerned in dreaming as in perception, provided we do not forget that of the three constituents of mind, intellect is drowsy* and fatigued, will is like the child who fain would play but is afraid to disturb those sleeping in its vicinity, and attention assumes the form of a night light, burning low and dim and casting mysterious shadows all round. We should not further forget that this three-fold division is not intended to represent three separate and altogether independent entities or organs ; the thing working throughout the mental operations is only one--- the power, force or faculty of intelligence though it is known by different names in different conditions and aspects. Whenever, therefore, we find ourselves in difficulties over the delimitation of boundaries between * In deep-sleep intellect is merged in will which becomes quiescent and passive, and attention is switched off, so to speak. It is this fact of the suspension of intellect in deep-sleep which the ancient Jewish writers symbolized by Cain's building his house in. the Land of Nod, as already explained in an earlier chapter,

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642 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the different aspects of mind, it will be worth while to enquire whether we are not actually endeavouring to effect, in thought, a partition, with metes and bounds, between things which are not intended by nature to be so divided off from one another, We may now apply ourselves to the elucidation of the myth which has furnished us the title of our present chapter. That the Biblical Trinity does not represent actual beings, but is a secret doctrine imparted in concealed metaphor, like the legend of the 'fall,' is clear from the very constitution of the Trinitarian Board, which comprises (1) a father, (2) a son, and (3) a ghost ; for there can be no partnership between living beings and a phantom, even though it be a holy one. But this is not the only objection to the acceptance of the idea in the literal sense; for each member of this puzzling body is further supposed to be diffused in the other two, and all the three to be compressed, or compressible, into one. But no amount of eloquence or ingenuity can ever hope to succeed in making the rational intellect grasp the manner in which, or the method by which, three individualities may exist separate and distinct and yet be reducible to one. Nor are we able to picture to ourselves the kind of relationship which is inplied by the terms father and son when both are posited as co-eval in point of time. The more one reflects on these elements of confusion, the more does one become convinced of the fact that the description is not intended, and was never intended, to convey to the human mind the knowledge of a family of gods or men, who outrival all the freaks of

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 643 prolific nature and of the equally prolific imagination of man. On the contrary, the terms employed to define and the attributes of what is defined distinctly point to a mental conception of a being, faculty or thing capable of being looked at from three different standpoints, though not of being partitioned off into as many separate compartments. There can be no doubt but that the primary conception of the Holy Trinity is that of three different aspects of Life, which is by nature endowed with potential Divinity. This potential Divinity being the ideal as well as the source, or substantive cause, of the subsequent actual Godhood of the soul, is the first member the Father-of the Holy Trinity. The Son naturally represents the Soul that has conquered Death and obtained that world and the resurrection from the dead' (Luke, xx. 36; Romans, viii. 14); for he then becomes an 'heir of God,' to use the significant language of St. Paul (Romans, viii. 17). Now, because the potential Divinity of the Soul is only realised by those who attain nirvana, in other words, since Godhood is brought into manifestation only by the Soul who becomes an 'heir of God, the Son alone is the revealer of the Father. Accordingly, the Bible tells us : * "No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." - John, 1. 18. Now, because the actual is the successor to the potential in point of time, Divinity in manifestation stands to the Divine in potency in the relation of a successor or son, whence the Pauline metaphor -an heir of God. Yet, in so far as the manifested

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644 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and the unmanifest represent merely the two different phases of what in substance is the same thing, that is to say, since the Son only comes out of the 'bosom' of the Father, like a statue from: oui of rough stone, the Son cannot be said to have been non-existent at any moment in the life of the Father. The third member of the Holy Trinity is the Spirit of Holiness in a literal sense. As has already been seen, in an earlier chapter, renunciation, that is to say, rigid self-control and self-denial, are necessary to make us whole in which consist our salvation and holiness. The soul imbued with the spirit of vairagya (renunciation), or wbat is the same thing in different words, the fully developed will, is then the third member of the Divine Trinity. When the individual will is developed to perfection in renunciation and self-denial, then is final emancipation obtained, enabling the Soul to enter nirvana as pure radiant Effulgence, perfect and whole and unencumbered with any kind of material bodies. Being whole and perfect in renunciation, it is holy, and as a pure bodiless Spirit, it is a ghost, whence the third member of the Holy Trinity-the Holy Ghost. Such is the primary conception of the Biblical Trinity, which is not only beautiful as an ingenious mythological metaphor, but is also strictly in accordance with truth. The reason why the real import of the doctrine has been lost sight of by the world at large is probably to be found in the engrafting of an impure concept of inferior value obtained through Greek sources on the original stem. This latter conception is that of the Word which is peculiar to the fourth Gospel.

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645 The Platonist philosophers who started on their philosophic rambles with the assumption of a first beginning of things, in obedience to the command of a god, conceived the creative thoughts of the Supreme Being as logoi, which, when conceived as a single psychosis, or thought, became the Logos; and early Christians, like St. John, recognizing the inseparable nature of language and thought, conceived the Greek Logos as the Word (Max Muller in 'The Vedanta Philosophy,' pages 141 and 142). The idea of the Word is that God created the world by the Logos, that is, by a word, or by many words, the logoi, i.e., the ideas of Plato. In India Speech (uttered thought, hence word) was recognized, long before the conception of the Word by St. John, as the first manifestation of the Creator. In the Maitrayana Upanishad (VI. 22), quoted by Max Muller in 'The Vedanta Philosophy,' at page 154, two Brahmans are pointed out as the object of meditation, one of whom is called the 'Word' and the other the 'Non-word.' The Upanishad further lays down that the Word alone can reveal the Non-Word. THE HOLY TRINITY. When the term son came to be applied to the person. alized aspect of the creative logoi, the Word also began to be recognised as a member of the Holy Trinity. We have it on the authority of Prof. Max Muller : * "There is, according to the Alexandrian philosopher, the Divine Essence which is revealed by the Word, and the Word which alone reveals it. In its unrevealed state it is unknown, and was by some Christian philosophers called the Father; in its revealed state it was the Divine Logos or the Son."-The Vedanta Philosophy, p. 154. Thus, the unrevealed state of the Divine Essence is called the Father, the revealed one, the Son, be

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646 THE KEY OF ENOWLEDGE. cause it is the very first manifestation. Now, since the manifested aspect of the Divine Essence is here regarded as Divine Thought, on a lower plane, the Son is identical with the Logos of the Greek philosophers. And, because an idea is a presentation in consciousness, it is to be regarded as the resultant of the activity of will, which represents our conception of energy with reference to mind or imagination, as already seen. Hence, when imagination is analyzed into its three components, and separate places are assigned to Consciousness and the Idea, but none to idea-tion or Will, we have the two Brahmans, the Revealed and the Unrevealed. If, however, Consciousness and Ideation alone are kept in view, Brahman and Vach are the names by which they are respectively known. Vach is generally described as the daughter of the Creator, who is, however, regarded as neither masculine nor feminine, on the ground of being the Absolute. . If we can now imagine the world to be of the nature of a dream, we can easily see how Brahma or Ishvara, can be said to be its creator. For being conceived as the illumination, after the manner of a dream, of an all-comprehending Idea, it cannot but be described as the creation of Brahma, the personification of the collective aspect of knowledge or thought. It is in this sense that St. John writes : "All things were made by him [the Word] and without him was not anything made, that was made" (John, 1-3). Further identity of thought between the two systems, the Indian and the Greek, will appear most strikingly from the following table in which we shall compare their conclusions, side by side, with the metaphysical John. 1-3).

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 647 conceptions of St. John and the psychological constituents of Imagination : Vedanta. Greek philosophy. St. John. Psychology. 1 God 1 God 1 Brahman) 2 Ishvara or Brahma, or Vach Godhead. 2 The Logos. Godhead. 2 Godhead. Imagina tion. The Word. 1 Consciousness, including will, i and 2 Ideas, or, col lectively, knowledge. . St. John's Word is, thus, the same thing as the Ishvara of Vedanta, the Logos of Greek Philosophers, and the 'Idea' of Psychology. The Hindu Scriptures declare that Prajapati, the Creator, was all this (the mass of illusion, that is, ideas), and St. John says that the Word was with God and was God. As to the coexistence of Brahman and Vach, the Hindu Scriptures teach the same thing as is expressed in the book of Proverbs (VIII. 22-30), from which we need only quote the following: "When he prepared the heavens, I was there; when he set a compass upon the face of the depth; "Then I was by him, as one brought up with him, and I was his daily delight, rejoicing always before him." The Hindu Scriptures teach :"Prajapati, the creator, was all this. He had speech (Vach) as his own, as a second, or, in the language of the Bible, as one brought up with him."--(The Vedanta Philosophy, p. 147). . Thus, according to Hinduism and Christianity both the Father and the Son are co-eval, and cannot be said to come into being at different points of time. The same is the result of the metaphysical or psychological analysis, when pushed to the final limit; for

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648 . THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. consciousness can never be conceived as devoid of ideas altogether. We shall now take up our stand at a point intermediate between the schools of the Advaita Vedanta and the dualistic Sankhya to be able to further pursue the line of thought which has given us these highly interesting and instructive doctrines and myths. This method is liable to lead us into error to some extent, in the first instance; but we shall have ample opportunity of correcting the same in this and the following chapters. To appreciate the beauty of thought underlying religious doctrines, it is always necessary to put ourselves in the position of the writers themselves, and to follow them in their ideas, on their own lines. Starting from an assumed beginning of the worldprocess, and with the Absolute as the sole existence, we may say that the matter of which the universe is made is the objectification of Maya, the power of thought, or illusion. This gives us the first duality of Spirit and matter, from which the followers of the Sankhyan philosophy start on their investigation. The compiler of the first Book of Moses also proceeds from this point, and says:--- "And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters."-(Genesis, I. 2). At this stage there was no interaction between Spirit and matter, and consequently the earth was void and without form, and the universe of names and forms was non-existent. But to reach the next stage the Biblical narrator at once calls in aid the deux ex machina of the

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 649 will of his god, and the founder of the Sankhyan school, the reflection of Spirit on matter. The former, however, does not explain the reason why a god who had, throughout all the unimaginable period of eternity, remained content with merely moving on the face of the deep, should all of a sudden change his mind and set himself up as a creator ; but the latter proceeds on the basis of alterpate creation and destruction of the universe. Both of them ignore the nature of the force which held Spirit and inatter together, in close proximity to one another, to render their interaction possible. The Biblical record has also nothing to say about the process of this interaction and is silent as to how the will of God caused the creation of the world. According to a certain school of Hindu metaphysics, Brahman's awareness of itself is the cause of the worldprocess. To understand the exact significance of the idea underlying this statement, we must take imagination separately from the ideas. As such, it is conceived as pure consciousness, aware of itself. Hence, assuming a starting point for the world-process, Brahman has to be pictured in the beginning as a being aware of his existence, or as thinking or saying 'I am' to himself. This impression, or thought, implies at once the ideas of unity and being (existence), and, by the force of deduction, which is inseparable from understanding, further involves the denial of not-one, that is, 'manyness,' as opposed to unity, and of not-being (non-existence) as opposed to being (existence). Thus, the sense of 'I am' is "I am one, not many,' and 'I am not non-existent.' But in this ideation of I-am-ness is involved the whole mis 46

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650 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. chief; for no sooner does the idea come than the understanding becomes conscious of the many non-existent, and thus the multifarious not-Self is conceived in its womb, as an idea, or illusion, albeit only to be contradicted. The thought now becomes 'I am, not this,' which is equivalent to the Sanskrit 'aham etat na' (I this not). The idea has also been expressed by a single word, satya (truth), which is composed of three syllables, sa, ti and ya, sa implying the unperishing Self, ti, the perishing, and ya, the nexus or connection between the sa and the ti. The 'this' of 'I this not' refers to the totality of the illusory existences, that is, the entire universe of illusion. This is the how of the one becoming or, to be more precise, appearing as many. This also explains the position of the illusion which, in the language of Bribad Aranyaka Upanishad (Chap. V. 5. 1.), is in the middle of Satya,' i.e., between the sa and the ya,-a layer of falsehood encompassed on either side by truth, in other words, the shadowy product of consciousness and thought-power. If we can further assume an alternation of creation, or manifestation, and destruction, we shall find it easier to follow the working out of the idea. The moment Conscio usness awoke from the sleep of quiescence and the though t of Being arose in it, the balanced state of rhythm into which energy had subsided and merged, during the pralaya, broke out into vibrations, and life began to manifest itself all round. Simultaneously with the birth' of the living energy, came the thought of 'I' which can be understood only after a

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 651 negation of its antithesis, the 'not-I.' Now, because you cannot deny a thing without, in some way, giving it a local habitation and a name, however suppositional, or imaginary, the act of doing so might be, imagination had to create the not-I, to enable the understanding to grasp the significance of 'T.' In this manner was the diversity of illusory forms created in the totality of the not-self. When consciousness becomes merged or lost, so to speak, in the rhythm of Self-awareness, it loses the consciousness of the "not-I," and a state resembling the trance of ecstasy, or sleep, ensues in which the Self knows nothing, that is to say, that in that condition it positively knows what is meant by Nothing, i.e., the Not-Self as a whole, without the distinction of name and form ; for the potency and necessity of the Being of the Self maintains constantly, in one unbroken act, or fact, of Consciousness, this Nothing, a pure Not-Self, before that Self (The Science of Peace, p. 110). This state is not to be compared with the sleep with which we are familiar. It is a wonderful 'sleep'; it is not the sleep of darkness, dulness, or ignorance, but one of Light. It is the sleep of Consciousness itself, and, because Consciousness and its nature are inseparable, therefore, it is a sleep with awareness in it. This constant making and destroying of the worlds is called the lila, i.e., sport of Brahman; however, he does not indulge in it for the sake of play, but because it is his nature to do so. When it is said that he creates the world by the thought, I am one, let me become many, what is really meant is not that he feels lonely, or has any longing for company, but only that

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652 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. creation is a matter of necessity which arises out of the thought of his own one-ness in his mind. Hence, what is a necessity or law from the standpoint of the created, is from that of Reality mere play. Hence, also, when it is said 'desire first arose in It which was the primeval germ of Mind,' the word desire is not employed in the same sense in which it is ordinarily employed by men, but to express the idea of pleasure or will (the Sanskrit ichchha) of Brahman. As every being experiences pleasure when engaged in the full exercise of his natural function, the pleasure of Brahman, who is pure Consciousness, consists in an unbroken thought of Self-awareness. Now, since by the necessity of accurate knowledge, it becomes necessary to define the terms of our thought, and since perfect knowledge of a thing is possible only when it has been contrasted with all those that it is not, therefore, every idea includes its own negation, in itself. Thus, the definition of unity involves its own opposite within itself, although the purpose to be served by this other than itself' is merely that of accentuating its sense by a repudiation of its imaginary antithesis (see the Pranava Vada, Vol. II. pp. 240 and 241). With the awakening of the consciousness of 'I am' or Self, the Understanding, spider-like, spins out its world-web; producing the material and all from within itself. The necessity of this, as has already been seen, lies in the process of Self-defining, culminating in the judgment 'I This not.' With the creation of the 'This,' the antithesis of 'I,' Will rushes, as it were, towards the imaginary multitudinous This,' and the Under

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 653 standing, fixing itself upon the two, pronounces the dictum, 'I (am) This not.' Thus, there are three steps in the process of world-making, namely, (1) the relaxation of tension, (2) the breaking up of the This' into countless fragments, i.e., bodies and objects, and (3) the simultaneous affirmation and denial of the 'This,' that is, of the innumerable diversified forms of matter. We may call these steps the three waves* of the activity of Life. * The three life-waves, as described above, do slightly differ from the three life-waves of the Theosophists, but the difference is hardly of any importance. The third wave is said to descend no lower than the upper mental plane ; but it seems to us that that statement acquires significance only when applied to its patent and not to its latent aspect. For, if the fountain-head from which these currents proceed is an all-pervading being or thing, they must be present everywhere in nature. If we substitute the terms Will, Wisdom and Activity in place of the three Logos, we must concede that all the three, being different aspects of the one reality, interpenetrate one another, and that in each aspect the remaining two are also present, although in a latent or sub-latent form. Besides, if man can develop the spiritual element in him so as to bring about the marriage' of his soul with pure Spirit on the higher mental plane, he must have the element of Spirit in him already, since proper union cannot take place between dissimilar things. Thus, what is meant by the third life-wave not descending lower than the arupa' level of the mental plane is that pure Spirit, as such, does not descend to regions below the plane indicated, although in its latent or sub-latent condition it is all-pervading. When the individual soul is spiritualized, and its consciousness awakened on the spiritual plane, it is like a bride adorned and ready for her union with the Self. This is, at least, how we understand the significance of the third life-wave described in Theosophical literature. As regards the merit of the doctrine, the reader is already familiar with the truth concerning the principle of pervasion,

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654 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Of these life-waves, the second is concerned with the breaking up of the compactness of the This'into minute fragments, from whose groupings arise countless combinations and forms ; but the third has a twofold function. Firstly, it is a pouring of Will into the countless combinations and atoms of matter, in the act of cognition and affirmation of their supposed existence in imagination, and, secondly, it is a moving away, or withdrawal, from them in the process of their denial. Both these motions of Will, namely, that towards matter and that towards the Self in which it turns its back, as it were, on matter, are constant and eternal, and are to be understood as being simultaneous, not as successive events intime. This constant interaction between the Will and the 'This,' involved in the simultaneous affirmance and denial of the latter, is the cause of evolution. * The suggestion here seems to be that the universe is like a cinematographical show. The idea is that if we were to look into the nature of our perceptions, we should become aware of the fact that the world is presented to us in a succession of presentations, or moments, each of which constitues a complete picture, but that the succession of these pictures is so rapid that the mind, unless trained to minute observation, fails to recognize the fact of succession, and, misled by the fusion of common elements, or features of resemblance, in the successive pictures, looks upon the panorama as if it possessed a fixed continuity in time and space. What seems to be moving, progressing, evolving and disintegrating, in the succession of moments, is that in respect of which the succeeding pictures differ from one another. Hence arises the delusion of reality and stability of the universe of forms. From the point of view of the perceiving faculty, the act of Self-defining consists in the incessant process of moving the inexhaustible series of the films of the mental cinematograph, accompanied, in one and the same breath, as it were, by the questionanswer, Am I this?-No,' i.e., the mental determination, 'I This not.' This eternal impossibility of satisfactorily getting the Infinite into the frames of finite things, that is, the Actual into the ill-fitting, readymade moulds of our intellect, in other words, of defining the Real in terms of the unreal, is the cause of the world-process or Evolution.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 655 To continue with the explanation of the worldprocess, in the state of pralaya, when Life may be said to be pulsating unconsciously, thought becomes merged in Intellect, which, in its turn, disappears within the eternal Consciousness. This is the condition in which there is a 'consciousness of 'am' or 'being' only without any idea or notion of 'I'; in other words, when the Absolute consciousness is only aware of existence as the antithesis of nothing, that is, of the totality of the Not-Self without the names and forms. The Bible thus describes this state of pre-creation'existence : "And the earth was without form, and void : and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters." The Upanishad, also, teaches :"Water was at first this."--(Brihad Aranyaka Upanishad, V. 5. 1). When the pendulum of rhythm swings back again, in due course of time, the dawn of a new world-morning Such is the case for the cinematographical view of the world. We cannot, however, suppose that these mental pictures in all respects resemble the films of the cinematograph. The most important difference between the living beings in the universe and the moving images on the cinematographical screen lies in respect of selfconsciousness. In the cinematograph the spectators form no part of the spectacle ; but in the world the spectacle is only constituted by the spectators. Moreover, in taking the cinematographical view of the universe, we necessarily lose sight of the material necessary for making the films, and of the principle of change, that is, Time. Thus, making due allowance for the action of force, we must hold that leach present picture itself becomes changed into the one which will be perceived the very next moment. Hence, even if we ignore the element of the human will as a condition of events. within certain limits, the factor of time is there to show that the cinematographical view of the universe, however fascinating it may appear on account of its boldness, or brevity, is devoid of philosophical merit.

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656 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. takes place; the consciousness of am' becomes changed into that of 'I am,' and the Understanding, waking up from its sleep-like condition of repose, interprets the significance of 'I am' by a creation and denial of the manifold Not-Self. This condition has been described by the ancient sages as 'One great flame with countless undetached sparks in it.' The Mundaka Upanishad declares*:- "As from a blazing fire sparks, being like unto fire, fly forth a thousand fold, thus are various beings brought forth from the imperishable, my friend, and return thither also." And Job writes : "Yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upwards." -- (Job, V. 7). In the following table + we give some further details of the making of the world : CONSCIOUSNESS { UNDERSTANDING. (Self). * This,' i.e., the totality of the manifold illusory, henco, material, Not-Self. Not,' i.e., denial after giving a local habitation and a name, hence, creationdestruction, i.e., energy. Personality or Ahamkara. Discriminatio Wisdom, i.e., knowledge Discrimination, i.e., experimental knowledge of the Phenomenal (The Tree of Life). (The Tree of Knowledge of good and evil). of Self or Litledge Impressionability (mind staff or Chitta). Manas. Senses. * Tho Mundaka Upanishad, 11.1.1. | for a fuller account, sce 'The Science of Peace,' by Bhagwan Das, M.A. Aham, or '1,' and atom are said to be interdependent. "In the

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 657 An infinity of jivas (souls or living beings) are formed in the manner indicated. But, so far as the Reality is concerned, they are not separate, or separable, from one another, but being enlivened, as they are, by the power of Consciousness, by which they are pervaded through and through, they possess the power of seeing' in two directions, namely, inwards and outwards. If they look outwards, they must regard each other as separate existences; but if inwards, they cannot fail to realize the unity of all in the unity of the Absolute. Accordingly, the Upanishad has it :"The self-born pierced the senses outwards, hence the jiva seeth the outward, not the Inner Self. One thinker, here and there, turneth his gaze inwards, desirous of immortality and beholdeth the Pratyag-atma, the abstract Self."--(Ratlu, IV. 1). According to the Bible, Adam, the son of God, was advised to look inwards to realize the real unity of the name jivitma, the element of etat, i.e., the 'anu,'or'atom' is the jiva, and the element of aham is the atma. It is true that when the two are separated, the former is called anu, atom, and the latter jiva; but this is a matter of usage....Size is nothing. The original hole in space,' or bubble in the aether of space, in our or anyuniverse, made by the breath of the Ishvara of the universe, is an aham ; definite numbers of these, definitely arranged, form the atom' of each plane, and this again is an aham; these atoms,' in turn, form molecules, and the molecules tissue, and tissues bodies, and each successive aggregation is similar in principle though not in bulk, so that there is no essential difference in meaning, whether the word "atom' or the word 'body' is used in this connexion From the standpoint of the etat, bulk and interrelation and number are important differences; from the standpoint of the uham, it is all one, himself and this'" (The Prunava Vada, Vol. 11, pages 260 and 261). 47

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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. 658 Self. This was the path of Wisdom and Life, but he preferred that of sensuality, that is, of looking outwards. Now, because looking outwards signifies a longing to differentiate and distinguish between the qualities of the phenomenal, and depends on sensations which require the organs of sensation and action to form the media of intercourse between the ego and the objects without, therefore, the wish, being a directive force, unfolded the longed for organs, and extended them out to the 'coat of skin. Such is the explanation to be gathered from the ancient records, in the light of the systems of Sankhya and the Advaita Vedanta, which differ mainly about the nature of the ultimate being or reality, one maintaining the duality of the seer and the seen, but the other, the existence of only one reality, the Absolute. The Advaita view has already been subjected to criticism in an earlier chapter and found to be untenable as a philosophical doctrine. We shall, therefore, now proceed to examine the other system which occupies a place of honour in Hindu metaphysics. The insufficiency of the Sankhyan thought has been commented upon by more writers than one, and even Hindu commentators have not always been able to suppress their sense of disappointment, or to withhold blame. The following free comment from a friendly Hindu source on the doctrines of the six schools of Hindu metaphysics, including Kapila's, may be read with interest in this connection: "He Vijnana Bhiksu, a commentator on Sankhya) was fully aware of the fact that none of the six Darkanas, for example, was, as we

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 659 have hinted more than once, a complete system of philosophy in the Western sense, but merely a catechism explaining, and giving a reasoned account of, some of the truths revealed in the Vedas and Upanisats, to a particular class of students, confining the scope of its enquiry within the province of creation, without attempting to solve to them the transcendental riddles of the Universe, which, in their particular stage of mental and spiritual development, it would have been impossible for them to grasp."--The Sacred Books of the Hindus, Vol. ix, preface, p. xii. The excuse found by Mr. Nandlal Sinha for the shortcomings of the founders of the six world-famous darsanas, including the Sankhya, in the passage cited, is rather lame and inadmissible, especially in the absence of anything showing perfection of knowledge in the persons concerned; but as it would be conducive to a better understanding of the causes of its failure to pursue the line of thought on which the doctrine under consideration is founded, we must endeavour to catch its author's mind actually at work in devising his system. It would be seen that Kapila is not a believer in miracles, and does not recognize a creator who might create the world by a word of command. He discards monism for this reason. His system is a kind of dualism, consisting of a spectacle and its spectator, an unconscious show perceived by a conscious being or beings. To the spectacle belongs all that is changing, variable and shifting,--all that evolves and all that 'involves.' To the spectator is to be attributed nothing that is shifting and moving. He is a witness, and only a witness, though liable to be overpowered by ignorance. Even the intellect which disappears in deep-sleep can

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660 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. not be said to appertain to the spectator for this reason. Starting from this duality of the seer and the seen, Kapila conceives the world to be characterised by an alternation of manifestation and destruction, on the analogy of the alternation of waking and sleeping consciousness. In the condition of dissolution, the spectacle is reduced to a balanced state of the three attributes, sattva, rajas and tamas (see p. 21 ante). Then there sets in a counter movement; with the disturbance of the equilibrium, the process of manifestation begins, resulting in successive transformations of the evolvent or prakriti (the balanced condition of the attributes), which accounts for the evolution of the spectacle as well as for the organs of sensation. But the most important part of this scheme of evolution, as it might be called, is the order of unfoldment of the twenty-five tattvas (essentials or elements) which constitute the bulwark of the Sankhyan philosophy, and which may be arranged in the following way in a tabulated form : * Hindu Metaphysicians, it would seem, knew little or nothing about logic, for they never seem to hesitate to base their deductions on analogy. Even the nyaya darsana of Gautama, which literally signifies the school or system of logic, does little more than dismiss the entire subject with the observation that a homogeneous example is the basis of logical inference, the main condition being that no one should be able to cite an instance to the contrary, But this is absurd, for, as Jaina logicians point out, it would warrant our inferring that the future child of a person who has always had boys born to him, would also be a boy!

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Unmanifest, i,e., the state of equilibrium (2) Modified by sattva 5 senses (6-10) Purusha (1) Sound (16) || THE HOLY TRINITY. manas (5) 1 Touch (17) 11 5 kinds of motor functions (11-15) Smell (20) Form (18) Flavour (19) 01 || II Ether (21) Fire (23) Water (24) Earth (25), Air (22) It is this order which is also interesting for us, since it proves that the system is based on nothing more solid or reliable than a series of imagined analogies between a somewhat distorted idea of the manner in which concrete nature bursts on an awakening consciousness and the world-process. Prakriti Manifest 1 Mahat (3) Ahamkara (4) 661 Modified by tamas In a general way-and Kapila seldom went into particulars-it will be seen that the following transformations occur before a sleeping consciousness may he said to have perception of the world on waking up : (1) the manifestation of intellect; (2) the dawning of the notion of individuality, the idea of "I," in the intellect ; (3) the awakening of the faculties and functions of the ego, that is, of the manas and the organs of action and sensation; (4) the stimulation of the senses, i.e., sensation, and (5) the projection in the external space of the mental counterpart of the object perceived.

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662 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. If the reader would bear in mind the notion entertained by certain Hindu Idealists that the sensible world is only held in the mind of its percipient and has no existence apart from it, he would have no difficulty in comprehending the position of Kapila, whose doctrine we shall now compare, side by side, with the manner in which an awakening consciousness becomes cognizant of the world of phenomena. Human consciousness. The World-process. (1) Alternation of waking (1) Alternation of creation and sleeping. and destruction. (2) In deep-sleop the ego is! (2) In world-destruction (pranot destroyed, but the spectacle laya) the perceiver (purusha) is is not perceived. not destroyed, but nature is not perceived. (3) In awakening intellect (3) In the world-process, is roused first of all, mahat (Intellect) is produced first, (4) From intellect arises the (4) Mahat is then transformed thought of "1," i.e., ahamkara into ahamkara (the author' of (egoity or individuality.) aham or " I-ness"). (5) From egoity flow the (5) From ahamkara the manas, functions of certain organs or the five senses, and the five-fold constituents of individuality, functions of the five organs of attention (manas), the senses and action, the hands, feet, and the motor faculties. like, are formed. (6) Egoity being awakened (6) The anamkara is transand developed, sensations, which formed into (i) smell, (2) flavour, signify affections of the ego, are (3) form, (4) touch, and (5) sound, perceived. i.e., the five kinds of sensations. (7) The data of sensations (7) The data of sensations, are then projected and consti- i.e., the subtle elements (tantute the perceptible world. matras) of smell, and the like, are transformed into the five gross elements, ether, air, fire, water and earth, of which the perceptible, that is to say, the phenome nal world is composed. No need to go into further details; the whole doctrine is based on certain crude notions about what takes

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663 place in the mind when consciousness awakens from sleep. It is certain that Kapila's inspiration consisted neither in a divine revelation nor in any rational sciences, but solely and simply in an imaginary analogy which he sought to establish between nature and the human consciousness, and which he simply assumed to avoid further trouble. Kapila's system, however, marks an advance on the rigid Idealism of Advaitism which denies reality to all except consciousness. Kapila in effect agrees with Advaitism as to the unreality of the objects of the senses, holding that their existence consists in their being perceived, that is, in the states of the perceiving consciousness; but he maintains that the changes of states of consciousness themselves require the presence of an independent cause which must be co-existent with consciousness. To this cause, conceived as the source or substratum of change, is transferred all that is changing in consciousness. Having found a basis for the states of individual consciousness, Kapila devoted himself to develop perceptions in it, which he finally achieved by projecting the data of sensations in a spatial sense. It will be now evident that Kapila knows nothing of an outside world, apart from the projections of his own mind, i.e., the transformations of his sensations; for the sensations-flavour and the like,-are described as transformations of the ahamkara, and conceived to consist of subtle elements which are transformed into the grosser material of concrete things. Unfortunately for this line of thought, it never seems to have occurred to Kapila that a sensation does not originate entirely in the mind, and that it consists in the prevailing psychic state plus THE HOLY TRINITY.

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664 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the excitation from without. If he had noticed this important feature of sensation, he would not have described the gross elements, fire, water and the like, as transformations of the subtle tan-matras of our sensa tions. The correspondence between particular sensations and gross elements is equally irrational. It is said: "The tan-matra of sound, possessing the attribute of sound, is produced from ahamkara; then, from the tan-matras of sound, accompanied by ahamkara, is produced the tan-matra of touch, possessing the attributes of Sound and Touch. In a similar manner, the other tan-matrus are produced, in the order of their mention, by the addition of one more attribute at each successive state" (Preface to Vol. IX of the Sacred Books of the Hindus, p. VIII). That being so, sound is the first and smell the last evolute among the senses. But this is not borne out by observation which shows that 'sound' is not enjoyed by all living beings in the animal kingdom. If sound were a necessary ingredient in the composition of the remaining senses, then those animals which are not endowed with the sense of hearing should be devoid of senses altogether; but this is not the case. The same is the case with the mind, the central organ of action and sensation; for it is not possessed by all living beings, being absent in all cases of life below the five-sensed organisms and in some cases even among them. It is needless to criticise the Sankhyan view any further; for, as its very inception shows, it is a substitution of surmise and speculation for science and scientific thought. But as the Sankhyan view seems to have influenced religious thought to a considerable extent,

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665 it is a useful ally for unravelling mythology and mystic records. It will be interesting in this connection to look into the significance of a passage in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad which has non-plussed many a scholar and theologian. It runs thus: THE HOLY TRINITY. "He was in the same state as husband (pati) and wife (patni) are when in mutual embrace. He divided this two-fold. Hence were husband and wife produced. Therefore was this only a half of himself, as a split pea is of the whole. He approached her. Hence men were born. "She verily reflected: How can he approach me, whom he has produced from himself? Alas, I will conceal myself. Thus she became a cow, the other a bull. He approached her. Hence kine were born. The one became a mare, and the other a stallion, the one a female ass, the other a male ass. He approached her. Hence the onc-hoofed kind were born. The one became a female goat, the other a male goat, the one became an ewe, the other a ram. He approached her. Hence goats and sheep were born. In this manner he created every living pair whatsoever."-1st Chap., 4th Brahmana. In the above quotation, he refers to Prajapati (the Creator), and she to his companion Satarupa a hundred forms). (of Now, the best way to understand the purport of the passage is to make ourselves familiar with the significance of 'ideas' in the Platonic sense of the term. According to Schopenhauer, what Plato meant was : "The things of this world which our senses perceive have no true being; they always become, they never are: they have only a relative being; they all exist merely in and through their relation to each other; their whole being may, therefore, quite as well be called a non-being. They are consequently not objects of a true knowledge, for such a knowledge can only be of what exists for itself, and always in the same way; they, on the contrary, are only the objects of an opinion based on sensation. So long as we are 48

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666 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. confined to the perception of these, we are like men who sit in a dark cave, bound so fast that they cannot turn their heads, and who see nothing but the shadows of real things which pass between them and a fire burning behind them, the light of which casts the shadows on the wall opposite them; and even of themselves and of each other they see only the shadows on the wall. Their wisdom would thus consist in predicting the order of the shadows learned from experiece. The real archetypes, on the other hand, to which these shadows correspond, the eternal Ideas, the original forms of all things, can alone be said to have true being, because they always are, but never become nor pass away. To them belongs no muliplicity; for each of them is according to its nature only one, for it is the archetype itself, of which all particular transitory things of the same kind which are named after it are copies or shadows. They have also no coming into being nor passing away, for they are truly being, never becoming nor vanishing, like their fleeting shadows. .The animal (individual) has no true existence, but merely an apparent existence, a constant becoming, a relative existence which may just as well be called non-being as being. Only the idea which expresses itself in that animal is truly being', or the animal in-itself, which is dependent upon nothing, but is in and for itself; it has not become, it will not end, but always is in the same way. If we now recognize its Idea in the animal, it is all one and of no importance, whether we have this animal now before us or its progenitor of a thousand years ago, whether it is here or in a distant land, whether it presents itself in this or that manner, position, or action; whether, lastly, it is this or any other individual of the same species; all this is nothing, and only concerns the phenomenon; the Idea of the animal alone has true being and is the object of real knowledge." * And Schopenhauer himself adds : "It is necessarily presupposed, however, in this negative definition, that time, space, and causality have no significance or validity for these Ideas, and that they do not exist in them. Time, space and causality are that arrangement of our intellect by virtue of which the one being of each kind which alone really is, manifests itself to us as a multiplicity of similar beings, constantly appearing and disappearing in endless succession." *The World as Will and Idea', pp. 222-4. Ibid, pages 222-224.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 667 But it seems to us that both Plato and Schopenhauer fall foul of concrete nature when they endeavour to posit pure mental abstractions as actual and eternal beings in existence. For it is not in the nature of a type or archetype to enjoy an existence independently of the living beings and things whose comparison with one another gives rise to its notion. These 'Ideas' or archetypes can, then, only mean moulds or types of rhythm, i.e., energy, the constructive force, which is responsible for the making of an organism. Each of these types, whatever may be the number of individuals belonging to it, very naturally, can be only one. As regards the potency of rhythm as a builder of organisms, it was demonstrated some time ago, * by means of experiment, that particles of sand spread over a rotating disc attached to a vibrating instrument arranged themselves in certain charcteristic ways under the influence of different tunes to which they were subjected. It was inferred from this that each tune had a characteristic rhythm of its own, which was responsible for the arrangement and groupings of the particles of sand. The making of an organism, it is conceived, must, similarly, be due to the operation of the forces residing in the fertilised ovum ; and it is the resultant of the sum-total of these forces which determines the class and type of the body, and which might, for that reason, be called its rhythm. Now, in the teaching of the Upanishad, Prajapati * See * The Building of the Cosmos,' by Annie Besant, pp. 18, 19, 22 and 23.

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668 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (the Creator) stands for Imagination, which comprises both the will and the creative energies, in metaphorical speech, the Word as representing the creative logoi. The latter constitute the Satarupa, of the Upanishad, the personification of a hundred* forms. When these two, i.e., the Prajapati and Satarupa, are taken as one, the metaphorical description of the Upanishad, that is, the embrace between husband and wife, best explains the situation. But if we separate the Word, or collectively the 'ideas,' the Satarupa of the Upanishad, from the creative Mind, which holds her in himself-according to St. John also the Word was with God and was God-the husband and wife no longer remain 'one,' or embracing each other. + So the Upanishad says that she, i.e., Satarupa, was separated from him. Now, inasmuch as the phenomenal world has been conceived to consist in the forms of knowledge, a general dissolution must be predicated, whenever Intelligence taking Satarupa in its embrace becomes merged in Will. Intelligence with his wife, Satarupa, then resembles an egg, which, as the Hindu Puranas and Manu's Shastra teach, lay in the ocean of Consciousness. This mundane egg, in due course of time, again divides itself into two, the upper and the lower halves, the dawn of a new world-morning takes place. Noah's Ark is another synbolism in point, Noah being the Male or the active Principle, and the Ark, the emblem of the female organ, the * The word hundred here implies all the forms of understanding, i.C., types of constructive rhythm. f Probably this is the idea intended by the Mythical statement in Genesis III. 20, according to which Eve, the mother of all living, was made from a rib taken out of Adam's body.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 669 Satarupa of the Upanishads. The seeds are the archetypes of all species, a pair of each of which is preserved from general destruction in the Cosmic Ovary of Imagination. A similar account is to be found in the Hindu Puranas which agrees with the Biblical legend in almost all particulars, except that while the species are expressly mentioned in place of 'ideas in the Bible, the Hindu account simply refers to the Vedas (literally, knowledge). To return from the digression, since Satarupa is taken out of, and disengaged from, the embrace of the Prajapati, she is like a daughter unto him, and, with all becoming modesty, naturally reflects over her relations with him, and then flies from form to form (i.e., from type to type), producing a multiplicity of individuals in each species, in consequence of his approach. The reader might here clearly perceive the analogy to the creation of mental forms by Will's dwelling on general concepts. The theory of ideas, thus, is not a feature of the Greek philosophy alone; it was known to the writers of the Old Testament, but is to be found in its most perfect form among the Indians alone, whose mythology, if properly studied, would revolutionize the entire constitution of Religion and Philosophy in the World. As for the interpretation of these myths and legends, much that is obscure in mythology becomes intelligible with the aid of psychology, for the ancients had a most wonderful knowledge of this department of science, and freely resorted to symbolism to give expression to some * See the Hindu Mythology by W. J. Wilkins, pp. 137--138,

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670 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, of its most abstruse doctrines. We shall here deal with a few more of these mythological conceptions to illustrate our point. Shiva is the third member of the Hindu Trinity, and is represented as a being with matted hair, and with serpents entwined round his person. He takes swallowwort and other intoxicating and poisonous things, and wears a garland of skulls. His consort is Parvati, the daughter of Himalayas, who also assumes various other forms, such as Durga, Kali, and the like. His most popular name is Bholanath; he is easily pleased, and grants boons to his worshippers readily, and, at times, even foolishly. Now, Shiva represents Will inclined to Vairagya (renunciation), which, as such, is free from formal sophistry. On account of his freedom from worldly wisdom, he is called the Simple-minded--the Un-worldly, or Unsophisticated--and because he knows no trickery, he is the Bhola (innocent, guileless) Nath (Lord). The intoxication of Shiva is due to the nature of Will which is the pure emotion of Self-feeling. It is this emotion of Self-feeling that constitutes the mystic's joy, which no wine can produce, and for which those who have experienced it renounce the world and become Self-centred. This comes only from Self-contemplation, or samadhi of Yoga, in which Will, finding itself free from the thraldom of desire, feels its own inherent Joy. We feel truly free in this state of extreme Self-centredness in the course of whose attainment the energy of life, which was being dissipated all round, is wound up, as it were, into an indivisible impulse of

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THE TOLY TRINITY. 671 feeling. The ancients described this elevated state of feeling by the mystic symbolism of a rod, with a knob at its top, and a serpent entwined round it, the knob representing the point into which the Self has withdrawn itself, the rod standing for Power, and the serpent for the force of Kundalini, the all-conquering energy of Life, or Spirit. Somewhat similar is the sign of the caduceus of Mercury which contains such a lot of hidden significance that it is impossible to describe it here fully. Its figure also represents the human trunk and the nervous centres, seven in number, the book * which is sealed with seven seals, and written inside and at the back. The tivo interlacing serpents represent the Ida and the Pingala nadis (nerves), and the central tube is the symbol of the Sushumna (the hollow canal in the spinal column). The triangle formed at the lower end is the nervous plexus Muladhara, while the knob, or the head, at the top, is the Sahasrara, the plexus of the brain. The Muladhara is the abode of the spiritual energy known as Kundalini, or the serpent force, which is roused into activity in the course of advancement on the path of Yoga. The plexus Muladhara is also the seat of three spiritual currents, collectively called Tribeni, that is, the confluence of the three streams, the Ganges (Ida, whose colour is that of the Sun), the Jumna (Pingala, which is of the colour of the Moon), and the Saraswati (Spirituality, which becomes visible only in the heaven, i.e., the plexus of the heart). Now, in order that the individual should derive any real benefit from the confluence of these potent forces, they must touch his whole being from * The book of Revelations, V. I.

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672. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the muladhara to the plexus in the head; but in order to do so, the Spiritual current must pass upwards through the hollow tube of the Sushumna, energizing all the nervous plexi on the way, thus enlivening him from within. When the current reaches the brain, the individual becomes perfect like Shiva. Man can achieve this muchcoveted consummation by mentally bathing at this confluence of the Ganges, the Jumna and the Saraswati daily, if possible, constantly. The supposed Tribeni at Allahabad, in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, is an ingenious symbolism for this confluence of the three spiritual currents, though its esoteric import being unknown to the generality of men, it is now resorted to by all classes of Hindus as a place of pilgrimage.* The garland of skulls worn by Shiva is probably iutended to suggest the destructive element in pure Self-contemplation, since all kinds of good and evil tendencies have to be destroyed for spiritual emancipation. It is worthy of note that virtue is as much a cause of bondage as vice, though the fruit of the former is pleasant and of the latter bitter, and, at times, very painful. The constant consort of this great god, Shiva, is Parvati, who is the daughter of Himalayas. But it would be foolish to take the Himalayas as a mountain; the goddess represents that highly desired state of the soul which arises from steady, immutable dhyana (concentration of mind). According to the 'Per * For the secret import of the names of the other sacred places of the Hindus and for a proper appreciation of Hindu Mythology in general, the reader is referred to the comprehensive work, "The Permanent History of Bharatavarsha,' by K. Narayana Iyer, B.A.

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THE HOLY TRINITY, 073 manent History of Bharaivarsha,' a work of paramount importance in the elucidation of Hindu mythology, Parvati represents buddhi (intellect, i.e., the faculty of reflection). But she must be distinguished from Eve of the Genesis legend, in so far as the term "buddhi is limited to that particular tendency of the Intellect to turn back inwards in the direction of Bramhan."* According to the same work, Bramha is the totality of buddhi or the determination to involve. " As all the religious advancement has to start with this turn of mind, it is described as Brauha's creation. The work of maintaining and developing this buddhi points to Vishnu and preservation, Rudra as destroyer has two functions hore. He has to destroy the worldly desires of man before Bramha could create thic buddhi which turns back to the Bramhan. He has also to destroy the good cffects of Bramha's and Vishnu's workings before final cmancipation could be secured. Thus tho three gods here specified are not virtually distinct and separate, and they cannot possibly continue to exist as such." In summing up his conclusions on the nature of the Ilindu Tri-Murti, Mr. K. Narayana Iyer points out (The Permanent History of Bharatavarsha,' Vol. I. p. 395): " In the conceptions of Bramha, Vishnu and Siva, the following important points have therefore to be cvor kopt before our viow to avoid doubt and confusion : "(1) The region of the Triad is the sphere of Satwie Maya, and not of Avidya, which is exactly the jurisdiction of the modern interpreters. "(2) Tho very nature of the functions of the Triad is involutionary. The creation of Bramha or evolution virtually means the destruction of all the worldly desires and tho consequent rising of a devotional tendoncy in man. " (3) Vishnu preserves and develops the Budhi created by Bramha and does not preserve any other absurdities. * The l'ermanent History of Bharatavarsha, Vol. 1. 2. 393. 49

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674 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "(4) Siva is primarily the cause of Branha's creation by his destroying the worldly desires, and, lastly, he is the cause of final liberation by annihilating the good effects of religious devotion and practice, "(5) Bramha, Vishnu and Siva, as explained above, exhaust tho religious requirements for the final omancipation of man." It would thus appear that right discernment, dharma (religious observance), and renunciation (vairagya) are the three primary conceptions on which the Pauranic Triad is founded. * But the widest significance is to be attached to these conceptions in unravelling mythological thought, since the very nature of the mental faculties precludes division by metes and bounds, and, therefore, makes it possible for the productions of fancy to encroach on the territories of one another. Besides, it is but rare to find a faculty or function with only one aspect, so that it would be strange if the gods representing them were not endowed with complex personalities. Bearing these observations in mind, we can see that Vishnu is not a personification of dharma as an abstract principle or thing, but of a consciousness saturated with it (dharma). As such, he incarnates again and again periodically, because in the very nature of things a change must occur for the better whenever conditions become unbearable. As a rule, general wickedness, impiety and vice bring on unprecedented calamities on the race, and there is nothing like calamity to set * Of thosc conceptions, right discernment leads to the observanco of dharma, resulting in the accrual of virtue and consequently also of prosperity to the soul; but absolute renunciation, culminating in the cessation of vice as well as virtuc, is the cause of mokshu, Honco, is Siva tho gencral destroyer,

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 675 men thinking, finally changing their ideals and turning them away from irreligious inaterialism. This is lharma's birth, described as Vishnu's incarnating again and again. In his broader aspect, Vishnu is the second Logos, i.e., Wisdom, as well as the Absolute, conceived as pure consciousness. He is the Destroyer of delusion, inasmuch as meditation on the nature of consciousness directly leads to Wisdom, which is the antithesis of ignorance and delusion. Again, because suffering does not originate in not having a thing, but in desiring to have and not having it, the disillusioned soul must, sooner or later, establish itself in its own Self when once it is discovered to be the source of all bliss and blessedness. This is moksha. Hence is Vishnu also the bestower of moksha. As the personification of consciousness, Vishnu carries the form of Wisdom, that is, Bramha, in His forehead. The latter, when taken by himself, that is, apart from Consciousness, becomes reduced to mere formal knowledge. Therefore, when he tries to measure his strength against Krishna, the latter assumes his mysterious aspect of the Unfathomable and baffles him. An incident illustrating this point is related in the Puranas as follows. During the temporary absence of Krishna, Braraha, once upon a time, descended on earth and removed the cowherds' children, who were Krishna's play-mates, and hid them in a cave. When Krishna came and found them missing, he created, by his power of Illusion, other children, who in every respect resembled those whom Bramlia had removed. When the latter came

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676 down to earth again to see how Krishna was feeling the loss of his companions, he was astonished to see the children playing as usual, and ran to the cave to see if it was empty. On arriving there, he was astonished to find them lying as he had deposited them there, and, on reflecting, came to know the Illusion of the Absolute, and worshipped him. This is clearly illustrative of the imperfections of the human intellect which depends on memory as compared with the all-knowing nature of pure consciousness. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. When Bramha and other gods are in trouble, Vishnu, as representing Wisdom, comes to their rescue, as happened when Shiva, unable to settle matters with a demon worshipper of his, found himself in difficulties. What had happened was this: the demon had worshipped the great Mahadeva wholeheartedly, and the latter, pleased with the devotion offered to him, had decreed that on whomsoever's head the former might place his hand, he would immediately destroy and burn him up. Delighted with the boon, the demon sought to test its efficacy on Shiva's own head. Shiva ran for dear life, and took refuge with Vishnu, who destroyed the foe by making him imitate his own movements, with the result that, deluded by maya, the demon put his hand on his own head and was immediately reduced to ashes. What is meant is not that the incident actually took place as an historical event, but the simple fact that when will is irritated, consciousness at once appears, as light from heat, in consequence of 'friction,' just as it happens in dreams. So long as a man is sound asleep, life 'flows' freely through his body, but the moment some

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THE HOLY TRINITY, 677 irritating stimulus reaches it, consciousness at once springs into manifestation, and with the aid of the * Idea,' which it 'carries in its head,'transforms the sensation into living pictures, and endeavours to perceive and understand the situation, albeit in a more or less drowsy way. Such is the purport of the tale of Shiva's foolishness and undignified flight. Those who narrated such anecdotes were men who fearlessly recorded their conclusions, remaining uninfluenced by all pettifogging considerations as to whether their stories were or were not calculated to reflect discredit on their conception of God. They very well knew that all those who were ripe for and cared to understand the Truth would apply themselves to discover the true significance of these instances of seeming short-comings in the gods, and would learn true jnana. Hence, those who feel disgusted with religion itself on account of such matters had better seek their salvation elsewhere, for religion wants and can benefit only the earnest seeker after truth, not those who are ready to pronounce an opinion without thoroughly studying what is taught. The constant but indecisive warfare between the devas and asuras, or God and Devil, is another instance of shortcoming in the Deity. The Evangelists, too, did not hesitate to record the failure of Jesus to perform miracles in his own country. Even the Old Testament writers fearlessly recorded that which a modern theologian would fain leave out. It is said in the Book of Judges: "And the Lord was with Judah; and le drove out the inhabitants

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678 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley because they had chariots of iron" (Judges, 1, 19) * These and all other similar instances of shortcomings in the gods are not meant to be understood in their exoteric sense: the reader must search for their hidden interpretation, which, when discovered, would enable him to realize that his true, living God is nearer to him than the vital vein in his body, as the Prophet of Islam rightly proclaimed. We may now explain the mythological significance of Sarasvati, the goddess of wisdom. She is noted for her love of music and carries a vina (a kind of banjo) in her hand. Her word is inviolable; she rides on a hamsa (swan), and is the daughter of God. These are her chief characteristics. It would seem that the primary conception is that of Jina-bani, the voice of God, from Jina, the Conqueror of samsara, hence, God, and bani, voice. As such, she represents revelation, for which reason her word is absolutely inviolable. She is the daughter of God, because she directly springs from a Tirthamkara (God). The hamsa on which she rides is a symbol for breath, because ham and sa (ham +sa hamsa) are the sounds actually heard in deep inhalation and exhalation, respectively. *The explanation of this passage is a death blow to the idea of favouritism, its main symbolical elements being (1) chariots signifying bodies, as in the allegory of the Mahabharata which shows under what circumstances and with what effect Vishnu (dharma) be. comes the charioteer of Arjuna (the soul), (2) Jehovah, the great principle or magnet of Love, and (3) iron indicating what is readily attracted by a magnet, hence a soul in love with God. Thus, the passage in question was probably intended to signify the relationship of love between God and a self-conscious soul, which would tend to protect and not destroy the latter.

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679 The Hindu conception of Sarasvati is also that of ultimate knowledge. In a passage in the Sarasvatirahasyopanishat, quoted by Mr. K. Narayana Iyer, she is thus invoked : She "May the goddess Sarasvati whose form is the very essence of Vedanta, protect me. She is the Sakti [-energy] of Brahman that is dealt with in the Vedas and Vedangas as the only one. dirccts the three Lokas internally by her involutionary work. She is the guiding principle in Rudra, Aditya, etc., and she is enjoyed by those who turn their eyes inwards in their involutionary process of work. She is the expanding knowledge divided into eight parts. She is Nirvikalpa and the form of Bramhan, meditating on whom Yogis deliver themselves from bondage. May the pure and white Sarasvati residing in the face of Bramha take rest in my heart." THE HOLY TRINITY. "The goddess Sarasvati," adds Mr. K. Narayana Iyer "is here described as the ultimate knowledge and form of Bramhan and particularly explained as enjoyed by those who turn their eyes inwards back to the Bramhan." As It is also possible to regard Sarasvati as a personification of 'Ideas' in the Platonic sense of the word. such, she would be the "daily delight" of the creator like the Satarupa of the Upanishads, and also his second, or as one brought up with him being a personalization of Ideas' or rhythms, which, as types of different vibrations of Life (personified as God) are co-eval with it. The vina would thus represent the entire cosmic or archetypal 'orchestra' on which Life plays its tuneful melodies. " Sarasvati must, however, be distinguished from Ganesha, who is also the God of Wisdom. He is a child, The Permanent History of Bharatavarsha, Vol. I. p. 415.

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680 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and las the trunk of an elephant with only one tusk, in place of the natural head of which he was deprived soon after his birth. His mount is a rat, and he eats only sweets. The youngest of gods, he nevertheless insists on being the first to be invited, and gets angry and causes a lot of mischief if neglected. In build he is ill-knit and awkward as if disjointed. These are the main characteristics of Ganesha. In interpreting this personification, we must begin with the mount --the rat----which is noted for the excellent use it makes of its teeth. Now, the only mental faculty which can be represented by an animal notorious all over the world for its cutting propensities is analysis, which enables us to ascertain the composition of things. The awkward, ill-knit body of Ganesha with an elephant's trunk, on the other hand, is suggestive of synthesis, which being more useful than analysis has precedence over it. Hence, the rat is described as the mount of Ganesha. The solitary tusk has reference to the monistic view which certain systems of philosophy aspire to attain. Obviously, two tusks would have been compatible with dualism* alone. Ganesha is represented as a child, inasmuch as wisdom makes people so, and also becauso wisdom is the last to be born. This also explains why Ganesha is the youngest of gods. He cats sweets, because ananda (happiness) is the fruit of wisdom. His insistence on being the first to be invited, and the -- -- * The same idea is traccable in the personality of Odin of the Toutonic mythology, who sacrificed one of his cyes, so that he might be dowered with great wisdom.'

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 081 trouble arising from his being neglected only go to emphasize the nature of wisdom. These instances, in our opinion, suffice to prove that the nature of the divinities constituting the different pantheons is very different from what it has been generally supposed to be hitherto. And, the same observation has to be made with respect to the teaching of mysticism some of whose doctrines, like those of the fall' and the holy trinity,' have been examined by us in detail. The same line of investigation, if pursued, will, it is believed, reveal the secrets of most other myths and mythologies ; but we cannot tarry over this department of thought any longer for the present. We may, however, point out here that confusion of thought is likely to result in the mind by our splitting up the mind into (1) Consciousness, (2) Will, and (3) Ideation, since mythologists have generally dealt with the first and the last of these aspects under one lead, instead of two. But this is a mere difference of nomenclature. We, too, would have preferred to deal with the subject in the same way, bad it not been necessary for the requirements of a broader survey and reconciliation of all the systems of thought, including the science of psychology, to adopt this particular method. If the reader would keep in mind the distinct standpoints of the different systems, he would be able to avoid the jar arising from what might seem to be the forcing of the three facades of the Trinity into the two aspects of the Brahman of 50

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682 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Vedanta. As a matter of fact, there is no jar anywhere, except for a mind prejudiced by a too narrow horizon of thought. However, we append a synopsis of the leading systems hitherto examined, for greater facility of comparison. Serial System. Godhead, Aspects. No. (1) Vedanta ... Brahman ... The Nirguna*, the Unknowable, the Unnameable Reality, Im material (i.e., not-material, hence) Spirit, a triune Unity comprising : (1) Sat, i.e., existence. (2) Chit, i.e., consciousness and (3) Ananda, i.e., bliss. 2. The Saguna, i.e., the Word, or Speech. (2) Theosophy The Unmini- | 1. The first Logos, i.e., Will. fest. The second Logos, i.e., Intelli gence or Wisdom. 3. The third Logos, i.e., Activity, (3) Puranas ... The Tri-unc Godhead. 1. Brahma, buddhi. 2, Vishnu, i.e., consciousness, also dharma, and 3. Shiva, Will (vairagya). (4) Christiani- The Holy 1. The Father, i.e., consciousnoss, ty. Trintty. 2. The son, i.e., the Word, and 13. The Holy Ghost, i.e., Will, the bestower of joy, or Vliss, hence the Comforter. The primary conception of tbe Biblical Trinity is owitted from the above synopsis, but a glance suffices to show that the fourth Evangel follows Vedanta with respect to the impersonation of the creative logoi as the * Nir-without, and gung=quality; hence the qualityless. + Saguna, the opposite of qualityless.

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 683 Word. Even the third member of the Divine Triad, as conceived by the compiler of the 'Acts of the Apostles,' is not unlike the Saras vati (spiritualized Will) of the psychic tribeni whose identity with the Holy Ghost becomes clear when we recall to mind the fact that it was after its descent* that the disciples were able to perform the miracles recorded in the second chapter of that book. Jesus called it the 'Comforter,' i.e., that which gives Joy. Christianity, permeated, as it undoubtedly was, hy the spirit of Indian Philosophy, in its earlier days, seems to have based its Holy Trinity on the true principles of religion, but, owing to the early disappearance of knowledge, was not able to benefit by the true interpretation of the teaching, or, if able to do so, was unwilling to adopt it, as it would have interfered, considerably, with the authority of the established head of the Church. As for Hinduism, unfortunately, its followers have ceasel to take interest in the truths embodied in their mythology, and what was intended only for imparting the highest knowledge is now looked upon, by one section of the Hindu community, on account of their excessive conceit, as a collection of silly, childish tales, and is regarded by another engrossed in deep ignorance as the * Remombering what has been said about the power of concentration increasing as the square of the number of persons engaged in meditation, the phenomena which took place on the day of Pentecost can be easily seen to be the result of the concentrated will of the apostles who were all in one place and with one accord. The intensity of their all-absorbing concentration was relieved by sound, and wisdom manifested itself, enabling them to speak with other tongues.

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684 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. sole object of religious worship. If the truth is to betold, it was never intended that any worship beyond meditation on the different aspects of Life, which manifests itself in all the 330,000,000 forms spoken of in the Puranas, was to be performed. The Vedas could not very well teach "That thou art," and yet enjoin the worship of mythological deities at the same time. It is the meditation on the nature of Life which is worship in the true sense of the word ; begging for favours from another can never be the means of salvation. Far from thinning delusion, begging only goes to deepen it. The same is the case with all other rituals and ceremnonies, whether they be performed for the special benefit of the souls of the departed, or for those of the living. They all tend to give prominence to the lower personality or nature, and prevent us from grasping the sense of the mahavakyas (great sayings, or truisms), such as "I am Brahman." So far as the forms of these spiritual conceptions, Bralima and others, are concerned, they have been conceived with the greatest precision in the different mythologies ; but as they personify powers and faculties of an exceedingly complex nature, it is not always easy to comprehend them fully. These mythological deities, however, are not to be confounded with actual beings, Indras, demons, and the like, who are living beings like ourselves. There is absolutely no reason why the bhuta, the preta, the goblin, the elf and the like, should not exist at all. They have been seen by men in all coun. tries and in all times. They are not disembodied spirits, but possess bodies made of the same material as ourselves, although of a finer quality. The remark made

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 685 by us in connection with the worship of Brahma and other mythological gods, applies with even greater force to demonology or the worship of angels and ghosts and the powers of darkness generally; it only goes to strengthen delusion. On this point, we need only give the emphatic declaration of Vedanta, in the language of S. Abhedananda, who says (Spiritualism and Vedanta,' p. 17):-- "No amount of good thoughts and good deeds can produce as their effect that which is beyond thought and mind, and consequently beyond the reach of their efforts, because divine realization is not within the realm of psychic phenomena, nor can it be reached by mind, intellect or sense powers. And the path which leads the individual soul to the realization of the Absolute is neither through religious works, nor through the belief in departed spirits, nor by the worship of the spirits of the ancestors, but through self-knowledge and the knowledge of the relation which the individual soul bears to the Universal Spirit. That path is called in Vedanta Devayana, the divine path, or the path which leads to Divinity. The travellers on this path are those who are the most sincere and earnest seekers after the Absolute, who do not care for phenomena, whether physical or psychic, whose souls soar high above the clouds of desires that cover the light of the spiritual sun in the ordinary mortals; but whose highest aim, loftiest aspiration, and deepest longing of the soul are to realize that unchangeable Truth which is beyond mind, beyond intellect, which the Father in heavens of the spiritualists cannot reach." We may now conclude this chapter; but, before inviting the reader to accompany us to the next one, wherein we give the views of what, to our thinking, is the only true philosophy of religion in the world, it will not be quite amiss to cast a cursory glance at the result of our enquiry thus far. We have seen how the natural but mostly fear-smothered craving of every soul is to attain to

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686 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that degree of happiness which knots nothing of imperfection or desire; and we have also seen how that state of happiness is not only possible to be attained, but also not far to seek. Step by step, have we been led to consider two of the most important religions in the world, that is, Christianity and Vedanta, and from their comparison have been enabled to draw certain highly important conclusions as to the nature of the world and the God which we have aspired to become. But we have not yet found a true definition of God or nirvana, or even of the nature and causes of the soul's bondage, anywhere in either of the two creeds we have so thoroughly examined, not criticisingly, but constructively. Vedanta even considers it beneath its dignity to give a thought to the individual, and ascribes its very idea to illusion, pure and simple, while Christianity is altogether silent on the point. It is true that there is a close resemblance between the scenes in dreams and the waking world, but simply because of this resemblance philosophy cannot jump to the conclusion that the universe must actually be the dream of a super-human dreamer. There is a very important difference between the dream and the world of our waking consciousness, and it lies in the fact that, while the dreamer whose subconscious mental activity is the cause of the dream was at one time a conscious being in the world of men, prior to his lapsing into the state of dreaming, and would wake up again into that world of waking consciousness, the dreamer of the universe has not been shown to be a being who was ever awake, or who would ever wake up from his eternal, beginningless and apparently un

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THE HOLY TRINITY. 687 ending sleep. The difference is not one of mere words, but of vital import to the soul which aspires to become " That." Are we drifting towards the state which Lord Byron describes as a "Strango state of being ! (for' tis still to be) Senseless to feel, and with seal'd Eyes to sce,"? The "Perchance to dream!" of Hamlet is a silent commentary on the summum bonum, if dreaming be the be-all and end-all of religion. To be a dreamer-an eternal, 'never-waking' dreamer,--is more than any one cares to become. Have we, then, misunderstood Vedanta ? Perhaps we have. But we have endeavoured to follow and work out its conclusions from its own point of view, as far as it was possible to do so. The idea of Brahman as the Enjoyer of Bliss is magnificent, but there also remains the other aspect, namely, that of a dreamer, to be considered, so that the query who am I?'-of the soul can hardly be said to find an answer in the sublime formula, That thou art,' since it also wants to know, "What is the "That," the Enjoyer, or Dreamer, or both ?' This last idea, i.e., the rolling of the Enjoyer and the Dreamer into one, is the most unsatisfactory of all, since no one can combine two incompatibilities in himself, at one and the same time. Christianity, when we turn to seek an answer from it, fares even worse, since it has nothing of its own, and itself stands in need of a foreign light to be deciphered into intelligible thought. The Saukliyan metaphysics also which we have examined in this chapter turn out to be a inisconception

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688 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of the nature of the perceptible world, and can lay no claim to a scientific grounding or origin. Mythology and mysticism might, no doubt, possess the information we desire to obtain, but it seems safer to keep them at a respectable distance than to run the risk of being lost in their labyrinthine mazes. We thus see that it is only an inkling of the truth that we have been able to get thus far, and that if we wish to satisfy our understanding on all those important problems which constitute true jnana--and jnana is, the pre-requisite of moksha--we must turn to some other source able to satisfy the enguiring soul. The foregoing treatment of the subject in hand and the explanation of the various mythological doctrines of different religions, from the standpoint of philosophy and metaphysics, have, it is to be hoped, prepared the ground for the reception of the doctrines of Truth which will be dealt with in the next and the succeeding chapters.

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CHAPTER X. THE SIDDHANTA.* A number of blind persons, once upon a time, went out to see' an elephant which had come to their village. They were all taken to it, and allowed to touch it with their hands, one touching its trunk, another its car, a third its leg, and so forth. After the departure of the animal, they all began to talk of their knowledge concerning its form. Each described it according to his own personal observation but it was soon found that their descriptions did not tally. Upon this, a quarrel arose as to who was the truthful witness among them, and from words they speedily came to blows. At this juncture, there appeared on the scene a man who was not blind like them, and who had actually seen an elephant; and he was with great difficulty able to reconcile them by explaining to them that what each one of them had felt with his hand was not the whole animal, but only a part of its body.-The purable of the blindmen and the elephant. Moral :-Men of this world are like the blindmen of the parable; they insist on their partial knowledge being accepted for the whole truth. The causes of misunderstanding in religion can be classified under two distinct heads, namely, those which arise from partial knowledge, which men try to pass off for exact truth, and those that are due to a failure to understand the teaching embodied in myths and legends. Of these two kinds, the latter is the more fruitful source of trouble. . It is not to be supposed that mythology is a science to be encouraged. Its value is apparent from the fact * Established Truth, the last word, or final conclusion,

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690 that during the last two thousand years, at least, it has only led to wrangling, disputes and bloodshed among men, and has created greater differences among them than all other things put together. This is quite a natural result of the spirit of mysticism which mythology directly fosters, since it gives rise to ignorance which never fails to give birth to the unholy twins, bigotry and fanaticism. THE KEY OF KNOWI EDGE. Stories and myths, no doubt, are very fascinating, and do not entail much hard mental work, but we ought not to underrate the difficulties which they create for men. No one will seriously deny that they throw a veil of obscurity over the ideal, which it is the aim of philosophy to set free from the nebulosity of indistinct, chaotic thought, and of religion to bring into realization. Clear thought, not mythology, is needed for salvation. We recall to mind a certain over-zealous, though cultured Mahomedan gentleman who was very lavish with his praises of the Qur'an, on the ground that it contained many passages which no one could understand. Our friend, however, did not stop to consider what his words signified, and had little or no idea of the practical value of religion. How can that which is not understood by any one be a means of liberation by any possibility? Suppose a scientific work contained formulas which were beyond the comprehension of men, could anyone urge their unintelligibility as an argument in favour of its merit? It is no answer to say that those formulas would disclose important secrets of nature when understood, since cash-value depends on practical good, not on theoretical speculation as to the charm of

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THE SIDDITANTA 691 unintelligibility. Would a pauper who claimed credit on the ground that he owned and possessed untold wealth, but was only ignorant of its whereabouts, derive any benefit from his millions ? The same is the case with mythology, which, as stated above, has given rise to the worst forms of ill-feeling amongst men. As regards the first kind of the causes of misunderstanding, it is sufficient to point out that none of the religions that we have examined hitherto is characterised by perfection. Vedanta, for instance, leaves us with Brahman and Maya, and gives little or no help in constructing a world of matter and force with their aid. Of Time, Space and Causality it has no explanation to offer. Nor are we given an insight into the mechanism of Maya, which is supposed to be responsible for the world-process in some mysterious way. The final causes of the world must, then, be sought for and described in terms which make further thought possible. The theory that the universe is a bundle of names and forms is very useful in so far as it goes, and we hope we have accorded it the fullest latitude which it is entitled to; but the problem of the nature of the material and the operative cause or causes, which stamp on it the variety of names and forms, still remains to be solved. Bearing in mind the fact that the world-process is eternal, and that concrete things, whether they be called thought-forms or actual objects, must have some sort of material basis for their being, we may lay down that the existing material of the universe consists of two different kinds of substances, the living, i.e., self-conscious, and

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692 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the jara, that is unconscious, or the Jiva and the A jiva, as they are called in the philosophy of Jainism. We must also make due allowance for their interplay. This necessitates a common ground for action, as well as the determination of the causes which bring about and render that interplay possible. We thus get Space, Time, the continuous ether, i.e., the medium of motion, and an opposite kind of ether as the medium of rest. Of these, Time is the principle of continuity and is recognized as a separate substance in the Jaina philosophy. The medium of motion and that of rest are called Dharma and Adharma respectively; and matter is known as Pudgala. This completes our list of the substances necessary for the world-process which may be enumerated in the following tabulated form: SUBSTANCE Ajiva Tiva siva Jiva Space Time Dharma Adharmia Matter (Pudgala) Jainism posits these six substances as eternal," and * It is impossible to accept the theologian's dictum that everything that exists must have a maker, so that nothing can be self subsisting. For if that were so, that maker would himself stand in need of a maker of his being, and that one of still another, and so forth. But this is too absurd to be acceptable to theology itself, according to which there is a self-subsisting maker who is the author of everything else. Here also theology has no leg to stand upon, for if it is possible for one being or thing to be self-subsisting and eternal, it is also possible for more things and beings to be ancreate. Hence, the real issue again is what is more rational,

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THE SIDDHANTA. 693 claims that no world-process is possible without them. Even when portions of the universe are destroyed, these realities do not disappear or become merged in one another; for there can be no such thing as an absolute praluya. Even Vivekananda maintains (* Jnana Yoga, Part II, p. 26): "I should rather follow the.........Opinion that this quieting down is not simultaneous over the whole universe, but that in different parts different things are going on." It is not to be supposed that the word 'substance' used in reference to the six realities of Jainism, means only physical substances, such as stones. Matter is naturally included in these six realities, but the remaining five are very different in their nature and bear no resemblance to it. The best way to understand their nature is to consider them as different kinds of forces, or rhythm, hence, activity, since they all perform certain functions. These six realities are thus defined in the Uttaradhyayana Sutra ("Sacred Books of the East,' Vol. XLV. pp. 153-4): "Dharma, Adharma, space, time, matter, and souls are the six kinds of substances; they make up this world. Dharma, Adharma, and space are each one substance only; but time, matter and souls are an infinite number of substances. The characteristic of Dharma is motion, that of Adharma immobility, and that of space, which contains all other substances, is to make room for everything. The characteristic of time is duration, that of soul the realisation of knowledge, faith, happiness, and misery. The characteristic of matter is sound, darkness, lustre, light, shade, sunshine, colour, taste, smell and touch. Substance is the substrate of qualities; the whether the notion that a god made the substances of nature, or whether they are self-subsisting and eternal ? And as to this the answer can be only one, namely, that which has been given in these pages.

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694 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. qualities are inherent in one substance; but the characteristic of (levelopments is that they inhere in either (piz., substances or qualities). The characteristic of development is singleness, separate. ness, number, form, conjunction and disjunction." It will be interesting at this stage to compare the six substances of the Jaina Siddhanta with the nine realities of the Vaisheshikas. As pointed out on pp. 81 and 82 ante, tliese nine realities comprise (i) the ultimate units of odour, (ii) do. do. of flavour, (iii) do do. of luminosity, (iv) do. do. of temperature, (v) akasha, i.e., a kind of ether, (vi) kala, (vii) dik, (viii) manas, and (ix) souls. These are the nine realities in the system of Kanada; but only a glance is needed to show that the onumeration is purely arbitrary and devoid of scientific or philosophical merit. The first four classes, the ultimate units of odour, flavour, luminosity and temperature, do not represent four different things or substances, but only the four common attributes of one and the same substance, namely, matter. For there is no warrant for holding that temperature can be altogether eliminated from flavour, flavour from odour, odour from colour and so forth. The fact is that matter is endowed with the properties of touch, taste, smell and colour, though each particular sense-organ responds to only one of these properties. For instance, we cannot perceive colour with the nose, odour with the eye and

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THE SIDDHANTA. 695 so on. It is true that water is not perceived with the nose, fire with the nose and tongue, or air with the nose, tongue and eye ; but it is also true that earth is known by all the senses excepting the ear, water by three (touch, taste and sight), fire by two (sight and temperature), and air by one (temperature) falone. We cannot, therefore, hold that earth is only endowed with odour, water with flavour, fire with colour, and air with temperature. Modern science has fully demonstrated the transmutability of elements, but no laboratory experiments are required to show that solid matter (e.g., wood) is convertible into fire or that water is but another form of vapour, a kind of gaseous matter. The so-called elements are the different forms of the one and the same substance, matter, called pudgala in the Jaina Siddhanta, because of the liability of its particles to become fused (from galana, to melt) among themselves as well as with souls. Owing to such fusion, different combinations arise in which certain qualities predominate, while certain others are more or less suppressed. It is thus evident that the Vaisheshikas have no true conception of matter, which they unwarrantably split up under four different heads, as noted. The Vaisheshika conception of ether as the source of sound is also unscientific, inasmuch as sound arises from the agitation of material particles, as may be fully demonstrated by experiment. Any elementary work on physics would furnish conclusive proof of this statenient. Even apart from scientific experiments, the plienomenon of echo suffices to denolish all such theories; for echo arises from the reflection of a sound-wave when

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696 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. its path is obstructed by some material body; but Ether cannot be obstructed by matter, being a finer and subtler element than it. The argument that because atoms of matter can be conceived to be absolutely silent therefore sound must be the property of Ether, is unscientific, since Ether can also be conceived that way, and since no argument which ignores matters of observation and daily experience can be regarded as good. The fact is that having laid down four ultimate elements to correspond to four of the five senses, Kanada found his imagination exercised to find a correspondence for the sense of hearing, and, in his perplexity, immediately hit upon Ether as the source of sound. The Vaisheshikas have no idea of Ether as a medium of motion without which things cannot move about in space ; but their fifth category is a fanciful stuff conceived to be essential as the source of sound, as already noticed, and as an element necessary to impart magnitude to the ultimate units of matter or atoms. Their conceptions of Time and Space are also involved and unintelligible. They regard time as only the principle of change, which, as such, cannot be held to be a reality or substance ; and space is said to be the "Reality, Power or Force, holding things in their relative positions even while they are being driven on " (The Hindu Realism, p. 29). We shall have more to say about the nature of Time and Space later on ; meanwhile it is clear that no true element of reality or ultimate substance is to be found in the description given.

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697 The eighth reality of the system of Kanada is manas, the cause of succession in sensation and thought. It is, however, acknowledged to be not a reality by itself, but only a material organ, the instrument of experience (The Hindu Realism, p. 93). Its classification under a separate head, as a reality, is illogical under the circumstances. THE SIDDHANTA. All this suffices to show that the Vaisheshika system is neither scientific nor logical in its analysis. To proceed with our subject, the reduction of the world-process to the six primary or ultimate substances brings the old conflict between Advaita and Dualism once more to the front. Let us see what Jainism has to say on the point, and how it meets the arguments of its adversaries, in its turn. Notwithstanding that its own doctrine implies a multiplicity of souls, Jainism finds fault, to begin with, with the systems which preach absolute 'Dualism' and maintain that the individuals have nothing in common between them. It points out that, while the individuals are independent in respect of their individuality, they possess many qualities in common with one another, which goes to indicate that they have a common nature. This seems, at first sight, to lead to the tenet of Vedanta, but when the argument advanced against that system itself is taken into consideration a very different result is reached. The argument proceeds in the following manner : "The self cannot create the self. That means that Adwaitism cannot explain, without some duality to help, how the all-in-all gave rise to itself, or to the other-than-itself. Again, has the Adwaita doctrine any evidence to prove its truth? It may have it, or it may 62

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698 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. be its own justification. In the former case, the evidence brings in a duality, in the latter, Adwaitism is condemned as unproved, as nothing can be its own proof."* If Vedanta calls in the aid of Maya, Jainism declares it to be out of court, on the ground that that which does not exist has no right to be heard, or introduced. Nor does it allow Vedanta to open its mouth to formulate an argument in reply, since that would be the recoguition of the objector whose argument is to be met. Further, as two or more irreconcilable attributes cannot inhere in one substance, and since the attributes of consciousness and life are inconsistent with the nature of Maya, which is jara, it follows that there are more substances than one in existence. Vedanta, on the other hand, might retort that two or more substances possessing any attributes in common cannot be granted. The six substances must possess existence in common, in order to exist. They must, therefore, owe their origin to one and the same source, which alone is the real substance that exists. To this Jainism might again object on the ground that if we grant a single substance of an unchanging nature as pure, quality-less existence, it is inconceivable how attributes and modifications can possibly arise from or in it. In reply to this, Vedanta points out that the attributes and qualities exist for perception alone and inhere in the intellect, not in things or substances. This, however, brings us back only to the point from which we started ; because the intellect"and the attributes which appertain to or inhere in it must both ** An Introduction to Jainisin hy N. Rangaji.

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THE SIDDHANTA. 699 possess some kind of substantiveness in order to exist; and the moment this is conceded, 'there is no escape from the dictum of the Jaina philosophy and its six realities. Vedanta now takes refuge behind the nature of Maya which it describes as inconceivable and for ever beyond the reach of intellect. But this is really tantamount to throwing up the brief, for no one has a right to preach what is inconceivable to him. Now, if the Vedantist maintain that he understands what he is talking about, Maya ceases to be incomprehensible; but if he say that he has not been able to comprehend it well, then he is talking of things which he does not understand, and has no right to be heard. For similar reasons, Jainism is not prepared to accept the doctrine of those who say that consciousness arises from moment to moment. If this were true, it would follow that the mind is formed from successive sensations received from external objects, or is generated from time to time, i.e., in each moment, afresh. "This is met by pointing out that on this theory, the mind that determines upon killing an animal is not the mind that kills it the next moment; hence this latter commits the act without any motivo and responsibility. And, further, the mind that has to suffer the consequences of this sin is neither the mind that planned the act nor the one that executed the plan......... If knowledge consists of passing sensations without the unity of apperception' to connect them, there can be no recognition."* We next come to Buddhism, whose philosophy lays all the stress it can on the notion of a perpetual "becoming." This system is also one-sided. Its conception ** An Introduction to Jainism' by N. Rangaji.

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700 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of becoming is magnificent, but in the absence of true being, must ever remain incomplete. It maintains that Life is a current, the causal activity, which is never in the same state twice. Bergson's philosophy, which has stirred modern thought so much, for the most part, follows the Buddhistic notion of "becoming." It maintains that the whole universe is a flux or system of different activities or processes from whose operation arise all kinds of forms. The latter are also activities, though of a less intense type. These activities are further inconceivable in themselves, for they are processes, and therefore, inaccessible to intellect. Their nature is only felt in intuition, not conceived in thought. The view presented is that of an universe which is the resultant of certain eternal processes--a perpetual becoming, with nothing permanent, fixed or stable about it. As for the merit of the doctrine, it is unquestionably true, in so far as it points out the fact that all material phenomena are constantly undergoing change ; but how can a system whose very foundation is beyond the reach of thought ever yield satisfaction to the rational intellect? If the right intuition* be wanting, how is its lack to be * It is a fashion, it seems, with irrational mystics to rely on their own intuitions whenever they are unable to explain a phenomenon intellectually, there is one obvious advantage in this, and that is that the change of front is so sudden and unexpected that in a majority of cases the opponent is completely taken by surprise and finds no escape except by a direct denial of the truth of the assertion, which politeness and good manners do not permit to be made, and which can only lead to unpleasantness. The fact is that except where it is taken to mean omniscience, or other higher kinds of knowledge, such as pure or super-clairvoyance, the claim to the possession of which can be easily tested, intuition is no argument nor a guarantee against self

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THE SIDDHANTA. 701 made up ? Mr. Hugh S. R. Elliot, the author of "Modern Science and The Illusions of Professor Bergson," denies that every one possesses that kind of intuition which enables one to realize the truth of this philosophy; and he is probably not the only one who holds that opinion. The question is, how is he to be met ? That the philosophy is true is no answer, since it has to be proved, before assent can be given to its accuracy. This is not the only difficulty with the advocates of the phi. losophy of Change. How is a universe to be constructed, in Time and Space, from pure becoming ? In what way, again, do the different processes differ from one another ? Have they no fixed types of their own? What again is recollection, and who exercises it, and how ? Further, how comes it that the flux happens to have selected a direction which is fraught with pain and misery to the untold millions of individuals who appear on its surface in the course of its unceasing, unending, and apparently aimless journey? What is the goal which it is marching towards ? Such are the difficulties which arise in the path of the philosophers of change, who have nothing else but pure becoming at the root of the world-process. If they will only reflect sufficiently on the nature of deception, in ordinary cases it is merely synonymous with a sense of inner conviction, all the more vague, unreasoning and unreliable because not proceeding from intellectual determination. If such random flashes of native wit could be accepted as furnishing accurate data for human guidance, every lunatic would have a right to fill the chair of philosophy or to rank as a patron of science. There must be a guarantee against self-deception in the declarant, and no guarantee is good enough from a man who is not able to remove the element of vagueness from his own convictions,

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702 the problem, they will not fail to perceive that it is clearly impossible to construct a material world without positing, in the first instance, certain kinds of constant units, particles or atoms, from whose combination bodies could be made. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The insufficiency of a system of thought which proposes to construct a solid, material world from pure processes, becoming or change is evident from the very terms employed to give it expression. For a process is a movement of a something, and not a thing by itself, while becoming and change are equally impossible in the absence of a material substratum, or basis, in which they might inhere. Thus, where there is nothing to proceed or pass from one state to another, there can be no process, becoming or changing there, and the only harvest one can hope to gather from this kind of sowing is a whirlwind of wordy abstractions. The beautiful simile of the flame of a lamp which the Enlightened One, as Buddha was called by his followers, employed to illustrate his philosophy is only valuable in relation to forms; it is utterly misleading in the department of substance the absence of which would be fatal to the very existence of things. For while it is true that the universe is a changing, shifting panorama like the flame of a lamp, in which luminous particles are being constantly replaced by others of their kind, it is also true that no change whatsoever is ever known to or can possibly occur in respect of the ultimate basis of all changes themselves. As Jainism points out, every substance is characterised by the three-fold phenomenon of origination, destruction

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THE SIDDHANTA. 703 and continuation at one and the same time. Of these, the first two appertain to form without which no substance can ever be found to exist in nature, and the last is the characteristic of the material aspect of substances, For instance, in a gold ring there is origination of ringness and destruction of the previous form---bar-ness, lump-ness, and the like--accompanied by the continuation of gold as a substance throughout, that is both when existing in the form of a bar, or lump, as well as in that of the ring It is true that not being a true substance but only a form of matter, gold itself is subject to origination and destruction ; but it is inconceivable how without the continuity of the ultimate substance,-matter,-goldness, bar-ness or ringness could have inhered, originated or disappeared in pure nothing. We must, therefore, concede that pure becoming, or change, is utterly inadequate and insufficient as a cause of the world-process. The Jaina View of the nature of reality (substance) is well described by Mr. V.R. Gandhi, who, speaking at a meeting of the East India Association (London), on May the 21st 1900, observed :-- "Noumenon and phenomenon are not two separate existences, but only two modes of our looking upon the full contents of a thing, part of which is known and part unknown to us now. The fallacy in the popular mind in reference to these terms is that of confounding logical distinction with an actual separation. In the Buddhist view nothing is permanent. Transitoriness is the only reality. As professor Oldenberg says: The speculation of the Brahmans apprehended being in all being, that of the Buddhists becoming in all apparent being "The Jainas, on the contrary, consider being and becoming as two different and complementary ways of our viewing the same thing.

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704 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Reality in the Jaina view is a permanent subject of changing states. To be, to stand in relation, to be active, to act upon other things. to oboy law, to be a cause, to be a permanent subject of states, to be the same to-day as yesterday, to be identical in spite of its varying activities, these are the Jaina conceptions of reality. More becoming is as much an abstraction as mere being. In short, being and becoming are complements of the full notion of a reality." * C This is also the reply which Jainism gives to Vedanta concerning the nature of existence. Pure existence is a logical abstraction, and can exist by itself only in thought. In actual life, existence means to subsist with reference to material, place, time and qualities; but that only means to co-exist with other things. In this manner does Jainism pull down the structure of different philosophies with its ruthless logic. But has it anything to offer us itself in return for the damage it does to our beliefs? Yes, it has; and that which it offers us is not only free from the faults which it points out in other systems, but is also the only satisfactory explanation of things and facts of experience which rational thought can accept. Jainism points out that all the above schools of thought have fallen into error on account of their onesidedness. They only look at things from one particular point of view, and ignore all others. This is not the way to deal with the living Reality which overflows mental speculation on all sides. Hence, if any one wishes to get hold of the whole truth, he must first put himself in different attitudes to study things from all possible points of view. This particular method of study, called the anekanta, is the one which Jainism itself adopts. With its aid it not only points out the element of truth in *See 'The Jaina Philosophy,' App., pp. 20 and 21. *

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THE SIDDHANTA. 705 all other religions, but also rectifies their errors. It gives us a many-sided, and, therefore, necessarily true, view of things. It says:-- "The idea is not true; also the individual is not true. But they are both true from different points of view. When the speaker lays stress on the one, he is speaking of the many with only an implication. If the many are to the front, the one is not ignored but referred to only as secondary. The truth is neither in the one, nor in the muny; but it lies in the one in the many, or the many in the one. Every individual implies an idea, and every idea presupposes the individuals. Existence as well as knowledge are governed by this relativity. Being possessed of the qualities of existence, all things are one. So again looking at the modifications, or considering the differences due to material, place, time, and quality, it is manifest that every thing is different from every thing else, Transferring the same idea to modern philosophy, the subject is the origin of all knowledge, because he is the one in the many, and thus he it is that makes the many possible. Exactly the same consideration applies to the objects that give the subject all its contents. The subject differs from the objects by the rationality, and the objects are different from the subject by their Satswaroop, or the quality of being,'-- this is not tenable, since the subject also is characterised by the Satswaroop. The difference would deprive both the knower and the known of their reality. If the knower is without Satta, the known would be non-existent. If the known is Asat, the knower, who is constituted by the known, would also become Asat. So in reality or Satta, there is no disparity between the subject and the object. The difference is only Kuthanchit, i.e., here, from the standpoint of rationality residing in the one and materiality residing in the many."* It is this view which we have been elaborating slowly in the preceding pages, and there can be no doubt but that this is also the view which accounts for the element of incompatibility and discord in different religions. For instance, we can see that * An Introduction to Jainism' by N. Rangaji. 53

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706 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the final truth of the Advaita Vedanta is the same as that of the Jaina Siddhanta, notwithstanding that they are opposed to each other in almost all other things. This is due to the fact that Advaitism confines itself to the point of view of the essence, totally ignoring all others, while Jainism is comprehensive and all-embracing. They both teach that the Atman and Paramatman are one ; both maintain that the essence is only one; but Jainism, more scientific and exact as it is in giving expression to the culminating thought, rightly adds, 'when looked at from the standpoint of the essence. The addition of these nine words would make the teaching of Vedanta acceptable to the world at large which at present derides it. For Brahman is not a unit, but a sum, the infinite. Vedanta would be wrong if it were to adhere to the popular sense of the word 'one'; Dualism would be false if it professed to teach a multiplicity of 'sums.' * Applying these observations to the question of the unity or multiplicity of souls, we may say that both Dualism and Adwaitism are right from their respective standpoints, but they only express partial truth. The Absolute when conceived as Existence is one ; but many when thought of in reference to the individuals through which it manifests itself. A recent work on Jainism puts the case fairly when it says : "Here some one might choose to ridicule this theory, by observing that if Atman can become Paramatman, then it means that the Jainas believe, not in one God, but in many. In answer to this, it must be borne in mind that the Jainas are the followers not of Aikanta, but of Anekanta. Their belief is not that God is absolutely one or many.

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707 According to Jain principles, from one point of view God is one, but from another, he is not only many, but infinite. With reference to His Svabhava or Swarupa (Omniscient and perfect status), He is one, but as regards the Atmans in which that perfect status has been manifested, He is infinite. In reality, Jainism does not worship any particular individuality, but that Perfect, Pure and Good status in which Atman exists as All-knowing, All-seeing, All-powerful, Allhappy and Vitraga. In Jainism prominence is given not to individuality, but to the status in which Atman becomes Paramatman, and that status, whatever may be the number of souls individually, is identically the one and the same."* THE SIDDHANTA. Jainism, thus, starts from the reality of the essence as well as the individual, and leads us to the highest heights of thought, without destroying either. From the point of view of the one, the many are transitory, hence, in a sense, illusory; but from that of the latter, the one is only seated distributively among them. How would a redeemed Soul feel?-is a question which can be answered by combining the two points of view, since a Saved One would possess perfect knowledge. He would, then, know Himself to be the enjoyer of a status which, as such, is only one and indivisible, but which is all the same enjoyed by all those who have been redeemed. This, then, is the true definition of Brahman or the Absolute, as some people insist on calling It. The word Brahman usually indicates existence or consciousness. But reflection shows that existence and consciousness are pure abstractions of thought, like fluidity, manhood, or any other abstract quality. We are in the habit of abstracting away the qualities found in common between a certain number of individuals or things, forgetting that, apart from thought, they are not *An Insight into Jainism.'

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708 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. capable of existing by themselves. Just as fluidity is inconceivable as existing by itself and independently of a liquid or fluid material, so are not existence and consciousness capable of existing apart from beings and things. The fact is that qualities can only inhere in substances, and substances are only bundles of qualities. It is not permissible to make a separation between them in thought. Hence, the moment we make a division between jnana (the quality of consciousness) and the jnani (a conscious being, or knower), we deprive the two terms of existence and render them incapable of entering into relations with each other. Suppose we start from the proposition that jnana is a separate thing from the jndni. Then either the jnani was ignorant prior to his 'picking up' the quality of jnana, or was a ' knowing being.' If the latter, jnana adds nothing to his being, and may be ignored. If the former, he was ignorant either by nature or in consequence of being permeated with the quality of ignorance. If we now say that he was ignorant because of his nature, he can never subsequently become illumined; but if we say that his ignorance was the result of the assimilation of the quality of ignorance, he must be considered to be a jndni, in the first instance. Moreover, jnana, when separated from the jnani, can only exist either as a knower or as an object of knowledge. But in the former case, its separation from the jnani is imaginary; and in the latter, it loses its characteristic and becomes objectified into bodies and relations which constitute knowledge only when they are cognized by a knowing being. Hence, the actual separa

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THE SIDDIANTA. 709 tion of jnana and jnani can only result in the destruction of both. We must, therefore, say that ji vas are many, though they all manifest the one and the same essence. When we look at the number of individuals, attention is directed to the many, but to the one when we look at the Essence. This is precisely the view which is taken of God hood in the book of Genesis. In the 26th verse of the first chapter of that book it is said : "And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." The italicized words are quite significant. As if to remove all possibility of mistake and misunderstanding, the author again refers to the subject in the 22nd verse of the third chapter, where the Lord God is made to say: "Behold the man has become as one of us." The words 'as one of us are too significant to be ignored, and unerringly point to the idea of God being that of a great Mountain of Light consisting of an infinity of smaller lights, all interpenetrating one another, and, thus, presenting manyness in the one and one-ness in the many. Even the serpent tempts Adam and Eve by promising them the status of Gods (Genesis, III, 5). So far as Islam is concerned, we have already shown, in our third chapter, that the concept of Allah is that of unity in multiplicity, whether we tracu the word to Al-lah, or regard it as a contraction of Al-ilah; for the former signifies a hidden Flame, i.e., Consciousness, which is pluralistic in form, though singular in essence; and the latter is, on the face of it, a plurality

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710 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of Knowing Lights. The same is the case with the word God, which, as the Imperial Dictionary shows, originally conveyed a pluralistic idea of the Deity. Turning to Zoroastrianism, we find the same idea of a pluralistic Godhead. The Ahuras are many as well as one, according to the Holy Scriptures of the Parsis. Commenting upon the idea of God, Mr. E. Edward writes in the Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics (Vol. VI, pp. 291 and 292). "The ahuras.........Shem to have gradually gained in prestige, and, apparently at a very early epoch, one of them had become the Ahura par excellence." Mr. Edward's idea of a progressive monotheism is naturally based on the notion of evolution from a state of savageness to one of civilization ; but this is hardly tenable in the light of our knowledge, especially as there is a complete explanation of the idea of plurality inseparable from the nature of Divinity. We not only find the pluralistic conception of God in almost all the religions of the world, but also the significant number 24 expressly mentioned in several of them. Even Zoroastrianism, which undoubtedly inspired many a prophet of the Old Testament fame, gives the precise number of Gods as four and twenty. These are not to be confounded with purely mythological gods, which are mere personifications of the aspects of consciousness, as we saw in the analysis of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, but are to be taken as explained in Jainism. Modern writers generally fall into error in understanding the doctrines of religion, because they have little

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THE SIDDHANTA, 711 or no idea of its basic principles. Hence, they only see the personifications of constellations and stars everywhere in all gods. Prof. Cumont takes these 24 Gods to be the 24 stars, outside the Zodiac, 'twelve in the northern and twelve in the southern hemisphere, which, being sometimes visible, sometimes invisible, become the judges of the living and the dead.' According to Zimmern, they are the twenty-four constellations which are set in circles round the polar stars, as the 24 Spiritual Kings of the book of Revelation are set round the Throne. To this Moulton objects as follows (Early Zoroastrianism, p. 402): " This may or may not convince us. But what does he mean when he goes on to remark that these 24 signs are of course' 24 divisions of the Zodiac?...Diodorus expressly says these were outside the Zodiac, and Zimmern's remark implies that they are not far from the poles." To our thinking, the word Ahura Mazdah, when used in the singular number, denotes either the Supreme Status or the Siddha Atmans, the 'Blessed Ones', taken collectively, and in the plural form the 24 most glorious Siddhas. This is evident from Yasna XXVIII. 9, which records : "With these bounties, 0 Ahura, may we never provoke your wrath, O Mazdah and Right and Best thought,... Ye are they that are mightiest to advance desires and Dominion of Blessings" (Early Zoroastrianism,' p. 346). The same idea underlies the teaching in Yasna LI, 20, which reads: "Your blessings shall ye give us, all ye that are one in will, with whom Right, Good Thought, Piety, and Mazdah (are one), according to promise, giving your aid when worshipped with reverence." The idea of God, thus, is that of perfection, which

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712 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. any number of souls may attain to, though no particular individual has an exclusive right to that high and sublime status. The popular fallacy in this respect lies in the personification of a status as a being, and in confounding the ideal with the individuals who bring it into realization. The above is well expressed in the Bible, in the memorable words of John, the divine, as one seated on the throne from which proceed thunder and lightnings, * and which is surrounded by four and twenty seats on which sit the twenty-four Elders all robed in white and wearing crowns of gold. This represents the sublime status of the twenty-four Tirthamkaras in whom the one Living Essence is most fully and perfectly manifested. It is the idea of the 'One in the Twenty-four.' Then follows that of the Twenty-four in the One,' which is described as follows : "When those beasts give glory and honour and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever, the four and twenty elders fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power, for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created." The four beastst with eyesi in both directions are the * Thunder and lightnings signify the explosive nature of life. t of the four beasts alluded to here, the lion and the eagle point at once to their respective types, since the lion walks on earth, and, therefore, represents the earth-bodied jivas, while the eagle flies in the air and thus points to the air-bodied. Of the remaining two, the one with the face of a man is typical of the super-human type, - devas, or angels, whose bodies are popularly supposed to be made of the element of fire on account of their phosphorescent splendour. This leaves the calf to be explained. Now, the calf is not only the young of the cow, but, also, of themarine mammalia, e.g., the whale (Imperial Dictionary); hence, it is typical of the water-bodied creatures, I The metaphor of eyes' is also to be found in the Hindu

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713 THE SIDDHANTA. four classes of living beings, that is, those whose bodies are made of the four different kinds of matter, namely, the air-bodied, the fire-bodied, the water-bodied, and the earth-bodied. The six wings of each of these beasts have a reference to the descending and ascending arcs of Time, called Avasarpini and Utsarpini respectively. The aras (spokes), of which there are six on each arc, probably refer to the divisions of time in which the four kinds of jivas undergo different kinds of experiences, on account of the changes of Time. After this brief prelude, we may proceed to consider 4 Mythology. Indra, the god of the thunder-bolt, is said to have committed adultery with Ahalya, the wife of his spiritual preceptor, Gautama, for which he was punished with a thousand disgraceful marks all over his body. These marks were, however, subsequently changed into eyes, which, according to Mr. W. J. Wilkins, the author of Hindu Mythology' came to be regarded, by the ignorant, as marks of his omniscience.' The interpretation of this myth gives us, in a few words, the nature of Life and the effect of its manifestation in matter. Indra is Life, the god who holds in his hands thunder and lightning. He is ever-joyous and fond of Soma, the intoxicating nectar of bliss. Ahalya is the wife of Gautama, the sage, who is an impersonation of wisdom, i,e., intellect. The wife of intellect is matter, since intellect primarily only deals with matter and form. The word Ahalya means night, i.e., darkness, as well as unploughed soil, and is thus suggestive of matter. Therefore, the mythological adultery of Indra with Ahalya only signifies the entry of Will, or Life, into matter, in consequence of which jivas appear as ugly spots on the body of Indra. These jivas subsequently evolve out self consciousness, in the course of spirit ual evolution; hence the disgraceful marks are changed into 'eyes' on the body of the god. Mr. Wilkin's observation about the ignorance of those who regard these 'eyes' as marks of Indra's Omniscience needs no further comment. 54

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714 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the nature of the part assigned to the twenty-four Elders in the Apocalyptic drama. The worshipping of the one, that is the Essence of Being or Life, is the symbol of the recognition of its one-ness in all the twenty-four* Perfected Souls. Hence the idea conveyed is that of the One-ness of Life, as distinguished from the twenty-four perfect Beings in whom it is manifested. Lest some pious but unthinking Christian be inclined to think that the one on the throne is the Jesus of the Gospels, we desire to add that the historical Jesus is nowhere to be found in this drama, but the redeemed Soul may be said to be the Lamb whose conquest is described in the subsequent chapters of the Apocalypse. Hence, Jesus, t and, in general, every aspiring Soul, may be said to be represented by the Lamb, who unseals the Book of Life, written inside and at the back, i.e., in the matter of the spinal marrow, and sealed with the seven chakras (psychic centres) of yoga. In the state of moksha, then, the Soul is robed in its natural garment of bliss which enables it to recog. nize its one-ness with Life, and yet retain its individuality as that of the conquering jiva. As such, it rises upto the top-most part of the universe, called the Siddha Sila, and resides there for ever, free from transmigration, i.e., the liability to repeated births and deaths. The storehouse of unevolved jivas is the region * Twenty-four is also the number of Buddhas according to Buddhistic belief, though some claim for Gautama Buddha the privilege of being the twenty-fifth. + As a matter of fact, John employs the word 'Jesus' in the Book of Revelation in the sense of soul.'

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715 called nigoda where an infinite number of them exist from all eternity. The nigoda is the portion of the universe situated below the hells. Here evolution is almost at a standstill and is proceeding so slowly as to be almost imperceptible. From this condition jivas are constantly A jiva in passing into the higher states of evolution. this state is almost unconscious of himself. THE SIDDHANTA. Jivas in nigoda exist in two forms: either as groupsouls which have a common mouth, or as separate individuals. Some of these after entering into higher forms of evolution again fall back into the condition of nigoda and are called itara nigoda. These are they who are said to go to the 'outer darkness,' in the language of the Bible. In the accompanying diagram is given the map of the universe, showing the nigoda and the siddhasila. The following description of the latter place is given in the Scripture: * "Twelve yojanas above the Vimana Sarvartha is the place called Ishatpragbhara, which has the form of an umbrella: where the perfected souls go. It is 45,00,000 yojanas long, and as many broad, and it is somewhat more than three times as many in circumference. Its thickness is eight yojanas, it is greatest in the middle, and decreases towards the margin, till it is thinner than the wing of a fly. "This place, by nature pure, consisting of white gold, resembles in form an open umbrella, as has been said by the best of Jinas. Above it is a pure blessed place called Sita, which is white like a conch-shell, the anka-stone, and Kunda flowers; a yojana thence is the end of the world. There, at the top of the world, reside the blessed perfected souls, rid of all transmigration, and arrived at the The Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XLV, pp. 211-212,

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716 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. MAP OF THE LOKA.-(The Universe.) THE SIDDHASILA OR THE ABODE OF THE MOST HIGH. PER E2 URDHYA 00: S A CELESTIAL -> LOKA REGIONS. ALOK A_ MADHYA LOKA - TEMPORAL WORLD ALOK KA S A ADHO NETHER LOKA. REGIONS. GH ANODAJHI VATA-VALAYA. (Humid-air Envelope.) GHANA VATA.YALAYA. (Dense-air Envelope.) TANU VATA.VALAYA.-(Raritied-air Envelope.) Explanation of figures in the diagram : I. Five Anuttaras. II Nine Anudishas. III. Nine Graivikas. 16 | 1. Saudharma. 2. Eeshana. 3. Sanata. 4. Mahendra. 5. Brahma. 6. BrahCelestial mottra 7. Lantava 8. Kapishta 9. Shukra. 10. Mahashukra. 11. Shatara Regions. 12. Sahasrara 13. Anata. 14. Pranata. 15. Arana, 16. Achyuta. i Kharabhaga. ii Pankabhaga. 7 Netherl. Dhamma. 2. Vansha. 3. Megha. 4. Anjana. 5. Aristhag 6. Maghvi Regions. 17 Maghvi. For a different set of names of the seven Hells, see ante p. 272, footnote.

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THE SIDDHANTA 717 excellent state of perfection. They have no visible form, they consist of life throughout, and they are developed into knowledge and faith, they have crossed the boundary of the Samsara and reached the excellent state of perfection." It is to be observed that the form of the Lokakasha, as described in the diagram, is necessarily given on the high and unimpeachable authority of the all-knowing Siddha Bhagwans themselves. Those who have no faith in Their Word need not accept it as correct; but it is essentially a matter of geography which depends more on testimony than logic. For the theologian, the matter is not only not open to dispute, but concluded by authority, since almost all religions describe the Microcosm (the body of man) to be a copy of the Macrocosm (the universe). The central region, called the madhyaloka, is not to be taken as confined to our world alone. It includes a large number of vast continents' and 'seas,' such as the Jambu-Dvipa, the Lavana Samudra, and the like, lying one after another in an unbroken succession. Modern Orientalists have found it difficult to identify these continents' and ' seas,' and failing to understand the text, have jumped to the conclusion that the Jainas were hopelessly ignorant of geography. The fact, however, seems to be that the text refers to the principal divisions of the universe, and not to our little globe alone, though the latter is also included in the central division called the Jambu-Dvipa. Below the mndhyaloka are the hells, seven in num. ber which are situated above the nigoda, one on the top of another; and above it sixteen heavens on eight storeys where pain and misery are the least known. Above

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718 these are higher celestial regions-graivikas, anudishas and anuttaras-where all but perfect happiness prevails; and above these is the holy Siddha Sila which is the abode of Those who have reached the other shore. The whole of the region below this Abode of Gods is the region of transmigration, known as samsara, which is to be crossed with the aid of the Teacher's Word. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. To revert to the nature of the soul, jiva or spirit is a substance whose function is to know; and, as shown in an earlier chapter, every soul is endowed by nature with a capacity for infinite knowledge and bliss. As such, every unredeemed soul is like a contracted aspect of knowledge and joy--an idea-rhythm or globule of wisdom charged with bliss. It is not made of matter, though being a substance it cannot be altogether 'immaterial.' As regards its dimensions, the soul is an expanding and contracting substance, and has no fixed size of its own prior to the attainment of salvation. It is obvious that the soul cannot be smaller than its physical body, for in that case it will not be able to feel the bodily affections as its own. This will be readily agreed to if we take into consideration the proposition that pleasure and pain being affections of the ego, that is to say, modifications of the soul-substance, it is impossible to feel either in a place which is not pervaded by the soul. If it be said that a mental message is received by the soul from the seat of the trouble, then the reply is that there would be no feeling of pleasure or pain on such an assumption; for just as it is impossible for a man to experience the actual sensation of burning and physi

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TAE SIDDHANTA. 719 cal pain on the receipt of a message that his house is on fire, however much he might be distressed by the piece of information mentally, in the same way and precisely for the same reasons it is not possible for the soul to experience pleasure or pain in a place where it is not. And, lastly, even if it be assumed that physical pain could be caused by the message, then the feeling would be confined to the substance of the soul itself, and thus to the cavity of the heart or wherever else the soul might be located, but not at the seat of trouble. Actual experience, however, demonstrates only too clearly that the feeling of pain is not confined to any particular locality in the organism, but may be experienced all over the body. This unmistakably proves the pervasion of the whole body by the soul. A possible objection to this view is that because our sensations are felt successively and not simultaneously, therefore, the soul cannot be present in every part of the body. But there is no force in it; for the succession of sensations arises from and is due to the fact that exclusive attention to any particular part of the system affects the sensitivity of the soul in other parts, rendering it insensitive to other stimuli for the time being. If it be said now that the sensitivity of the soul is not affected by exclusive attention being paid to any particular sensation, but that the succession is due to the barrier of mind which can only be crossed by the centripetal impulses one by one, then there ought to be no limit to the number of interviewers' with the soul on the other side of the mental bar, for the barrier being once crossed, there is no further obstacle to prevent these

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720 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, 'visitors' from the without from joining one another and presenting themselves, hand in hand, to the soul. It is thus clear that unless the soul itself become impervious to all except the sensory stimulus to which it may be attending at the time, it ought to feel all those of its affections which arise together simultaneously, that is at one and the same time. But since this is never known to take place in actual experience, the argument conclusively proves our proposition. It will be further observed that the function of mind in the economy of life, is not of making the soul feel the sensory stimulus in a place where it is not, as some persons maintain, for that would be tantamount to a mental fiction pure and simple, but of summoning any particular impulse, at will, into the centre of the most intensely conscious part of the field, diverting it from its normal path where it would have invariably exhausted itself in the shape of a motor discharge. When a sensory impulse is called up by the mind, it travels along a nervous loop- if we may so call the arrangement which connects the system of what are technically known as direct reflexes with the mechanism of mind--and is then subjected to a deliberative analysis, more or less elaborate according to the development of the individual. This happens only in those beings who are endowed with a mind; in the lower animals which are not so endowed, and which cannot, therefore, pause, postpone, deliberate, compare, or nicely weigh one motive against another, the movement at once passes through the prescribed channels of reflexes into a motor discharge, resulting in the contraction

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THE SIDDHANTA. 721 of a muscle. Such animals cannot exercise any choice, and are fatally condemned to perform the prescribed movement, no matter what the circumstances be. This shows that the mind is an instrument of selection in regard to the movement to be executed, and of analysis with regard to the movement received, which it can shunt off along any particular motor track in the system, checking and diverting its course at will. This is sufficient to show that the function of mind is not to make a sensation felt in a place different from that where it should be felt, but only to analyse it, permitting or checking its natural reflexes or substituting others for them at will, at the same time. The objection therefore fails in its entirety and we must, accordingly, conclude that the soul is not confined to any particular locality in the body, but pervades every part of it within its periphery. Now, since the body is not constant, but a thing which grows from small dimensions, it follows that the soul cannot have a permanent size of its own so long as it is involved in transmigration. This amounts to saying that the soul is an expanding and contracting substance; it begins from a microscopical size in the female womb and goes on expanding with its body till it attain its full proportions. Finally, that is, at the end of each earthly life, it is contracted again into the seed of the next incarnation to undergo the expanding process once more. Thus does the jiva continue to expand and contract in its different bodies, in the course of transmigration, till nirvana be reached. 55

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722 TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The Hindu philosopher, Ramanuja, seems to take the same view when he says : The souls and matter are asatya or unreal, which again means that they are subject to modification, which is necessarily an element of impurity. In the case of souls, this modification takes the form of expansion or contraction of Intelligence."--Sri Ramanajacharya, by T. R. Chariar, p. 53. Concerning the locus of the soul, the following passage which occurs in Maher's Psychology is full of interest for us : "There has been much discussion among philosophers, Ancient and Modern, regarding the precise part of the body to be assigned as the seat of the soul. Some have located it in the heart, others in the head, others in various portions of the brain. . . The hopelessly conflicting state of opinion on the question would seem to be due to the erroneous but widely prevalent view, that the simplicity of essence or substance possessed by the soul is a spatial simplicity akin to that of a mathematical point. As a consequence, fruitless etfcrts have continually been made to discover some general nerve centre, some focus from which lines of communication radiato to all districts of the body. The indivisibility, however, of the soul, just as that of intelligence and volition, does not consist in the minuteness of a point. The soul is an immaterial energy which, thongh not constituted of separate principles or parts alongside of parts, is yet capable of exercising its virtue throughout an extended subject. Such a reality does not, like a material entity, occupy different parts of space by different parts of its own mass. In scholastic phraseology it was described as present throughout the body, which it enlivens, not circumscriptive, but definitive; not per contactum quantitatis but per contactum virtutis. Its presence is not that of an extended object the different parts of which fill and are circumscribed by corresponding areas of space, but of an immaterial energy exerting its proper activities ubiquitously thronghout the living body. "The soul is present though in a non-quantitative manner, throughout Che whole body: moreover, it is so present everywhere in the entirety of its essence, although it may not be capable of ubiquitously therein exercising all its faculties. ... ... ... Those activities ...

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THE SIDDHANTA. 723 ... ... which require a special organ are limited to the district occupied by the bodily instrument. In so far as the material subject by the limits of which vital activity in general is defined and conditioned increases or diminishes, the soul may be said in figurative language to experience virtual increase or diminution-an expansion or contraction in the sphere and range of its forces ; but there is no real quantitative increase in the substance of the soul itself." The soul's 'diffusion in the body cannot be compared with any other case of diffusion in nature, for the soul is a simple substance and altogether devoid of parts. The difficulty that is felt in connection with the notion of expansion and contraction of such a simple entity lies in the fact that the human mind is almost exclusively adapted to deal with quantitative phenomena, and comes to grief wlien endeavouring to picture to itself the extension of that which is not composed of different elements and parts. But, as Maher S. J. urges, imagination is no test of possibi lity. The analogy of light may be employed to illustrate the point to a certain exterit; for as the sphere of light increases or diminishes, according as it is placed in a small room or a big hall, or by the employment of different kinds of covers, though they do not in any sense affect its diffusion quantitatively, so does the soul expand and contract to fill up different bodies. That the conception of the living Force or Rhythm should be somewhat puzzling to the unphilosophical mind, is but only natural. For consciousness is not a thing like stone or metal, but a living and knowing substance, called Spirit by the ancients to distinguish it from matter. It is the subjective

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724 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. aspect of Thought, the living Essence of life. The question, why should a substance perform all these functions ?- is inadmissible. Philosophy is only concerned with finding out things as they exist, and not with creating them to suit the whims of its interlocutors. One might just as well ask : why should matter be inert, space extended, time fleeting, and so forth? The point is not whether the mind can picture a simple substance as an extended entity, but whether the soul does or does not perform the functions which have been ascribed to it, and as to this there can be no doubt but that its 'diffusion in the body is absolutely essential for the reasons given. Vedanta describes the jiva as the pratibimba (reflection) of the Self, but the description is in no sense accurate, since a pratibimba is only the effect of a number of luminous rays thrown on a surface and reflected back, like the reflection of the sun in water. The jiva, not being an effect, like the reflected image, cannot be a reflection of anything, but is an independent reality existing by itself. The idea that the jiva is the pratibimba of Brahman can be true only in so far as it has the potentiality of becoming Brahman, not otherwise. But in so far as the jiva is a centre of thought, or idea-rhythm, it is the builder of its own form, which it makes according to the paramount tendencies of its character, or disposition. Hence the body which it builds for itself, is the reflection of its mind. Every creature, in this sense, is the pratibimba of its own character ; but it is impossible to carry this principle any further, except in the sense

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725 that every jiva enfolds, within its own form, the germ of the divine status which will be attained on reaching Nirvana. For, if the jiva be only a pratibimba of consciousness, how comes it to be endowed with consciousness? Observation certainly does not support the supposition of understanding, will and memory in pure reflections. THE SIDDHANTA. Passing on to a consideration of the question, whether motion be a property of pure spirit, reflection shows that the soul is unmoving by nature; it can only move from place to place with the aid of matter. If the soul were to move about, it would do so either because it is its nature to do so, or because it is subject to the forces of attraction and repulsion of matter; but so far as the former alternative is concerned, there is absolutely nothing to suggest that motion is a characteristic of pure spirit, and in regard to the latter, its subjection to the material forces of nature is exactly of the same sort as that of the insect which is drawn to a magnet because it would not give up its hold on a piece of iron filing besmeared with honey. There is absolutely nothing to show that the soul, in its natural purity, is liable to be influenced by the operation of the physical forces of attraction and repulsion to which matter is undoubtedly subject. As a matter of fact the soul can override gravitation itself in the twinkling of an eye if it be self-conscious. A partial confirmation of this is to be found in the fact that while lifeless, unconscious things cannot break away from this powerful force, we jump, dance and walk about in defiance of it, at our merest will. It is thus certain that motion is not a function of the soul, which

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726 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is subject to the force of gravitation only in so far as the association of matter renders it liable to be dragged along with its bodies. Besides, if the soul were characterised by motion, the body would never know rost, for it cannot separate itself from its occupant whose slightest wish suffices to put it in motion, It is true that the soul continues in time, but the idea of continuity implies motion of a very different kind from that which we perform when moving from one place to another. "To be" and "to continue to be" not being the same thing, the difference between them is precisely what underlies the idea of continuity; and consists in the discharge of functional activity, which is not taken into account in the one case and is mentioned as being continuously performed in the other. But so far as the nature of the motion implied in the idea of continuity is concerned, it is obvious that it cannot be one of translation from one place to another, since a function may be discharged without moving away from any particular place. Motion in Time, as a matter of fact, is not to be measured in terms of distance in space; it is a qualitative alternation of moments,' or attributes--intense, less intense, and again intensewhich is certainly not motion in the spatial sense. It is thus clear that the soul is not characterised by motion. We may make a little halt here to rectify a few of the common errors into which philosophers unconsciously fall when they try to define certain terms. Since the only purpose which definitions serve is to enable us to understand things as they exist, it is clearly of the utinost importance to realize the necessity of being very

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THE SIDDHANTA... 727 precise with them. Where this necessity has been ignored, and inexact definitions accepted in place of true description, nothing but confusion-oft times of the worst possible type-has resulted from the error. Buddha's inability to define Nirvana, of which mention will be made again later on, and Shankaracharya's concept of Brahman as the Absolute, to become which is the chief desideratum in Vendanta, may be cited in illustration of the point. The modern theological conception of God is the outcome of a similar lapse from precision of thought. All true definitions involve a description of the relations in which a thing stands to other things, not an isolation of it from them; and since none of the things is without relations, relativity is the true feature of all proper and philosophical definitions. If philosophically inclined dabblers in theology will only bear this in mind, they will very soon discover the true light of wisdom dawning upon their souls, and will then speedily realize that shouting oneself hoarse in praise, or condemnation, of misconceived ideas is, in no sense, the path of salvation. It is high time that those who take pride in belonging to a missionary religion did understand the nature of the evil which results from the spreading of the ideas and traditions of men, in place of the doctrines of religion. It is nothing short of down-right wickedness to implant the seed of ignorance and vague mysticism in the minds of men ; and yet this cannot be avoided so long as the teacher, or the preacher, as the case may be, only dabbles in high

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728 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE sounding but otherwise empty words. Of the thousands of preachers who preach in the public, and of the equally large number of those who write their doctrines in books, bardly one in a thousand has any idea of what the words employed by him signify ; yet, they all, unblushingly and shame-facedly, go on discharging a ceaseless torrent of rhetoric in the supposed interests of their presumably defenceless god whose cause, they seem to imagine, requires a vast army of champions to defend ! Most of them, when asked to define their concept of God, lose their footing on the terra firma of relevant sense, and begin to flounder in the quagmire of metaphysical nonsense. If this is the case with the teachers themselves, what must be the plight of their victims '? Definitions fail to serve their object when they cease to be true to nature, and philosophers only prattle when they talk of pure abstractions as existing by themselves. The notion of the Absolute which Vedanta and certain other systems of thought persist in positing as the sole existent reality is a fair instance of confusion resulting from want of discrimination between a mental abstraction and concrete things. Regarded as pure existence, it is merely a quality of substance, and not a substance or thing itself. As such, it is impossible that it can exist by itself, for qualities only inhere in substances and substances are but bundles of qualities. If it were otherwise, we should have existence existing apart from all other qualities. But this is absurd' ; for existence would not then pertain to anything but itself, which would make all other qualities and things nonest.

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THE SIDDHANTA. 729 Existence itself would also then become a featureless quality of nothing whatsoever, and, in the absence of different substances and qualities, the universe would cease to be. Thus, the conception of the Absolute as pure existence is quite unsound logically. There remains the notion of the Absolute as a summation of all to be considered. But as such it will resemble any collective concept, e.g., the British Empire or the French Republic which are pure mental conceptions. Suppose we set out to discover the latter, and proceed to France in search of it. It is obvious that we shall see only the country, the people, the institutions, and so forth in France, but not the French Republic itself. For the latter is only an idea which works through the numerous things French, and holds them together as a compact whole. Now, suppose we take away the tie of relationship between the idea of the French Republic and the things, or institutions, actually existing in France, and make a complete severance between them, in thought. We should then have the country, the people, the institutions, and the like as so many parcels, on the one hand, and an absolutely non-existent abstraction on the other. The former would become independent entities in the absence of a uniting bond, and the latter an idea without anything to control, because we have denied it all relation with the very things which it could control ; and inasmuch as its raison d'etre is only the bond of oneness of aims and aspirations among the French, which is denied it by actual separation, its very existence becomes self-contradictory and ends in death 56

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730 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. at the very moment of its conception. An actual French Republic requires a living force, or idea, actually influencing the minds of the people in France, and holding them together as a nation. Separate the two terms by impassable barriers, and you destroy the republican spirit in the hearts of men, and the power to exist in the idea of the Republic at a stroke. The Absolute of philosophy, when conceived as a collective concept, is an idea of the same type as that of the French Republic, and is subject to all the limitations of the class to which it belongs. It is not a being, but a bond, and cannot exist apart from the terms which it unites and controls. It will now be seen that the idea of Brahmau in the early Upanishads is a pure mental abstraction. The early Hindu theorists of the Vedanta School, ignorant of the state of super-consciousness, which was later recognised as turya, the fourth, seem to have revelled in the idea of becoming "That," conceived as a mental abstraction. As a matter of fact, their description of Brahman itself suffices to refute any argument to the contrary, since it (it' is the pronoun which is invariably employed for Brahman) is not the Being-Knower-Blissful, but only Sat, Chit and Ananda, that is, Existence-Knowledge-Bliss, in other words, pure abstractions. Accordingly, Hindu philosophers invariably described Brahman by maintaining unbroken silencex-a method which Buddha also employed on certain occasions. The reason for this lay in the fact that their conception of Brahman, not being that of a being, but of pure mental abstractions, * Deussen's Philosophy of the Upanishads, p. 309.

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THE BIDDHANTA. 731 which are unanalyzable and therefore almost beyond words, left them with no choice but to keep quiet. The Hindus, however, made no secret of their inability to describe Brahman, and openly said so invariably in the end. At times this silence was preserved most tantalisingly, and finally employed as an argument to baffle the exasperated opponent with some such retort as the following, uttered with all the boldness of accusation : "I have been answering you all the time, but it is no fault of mine if you do not understand ; Brahman, dear sir, cannot be described in words, but by silence !" The later teaching quite correctly acknowledges, the fourth phase of consciousness, which is the true Ideal for mankind ; though even here the conception of Brahman as an abstraction is responsible for a lot of confusion. If the Vedantists will seriously reflect over the matter, they will not fail to observe that it is neither desirable nor possible to become a pure mental abstraction. : If we revert to our old illustration for the moment, we can see at a glance the absurdity involved in the conception of Vedanta. Suppose we were to ask a candidate for the dignity of the post of honour of the French President as to the ideal he had in view, and he to reply that he was trying to become the French Republic, would he be right in saying so ? Most certainly, not; for nobody can become the French Republic. Similarly, nobody can become the Absolute of Philosophy, which stands to the whole world in the same relation as the French Republic does to the people and institutions of France. Neither is it possible to imagine the

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732 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. pleasure which one can possibly derive by becoming Force, or Power, or even Existence or Mind, in a generic sense. It is not the Knower or Enjoyer, in any sense of the word. To become God, surely, does not mean to become the Absolute of Philosophy, but the Knower as distinguished from thinker, the Enjoyer, as distinguished from the seeker, in a word, the Paramatman,-not the republic of be-ness and becoming, but its Omniscient President. Surely, when one joins the Inns of Court to study Law, one does not aspire to become Law, but a Lawyer. To become Law is neither a possibility nor the ideal in view.. Buddha's ideal is also too obscure to afford satisfaction. Moksha is Nirvana, we are told; but what is Nirvana? There is nothing definite said as to this, and we are left to draw our own conclusions from a number of stray observations of the 'Enlightened One,' as Buddha was called by his followers. The source of pain is life, and the source of life is will (desire, ichchha), therefore, destruction of desire, i.e., will, is Nirvana.' This is true in so far as it goes, if taken in a qualified sense, but it does not go far enough to enable us to form a clear concept of Nirvana. "What is the nature of life in Nirvana?'-is a question which the early Buddhists declined to answer. Some have imagined Nirvana to be tantamount to extinction on account of Buddha's silence; and the confusion of thought seems to have been augmented by the wrong use of the word ichchha, which is used in two different senses. Firstly, it indicates will, and, secondly, desire. Now, the destruction of desire does not mean the destruction

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733 of will; for they are two different things, like light and shade. As a matter of fact, desires can be given up only by the exercise of will, which, in consequence of such exercise, becomes more and more strengthened and developed. Hence, the destruction of desires is not tantamount to the destruction of the jiva, but actually leads to its perfection. It is no use speculating about Buddha's idea of Nirvana, for no one has yet been able to discover any positive content of knowledge in the word as used in the Buddhistic literature. Even the staunchest champions of Buddhism have found it difficult to avoid associating its idea with that of extinction out and out. The destruction of the will to live-this is what Dahlmann understands nirvana to imply-has already been shown to be an erroneous view of moksha. THE SIDDHANTA. A glance at the philosophy of Buddha suffices to show that the confusion of thought in his system has arisen from the laying of too much stress on what is termed' becoming' as distinguished from 'being.' The followers of Buddha had to resort to all sorts of evasions to meet the disturbing questions about the condition of the jiva in Nirvana. An instance of the inability of his disciples to explain the nature of life in Nirvana is to be found in the dialogue between King Pasenadi and Khema, the who was noted for her wisdom. "Does the Perfect One [Buddha] exist after death, O venerable lady?" asked the king. "The Sublime One, O great king, has not revealed to us the existence of a paradise beyond the grave," replied Khema. "Then the Perfect One," repeated the King, "exists no longer now that he is nun, 66

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734 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. dead, O reverend lady?" The reply given to this was : "Neither, O king, has the Sublime One revealed that he who is perfect does not exist now that he is dead." "Am I to believe, then," continued the king," that the Perfect One being dead, neither exists nor does not exist ?" But the King might have put this to a statue of stone for it remains unanswered to this day. We have not to deal with a case where the disciples low intelligence is to be blamed for errors in expounding the doctrine of their Master; Buddha himself had nothing definite to say on the point. A wandering monk once asked him: "How is it, Gotama ? Is there an I?" No reply was vouchsafed by Buddha. The monk continued: "How is it, Gotama ? Is there nut an I?" But the Enlightened One simply preserved silence, till, at last, the monk grew impatient and went away. Another monk asked him, "Who has contact ? who has sensation ?" Buddha replied: "The question is not admissible. I do not say, 'He has contact.' Did I say, 'He has contact,' the question, 'Who has contact, Reverend Sir?' would be admissible. Since, however, I do not say so, then of me that do not speak thus, it is only admissible to ask, 'From what, Reverend Sir, does contact proceed ?'" "Buddhism," says Paul Dahlke, in ' Buddhism and Science,' at page 240, "is the doctrine of actuality, and its value as a view of the world from the standpoint of epistemology, lies in the fact that it teaches us to accept actuality as actuality. To this idea it is itself a martyr, inasmuch as its own teaching here is nothing ideally

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THE SIDDHANTA. 735 fixed and fast, but only an incitation to experience it in one's own self; it is 'a raft, designed for escape ; not designed for retention." But we must give Buddhism an opportunity of being fairly heard. Let us see how the founder of this system justifies himself, in this particular. He says, "I am,' monks, is a believing. 'Such am I,' is a believing. 'I shall be,' is a believing. 'I shall not be,' is a believing. 'I shall have a form,' is a believing. 'I shall be formless,' is a believing. 'I shall have perception,' is a .believing. 'I shall be devoid of perception,' is a believing. To entertain believings is to be ill. To entertain believings is to be infirm. To entertain believings is to be sick. When, however, all entertaining of believings is overcome, then is one called a right thinker." Wisdom, then, consists in refusing to believe! Very good, we too refuse to believe what Buddha said, on Buddha's own authority! Thus, believing in him, we are ill, infirm and sick ; not believing in him, we are, at least, wise! The beautiful simile of the flame of a lamp, employed by Buddha to illustrate the impermanence of all nature, would hardly hearc riticism. To compare Living Actuality, or Rhythm, as we have called it, to a manifestation of matter, is scarcely permissible in philosophy. A flame does not and cannot exist by itself; but Spirit, Actuality, or Rhythm, is a self-subsisting principle, and, therefore, free from death and decay. Moreover, as an emancipated spirit can never be without some sort of knowledge or belief, being pure consciousness in essence, the question is: 'what would be the belief

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736 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of the perfected Soul, in Nirvana ?' According to Buddhism, it can only be that believing is to be avoided, which, as we have pointed out before, is itself a false belief. Buddha seems to have aimed at the wiping out of consciousness and knowledge from mind, forgetting that omniscience does not consist in having no knowledge, or belief, but in having full knowledge and right belief. Vain is our endeavour to reduce the mind to a tabula rasa, since it is its nature to know. Hence, the philosophy which aspires to attain this unattainable end is, from its very nature, foredoomed to failure. It is beside the point to speculate about the opinion of the millions that follow it, since only a very few persons care to know the truth in its naked majesty. Paul Dahlke, in his masterly treatise on the philosophy of the great Master, entitled "Buddhism and Science," makes Buddha say : "I not only am aware that I am no true I, as a unity in itself, but I also know what it is that I am. And that this has really been comprehended by me,-this I prove in my own person. For, from the moment that I comprehended myself as a process sustaining itself from beginninglessness down to the present hour by its own volitional activities, all volitional activities have ceased in me. A new upwelling of in-force, any further self-charging of the I-process, has no more place in me. I know; this is my last existence. When it breaks up, there is no more Kamma there to take fresh hold in any new location, be it in heavenly, be it in earthly, worlds. The beginningless process of combustion is expiring, is coming to an end of itself, like a flame that is fed by no more oil." < On page 93 of the same book it is said: "When I say, That is green,' the statement conveys no definite positive contents of Knowledge; in making it I only say, 'That is not red, yellow, blue, and so forth.' 333 That may

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737 or may not be so, but we are sure that Mr. Dahlke would be the last person to adhere to this definition, if on going to a restaurant he orders, say, a cup of tea, and the waiter begins to move about cakes, biscuits, coffee, etc., etc., thinking to himself that the guest's cup of tea is only a negation of all these and of everything else, except tea, which he is, however, precluded from knowing, since it has no positive contents of knowledge in itself. This, we fear, is too good to be true. Jiva, as has already been pointed out, is a living rhythm, subsisting by its own force, so that it is actually indestructible, like the ultimate particles of matter. Scientific research reduces the atoms of matter to vortex rings in ether* which persist by their own rhythm. THE SIDDHANTA. * The following from The Ether of Space,' by Sir Oliver Lodge, may be read with interest on this point: "But now comes the question, how is it possible for matter to be composed of ether? A solid possesses the properties of rigidity, impenetrability, elasticity, and such like: how can these be imitated by a perfect fluid such as ether must be? "The answer is, they can be imitated by a fluid in motion; a statement which we make in confidence as the result of a great part of Lord Kelvin's work. It may be illustrated by a few experiments. A wheel of spokes, transparent, or permeable when stationary, becomes opaque when revolving, so that a ball thrown against it does not go through, but rebounds. A silk cord hanging from a pulley becomes rigid and viscous when put into rapid motion; and pulses or waves which may be generated on the cord travel along it with a speed equal to its own velocity, whatever that velocity may be, so that they appear to stand still. A flexible chain, set spinning, can stand up on end while the motion continues. A jet of water at sufficient speed can be struck with a hammer, and resists being cut with a sword. A spinning disk of paper becomes elastic like flexible metal, and can act like a circular saw A vortex ring, ejected from an elliptical orifice, oscillates about the stable circular 57

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738 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Even rings of smoke blown from the mouth have a moment or two of existence, and behave very curiously when coming in contact with another one of their kind. They often contract, pull themselves together, as it were, and pass through one another, whole and entire. If particles of gaseous matter, held together by nothing more permanent than the force of propulsion, can persist in this manner, what is there surprising in the fact that the self-subsistent rhythm of Life, the soul, should be a permanent entity or being? Thus, it is beyond doubt that the Jaina conception of Nirvana, with the persistence, for all eternity, of the Emancipated Soul, as the Paramatman, is a truth of philosophy. The identity of the Saved One in moksha is determined by the Living Rhythm retaining the form of the last physical incarnation and by the knowledge of the past. As for the distinguishing features of the Siddhatmans, Right Belief, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct are the permanent attributes of Their souls. Of these, Their beliefs cannot be modified, for wisdom is the guarantee of their permanence; Their knowledge is eternal, being only the condition of being, i.e., the states of Consciousness of Their pure Souls; and Right Conduct remains because the total destruction of desires insures its freedom from all forms of shortcomings, failings and fluctuations. The nature of the personality of the Siddhatman, form, as an India rubber ring would do: thus furnishing a beautiful example of kinetic elasticity, and showing us clearly a fluid displaying some of the properties of a solid."

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THE SIDDHANTA: 739 it must be borne in mind, is not the same as that of an unredeemed soul. It is not a personality of private loves and hatreds, or likes and dislikes, of a calculating, appropriating ego; it is a personality born of Omniscience, consisting in the awareness of all the innumerable bodies through which the Perfected Soul had incarnated before the attainment of Nirvana, including the knowledge of, but not the feeling of warmth in, the last earthly form which it had assumed in the world of men. The result of the investigation into the nature of the Siddhatman justifies us in saying that, apart from the Perfected Souls, the Paramatmans, there can be no such thing as a separate and distinct kind of god. Not only does this appear to be so from the fact that the worldprocess is capable of being carried on without any one's interference, but also from the additional fact that nothing but the worst kind of confusion can result on the hypothesis of such a mythical being. The reasons which have led us to this conclusion have already been set out elsewhere in this book, and it would be a needless waste of time to reproduce them again. It seems to us that the misunderstanding which has arisen in connection with the idea of God, amongst different religions, is due, as is usual with all kinds of misunderstandings, to lack of precision in thought. The Loka (the universe) is held in the middle of the Aloka in the form of the trunk of a man, with the Siddha Sila at the top, at the place where the head should be. This Siddha Sila, as already observed, is the abode of the Omniscient Souls, and, for that reason, may

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740 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. be called the Spiritual Eye of the Universe. The Perfected Souls who reside there, enjoy a kind of interpenetrating existence on account of the oneness of status and of the special power of the soul-substance, or spirit, which enables an infinity of souls to exist in the same space without mutual exclusion. The reader may recall the passage in Genesis-III. 22, which reads : "And the Lord God said, behold, the man has become as one of us to know good and evil."--Gen. III. 22. This is the true idea of God with which the ancients were fully familiar, but in course of time people lost sight of the truth, and, in obedience to the personifying impulse of the latter day humanity, ended in personifying the form of the universe and the forces of nature indiscriminately, thus losing sight of the true sense of the godly status of the Perfected Soul, in the confusion caused by the crowd of gods and goddesses springing into being in the mystery-loving fancy of a poetically inclined mind. Those of a matter-of-fact turn of mind, however, soon perceived that the enormous crowd of gods and goddesses--their number in Hinduism alone rose to 330,000,000-could not but lead to holy wars of supremacy in the heavenly world, and, becoming disgusted with the unmanageable crowd, elected to pay homage to the most powerful one of them, whoever he might be. We thus have a god who not only cannot be found in the region of reality, but who is also responsible for a lot of mischief in the world. As knowledge dwindled still further amongst men, misunderstandings ripened into hot disputes, and strifes, warfare, and bitter feuds became rife in the world. At the present day,

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741 matters have come to such a pass that the true explanation is un-ceremoniously condemned as an atheistic heresy! Nevertheless, no one actually tries to give a proper definition of him whom they all talk about. If they had ever attempted to do so, they would not have failed to discover that the attributes they ascribe to their god can only go to contradict him out of existence. For instance, the qualities of omniscience and bliss, which are the necessary attributes of divinity, are in no sense compatible with the facts embodied in such statements as the following from the Holy Bible: "And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart."-Genesis, VI. 6. A god who makes things and beings only to repent of having done so afterwards has no right to be called omniscient and blissful. Desirelessness must be a feature of divinity, in whatever form it may be posited, but that it is not one of the characteristics of the god postulated by most of the modern theologies is only too apparent to need proof. The true God is the Ideal of Perfection, the status of the Siddhatman, which is already within each and every soul; and it is this ideal, manifested, in the most perfect degree, in the lives of the four and twenty Perfect Ones, the Tirthamkaras of Jainism, and known as the twenty-four Spiritual Elders in Christianity, which the Jainas go to receive their daily inspiration from in their Temples. Let us not forget that it is the devotion to the Ideal, not a fanatical doting on a false and non-existent idol, which can ever be the means of THE SIDDHANTA. spiritual progress. Even in worldly matters, he who wishes to excel in a profession must take some great,

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742 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. living leader of that profession as his ideal, and should walk in his footsteps to attain to his eminence. Can a law student ever hope to become an eminent lawyer by worshipping an idol of mystic fancy, say, Alladin of the wonderful lamp ? He must make up his mind to attend. on the man who has already risen to eminence in the profession, not to worship him, nor even to beg him to throw a slice of his greatness towards him, but to keep him in mind as the ideal to be attained, and to follow him on the path which leads to its realization. Then alone can good come out of devotion. It is high time that mankind understood the true sense of worship : it is not the devotion to a person, but to an ideal which is enjoined by religion. The great ideal of the divine status, which must be idolized to be realized, is the original of the devotee's god ; and it is time misspent to bow before any other gods and goddesses, who, like a blind alley, lead to nowhere, but keep their devotees entangled in the same place with themselves--the region of darkness and untruth. We may also observe that the world-process being eternal, that is, without a beginning in time, there never was a time when the status of perfection could be said to have been in abeyance. Hence, Perfect Souls have always existed in the Siddha Sila, and will always exist there in the future. Ordinarily, however, it is only necessary to offer obeisance to the twenty-four Tirthamkaras of the current cycle for the purposes of worship. We must now proceed to enquire into the nature of ajiva, the second of the two main divisions into which substance is divided in the Jaina Siddhanta. This

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THE SIDDHANTA. 743 class comprises Space, Time, that two kinds of ether and matter, and is called ajiva (a=not+jiva soul) to distinguish it from jiva, the conscious substance, i.e., spirit. We shall take up the five ajiva substances one by one to ascertain their nature. space To begin with space, Bergson's account of the origin of is so highly interesting and instructive, that we cannot refrain from giving the following abridged passage from his' Creative Evolution' :-- "When a poet reads me his verses, I can interest myself enough in him to enter into his thought, put myself into his feelings, live over again the simple state he has broken into phrases and words. I sympathize then with his inspiration, I follow it with a continuous movement which is, like the.inspiration itself, an undivided act. Now, I need only relax my attention, let go the tension that there is in me, for the sounds, hitherto swallowed up in the sense to appear to me distinctly, one by one, in their materiality. For this I have not to do anything; it is enough to withdraw something. In proportion as I let myself go, the successive sounds will become the more individualized; as the phrases were broken into words, so the words will scan in syllables which I shall perceive one after another. Let me go further still in the direction of dream: the letters themselves will become loose and will be seen to dance along, hand in hand, on some fantastic sheet of paper. I shall then admire the precision of the interweavings, the marvellous order of the procession, the exact insertion of the letters into the syllables, of the syllables into the words and of the words into the sentences. The further I pursue this quite negative direction of relaxation, the more extension; and complexity I shall create; and the more the complexity in its turn increases, the more admirable will seem to be the order which continues to reign, undisturbed among the elements. Yet this complexity and extension represent nothing positive; they express a deficiency of will, And, on the other hand, the order must grow with the complexity, since it is only an aspect of it. The more we perceive, symbolically, parts in an indivisible whole, the more the number of the relations that the parts have

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744 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. between themselves necessarily increases, since the same undividedness of the real whole continues to hover over the growing multiplicity of the symbolic elements into which the scattering of the attention has decomposed it. A comparison of this kind will enable us to understand, in some measure, how the same separation of positive reality, the same inversion of a certain original movement, can create at once extension in space and the admirable order which mathematics finds there. There is, of course, this difference between the two cases, that words and letters have been invented by a positive effort of humanity, while space arises automatically, as the remainder of a subtraction arises once the numbers are posited. But, in the one case as in the other, the infinite complexity of the parts and their perfect co-ordination among themselves are created at one and the same time by an inversion which is, at bottom, an interruption, that is to say, a diminution of positive reality." Again, at page 218 of the work quoted it is said :"As regards space, we must, by an effort of mind sui generis, follow the progression or rather the regression of the extra-spatial degrading itself into spatiality. When we make ourselves self-conscious in the highest possible degree and then let ourselves fall back little by little, we get the feeling of extension : we have an extension of the self into recollections that are fixed and external to one another, in place of the tension it possessed as an indivisible active will. But this is only a beginning. Our consciousness, sketching the movement, shows us its direction and reveals to us the possibility of continuing it to the end ; but consciousness itself does not go so far. Now, on the other hand, if we consider matter, which seems to us at first coincident with space, we find that the more our attention is fixed on it, the more the parts which we said were laid side by side enter into each other, each of them undergoing the action of the whole, which is consequently somehow present in it. Thus, although matter stretches itself out in the direction of space, it does not completely attain it; whence we may conclude that it only carries very much further the movement that consciousness is able to sketch within us in its nascent state." All this is very graphic and interesting ; but we must not allow it to escape our attention that physical expansion and mental regression and progression are

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TAE SIDDHANTA. 745 not the phases of the same thing, but of different things. The simple state of entering into the poet's idea does not mean the disappearance of the poet himself from the field of extension. Unless we roll up the poet along with his poem, in the state of intension, it is useless to endeavour to show that he too spreads himself out in the movement of regression. Expansion and contraction, thus, are the two phases of jivic consciousness, but not of other things in nature. And, inasmuch as, apart from the states of consciousness of living beings, actual things outside those states remain where they are, it follows that extension and intension are both in existence at one and the same time. Bergson's error, it seems, has arisen, like so many other errors of Monism, from a monistic aspiration of thought to which, as we have already seen in these pages, so many philosophers have fallen victims both in the East and the West. Thus, the statement that space is already possessed by the mind as an implicit idea in its own detension, that is to say, of the possible extension of its own mental operations, is true only to a certain extent. Even the field of the possible extension of life must be taken to be a permanent one, for there is no warrant for maintaining that it is created along with the movement of regression. If life exist prior to the commencement of the said movement, it must exist in space, which must be conceived as an infinitely extended substance, leaving no emptiness anywhere, otherwise we shall have emptiness also existing by itself as space, which would be absurd. Space, therefore, can, in no sense, be regarded as resulting from the movement of 58

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746 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. regression of life. Let us emphasise our point by an illustration. When a musician produces a melody, on a musical instrument, by the ear, his fingers run over the keys automatically, leaving his mind free to enjoy the music. But the moment a false note is struck, his attention is roused from its' unconscious' attitude, and becomes engaged in discovering the nature and cause of the mishap. He then spreads out the notes side by side in imagination, and singles out the one which was out of place. This is what is known to everybody, but what is not known is the nature of the process which takes place within the mind itself. The rapt attention, with which our musician was executing and enjoying the melody, was not the same attitude which sees the notes and rests, put alongside of one another, as in the written scroll. There were no notes and no rests for the musician at the time; and his whole mind was gathered up, as it were, in the melody itself. It was a higher rhythm which the soul was beating time to, and in which the entire tune was present to the mind as a single sensation or feeling. In that attitude the soul lived the melody rather than knew its composition. Each note was then felt to be a part of the whole, and pointed to the whole of what had preceded and the whole of what was to follow, in one and the same instant. The discriminative consciousness, which cuts up the melody into separate notes and pauses, had vacated its throne, and lay folded up, as it were, in the intensity of the higher rhythm of life. When the accident occurred, the rhythm of the soul was thrown out of harmony with tbe rhythm of the melody, and will,

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THE SIDDHANTA. 747 feeling irritated at the turning up of the unexpected, descended to the plane of discriminative intellect to discover the nature and cause of discord. The descent of will on the lower plane slackened the rhythm of the melody and spread it out, in the form of separate and discontinuous notes and pauses, in the mind. The feeling of the melody, as a whole, was thus replaced by the knowledge of the notes which composed it; and it was by using this knowledge, as a chart of discrimination, that the mind was enabled to single out the note which was falsely struck. So far we are at one with Bergson, but when he goes further and endeavours to show that the musician, the instruments, the spectator, and space are also created by the movement of regression, it is impossible to keep him company. The truth is that will possesses the power of extension and intention, but the power only affects its awareness of the contents of its consciousness. The objects outside in the world are not affected by the change of rhythm in will, and remain where they are. Bodies and compounds, indeed, may, and do perish, from time to time; but mind refuses to believe that space, matter, ether, etc., should ever disappear altogether out of existence, though, owing to the intensity of certain types of feelings, their consciousness may be reduced to a zero-point. The reality of space is also borne out by the fact that in order to reach things it is necessary to traverse the distance which separates them from ourselves. Further, the removal of Space can only result either in the throwing of all things into ' nowhere,' or in the complete isola

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748 tion of each individual atom from all the rest of its kind, and in its being doomed to an eternal, solitary confinement. The one is, however, as inconceivable as the other, for nowhere' is as great an absurdity as absolute vacuity, and isolation is only possible in Space, never in spacelessness. As Deussen says, it is impossible to be nowhere, or in two different places at one and the same time. ( That Space is a reality and not an absolute vacuum, is also evident from the fact that our notion of absolute vacuity, or void, is, at bottom, only what Bergson calls a self-destructive idea (Creative Evolution, pp. 296299). The fact is that an absolute void is an impossibility in Nature, and is altogether inconceivable by the mind, the true conception of vacuity, or what it really and logically implies, being only founded upon the idea of " room, however much the untrained mind might allow itself to be confused by the two terms. Starting from the notion of emptiness arising from the perception of a room or place devoid of all sensible things, the man in the street expands his conception of vacuity till the boundaries of finitude melt away in the limitlessness of the infinite. He now imagines himself to have acquired an absolutely accurate image of pure vacuum, and insists upon positing it in place of Space. But it is obvious that what he has got hold of is not absolute nothing, but the pure concept of an infinite expanse containing nothing, which is a very different thing; for pure expansion is not thinkable in the absence of a substance in which it might inhere, so that, at bottom, our friend's conception of emptiness actually and truly represents our idea of "" THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

Page #770
THE SIDDHANTA. 749 Space. Besides, if we deny substantiveness to Space and replace it by absolute vacuity, the conception of the latter will have to imply unlimited expansion, our idea of spatiality being only that of a boundless expanse. But such a concept will be as self-destructive as the notion of a square circle, or a circular square, for it will then imply the presence of the attribute of infinite extension in that which has no existence itself. On the other hand, if there be not one infinite vacuum but a large number of finite ones, then will arise the question as to the size of each of them; for if their dimensions be no bigger or greater than the point of Geometry, then it will be impossible to construct our concept of an infinitely extended space or room with the aid of such points. But if it be said that each of the units or atoms of vacuity is endowed with actual dimensions, though of a finite type, then the old difficulty re-appears with increased vigour, since that which has no existence is as incapable of a finite size as of an infinite one. There is a further difficulty which arises on the supposition of a multitude of vacuities, for a multitude of unreals' is a possible conception for unbealthy intellects alone. The infinity of Space is evident from the fact that, we cannot conceive it as finite. If it were a finite substance, it would be limited by something else, and would have a 'beyond' to it which must be either another piece of Space or pure emptiness. But not the latter, for the reasons already given: It would then be the former. But two finite spaces would themselves require an inter-space to fill in their interstices. We should then have to enquire whether this inter

Page #771
750 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. space be infinite or not, and, if it turn out to be finite, to posit a second inter-space, and so forth, ad infinitum. But this is absurd, for one infinite Space is sufficient for the purpose of finding room for all things. Space, then, is a substance which is infinite and nonatomistic, that is, partless. Its function is to find room for all things, though being of the nature of "place," it does not stand in need of it itself. The claim of space to rank as a reality is based upon its partless, non-atomistic nature, which preserves it in one condition always. Not being an effect, but only a simple substance in itself, it cannot be conceived to have been produced from other substances; and as such must be an ultimate reality, that is a thing in itself. The infinity of Space, called ukasla in Sanskrit, is divided by the Jaina siddhanta into two parts, namely, the lokakasha (loka + akisha), the space occupied by the universe, and the alokakasha (a, not, and lokakasha), the portion beyond the universe. The lokakasha is the portion in which are to be found the remaining five substances, i.e., jivas, Matter, Time, Dharma and Adharma; but the alokakasha is the region of pure space containing no other substance, and lying stretched on all sides beyond the bounds of the three worlds (the entire universe), as shown in the map on p. 716 ante. Space, thus, is a self-subsisting entity ; it cannot be created, or destroyed, by any process of regression, or progression. In its infinity of extension, it includes the universe of matter and form as well as that which lies beyond. It thus embraces the Loka and the Alokn both, and is uncreate and eternal, hence, a self-subsisting

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751 reality, since there is neither a being to create it, nor any possible source for its creation. The idea of 'extraspatiality' is a contradiction in terms, because that which exists must occupy space, in some form or other. The next substance to demand our attention is Time, the thread of continuity on which are strung the successive moments of sequence. That Time is a reality, is evident from the fact that neither the continuation of substances and things, nor the sequence of events can be possibly conceived without it. THE SIDDHANTA. The primary conception involved in the idea of Time is that of continuity, since the power to continue in Time is enjoyed by all substances, and, to a limited extent, also by all bodies and forms. Continuity itself is not a summation of a series of discontinuous events, changes, or moments, but a process of persistence, i.e., an enduring from the past into the ever-renewing presenta survival, or carrying over, of individuality, from moment to moment. If we analyse our feeling of self-continuance, we shall observe that our consciousness feels itself enduring in Time, that is to say, that it knows itself to be constantly surviving the past, and emerging, whole and entire, in the present, together with an awareness of having performed some sort of a journey from moment to moment. This consciousness of the progress made is not the consciousness of a journey performed in space, but of one made in an entirely different manner. It is a journey which leaves the traveller exactly where he was before in space, but implies his progress in duration. Now, since we cannot have a consciousness of travelling, or change, except when some kind of move

Page #773
752 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ment is actually executed, the progress of consciousness in Time inust be a real journey in some way. Analysis discloses the fact that the movement of continuity is not a process of translation from place to place, but a sort of revolving on oneself, so that each revolution gives us a new now,' while, at the same time, leaving us wbere we were before, in all other respects. Introspection confirms this conclusion fully, for, while the consciousness of continuity implies a constant movement from the past towards the present, it involves neither an idea of locomotion in space, nor a notion of the change of identity. The consciousness of Time, then, is the consciousness of a movement of internal rotation of some kind. Any one who withdraws himself into his inner being, and concentrates his attention on the awareness of continuity, will feel himself emerging into each now' as the same individual, and will also know the present moment to consist in the feeling of self-awareness which life has of its own existence, independently of the sense-organs. This feeling of progress is precisely the one from which springs our consciousness of Time, and that which enables this progress to be made is the substance of Time. Time, thus, is the substance which enables things to continue in nature. The Jainas, therefore, define Time as a substance, which assists other substances in their continuity. Just as the central iron pin of a potter's wheel is necessary for its revolving, so is Time, i.e., the substance of Time, necessary for the revolving' of substances in nature. These revolutions, however, are not to be taken as an actual whirling

Page #774
THE SIDDHANTA. 753 round of elements and things, since our conscionsuess does not testify to any such physical movement; they concern the qualities of substances, and to some extent resemble the process of breathing, if we may employ such a metaphor in respect of simple substances. Still greater light is thrown on the nature of motion involved in ' temporal' gyrations by a study of the phenomenon of the consciousness of the present,' which all living beings are familiar with. Reflection reveals the fact that our awareness of the present moment is the feeling of a certain type of intensity, or rhythm, of being, which fades away as we try to arrest it, but only to re-appear immediately as the next 'now' of duration. There is a diffusion of attention or intensity in one moment, and a gathering up or re-charging of it in the next. Life stoops, as it were, to conquer duration every moment, and rises conscious of its triumph each time. Awareness of the progress in Time, then, is the awareness of an alternating, yet continuous, rhythm of Life,--intense, less intense, i.e., vanishing, and again intense. Now, if we bear in mind the fact that Life is itself a kind of rhythm, we must say that its alternating intensities are only its own qualitative movements, in the course of which it constantly gathers fresh momentum for its future gyrations in Time. As a substance which assists other things in performing their temporal' gyrations, Time can be conceived only in the form of whirling posts. That these whirling posts, as we have called the units of Time, cannot, in any manner, be conceived as parts of the substances that revolve round them, is obvious from 59

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754 the fact that they are necessary for the continuance of all other substances, including souls and atoms of matter which are ultimate units, and cannot be imagined as carrying a pin each to revolve upon. Time must, therefore, be conceived as a separate substance which assists other substances and things in their movements of continuity. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Those who do not regard Time as a separate substance should bear in mind that a real difference is implied between pure existence and continuity of being, and that, though things revolve round only on account of their internal impetus, they stand in need of some kind of a post to assist them in their temporal' gyrations. Moreover, since both the souls and particles of matter are indivisible units whose 'temporal' process, or enduring, is maintained by their turning round, in a " *The question, on what does Time itself revolve?' does not arise, for its particles revolve on themselves. If Time were to depend on another substance for its continuance, and that substance on another, and so forth, the series would be interminable, and we would ultimately have to acknowledge that among the substances in existence there must be a particular one which revolves on itself and also assists in the revolution of others. Suppose we posit t1, ta, tz.........T as the series of substances of which t, is the cause of the revolution of the particles of matter and the other known substances, t2 of t1, and so forth. Then, in the light of the above observations, T is a substance the particles of which exist in the form of whirling posts and depend on themselves for their own revolution. Now, since T furnishes us with whirling posts, and is also endowed with self-continuity, the rest of the series, t, t2, iz, etc., has absolutely no purpose to serve in existence. Hence, T alone is to be recognised; and since it is endowed with all the qualities necessary in the substance of Time, it follows that it is Time itself,

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755 qualitative sense, in the same place in space, it most clearly follows that the absence of the whirling posts would at once deprive them of their continuity in Time, and cause them to vanish and disappear, like vortices which cease to exist the moment they cease to revolve. Now, since things continue in all parts of the Lokakasha, it further follows that Time must be present at every conceivable point of space in that region. Time, then, may be said to be a substance consisting of a countless number of points or pins, each of which occupies but one point of the region of space known as the Lokakasha. As such, its particles cannot be conceived as forming compounds with one another, or with other substances. For this reason it is called a non-astikaya, that is, as not extending beyond a solitary pradesha (an imaginary point in space of the size of the smallest particle or atom). THE SIDDHANTA. The distinction between pure 'be-ness' and continuity of 'be-ing' insisted upon by us, it may be pointed out here, is not purely imaginary, or a mere matter of words; there is a real difference between the two terms and it lies in the fact that the suggestion of functioning present in the latter is altogether wanting in the former. 'To be' and 'to continue to be' not being the same thing, the difference between them is precisely what underlies the idea of function, since to be in nature is in reality only to function. In other words, pure functionless 'be-ness' is absolutely unthinkable by the mind, so that existence cannot be ascribed to what is devoid of all function. To continue to be, then, holds good in respect of all things, and the continuity itself is possible

Page #777
756 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. only with the aid of the substance of Time as already shown. This substance of Time is called the nishchaya Time by the Jaina philosophers, to distinguish it from the V yavahara (the practical) time which is not a substance in any sense of the term, but only a measure of duration--hours, days and the like. It is this vyavahara aspect of Time which is said to be given a priori to the knowing consciousness, as will appear from the following arguments of Kant and Schopenhauer. * (1) The idea of Time cannot be derived from expe. rience, for we could not be aware of simultaneity or succession, if it did not underlie thein a priori. (2) We can think away all objects from Time, but not Time itself. (3) Time is not a discursive or general idea, for different Times are only parts of the same Time, and the presentation which is given by one object is a perception. (4) If our presentation of anything were due to ideas, the partial presentations would be first formed, and the general idea, by putting these together. But the endlessness of Time is only possible through limitations of a single underlying Time. Therefore our presentation of Time is an a priori perception. (5) The axioms of Time, generally, have apodictic certainty, but could not have it, if they were derived from experience. Without the a priori presentation of * See Kant's Philosophy as Rectified by Schopenhauer,' by M. Kelly. m itself

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THE SIDDHANTA. 757 Time, it would be impossible to have an idea of change or movement (change of place). Time is the possibility of change in the same place. Thus, from the point of view of the knowing subject, Time is a condition a priori of the consciousness of change. This may be taken to mean that Time is not an object of perception, but essentially a matter for mental conception. Struck with the similarity between regularly recurring events and a wheel, the ancients described Time as a chakra (wheel), and called it Kala, the mover. And, because all bodies are liable to dissolution of form in due course of time, and because decease only signifies the dissolution of form which results from the operation of energy, i.e., motion on a body, Time (Kala) also came to be regarded as the Destroyer. In the Hindu mythology time is represented by Garuda, the King of birds. He is practically invincible and gives a good account of himself in an encounter with the gods. Even Vishnu could not overpower him, though the terms of the peace-treaty arrived at between them leave no doubt as to the superiority of the god. As a result of the compromise, Garuda accepts the position of the mount of Vishnu, on condition that he be given a seat on the latter's car as his flag. Vishnu also confers immortality on him in token of friendship. The interpretation of this legend is to be sought for in the nature of Time which is eternal, and, as such, necessarily, immortal. As Vishnu's flag, Time is indicative of mmortality which accompanies dharma (religion). Garuda is further represented as tightly holding and carry.

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758 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ing in his claws a giant tortoise and a huge elephant who were engaged in fighting with each other and who are ultimately devoured by him. This points to the natural antagonism between Spirit and Matter as well as to the power of Time as the Destroyer of embodied life, symbolised by the tortoise, and of material compounds of which the elephant is an excellent symbol on account of its bulk. From the foregoing explanation of the nature of Time, it is obvious that no philosophy which ignores the elements of continuity and succession can ever succeed in solving its mystery. Most of the philosophies of the world have taken it to be synonymous with succession, and, consequently, failed to understand its true nature. Some have even gone the length of eliminating it from the list of existing substances, forgetting that things continue and undergo changes of form only in Time, not otherwise. In one of its aspects, then, Time is the source of continuity, and in the other, is a kind of force which makes it impossible for things to leap over succession and orderliness, by making them travel, point by point, or step by step, on the path of evolution. Take away Time as an all-pervading force from the universe, replace it in the form of capsules of energy in the individuals, and you destroy the possibility of succession, i. e., orderly causation, at a stroke, since in a world without Time things might well occur and vanish like the beautiful palace of Alladin of the wonderful Lamp. Remove Time altogether from * See ante, p. 220.

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THE SIDDHANTA. the world, and you stop its evolution instantaneously, since no world-process is conceivable where continuity and succession are both conspicuous by their absence. Thus, from one point of view, Time serves as the mainspring of the perpetuum mobile, and, from another, keeps back the impish chance from playing its uncanny pranks with men and things in the world. We now come to the two substances known as Dharma and Adharma. These are the two kinds of Ether which are necessary as a help to jivas and matter in their motion and rest respectively. Without Dharma, as an accompanying cause, motion from place to place will be an impossibility in nature, and without Adharma it will not be possible for things in motion to come to rest. It is obvious that things in nature require some kind of a medium for their motion, for, as Haeckel points out (The Riddle of the Universe, Chap. xii), the idea of action at a distance is quite untenable in philosophy, and is possible only on the supposition that things cross over empty spaces by taking a leap, which is a highly absurd proposition. As regards its structure, 759 "Ether is not composed of atoms. If it be supposed that it consists of minute homogeneous atoms (for instance, indivisible etheric particles of a uniform size), it must be further supposed that there is something else between these atoms, either 'empty space' or a third, completely unknown medium, a purely hypothetical inter ether;" the question as to the nature of this brings us back to the original difficulty, and so on ad infinitum. As the idea of an empty space and an action at a distance is scarcely possible in the present condition of our knowledge I postulate for Ether a special structure which is not atomistic, like that of ponderable matter, and which may provisionally be called (without further determination) etheric or dynamic structure." (The Riddle of the Universe). ...

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760 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. This is obviously correct; and it is further easy to see that motion being a characteristic of things in all parts of the universe, its medium should be a substance which fills the entire field of activity. Upto this point Jainism is in full agreement with modern science, its conception of Dharma being purely that of a universal medium of motion-a substance co-extensive with the Loka and devoid of parts and interspaces. But when scientists go further and, in obedience to their monistic aspiration, try to invest their ether with all kinds of attributes, making it out to be even the source of atoms of matter, the Jaina Siddhanta does not endorse their views. When the confusion which prevails in certain quarters gives way to clarity of thought, it will be recognized that no single substance can perform all the functions which we ascribe to ether at one and the same time. At present, people imagine it to be an all-pervading, non-atomistic medium, circulating internally as a perfect fluid, and possessing a tremendous velocity comparable to that of light. We confess that to us the concept appears to be anything but clear. An infinite substance, very naturally, cannot move externally,' but can it move internally? If there is motion in ether, it can be only motion of parts ; but then ether is nonatomistic (Haeckel.) Thus we have motion of parts of a substance which is, by its very definition, devoid of parts! It seems to us that the error lies not in the analysis of the functions of things in nature, but in their attribution to one substance. Rather than take up an attitude which throws us into conflict with the laws of clear thought, we ought to recognize that the different

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THE SIDDHANTA. 761 functions are performed by different substances all of which exist, in an interpenetrating manner, in one and the same space. Space would then represent the partless, non-atomistic, extended substance which provides rooin for all things, Time, the reality or force underlying continuity and succession, jivas, the self-conscious beings, and matter, * the atomistic substance, moving about in ether, in consequence of the operation of different kinds of energy. According to the Jaina Siddhanta, Dharma possesses none of the specific properties of matter, and is not matter, though essentially a substance, i.e., a self-subsisting reality. It is devoid of all sensible qualities, and cannot be perceived with the senses. Dharma is not the cause of motion, but only its medium. As water is helpful in the movements of aquatic animals, but does not set them in motion, so is Dharma only a vehicle of motion, but not its originator or cause. Adharma, like Dharma, is also a substance which pervades the whole lokakasha ; it, too, is non-atomistic in its structure and devoid of sensible qualities. It is the accompanying cause in the cessation of motion. The necessity of Adharma' as the accompanying cause of cessation of motion will be clearly perceived by any one who will bear in mind the proposition that every body perseveres in its state of rest or motion * Taken in its entirety, the pudgala dravya of the Jaina Siddhanta might well be described as a perfect fluid, circulating internally, and possessing a velocity comparable to that of light.' Now, if we can recall to mind what Dr. Alfred Russell Wallace said on the point --that matter was ultimately traceable to force (Natural Selection and Tropical Nature') - we can easily see that the ultimate atom would not be unlike a vortex or bubble in such an ocean of dynamic force. 60 be unlille ?-we can easile to force (Naturon the point

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762 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. uniformly in a straight line, except in so far as it is made to change that state by external forces, and put to himself the question, how such substances as jivas and lighter kinds of matter come to rest from a state of motion. The principle of friction does not apply to either of them and inertia is not a quality of souls. The only other force known to science which may be regarded as capable of assisting them in coming to repose is gravitation, but that is concerned only with the determination of the direction which a moving body may take and although it is possible to say that gravitation itself may ultimately discharge the function of Adharma by bringing a moving body to rest by the side of the one towards which it has gravitated, it is clear that its operation is confined to attracting one body towards another. Besides, gravitation is not an all-pervading medium, though Sir Isaac Newton* seems to have had a true inkling into the nature of Adharma when he ventured a surmise about gravitation being dependent on an etherial medium pervading space. Further reflection will show that gravitation cannot be the medium of stationariness in the case of material bodies; for given a body in motion gravitation can only determine the direction of its motion, but has no further concern with its fate-whether it come to rest alongside the mass by which it is attracted or remain perpetually sliding and rolling about its surface? The trend of the scientific thought seems to suggest the law that stationariness of a mass is the resultant of the 'pull' exerted on it by other masses of matter See Matter and Motion,' by J. C. Maxwell.

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THE SIDDHANTA. 763 from different directions at any given moment of time; but the necessity for some such substance as Adharma can be clearly perceived in the case of pure spirit. It should be borne in mind that gravitation has really no hold on the jiva whose nature is freedom itself. It is, however, rendered vulnerable on account of its association with its body which is subject to that force. But even here observation shows that the individual will is endowed with the power to partially annul the operation of gravitation, as in walking, jumping and moving about; and the case with a trained ascetic will is simply astonishing, inasmuch as it brings about the phenomenon of levitation and enables one to walk through the air, as the ancient records testify. Finally, when the soul is completely rid of its load of the impurities of sin, it immediately rises up and goes to the Siddha Sila to take its place among Gods. It is thus clear that pure spirit is not subject to the operation of gravitation, so that even if that force be regarded as the medium of rest, it will not be available to assist a Redeemed Soul to assume the condition of stationariness from motion. That such a medium is necessary may be seen by considering what is involved in its denial ; for the Deified Soul who ascends up to nirvana at the top of the Universe will then be constantly sliding and rolling about in a state of perpetual un-repose. But this is clearly absurd. Adharma, then, is a necessary element in the order * To some extent the phenomena of levitation have also been recognised by modern research (see the Law of Psychic Phenomena and other works dealing with the subject).

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761 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of nature. Its function, however, is not to bring things to rest or to interfere with their motion in any way; but only to enable them to become stationary when their motion ceases, from whatsoever cause or causes that might happen. This finishes our survey of the two substances known as Dharma and Adharma. We now pass on to a consideration of the last of the six substances of Jainism, known as Pudgala, or matter, which is illusory according to Vedanta, but a reality according to Jainism. However illusory the matter, it certainly does not come into existence from nowhere. No matter by what name we may ultimately decide to call it, it is something which cannot be ignored. Even if it be regarded as illusory, its reality is not open to dispute, since an illusion is not an absolute nonentity. Look upon it in any way we might, we have to recognize its existence, in some form or other, since there is and can be no creation in the sense of a miracle, i.e., a making of something out of nothing, except that of forms. Matter, however, is not form, but the material basis of all forms. Jainism points out that matter exists in six different forms, that is, as (1) sukshma-sukshma, or exceedingly fine, (2) sukshma, that is, fine, (3) sukshma-sthula, which is invisible to the eye, but capable of being perceived with some other sense or senses, (4) sthula-sukshma, that is visible to the eye, (5) sthula, i.e., gross, as water, and (6) sthula-sthula, i.e., exceedingly gross. There is another aspect of matter known to Jainism as karma-pudgala ; but we shall refer to it later when

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765 we come to deal with the theory of karma. It suffices here to point out that as our thoughts and deeds affect our character, and create, or modify, the tendencies of our souls, karma must be recognized to be a force of some kind; for it would be ridiculous to maintain that a thing could be affected by that which had no substantiveness whatsoever. Now, since force is unthinkable apart from matter, the individual karmas cannot but be deemed to produce their effects through a material agent of some kind. THE SIDDHANTA. The next question in connection with matter is, whether it is a single substance or composed of parts. The cinematographical view of the universe tends to suggest, at first sight, that matter might be one substance only, but if we probe a little deeper into its nature, we at once find that that view is confined to the faculty of simple Perception with which intellect does not concur in this instance, on the ground that the pictures themselves must be composed of parts, hence of atomistic matter, or particles. Besides, it is a self-evident truth that if material things can be cut into pieces, they must be made up of parts. The difficulty arises only when we take our stand at the beginning of a supposed world-process, and, assuming the existence of matter as a given unit, try to find out how that unit could be cut up into atoms. Hence Sankhya which posits indiscrete prakriti at the beginning of a world-process or evolution, and all those other schools which have substituted fanciful terms--- e g., akasha of the Yoga system----for pudgala (matter) have had to explain it as indescribable. We seem to get a great insight into the nature of things by working

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766 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. out the genesis of matter from a supposed source; but the moment we ask how it could come out of a place where it did not exist before, the whole edifice falls to the ground, leaving us with the infinity of particles, as constant reals. The nature of these particles is immaterial ; they may be pure vibrations, or vortices in some kind of forte, or anything else ; they certainly are not parts of an indivisible whole. We must, therefore, make up our minds to call matter as consisting of an infinite number of particles. According to Jainism, matter, like other substances, is only a bundle of qualities. Qualities, or gunas, are those which inhere in substances, as materiality exists in all atoms and bodies of matter. It is not correct to say that qualities can exist by themselves. There are many qualities, but six are the more important. These are: (1) existence, (2enjoyability or utility, (3) substantiveness, (4) knowability, (5) specific or identityrhythm, i.e., the force which prevents one thing from becoming changed in essence, and (6) the quality of possessing some kind of form. These are some of the general qualities ; besides them, there are special or individual qualities wbich exist only in special forms, combinations, or individuals, such as snow-whiteness, lilly-whiteness, and the like. A little reflection will show that the six general qualities enumerated above exist not only in matter, but in all the six substances. In addition to the above, each of the six substances also possesses its special quality, e.g., space has the quality of finding room for and containing all things. The general qualities, therefore, are

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THE SIDDHANTA. 767 to be conceived as the substratum of matter and other substances which exist in nature. Hence, matter ought to be defined as that which has a certain number of general qualities in conimon with other substances, and also as that which is composed of an infinity of particles, each of which is pervaded by the general qualities, as mentioned above. Further light is thrown on the nature of matter with reference to the quality of enjoyability, or utility. Jiva is the enjoyer, and matter, the object of enjoyment; hence the relation between them is that of subject and object. The common element between the subject and the object of enjoyment consists of special qualities, as for instance, the common element between the eye, which is the enjoyer of form, and its object is colour. For the eye is adapted to respond to colour which is a property of matter. Now, since tbe sense-organs are only the exteriorized faculties or instruments of sensation of the jiva, the elements which render enjoyment of all objects possible inust exist in the constitution of the soul itself. But these can exist in the soul only as capacities for enjoyment, not as sensible qualities, as they do outside. Here, also, it is apparent that the special qualities of matter, that is, sound, colour, taste, smell, and sparsha (tactile properties, i.e., heat, cold, and the like) correspond to the pleasure-extracting qualities of the jiva. Hence the disparity between the positive qualities of the soul and the negative elements outside in the world is not absolute ; in other words, the power to vibrate of the jiva stands in about the same relation to the vibrations of matter as does the subject of perception

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768 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to the object to be perceived. This fully tallies with the view from the standpoint of Idealism, according to which matter is nothing but a bundle of sensible qualities. Jainism, thus, fully explains away the causes of the old enmity existing between Realism and Idealism, and brings them together on a common platform by its anekanta method of investigation. The eternity of souls as well as matter being established, it now becomes necessary to analyse the nature of their interaction. To understand this fully, we must turn our attention to the quality known as agurulaghutva, which is defined as that property of substances which maintains them as they are, and prevents their being converted into other things. This is nothing other than the special rhythm of each substance which is maintained in its own nature by the intensity of its vibrations, though allowed considerable scope for fluctuations of intension within certain limits. In virtue of this property of things, the union of different substances results neither in the destruction of an old nor in the creation of a new substance, for that would be a miracle, but in the fusion of their elements into a new form. It is also worthy of note that the interaction between the substances of nature is possible only on the hypothesis that they possess certain quality, or qualities, in common, which draw them towards each other, and the modifications of form and function require that two or more substances should become interlocked in each other's embrace, giving rise to a new set of qualities as the resultant of their compounding.

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THE SIDDHANTA. 769 Now, so far as the two principal substances of nature, namely, jiva and pudgala, are concerned, the affinity between them may be determined by the fact that the former is the knower and enjoyer of matter, which, consequently, is the object of knowledge and enjoyment. The relation between them is that of subject and object, which might also be called that of positive and negative, because of the two opposite aspects of knowledge and joy which the two substances present. The relation of jiva and matter being determined, we may now enquire into the nature of the force which brings about their interaction. Obviously, knowledge is not that force, because one may know a thing without actually being compelled to be locked up in its embrace. And, so far as the power of omniscience of the Siddhatman is concerned, the whole universe is reflected in His consciousness, as in a mirror, without involving Him in bondage, in the least degree. Thus, the force which brings about the interaction between jiva and matter can only be that which springs from their relationship in respect of enjoyment alone. But this depends entirely on the desires of the jiva, because matter can have no longing for enjoyment. Furthermore, the jiva, too, is impervious to this force by nature, since every jiva does not run after every kind of enjoyment, and also since he may give up sense-enjoyment altogether. Thus, interaction between jiva and matter only takes place when the former is actuated by a desire for the enjoyment of sense-objects, and, conversely, matter can affect the soul only when it is rendered vulnerable by its desires. It follows from this that the soul remains liable to be 61

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770 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. influenced by matter, only so long as it exists in a state of impurity. It is owing to the influence of material impurities that it wanders about in the samsara, seeking perfection and joy. Itself the subject of knowledge, it wanders about like a query__'?'-trying to define itself, and, under the blinding influence of matter, again and again, identifies itself with its body. Its natural rhythm of freedom is consequently unable to assert itself, and undergoes all kinds of changes--the number of their types has been estimated at 84,00,000--in the course of transmigration. When the jivic consciousness vibrates in harmony with the rhythm of its physical personality, it can only extract such pleasures from life as are possible to a jiva vibrating at that low level. The joy of life increases as it raises the tone of its rhythm to higher potencies, the most perfect of which is called the Tirthamkara, or God-rhythm. In connection with the subject of inflow of matter into souls, it is to be borne in mind that they are involved in bondage from begin ningless time. If it were otherwise, we should have either a creation of souls, or the descending of a perfect Jiva, ie., God, to enter into crippling relations with matter, to His own detriment. But both these propositions are untenable in philosophy. A third alternative which may be put forward is that the jivas are locked up in some air-tight compartment, and that a certain number of them is sent out into the world, from time to time, to undergo evolution. Here again the question arises : is this air-tight compartment full of pure souls, or of those involved in impurity? But the former alternative is untenable, be

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THE SIDDHANTA. cause the soul in its natural purity is a God, and cannot be kept locked up anywhere ; and the latter directly supports our case, and points to Nigoda as the storehouse of unevolved jivas. It is thus clear that no beginning can be ascribed to the bondage, i.e., the condition of negativity of souls. The effect of negativity is that souls become liable to be influenced by matter, from which they constantly try to extract joy according to their capacities. This leads to the fusion of spirit with subtle particles of matter, resulting in the bondage of the soul. For just as gaseous matter is robbed of its gaseous nature in consequence of becoming converted into water, so does the soul feel helpless in the clutches of matter. The Arya-Samajist's conception of moksha as an impermanent state, it must be now evident, is unentertainable philosophically ; for there is no force capable of overpowering the Redeemed Jiva in nirvana and of dragging Him down from that High and Holy Seat. As for desire, the Omniscient Siddhatmans not only know it to be the arch-enemy of souls, but can also have no longing for its objects, being placed too high above the temptations of 'flesh' by the conscious enjoyment of the state of ecstatic bliss which is the natural property of Their pure and purified Souls. Thus, there is no possibility of a 'fall' in Their case. The important thing to note in this connection is the principle or law that the bondage of karmas is really the bondage of desires, so that where there is no desire on the part of the soul itself there can be no bondage for it. In different language, no one can force a soul into bondage, just

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772 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. as no one can set it free from its bonds. Our conclusion, then, is that the notion of nirvana being a temporary state of existence is altogether untenable in philosophy, and must be rejected as devoid of merit. It might be urged that all that exists in Time and Space is subject to causality and therefore liable to change; but the argument is an instance of that perversity of metaphysical thought which delights in making sweeping generalizations regardless of facts. For it is the purest assumption to say that all that exists in Time and Space is liable to change, at least till so long as one does not prove that the Siddhatmans are also liable to experience a 'fall' from Their high status. As for causality, its idea has been so much confounded by the use of technicalities in modern times that one finds it a relief to rely upon the voice of common sense in preference to the learned discourses of metaphysicians. Introspection here reveals the fact that mind has a tendency, born of practical observation and nourished by actual experience, to look out for the cause or causes of every event, and declines to believe that the relationship of cause and effect does not govern the whole range of occurrences in the world. This is one of the senses in which the word causality is employed. Besides this, causality also implies the action of energy upon a body, as in the melting of snow by the heat of the Sun. In this instance the heat of the Sun is called the operative and snow the material cause of the resulting stream of water. There is another significance of causality which implies the idea of an agent, as a potter is said to be the cause of the pot which he makes from clay. The

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THE SIDDHANTA, 773 principle of causality, however, depends upon the existence of certain substances, and on their coming together in one place and at one time under certain specified conditions. Beyond this there is nothing in the conception of causality to authorize its interference with rational thought. Applying the true principles of causation to the problem about the eternity of moksha, it may be seen at a glance that so far as the idea of agency is concerned there is no one to force an Emancipated Soul into the state of bondage and transmigration afresh, for there are no higher beings than Gods, and they cannot be imagined as engaged in forcing one another into captivity, being living embodiments of Renunciation. With reference to the instrumental or operative cause, also, there is no force capable of operating on pure spirit; and matter cannot approach and overpower a soul whose consciousness is unmarred by desire. Thus, causality has no hold on the Redeemed Soul, who must be deemed to exist as such for all eternity. We may now say that with respect to the high and sublime status of the Saved One there is a beginning but no end, but as regards the bondage of the unemancipated soul there is no beginning but an end, except where the possibility of the attainment of nirvana is excluded by the malignity of individual karmas, in which case there is neither a beginning nor an end to its thraldom. In respect of the world-process it is to be further observed that the evolution of jivas proceeds from the lowest to the highest types of rhythm, or states, not in the precise order which a careless perusal of the story of the

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774 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. 'fall' would seem to suggest. That legend is useful only in so far as it points to the latent divinity of the soul, but not any farther. It is true that there is a great deal of rise and fall in the status of the jiva in the course of its transmigration, but the two ends of the line, the one marked by the condition of nigoda and the other by the Perfection of Gods, are unalterably fixed. As a matter of fact, the author of the legend of the fall' did not intend to suggest that a perfect God had fallen into the state of wretchedness and sin, but that the story was to be taken as a reminder of the latency of godly virtues and power within the soul. Hence, the jiva who, having attained to human status, does not try to realise bis divinity, but becomes absorbed in the pursuit of sensual gratification, may truly be said to experience a fall. It is the employment of intellect to pander to the animal passions and carnal appetites which constitutes the fall. Man is a thinking being and has the Ideal of greatness put before him, but when he discards it in favour of a brute's existence and falls from the position of the thinker to that of the sensualist, he experiences a fall from a higher to a lower status. It is with difficulty that one obtains birth as a man in the course of evolution; but having obtained it, if he again lives the life of a brute, there is no better word for it than 'Fall.' According to Kapila, the founder of the Sankhyan philosophy, evolution is really an involution, in the first instance, so that the Purusha, i.e., pure Spirit, first of all descends into matter, and becomes ensouled in it, evolving out intellect, ahamkara, and the like, one after another. But, as we said in the last chapter, this

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THE SIDDHANTA. 775 is quite untenable ; since absolutely no reason can be found for the descent of an Omniscient Being into matter, to undergo the pain and suffering of an unimaginably prolonged bondage. Besides, the Sankhyan philosophy, though based on the hypothesis of an alternation of cycles of inanifestation and destruction of the universe, nowhere accounts for the souls which remain unevolved at the end of a world-cycle, nor for those who obtain eternal emancipation. The latter cannot become involved in transmigration afresh, and must exist somewhere freed from the trammels of samsara ; and the former cannot disappear from existence altogether. Their nature would prevent them from rising to the Siddha Sila, so that they must remain somewhere in the samsara itself. This point alone will suffice to show that the system of Kapila is as unsatisfactory as Advaitism pure and simple. Moreover, it is permissible to ask, what might be the significance of Purusha ? Is it a quality, or being ? If the former, it cannot exist by itself, since qualities require a substratum of substance to inhere in. If the latter, that is, a being, how is the multiplicity of souls to be explained ? They surely are neither non-existent, nor reflections of any particular being. If it be now conceded that there is a multiplicity of purushas, then arises the great difficulty about their becoming all involved in alternate involution and evolution at one and the same time. But Sankhya has nothing to say to this in reply. . We thus conclude that the notion of an alternation of involution and evolution is as untenable as that of the creation of the universe at the fiat of a world-making god.

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776 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. To sum up, the elucidation of the mystery of Existence has led us into the profoundest secrets of Metaphysics and Religion. Looking into the nature of the world-process, we have seen how each theory set up by the leading Schools of Thought is but a partial view of the whole subject, which is dealt with in its entirety in Jainism alone. Thus, Vedanta, while endeavouring to furnish the raison d'etre of the process, fails to describe the mechanism of Maya and the nature of the material necessary for the manufacturing of the visible universe. Its definition of Reality is also somewhat involved, and not definite enough to enable one to escape from the intellectual pitfalls which abound in the region of Metaphysics. Buddhism, too, commits the same blunder. Its grasp of the principle of becoming is truly superb, but there ends all its philosophy. The theory of Ideas, likewise, meets with no better success, and by itself is quite inadequate to explain the world-process. When we turn to the Bible and the Holy Qur'an we encounter the same difficulty; these sacred books have nothing more to offer than mysticism and dogma which reason is heartily sick of by this time. As regards the speculations of European philosophers, they avowedly do not go to the root of the matter, and wherever they pretend to do so, they are easily seen to be incomplete and one-sided. Materialism, on its very face, has hardly a leg to stand upon at the bar of philosophy, and we pass it by accordingly. We thus turn away from every door, with disappointment, and enquire of Jainism whether it has any satisfactory solution to offer of the riddle which has baffled every

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777 one without exception. It at once introduces us to its six Realities without whose aid nothing but confusion can be created. Their nature, properties, and modes of working have already been sufficiently discussed; and it is for the world to judge whether it does or does not satisfy the natural human thirst for a perfect understanding of the world-process, in conformity with the strictest demands of reason. THE SIDDHANTA. With the aid of its most exact metaphysics, Jainism enables us to comprehend, in the fullest possible measure, how the universe is eternal and composed of six substances, and how their interaction is the cause of the world-process. It gives us a true insight into the idea of God, and explains how the individual soul may aspire to the high and sublime status of the Holy Ones. Jainism also enables us to unravel the meaning of myths and other sacred traditions, and, on account of the manysidedness of its philosophy, is the sole means of establishing the truth underlying all creeds, each of which has fallen into error on account of the one-sided absolutism of its philosophical outlook. In short, Jaina philosophy alone furnishes a common platform where all other creeds may meet, and grasp each other's hands in the sincere grip of friendship. The value of philosophy as the only means of salvation cannot be exaggerated. Myths only throw us into superstition, and mysticism produces intellectual fog and mist. It is clear thinking alone which can lead us into the region of Light and Life for which every soul is athirst. History shows how truth entombed in the sepulchre of myth and legend is soon 62

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778 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. lost to view and replaced by unholy superstition and purblind bigotry, so often mistaken for faith. The purpose these myths serve is great, but, when all is said and done, they are useful to him alone who can understand their significance. The soul is hankering after the realization of the great Ideal of Perfection, that is Godhood, but the theologians have nothing better than mystic and misty dogmas to console it with. They have nothing but pieces of stone to give in place of the bread that we ask. The realization of Godhood however, requires the conception of Truth, i.e., the Ideal to be attained, and the knowledge of the means to attain it with, in the clearest possible way. That mythology, which is nothing if not the labyrinthine maze of obscurity, can ever help the unphilosophical in the elucidation of Truth and clarity of thought, is beyond conjecture. It follows from this that religion can only benefit where it is conducive to precise and clear thinking. The attempt to educate the masses by means of myths and legends has been given a sufficient trial, but it has only gone to make men irreligious at heart. It is high time now that Truth was imparted to them in its pure undisguised form. The great fault with us is that we are always ready to set ourselves up as teachers without ever having been students ourselves. When we approach Religion as humble seekers after truth, and not in the spirit of bigotry or conceit, it will be seen that Jainism stands unrivalled among the systems which claim to impart the truth.

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CHAPTER XI. THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. * dykh@ gr dykhhn hy dhwq khh w prdh nshyn - dydh rwzn dl sy hy dkhhy'y dyt * The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God : and if children, then heirs : heirs of Go and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together."--Romans, VIII, 16-17. The advent of the coming Messiah, the Redeemer divine, is an event for the signs of which almost every mystic's eye is constantly turned heavenward. The belief is to be found in almost every system of mythology, no apocalyptic religion being altogether free from its influence, though different names are given by different creeds to the Saviour who is to come. Thus, Hinduism has its Kalki, Islam its Mehdi, Theosophy its Maitrai and Christianity its Christ. This difference of nomenclature, however, does not affect the function of the coming Messiah who is expected in each and every instance to establish a new order of things by redeeming the faithful and by destroying the foe. Many and varied are the prophecies which foretell the coming of the 'Lord,' and history records the names of some of the men who have claimed to be the coming Messiah themselves. In our own day we have seen considerable stir ** If thou wouldst, O Zauk, behold that glorious one behind the Veil, " Then peep through the hole in thy heart."

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780 being made over a Hindu lad whose body was supposed to have been marked out for the descent of Maitrai, but happily the matter was put an end to by litigation in court. It would thus appear that the belief in the coming of the Messiah is not confined to any particular sect or section of men, but prevails among all classes of mystics; and the ridicule which men have drawn upon themselves in connection with the coming of the looked for Saviour goes to show that even this little matter has not been properly understood by the followers of these creeds in our day. The truth is that the coming Messiah is as much a myth as any other tenet of mysticism; it certainly bears no reference to any particular human or super-human being whose descent on earth might be expected to put an end to the prevailing evil. The tenet represents a pure doctrinal allegory, depicting, in metaphorical garb, the fact of the attainment of divine perfection by the individual soul. There being no source of true happiness in the external world, it is simply impossible for any one to establish an order of things of the kind that will bring lasting good to the soul or be permanently satisfactory to all. Certainly, bliss is not to be culled from one's environment and surroundings, being nothing other than the natural emotion of pure joy which arises in the soul when it is no longer obsessed with the thought of the other than itself. As already pointed out more than once, there can be no happiness for the soul if it happen to be barren in itself. The coming Messiah must, therefore, spring up from within, if he is to confer happiness on the soul. The soul that is freed from the taint of its wrong beliefs is THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE,

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 781 then its own saviour, and the Liberator that is to come. The advent of the Messiah which so many pious people are looking forward to, thus means neither more nor less than a vision of their own Soul. In this sense alone is it possible to put any sensible construction on the statement of Jesus: "Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom" (Matt. XVI. 28). Any other interpretation would make it a piece of falsehood. The use of the word 'some' indicates that the sight was one not open to all alike, and, therefore, not an historical event in the physical world. Nor was the spectacle timed to happen on or about the Judgment Day;' for it was to be witnessed during the lifetime of some of those who stood by at the time. What Jesus meant was the consciousness of one's own soul as the great and glorious Self, and the enjoyer of bliss. For, it is the 'vision' of one's true Self which is the immediate cause of redemption, not that of another of however exalted a position. It was pointed out in the seventh chapter of this book that yoga aimed at securing the vision of the Self for the yogi. We did not then enter into the intricacies of the process, but the time has now come to describe it in detail. When the aspirant has perfected himself in the preliminary training, and has no longings left in his mind for sensual enjoyments, he is qualified for the vision of the Lord. Now, the seer is not the eye, but the soul; for the eye

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782 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is an obstruction to its unlimited vision, being attuned to a certain type of vibrations alone. This seer is the dweller immortal in the body, and not the body or the organs of the senses. Hence the Upanishad teaches : "Here within the heart is a cavity; therein he resides who is the Lord of the universe" ("The Philosophy of the Upanishads,' p. 169). It is the vision of this Dweller in the cavity of the Heart which is to be secured for emancipation. But this is impossible till the veils of matter covering the Atman and obscuring its vision are not torn to pieces. Self-perception, therefore, consists in the withdrawal of attention from the outside and the throwing back of will on itself. This is a process in which the organs of sight also play an important part. In the normal condition, the eyes are turned outwards, and enable us to perceive external objects alone, but, at times, they also converge slightly upward and inward, as in the attitude of prayer ; and when they do so we are enabled to see visions. How this happens is not difficult to understand. The peculiar upward, inward convergence of the eyes disengages the attention from the physical plane, and makes it penetrate the veils of finer matter, the astral, the mental, and the like, as they are called by the Theoso phists. The Yogi aims at throwing his converging gaze inwardly with the full force of concentration he is capable of, till it is fixed on what is known as the pineal-gland in the brain. The pineal-gland is an organ the function of which has not been understood by physiologists as yet, but whicb, according to the Yogis, is an incipient

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 783 eye. This 'third eye,' when developed, enables them to look into the cavity of the heart, which is the abode of the Lord. Remembering that vision is not in the eye but in the soul, the version of the Yogis, when put into simple language, means that when by controlling the mind one prevents its outward flow, and throws it back on itself, it sees the Atman face to face in the cavity of the heart. The point at which the outward flow of the tide, or current, of perception can be checked is the pineal-gland, described as the undeveloped third eye by the Yogis. By the time the Yogi has acquired the power of fixing his attention on the pineal gland, his eye-balls become accustomed to turn the angle and remain steady in the attitude of internal introspection, without feeling strained. Exactly in the proportion in which the Yogi's power of concentration gains in intensity, does his feeling of the warmth of intimacy in his physical body decrease, so that when the intensity of concentration is able to force the tide of perception back into the cavity of the heart, the small remnant of interest in the external world which might be still lingering in the mind is completely destroyed for ever, and the soul is seen face to face in its full glory. This is the delight of God-vision of the earnest devotee, and the joy of seeing the Lord of the mystic. The Shiva Samhita thus describes an earlier stage of this process: "When the yogi thinks of the great Soul, after rolling back his eyes and concentrates his mind to the forehead, then he can perceive the lustre from the great Soul. That great yogi, who even for a moment has seen the beauty of the Omniscient and all-pervading Soul, frees himself from sin and attains salvation."

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784 THE KEY: OF KNOWLEDGE... Thus, when by the supreme effort of his will the Yogi throws his concentrated gaze to penetrate beyond the veil of illusion,' so as to be able to contemplate his Soul, in its naked effulgence, his evil karmas are destroyed, resulting in the acquisition of omniscience and other kinds of divine attributes. This means liberation full and complete in all respects, except that nirvana is not reached so long as the physical body is not dissolved, setting the soul free to ascend to the Abode of Gods. Some people, however, imagine that the ascent to nirvana takes place immediately on Godvision. Such would also seem to be the view of the author of the Biblical text which makes God say : "Thou canst not see my face : for there shall no man see me, and live" (Exodus, XXXIII. 20). The passage :"The Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend" (Ex, XXXIII. 11)does not contradict this view, inasmuch as it refers to an earlier stage of the process, when concentration on the nervous centre in the forehead, as described in the quotation from the Shiva Samhita, enables the aspirant to behold only the reflected image of his ego, described as the 'lustre from the great soul.' It is this 'lustre from the great soul' which is described in certain scriptures as the arch-angel, as will be shown later on. We are now ready to enquire into the significance of the statement of Jesus about the coming of the son of man. About the time when the prophecy' was uttered, it was the idea of the chosen twelve that the kingdom of God should immediately appear' (Luke, XIX. 11).

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 785 To remove this impression, Jesus propounded the parable of the nobleman who gave some money to each of his ten servants and left for a far off country. He returned home from his journey after a long time, and called for the accounts of their investments. Now, nine of the servants had employed the moneys entrusted to them profitably, but one had not. The result was that the good servants were all suitably rewarded, but the wicked one was made to refund what he had received. This parable was spoken to illustrate the principle that 'unto every one which hath shall be given; and from him that hath not, even that he hath shall be taken' (Luke, XIX. 12-26). This, then, is the fate in reserve for those who do not avail themselves of the present opportunity to control their destiny; they are in great danger of losing even what they enjoy to-day. . On another occasion Jesus declared : "If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him" (John, XIV. 23). Here is the key to the situation : Christ will come to each and every one who keeps his word, and will take his abode with him, and because the Father 'loves whomsoever the Son loves,' the Father will also take up his abode with him. Jesus could not have meant that he would come back bodily into the world from heaven. How could he bring the Father with him? Again, how could the abode be taken, regardless of time and space, with each and every devotee all the world over? The truth is that the kingdom of God "cometh not with observation, ... for behold, it is within you" (Luke, XVII. 20-21). 63

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786 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. When sending out his disciples to preach the gospel to the 'lost sheep,' Jesus prophesied : "Verily I say unto you, ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come" (Matthew, X. 23). Now, this prophecy is just as important as the one which is under consideration. The question is, has it been fulfilled ? That it did not refer to Jesus does not admit of doubt, for Jesus was already there with them, and had not to come from anywhere. Therefore, if we are to interpret the expression, the Son of man, as referring to Jesus, this prophecy did not and could not come off ; in other words, it was a piece of information of a past event gratuitously furnished in the future tense. But if we read the expression in the sense of the quickening of the germ of Godhood within men, its sense not only becomes clear but most appropriate also. As St. Paul says, as many as are led by the spirit of God, are the sons of God (Romans, VIII. 14). What more appropriate for the Master when sending out his disciples to preach the gospel to the people than to encourage and inspire them with the hope that they would see the signs of the unfoldment of the germ of Divinity among men, before they got half through their work ? In determining the nature of the prophecy about the coming Messiah, the first question which naturally arises relates to its authenticity, since impartial Biblical scholars are agreed upon its being a subsequent interpolation. Perhaps the endeavour to make the statement as much repugnant to history as possible by the introduction of the symbolism of the holy city in the midst of the original observations, on the subject, is, more

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 787 than anything else, responsible for the doubt that has prevailed amongst the unprejudiced section of the BibJical scholars about its authenticity. This circumstance, however, only tends to fix the date of the gospel, and leaves the question of its cash-value untouched. The words used by (Luke, XXI. 20): "And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh," inserted in the middle of the chapter, are the most significant, and furnish a strong argument against the authenticity and genuineness of the passage under consideration. In our opinion, however, the siege of Jerusalem has nothing to do with the genuineness of the prophecy,' inasmuch as Jerusalem would appear to be a time-honoured symbolism for the human body. Besides, most of its verses are so full of the spirit of truth and remarkably Jesus-like that they carry the stamp of genuineness with them. And, if we add to this the fact that true philosophy furnishes a complete explanation of the so-called prophecy, and explains away the discrepancies which abound in the orthodox interpretation, the conclusion is irresistible that the idea of forgery cannot be entertained for a moment in connection with it. The statement made by Jesus can be very easily understood. He was asked as to the signs of the coming of the Son of man, i.e., of the kingdom of heaven. That these two expressions, 'the Son of man,' and the 'kingdom of heaven,' were used interchangeably, in the same sense, is rendered clear by a comparison of such verses as Mark, IX. 1, Matthew, X. 23 and XVI. 28, and Luke,

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788 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. IX. 27. In reply, Jesus warned his followers not to listen to the false prophets and christs who would arise in the external world, from time to time. This, as a matter of fact, shuts out the hypothesis of his own return in a literal sense. As to the signs of the coming of the Son of man, they were told to wait patiently for them. They would see wars, famines, persecution of the righteous, and all sorts of other calamities on the earth, but they must patiently possess their souls (Luke, XXI. 19), for the end is not yet (Mark, XIII. 7). They must wait and watch like the good servant for the coming of the master, for no one knoweth when he would come (Matthew, XXIV. 46 and 47). It is a wicked servant who turns away from the path of rectitude and ill-treats his fellow-servants, because of the delay in the coming of the Lord (Matthew, XXIV. 49). One who desires to enter into the kingdom of heaven must, there. fore, constantly remain on the alert, for no one knows of the day or the hour when his opportunity will come, not even the angels of heaven, but the Father only (Matthew, XXIV. 36). When there be signs in the sun* * The precise significance of such things as the Sun and the Moon in the mystery-language of symbolism would appear from the following brief extract from the Permanent History of Bharata Varsha (vol. I. p. 286):-- "The Ida or current of breath through the left nostril is techni. cally called the Moon, and Pingala on the right is known as the Sun. The passing of the breath from the right to the left is also technically known among philosophers as Uttarayana. The reverse is Dakshi. nayana. The junction of Ida and Pingala is Amavasya or new moon. When the life breath reaches Muladhara, it is Vishuva, or the New Year's day. When the life breath passes to Kundalini through Ida, it is Lunar Eclipse, and through Pingala it is Solar Eclipse."

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 789 and the moon and the stars, and the very powers of heaven seem shaken, then will appear the sign of the Lord, like a flash of lightning, which, while shining in one part, illumines the whole heaven; then shall be seen the "Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory" (Luke, XXI. 27). "Thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed' (Luke, XVII. 30). Then one may lift up his head, for his redemption is near (Luke, XXI. 28). Even then only he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved' (Matthew, XXIV. 13). The whole statement is intended to be a great secret, and its significance is made to depend on the warning: "whoso readeth, let him understand." (Matthew, XXIV. 15). Now, we saw in connection with God-vision that it is only when the mind is disgusted with fleshly lusts that the Yogi can hope to attain salvation, and it was pointed out, in the chapter on Yoga, that a tremendous annount of action takes place, as a result of spiritual training, in the nervous system of the Yogi, displacing many important nerve currents of the face and head, in particular, those of the spinal column. The nerve action consequent on the intensest concentration of will on itself, so as to be able to have God-vision, in the cavity of the heart, causes still greater changes in the nerves; and it is due to these changes that the roots of bondage and samsara are loosened and destroyed. The change brought about by the alteration of the pole or centre of perception" is so great that many misguided persons have come to grief through it. This change of polarity has the effect of arranging the mind particles

Page #811
790 in a manner akin to the process of magnetisation of a bar of steel. The old percepts are all upset; the sun seems to lose its light, the moon its brightness; the stars are seen to fall, making the very heavens shake and tremble; and visions of all sorts float before the eyes. When these signs appear, the point of concentration should be changed from the pineal-gland to the heart, or, as Jesus put it, one should 'stand in the holy place,' with the injunction: 'whoso readeth, let him understand' (Matthew, XXIV. 15). This state of affairs is the prelude to the vision of the Lord, but Nirvana is not yet, inasmuch as it is a step beyond this stage. Every Yogi knows what this change of polarity in the nervous system means. The sceptic need only strain the nerves connected with his organs of sight, for a little while, to see a partial confirmation of our statement. We can now understand why Jesus said: " Verily I say unto you: This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled. Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away" (Matthew, XXIV. 34 & 35). THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. His last declaration that not a hair of the head of those who possessed their souls in patience, in spite of calamities, tribulations and disasters, should perish (Luke, XXI. 18), if anything, emphasizes his doctrine. Believe in your immortality and the power of the soul, and no harm can befall you, till, conquering death, you ascend to your true abode-the blissful Heaven of the Jinas (Conquerors, hence, Gods). The injunction, "In that day, he which shall be upon the housetop, and his staff

Page #812
THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 791 in the house, let him not come down to take it away: and he that is in the field, let him not likewise return back."-(Luke, XVII. 31.)simply means that the desire for all worldly concerns must be given up at that supreme moment, for "wheresoever the carcass [the bundle of the objects of desire) is, there will the eagles [desiring manas] be gathered together [attracted]." Remember Lot's wife (Luke, XVII. 32), for as she was turned into a column of salt, in consequence of her looking back on the world, so shall all those who 'look back' be accounted unworthy to obtain salvation. " There is no question in all this of a public or official redeemer of souls, or of the establishment of a new order of things on a general resurrection of the dead. There is no trace of an universal resurrection, on a particular day, even in the following mystic passages which were uttered in connection with the coming of the son of man :-- "" "In that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. "Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other left. "Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left."-Luke, XVII. 34-36. Besides, if rewards and punishments are to remain in the mind of a divine judge till the Judgment Day, and only to be adjudged when the world shall have ceased to exist, how shall the meek inherit the earth (Matt. V. 5)? The true interpretation of this passage lies in the doctrine of transmigration of souls, which points out that rewards and punishments are meted out to each and every soul in this very world, and that the most coveted boons

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792 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of all, namely, perfection, blies and immortality, are to be had only on reaching the other shore,' i.e., Nirvana. The expressions all the tribes of the earth [material tendencies] shall mourn' (Matt. XXIV. 30), and the like, are mystic allegories, some of which have been explained by Mr. Pryse in his valuable work on the book of Revelation, entitled "The Apocalypse Unsealed,' to which the reader is referred for their interpretation. The coming of the Son of man, thus, was an expression employed to denote the dawning of God-consciousness in the soul, not the appearance of an historical saviour in the world of men. Walter De Voe well expresses the idea, when he says :-- "The essential attributes of Jehovah-God are organized into your individual soul. The Father has organized His omniscient love into a glowing sun of light and power, and this divine ego is your soul, your true self, the Lord of your mind and body. This living Pearl of Divinity is the presence of God within your nature ; you can well afford to sell all your accumulations of earthly thought, even though it seem a great sacrifice, in order to attain to conscious possession of this Pearl of great price. Your personality is from below, your individuality is from above. Your personality is the image and likeness of mortal parents, your soul individuality is the image and likeness of God. The first man is of the earth earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven.' Each soul is a son of God, a Christ. Your soul is God manifesting - your Lord and redeemer. The Lord said unto my Lord; Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool' Psalms 110 : I. This Scriptural passage mentions the Father speaking to the individual soul, or lord of the body, telling it to sit on the right side, and it will realize the power to overcome all things. Surrender to your souls, O mortals, and then you will see the mighty conqueror come. Then the soul will say, 'I am come that ye might have life, and have it more abundantly. I am the way, the truth and the life. I and my Father are one. He that hath seen me hath seen the Father,'"

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 793 The true Redeemer can come only from within, and to whomsoever He has come, He has come from within. He is then described as Christos, or Krishna, seated at the right hand of Power. It will be seen that quite a large number of the Biblical sayings which are meaningless and irrelevant with reference to Jesus acquire significant and lucid sense when applied to the Christ within. " I am the resurrection and the life : he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live," " whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die," and other such expressions cannot be applied to Jesus without divesting them of their true sense. Similarly, the passage : " There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in liis kingdom" (Matthew, XVI, 28), is robbed of its true merit if we take it to refer to Jesus, but is full of meaning when taken as alluding to the individual soul. Some one has well said : * Though Christ a thousand times and more In Bethlehem's stall be born, If He's not born within thyself Thy soul is still forlorn," To have a perfect grasp of the subject, we must look a little more deeply into the idea of redemption from the point of view of Jainism. In the purity of its essence, the soul is blissful and omniscient, but its vision is obstructed by the contact of matter which it has absorbed. In this condition it is incapable of penetrating the veil of impurity with which it is enshrouded on all sides. Hence, if its vision be clarified by the removal of the material filth that obstructs it, it 64

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794 can regain its pristine glory at once, since its real nature has in no wise changed. So long, however, as it is engrossed in the pursuit of fleshly lusts, its attention remains turned away from itself, and only directed to the perception of matter. Religion aims at turning its attention on itself, informs it of its omniscient nature, and advises it to actually behold its own glorious vision to realise its divinity. But in order to see itself, the soul must, first of all, purge itself of the particles of matter which it has absorbed ; and the only method of being rid of these harmful particles is to scatter them about by the force of will. Hence, the withdrawal of the outgoing energy of will, and its inner concentration are required to enable the soul to behold its own glory. Concentration on the inner centres in the body has a two-fold effect on the soul. Firstly, it checks the incoming stream of the particles of matter through the doorways of the senses; and, secondly, it disposes of the particles already present by scattering them about and destroying their bandhas (bonds). When this is accomplished, the self-luminous soul, freed from the taint of matter, sees and realizes its true nature, and feels the utmost joy. It is then called a jina, i.e., conqueror. It is here that the precision of Jaina thought asserts itself against the one-sided Idealism of Vedanta, and it is here also that we see the insufficiency of the system of Buddha brought into full view. King Pasenadi's question to the nun Khema, and the latter's confusion as to the existence or non-existence of the Perfect One after death, fully illustrate our point. Vedanta also finds difficulty in meeting the awkward question: the THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 795 world being my illusion, will it come to an end on my redemption ? It is certain that there is such a thing as release from the bondage of samsara, which few have understood better than the great founder of Buddhism, and it is also certain that the world would not come to an end on the attainment of Nirvana by an individual. The weakness of these systems lies in the narrow horizon of thought which renders them one-sided, hence, imperfect. Truth is not exhausted, without remainder, when looked at from any particular point of view; its full grasp can be had only when the student looks at it from all sides. It is here that the philosophy of Jainism comes to the rescue of the student mystified by the reticence of Buddha and the vacillation of Vedanta. It shows that the soul enters Nirvana in a Solar body which is pure divine Will, and, therefore, undecaying. It is separate from all other Emancipated Souls, and yet not so in respect of the nature of its pure Essence. Hence, when a Redeemed Soul reaches Nirvana, it becomes part and parcel of Divinity in the above sense. In respect of the quality of Consciousness, it is one with all, but in respect of its Solar body which signifies Pure Spirit, it has its own 'impersonal' personality, like that of the drop in the sea. The continuity of the world is not affected by the attainment of Nirvana on the part of individuals. The world is, truly enough, like an illusion, in many respects, but it is not an actual dream. Hence, the emancipation of the individual is only consistent with his own disillusionment, not with the breaking of the 'spell'

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796 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. altogether. The illusion will persist, if only to accentuate the sense of freedom and to give a meaning to the joy of the Saved Ones. Early Christianity seems to have followed the teach: ing of Jainism, at least in respect of the idea of Redemption. The similarity of thought between the two creeds is too remarkable to be ignored. We have the same rule of confession * in the primitive Church as in Jainism (see. The Sacred Books of the East,' Vol. XLV. p. 168), the same notions of Redemption and Nirvana, the same sort of aristerities, and last but not the least, a marvellous concurrence of thought about the number of the Spiritual Leaders, called Tirthamkaras by the Jainas, and Spiritual Elders, or Kings, by the author of the Apocalypse. Perhaps some day when the tenets of mysticism are better understood than to-day, we shall have an explanation of all the other problems which are involved in obscurity at the present day. It will be seen that true religion aspires to make men jivan-muktas in this life, and lias little in common with the idea of salvation subsequent to a general resurrection of the dead on a suppositional Judgment Day. The idea of such a post mortem salvation is incompatible * Confession is the surest means of self-improvement. When the impulse to lay bare one's evil thoughts originates in the heart, it cannot but elevate the soul. At all other times, however, it is idle to talk of its utility. The abuses which it gave rise to in the Christian Church only show that Christians failed to understand its application. Here, also, clear thinking reveals that where the priest and the parishioner are moved, not from true religious motives, but from social compulsion and ignorant superstition, nothing but abuse is to be expected.

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THE COMING OF THE BESSIAH. 797 with the instinct of life, which causes a thrill of horror and impotent rage to pass through the human frame at the very idea of death. True salvation comes through a conquest of death, not by an unwilling submission to it. A resurrection of the dead on a future day is like the draught of a physician which is to restore everlasting health after the patient is dead and buried; and it must be confessed that beyond the misinterpretation of certain difficult passages in the sayings of some of the founders of religion there is not the slightest evidence in support of it. The ancients only invented myths and legends to conceal their true philosophy from all but the thoughtful, but the moderns take them literally! The legend of the emancipation of Israel from the rule of Pharaohs, the king of Egypt, is an instance in point. An historical interpretation of it is well calculated to lead the scholar and the historian to pronounce against its genuineness, on the one hand, while an unintelligent reading is enough, ou the other, to strike the pious devotee with awe and disgust at the character of the Lord God himself. Far from respecting age, sex, or innocence, the Lord God sends Moses, armed with supernatural signs, to Pharaoh to intercede in the cause of the chosen people, and then himself hardens the heart of tbe tyrant, as if he was purposely manoeuvring to bring about the bloodshed and carnage wrought among men and beasts in the land. The truth is that these accounts were written in this manner purposely to set the mind on an enquiry as to their hidden sense, so that if any one could understand that in what assumed the garb of history the substratum of truth was not

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798 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE made to lie on the surface, but lay hidden beneath, he would aot be long in finding it out for himself. What has been said about this particular Biblical legend applies not only to all other seemingly historical accounts in the Bible, but also to the Puranas and Scriptures of almost all other creeds excepting Jainism. The story of the emancipation of Israel, the chosen nation, is a beautiful illustration of the emancipation of the Self from the clutches of the self. Through ignorance, the real Self of man is in the bondage of his false, 'illusory,' bodily self, and iss uffering in captivity. This little bodily self of man is the tyrant Pharaoh. Israel represents the real, effulgent Self, who is to be rescued and taken out from the land of captivity to that of bliss, where streams of milk and honey flow, and a vision of which was seen by the early patriarchs by the power of communion with the Self. The stubbornness of Pharaoh illustrates the resistance which the lower self offers to the novice, in the early stages of spiritual unfoldment. The pith of the story now becomes clear, and may be described in a few words. When the disciple is firm in his determination for spiritual emancipation, he is opposed by his personal self, which throws all sorts of obstacles in his way. The early part of discipleship is, indeed, a hard struggle between the higher and the lower natures, and Maya (delusion) helds out all sorts of temptations and threats to the aspirant. But no emancipation is possible till the power of Maya is not totally destroyed once for all and for ever. The little, illusory self of Maya, therefore, is represented as having hardened his heart over and over

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THE COMING OF THE MESSIAH. 799 again. At last, frightened by the devastating desolation of calamity, the despot half-heartedly agrees to set the Chosen One' free. But he soon repents of his weakness, and makes one more effort to recapture the Emancipated Soul, but, God having manifested Himself, miracles are performed to baffle the enemy; the sea parts dry, letting the favoured one pass, but entombing the tyrant and completely destroying all traces of him. The story of the rescue of Prahlada, which is celebrated annually in many places by the Hindus, is the Puranic counterpart of the legend of the emancipation of Israel. Hiranya-Kasipu, the asura-king and the bitterest enemy of Vishnu, had a son named Prablada, who took to worshipping the god in defiance of the wishes of his august father. The distressed parent resorted to various devices to wean the unruly child from the love of the deity, but in vain. At last he resolved to destroy the boy, but failed in the various attempts he made on his life. He then sought the help of his sister who was supposed to enjoy immortality, as a divine gift, and prevailed upon her to enter a burning pyre, taking the lad with her. The roaring pile was, however, turned into a garden at the touch of Prahlada, but the sister of Hiranya-Kasipu was destroyed by the flames. This exasperated Kasipu so much that he resolved to destroy the boy with his own hand. Tying him securely with a rope to one of the solid masonry columns in his palace, he addressed him thus: "Thou hast defied me thus far, but I am now going to destroy thee. Thou knowest well that I cannot be killed by man or beast; neither the weapons that have been manufactured by devas or

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800 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. men, nor metals nor elements have power over me; and day and night cannot witness my destruction. Therefore, there is none to release thee from my power. Hasten thou now to call upon thy god to come to thy rescue, for thou shalt not live to utter his name again." Having thus spoken, Hiranya-Kasipu raised his arm to strike down his son ; but just as the glittering blade flashed out of its sheath, the massive column burst with a loud report aud a fearful creature, half lion and half man in appearance, sprang from its middle. The next moment it had ripped Hiranya-Kasipu's bowels with its powerful claws. Thus was Prahlada saved from death, and Hiranya-Kasipu destroyed. As for the interpretation of this legend, HiranyaKasipu represents greed, the source and support of all other evil tendencies described as asuras. According to Mr. K. Narayana lyer (see the Permanent History of Bharata-Varsha, Vol. II. p. 152), "Hiranyom means gold or riches and Kasipu, a pillow or bed. HiranyaKasipu therefore naturally applies to a person who having acquired wealth is unwilling to spend, but clings to it with great attachment." Prahlada, on the other hand, signifies "great delight and contentment," which are the antithesis of greed. Greed being the most di fficult mental trait to destroy, the development of contentment already marks an advanced stage of spiritualism. Hence is Prahlada a devotee to be saved. The sister of Hiranya-Kasipu is the calculating intellect impressed in the service of greed, and fire l'epresents a state of confusion, which is, however,

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THE COMING OF TIIE MESSIAH. 801 changed into orderliness at the touch of Prahlada. The monster represents the combined virtues of intelligence and fearlessness (man-intellectualism + lion=courage), hence the combination of wisdom and will; and the column of masonry is a good symbol for the column of the spine which is the seat of many psychic plexi. Being the last enemy on the path, greed is destroyed just as the soul turns away its attention from the world of men, that is to say at the moment of the darkening of the sun of ahamkara, hence neither in the day (when the sun of ahamkara may be said to be in power) nor at night (after the destruction of the ahamkura). The rest of the story is lucid enough and needs no further comment. To sum up : every religion recognizes, more or less definitely, the possibility of a state of existence of surpassing joy which would have no ending. The coming Messiah is an ingenious symbolism with reference to that beatific existence, and conveys no idea of the return of a real or mythical personage of the name of Jesus, who might or might not have lived in the world of men in the past. The soul that destroys its evil karmas becomes its own Saviour, and needs no Liberator from outside itself.

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CHAPTER XII. RE-INCARNATION. hmchw sbzh brh rwy'ydh m hftSd hftd qlb dydh m * [Tr.-Seventy times seven hundred bodies have I passed through; seed-like have I sprouted forth again and again.] no The eternity of the soul being established in the preceding chapters, re-incarnation follows as a necessary logical corollary. For it is inconceivable that throughout the unimaginably vast eternity of time which is implied in our notion of the past, the present incarnation of the soul should be altogether a novel and unprecedented event in its experience. The present appearance of the jiva can, then, in no sense be its first incarnation in the world. This is tantamount to saying that it must have appeared in many other forms or incarnations in the past. To deny this would be to introduce the element of chance, or the deux ex machina of a divine will, concerning which Mr. J. C. Chatterji makes the following highly pertinent observations in his Hindu Realism (pages 116-117): "It cannot be said that the Atman suddenly makes a resolve to be born and is born, For, in that case, we have first to show the antecedents which can lead to such a resolve; because we know of resolves which are made without antecedents consisting of thoughts, ideas and perceptions. Secondly, if an Atman came to be born out of its own choice, by making a sudden resolve, it would be born only under conditions which would make it happy. But there are millions of men that are anything but happy in regard to their

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RE-INCARNATION. 803 situations or bodies; and it is unlikely that the Atmans in them would have come to be born out of anything like choice. "Nor can it be said that it is born, once and all of a sudden, entirely by chance. For there is a rigid law which guides and governs the body in which the Atman is born (that is to say, with which it is related), and the surroundings in which the body is found. This body and surroundings form one term of the relation, while the Atman forms the other. In these circumstances it is hardly reasonable to assume that, of the two terms of a relation, while one is guided by law, the other is merely a thing of chance. "Finally, if it be held that it is God who associates the Atman with a body, and he does so only once, then such a God would be open to the charge of injustice and involved in contradictions. He would be unjust and malicious, inasmuch as he associates one Atman, without any reason, with a body where a man cannot but be happy and have pleasant surroundings, while He associates another with a body which can be only a source of misery, and surroundings which can only foster vice. But nobody thinks of God as being unjust or whimsical, and therefore the theory that God associates an Atman with a body, only once, without any reason, must be abandoned." It is only necessary to look at the souls of men to be convinced of the fact that they are neither at the top nor the bottom of the scale of evolution, since none is fully developed in knowledge, and none absolutely ignorant. Whence this middling status, and the differences* of temperament, knowledge, and the like, if * However eloquently one might advocate the cause of a man-like architect of the world, it is impossible to defend him on the count of favouritism. No amount of subtle hair-splitting, no manner of ingenious juggling with vague and contradictory epithets, no power of stirring oratory, can ever defend such a being from the simple charge of biased (i.e., malicious) differentiation in the exercise of his creative function. Why should he create one man happy and another very wretched; one the favourite of gods, another the companion of evil; one intelligent, another stupid ; one capable of imbibing faith, another hopelessly perverse and incorrigible ? Even great nations show differences of circumstances,- one is born to rule,

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804 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. they have come for the first time into the world? Reincarnation and re-incarnation alone explains these facts, and also accounts for the differences between the animal, the vegetable and the human souls. Reject re-incarnation, put the soul, for all the past eternity of time, in a region of stagnation and inaction, and you will find that you cannot bring it into the world at all except on the hypothesis of chance, or, what is even worse, the miracle of a divine command. another to serve in slavery, and so forth. Why does God, the Just, the Merciful, the Omnipotent, discriminate between his creatures in this manner? Theology has no sensible reply to give; but Vedanta with its doctrine of Maya, tries to explain the situation as follows:-- "Here is a master who goes into the garden at one time, and goes into the mansion at another time, and goes into the dingy dungeon at one time, and goes into the toilet at some other time, goes into the kitchen himself, and lives also under a burden himself. What will you call him ? Is he unjust? No, No. He were unjust if the people whom he kept in the dungeon, or in the garden, or in the mansion, or in the toilet were different from him, but it is he himself who resorts to the toilet, and he himself who goes into the other places, if it is he himself who does all these things, then he is not unjust. Then all the blame is taken off him" (In the Woods of God Realization, Vol. III. 36-7). And Sufeism chimes in : khwd khwzh w khwd khwzh gr w khwd gl khwzh * khwd br sr an khwzh khrydr br amd [Tr. Himself the pot, himself the potter, himself the material of the pot; himself appears also as the purchaser of the pot.'] Vedanta itself does not go quite so far as Sufeism, since it is not its doctrine that Brahman itself becomes the material of the 'pot,' though certain passages in the writings of Shankaracharya himself are open to that interpretation. As for the merit of the explanation, it is sufficient to say, with Schopenhauer, that a God, who, from the beginningless eternity, has been acting in this manner must have been tormented by the Devil.

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RE-INCARNATION. 805 When we look at the unimaginable infinity of the jivas now ensouled in the bodies of beasts, birds and insects, to say nothing of plants, and other lower forms of life, each of which is possessed of the potentiality of Godhood, we are irresistibly led to the conclusion that to deny re-incarnation is to foredoom them all to eternal damnation and misery; for none of them is possessed of that type of intellect, which can discriminate between the Self and the not-Self, so as to be able to evolve out into perfection in their present incarnations. Moksha being dependent on self-exertion, and not on the favour of another, by far the vast majority of mankind, too, will find themselves unable to attain it in the course of one earth-life. What, we ask, will be their plight, on the hypothesis of one earth-life per soul? Which is preferable of the two states, an eternal and unending life of damnation, torture and torment, in hell, or a course of 'evolution' which furnishes opportunity to each and every soul of developing its potential perfection that already exists in the seed '? The case with those whose souls have felt the thrill of inspiration arising from a consciousness of their divine goal is still more striking; for if we ponder over the problem, we shall observe that the consciousness of the Ideal in a Self-conscious soul must itself lead it to perfection willy-nilly, in due course of time since it is the nature of the Ideal to be active. How powerful must be the force of this living Ideal, can be seen at a glance by comparing it with the false ones which men pursue in the world. Money, for instance, though unmoving in itself, is the cause of all the wild bustle and 'life in

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806 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the world, and what has it not led men and nations to in the past? One need only think of the horrible scenes which generally take place on the discovery of a " Klondike," --scenes of starvation, suffering and villainy of men--to realize its power. The metaphysics of the sub-conscious, which is engaging the attention of European psychologists at the present day, has gone a long way to show that the subconscious is not the same thing as the unconscious or inactive. It has been observed that the idea of the action ordered in hypnosis not only becomes an object of consciousness at a certain moment, but the more striking aspect of the fact is that the idea grows active : it is translated into action as soon as consciousness becomes aware of its presence. As to this, Prof. Sig. Freud of Vienna observes : "The real stimulus to the action being the order of the physician, it is hard not to concede that the idea of the physician's order becomes active too. Yet this last idea did not reveal itself to consciousness, as did its outcome, the idea of action ; it remained unconscious, and so it was active and unconscious at the same time."* This is quite sufficient to show that the true Ideal of divine Perfection cannot but be active, and with a greater degree of intensity than the false ones whose association with consciousness is not of a permanent sort. Thus, the activity of the Ideal is put beyond dispute ; its effect can only be to lead to the realization of individual perfection, however much we might retard it by our wrong actions and failings. Now, since one earth-life * See the article entitled 'Some Types of Multiple Personality' in the Special Medical part of The Proceedings of The Society for Psychical Research,' for November, 1912.

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RE-INCARNATION. 807 an does not suffice for every jiva, it follows that there must be repeated births, or rather rebirths, to enable them to obtain full development. The above arguments conclusively establish the doctrine of transmigration. Two counter-theses have been advanced against this theory, namely, (1) the materialistic notion of heredity, and (2) the dogmatic assertion of theology which ascribes the creation of beings to the volitional activity of God. These have already been sufficiently refuted, but we shall deal with them further, as we proceed with our general observations on the law of Karma. Karma is said to be the cause of bondage and ignorance, pleasure and pain, and birth and death, in short, of every complexion' which the soul puts on. The law which regulates the action of Karma is based upon the principle of cause and effect, so that the saying 'as one sows, so must he reap,' presents the whole doctrine in a nutshell. Every action, whether mental or physical, is a sowing of the seed,' or, in the technical language of Indian philosophy, an engendering of karma. In the act of sowing the seed,' or engendering the karma, the soul has the choice of acting or refraining from action ; but when once the seed' is sown or karma engendered, its freedom is replaced by an inevitable liability to bear its consequences. The harvest which is sown must be reaped, gathered, and assimilated in its unabated fulness.* This is what constitutes the bondage of the * This is the general rule, and it admits of one exception, since the effect of karmas can be modified and even destroyed before fruition by the acquisition and practising of dharma.

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808 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. soul. Karma, therefore, is a kind of force which compels the soul to bear the consequences of its good or bad actions ; and this force originates in the very action itself and at the very moment of its performance. Every action affects the doer as much as it does another, though the effects of it may differ in the two cases. The other may, in some cases, be not affected at all, but the doer is always affected by his acts. The result of the expenditure of energy on another is generally visible, but not so its effect on one's own self. In the latier case, the invisible kurmuna body (a sort of inner vestment of the soul) is directly affected, for good or evil, by the energy spent in the performance of the act. The effect of such action on the harmana sarira is a change of the complexion of the soul, which determines its future liability to particular actions and experiences. In plain language, the effect of such action is the creation of new tendencies and inclinations, or the confirmation of some old and deeply-rooted habits. Karma, thus, is a force which binds the soul to the consequences of its good and bad actions. True to nature as the Jaina philosophy throughout is, it recognizes the different kinds of karmas as so many forces (karma-prakritis) which, operating on the soul, tie it down hand and foot, and constitute its destiny. They are conceived as material in their nature, inasmuch as there can be no such thing as an immaterial force... In subjection to its karmas the soul is like a balloon which is kept from rising up in the air by the weight of heavy sand bags tied to it by means of ropes. As the balloon cannot ascend up in the air as long as the sand

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809 bags adhere to its ropes, so is the soul unable to enjoy its natural freedom and divinity so long as its karmas are not severed from it. RE-INCARNATION. If the soul were an insentient principle, like the balloon, it could never free itself from its captivity, but being a self-active, conscious being, it has the power, hence the choice, to cut the cords with which it is tied down. Hence, its bondage continues just so long as it does not exert itself to break its bonds. It must, however, be remembered that the power of exertion depends on selfknowledge which arises only when the bondage itself is somewhat loosened, as in the case of man. Therefore, man alone of all creatures is gifted with the power to free himself from the cycle of births and deaths; hence he alone needs the warning against the eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Hence, also, the emphasis on the privilege and importance of human birth in the Scriptures. Thus recognised, karma is no imaginary creature of the Jaina and Hindu metaphysicians, but a real binding force, the coils of which can only be unwound by certain prescribed means. The effect of the actions of the soul is not to create a liability to suffer identically the same experience that an individual subjects another to, in all cases, e.g., he who has killed a man would not be necessarily murdered by his victim, in expiation of his sin, in some future birth; for if that were so, moksha could not be obtained till the identical experience, or suffering, had been undergone. The fruit of evil karma may take any form, and subject the individual to ignorance, loss of vision, 66

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810 and the like. Evil karmas lead to ignorance, because perfect knowledge depends on the purity of the Self which is all-knowing, so that when it is covered over with impurities, like a candle put under a bushel, the light of its wisdom is necessarily obstructed. Moreover, the impetuous activity of will in the pursuit of desires, acts as an obstruction to knowledge, just as the disturbed state of the water of a lake prevents the things lying at its bottom from being clearly perceived. Swayed by passion we become unreasonable, and often do things which we repent of in calmer moments. But, since passions only arise from desires, which are, in their final analysis, reducible to love and hate, i.e., attachment (raga) and aversion (dvesha), attachment and aversion are the true causes of ignorance. Hence, the nourishing of these two arch-enemies of the soul is the cause of its bondage. The Jaina Scripture, therefore, points out that he who would attain liberation must not only give up sense-gratification, but also the very desire for it. The evil lies to a much greater extent in the entertainment of desire than in the actual indulgence of the senses. Hence, he who looks after a woman with lust is not less 'guilty' than he who has carnal knowledge of her. It is to be remembered that the soul, as the enjoyer, is the subject, and matter, the object of enjoyment. Hence, the relation between the pleasure-extracting capacities of the soul and the qualities of matter, that is, colour, taste, smell, and the like, is that of subject and object, ie, the male and female principles. As the male opens his arms to embrace the female, so does the soul give up its rhythm of intension and expand out, THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RE-INCARNATION. 811 as it were, to embrace the slower rhythms of the qualities of matter. This results in the loss of its free rhythm of intension, and in the acquisition of the slower types of rhythm corresponding to the qualities of matter. In some cases, the quality of the pure rhythm of freedom becomes so much defiled and vitiated that the jiva can find solace only in the 'embrace' of matter. Smoking and drinking furnish fairly good illustrations of the polluting influence of matter on the soul, whose purer instincts, at first, revolt at the very sight of the things named, but later, when habituated to their use, become debased into a longing, and, in the worst cases, into an insatiable craving for them. The craving itself arises from the fact that the sensible qualities of matter, that is, colour, odour, and the like, cause only momentary satisfaction to the soul, which, having acquired a taste for them, feels ill at ease, like a fish out of water, when not in contact with them. Hence, the lower rhythms corresponding to the qualities of matter becoming predominant in the nature of the jiva, it feels a sort of void when not embracing their objects. It can also be seen without much difficulty that all evil passions and emotions, and the foul deeds, also, which they lead men to commit, arise from the free indulgence of the senses. For instance, a person in whom the craving for liquor has passed the limit of control will readily do anything to obtain the means for procuring it, passing, by imperceptible degrees of moral degradation, from the self-abasing begging of money as a favour, to theft, and also, at times, to robbery and murder. That the unconquerable longing for the grati

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812 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. fication of the senses also deprives one of the power of judgment, the sense of morality, and the capacity to act in the right way, follows as a necessary corollary. The associations, too, are determined by the same cause, since a drunkard can only find pleasure in the company of men of his own type, and so forth. The duration of life, i.e., longevity, also depends, to a considerable extent, on the nature of the active tendencies of the soul, since the pursuit of sensual pleasure constantly acts as a strain on the body hy subjecting it to all kinds of unhealthy surroundings and uncongenial environment. Besides, desires invariably bring us into conflict with men also bent on gratifying their lusts and often lead to quarrels, duels and wars. As a matter of fact, the physical body also can be made to defy death and decay, to a considerable extent, as will be shown more fully later on, but that requires an active attitude of the soul, whose desires and actions in the state of bondage are only calculated to jeopardize and imperil its 'life' every moment. The bondage of karmas is got rid of in two different ways, either naturally, or by the active exertion of the will. The difference between the two modes lies in the fact that, while in the former case the release is always partial and brought about by the exhaustion of the force of one or more karma-prakritis, in the latter it results from the knowledge of the real nature of the Self, and the consequent exertion of the will to remove the obstacles from its path. The result is that in the former case the soul is freed from one kind of bondage only to fall into some other, but in the latter all kinds of bonds are broken, one after another, by the conscious

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813 exertion of will. It is, however, evident from the nature of the process and the causes of bondage that will alone can bring about the freedom of the soul. No outside agency can, therefore, do anything for him who is not prepared to save himself. The function of the Siddhatmans in Jainism is, therefore, confined to the imparting of instruction, which They have left behind in the shape of Scriptures. * How the karma of one life affects the soul in a sub RE-INCARNATION. * Anxious as we are to acknowledge merit wherever it might exist, it would not have pained us at all to recognize the founders of other creeds also as true Teachers of mankind. But when after giving the fullest possible credit to the accounts of their lives as contained in their own books, we find that not one of them attained moksha in its true sense, the very idea of which was unknown to a majority of them, there is no alternative but to say that the true Teachers of humanity are only the twenty-four Tirthamkaras of Jainism, since he alone can be a teacher who combines in himself perfect knowledge, resulting from omniscience, and practical experience as the Conqueror. The founders of other religions, in so far as they teach the elementary principles of religion, are at best like the staff of a modern high school who are not intended to impart instruction in the more advanced course of education necessary for those determined to pursue their studies in a higher sphere of thought. Mahomed was a seer,' or prophet, Jesus a great yogi, Buddha the world-famous head of an order of monks, Kabir a mystic Bhakta, the great Shankaracharya a monument of learning, and so forth. None of them crossed the samsara, or attained to omniscience. Their writings are good and useful, as an elementary course of training, but not free from confusion of thought, nor from misdirection which none can afford to follow with closed eyes. He who wishes to avoid the pain of births and deaths in the world and the torments of hell, after death, must, therefore, turn to the only true source, and sit at the feet of the perfect Teachers, the Tirthamkaras.

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814 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. sequent incarnation is not difficult to understand, if we reflect over the principle of objectification of will, as Schopenhauer calls it. Says* the great philosopher : "The body is given in two entirely different ways to the subject of knowledge. It is given as an idea in intelligent perception, as an object among objects and subject to the laws of the objects, And it is also given in a quite different way as that which is immediately known to every one, and is signified by the word will. "Every true act of will is also at once and without exception a movement of the body. The act of the will and the movement of the body are not two different things objectively known, which the bond of causality unites; they do not stand in the relation of cause and effect; they are one and the same, but they are given in entirely different ways,-immediately, and again in perception for the understanding. The action of the body is nothing but the act of will objectified, i.e., passed into perception. This is true of every movement of the body, not merely those which follow upon motives, but also involuntary movements which follow upon mere stimuli, and, indeed, the whole body is nothing but objectified will, i.e., will become idea. Thus in a certain sense we may also say that will is the knowledge a priori of the body and the body is the know ledge a posteriori of the will. Resolutions of the will which relate to the future are merely deliberations of the reason about what we shall will at a particular time, not real acts of will, Only the carrying out of the resolve stamps it as will, for till then it is never more than an intention that may be changed, and that exists only in the reason in abstracto. It is only in reflection that to will and to act are different; in reality they are one. Every true, genuine, immediate act of will is also, at once and immediately, a visible act of the body. And, corresponding to this, every impression upon the body is also, on the other hand, at once and immediately, an impression upon the will. As such, it is called pain when it is opposed to the will; gratification or pleasure when it is in accordance with it. It is quite wrong, however, to call pain and.pleasure ideas, for they are by no means ideas, but immediate affections of the will in its manifestation, the body; compulsory, instantaneous willing or not-willing of the impression which the body sustains. Lastly, the knowledge * See The World as Will and Idea,' Vol. I, pp. 129-141.

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RE-INCARNATION. 815 which I have of my will, though it is immediate, cannot be separated from that which I have of my body. I know my will, not as a whole, not as a unity, not completely, according to its nature, but I know it only in its particular acts, and therefore in time, which is the form of the phenomenal aspect of my body, as of every object. Therefore the body is a condition of the knowledge of my will, Thus, I cannot really imagine this will apart from my body. So far as I know my will specially as object, I know it as body. The will as a thing in itself is quite different from its phenomenal appearance, and entirely free from all the forms of the phenomenal, into which it first passes when it manifests itself, and which therefore only concern its objectivity, and are foreign to the will itself. "If now every action of my body is the manifestation of an act of will in which my will itself in general, and as a whole, thus my character, expresses itself under given motives, manifestations of the will must be the inevitable condition and pre-supposition of overy action. For the fact of its manifestation cannot depend upon something which does not exist directly and only through it, which consequently is for it merely accidental, and through which its manifestation itself would be merely accidental. Now that condition is just the whole body itself. Thus the body itself must be manifestation of the will, and it must be related to my will as a whole, that is, to iny intelligible character, whose phenomenal appearance in time is my empirical character, as the particular action of the body is related to the particular act of the will. The whole body, then, must be simply my will become visible, must be my will itself, so far as this is object of perception. It has already been advanced in confirmation of this that every impression upon my body also affects my will at once and immediately, and in this respect is called pain or pleasure, or, in its lower degrees, agreeable or disagreeable sensation; and also, conversely, that every violent movement of the will, every emotion or passion, convulses the body and disturbs the course of its functions. "Thus, although every particular action, under the pre-supposition of the definite character, necessarily follows from the given motive, and although growth, the process of nourishment, and all the changes of the animal body take place according to necessarily acting causes (stimuli), yet the whole series of actions, and consequently every individual act, and also its condition, the whole

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816 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. body itself which accomplishes it, and therefore also the process through which and in which it exists, are nothing but the manifestation of the will, the becoming visible, the objectification of the will. Upon this rests the perfect suitableness of the human and animal body to the human and animal will in general, resembling, though far surpassing, the correspondence between an instrument made for a purpose and the will of the maker, and on this account appearing as design, i.e., the teleological explanation of the body. The parts of the body must, therefore, completely correspond to the principal desires through which the will manifests itself; they must be the visible expression of these desires. Teeth, throat, and bowels are objectified hunger; the organs of generation are objectified sexual desire; the grasping hand, the hurrying feet, correspond to the more indirect desires of the will which they express. As the human form generally corresponds to the human will generally, so the individual bodily structure corresponds to the individually modified will, the character of the individual, and therefore it is throughout and in all its parts characteristic and full of expression." This somewhat lengthy, though highly abridged, account of Will as the Thing-in-itself and of its objectification was necessary to show that the body is only an expression of the inind, that is to say, is made in the likeness of the soul, as Muslim philosophers point out. If we bear in mind the distinction between the process of organization and manufacturing, as pointed out by H. Bergson in his "Creative Evolution," namely, that the former proceeds from the centre to periphery, while the latter in a reverse manner, i. e., from the periphery to centre, there appears to be nothing surprising in the fact that the body should be built up according to the character which is to be expressed in it and through it. Thus, the present body is necessarily the result of the pre-natal character, formed in a previous life.

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RE-INOARNATION. 817 So far as instincts are concerned, their variations cannot be explained by environmental conditions and influences, for we see children in the same family--even twins-differing radically from each other in respect of their temperaments, instincts, emotions and the like. The whole of the past experience, ante-natal and that acquired since the physical birth, is stored up in the constitution of the soul in the shape of tendencies, emotions, feelings, and inclinations,-in short, as character. "What are we," writes Bergson, " in fact, what is our character, if not the condensation of the history that we have lived from our birth--nay, even before our birth, since we bring with us pre-natal dispositions? Doubtless we think with only a small part of our past, but it is with our entire past, including the original bent of our soul, that we desire, will and act. Our past, then, as a whole, is made manifest to us in its impulse; it is felt in the form of tendency, although a small part of it only is known in the form of idea...... We could not live over again a single moment, for we should have to begin by effacing the memory of all that had followed. Even could we erase this memory from our intellect, we could not from our will" (Creative Evolution, pp. 5 & 6). The parents are inerely a channel for the passage of the soul from one condition into another; they do not manufacture it or its character in their own bodies. There must be a substratum of individuality, at the very outset, to be acted upon and affected by variations of surroundings and environment. But this is what is generally lost sight of by Christian and Muslim writers, whose preconceived notions of their misunderstood creeds have prejudiced their minds, in some cases consciously, but mostly unconsciously, against the only theory which can offer a satisfactory explanation of all 67

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818 the discrepancies, disharmonies and enigmas in the world. The effect of this unconscious bias in the mind of the investigator is fateful for the unwelcome theory, for the moment the hypothesis suggests itself, it is apt to be dismissed with little ceremony and without full investigation. So far as Christians are concerned, we have already sufficiently shown that their own religion preaches identically the same doctrine as is taught by Hindus and Jainas in respect of the eternity, 'evolution,' and final emancipation of the soul, and with regard to Islam, also, we hope ere long to satisfy the world that the Holy Qur'an itself cannot but lead to the same conclusion when properly understood. Meanwhile, let us dispose of the subject of heredity with a single quotation from a modern psychologist of note. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "Even though the individual organism," says Harald Hoffding (Outlines of Psychology, pp. 353-354), "which, in spite of its completeness and relative independence, is still a republic of cells, were to be explained as compounded out of elements, and its origin made intelligible through the laws of persistence of energy, this would not explain the individual consciousness, the formation of a special centre of memory, of action, and of suffering. That it is possible for such a centre to come into being is the fundamental problem of all our knowledge. Each individual trait, each individual property, might perhaps be explained by the power of heredity and the influence of experience; but the inner unity, to which all elements refer, and by virtue of which the individuality is a psychical individuality, remains for us an eternal riddle...... Psychical individuality is one of the practical limits of science. "In recent times the attempt has been made to explain by heredity, not only the properties of the individuals and of the family and race, but also the forms and characteristics which apply to all consciousness. Even before Darwin's hypothesis of the origin of species, Herbert Spencer (in the first edition of the Principles of Psychology, 1855,) propounded the theory, that the fundamental forms and powers

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RE-INCARNATION. 819 of consciousness had been developed through the adaptation of the ancestral races to their conditions of life. The forms of thought and feeling which are typical of the human race, would therefore be a priori in respect of the individual, that is to say, they could oot bo fully explained by the individual experiences, but these experiences would, on the contrary, be conditioned by an original substratum. However far back we go, the individuals still start always with a certain organization, with certain forms and powers which they have not themselves acquired, consequently with something a priori. At every stage of the great process of evolution there is a given basis, by which the effect of all experiences is determined. It must therefore be true of the race as of the individual, that the external always pre-supposes the internal, that which is acquired is conditioned by what is originally innate. This is a fundamental relation that constantly repeats itself." Heredity, in truth, explains nothing about disposition ; at best, it only accounts for the modifications of the innate substratum of individuality. We see a few striking resemblances between individuals in a family, or race, and shutting our eyes to a vast majority of equally striking differences, and leaving out of account the part played by common associations, surroundings and education in developing similar characteristics, jump to the conclusion that heredity sufficiently accounts for them all. It may well be that the resemblances are due to the fact that the soul is attracted towards parents and families whose predominant mental propensities accord with its own in which case there would be an agreement in respect of the predominant traits between the individual and the family, but not in respect of other characteristics. According to the theory of heredity, every individual owes its existence to a germ-plasm, which is a tiny speck of protoplasm. That this germ-plasm is the seed

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820 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of all the peculiarities of the individual's character, disposition and tendencies is disputed neither by the propounders of the thesis of heredity nor by the supporters of re-incarnation. There being a hopeful agreement between them on this important point, the issue to be determined may be framed as follows: whether the nucleus of the character residing in the germ-plasm is formed for the first time in the body of either parent, or does it possess any existence of its own. But the first alternative is untenable, since character is inseparable from will and cannot possibly be described as the resultant, or product, of a process of compounding molecules or particles of matter. Furthermore, if the germ-plasm be the source of individuality, as it must be on the materialistic hypothesis, it would follow that character is the maker of man rather than man the maker of his character--which is by no means in harmony with the dictates of reason and commonsense. * We may now push this enquiry still further and transfer the store of tendencies, disposition, and the like, from the germ-plasm to some specific or central part within it; but tbe operation cannot result in greater satisfaction by any means, unless we accord to this part the power of having existed from all eternity, and, also, credit it with a will of its own to be the substratum of its mental equipment and choice. The only other way to get out of the difficulty is to say that this specific part, or the fundamental atom, as it has been called by certain writers, is manufactured in the parent's body, by a number of particles or electrons of matter becoming fused or blended together in a particular form; but that would not give

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RE-INCARNATION. 821 us an organism, but only a centre-less, will-less product of matter, and would again bring us face to face with the old problem, viz., how came this part itself to be endowed with individuality? Besides, the process can account for the form of the body, at best, but not for the mental faculties and the element of choice. It is thus evident that the theory of heredity is utterly insufficient to meet the situation, and it is certain that the power which builds the physical organism is a pre-existing nucleus of force independent of the ovum and the spermatozoon both. This nucleus of creative, that is to say, form-making, energy is bound up in a subtle and invisible body of matter, called the karmana sarira (the body of karinas) because of its being the repository of the effects of the past karmas of the soul, and is the root-cause of the differences of form and conditions amongst all kinds of living beings in the universe. Thus the 'seed' of life, i.e., the soul, does not originate in the body of its male or female parent, but utilises its mother's womb as a portal of ingress into the world. As regards the selection of the 'womb,' that also depends on the past karmas of the individual, since it is determined by the magnetic properties or chemical affinity residing in the inner bodies of the soul. It is, therefore, correct to say that the soul is the maker of its body itself. That these are not purely oriental speculations, but truths based on sound reason, may be shown by a single quotation from Schopenhauer* (The World as Will and Idea, Vol. II. page 485):-- "Who makes the chicken in the egg? Some power and skill * See also pp. 252-230 of "The Fourfold Root and Will in Nature."

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822 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. coming from without, and penetrating through the shell? Oh no! The chicken makes itself, and the force which carries out and perfects this work, which is complicated, well calculated, and designed beyond all expression, breaks through the shell as soon as it is ready, and now performs the outward actions of the chicken, under the name of will. It cannot do both at once; previously occupied with the perfecting of the organism, it had no care for without. But after it has completed the former, the latter appears, under the guidance of the brain and its feelers, the senses, as a tool prepared beforehand for this end, the service of which only begins when it grows up in self-consciousness as intellect, which is the lantern to the steps of the will, and also the supporter of the objective external world, however limited the horizon of this may be in the consciousness of a hen. But what the hen is now able to do in the external world, through the medium of this organ, is, as accomplished by means of something secondary, infinitely less important than what it did in its original form, for it made itself." The transmigrating ego carries with it the entire load of its past karmas which account for the circumstances and conditions of its present incarnation, or 'life.' The material basis of these karmas, as already hinted at, is the subtle inner body called the karmana sarira, which, along with the one known as the taijasa, is a constant companion of the soul in all its transmigratory wanderings. Both these bodies are destroyed at the moment of final emancipation, when the soul immediately rises up to the holy Siddha Sila as pure Spirit, and attains nirvana. The karmana sarira is the compound arising from the union, or fusion, of spirit and matter, and is subject to modifications of form and type from time to time. The taijasa is composed of electric, or magnetic matter, and is a necessary link between the outermost body and the karmana sarira. The necessity for a link of this kind lies in the fact that its

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RE-INCARNATION. 823 So far as the karmana sarira is concerned, its existence is proved by the fact that a body of subtle matter is an absolute necessity for the sojourn of the soul in the regions of decas, demons and men, since a bodiless spirit at once rises up to the top of the world, to take its place among Gods. Hence the existence of a force which prevents its rising to the Holy Siddha Sila is a sine qua non to its remaining entangled in the samsara. Notr, since force cannot be conceived apart from matter of some kind or other, it is obvious that the bondage of the soul is due to its being imprisoned in some kind of an encasement or body of matter. It is this encasement, or body, of finer matter which is called the karmana sarira in the Jaina Scripture. That this body cannot be the body of gross matter itself, is evident from the fact that its existence is a condition precedent to the -making of the outer visible body. If it were otherwise, absence would render the gull between spirit (soul) and gross matter unbridgeable, waking it impossible for the ego to comcin contact with or to use his bodily limbs. As to this the following observations of Dr. J. Bovee Dods (Mesmerism and Electrical Psychology, pp. 13 and 14) may be read with advantage : "It is evident that there is no direct contact between mind and gross matter. There is no direct contact between the length of a thought and the breadth of that door ; nor is there any more contact between my mind and hand than there is between my mind and the stage upon which I stand. Thought cannot touch my hand; yet it must be true that mind can come in contact with matter; otherwise I could not raise my hand at all by the energies of my will. Hence, it must be true that the highest and most ethereal inert matter in the universe, being the next step to spirit, can come in contact with mind, And electricity, changed into nervo-vital fluid (which is living galvanism) is certainly the highest and the most ethereal inert substance of which we can form any conception,"

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824 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the soul which is perfectly divine when devoid of all bodies, would have absolutely no reason to descend to our world, to enter into crippling relations with matter, shutting itself out from all its divine powers, attributes and qualities. Furthermore, the attainment of moksha would also necessarily and immediately follow the dissolution of form, and could be obtained, with the greatest ease, by the simple process of committing suicide. Nay, even an act of murder would, on the supposition of the gross body being the only vestment of the soul, become invested with all the meritorious qualities of a virtuous deed, since it would signify the immediate emancipation of the soul of the murdered man. The absurdity of the supposition might be further emphasized by the fact that the separation of the soul from its physical body would place men and animals on the same level, doing away with the differences of development in respect of intellect, knowledge, and character at a single stroke. It is thus clear that the force which prevents the soul from attaining the perfection of Gods is not the outer body of gross matter, but an inner vestment of a finer sort of clay, to use the language of Al Qur'an. It also follows from this that so long as this body of finer clay, the karmana sarira, is not totally destroyed by the soul, it is not possible for it to acquire its natural purity, i.e., the perfection of Gods. The karmana sarira, thus, is the seed of all the mental and physical activities to be exhibited in a future incarnation, and is the momentum in which are gathered up the effects of all the desires, passions, virtue and vice, evolved out in the course of its career as an incarnating

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RE-INCARNATION. 825 ego. In this state it resembles a seed which readily germinates as soon as it finds itself in suitable congenial soil. It is attracted into surroundings suitable for its objectification by the operation of certain magnetic forces operating upon its material, and becomes the starting point of a new phase or complexion of life. Now, since descent, lineage and other circumstances relating to status are dependent on the family in which one is born, and since the incident of birth is governed by the nature of the forces residing in the karmania sarira, the sumtotal of the effects of the different kinds of the soul's activities, it is clear that worldly status is ultimately traceable to one's own karmas in the past. The same is the case with the bodily form, the duration of life, and all other incidents connected with the physical life. Thus the determining factor of the genus, and in the genus of the particular species to which an individual belongs, as also of the longevity of the body and the development of intellectual faculties and of all other individual peculiarities and traits is nothing other than the force of karma persisting in the form of the karmana sarira. The taijasa sarira is a coat of luminous matter thrown over the karmu na sarira, and forms an atmosphere, or aura, of light round it. It is to the karmana sarira what a body is to the bony skeleton beneath. Taken together, the taijasa and the karmana sariras form only one organism, and accompany the soul throughout its evolution as a migrating ego. The karmana and the taijasa bodies, taken together, are the equivalents of what are described as the karana and the sukshma sariras in Vedanta, though taken separ 68

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826 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ately, there is but little correspondence between them. The reason for this is to be found in the fact that the Vedantic conception of these bodies is not characterised by that scientific precision and accuracy of thought which is a distinguishing feature of Jainism. Practically, no information is forthcoming about the karana sarira, but the suk shma is said to consist of five seed'-organs of knowledge, five similar organs of action, the root-cause of mind, and the elements of the five kinds of activities of prana, i.e., the functions of exhaling, inhaling, digestion, evacuation and circulation generally. No doubt, these functions cannot belong to the sthula sarira (the gross body), for that body is not the starting point of life ; but they cannot likewise be rooted in the sukshma sarira, but in the very first vestment or sheatli, whatever it be called, the karmana or korana or any thing else. Furthermore, as every living being does not possess all the five senses and the organ of mind (dravya mana), the sukshma sariras of different beings cannot be said to be identically the same in all cases. But Vedanta makes no distinction between the sukshma sariras of different beings, and knows of no difference with respect to them. There are three bodies of the soul in Vedanta, but five according to Jainism. The former recognizes the karana, the sukshma and the sthula sariras alone, but the latter adds two more to them. These two additional bodies, however, do not always accompany the soul. To explain this difference of opinion, we give the description of these five bodies below. (1) The karinana, which, as already described, is

Page #848
RE-INCARNATION. 827 made up of the different kinds of energies known as karma-prakritis, engendered by the operation of the force or forces of different kinds of raga and dvesha, i.e., attraction and repulsion ; (2) the tai jasa (lit. brilliant) which is composed of electric matter, as already defined; (3) the audaraka, i.e., the ordinary body of gross matter; (4) the vaikriyaka, or the body which the residents of heavens and hells possess, and which is ordinarily invisible to our normal vision; and (5) the aharaka, which is developed by very advanced munis, and may be projected by them to visit the Tirthamkara if there be one living in a distant land. Of these, the first two never leave the ego till it enters Nirvana, and the third is also an almost constant companion of the soul in the world of men, though it undergoes modification on account of birth, growth, death and transmigration, from time to time. The fourth takes the place of the audaraka sarira when the soul is born in heaven or hell, and the last is evolved out only by certain highly advanced Adepts (saints). The first four of these bodies do not require any further proof, but the fifth one, the aharaka, rests on the authority of the very saints and munis who have seen it issue forth. To familiarise the mind with the operation of the Law of Karma, it should be remembered that the karmana sarira, which is a constant companion of the soul in all its migratory wanderings in the samsara, including the heavens and hells, is liable to undergo

Page #849
828 changes of form from time to time, so that no condition of life short of nirvana can be a permanent state of existence. Hence, the soul which goes to heaven or hell returns to the human or animal kingdom on the termination of its life in those regions. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Here we may incidentally remark that the confusion of thought prevailing among the numerous sects of reincarnationists themselves, as to whether a human soul can be born again in an animal body, finds an easy solution in the nature of the karmana sarira. People do not take the trouble to work out the process of re-incarnation, and merely wrangle in empty words and concepts, the sense of which they do not themselves grasp; therefore, their disputations seldom lead to any substantial truths. In the light of the above remarks, it is clear that being born in a human or an animal body is just the question which depends on the human or animal tendencies lying latent in the 'creative momentum', i.e., the karmana sarira. We have no doubt whatever on the point that whenever the animal propensities preponderate over and outweigh the nobler human tendencies of the ego, it cannot help being born in an animal body, the species being determined by the degree of brutal instincts evolved out by the soul. Those who ill-treat their fellow beings, who show no mercy to the weaker in their dealings with men, who slaughter helpless, dumb creatures for the sake of food, or trade, who rob poor widows and defenceless orphans, and all those who persist in the path of villainy and vice, subject themselves to future incarnations as beasts and brutes. On the other hand, many of our dumb friends who have

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RE-INCARNATION, 829 evolved out humane tendencies are on the high road to get a human form. Let man take a lesson from animals; they are at least honest. Terrible as the law of karma is in its effect as the instrument of punishment, it can nevertheless be made to remove the evil, not only of the present life, but, also, of all the past lives, and that in the course of a single earthlife, if one only applies oneself to attain emancipation with one's whole heart. But this is possible only by giving up all kinds of worldly activities and by becoming absolutely desireless. The subject, strictly speaking, belongs to the next chapter, but it may be said here that ahimsa is the first great requisite without which no real progress whatsoever can be made on the spiritual path. Obviously, the means employed to achieve an end must be commensurate with the aim in view. Here the aim is to manifest the hidden condition of bliss, which includes freedom from pain and a prevention of its recurrence. Our want of happiness is due to our desires which, if they remain unsatisfied, create worry, and, if satisfied, a deeper and stronger longing for the objects of enjoyment. Desire, therefore, is the root of all evil. The principal form of austerity, therefore, should consist in a firm determination to be desireless; one should take what is called a vow to that effect, and exert one's will persistently to adhere to it. There should be no desire for the enjoyment of the palate, the eye, the ear, and the like. One should practise ahimsa every day of one's life. Ahimsa means not injuring others. Since we injure others only to satisfy our desires, desirelessness must

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830 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. necessarily lead to ahimsa. Many people think that the killing of animals is necessary for their living, and on that account harden their tender nature. There is absolutely no justification for this act of wanton cruelty. Nuts, vegetables and cereals contain all the nourishment necessary to maintain life, and, in their purity, constitute more joy-giving food than the dead entrails and carcasses of innocent animals, butchered relentlessly and in utter disregard of their mute appeals for mercy. Life is dear and joyful to all, and we should remember that the disregard of their appeals for mercy, and the sight of the pain and writhings of their bleeding and dying carcasses must recoil on our own selves, furnishing us with brutal and butcher-like tendencies, thus engendering karmas which cannot be easily destroyed, and form an ever-hardening shell round our souls. He who is desirous of taking the vow which leads to Brahman must resolutely set his heart against such evil deeds, and must give up all desires, which, in any way, whether directly or indirectly, lead to the causing of injury to other living beings. The desire for tasty food is, after all, a form of desire, and so long as it is not got rid off bliss cannot be had, even if all the powers under the sun decree otherwise. If the foregoing argument is sound, the meat-eaters must face the question: is it worthy of man-a thinking being--to please the palate and deny happiness to the soul ? In other words, should we allow our tongue to devour our chances of salvation ? The soul is thirsting for knowledge and bliss and for freedom from such undesirable conditions as death, disease, old age, suffering, pain and sorrow. Should we allow our perverse desires and

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RE-INCARNATION. 831 inclinations to condemn it to a life which it heartily abhors ? Should we not rather pluck out the tongue if it stand in the way of the realization of our glorious, godly nature ? Let us think and reflect well before we condemn our souls to a life of anguish and torment. Mahomed, the great prophet of Islam, said* :"The creation is as God's family; for its sustenance is from Him: cefore the most beloved unto God is the person who doeth good unto God's family, " An adultress was forgiven who passed by a dog at a well; and when the dog was holding out his tongue from thirst, which was near killing him, the woman drew off her boot, and tied it to the end of her garment, and drew water for the dog, and gave him to drink ; and she was forgiven for that act. "A woman was punished for a cat, which she tied, till it died with bunger; and the woman gave the cat nothing to eat, nor did she set it at liberty, so that it might have eaten the reptiles of the ground. "There are rewards for benefiting every animal having a moist liver (i.e., every one alive)." This last was in answer to the question put to the Prophet by some one ; "Verily are there rewards for our doing good to quadrupeds, and giving them water to drink?" Mr. Abdullah Suhrawardy adds the following as an explanatory note to the above passages : "In the Kur'an animal life stands on the same footing as human life in the sight of God. There is no beast on earth,' says the Kur'an, nor bird which flieth with wings, but the same is a people like unto you (mankind)-into the Lord they shall return."" If it is true that there are rewards for those who give quadrupeds and other dumb animals water to drink or otherwise show them kindness, and punishment for those who ill-treat them, like the woman who killed the cat, * See. The Sayings of Muhammad.'

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832 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. can we say that our slaughter of cattle for the sake of filling our stomachs which can be filled just as well, even if not better, with non-animal dainties, is a proper and becoming act for the soul that aspires for freedom and bliss? If we would but ponder a little over the matter, we should find that the slaughter of animals is not only sinful, but quite unnecessary as well. Taste, of which we make so much in insisting upon an animal diet, is not at all in the things which we take in or absorb. The aesthetic pleasure which simple, wholesome, non-animal food affords to the soul on account of its natural purity, cannot be equalled by the most sumptuous and expensive preparations from dead entrails and carcasses of birds and beasts, however much we might endeavour to conceal their sickening stench by condiments and spices. Besides, taste for flesh, is only an acquired something like all other tastes. When a man takes to smoking, his instincts revolt from the fumes of nicotine, but with each repetition they become more and more blunted till they lose their natural delicacy altogether, and actually long for that which they had abhorred before. the case with all other evil things; they not only vitiate the natural instincts of the soul, but also tend to harden one's heart. The same is Ahimsa is the only means of removing the impurities arising from evil tastes and inclinations. He who wishes to enjoy immortality and ever-lasting bliss must first We give below the lineage' of himsa to show its evil nature. It is taken from the Bhagavata Purana (see Eng. Trans. by P. N. Sinha, p. 52). The names in italics denote the feminine gender.

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RE-INCARNATION. 833 subdue his senses. The conqueror is Le who conquers his own lower vature ; to destroy another is no criterion of heroism. He who cannot control his desires has 110 chance in the coming struggle with Death. The weapon which slays this arch-enemy of mankind is not to be found in the armoury of kings and potentates of the world, but is the evil-consuming glance of the himsa-freed will. : Does it seem strange that Death should be terrorstricken in the presence of an ascetic will ? There is no Adharma married Milliya (irreligiousness) (falsehood) Damba (deceit) Mu ty (trickery) Lobha (greed) married Sathatii (cruelty) married Krodha (anger) Hinsd (injury) married Kai (str,fe) Dur ukti (abuse) married Mrityu (death) Bliti (terror) Niraya Yalani (hell) (torment) Himsa, according to the above gencalogy of evil tendencies, is the great grand-daughter of irreligiousness and fulsehood, and the mother of contention and abuse. Her grand children aro death and terror, who are the progonitors of hell and its sister, the unsufferable anguish, Himsci, thus, arises from falschood, dccoit, and the liko, and leads to death and the torments of hell hereafter. 69

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834 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. thing surprising in the statement. The power to defy death is the natural result, or culmination, of a course of life characterised by the severest forms of asceticism. We have had occasion to refer to this power ere this, but we shall now go into the matter more deeply. To begin with, we must ascertain the true significance of death. Since souls are not liable to disintegration or destruction, death must be a process fully conipatible with the survival of the jiva. But we have seen (ante, pages 824-825) that it is not as a pure disembodied spirit that the soul outlives the disintegration of its physical body, for its learmana and tai jasa sariras do not leave it till destroyed by tapa, preparatory to the attainment of moksha. It follows from this that death signifies the departure of the soul with its two inner bodies, the karmana and the taijasa, from the body of gross matter. Now, since the law of transmigration, to which all living beings involved in the samsara are subject, implies an alternating succession of births and deaths, death necessarily becomes the first step towards rebirth. There would be little to dread death for in this sense, since it is like an obliging friend ever ready to change the old, the useless and the worn out with that which is fresh and young and healthy, were it not for the fact that it is also the most strictly just and incorruptible judge, giving to every one neither a tittle more nor less than what is deserved and merited by him. Thus, those who have earned merit and laid by store of virtue find in death a kiod friend whose agency enables them to rise higher and higher in the scale of being, while those who have

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RE-INCARNATION. 835 wasted their opportunity and gambled away their prospects dread it as an unrelenting foe. Death, then, is the gateway to re-birth, though full of pain and suffering both in the closing moments of life as well as in the circumstances surrounding the reappearance of the soul in another form. The conquest of death, therefore, can only mean an escape from this liability to re-birth, i.e., the cycle of transmigration. This amounts to saying that immortality is the nature of pure spirit and is enjoyed by those alone who rid themselves of all traces of material impurity. It follows from this that the idea of physical immortality is a fallacy of reason pure and simple. The same conclusion is to be reached from the physical side of the problem, where death means not the separation of spirit and matter-for that would end in the immediate deification of the soul--but a readjustment of form, or type, of their union, consequent on the changes incessantly taking place in the karmana sarara. Death may be said to occur either in the fulness of time, or prematurely, as the result of an accident or from certain forms of disease. The former of these is due to internal causation, and arises from the exhaustion of the force of longevity (ayuh karma), while the latter is the result of the separation of the body of gross matter from the two inner bodies of the soul as the effect of causes external to them. So far as the force of longevity, i.e., the ayuh karma, is concerned, it is the term, or duration, of a particular form of the karmana sarira, and therefore, must come to an

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836 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. end sooner or later, since that body is a compound of spirit and matter, and since all compounds are Viable to change. Hence, time, which revolves all substances round and thereby forces all combinations and compounds to undergo changes of form, must, sooner or later, destroy the force necessary to maintain a particular form of the karmana sarera, throwing it antomatically into a new form. The result of the operation is that the association of the soul with its outermost body is rendered impossible any longer, ansi what is known as death immediately supervenes. It is to be observed further that the dyuh karma is a force which cannot be augmented by any means, inasmuch as it is engendered not in a vartama na (current or present) incarnation or life, but in the one that is past. Just as it is not possible to prevent the collapsing of a house built on a sliding bill-top, when he who would put up a prop happens to be imprisoned in the edifice itself, in the same way is it beyond the pale of possibility to staunch the running out of the ayuh karma, that is to say, to augment the force of longevity generated under circumstances and surroundings which have ceased to be actual and accessible since. Like the effervescence of an opened bottle of wrated water, which nothing can re-inforce, the store of ayu! is bound to be exhausted in due course of things, sooner or later. For, just as the duration of the process of bubbling up in aerated water is determined by the quantity of the gaseous matter in combination with water and by the nature of its fusion with the liquid, so is the longevity of living beings dependent on the type of bandha (bonds) forged by the

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837 union of spirit and matter in the karmana sarira. To put it in the simple language of philosophy, the ayuh karma is the force which determines the duration of the continuance of a particular form or type of the karmana sarira, upon which depends the association of the soul with its outermost body of matter. Hence, the exhaustion of ayuh is immediately accompanied by the last gasp of life, and the migration of the soul into a new 'womb.'* RE-INCARNATION. Thus, a perpetuation of the physical life, that is to say of the outer body of matter as a living organism, is a matter of impossibility; it has to be deserted by its immortal occupant on the determination of his lease of life in each and every case. Hence, while the inevitability of death holds true of all forms of life in the samsara, he who passes out of the cycle of transmigration necessarily rises above death and enjoys immortality. For death holds no sway over simple, that is to say, indestructible things, so that whoever attains to the purity of the nature of his spirit--a simple substancemay hurl defiance in its teeth. When certain kinds of its malignant karmas, to be described in the next following chapter, are destroyed, the soul becomes freed of its liability to re-birth, and cannot die any more, though it still continues to live in the world of men so long as its dyuh karma remains to be worked off. When this is exhausted, it is left as pure spirit, and immediately ascends to the Siddha Sila at the top of the universe, to reside there for ever, as a *The word womb' is here used in a general sense and refers to all kinds of births, i.e., modes of being born,

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838 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. fully perfected soul, the Siddhatman, enjoying immortality and bliss and all other divine qualities of which as a samsari jiva it was deprived, owing to the evil influence of matter. This is the only way of conquering death, to acquire immortality. But while the soul is debarred from the enjoyment of true immortality so long as it is unable to escape from the wheel of transmigration, it is undoubtedly endowed with practically unlimited power to triumph over sickness and disease. Old age, too, not a calamity which cannot be made to fly away to a great distance, even if not altogether avoided; nor are accidents which so often have a fatal ending necessarily included in the class of things which the soul must put up with. We shall deal with each of these causes of premature death separately to be able to understand their nature better. To begin with disease, it will be observed that it is neither a function of the organism nor a state consistent with the natural condition of the body, inasmuch as the organism itself tries to throw it off even when unaided by medical skill and medicaments. The natural normal condition of a living organism is health which is regained the moment disease is eliminated from it. The question, then, is what is disease, and how and why does it appear in the organism? The reply is that it is a run down state of health, and its cause, in each and every instance, is to be found in the low vitality of the system. Whether it be an ordinary malady, such as common fever, or the most virulent form of an epidemic, health cannot be affected where the vitality is strong enough to resist the onslaught of disease-bearing ele

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839 RE-INCARNATION. ments and germs. Even when cholera, which is perhaps the most malignant form of an epidemic, is raging in a locality it is only a few who succumb to it, the majority of men remaining unaffected, and some even surviving its attack. This just proves the fact that where the vitality is not impaired germs of malignant disease are powerless to do harm to the organism. The question which now arises in this connection is : to what cause or causes is the lowness of vitality itself due? Before attemptiug to find a reply to this question we must consider the cause of old age first, so as to be able to deal with the whole subject at once. Observation will show that there is no fixed time at wbich old age may be said to set in in each and every case ; on the contrary, it appears some times at a comparatively early age, while in other cases its symptoms are not observable till a very advanced period of life. The most essential difference between youth and the state of senility lies in respect of the quality of matter of which the body is made and the presence of certain microbes that eat up the finer material of nerves, replacing it with a coarse and inferior stuff. It is well-known that increasing muscular debility, friability of bones, atrophy of vital organs and general degeneration of the system are the usual accompaniments of old age. According to Prof. Elie Metchnikoff,* "a conflict takes place in old age between the higher elements and the simpler or primitive elements of the organism, and the conflict ends in the victory of the latter. This victory is signalised by a weakening of the intellect, by digestive * See. The nature of man,' p. 239.

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840 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. troubles, and by lack of sufficient oxygen in the blood. The word conflict is not used metaphorically in this case. It is a veritable battle that rages in the innermost recesses of our beings." Hardened arteries, abnormal liver, vitiated kidneys and a general atrophy and degeneration of the vital organs are some of the effects of a victory of the forces inimical to youth and health. Gradually the muscles shrink, making the skin loose and wrinkled; the memory and intellect are enfeebled, the back becomes bent and the senses are impaired. Extreme decay is characterised by the dissolution of some of the Time in the skeleton and by its transference to the blood vessels. In consequence of this the bones become lighter and brittle, the cartilages bony, and the intervertebrate discs impregnated with salts, producing the well-known senile malforination of the backbone.* Such are the consequences of a victory of the enemies of health and youth on a living organism, and it is evident that the commencement of decay is accelerated or retarded in different individuals according to the degree of resistance which they are capable of offering to the forces inimical to the well-being of the body. Here also we are entitled to infer that the run down condition of the system, implied in the inability to resist the encroachment of the forces inimical to its own wellbeing, is produced by the lowness of its vitality. Thus, the problem presented by disease and senile decay resolves itself into the simplo question : what * See The Prolongation of Life' by E. Metchnikoff, p. 30.

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RE-INCARNATION. 841 is vitality and to what cause, or causes, is its impairment due ? In order to understand the nature of vitality, it is necessary to bear in mind the fact that health is affected both by mental and material causes, so that harmful passions and emotions, such as peevishness, envy and the like, as well as unhealthy suggestions produce as much harm as unwholesome foods and poisonous surroundings. Vitality, it should be added, signifies the healthful energy of a living organism which is characterised by the presence of the soul, and is a term utterly inapplicable to a purely material compound. Hence, it is only natural that it should be liable to be affected by both the mental and physical stimuli. Accordingly, we find many of the ordinary ailments of life amenable to control by suggestion as well as hy proper medicament. That vitality is not a pure secretion or product of matter, may be seen by trying to infuse it into a body from which the soul has already taken its departure, when the whole of the contents of all the different pharmacopaeias may be emptied into the belly of the corpse without making it move as much as a single muscle. The modern mind whose outlook is limited by its ignorance of the nature of the law of karma, no doubt, seeks to discover the cause of the lowness of vitality exclusively in the influence of matter on a living organism, but religion points, in the first instance, to the operation of the forces engendered in the previous incarnation of the soul as furnishing the key to the solution of the problem. As already stated, the effect of the different kinds of activities of the individual 70

Page #863
842 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is preserved in the karmana sarira, the seed as well as the vehicle of re-birth, and constitutes the nucleus of potential energy or force for the life to come. At the moment of death the soul enwrapped in its two inner vestments is separated from the physical body of gross matter, and immediately enters a new womb. This operation, which takes much less time than is required for its description, is performed mechanically by the soul, in obedience to the action of the chemical and magnetic forces residing in the two inner bodies, the karmana and ta ijasa sariras. The transference of the soul from a dying organism to the selected base of fresh activities being complete, the process of organising an outer body immediately begins, resulting, in due course of time, in a new re-birth in fresh environments and surroundings. If we now bear in mind the fact that the physical body is the objectification of will, as already shown, we shall have no difficulty in arriving at the conclusion that the power of the organism to resist the onslaught of the microbes and elements of disease and old age, in other words, the vitality of the system, is primarily dependent on the nature of the forces stored up in the karmanu sarira. Whether it be regarded as a chemical property of the physical matter of the organism, the effect of the conjunction of the body and soul stored up in the structure of nerves, muscles and bones or in any other way, it is certain that vitality is dependent, in the first instance, on the operation of forces responsible for the making of the body itself ; for the differences in the degree of resistance offered by different systems to

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RE-INCARNATION. 843 the harmful infuences from without must, obviously, arise out of the differences in the quality, or quantity, or both, of the material of bodies and the structure of bodily organs and limbs, and, must, therefore, be attributable to the organising agency or power in each and every case. Thus, every organism enters into the struggle for existence with a certain amount of the vital force which represents the amount of the investment of the soul in its last incarnation. It is the balance which is placed to the credit of the individual in the Bank of Life, and which may be preserved by careful economy, or squandered speedily by reckless and riotous living. But while the individual soul is allowed to bring the nucleus of the vital force from its past life, it is also forced, in a certain sense, to carry with it the causes that constitute a heavy drain on it. These are the seeds of desires which may be said to be the harbingers of vital poverty and decrepitude. A very little reflection will enable us to perceive that the secret of decay lies in the desires inherent in the individual will, for the organs of action and sensation are its objectification through and through, as Schopenhauer rightly affirms. Now, the body which is at once the objectification as well as the instrument of will, for the gratification of the bodily appetites, is liable to deteriorate, and subject to wear and tear in its use for one's desires frequently become too strong for it for want of proper control, and also because they bring it into conflict with other bodies. It is easy to desire, but not so easy to gratify the senses; for their objects often lie beyond reach. Besides, every desire once

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844 TJIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. gratified, becomes a still stronger longing for further gratification. Hence, worry puts in its appearance and becomes an additional tax on the body for which it was never designed. It is this additional burden on the body which is the cause of much trouble in the case of thinking beings. An animal suffers but little mental pain on account of worry, for it seldom thinks of the future. in is, however, mostly given to relyingen an his intellect, and, thus, suffers most acutely from h' real and imaginary pains, for he not only thinks of the immediate future, but also of that which is the most remote and might never happen. The amou at of energy which is consumed in the operations of intzilect, in calculating and determining the future course of events, is enormous, and directly tells on one's health. This is not all, for man at times evolves out emotions which are not only unnecessary, but positively harmful as well. Besides this, the human body is a most delicate organism and not suited to bear, with impunity, the constant pressure of hard work to which it is subjected in many instances. Exposure to inclement weather, harmful uncongenial surroundings, and want of suitable healthy food also combine to accelerate the approach of old age, and often lead to untimely death. One of the most fruitful causes of disease and premature decay, in the case of thinking beings, is the force of unhealthy suggestion, which, as pointed out by M. Jean Finot, is responsible to a great extent in shortening life. The same is the case with excessive eating, unhealthy foods and riotous, Bacchanalian living which also make heavy drains on one's store of vitality.

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RE-INCARNATION 845 Now, if vitality were a fixed quantity which could not be augmented or re-inforced, health and youth would very soon come to grief. Fortunately, however, it is not a fixed quantity, but a fluctuating balance, generally on the credit side of the account. The rallying power of the organism is no less remarkable than its capacity to resist disease, though this power appears to diminish or dwindle away with each trial of strength between the forces of health and the elements inimical to physical well-being. In conditions characteristic of prostration and disease, the microbes of health '-if we may coin such a phrase seem to resemble the men who are unable and disinclined to work on account of mental listlessness, overfeeding or the paralysing effect of intoxicants and drugs. In some cases-generally the worst---all these three aspects are found together with symptoms characteristic of exhaustion and fatigue due to over-work for a long period of time. These are the cases of those who are past all hope of cure, and the question they suggest is not how much relief can any particular system of treatment afford to the patient, but how soon will death put an end to the misery of dragging out an existence which has nought but suffering and pain in store ? Leaving these and some other similarly hopeless ases of extreme lowness of vitality out of consideration, there is every reason to believe that where no inroads are allowed to be made on the resources of the organism, and where the healthful energy of the system is properly husbanded by itsoccupant,' there is no cause to fear the coming into being of the conditions which usher ill-health, premature senescence and untimely death.

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846 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Ascetics, indeed, aspire for absolute control over these undesirable conditions, and by means of persistent healthy auto-suggestion and tapas-fasting, observance of the vow of celibacy and the like-acquire full mastery over them. We now come to cases of accidents. It would seem a great presumption to the vast majority of mankind to say that no accidents can possibly happen to a fully spiritualized soul; nevertheless the fact is that no jivana mukta or kevali (the saint who has acquired omniscience) can ever die of an accident. It is, no doubt, hard for materialism to endorse our statement, especially as science is supposed to deny the miraculous ; but if we ponder over the matter we shall perceive that there is nothing strange or incredible in it. We could quote many great men of science to show that the materialist's views are not corclusive on spiritual matters; but in these days of rapid progress a single quotation from an address, delivered by Sir Oliver Lodge, at the Free Church Council Assembly at Portsmouth, will suffice to show that spiritualism has passed that stage when it could be open to doubt, though men of science are still trying to understand its phenomena and know very little about its real nature. "Why seek to deny either the spiritual or the material ? Both aro real, both true, In some higher mind, perhaps, they might be united. The bare possibility of the existence of the miraculous has been hastily denied. It is not necessary to object to miracles on scientific grounds. They need be no more impossible, no more law. less, than the interference of a human being would seem to a colony of ants or bees.''* There is, as a matter of fact, no miracle, nothing that * See The Leader' (Indian), dated 4th April, 1911.

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RE-INCARNATION. 847 is supernatural, nothing that is lawless. It is our ignorance which makes us look upon an occurrence as a miracle; for were we all-knowing, we should know the causes of the miraculous as well, and thus know them to be simply natural. The reasons given by us in proof of the power of will are not pure speculations of a metaphysically inclined brain, but facts which are conformable to truth under the severest tests, namely, (1) as being in strict conformity to the rules of reason, (2) as being confirmed by ancient tradition, i.e., the experience of mankind in the past, and (3) as being capable of yielding immediate and certain results when experimented with. In the last instance, however, there is a little qualification to be attached to our statement, and it is that we do not try to make theoretical experiments with spiritual truths, but, in all earnest sincerity, put them to practical test. The powers of the human will seem incredible on account of their simple explanation, and superficial students are ever prone to raise their voice against what they have never properly exerted themselves to understand. When the construction of steamships was in contemplation, some one, it is said, took it into his head to write a book on the impracticability of the idea, and sent some copies of it for sale to America. But, by a strange irony of fate, the boat which carried the books to the New World happened itself to be a steamship! The 'easy-chair 'speculations of our men of science on spiritual matters are just like the views of the author of the book referred to, and

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848 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. possess little or no validity in the realm of true metaphysics. Many of them even deny the existence of phenomena which are only too well proved, on unimpeachable testimony. But no more of this. The one most fatal effect of ignorance in us is that it makes us blind to our own inner forces and powers. By the impetuosity of will running wild in the pursuit of desire, the transparency of consciousness is disturbed to such an extent that we are rendered quite unconscious of its inner operations, and begin to prize the little gleam left to us, with which to adjust our relations with the outer world. The consequence of this is the most unfortunate one for our race, for it renders the will negative, exposes us to all sorts of evils, and prevents our acquiring a knowledge of such psychic faculties as clairvoyance, clair-audience, and the like, lying dormant within the soul. When one desires to have the homage of all mankind, to appropriate all the wealth of the world, to be admired and praised by every one, to get all the titles and other marks of distinction, which tickle the vanity of the foolish-in short, when one craves for all the things that abound in the world, he converts himself into a sort of pit which remains ever empty, in spite of being filled from all directions unceasingly. When a man thus turns himself into what may, more appropriately, be called a dust-bin, his will becomes negative, and is forced to look upon itself as impotent. In such a state of mental cowardice it cannot perform its higher functions, and lies dormant, as if drugged and stupefied. If we are then exposed to any danger, we are powerless to combat it, and readily

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RE-INCARNATION. 849 succumb to it, being stricken with terror at its very sensing. The whole of mankind, except those who are aware of and have realised the true nature of their will, pass their lives in a state of demoralizing terror, and so great is their sense of powerlessness that a slightly louder peal of thunder than what they are accustomed to is quite sufficient to make their hair stand on end, even when they are pefectly safe from it. This mental cowardice is a characteristic of the race, but, amongst the cowards, those who are a little more courageous are patted on the back and loudly praised for their bravery! How can man, who looks upon himself as the noblest creaturo on earth, justify such eternal mental degeneration in him? Courage and cowardice furnish us with the key to the nature of will. The former is the result of fearlessness, and springs from self-reliance, implying a belief in the invincibility of one's self; but the latter is the outcome of dependence on reason, which, by relating one concept to another, gives rise to fear, thus paralyzing the system by terrifying the ego. Will, as the Thing in itself, is invincible and recognizes no force or power to be greater than itself. But its chief limitation is that it does not reason, and is, thus, amenable to suggestion. Hence, the great importance of right beliefs, i.e., faith. Those men who give wrong suggestions to their will are necessarily the authors of their own undoing. This is the sin which cannot be forgiven, for it is one against the Holy Ghost, and death is the wages thereof. 71

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850 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Will is the executive side of life and capable of accomplishing the most wonderful feats, but in the state of impurity it is forgetful of its own nature and powers, and, therefore, liable to be influenced by the wrong suggestions of others as well as of its own intellect. Different kinds of karmic forces produce different kinds of impurities in its nature, some obstructing its knowledge, some its perception, some its capacity for faith and mental serecity or sober-mindedness, and some its freedom of action. Deprived of its natural perfection and independence, the soul behaves in all sorts of ways, and has to break away from its harmas before it can attain to the status of Gods. It is thus clear that the will remains weak and impotent only so long as it is involved in the delusions of ignorance, that is, wrong ideals and beliefs. Accord. ing to our thoughts it is that the will in us appears as potent and powerful, or impotent and powerless. But for our individual ideals and beliefs, we all would be equally brave, or cowardly, since the egos are all alike in substance, and, also, since all forms are raade of the same material. Our thoughts may, therefore, be said to constitute the influence which renders the will negative in us. To understand the power of thought on will, it is necessary to bear in mind the fact that there are two systems in the human organism, the conscious, or intellectual, and the subconscious, also known as the subjective, which possesses full control over the bodily organs and functions. The ego, i.e., the will, is the primary impetus which combines both these

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RE-INCARNATION. 851 systems in itself. It is the king for whose preservation they both work in their different ways, the subconscious doing duty for the executive, and the in: tellectual discharging the functions of a prime minister who determines and adjusts the relations of the individual with other individuals and bodies in the world. The affairs of the waking moments of life are ordinarily conducted by the prime minister (the intellect), but when the latter is incapable of dealing with any particular situation, e.g., when danger is imminent, the subjective mind takes the reins of control in its own hands. At other times, however, it does not dispute with the discriminative faculty the advisability of its orders, but obeys them all if they happen to bear the seal of the king,' that is to say, it faithfully carries out all such suggestions as are approved of by the will. Hence, suggestions which are strong enough to affect the will are alone recognised and obeyed by the sub-conscious, i.e., the Executive Government of life. The sub-conscious is there merely to do the will of the ego, so to speak, and, therefore, does not reason concerning the advisability of its orders; it seizes the reins of control only when the prime minister is rendered powerless and the king turns to it for protection and help. In such extreme cases, the executive (incapable of induction) perceives and grasps the situation by direct intuition, and does the best thing possible, under the circumstances, to avert the threatening danger and to preserve the king. If, however, the mischief done by the terror-stricken minister is

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852 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. great, and the situation untenable, as when the king, instead of trusting the executive, is still trying to rouse the minister from his terror-stricken and paralyzed condition, the executive can only succeed in rendering the ego immune from pain, but is powerless to avert the catastrophe. What is called death then takes place. It is thus obvious that the discriminative intellect only acts as a wily, sweet-tongued parasite, when employed solely to pander to desire. The Government of the empire,' however, is truly carried on by the subjective power, since intellect is only a bungler in the department of life. The true import of the two trees, that of Life and that of Knowledge of good and evil, now becomes fully intelligible, and the warning of the Father in heaven, the true Ego, can now be seen to be a philosophical truth of the utmost importance to man in his materialised form. The fruit of the first-mentioned tree is heavenly, and the giver of Life ; but of the second only produces confusion, doubt and worry, and, finally, leads to death, which, however, is death of the body alone, although the ego looks upon it as bis own, on account of having completely identified himself with it. Now, when a man is attacked by a wild beast, say, a wolf, he is frightened by its approach and his reason tells him to fly away from it. The moment this conclusion is arrived at, will is rendered negative, leaving the man exposed to danger and death. But sometimes when danger appears suddenly, and there is little time for reason to look round and determine upon the best

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853 possible means of defence, we, without reasoning, avail ourselves of the readiest means available, whatever they be, and then invariably escape from harm. We then call it the presence of mind, which, however, is nothing other than the presence of will as the result of reliance on the self, but not on intellect. Now, if we could go a step farther, and, instead of unconsciously relying on the self, were to consciously rely on and cling to the Self, our will would ever remain positive, that is, in a condition natural to it. We should then observe that taking place which would astonish every body, and would be called a miracle. The wolf, then, instead of coming and devouring us, would turn away and pass by harmlessly, or would come and lie down at our feet. A majority of men in the world, no doubt, would consider this statement highly absurd, but it is no more absurd than the turning away of the positive point of a magnetized needle from the positive point o another similar one, or their coming together only at different and opposite poles, i.e., in a friendly spirit. It is the magnetism of Will which is the miracle, not its manifestation in the Self-conscious Souls. Such is the secret power which enabled the yogis and mahatmas of India to remain unmolested from wild beasts in the forests. Every day do we see the manifestations of Will in various forms, but fail to observe their significance. The heaviest stone and the lightest feather cannot get away from the law of gravitation, and lie chained to earth, till they are moved by some external force; but man, an insignificant and frail being, so far as the matter of his body and its dimensions are con it RE-INCARNATION.

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854 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. cerned, at his sweet will and pleasure, overrules that very law, and walks, runs, dances and jumps about in defiance of it. Is it not because his will lifts up his body and suspends, as it were, the operation of one of the greatest of all the laws of nature, which is said to be keeping all the suns and planets, and even entire solar systems, in their proper positions, maintaining their equilibrium ? And, what enables his will to defy this great force of nature ? Just the slightest inclination in that direction! Is this not an equally great miracle? If we were to ascertain the cause of the exertion of will, we should learn that it is none other than self-knowledge, in different language, self-consciousness. Hence, knowledge is power, as the proverb says. When the consciousness of the little appropriating ego has such a wonderful effect on one of the greatest of all the forces of nature, can we possibly measure the extent of power which a consciousness of one's true Self puts within the reach of the wondering soul? What chance, then, does a poor beast of the forest stand against a Selfillumined soul? Not only the beasts of prey pass quite harmlessly by in the presence of such a Self-conscious soul, but also the forces and powers of nature work only for his welfare--at his bidding, as it were. Accidents such as arise by the collision of ships and railway trains, the falling of roofs, and the like, also do not affect him, for the opening out of his consciousness enables him to discern the causes which bring them about, and he can then not only save himself but many others besides. Another form of the wonderful manifestations of

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RE-INCARNATION. 855 will is the magnetic fluid, which radiates in all directions from the person of great yogis and saints. Jesus referred to this fluid when, on being touched by an unclean woman, he said that virtue had gone out of him. It is this virtue which is responsible for the engendering of that atmosphere of peace and love which invariably surrounds holy persons. The arrival of a Tirthamkara was heralded by the appearance of bloom on trees out of season, and wolf and sheep invariably sat by the side of each other in His presence. Even the mountains where Jaina ascetics performed their holy meditation are known to have offered resistance to the passage of vimanas (air-craft) flying over them. All this was the effect of the munis' personal magnetism. Their magnetic radiations impinging on the surrounding matter created such an atmosphere of holiness, love and impregnability in their vicinity that all those who came in contact with it were overpowered by its powerful vibrations, forgot their personal animosities and unholy pursuits, and were unable to penetrate into it, except to show reverence to the Source whence emanated those radiations of virtue and power. Those who come under the influence of such an atmosphere of human magnetism, as is described above, undergo two opposite kinds of experience, according to their own nature. Persons of a holy and pious temperament feel exalted, but those who are evilly inclined and vicious find then selves overpowered by the higher vibrations of the ascetic Will, and soon come to grief, if determined to oppose its rhythmic pulsation. Investigation into the nature of the causes which

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856 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. dethrone reason in all cases of sleep, mesmerism, fascination and will-power, discloses the fact that it is the rhythm, or pulsation, of life which is first affected by them. They either increase or diminish the intensity of the pulsation or rhythm of life. To the former class belong all cases of exaltation of will, and to the latter all those which are characterised by symptoms of sleep, fatigue, fright, or death. Midway between the two opposite types of rhythm does reason occupy its throne. Hence, whenever the normal conditions which favour the functioning of calculating reason are disturbed, it at once vacates its throne, and a state of exaltation, or depression, of varying degree, comes to take its place. It is thus clear that the 'virtue' which flows from the person of great rishis and sages is Lothing other than the magnetic vibrations of their Self-conscious will which create, in their vicinity, an impregnable atmosphere of peace and love, and which, by coming into contact with different temperaments, exalt or diminish their life-pulsations, according to their own dispositions. Jesus was enabled to discover the fact that some one had touched him, on account of the increased radiations of this magnetic fluid from his person. A human soul had opened her heart to receive the healing vibrations, in his vicinity; and it was the exaltation of will to meet the demand which was directly felt by him. It is not to be supposed that the going out of 'virtue' is a loss of power, in any sense. On the contrary, it directly leads to greater power, since it makes the will vibrate more intensely than before, and also because will has an inexhaustible supply of virtue in itself. The effect

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857 of the woman's faith on the Master's will was something like that which is produced by a piece of iron on a magnet, and actually furnished an occasion for the greater manifestation of power. The training of the will, then, is the door to power. Many persons try to develop their will now-a-days, but derive little or no benefit from their exercises, on account of their ignorance of its nature. Some undergo severe tortures to acquire will power; and a class of literature has sprung up pretending to deal with the cultivation of occult and psychic forces, neither the authors nor the readers of which have the slightest idea of the mischief which is likely to result from the unnecessary and harmful exercises prescribed in the books. Will, in its purest form, is the holiest of forces in existence, and opposed to all moral failings. Hence, it cannot manifest itself, in its true character, till all taint of evil thoughts, passions and inclinations is not removed from the soul. Those who try to develop it from motives of worldly power and greatness, therefore, do the very thing which prevents its coming into manifestation. One may spend one's whole life in practising all conceivable kinds of breathing and other exercises, yet will not will condescend to manifest itself, so long as mind is not freed from all kinds of taint of selfishness. The utmost that can be had from these exercises is the development of such powers as the superficial clairvoyance with which the investigations of the Psychical Research Society have made us familiar. These powers, however, confer neither immortality nor bliss on the soul, but generally lead 72 RE-INCARNATION.

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858 TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to mental and moral degeneration here, in this life, and to undesirable re-births hereafter. Besides, the temptation to turu them to one's material advantage is too great to be resisted by ordinary humanity, and their least use, for one's selfish ends, is sure to lead the soul on to the path of destruction. For this reason, Jesus turned away from the voice which offered him all earthly power in consideration of his soul. Those wlo wish to develop their will for the conquest of Death must, therefore, give up the silly and senseless idea of training it by means of the physical exercises of the body, but should apply themselves to purify their moral nature. It is only the moral impurities which stand in the way of the soul ; for the higher and truly joyqus rhythms of Will are kept back only so long as passions and desire are allowed to sway one's conduct. It is not the will seeking power and greatness, in the world of men that will conquer death, but the will which is holy, spiritual and self-centred. * It seems incredible to us that man should be able to vanquish death itself, yet this is precisely what one of us said, as will appear from the following: "I am the resurrection and the life. I have the power to lay it clown and I have the power to take it up again." And the speaker was but one of an innumerable company of Self-conscious souls, though he was the only one who thus spoke openly in the Holy Land. The powers of the Self-conscious Will are truly wonderful, and life is only the effect of the conjunction of will and body. Hence, where the soul wills, not merely wishes; to maintain this connection, disease, old age

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RE-INCARNATION. 859 and even untimely death, every one of which arises from avoidable causes, can be made to fly away to a great distance from the body. The recuperative powers of the will have never failed to manifest themselves wherever the unnatural strain, to which the body and mind are subjected, in the prime of youth, has been lessened in the more advanced, and therefore the less active, i.e., the more restful, period of life. Third dentition is known to have occurred in several cases after 80. M. Jean Finot reports* a number of cases where eye-sight, a new set of teeth, and even the natural colour of hair have been regained and acquired at the remarkably advanced ages of 110 and 117. "The forces of the mind," says the Philosophy of Long Life," well utilized, may render us most important services from the point of view of the prolongation of life, as we have demonstrated elsewhere. ... When we think of our manner of life, which seems only calculated to upset, from our earliest infancy, the thousand whcels of the human machine, we are filled with wonder at its resistance. And not content with disorganizing it, we endlessly calumniate it besides, After having used and abused our body during a certain number of years, we are pleased thereupon to declare it old, decrepit, and worn out. We then neglect it with a carelessness which completes its ruin. After having suffered for long years from our excesses and our follies, it succumbs under the weight of our gratuitous contempt. And even if the insult did not come from its immediate proprietor, be sure that our neighbours, relations, or friends woulil not spare to throw it in its face. Poor human body! Source of so many joys which embellish, nourish, and sustain our life, it is nonetheless reduced to the post of simple whipping-boy. The reproach that our mind or conscience is senile or worn ont rouses in us a sentiment of revolt. We allow no one to doubt their power or their youthfulness. And yet how many are there who would dare to rebut the accusation of senility unjustly addressed to them? Worse * See The philosophy of Long Life.!

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860 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. still, men who have reached a certain age bend themselves still lower under the imputation, and do all that they can to merit it." The effect of evil suggestion about old age, senility and weakness is terrible on life. It paralyzes the will, on wucse activity alone depend the life and health of the organism. Men who assume the airs of age, weakness, and decrepitude to excite the sympathy of their fellowbeings, who pretend to be overwhelmed with grief to convince others of their love for the dead or sympathy with the living, and all those who stifle or in any way smother the natural buoyancy of their souls, are the authors of their own death. Wherever and whenever, on the contrary, the organism has been treated with the love and respect which it is entitled to from its ' tenant,' and not made to bear the ceaseless strain of unnatural living, nor exposed to unhealthy, uncongenial or poisonous environment, it has never failed to prove the fact that premature death, disease and old age are merely accidents, which nature has strewn in the path of reckless Bensuous living. And death itself is conquered with the subjugation of passions and lusts, for it holds no sway over pure Will, so that he who becomes one with it necessarily passes out of the whirling whirlpool of transmigration to which alone is confined the Kingiiom of the King of Terrors. But much more than mere speculation from an easy armchair is needed to acquire the mastery of death. He who would aspire to soar so high-and none is debarred from it by nature-must follow the advice of Buddha : "Look to no extraneous aid, make yourself an island, depend on none, depend on the strength of your own righteous exertions, and the supreme effort made with earnestness to control the low nature

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RE-INCARNATION. 861 is sure to succeed. Strive earnestly, persevere strenuously, let no lethargy and irritability and scepticism prevent you from reaching the goal. Ring ont the old, ring in the new, avoid evil, store in good. Fight valiantly against sin and lust and selfishness." It must be distinctly understood that the practising of what may be called purely 'negative' virtue will not enable the soul to defy death. Negative virtue merely amounts to not doing unto others what we should not like them to do unto us, but it takes no account of the first commandment, Thou shalt love thy God with all thy might,' which, in plain language, means: "Thou shalt cling to thy Self with all the force of will thou art capable of exerting. Moreover, since the Self is characterised by pure love, it follows that he alone who actively practises love, in all his thoughts and deeds, can be said to practise virtue actively. He, then, not only tolerates, but actually and actively loves all those who are involved in transmigration like himself. As the capacity for love increases in his breast, the power to defy death becomes more and more his possession. It follows from this that no one who is not prepared to renounce himsa (injuring others), in all its three forms, can ever hope for salvation or immortality. These three forms are, (1) the actual commission of the harmful act oneself, (2) its abetment when done by another, and (3) the encouraging of those who have already committed it independently of oneself. As we punish the man who abets a burglary, the thief who actually commits it, and the receiver of the property stolen at the burglary, so does Will detest the accessory after the fact as inuch as the abettor and the thief.' Hence, they who slaughter

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862 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. animals, they who get them slaughtered, and, also, they who purchase their dead limbs are travelling on the path which leads to suffering and pain. Mr. Warren points out (Jainism, p. 101):-- "If we analyse the state of mind of a person who is hunting for sport, we find three factors, (1) an absence of thought of the pain and harm he is inflicting on the innocent creatures ; (2) he is entirely taken up with his own pleasure ; and (3) he has no feeling for the pain and suffering of the animals. Thus we find thoughtlessness, selfishness and heartlessness." Neither the heaven-world, nor Nirvana is suitable for the residence of those who possess these three qualifications, and the only other place for their after-death sojourn is too dreadful to contemplate. Ahimsa, thus, is the path of salvation, which is open to each and every one who would but exert himself to reach the goal. Freedom and bliss lie only in this, not in the pursuit of the wisdom of the world. After what has been said above, it is not necessary to dwell any longer upon the power of Will in preserving life and conquering death. As regards its healing powers, the testimony is overwhelming in its favour, for the art of mental healing is a birth-right of our race which has descended to us from the remotest antiquity. Even to-day scores of men, whose lives bad been given up hy medical specialists, bear grateful testimony to its efficacy. Whether it be the 'laying of hands,' or the making of magnetic passes, or a mere word of command, or any other process, its efficacy lies only in the omnipotence of Will; and its success depends, not so much on the powers of the operator, as on the mental buoyancy, courage and faith of the patient himself. The reader

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$63 may recall what the Bible says about Jesus-that he could perform no 'miracle' in his own country, and marvelled at the unbelief of men. RE-INCARNATION. In order that life and health be maintained in the body, two things are necessary to be done, namely, firstly, the removal of the existing trouble, if any, and, secondly, the eradication of all further liability to disease. Since disease arises only in consequence of the negative condition of the individual, both these ends can be secured by becoming positive, in other words, by the recognition of Will, and by faith in its omnipotence. It follows from this, that so long as one depends on the strength and virtue of another, there is little hope for him; for the necessary condition involved in a belief of this kind is that of emptiness within and of expectation of help from without, in other words, that of pure receptivity, hence weakness. Will is the maker of the organism, and always possesses the power to repair and renovate the old, the worn out, and the useless. And, since the body is the objectification of the individual will, that is to say of the desires, emotions, passions and beliefs of the individual, clearly, physical beauty also depends on the nature of our thoughts, so that, if we cease thinking evil and fill the mind with noble thoughts of 'virtue' and power, the body must necessarily become an expression of beauty, holiness and love, instead of sin and ugliness and fear, as it usually is. He who loves is never in a receptive or negative state. But it would be highly mischievous to confine the sphere of truc love to such emotions as one feels for the opposite sex, or even to those less

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864 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. selfish manifestations of it which one observes in the relation of parents and their offspring, and the like. It is a misnomer to call such low forms of emotions by the name of Love, for, while the human lover loves one particular individual, he hates the rest of the world, -a remark which applies equally well to all the relations of love among men, whether those subsisting between parent and child, or amongst relations or friends. Human love is the love of a particular individual or, at the most, of a few individuals, but a hatred of the rest of the world; but love, in its true sense, is that roblest of emotions which, free from all kinds of bias in favour of any particular individual or community of men, expresses itself in the form of mental equanimity and compassion for all kinds of living beings. This is the only form of love which can save humanity from the clutches of Death. It is a libel to call the spasmodic, trickling streamlet of emotion, which flows only at the sight of some particular person or persons, and dries up at that of the rest of our race, to say nothing of the other forms of life, by the name of Love. Love is not a thing which bubbles up and flows at intervals, or by fits and starts ; it is one continuous, ever flowing, ever bubbling emotion which flows in all directions and towards all beings, human and animal. The former only makes the heart cold, but the latter opens out its lotus, and keeps it ever fresh and blooming, by constantly irrigating its roots with the living waters of Life. This lotus is not a myth invented by the yogis, as some biased missionaries, backed up by a knowledge of physiology, would have us believe. These gentlemen,

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RE-INCARNATION. .. 865 ignorant of the true significance of yoga centres, only looked for it in the physical organ of the heart, a place where yoga does not place it-and, needless to say, failed to find it there. The lotus of the heart is an invisible psychic centre in the spinal column, and is only known by its action. It is called the lotus of the heart, because it controls the function of the heart. This great lotus is the centre of radiation in the organism, from which life radiates its joyous vibrations all round. Its free activity leads to health, youth and immortality; but its obstruction at once converts the vibrations of love into the poison of hatred and worry which soon destroys the organism. If we observe ourselves under the influence of different emotions, we shall not fail to be struck with the fact that we feel free and easy in the presence of friends, and oppressed and uneasy when thrown together with those whom we regard as our enemies. The explanation of these two different kinds of feelings is to be found in the fact that in the former condition the vital force is allowed to radiate unchecked in the system, while in the latter it is obstructed, especially on the side of the body which happens to be the nearest to the enemy. The sense of oppression, or obstruction, arises in consequence of an involuntary contraction of certain muscles and nerves, which is the immediate result of the emotion of hatred, and the tension of which disappears the moment the emotion is changed, as when the enemy departs. As regards the consequences of this mental tension on the physical body, it may be safely held that so long as the vital force is allowed to radiate freely in all 78

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866 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. directions, stagnation and stink have no chance of setting in, but if the free flow of the living, health-giving waters from the fountain-spring of life is interfered with in any particular corner or part of the body, it at once becomes transformed into heat, converting the tissues and structures involved into a sort of battle-ground of two opposing kinds of forces, the one of radiation from the centre and the other of obstruction at the seat of trouble. In consequence of the presence and operation at one and the same time of these two opposite kinds of forces, heat is engendered, and it begins its work of destruction by consuming the living tissue. Just as electricity is converted into the destructive heat by friction, so are the radiations of life transformed into a force of destruction in consequence of the friction caused by the tension of nerves and contraction of muscles. The heat generated in the operation tends to dry up the moisture of the body, thus making the tissues dry, rigid and non-elastic, and the bones and their joints stiff, unmoving and unwieldy. The organs of digestion and recuperation all require a certain amount of fluid for their proper working, so that when they have to carry on their work without the requisite quantity of water, they become deranged and perform their functions tardily. This is the commencement of decrepitude and old age. With the impairment of the digestive apparatus the remaining organs also suffer deterioration, with the result that their vitality is vitiated, and they can no longer be relied on to resist the onslaught of harmful diseasebearing germs from without, which even when they do not cause immediate death, lower the power of resistance

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RE-INCARNATION. 867 of the organism sufficiently to accelerate the approach of old age. Such is the nature of the poison of hatred, which is the cause of all kinds of troubles. The emotion of love, on the contrary, ensures the free functioning of the lotus of the heart, whose rhythmic pulsation sends the fresh life-blood coursing through the arteries and veins, sweeping and carrying away all obstructions and accumulations of effete matter so highly dangerous on account of its suitability for becoming a breeding ground for disease-bearing germs. When the will is fully developed by the practising of universal love, its powerful rhythm suffices to scare away death itself in the manner already explained. Thus, he who would aspire to attain inmortality must proceed by practising universal love. We thus see that death is not a thing which must come to every one ; on the contrary, it comes only to those who live in ignorance of their true self which is perfectly godly and omnipotent, and at the assertion of which death itself flies away like Iblis at the ejaculation of lahaul.' The efficacy of this or any other formula, it will be observed, lies not in words, but in the power which faith in its efficiency invokes on the occasion, for that power is Will itself, and it is irresistible by men, brutes and demons alike. Ignorant humanity is, however, debarred from the conscious exercise of this power, since man seldom distinguishes between the acts of wishing and willing, which are totally different and antagonistic, the former signifying mere passive day-dreaming, but the latter nothing if not the iron-will to succeed. The

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868 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. difference between the man who wills to be well and him who merely wishes to be so, is just that between life and death. The latter spends all his time in pure wishing, and frets and fumes at the non-realization of his wish, thus, accumulating a large amount of additional worry under the tearing strain of which the frail, human frame speedily collapses; but the former uses his internal forces to throw out disease, is saved all the worries which arise from listless, inactive wishing, and is soon restored to health, to the wonderment and confusion of specialists and experts. In vain shall we be told that religion is impracticable, and that philosophy and metaphysics are not intended for the man of the world. So far as philosophy is concerned, it is the only means of rendering life consistent in its actions, and of bringing the higher ideals of goodness and power within the reach of one and all. Even education, which raises men's ideals and imparts to them the urbanity of manner whereby we distinguish them from savages, is only the hand-maid of philosophy. With respect to practicability, it can also be definitely shown that all the impracticability that there is in the world, lies with the so-called man of the world, and in no sense with Religion, when properly understood. The question is, what is practical? If we reflect on this unfortunate word at all, we cannot remain ignorant of the fact that it acquires significance only when we accord to it the capacity to bring our ideal or ideals into speedy realization. Hence, anything is practical if it lead us to the goal, by the shortest path. Now, since the ideal of

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RE-INCARNATION. 869 our race is the attainment of happiness by the conquest of death, it follows that the only practical thing in the world is the 'path' which leads us to the realization of our high ideal. There is no man who, in his heart of hearts, does not cherish this great ideal, though there be some, who, from a superficial analysis of their feelings, or from fear of ridicule, might refuse to credit their souls with this noble and ennobling aspiration. Such being the high aspiration of the soul, it is evident that no means which do not bring it nearer to realization can be termed practical. Mankind, however, generally lavish all the praise they can on those who amass large fortunes, who move in high society, who are companions of kings and potentates, and who possess hereditary or personal titles conferred on them by their fellow beings, but who, in spite of all their wealth, companions and distinctions, are not a bit nearer the attainment of the ideal of their soul. Can we call these men, or their admirers, practical ? Which is more practical, the pursuit of ideals which must invariably lead to regions of pain and torture after death, followed by subsequent incarnations in undesirable surroundings in this world, or of the Ideal which confers immortality and bliss on the soul? There can be only one answer, and that in favour of the latter alternative. If any one still think that this world is going to afford him lasting joy, let him bestow a glance at the picture of human misery and woe so vividly drawn by Mrs. Besant (the Use of Evil):-- "Look at the men and women around you, look at their faces; see how they are full of anxiety and of desire, of trouble and of injustice; and see how men's hearts are pierced by pain and laid desolate by catastrophes, by miseries, by hopes and by fears; how they are

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870 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tossed about and flung from side to side, and too often brought to ruin!" Can a life so full of misery, so full of pain and trouble, so full of grim evil, where the spectre of death stalks about unchecked, with no certainty of anything even in the very next moment, be compared with the eternal peace, tranquillity and calmness of the blessed state of perfection, called turiya in Vedanta? Think and reflect and "then realize that Brahman is bliss. Bliss, but how? Bliss, because there is unity; bliss, because there is absence of desires; bliss, because there is knowledge of permanence, which nothing that is transient can disturb."-The Use of Evil,' pp. 33 and 34. The definition of turiya, the highest state of consciousness, need not altogether depend on negative statements, but an idea may be formed of it in the mind by an internal sensing of the feeling-"I am I "-which persists after all other thoughts are transcended. It is the condition in which the joyousness of life is directly the object of internal perception, the state of consciousness or soul which is characterised by a feeling of growing freedom and bliss. The following extract from Bergson's highly interesting work, the "Creative Evolution," will suffice to show that this beatific experience is not a pure hallucination of indolent asceticism: "Let us seek, in depths of our experience, the point where we feel most intimately within our own life. It is into pure duration that we then plunge back, a duration in which the past, always moving on, is swelling unceasingly with a present that is absolutely new. We must, by a strong recoil of our personality on itself, gather up our past which is slipping away, in order to thrust it, compact and undivided, into a present which it will create by entering. Rare, indeed, are the moments when we are self possessed to this extent:

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RE-INCARNATION. 871 it is then that our actions are truly free. Our feeling of duration, I should say the actual coinciding of ourself with itself, admits of degrees. But the more the feeling is deep and the coincidence complote, the more the life in which it replaces us absorbs intellectu. ality by transcending it. The more we succeed in making ourselves conscious of our progress in pure duration, the more we feel the different parts of our being enter into each other, and our whole personality concentrate in a point, or rather a sharp edge, pressed against the future and cutting into it unceasingly. It is in this that life and action are free." This is further confirmed by Schopenhauer whu observes The World as Will and Idea) : "All willing arises from want, therefore from deficiency, and therefore from suffering. ... Therefore so long as our consciousness is filled by our will, so long as we are given up to the throng of desires with their constant hopes and fears, so long as we are the subject of willing, we can never have lasting happiness nor peace. But when some external cause or inward disposition lifts us suddenly out of the endless stream of willing, delivers knowledge from the slavery of the will, the attention is no longer directed to the motives of willing, but comprehends things free from their relation to the will, and thus observes them without personal interest, without subjectivity, purely objectively, gives itself entirely up to them so far as they are ideas, but not in so far as they are motives, Then all at once the peace which we were always seeking, but which always fled from us on the former path of the desires, comes to us of its own accord, and it is well with us. It is the painless state which Epicurus prized as the highest good and as the state of the gods; for we are for the moment set free from the miserable striving of the will ; we keep the Sabbath of the penal servitude of willing; the wheel of Ixion stands still.... Whenever it discloses itself suddenly to our view, it almost always succeeds in delivering us, though it may be only for a moment, from subjectivity, from the slavery of the will, and in raising us to the state of pure knowing. This is why the man who is tormented by passion, or want, or caro, is so suddenly revived, cheered, and restored by a single free glance into nature: the storm of passion, the pressure of desire and fear, and all the miseries of willing aro then at once, and in a marvellous manner, calmed and appeased. For at the moment at which, freed from will, we give

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872 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ourselves up to pure will-less knowing, we pass into a world from which everything is absent that influenced our will and moved us so violently through it. This freeing of knowledge lifts us wholly and entirely away from all that, as do sleep and dreams; happiness and unhappiness have disappeared; we are no longer individual; the individual is forgotten; we are only pure subject of knowledge; we are only that eye of the world which looks out from all knowing creatures, but which can become perfectly free from the service of will in man alone. Thus all difference of individuality so entirely disappears, that it is all the same whether the perceiving eye belongs to a mighty king or to a wretched beggar; for neither joy nor complaining can pass that boundary with us." We need mention only one more instance, though any number can be cited on the point. It is furnished by the famous English poet, Lord Tennyson, who, in a letter which he wrote to Mr. B. P. Blood, reports of himself as follows (see "The Varieties of Religious Experience,' by William James) : "I have never had any revelations through anaesthetics, but a kind of waking trance-this for lack of a better word--I have frequently had, quite up from boyhood, when I have been all alone. This has come upon me through repeating my own name to myself silently, till all at once, as it were out of the intensity of the consciousness of individuality, individuality itself seemed to dissolve and fade away into boundless being, and this not a confused state but the clearest, the surest of the surest, utterly beyond words--where death was an almost laughable impossibility-the loss of personality (if so it were) seeming no extinction, but the only true life. I am ashamed of my feeble description. Have I not said the state is utterly beyond words ?" Professor Tyndall, in a letter, recalls Tennyson saying of this condition : "By God Almighty! there is no delusion in the matter! It is no nebulous ecstasy, but a state of transcendent wonder, associated with absolate clearness of mind." Such are the expressions of opinion of those who were not perfect Yogis and whose contemplative labours

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RE-INCARNATION. 873 in the region of Life allowed them but an occasional peep behind the veil, but the true bliss of the blessedness of being, which may be experienced in nirvana, has been declared to be beyond description ; for bliss is a kind of feeling and no human language is designed to actually describe feelings. Which, then, is more practical--the realization of happiness by following the great Tirthamkaras who have attained it Themselves, or the pursuit of means which are, by their very nature, incapable of leading to the ideal in view ? The practical wisdom of the worldly wise is clearly impracticable here, for it busies itself with the pursuit of means which lead in a direction opposite to that in which lies the ideal dear to every heart. It is the stupid opinions of a handful of ignorant men which are leading us into error in ignorance of our true ideal. Just determine to attain this ideal with half as much strength of will as you put into your business, and see if its realization is outside the pale of practicability, or more practical than the realization of your worldly ideals, money, fame, and the like. When you sincerely apply yourself to the realization of the true ideal, you will discover that all the impracticability that seems to surround it lies only in the muddled heads of your ignorant counsellors, and, in no way, in the ideal itself. The practical value of religion is to be judged not from the side of a theoretical speculation of what its adoption leads men to give up, but in terms of the actual increase of power, knowledge and bliss which it brings to the soul. As repeatedly pointed out ere this, the

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874 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. giving up is not of anything worth clinging to, but only of those things and ideals which actually play havoc with the higher aspirations of the soul. As soon as vision is sufficiently clarified to perceive the true side of life of which the majority of men are ignorant to-day, the idea of giving up will be recognized to be a process full of exhilaration and joy, since each act of giving up will only go to make the soul more and more positive, and thus bring it a step nearer the goal of perfect knowledge, unending bliss, and absolute power. Renunciation is a necessity with nature from which none can hope to escape. If we do not renounce our weakening tendencies and attachments ourselves, Nature will, sooner or later, compel us to do so perforce, in which case our anguish will be all the greater. Against the forces of life, nature arrays her terrible dragon of death, whose very thought is enough to strike terror in the bravest heart. The clinging to the objects of the senses is, thus, the creature of delusion ; they have to be given up, sooner or later. If we do not renounce them cheerfully, death will sure enough put an end to our enjoyment thereof. It is for us to decide whether we give them up ourselves, or let death tear us away from them. In the one case, power and blessedness result for the soul, but, in the other, there are only the lamentations and gnashing of teeth born of impotent rage. Such being the case, it becomes necessary for every rational being to prepare himself for the final struggle with the dreaded foe-Death. The law of re-incarnation proves, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that if we neglect

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RE-INCARNATION. 875 the present opportunity which the human birth has thrown in our way, we might not get another chance for a long long time to come. As the Scriptures teachi, dificult it is to obtain the human form ; having obtained it, difficult it is to be born in the best environment for speedy progress; having been born even in the most suitable environment, difficult it is to acquire the truth ; and having acquired it, clifficult it is to put it into practice. Nothing avails when death comes to claim its victim; friends, relations, money, fame, authority, and the like, only go to make the parting all the more sorrowful. Fool, indeed, is he who, having obtained the human birth, squanders away his time in the pursuit of the pleasures of the world, which can never obtain for the soul the bliss which it is hankering after. Our statement about the advantages of birth in a good family needs a little elucidation. There is a great deal of truth in it, since some men are so placed by the very circumstance of birth that they are saved most of the trouble involved in the practice of renunciation. This will become quite obvious on a comparison of the rules of conduct prevailing in different communities. For instance, he who is born in a family in which flesh and wine are generally taken is at a greater disadvantage than one born where only one of them is indulged in, and the latter is less fortunate than him who takes birth in a household from which both are rigidly excluded, as is the case with the Jainas. Similarly, a man born in a community which possesses the most exact knowledge has decidedly better facilities of speedily acquiring the truth than those of his brethren

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876 TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. who are born elsewhere. But although it is not in our power to undo the effect of the past karmas, in so far as it has brought about the present birth, it is certainly in our power to destroy its remaining force by the acquisition of Right Faith, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct--the three priceless jewels of the Jaina Philosophy. Terrible is the fate of those who not only are in ignorance of the real truth themselves, but who, also, convert others to their erroneous vierys. The value of religion does not depend on the numbers that acknowledge its supremacy. The whole world may be ignorant of truth, yet it is inconceivable that truth itself be any the worse for the ignorance of men. Numbers are only useful to him who has nothing better or higher to aim at than show. Religion loses all its potency in the hands of those who only go about converting others to their views, but who otherwise care little for living it themselves. The very nature of religion is opposed to such treatment. It is the system which undertakes to cure the soul of the spiritual breakdown, consequent on the absorption of the poison of ignorance and evil karmas, and it is inconceivable how without the practising of rigid disciplinary austerities on the part of its followers, its case can differ from that of a quack whose sole interest lies in increasing the number of his patients, irrespective of the question whether they are cured of their ailments or not. Jainism points out that the true Teacher must possess no less than eighteen divine qualifications, which are enumerated on pages 60 and 61 of Mr. Warren's "Jainism." The most prominent ones of these are :

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RE-INCARNATION. 877 (1) complete eradication of lust, or sexual passion ; (2) absolute freedom from ignorance, in different language, most perfect knowledge; (3) total abstention from drinking, flesh-eating, killing, and other forms of limsa (injuring others); and (4) freedom from sleep, since that would signify a gap in omniscience. Bhagwan Mahavira, the last great Tirthamkara, had all these 18 qualifications in Him, and for that reason His great personality stands out, amongst the numerous company of pseudo saints and saviours, as that of the greatest Teacher the world has had during the last five and twenty centuries. We are not minimising the greatness of the other teachers by any means, since it is not our purpose to find fault with any religion, however backward, or insufficient. But after the fullest possible credit is given to their lives, as described in their own books, it is impossible to shut one's eyes to the absence of most of the four prominent traits pointed out above. Jainism, indeed, goes still further and points out that its teaching does not include the worship of the Great Ones (the twenty-four Tirthamkaras) in any sense. These Saviours are not the objects of worship, in any sense ; but only the living Models of Perfection which every soul must constantly keep before its mind. For, as stated before, it is not idolatry, but idealatry,' which Jainism inculcates, the realization of the fruit of which it assures, in the fullest possible measure, to each and every soul, which would care to follow the great and the only perfect Masters on the path. Every soul, does not matter in what sphere of life it might be born, has the capacity to come into the realiz

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878 TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ation of its own godly nature, and may do so by following the right path. This right path, however, is not the 'practical' path of kings and millionaires and other potentates of the world, but the path of Those who have fought and conquered Death and destroyed the demon of Darkness. It should be pointed out here that Jainism recognizes two distinct classes of souls involved in the samsara, namely, ascetics and laymen. The former are those noble-minded, high-souled beings who are determined to reach the goal by the shortest route of tapas (asceticism), but the latter are the ordinary men of the world who, unable to keep pace with their more advanced bretliren, the sadhus or munis, aspire for the realization of the great Ideal of Perfection and Bliss along the less difficult, and consequently, the longer route of the house-holder's dharma (religion). The rules of conduct laid down for the former class of souls are all characterised by the utmost severity of disciplinary austerity, which no one desirous of the attainment of Godhood can ignore; but. those meant for the guidance of ordinary men and women in the world are tempered to the capacities of their less evolved souls. Hence, conduct becoming a sravaka is forbidden to the muni, though it is only compatible with the steady progress of the soul, through succeeding incarnations. Obviously, the rules of conduct, if they are to raise our status, must be consistent with the laws of progress, so as to bring out the best within us. This point is constantly kept in view in Jainism. Hence, the rigidity of moral discipline, in the case of less evolved souls, is made to yield only to the extent to which it is

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RE-INCARNATION. 879 compatible with the idea of steady progress. For this reason, while strict celibacy is enjoined on the muni, the sravaka is required to restrict his sexual passion to his married spouse, and may not gratify his lust with other women and 'slaves.' As for slavery, Jainism has been its bitter opponent from the very beginning. It does not tolerate even the bondage of animals and birds, to say nothing of men and women, To conclude, the proof of the theory of transmigration renders it necessary for man to re-adjust his existing notions of the important problems of life. The belief that all will end once for all and for ever in the cold embrace of mother earth in the grave, is seen to be an absolutely unjustifiable one. Man cannot now afford to take life indifferently. Something more than a life of 'harmless ease,' so fashionable in society, with all its well-meant chit-chat, picnics, tea parties and other forms of social intercourse, considered innocent fun, is needed to be saved the anguish which will be the lot of the soul imbued with the notion of its identity with the body. And much more than the eradication of that pernicious belief is necessary to escape from the cycle of births and deaths altogether. Strenuous effort is required to be made for the attainment of Godhood ; vice and frivolity have to be given up one after another, and to be replaced by meditation and knowledge of the Self. New light is thrown on the problem of ethics and morality by the doctrine of re-incarnation. In all the numerous departments of science and commerce, as well as in all other walks of life, the path to improvement

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880 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is laid open along lines which are compatible with the highest and noblest aspirations of the soul. When we regulate our conduct on truly religious lines, we shall find an easy solution for all those problems of modern times which have hitherto proved insoluble. The contest between capital and labour which has been growing keen for some time past, and for which no satisfactory remedy has been found as yet, is an instance in point. ( So long as people leave out of consideration the fact that the tables might be turned, and their own future incarnation might take place in the very class which they are now trying to keep down, there is little chance of arriving at a conclusion which would yield satisfaction to both the parties to the contest. At present, one side are eager to accumulate all the money they can, forgetting that it is neither the end nor the means for the realization of bliss, but only a means for the procuring of those luxuries and other accoutrements of voluptuous 6 disease so often mistaken for ease.' The soul can neither carry with it its millions of gold and silver into the grave, nor avoid with their aid a tittle of the punishment which the path of mammon entails; nor, yet, can it claim its previous earthly wealth in a subsequent incarnation. The value of vast accumulations of money in our own coffers, a very small portion of which would suffice to lessen the burden of some unfortunate creature, is, then, reduced to the satisfaction we feel in the idea of being considered rich by our neighbours and friends. When we set against it the harin its acquisition- not always strictly in accord with the rigorous code of morals--does to the

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RE-INCARNATION. 881 future peace of the soul, and remember that we are just as much liable to be re-born in the very position which we put ourselves in opposition to in the present life, it ceases to possess even the feeble satisfaction which the notion of importance in the eyes of our friends and neighbours used to yield. Its proper use would, then, be confined to the providing of the necessaries of life for the family and for such other purposes as would advance the cause of the soul. Wben the value of money is estimated in the light of the above observations, and full allowance is made for the consequences which must redound on the soul in case of a disregard of the true teaching of religion, it becomes perfectly clear that all our endeavours to keep down certain classes of men are decidedly harmful to our own interests. The same observations apply to politics. The idea of nationality is only on the surface of consciousness; for the transmigrating soul all nations are alike, and the man who in one incarnation is born in Europe, may, in the very next, appear in a Hindu body in Hindustan. The tyrant may take birth in the nation or family of the victim of his tyranny, and the bomb-thrower among those whom he now despises. Nay, the one may be now persecuting his own kinsmen,-even parents--of a past birth, just as the other may be blowing up the re-incarnated bodies of those who were near relations in some previous life. Those who are now ruling the destinies of men, and who pay no heed to the distress their tyrannical acts cause, consciously or unconsciously, among the weaker nations of the world, and all those who, in any way, tyrannize over their fellow-beings, may some day have 75

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882 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. to groan under the rigor of the very laws which they are now laying down, for keeping down those whom they regard as created solely for the purpose of being insulted and kicked by them. The law of karma is no respecter of personality ; it does not distinguish between the peer and the peasant, the cat and the king, or the rustic and the civilian. It only takes into account the quality of active goodness in the soul, and though its mills grind slowly, they grind exceedingly small. To sum up: the doctrine of re-births, by whatever name it might be known, whether metem psychosis, reincarnation or any other, is an indisputable proposition of philosophy, and rests on the solid foundation of the indestructibility of souls, so that being eternal and, therefore, also, uncreated, they must have existed in some form or other in the past. Furthermore, miracles being inadmissible in science, the present incarnations of the souls now living in the world cannot all have been determined by anything in the nature of a lawless occurrence, but must be due to a law or laws which are concerned in the shaping of our destinies. The fact is that the souls are wrapped, so to speak, in two invisible inner'sbeaths which constitute the vehicle of transmigration, regulating their re-births and determining their circumstances, environments aud conditions. All that a living being undergoes, all that lie feels, and all that he experiences, is in consequence of his own actions in the past, even health and vitality depending, in the first instance, on the forces residing in the very constitution, which he has brought over from a previous life.

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883 As for working off the effects of karmas, we may anticipate the next chapter to a certain extent and say that no one whose being is a continuing source of affliction and ill-luck to other living beings, especially to weaker souls, can ever hope to rise to that high and sublime status which is unattainable except by those who are the most merciful and compassionate. What misfortune can be too great, what calamity too severe, for him who separates the flesh of poor confiding animals from their bones, so that he and his friends might emulate Epicure for one passing moment at their meal? We would cry out immediately if a pin pricked us; but we have no thought for the extreme agony which we inflict on another soul when tearing off its flesh from its limbs, as if it had no right even to its own body! Abject slaves to the senses, we should pause and consider where the tongue is dragging us to? Ahimsu is the first and the foremost qualification for progress on the path that takes us out of this terrible region of births and deaths to the land of Everlasting Glory and Joy and Immortality. The path might, no doubt, appear to be thorny and uphill in the first instance, but he who perseveres shall discover, ere long, that it appears so only to keep off undesirable intruders, and that, in reality and truth, it is full of life and joy for the soul. RE-INCARNATION. As regards the association of the soul with its outer body of gross matter, that is determined by what is known as ayuh karma on the exhaustion of which it must come to an end in due course of time, sooner or later. Short of this, the power of the soul to avoid

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884 sickness, old age and even premature death is practically unlimited, though even this is liable to be affected by the past karmas of an individual, appearing in the form of the proverbial slip between the cup and the lip. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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CHAPTER XIII. IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. "The worshipping of the feet of the Deva of devas, the bestower of the desired good and the consumer of Cupid's shafts, is the renover of all kinds of pain; for this reason it should be performed everently every day." The Ratna Karanda Srava kachara. "Whoever turns himself into a jewel-case [i.e., an abiding place of faultless Wisdom, Faith and Conduct, to him comes uccess in all his undertakings in the three worlds, like a woman ager to join her lord,''-Ibid. There can be no denying the fact that no one who does not know the method of doing a thing is ever likely to be successful in his undertaking to accomplish its doing. The man who would bake his bread, for instance, must know precisely what bread is made of as well as the exact method of making and baking it. And the knowledge that is useful is not of the metaphysical type-a general discourse on food, cookery, bread, buns and the like-but of the specific properties of the ingredients of which bread is made, and of the detail of the process, that is of the steps to be taken and of the order in which they are to be taken. For the man who is ignorant of the specific properties of flour and water might proceed to make his bread with such things as gun-powder and picric acid, while he who is unaware of the exact order or process, pour down his flour and

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880 TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. water into the oven, instead of mixing them together in the first instance. Now, it is obvious that the result would be nothing short of an unmitigated calamity in either case. The acquisition of scientific knowledge connecting the individual effort with the goal in view, hy a series of steps each of which carries one nearer the end than the one preceding it, is, therefore, an absolute necessity, if we are to succeed in our undertakings. There is no exception to this rule, even spiritual progress falling within its scope, as must be evident to the reader hy this time. The path of Jinas (Conquerors, i.e., Gods) is the scientific path, and consists in the doing of the right thing at the right moment. It is constituted by the confluence of three streams--Right Faith, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct --which conjointly, but not separately, wash off the impurities of sin and carry the soul to the Temple of Divinity in Nirvana, installing it on the pedestal of everlasting glory among Gods. Of the three constituents of the path,' Right Faith has its eye constantly fixed on the great Ideal of Perfection and Bliss, and never loses sight of it for a moment. Its function is to determine the direction of individual activity in the right way, preventing it from becoming self-destructive. Faith is, like the man at the helm, always directing and guiding the barge of life, in storm or in calm, to the looked for Haven of Freedom and Rest. He whose heart is not chastened by Right Faith is like the rudderless ship which is soon dashed to pieces against rocks, for want of proper guidance and control. The necessity for Right Faith is fully

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 887 obvious from the fact that people only live up to their beliefs. Right Knowledge is the detailed knowledge of the process of self-realization without which nothing but confusion can be expected as a result of action. It is the chart which is intended to furnish an accurate description of the path to be traversed, of the obstacles to be encountered on the way and of the means to be adopted to steer clear of them. As no one who has not provided himself with such a chart is ever expected to take his boat successfully across an ocean, so is not the soul that is not provided with Right Knowledge ever likely to land in safety at Nirvana. Right Conduct is the third essential of success, since without the doing of the right thing at the right moment no desired results can ever be achieved by any one. If Right Faith is the properly directed rudder and Right Knowledge the chart of navigation in the Ocean of Transmigration, Right Conduct is the force which actually propels the barge of being Havenwards. The scientific validity of these three constituents of the 'Path,' called ratna trai (triple jewel) by the Jaina acharyas, may be further judged by the fact that it is simply inconceivable how success can possibly crown our endeavours where all or any one of them is wanting. Taken singly, Right Faith only opens the outlook of life to embrace the highest good, Right Knowledge is merely the diagram of the action to be performed, while Right Conduct is simply inconceivable in the

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888 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. absence of Faith and Knowledge of the right sort. Just as he who would bake his bread must believe in his heart of hearts that it is capable of being baked, must learn the process of baking it, and must also actually exert himself for its baking, so must he who would have Dame Success fly to embrace him on the spiritual 'path' acquire the ratna trai of Right Faith, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct in the first instance. The faith to be acquired means belief in the infallibility and truth of the doctrine of Jinas, the teaching of the Holy Ones who attained to perfection with its aid. An unwavering mental assent is what is implied by the word. With respect to its quality, faith grounded on knowledge is by far the best form of faith, but even belief induced by will will do. This comes about by acting as if the state of belief, to be induced, were true irrespective of its verification by reason. In the fulness of time, the assumed attitude will become, as it were, a habit, or emotion, and will possess all the characteristics of belief based on knowledge, and knowledge itself will arise from it in due course. Prof. James maintains : "Nature sometimes, and indeed not very infrequently, produces instantaneous conversions for us. She suddenly puts us in an active connection with objects of which she had till then left us cold. I realize for the first time,' we then say, what that means'! This happens often with moral propositions. We have often heard them; but now they shoot into our lives, they move us ; we feel their living force. Such instantaneous beliefs are truly enough not to be achieved by will. But gradually our will can lead us to the same results by a very simple method : we need only in cold blood act as if the thing in question were real, und keep acting as if it were real, and it will infallibly end by growing into such a connection with our life that it

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 889 will become real. It will become so knit with habit and emotion that our interests in it will be those which characterise belief, Those to whom God' and Duty' are now mere names can make them much more than that, if they make a little sacrifice to them every day." The last sentence in the passage leans towards bhakti, and furnishes sound argument in favour of 'idolatry' within the limits laid down by us elsewhere. Right Faith being acquired, it should be re-inforced by Right Knowledge, to be derived from study and meditation in conjunction with the reading of sastras (scriptures). Right Knowledge means knowledge which leads to and is indispensable for the attainment of moksha ; it is the knowledge of subjects (tattvas) which have the most immediate bearing on the attainment of the object in view. The tattvas are seven in number, and naturally arise in a scientific treatment of the subject. The aim is to obtain freedom from the mancipation of sin, which must consist of real bonds if it can hold us down in captivity. How to break these bonds ?--then, is the real proble.n, which is logically resolvable into the fol. lowing seven points, namely, (1) the nature of that which is to be freed-whether it is such as can be freed from its bonds ? (2) the nature of the substance of which the chains of bondage are forged; (3) how does the second substance approach the first ? (4) how are the bonds forged, also what kind of bonds are they which are to be destroyed ? (5) in what way can we stop the forging of fresh bonds ? 76

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890 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (6) how to destroy those actually existing now ? and (7) what will be the nature of the condition resulting from the destruction of one's bonds? Such are the ultimate principles of Right Knowledge ; they are called tattvas because no soul desirous of its welfare can afford to remain ignorant of them. In differrent language, the jiva that does not know them knows nothing worth knowing, though he may have mastered all the worldly sciences and arts and other departments of knowledge. In the technical language of the Jaina Siddhanta, these seven essentials of Right Knowledge are known as (1) jiva (2) ajiva, (3) asrava (inflow of matter into the soul), (4) bandha (bondage), (5) samvara (cessation of asrava), (6) nirjaru (destruction of existing bonds), and (7) moksha (liberation). The whole teaching of the Holy Siddhanta as to the nature of Right Knowledge may be tersely summed up in the following sentence, with the small numerals placed on appropriate words to emphasize the tattvas: the jiva' is held in the clutches of ajiva? which flows towards it, and assumes the form of bonds* ; the stoppages of the inflow and destruction of the existing bonds result in the attainment of salvation or liberation', the highest conceivable form of good. As to the nature of the tattvas, we are already sufficiently familiar with the first two and the last, but the others need explanation. To begin with asrava, the first thing to grasp is that there can be no bondage of pure mental abstractions, or purely wordy concepts; the word signifies some kind of l'eal fetters, not, indeed, consisting of chains of iron, but of some very subtle and fine kind of

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 891 matter. It is well to know that nothing but force, in some form or other, is capable of exercising restraint or of holding living beings in the condition of captivity, and that no kind of force is conceivable apart from a substance of some kind or other. The bondage of the soul must, therefore, be the bondage of matter, the only substance which is known to enter into interaction with souls, and the obtainment of freedom must consequently imply the removal of the particles of this foreign material from the constitution of the ego. As for the principle of interaction between spirit and matter, observation shows that the soul is affected by all kinds of actions, mental, physical and those concerned with speech. This is evident from the fact that the soul takes cognizance of, that is to say becomes aware of them. But before the soul become aware of them it is necessary that they should produce a modification of its substance, that is, a characteristic change in the state of its consciousness. Hence, a modification or affection of the soul-substance is, a condition precedent to the awareness of the different kinds of actions which are performed by it. But, since no modification of the soul-substance is possible or conceivable from a distance, that is to say in the absence of a material agent reaching and making an impression on it, it is certain that there must be a substance which flows towards the soul with every thought, word and deed, modifying its condition and affecting its faculty of awareness. Now, since apart from matter there is no other substance to enter into interaction with spirit, it follows that matter flows towards the soul with every action of mind

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892 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, and body, including the articulation of sounds and words, i e., speech. The first great law of interaction between spirit and matter, accordingly, may be laid down as follows : all actions of embodied living beings, whether mental, or physical, including speech, are accompanied by an influx of matter towards the soul. As pointed out in the introduction to the Householder's Dharma, our first law of interaction only concerns the process of influx which accompanies every action ; it has no concern with the further question whether an impression be made on the soul, since that depends on the question whether it be attentive to the incoming stimulus. It must have happened within the experience of every one of us that we have failed to notice the taste of viands put before us whenever attention has been deeply engrossed elsewhere. The physiology of taste indicates that while the bulk of food passes into the stomach through the gullet, some particles of its relish reach the soul through the glands of taste and the nerves connected with them, enabling it to 'feel' and enjoy the relish of each morsel. But these relish particles must be there all the same whether the soul attend to them or not. It would follow from this that taste is an affection of the ego which results from a more intimate contact with the particles of matter than mere co-existence, or coming together, in a place, and that attention acts as the band-maid of the soul who ushers afferent stimuli into the presence of her mistress. Moreover, since attention always implies interest, whether it indicate the merest wish to know or the most passionate

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 893 longing to embrace, it further follows that the union, or fusion, of spirit and matter cannot take place unless the soul be first thrown into an attitude of desire. Itself a dynamic force or substance by nature, the quality of soul's rhythm is affected by the entertainment of desire, and it is consequently exposed to the influx of the particles of matter which readily combine with it, limiting its functions in different ways. Our second law of interaction between spirit and matter may now be formulated as follows: the fusion of spirit and matter does not take place except where the soul is thrown into a condition of expectancy, or desire, i.e., weakness. It is a corollary to this that the giving up of desires which produce the condition of weakness in the soul must necessarily bring about its liberation from the thraldom of matter, also called the bondage of karma, on account of karmas being the primary causes of the material influx and bandha. As regards the quality of bandha, the rule appears to be that the stronger the desire the deeper the penetration of the particles of matter and the closer the union between them and the soul, so that the worst forms of bondage result from the worst types of desires. Now, desire principally assumes four different forms and appears as greed, deceit, pride and anger. Greed, it will be seen, is but another word for desire, to gratify which one resorts to deceit; and pride arises from the possession of what is desirable, while anger blazes up in consequence of being foiled in an endeavour to secure an object of desire or from wouuded pride. These four kinds of passions, thus, are the main causes of bondage,

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894 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. so that the strength and 'thickness,' and, consequently, the duration of the karmic chains also actually depend on the degree of their intensity. Besides these powerful passions, desire also takes the form of joking, attachment, aversion, grief, fear and disgust, as well as of the three kinds of sex-passion peculiar to the three sexes, the male, the female and the neuter. These are called the nine no-kashayas, and are all potent causes of bondage. So much for the duration and strength, i.e., malignity or virulence of the forces of karma. As regards the quantity of matter which enters into union with the soul, that obviously depends on the actions performed by the individual, since material influx only follows upon the three kinds of activities, mental, physical and lingual or vocal. So far as the different kinds of karmas are concerned, they also clearly result from the material influx, because they are, in their real nature, only so many different kinds of forces which, as already observed, cannot be imagined to be altogether immaterial. We may not formulate the third great law of interaction between spirit and matter thus: the quantity of the material of our bondage and the variety of karmic bonds depend on the three channels of activity, namely, the mind, speech, and body, but their duration and strength, or malignity, are determined by the intensity of passions and desires of the soul. The next thing to understand in this connection is the effect of the action of matter on the soul. We have said that the fusion of spirit and matter results in the bondage of the soul. This is literally true; for

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895 the union of substances always tends to limit their natural functions, though new properties and faculties arise in consequence of it. As hydrogen and oxygen, which are gaseous by nature, are robbed of their natural 'freedom,' i.e., of their gaseous nature by combining with each other in the form of water, so does the soul become crippled in respect of its natural functions in consequence of its union with matter. This is the bondage, meaning, as it does, the suspension and vitiation of the natural functions and properties of the soulsubstance which are held in check for the time being. Observation shows that the soul involved in the cycle of transmigration is unable to enjoy its natural perfection in respect of knowledge, perception and happiness, which, therefore, must be held in abeyance by some kinds of forces operating on it. Now, since no kind of force is thinkable apart from a material of some kind, and since these forces are not natural to the soul, they must be due to its fusion with matter. But, since fusion with matter is dependent on individual activity, they cannot but be the forces engendered by our own actions. We thus get three kinds of karmas, namely, those which obstruct knowledge, those that interfere with perception, and those that control the experiencing of pleasure and pain through the senses. In addition to these, observation also proves the existence of a force which stands in the way of the acquisition of Right Faith. This comprises two distinct types of energies: those which interfere with the acquisition of Right Faith itself, and those that debar one from putting it into practice. IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS.

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896 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Separate places must also be allotted to the force which determines the duration of the association of the soul with its physical body, and to the energies responsible for the making of the different bodies and their limbs. The status--descent, lineage and the like-which really depends on the 'womb' into which the ego is attracted by the operation of the forces of chemical affinity and magnetism residing in its two inner bodies, the karmana and the taijasa (see ante pages 824-827), is also the outcome of a distinct type of energy, and must, for that reason, be treated as a class by itself. Lastly, souls are also observed to differ from one another in respect of physical prowess and the power to achieve what is desirable and desired. There are several kinds of energy which limit the powers and effectiveness of the soul, and they form a class by themselves. We thus have the eight principal kinds of karmas which, for facility of reference, are technically known as (1) I nanavaraniya (from joana, knowledge, and avarana, to cover or obstruct) ; (2) Darsanavaraniya (darsana=perception); (3) Vedaniya, which regulates the experiences of pleasure and pain ; (4) Mohaniya, which is of two kinds : i. darsana-mohaniya (darsana=faith, and mo haniya=infatuation, hence the infatuations ranged against Right Faith); and ii. churitra-mohaniya (charitra=conduct), which prevents one's living upto one's faith ; (5) Ayuh (age, longevity);

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 897 (6) Nama, which is responsible for the work of organising different bodies and bodily limbs; (7) Gotra, which determines descent, lineage, and the like; and (8) Antaraya (from aya, to come or stand, and antara, between), which prevents effective ness and interferes with energy in general. These are the main kinds of forces engendered by individual actions. The Jaina Siddhanta sub-divides them again into one hundred and forty-eight minor types which may be studied with the aid of other works on the subject. It is, however, important to note here that the eight kinds of karmas are divisible into two main types, the ghatiya and the aghatiya, of which the former comprises the first, second, fourth and eighth classes described above, and the latter, the remaining four. The reason for the distinction lies in the fact that while the former actually restrict and interfere with the natural attributes and properties of the soul, the latter are mainly concerned with its environments, surroundings and bodies. Hence are the former known as ghatiya which means inimical, and the latter aghatiya (a=not+ ghatiya). The ghatiya may further be divided into (a) those that are directly controllable by the soul and (b) those which are not so controllable, but which can be affected indirectly through those of class (a). The different kinds of energies falling under the mohaniya group all belong to class (a), because they may be directly destroyed by self-restraint on the part of the soul. The following classification of karmas tends

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898 to facilitate the study of the subject and will be found useful by those who are not familiar with it: KARMA. Those that are directly controllable by the soul (a). Mohaniya. Mithyatva (falsehood). Darsana-mohaniya. 1 { Anger. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. f Ghatiya. Joking. ( Veduniya. Ayuh. Nama. Those that cannot be so controlled (b). Jnanavarniya. Darsanavarniya, Antaraya. Samyaga mithyat va (mixed true and false beliefs). Aghatiya. Samyaktva (right faith tinged with superstition). Kashayas (passions). Charitra-mohaniya. Pride. Deceit. Greed. No-kashayas. ment. Attach- Aversion. Grief. Fear. Disgust. Male sex Female sex Neuter passion. passion. sex passion. We can now understand, to some extent, the ramifications of the diverse kinds of forces operating on the ego. Different kinds of energies, called karmaprakritis in the literature of Jainism, form round him a veritable network of forces, which have to be destroyed before salvation can be attained. The jiva is entangled in this net-work of his karmas, and wanders about under their influence in all conditions of life in the samsara, experienc Gotra.

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. ing pleasure and pain in the course of his wanderings. He is the pilgrim who has to free himself from the attachments of the world to reach the holy Shrine of his own Divinity. Till perfection is attained, he remains in the clutches of destiny of which he is himself the author, and, consequently, liable to changes of forms and states, that is, births and deaths. Different kinds of karmic forces drag him about in the world, in different forms, giving rise to different experiences in the course of transmigration. 899 The jiva is the greatest living force in himself and not liable, by nature, to be influenced by any other force, or forces; but he becomes vulnerable by his own inclinations, longings and desires. Hence, it is his own longings for the things of the world which go to weaken his native vigour, and bind him down hand and foot with the chords of karma. His free nature is, however, constantly at war with his evil inclinations and pursuits. Thus, there rages a constant battle in the field of action, the physical body, between the natural qualities of the soul and the forces of karma, in which the scale sometimes turns in favour of the jiva, but mostly against him. The powers of the soul are diminished daily by the struggle raging in its own house. Thus arise the different kinds of disabilities which Jainism points out and which constitute the bondage that is holding us down in captivity. And it is this bondage which Jesus of Nazareth referred to when he said : "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."-John viii. 32.

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900 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The fictitious discourse recorded in the verses that follow this dynamic truth was only designed to furnish a hint to the thoughtful as to the nature of the bondage referred to. The important verses bearing on the point are reproduced below :33. "They answered him, we be Abraham's seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, ye shall be made free? 34, "Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, who soever committeth sin is the servant of sin. 35. " And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the son abideth ever, 36. "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." If we are to construe these verses correctly, we must first endeavour to find out the truth each of them lays down. Careful reflection will show that the 34th is intended to settle the question raised in the 33rd-whether the bondage meant national or political subjugation? The answer is plain : it is the servitude of sin that is meant, not national captivity. In the 35th verse a distinction is made between the conditions of servitude and Sonship, the former of which is pronounced to be terminable, but the latter eternal. The 36th finally lays down that true freedom from all kinds of bondsnote the force of indeed' after 'free'-can only be conferred by the Son who is to abide for ever. Now, we already know what the word 'Son' signifies in the mouth of Jesus- the soul that has inherited the status and glory of God. Thus if we put down our conclu- . sions categorically, we get, 1. that the word bondage in religion means the servitude or thraldom of sin;

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901 2. that this thraldom is not ever-lasting, but the condition of Sonship is eternal; and 3. that the soul obtains true freedom only when it acquires the status of the Son. IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. These propositions are fully in harmony with the teaching of Jainism, and only reproduce three of the most fundamental truths of religion. They are not exhaustive of the why and the wherefore of the doctrine of transmigration, but only intended as a hint to the wise. Let the reader ask himself as to what is meant by sin, and he will soon perceive that there can be no being or substance corresponding to the term. It is a mere word, and were we to search for it from now till the Judgment Day, it is certain that it will always remain what it is to-day-a pure wordy abstraction. The truth is that sin only conveys the idea of wrong-doing, there being no concrete being or thing to correspond to it in nature. The bondage of sin, thus, is clearly the thraldom of actions, i. e., karmas (actions or deeds), which is to be shaken off to bring the state of "Sonship" into manifestation. Now, if the reader will further pursue the theme, and enquire how the soul can be bound by its acts, he will not be long in coming to the conclusions which have been already established in this chapter regarding the nature of asrava and bandha. For there can be no binding of real, subsisting beings or things with mere imaginary notions or by pure ideas and words. A force is needed for the purpose, and no force is conceivable apart from a substance of some kind or other. It is here that the utter inadequacy of all the non-Jaina systems,

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902 without a single exception, may be clearly perceived; for while some have pure words, illusion, maya and the like, to bind the soul with, others vaguely talk of desire, and others again of such generalities as karma, action, sin and taqdir (destiny or fate). The importance of scientific knowledge has been pointed out by us in the beginning of the present chapter, and it is clear that vague generalities are wholly responsible for the amount of confusion which has prevailed in theological circles hitherto. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It is not likely that a man would now be found to insist on interpreting the word Son to mean Jesus of Nazareth in the 36th verse of the 8th chapter of John; but should one venture to entertain that supposition, it would be well to remember that no one can help another in the spiritual region except to the extent of pointing out the way for obtaining release from the turmoils of samsara. And the case is nowise altered by our individual beliefs; for the laws of nature are not dependent on the whims of men and other higher or lower beings, but work independently of them. Hence, when people say that it is more comforting to believe that some one else will out of grace do the needful for them, they lull themselves into a false security and allow themselves to fall asleep on the verge of an innocent looking volcano whose apparent quietness is soon to be changed into a sudden outburst of destructiveness. It is a corollary to be deduced from the spiritual laws already described that the bondage of the soul cannot possibly be terminated by any agency outside its own self. The reason for this is to be found in the fact that no one can possibly control the desires of another, which

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 903 being the causes of the fusion of spirit and matter, must continue to produce their effects so long as they exist. Surely, it is but common sense to say that unless we ourselves desist from the doing of evil and banish it from our hearts no one else can do it for us from without; and it is legitimate to infer that the forces which are set in motion by our own actions must remain operative and produce their appropriate results unless their causation is stopped and destroyed. Not only is the natural law opposed to the idea of redemption by the favour of another, but also not one instance can be cited of a man who may be said to have reached nirvana that way. The effect of desires on the constitution of the soul is to make it negative,' opening its pores, as it were, through which penetrates the poison of sin. It is this negative condition which is to be changed before redemption can be had, for in consequence of it the soul constantly draws the particles of a kind of subtle matter (known as karma-pudgula) unto itself, acting like a magnet. Change of intention, therefore, is the main thing to be done, but this is not possible except where the soul exerts itself in the right way, since no one can change the evil intention of another. This is why Jesus was never tired of repeating, in one form or another, the old injunction imparted by every Saviour before his time: "And why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say."- Luko vi. 46. So far as the harmful consequences of evil intent are concerned, Jesus correctly pointed out the principle

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904 when he said that every one who looked at a woman with lust was as guilty as if he had committed adultery with her. This is made perfectly clear by the principle of asrava (influx), which need not be discussed over again. With respect to bandha, it must be fully evident now that no outside agency is needed to fasten the coils of servitude on the soul. The fruit of action is secured to its author directly it is performed, and the process is carried on all along throughout life. There is no room for the interference of a superhuman magistrate or judge in this, even if one could be found able to perform and willing to be bothered by such a bootless duty or task for all eternity. The argument that because our karmas are jarha, that is unintelligent, therefore, they cannot themselves determine the punishment or reward which is deserved by us, is altogether unscientific and devoid of force; for in the realm of the natural law such determination is not dependent on an adjudication by a magistrate or judge, but on the properties of substances. The man who lies is punished by nature with as unerring judgment as he who puts his hand on fire, or he who sitting on the trunk of a tree cuts down its root. If the award of punishment in the last two cases be the result of the decree of a god, sitting, with the scales of justice in his hands, in some high heaven or other, and constantly engaged in determining the reward and punishment of living beings, he must be deemed to be guided in the discharge of his judicial function by the scientist who can tell beforehand the precise consequences of these acts. And, if it be a fact that the reward and punishment in these cases are not THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 905 meted out by any human or super-human agency, what is our authority for ascribing the fruition of other karmas to the decree of a calculating and judging divinity? Not only is there no such judicial agency to be found anywhere in nature, but the necessity for its existence is also absolutely counter-indicated by the facts of observation. For the same natural law which determines that the hand which is placed on fire should be burnt and that the hatchet that strikes at the root of the tree should be the instrument of punishment to the man seated on the trunk the same law which promulgates these decrees, we say, also declares that the man who denies what he has seen with his eyes should be deprived of his vision in the life to come. There is no dark mysticism involved in this; on the contrary, the punishment indicated is directly traceable to natural causation, for the formation of all bodily limbs, including the organs of vision, being the effect of the operation of energies residing in the karmana sarira of the soul, it is but natural that the organs to be formed must undergo appropriate, modification where the forces responsible for their manufacturing are themselves modified by individual actions. Now, when a person denies the evidence of his senses, e.g., the existence of a thing which is lying before him, he is forced to keep his eyes turned away from it as far as possible, to avoid his gaze falling on it. The result is that his eyes are forced into an unnatural and strained attitude, in consequence of which the asrava of matter is diverted from its natural course, its particles finding lodgment in places not intended for 78

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906 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. them in the normal course of nature. This leads to a decrement or clogging of certain parts of the karmana sarira and to an excessive tumefaction of certain others, with the result that when the organizing energies of the system become active again to manufacture a new organism, or body, the abnormalities prevailing in the constitution of the soul do not admit of the organs of vision being made in the natural way. This is why he who endeavours to deceive another ends, though quite unconsciously, by throwing dust into his own eyes. This one instance suffices to demonstrate the working of the principle of causality in the region of karma, and shows its independence of all human and divine interference. We must now proceed to a consideration of the fifth tattva, namely, samvara, which means the stoppage of asrava. Samvara is necessary, because no progress is possible where the fresh influx of sin is not brought to a stop in the first instance. As an enemy that has taken possession of one's house cannot be destroyed till the doors and windows through which his re-inforcements are pouring in be effectively barred against them, so can we not destroy the forces of our karmas without first of all closing the inlets of asrava against sin. The channels to be closed are the three passages of mind, speech and body, and the bolt with which they can be effectively fastened is the change of the attitude of negativity on the part of the soul. The course of conduct prescribed for effecting the desired change comprises the following

Page #928
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 907 sunday rules of conduct, falling under the seven heads detailed below. 1.. Vows, namely, i. abstinence from injuring living beings, ii. desisting from falsehood, iii. refraining from theft, iv. control of sex-passion, and v. indifference to worldly goods. 2. Samitis (diligence in movement to avoid injuring insect* life) in respect of i. walking, ii. speech, iii. food, iv. handling things, and v. disposal of excretions. * It is not to be supposed that the Jainas have nothing better to do than to spend their whole lives in studying the well-being of the insect community. The samitis are enjoined because they are the only means of bringing the automatic activity of life under control, A major portion of our actions, it will be seen, consists of those performed automatically, i.e., without deliberation, and as they all lead to asrava and bandluu they have to be brought under personal control and stopped. Now, the only means of checking uncontrolled, automatic activity is to cultivate the habit of carefulness and diligence with respect to all matters directly controllable by the will. Hence the samitis, which tend to check and ultimately destroy automatism of habit and action (pramada). They are difficult to be observed by the householder, because of his worldly concerns leaving him little time to cultivate them, but the muni who has withdrawn his attention from the world to apply himself exclusively to obtain mastery over his destiny, must exert himself to acquire the power of making his bodily movements only after due deliberation and carefulness. Now, since the muni has no other occupation in life, the samitis are the only means open to him of bringing his automatic activity or motor reflexes under control.

Page #929
908 3. Rules of dharma (piety), comprising, i. forgiveness, ii. humility, iii. honesty, iv. truthfulness, v. dispassionateness, vi. mercy, vii. self-denial, viii. renunciation, ix. contentment, and x. chastity. 4. Guptis, or control of i. mind, ii. speech and iii. body. vii. 5. Meditation on i. the transitoriness of the world, ii. the want of a protector of souls, iii. the pain and suffering implied in transmigration, iv. the inability of another to share one's suffering and sorrow, V. the distinction between the body and the soul, the filthiness of the body, vi. the nature of asrava, viii. ix. X. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. } All qualified by the word uttama, meaning saintly, excellent, or commendable. samvara and nirjara tattvas, the form and divisions of the universe and the nature of the conditions prevailing in the different regions-heavens, hells and the like,

Page #930
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 909 xi. the extreme difficulty of obtaining the human birth, and xi. the nature of dharma (religion). 6. Endurance of hardships consequent on i. hunger, ii. thirst, iii. cold, iv. heat, v. insect-bite, vi. nakedness, vii. national or racial calamities, viii. feminine attractiveness, ix. fatigue from constant moving about, x. maintaining an immovable posture, xi. sleeping on hard ground, xii. insults, xii. ill-treatment or assault, xiv. determination not to beg for favours, xv. disappointment in obtaining food, xvi. disease, xvii. thorn-pricks, xviii. uncleanliness of the body, xix. disrespect, xx. pride of learning, xxi. failure to acquire knowledge, and xxii. delay in the fruition of meritorious deeds. 7. Right conduct, comprising the following types : i. sumayika, i.e., equanimity and refraining from sin, ii. chhedopasthapana (re-establishing or repairment after a breach), i.e., observance of penalties

Page #931
910 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. for faults committed through inadvertence or negligence, iii. parihara-visuddhi, refraining from himsu, iv. suksmasamparaya, control of the lower nature where greed is reduced to a bare unrecognisable trait and all other passions are fully under control, and v. yathakhyata (perfect) which characterises those who have destroyed all of their passions and lusts. These are the diverse means prescribed for changing the negative condition of the soul and for ridding it of its desires. They aim at engendering the spirit of vairagya (renunciation or desirelessness) in the soul, weaken and destory the bonds of its karmas and enable it to acquire its divine attributes and powers. With the doorways of sin closed and fastened with the bolt of renunciation, the effect of the evil deeds of the past can be burnt up and destroyed in no time. The process of destruction of karmas is called nirjara, which is the sixth tattva. The main cause of success in nirjara is the attitude of undisturbed mental tranquillity or equanimity which is developed by practising the rules of conduct laid down in connection with samvara. But as the rigidity of these rules makes it impossible for a beginner to observe them without faltering, the conduct prescribed for the house-holder who has just entered on the 'path' is characterised by a lesser degree of severity than that laid down for a muni (an ascetic or 'homeless' saint). For instance, while the latter's vow relating to the control of the sexual passion signifies nothing less

Page #932
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 911 than absolute unqualified celibacy, the former's admits of his marrying a suitable spouse. The rule as to the practising of these vows and injunctions is that one should exert oneself in their observance to the full extent of one's power ; but not so as to do oneself harm by over-exertion. There is a close analogy between the development of the physical body for athletics and the training of the will. As insufficient exercise will not develop a bodily muscle and one overdone will be productive of harm by bringing on fatigue, so is not will developed by aught that falls short of full exertion or that is calculated to produce excessive strain. Within these limits, one should exert oneself, wholeheartedly, to maintain the spirit of imperturbable equanimity under all conditions. To this end tapa (asceticism) will be found to be a valuable and altogether indispensable ally. Tapa is of two kinds : the external and the internal. Of these, the external which is necessary for the due sustentation of the internal, consists in (i) fasting, (ii) avoidance of full meals, (iii) placing restrictions on the conditions under which food may be taken, (iv) abstaining from such things as impart relish to eatables --salt, sugar, milk, ghee, curds and oil, (v) living in unfrequented places, and (vi) practising physical austerities to be rid of the longing for bodily comfort and ease. The internal tapa comprises such acts as the acquisition and strengthening of faith, the showing of respect to ascetics and knowers of truth as well as to the Word of the Tirthamkara, attending upon and nursing holy saints when unwell, study, discrimination and meditation, including self-contemplation in the highest sense. The

Page #933
912 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. house-holder begins by worshipping the trinity of the Deva, Guru and Sastra(scripture) which constitute the layman's ratna trai (triple jewel). The Deva (Tirthamkara) is worshipped because He is the true Guide, and because His word is the final authority in case of doubt and dispute; the guru (preceptor) is worshipped because he is the living example to guide one's footsteps in the right way, and because without his practical help it is almost impossible to cross the thorny 'path'; and the scripture is worshipped' because it is the infallible Word of God. 6 The layman is also expected to observe the vows and to gradually train himself for the arduous path of asceticism, so that his perfection in the house-holder's dharma should be his passport to sanyasa and the complete renunciation of the world. Having thus qualified himself in the preparatory course, he now observes the vows and rules of conduct prescribed for saints, and whole-heartedly devotes himself to the attainment of moksha. In due course of time his passions are eradicated leaving his soul calm, placid and free from the tinge of all kinds of desire. The eradication of passions and lusts is the signal for the destruction of the remaining kinds of the ghatiya karmas of the soul, and is followed by the acquisition of Omniscience full and complete. The jiva is now styled a jivanamukta (from jivana alive, and mukta liberated), and enjoys the status of the Redeemed though still embodied in the flesh. Finally, when the force (ayuh karma) which holds the body and the soul together is exhausted, he throws off his three bodies, the karmana, the taijasa and the audarika (gross body) and

Page #934
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 913 immediately ascends to the Siddha Sila, as a pure effulgent Spirit or God, to reside there for ever, free from the impurities of matter and karmas and the pain and suffering of samsura. This is moksha. Completely rid of all those properties and faculties which spring from the association of matter, the soul can no longer perform the functions of an embodied soul, but everlastingly enjoys all those divine attributes and privileges which appertain to all pure undefiled Spirits, i.e., Gods. Such is the general scheme of tattvas which constitute Right Knowledge, the second of the three gems that combine to form the ratna trai of salvation. So far as Right Conduct is concerned, it comprises two sets of rules, one consisting in directions and injunctions applicable to the untrained laity and the other in those the observance of which is enjoined on munis (ascetics or saints). The reason for this division of the path into two sections is to be found, as already hinted at, in the fact that the austere life of a monk cannot be adopted by an untrained layman all at once, so that his conduct cannot. but be found wanting in respect of the vows of renunciation and self-control as compared with that of a well-disciplined saint. The layman's training is, thus, the preliminary course of asceticism, and is as essential to steady progress in the more advanced stages of the journey' as is a good foundation to a lofty edifice. The point is to develop the spirit of self-denial and renunciation in such a way as to ensure its steady sustentation. In vain shall we search for a method that shall place us at the goal on the instant. To become God it is first of all necessary 79

Page #935
914 to learn to behave as a God, and this can only be done by degrees. The Ananias in us cannot be killed in a moment ; the Sapphira element requires time to be brought under control. The important thing, then, is to proceed scientifically, that is step by step. Right Conduct aims at perfecting us in respect of action, so that we should also ultimately learn to behave as Gods. We must, therefore, make up our minds to give up all those actions and deeds which do not become Gods, and should strive to develop the traits of conduct that are characteristic of Divinity and Godhood. Enormous is the amount of work to be done before success may be expected to crown our efforts; the pinnacle to be reached is far off and precipitous, but cheerfulness and steadfastness of purpose have never been known to fail in any enterprise and may be always relied upon to take us to the goal. If a Simon, a Carson or a Sinha were told in his infancy the enormous amount of literature he would have to carry in his head as an eminent lawyer, it is more than probable that he would have died at the mere mention of the number of books he was required to read. Yet is none of these gentlemen a resuscitated ghost, but all men of flesh and blood; the eminence attained by them in their particular department is simply the result of cheerful perseverance and study. A real beginning is to be made, and, if we are steadfast and firm in our resolution, success is sure to be attained sooner or later, in the course of one or more lives. There need be no fear of the fruit of labour being destroyed by death; the merit acquired by faith, knowledge and conduct accompanies the soul from life to THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

Page #936
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 915 life and cannot be lost. It is carried in the shape of the modifications in the constitution of the karmana sarira, and becomes an important factor in the building of the future career and personality of the individual. The start in Right Conduct is to be made by the renunciation of the very worst habits and thoughts as soon as the Right Faith is acquired. Wanton cruelty, the worst form of himsa, for which there can be no justification, is the very first thing to be abandoned. It is no use our endeavouring to make any headway on the spiritual path without first renouncing animal flesh and sport. How shall he whose foot has never touched the very first rung of the ladder reach the top? The ". worse cannot be attacked so long as the worst" remains unchecked, for the one is implied in the other. The Gods in whose company we fain would sit are the well-wishers of all; they neither devour nor destroy any living being. How, then, can he who causes pain to living beings to afford momentary pleasure to his palate or tongue ever aspire to become a God? "" (6 The aspirant after immortality and joy must, therefore, give up sport and animal food at the time of the adoption of Right Faith. For similar reasons, he should also give up gambling, profligacy, and the habits of stealing, drinking and falsehood. This is the first step in the House-holder's section or stage. There are eleven such steps (pratimas) in all before the muni's status is reached, and it is necessary for the house-holder to perfect himself in them all if he wishes to make steady progress all along,

Page #937
916 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. The second pratima consists in the observance of the milder form of vows enumerated on p. 907 ante. There are seven other vows, comprising three guna and four sila vratas, which should also be observed regularly by the house-holder. The guna vratas are so called because they tend to increase virtue (from guna, virtue, and, vratas, vows); they consist in the placing of restrictions on the field of one's movements, refraining from purposeless activity, and cutting down the number of articles of daily use and enjoyment. The siksha vratas tend to increase piety and knowledge, and consist in further restricting one's movements, for certain fixed periods, within still narrower limits than those fixed in the first guna vrata, the performance of daily meditation (samayika), fasting and the service of saints. The full description of these vratas, the manner of their observance, and the faults arising in connection with them are all minutely described in the Jaina Books; they can only be briefly touched upon in a work like the present, which is mainly concerned with the comparative study of religion. The reason for the observance of these vows is not that our enduring of hardships has a tendency to please some supernatural god or goddess upon whose pleasure our destiny might be said to be dependent, but that self-denial is the only method of training the individual will and of purging it of its weaknesses. The third step on the house-holder's 'path' consists in the observance of the samayika meditation (see ante p. 365) three times daily, that is morning, noon and evening every day. Its duration should also be increased from

Page #938
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 917 two to six gharis (a ghari=24 minutes) on each occasion. The fourth step signifies the observance of the eleventh vow, relating to fasting, at least four times a month, on certain auspicious days. The fifth step is characterised by abstaining from eating unripe or uncooked roots, fruits, greens, tendrils, bulbous vegetables, flowers and seeds. The sixth is marked by the avoidance of food after sunset.. The seventh step implies sexual purity; the householder now takes the vow of absolute brahmacharya (abstinence). On the eighth step still further progress is made by the individual, who now withdraws himself from all kinds of business and occupations. In the ninth there is the distribution of property among the heirs. The tenth is reached by those who vow not to give advice on any worldly matter-not even if the family honour be at stake. The house-holder who has reached this step should only attend to the welfare of his soul, "leaving the dead to bury their dead." The eleventh and the last step in the house-holder's dharma consists in the renunciation of the world, that is of all that the world calls its own, retaining from its goods only a small whisk of the softest peacock feathers with which to remove insects from his person and books without causing them injury, a small bowl for water and a book or two on religion if necessary. This pratima is called uddista tyaga (uddista=that which has been ordered beforehand, and tyaga=renouncing), because the aspirant now refrains from accepting anything in the shape of food if offered by special invitation

Page #939
918 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. or appointment. The course of training here is twofold, the preliminary and the advanced. The householder in the preliminary stage of this pratima is called a kshullaka, and the one in the more advanced, an ellaka. The kshullaka wears a langoti and a sheet of cloth, three cubits long and of a single width, but the ellaka rejects the wrapper and keeps only the langoti. As regards begging for food, a kshullaka, if he belong to any of the three higher castes, should eat only what he gets from one household ; but he may visit five houses one after another if he happens to be a sudra. In no case should he call at another house after getting sufficient food for the day, but should sit down and eat. it at the last house visited by him. While calling for food, he should not penetrate beyond the court-yard, hall or vestibule, nor ask or beckon for food, but should only wish the inmates dharma-labha (may you obtain spiritual merit). If not observed or welcomed with due respect, he should immediately depart from that place and proceed to another. In no case should he call at that house a second time that day, The ellaka also observes these rules, but he eats what is obtained from one kitchen alone. Both the kshullaka and the ellaka eat only once a day, and go out in search of food between the hours of ten and eleven in the morning. The eleventh pratima attained, the house-holder becomes a muni, and follows the rules of conduct prescribed for ascetics, which may be studied with the aid of other works. He has now no concern with the world and aspires to reach nirvana in the shortest time possible.

Page #940
919 On two points alone does he come in touch with the men and women of the world, firstly he imparts instruction on dharma to all who seek it from him, and, secondly, he goes out to obtain his subsistence.from such of the pious house holders as welcome him with veneration and respect, considering it their good luck to have the opportunity of serving holy saints. He eats but only to keep his body and soul together, so that he might continue the work on which he has embarked-the destruction of his karmas. He is not a beggar in any sense of the word, and would not touch a morsel if the food be not free from all kinds of impurities pointed out in the Scripture. As a house-holder, he himself used to long for the opportunity to serve the holy men, and would patiently wait at his door for their arrival before taking his meal. What he then did for them it is his turn now to expect from others. Neither is he looked upon as a burden, for every true house-holder longs for the opportunity to tread the same path, and actually worships the beings into whose footsteps he knows that he will himself have some day to walk to reach the goal. With reference to the merit of giving food to homeless saints, it is said in the Ratna Karanda Sravakachara : IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. "As water for certain washes away blood, so does the giving of food to homeless saints, without doubt, destroy the sins incidental to a house-holder's life." The statement that the sins incidental to a householder's life are destroyed by the giving of food to a Jaina saint in the approved manner, is descriptive of the power of holy thoughts in washing away karmic impurities from the soul. The approved manner consists in (1) prostrating oneself at the feet of the saint, (2) offering

Page #941
920 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. him a high seat, (3) washing his feet, and applying the washing to one's forehead in token of reverence, (4) worshipping him, (5) saluting him, (6-8) preserving one's own mind, speech and body in a state of purity in his presence, and (9) giving him pure suitable food to eat. The life of a saint should be one continuous sa mayika from one end to the other, as far as possible. In practice, however, the development of his will depends on the destruction of his ghatiyu karmas, the order of which will now be described briefly. Of the four kinds of kashays (passions) comprised in the class of charitra mohaniya (see p. 898 ante), there are four types of each, denoting four different degrees of intensity which may be described as 1. mild, 2. malignant, 3. highly malignant, and 4. the most malignant. Of these, the most malignant are the worst, and prevent the acquisition of Right Faith itself ; the highly analignant sort admit of the acquisition of Faith, but obstruct Right Conduct; tbe malignant enable the householder's vows to be observed, but stand in the way of the more rigorous vows of asceticism becoming a saint; and the mild only debar the soul from pure self-contenplation (sukla dhyanu). The destruction of the fourth type leads to the acquisition of Right Faith through the development of discrimination; of the fourth and the third, to the adoption of the house-holder's conduct ; of these two and the second, to the observance of the vows of asceticism ; and of all the four to sukla dhyana, which is

Page #942
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 921 the cause of omniscience and nirvana. There are in all fourteen stages by which the soul of man passes from the lowest state of bondage and ignorance to that of full illumination and godhood. These are described in the following tabulated form, together with their characteristic features in the column of remarks.

Page #943
Table showing stages on the path. 922 2 Remarks. Serial number. Number of those Number of out of column Name of the ghatiya kar- 3 which are stage. I mas of class destroyed in (a). passing to the next stage. Resulting gain. still Ghatiya karmas of class (a) left to be destroyed. (Millyatva 27 [28-1] 1 Mithyatva ... 28 [16 Kaslayas, 9 10-kashayus, and 3 kinds of dar sa na mohaniya. Escape from liability to a rebirth in bell, and among beings of a lower order than the five-sensed. The escape from rebirth in hell, and among beings of a lower order than the five-sensed is the effect of the acquisition of Right Faith which prevents the soul from sinking'so low. This stage is called mitlyatva (falsehood) because it is characterised by false beliefs. This stage is characteristic of a soul that is falling down from the fourth stage into the first. The explapation of the fact that four energies are shown in column 4 although it marks a retrograde step lies in the fact that the TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Sa sadana 27 [Anger', pride deceit and greed of the most malignant type.)

Page #944
Misra 23 [Samyagri mithyatra] The destruction of mixed i beliefs (false. hood and truth) purifies the faith, 4 22 Avirata samyagadristi. The house[Anger, pride, holder's vows dece it and can be obserygreed of the ed by the third type] destruction of the highly malignant type of kashayas. soul in passing into the fourth from the first stage destroys the bandha of 6 karma prakritis, four of which cannot be engendered even in the state of falling back. This stage is called misra ! (literally mixed) because ; the samyaga mithyatva pra kriti of Darsana Mohaniya Karma kecomes active in it. The destruction of samyaga mithyatva causes the samyaktva prakriti to become active. The name of this stage indicates the progress of the soul, since avirata means non-observance of vows, and a samyaga dristi is he whose faith is of the right sort. The gain shown i as accruing in the previous stages really results in the first instance in this stage, because the soul always : passes from the first into the fourth stage when it acquires right faith for the i first time. Desa is partial, and virata ineans vows. Hence this stage is characterised by IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GOLS. 5 Desariratu ... [Anger, pride, deceit and The destruction of obstacles to the 923

Page #945
5 924 Serial number. Serial number. - Name of the stage, Number of ghatiya kurmas of class (a). Number of those out of column 3 which are destroyed in passing to the next stage. Resulting gain. (a) Ghatiya karmas class still left to be destroyed. of Remarks. greed of the observance of malignant the vows of a type]. saint. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGL. 6 14 14 Parmattavis rata. the observance of the qualified vows of a house. holder. The ka shayas of the malignant type being destroyed, the aspirant steps into asceticism in the next stage. The liability to be re-born among animals is counter-indicated at this point. The name of this stage indicates "vows tinged with carelessness." This is the condition of munis whose souls have reached this stage. The energies of class (6) of ghatiya karmas destroyed here are only minor forces of the darsanavarniya group, namely, heavy slumber, somonambulism and a kind of intense drowsiness. Three of the energies of the ghatiya karmas of class (b) are destroyed here, in consequence of the life of purity led by the saint.

Page #946
7 8 9 10 Apramatta Apurvakarana. Anivrittikarana. Suksmasamparaya. 11 Upasantamo ha. 14 13 7 1 24 [28-4] 1 [Samyaktva prakriti.] [1 Joking, 2 attachment, 3 aversion, 4 grief, 5 fear, and 6 disgust.] 6 [Anger, pride and deceit of the mild type, and the three kinds of sexual passion.] 1 [Greed of the mild type.] Purity of Right Faith results from the elimination of samyaktva prakriti. The destruction of the energies mentioned in column 4 enables the conduct to become almost perfect. Total destruction of the ghatiya karmas of class (a) results in the condition of absolute desirelessness. 13 7 1 Nil The word apramatta means devoid of laziness. Hence, the conduct of the saint on this stage is not characterised by carelessness or laziness. The name of this stage indicates strange, i.e., new thought-activity, resulting from the absolute purity of faith. The words anivritti karana indicate advanced thoughtactivity, showing that the mind of the saint in this stage is full of very holy thoughts. The name of this stage is suggestive of its chief characteristic, i.e., the slightest tinge of greed with all other passions eradicated. The upasantamoha is a station which does not lie on what may be termed the main line. As its name indicates, it is the stage of IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 925

Page #947
926 Serial number. Name of the stage. Number of those out of Number of column 3 which ghatiya karmas I are destroyed of class (a). in passing to the next stage. Resulting gain. Ghatiya karmas of class (a) still left to be destroyed. Remarks. quiescence, as distinguished from destruction, of karmas, and is the highest stage attainable by the saint whose mohaniya karmas are only rendered quiescent, notwithstanding that he has succeeded in destroying the most malignant type of his kashayas. Being a distinct psychical state, it cannot be left out of account from any systematic chart or scheme of progress to be made, but otherwise it has no concern with the main route on which the soul passes directly to the kshinamoha (the twelfth) stage from i suksma saimpariya, the TOE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

Page #948
12 K shinamola Nil tenth. The most virulent form of the four principal kashayas are destroyed in the seventh stage on this route, the further details of which are omitted here for want of space. Kshinamona (all infatuations destroyed) is characterised by absolute desirelessness, in consequence of which the remaining forces of class (b) of gratiya karmas are destroyed in less than 48 minutes. All the energies Omniscience of the giana- from the des. varnnya, all truction of the remaining the jnanavar kinds of dar- niya, infinite sanavarniya, perception and and all kinds infinite power of antarayas from the eliin class (b) of mination of the the ghati ya darsanavarnikaimas. ya and the antaraya karnas respectively, accrue to the soul, Vil IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 13 Sayoga kevali Nil Nil Sayoga kevali is the condition of liberation while still embodied in flesh. This is called jiwan-mukti, and signifies freedom in all essential respects though still in association with the physical body, Full unobstructed omnis. cience, freedom from sleep 927

Page #949
7 - 928 Serial number, Name of the stage. Number of ghatiya karmas of class (a). Number of those out of column 3 which are destroyed in passing to 1 the next stage. Resulting gain. Ghatiyu karmas of class (a) still left to be destroyed. Remarks. and many other divine attributes are the reward of the ascetic who reaches this stage. Sense-perception vanishes here completely, along with the entire equipment of the objective mind. Most of the aghatiya karmas, which have not been shown here for the sake of brevity, are also destroyed earlier in the course of the journey, and the remaining ones fall off the soul in this stage. Ayoga kevali (from a, not yoga, channels of astana, kevali, omniscient) signifies complete liberation. On the termination of the ayult kurma, which deter THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. 14 Ayopet kevali Vil Nirvana

Page #950
18 mines the association of the soul with its body, the spirit is freed from all kinds of fetters of matter, and immediately ascends to the Holy Abode of Gods in the full glory of a Deified Soul, to reside there in the everlasting enjoyment of omniscience and bliss and all other divine attributes. IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 666

Page #951
930 . THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. It is now necessary to work out the idea of meditation with reference to the different stages of the path of progress as described above. Meditation (dhyana) is of four kinds, namely: 1. arta dhyana which arises from the loss of an object of desire, the association with an undesirable person or thing, bodily suffering and envy; 2. raudra dhyana which implies the absorption of mind in himsa and other forms of sin, and delights in acts of cruelty, falsehood, theft and hoarding wealth ; 3. dharma dhyana which means meditation on such subjects as have a bearing on the attainment of liberation from the bondage of samsara ; and 4. sukla dhyana which signifies pure self-contemplation in the highest sense. Of these, the first two types are characteristic of all deluded jivas, and the last two of those who have acquired the Right Faith. The fourth form of meditation is, however, beyond the house-holder, who cannot, as such, aspire higher than devoting himself to dharma dhyana, that is meditation on the nature of tattvas, the means of the destruction of karmas, the consequences and effects of different kinds of actions and on the nature of conditions of existence prevailing in different parts of the universe - heavens, hells and the like-in which souls wander about in transmigration. Dharma dhyana leads to vairagya, and enables the house-holder to renounce the world. But it is the sukla dhyana which is the direct cause of moksha. Sukla dhyana is practised by holy saints well

Page #952
IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 931 advanced in asceticism and self-control. It consists of four parts, limbs or steps as follows: 1. that which is characterised by the changes of yogas*, that is of the instruments or vehicles of meditation; 2. that in which there is no changing of yogas, but which is steadily maintained with the aid of only one yoga ; 3. that in which the bodily activity is the slightest; and 4. that in which there is no bodily action whatsoever. Of these, the first part is practised by excellent saints in the eighth, ninth, tenth and eleventh stages on the path, and is the cause of the destruction of mohaniya karmas. The causes of distraction being destroyed, steadiness in meditation is attained in the twelfth stage, and there is no changing of yogas any more, that is to say, that the mind can be now fixed exclusively on one out of the three channels of self-contemplation. This speedily leads to the destruction of other kinds of ghatiya karmas, and to the acquisition of omniscience and other divine attributes which were held in check by those karmas. The saint now becomes a deified Soul in consequence of the acquisition of the divine attributes, and lingers in the world of men only so long as His dyuh-karma is not exhausted to set Him * Self-contemplation is only possible in three ways, viz. (1) with the aid of mind, i.e., thought, (2) by means of words, and (3) with the help of the body, e.g., the fixing of the mind on the nervous centre in the forehead. Being instrumental in self-contemplation, the mind, speech and body are technically called yogas.

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932 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. free from all kinds of fetters of matter. With respect. to the path of progress, He is on the thirteenth stage, which is characterised by Jivana-mukti. He is now qualified for the third kind of sukla dhyana which would be pure self-contemplation but for the fact that it is accompanied by a slight tinge of bodily activity that is itself due to the association with the physical body. As the ayuh karma which keeps the body and the soul together is exhausted, the aghatiya karmas which may still be existing are destroyed, the yogas come to an end, and the last form of sukla dhyana, implying pure self-contemplation, undisturbed by any kind of bodily activity, is enjoyed. The soul is now on the fourteenth stage, and immediately rises up to the Siddha Sila as a body of radiant effulgence, to reside there for ever in blissful contemplation of the unsurpassed glory of His own divine Self. The forms of meditation recommended for the destruction of karmas may also be noted in this connection. There are four such forms, namely, (1) Pindastha, (2) Padastha, (3) Rupastha and (4) Rupatita. (1) Pindastha dhyana is the contemplation of oneself, and comprises five special modes or forms, technically known as dharnas, which may be described as follows: (a) Prithvi dharna. The yogi should imagine a vast, boundless ocean of milk, motionless and noiseless, with a huge resplendent lotus of a thousand petals, having a bright yellow pericarp like a mountain of gold in its centre. On the top of this pericarp he should imagine a throne resembling the autumnal moon, and on this throne he should further imagine himself as seated,

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933 IN THE FOOTSTEPS Of Gods. calm and tranquil and engaged in the destruction of his karmas. (b) Agreyi dharna. The yogi should now imagine himself seated as in the first dharna, and should further imagine his whole body being burnt up by fire and reduced to ashes. (c) Asvasani dharna. He should now imagine powerful winds blowing away the ashes of the body from his soul, and scattering them about in all directions. (d) Varuni dharna. The yogi should now imagine a great downpour of rain washing away the ashes of the body that might be still sticking to the soul, leaving it in the condition of its natural purity as a pure effulgent spirit. (e) Tattva-rupavati dharna. The yogi now contemplates on his soul as possessed of all divine attributes, all-knowing, free from all kinds of bonds, the conqueror of samsara and the object of worship and adoration on the part of devas and men. (2) Padastha dhyana consists in contemplation with the aid of holy mantras (sacred formulas), such as namo arhantanam. (3) Rupastha dhyana is contemplation on form of the Tirthamkara, sitting in a celestial pavilion, attended by Indras (rulers of devas), of radiant effulgent glory, and expounding dharma. (4) Rupatita dhyana consists in contemplation on the pure qualities of Perfect Souls in nirvana, accompanied by the belief that the contemplating soul is also like Them in all essential respects. As to the why and the wherefore of the process of

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934 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. dhyana, it is evident that self-contemplation possible only in three ways, viz,: (1) with the aid of thought forms, (2) by means of words and (3) by feeling the pulsation of Life in certain nervous centres in the body. These are the three yogas which have been already referred to; and their changing is due to their instability in all stages prior to the thirteenth where only one of them is operative. Even this remaining yoga is destroyed in the fourteenth stage when there is complete separation between spirit and matter, so that the final form of pure self-contemplation (sukla dhyana) is only the functioning of pure spirit, devoid of yogas-mind, speech and the body of matter. The necessity for practising sukla dhyana arises because the contemplation of the soul as separate and distinct from matter and endowed with all the divine qualities and attributes is the only direct means of selfrealisation. In other words, sukla dhyana occupies an intermediate position between dharma dhyana and actual self-realisation, so that while dharma dhyana is the instrument of developing the knowledge of the self and of engendering the spirit of vairagya in the soul, sukla dhyana is necessary to raise that knowledge to the degree of an actual affection, or feeling, before divinity in embryo may be expected to be transformed into a fully evolved God. The old law--as you believe, so you become--is also in operation here, since belief reaches its culminating point only when characteristic feelings are evoked. The forms of the different dharnas and dhyanas are also most helpful in this respect. They not only furnish material for self-contemplation with the aid of the two principal

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 935 yogas, that is mind and speech, but, being in full agreement with nature and in no way subversive of the natural functioning of substances, actually tend to expedite the realisation of the wished for end. There is nothing in common between these scientific and natural forms of self-contemplation and the methods of mystics and others who spend their whole lives fruitlessly in a vain endeavour to make their minds blank, by forcing upon them all sorts of fanciful suggestions about sleep, somnolence and the like. The difficulty with the unscientific methods of others lies in the fact that no means or device can ever succeed indefiance of nature. Hence, where a given suggestion is opposed to the real nature of a substance, it will never take effect except in so far as to distort the vision of the individual to make him perceive that which has no foundation in truth. It is, therefore, actually fraught with great harm to put such ideals before one's soul as the Inconceivable, the Absolute and the like, or to lead it to imagine that salvation can be had by such suggestions as tend to produce mental blankness and fog. It only remains to complete our comparative study of the different methods of self-realization before closing this chapter. Most of these methods have already been examined by us in our chapter on Yoga; but two deserve special mention here, on account of their mystic tendency which has a great charm for the untrained imagination. The first of these methods aspires to obtain the highest good by separating the soul from certain specified envelopes or sheaths. The idea underlying the supposition is that the soul is wrapped in five successive koshas (envelopes or sheaths) and therefore unable to

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936 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. attain to emancipation. The first of these sheaths, beginning with the outermost, is conceived to be the envelope of food (the anna-maya kosha), the second of prana or breath (the prana-maya hosha), the third, of desire (the mano-maya kosha), the fourth, of knowledge (the vijnana-maya kosha), and the last of bliss (the ananda-maya kosha). The soul is conceived to be devoid of and distinct from all the attributes named in connection with the sheaths, and to be lying at the back of them all. It is this something lying behind all the sheaths that is to be freed. The means for its freedom consist in all those practices which, falling under the different heads--Hatha Yoga and the like, --have already formed the subject of enquiry in the seventh chapter of this book, and found to be insufficient and vague. Thus, the only question before us now is : how far is the idea of the soul's envelopes or sheaths entertainable by rational thought? The answer to this is really furnished by the nature of the things of which the sheaths are said to be composed. We have seen that knowledge and bliss appertain to the soul, not as a pillow case may be said to appertain to a pillow, but as inalienable properties of pure spirit as a substance. It is, therefore, wrong to say that they form two of the envelopes, or sheaths, which are to be destroyed before the soul can be set free. The case with the other sheaths stands no better, for mind is not an envelope, but only an instrument of discrimination and volition. We cannot even conceive prana as forming a sheath on the soul, though the diaphragmatic and the thoracic cavities might easily be mistaken for one,

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 937 because of their liability to expand with breath. It is not even possible to regard the physical body in the light of an envelope, though with regard to the soul its resemblance to a sheath, or cover, is more striking than that of the diaphragmatic cavity itself. The fact is that the outer body of matter which is nourished and maintained by food is in no sense of the term a sheath or cover like a pillow case ; it is an organism made by the soul itself, by the mechanical operation of the forces residing in its two inner bodies. Hence, the use of such terms and phrases as the physical encasement of matter, this mortal coil and the like, with reference to it is only permissible by way of a metaphor, but not in the literal sense. The idea of the association of the soul with its three bodies may be partially grasped by likening it to oxygen and the matter of the kurmana sluarira to hydrogen which combine together to form water. If we now throw some colouring matter into the liquid formed by the fusion of these two kinds of gases, we shall have an idea of the form of the taijasu suriru. The position occupied by these two inner bodies in relation to that of gross matter is sometbing like that which would come into existence by our holding the coloured fluid in a sponge, so that the liquid would saturate every portion of the sponge without becoming fused or united with it. We should not, however, lose sight of the important distinction between the sponge and the physical body, namely, that while the former is an independent article, the latter is only organised by the soul which is to become ensouled in it. It is thus not possible to lend assent to the theory 82

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938 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. which places the soul in a series of successive koshas one after another on scientific or logical grounds. Nor is a conception of emancipation which leaves the soul devoid of knowledge and bliss both likely to appeal to a mind whose natural vigour has not been vitiated by overdoses of mystery and mystifying thought. The misconception about the sheaths has probably arisen from the fact that the fusion of spirit and matter is not uniform throughout in the constitution of the soul, certain parts, e.g., the seats of the different senses and mind, being more sensitive than the rest. Even among the senses themselves the defilement of matter is not quite uniform, inasmuch as some of them respond to finer vibrations or stimuli than others, as, for instance, is the case with the olfactory nerve which takes cognizance of the presence of particles of matter that are invisible to the eye. If we may employ a metaphor, we may say that the soul is like a luminous substance covered all over with a thick pall which is aitenuated in certain parts or centres in varying degree of tenuity. There are five such centres in all, one being the seat of the dravya mana and the remaining four, of the four senses other than touch, which is diffused' all over, and not confined to any particular locality. These centres, however, do not resemble sheaths and are not sheaths in the sense in which the word is used by the mystics. We have commented upon the insufficiency of the methods suggested by mysticism for the obtainment of freedom from the bondage of samsara, but we may add, while we are still on the subject, that no amount of

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 939 breathing exercises or prandyama and other similar purely physical practices can ever take the place of the systematic scientific path ; for our karmic chains are held together by the force of desire, which breathing and pranayama cannot by any possibility unloosen. The same is the case with such practices as fixing the mind on the top of the nose and the like ; they, too, are valueless except when rightly employed and at the right moment of time. * So much for the method of emancipation through the destruction of sheaths. The other system which we propose to examine here is also advocated by a certain class of mystics, who follow the doctrines laid down in the Yoga Vashishta and other similar works of mystic origin. They believe in hallucination and 'suggestion', and propose to steal a marehon nature by substituting a product of illusion for the genuine 'thing.' The idea underlying their teaching is that suggestion' is the all-important, all-powerful force in nature, and that the products of imagination are as desirable as the genuine things themselves, only we should not believe them to be unreal. Thus, whatever be the nature of the condition to be produced, all one need do is to dream of it, and then to believe the dream to be a reality. In course of time the mind will accept the mental hallucination as a fact, and the belief will be gratifying to the soul. So far as moksha is concerned, it is regarded as a state altogether beyond conception, and as devoid of knowledge and bliss both. Such is the main doctrine of the hallucinationistic mystics as they might be called ; they create . mental

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940 TJE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. illusions and then hypnotise themselves to believe the product of their imaginations to be real. As for scientific or philosophical merit in their teaching, there is little or nothing to be said in its favour ; it is essentially a system* which can appeal only to a particular class of men-those who cannot or will not pursue clear, logical thought. It is true that suggestion is a potent and powerful ally on the spiritual path, but it is also true that it is not every suggestion that will land one in nirvana. As a matter of fact, salvation and hallucination are as widely apart from one another as the poles, the one implying the fullest degree of perfection in omniscience and bliss, and the other only seeking to hide its rotting imperfection under self-deluding falsehood. The suggestion that is likely to encompass the desired good is not the suggestion that the world is an illusion and that the ego is different and distinct from knowledge and happiness which must be scraped off it, but the belief that the soul is fully able to attain to the status of Gods, the living embodiments of all-embracing knowledge and absolute, unqualified bliss. Neither samvara nor nirjara * The cash value of this system of philosoply--if indeed the term he applicable to a collection of mystic and mystifying, though elegant and well chosen words and phrases, interspersed here and there with half-understood plagiarisms of others may be judged from the somewhat lengthy review of one of the most recent publications on the subject, which is given in the appendix at the end of the book. It originally appeared in the Jaina Gazette for 1917 (pp. 295-317), but as it lays bare the whole subject and goes to the very root of mysticism, it is reproduced here to enable the reader to form a correct estimation of the teaching of the system under consideration.

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IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF GODS. 941 is accomplished by the artificial stimulation of hallucination; nor is desire eradicated from the soul by aught but the right kind of meditation and beliefs. It is thus clear that hallucination is utterly incapable of taking the soul to nirvana, though suggestion rightly employed is a valuable ally on the spiritual 'path.' To sum up: hypnotism and hallucination are two of the blind alleys of faith that lead to nought but suffering and pain. They are narcotic in their effect and deaden the finer instincts of life, keeping the soul entangled in the meshes of transmigration, so long as their effects continue. Suggestion, no doubt, is a powerful instrument of self-realisation, but by itself it is by no means powerful enough to remove the karmic filth from the soul; it is also capable of great harm, when employed carelessly and without proper safeguards. Emancipation is also not to be had by the destruction of the so-called sheaths of the soul, for the simple reason that there are no such sheaths on the soul. The path of progress consists in the ratna trai of right faith, right knowledge and right conduct which means the doing of the right thing at the right moment. As Sri Samantabhadra ackarya, the author of the Ratna Karanda Sravakachara, points out, whoever turns himself into a casket, that is an abiding place, of faultless wisdom, faith and conduct, to him comes success in all his undertakings, like a woman eager to join her lord.

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CHAPTER XIV. RECONCILIATION. "Remember that everywhere you will find some sort of faith and righteousness. See that you foster this, and do not destroy." -Asoka. Only a very little study of comparative theology is needed to show that apart from matters of ceremony there are hardly any differences in the cardinal principles of the numerous religions which are flourishing in our midst in the world. Even the differences in ceremonies exist on the surface, and totally disappear when we look into the principles underlying their observance. The ignorant and the foolish alone emphasize the difference between the places and forms of worship of the numerous creeds ; in reality, the object of worship is always the same, whether it be understood by the devotee or not. To the true worshipper in spirit all places are alike, their forms and designations being matters of secondary import. Says Mr. Amir Ali: "As God's mercy and power pervade the universe, and every spot is consecrated to His holy name, the orisons may be offered at any place where the worshipper happens to be at the appointed time." Islam' by Amir Ali, Syed, p. 9, The Sufis maintain : " The true mosque in a pure and holy heart is builded : there let all men worship God; for there He dwells, not in a mosque of stone." The fact is that the earnest seeker after truth has eyes and ears only for the living Divinity enshrined

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RECONCILIATION, 943 within his own heart, and not for the style and structure of the places made by human hand. As regards image-worship, true worship being 'idealatry,' and not idolatry, as repeatedly pointed out before, anything which has the tendency to bring us nearer the ideal in view is a fit object for holy concentration. The images of those Great Ones who have attained to everlasting bliss, and whose lives, therefore, constitute beacons for our guidance in the turbulent sea of samsara, thus, are the fittest objects of worship. Those who regard the Jainas as idolators have no idea of the sense in which they worship their twentyfour Gods, nor of the object of devotion. The images of the Blessed Ones possess three great and priceless virtues which are not to be found in any non-Jaina image of God; and these are : (1) They at once inspire the mind with the fire of self-less vairagya (renunciation), and exclude the idea of begging and bargaining with God; (2) They constitute the true Ideal and point to the certainty of its attainment, thus removing and destroying doubt each time that the worshipper's eye falls on them ; and (3) They teach us the correct posture for meditation and Self-contemplation. As to the first of these advantages, it is sufficient to say that philosophy can never tolerate the hypocritical form of worship which is in vogue amongst the generality of mankind. Ordinary worship is the worship of a God-King whose omnipotence man is led to dread, and whom he wants to propitiate by food, song and praise, so

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944 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that he may not send him to regions of pain and suffering, and may give him choice things here and hereafter. But analysis reveals the elements of fear and begging to lie at the root of this form of devotion. It differs from the ancestor-worship of the savage only in this that the object of worship in its case happens to be an omnipotent power, instead of a dead and powerless ancestor. Hence, when we ridicule the ancestor-worshipper for his low form of faith, we ought, in justice, to find fault with him not for his emotion of devotion, i.e., fear plus begging, since that is also implied in the so-called civilised idea of worship, but for his ignorance in imagining that a dead ancestor can be of any use to him. But what does our so-called civilized worship mean if not devotion to our notion of a primary supreme power, personilied and conceived after the manner of earthly kings ? Far from leading us to understand tbe nature of the great Ideal, which is beyond its reach, farther still from making us whole and holy, which is our real destiny, and farthest froin enabling us to realize our own Godhood, it only tends towards demoralization by exciting unholy dread of a mythological monster* of unreason * Cf. "In my opinion it is not the quantity, but the quality, of persons among whom the attributes of divinity are distributed, which is the serious matter. If the divino might is associatod with no higher ethical attributes than those which obtain among ordinary men; if the divine intelligence is supposed to be so imperfect that it cannot foresee the consequences of its own contrivances; if the supernal powers can become furiously angry with the creatures of their omnipoteuco and, in their senseless wrath, destroy the innocent along with the guilty; or if they can show themselves to be as easily placated by presents and gross flattery as any oriental or occidental despot; if, in short, they are only stronger than mortal

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RECONCILIATION. 945 ableness, fury and power. There is, surely, not much to boast of in this form of worship. As to the second great advantage which the images of the Blessed Ones possess, it suffices to say that they not only represent the great Ideal of wholeness and holiness which we are all anxious to attain, but also teach us that that is the only true and practical Ideal to be entertained. The pratibimbas (images) of the Iloly Bhagwans* teach us the great lesson of Life that it is men and no better, then surely, it is time for us to look somewhat closely into their credentials, and to accept none but conclusive evidence of their existence.". Science and Hebrew Tradition,' by T. Huxley, p. 258. * The following somewhat lengthy article, reproduced here from the "Digambar Jain" (Special number for October-November, 1918), will be found to throw further light on the worship of tho Tirthamkaras : It would undoubtedly be a great surprise to many of our nonJaina friends to be told that Jainism is not an idolatrous creed and is as bitterly opposed to idol-worship as the most iconoclastic religion in the world, yot the fact is as stated. The attitude of Jainism towards idolatry is evident from the following from the Ratna Karanda Sravakachara, a work of paramount authority, composed by Sri Samantabhadracharya, who flourished about the commencement of the second century A.D. :"Bathing in the so-called sacred] rivers and oceans, setting up heaps of sand and stones (as objects of worship), immolating oneself by falling from a precipice or by being burnt up in fire (as in sati] are some of the common murhatas (follies). The worshipping, with desire, to obtain favour of deities whose minds are full of personal likes and dislikes is called the folly of devotion to false divinity. Know that to be guru murhata which consists in the worshipping of false ascetics revolving in the wheel of samsara [births and deaths, i.e., transmigration), who have neither renounced worldly goods, nor occupations nor himsa (causing injury to others.]" This is sufficient authority for the view that Jainism strongly coul83

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946 within our power to rise to the highest heights of power and glory. Their noble Lives 66 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ......remind us we can make our lives sublime; And, departing, leave behind us footprints on the sands of time; Footprints that perhaps another, sailing o'er Life's solemn main, A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, secing, shall take heart again." demns fetish-worship-the cult of rivers, stones and the like-as well as devotion to human or super-human beings who have not eradicated theirlower nature, that is to say who are liable to be swayed by passion and by personal likes and dislikes. What, then, is the significance of the image-worship which takes place daily in our temples and which is undoubtedly the cause of the false impression that has been formed by the non-Jainas concerning our faith? To explain the nature of this worship, it is necessary first of all to summarise the Jaina creed which fully accounts for it. The Jainas believe that every soul is godly by nature and endowed with all those attributes of perfection which are associated with our truest and best conceptions of divinity. These divine attributesomniscience, blissfulness and the like-arc, however, not actually manifest in the case of the soul that is involved in transmigration, but will become so when it attains nirvana. Nirvana implies complete freedom from all those impurities of sin which limit and curtail the natural attributes and properties of the soul. Accordingly, the Jainas aspire to become Gods by crossing the sea of samsara (births and deaths), and the creed they follow to obtain that devoutly-wished-for consummation is the method which was followed by those who have already reached the goal in view-nirvana. It is this method which is known as Jainism, and the images that are installed in our temples are the statues or photos of the greatest among those who have already reached nirvana and taught others the way to get there. They are called Tirthamkarus, literally the makers or founders of a tirtha, a fordable channel or passage (across the ocean of births and deaths). How did They cross the sea of samsara themselves? By curbing their fleshly lusts and by purifying and perfecting their souls. We,

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947 In respect of the third advantage, also, it is obvious that material aid can be had in fixing the true attitude of RECONCILIATION. too, have got to tread the path They trod, if we would attain to the heights They have attained. In a word, the Tirthamkaras are models of perfection for our souls to copy and to walk in the foot-steps of. Their images are kept in the temples to constantly remind us of our high ideal and to inspire us with faith and confidence in our own souls. As for their woship, They have no desire to be worshipped by us; their perfection is immeasurably greater than we can praise; They are full and perfect in their wholeness. We offer Them the devotion of our hearts because in the initial stages of the 'journey it is the most potent, if not the only, means of making steady progress, It is not mere hero-worship, though worship of a hero is transcendent admiration. As Carlyle puts it, it is something more; we admire what we ourselves aspire to attain to. The great English thinker, Thomas Carlyle, tells us :-- "I say great men are still admirable; I say there is at bottom, nothing else admirable! No nobler feeling than this of admiration for one higher than himself dwells in the breast of man, It is to this hour, and at all hours, the vivifying influence in man's life. Hero-worship endures for ever while man endures Boswell venerates his Johnson, right truly even in the Eighteenth century. The unbelieving French believe in their Voltaire; and burst out round him into very curious Hero-worship, in that last act of his life when they stifle him under roses,' At Paris his carriage is the 'nucleus of a comet, whose train fills whole streets.' The ladies pluck a hair or two from his fur to keep it as a sacred relic. There was nothing highest, beautifullest, noblest in all France, that did not feel this man to be higher, beautifuller, nobler....... It will ever be so. We all love great men; love, venerate and bow down submissive before great men nay can we honestly bow down to anything else? Ah, does not overy true man feel that he is himself made higher by doing reverence to what is really aboze him? No noble or more blessed feeling dwells in man's heart. And to me it is very cheering to consider that no sceptical logic, or general triviality, insincerity and aridity of any time and its influences can destroy this noble inborn loyalty and worship that is in man. It is an eternal corner

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948 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. self-contemplation by the same being illustrated in the pratibimbas of the Jinas. The weakness-conquering stone, from which they can begin to build themselves up....... That man in some sense or other, worships heroes; that we all of us reverence and must ever reverence Great Men: this is, to me, the living rock amid all rushings-down whatsoever." The italics are ours, and they speak for themselves. Even to-day men and women assemble in thousands in Trafalgar Square in London to do honour to a statue of stone that stands there! They illuminate the whole neighbourhood; they place garlands of flower on the object of their adoration! Is it idolatry they practise? Are they idolators? No, no, such a thing is simply impossible; no one can accuse the English of idolatry! It is not worshipping the block of stone; they ask nothing from it; they offer it no food, nor do they pray to it. If you look more closely into their "Statue-worship," you will find it to be the adoration of a something of which the figure in stone is a symbol. It is not the statue of Nelson they assemble to worship, but the spirit of the brave man, the fearless sailor who made England what she is to-day, -the acknowledged Queen of the Seas. The English are a nation of sailors: take away their sea-power, and they are gone. But for the glorious achievements of the British navy, England would have been overrun by Germany to-day. The English know it, and pour forth, spontaneously, almost unconsciously, the warmest devotion of their free hearts on the one being who saved them from utter ruin in the past, But if Nelson himself was able to save England from destruction only once, his inspiration has been her salvation not once, nor twice, but repeatedly. The great sailor is now dead; he may no longer command the fleet of England in the hour of danger; he may win no more laurels for himself or victories for his country; but his spirit and influence survive. For there is not a sailor lad in the whole of the United Kingdom who does not brighten up at the mention of Nelson's name, who does not reverently recognize him as a model of greatness for himself, who does not draw powerful inspiration from his life. The nation that placed the statue of this great man in a conspicuous part of the capital of their country knew that they were not merely erecting a statue to the memory of a dead man, but laying the foundation-stone of their own greatness for generations to come.

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RECONCILIATION. 949 posture of Yoga is well described in the Bhagavad-Gita, VI. 13 and 14, which makes Krishna say : " Holding the body, head and neck erect, immovably steady, looking fixedly at the point of the nose, with unseeing gaze, the self serene, fearless, firm in the vow of the Brahmachari, the mind controlled, thinking on Me, harmonised, let him sit aspiring after Me." Such is the posture for devotion, and material assistance in making it firm can be obtained by a contemplation of the serene, dispassionate images of the Jaina Tirtbamkaras. Thus, the three advantages enumerated above which spring from the worship of the Jinas cannot be gainsaid. It is well to remember that the realization of the Ideal of Perfection and Bliss is possible only when the soul is impressed with its own divine nature, not when its Such is the true significance of "Nelson-worship" which takes place on the Trafalgar Day annually. It is not idolatry that we can charge against the English, but idealatry, which, if a fault, is one that has been the source of unparalleled greatness to the culprit'! The Jaina form of worship is, similarly, an instance of idealatry, for devotion to God in Jainism only means devotion to the attributes of Divinity which the devotee wishes to develop in his own soul, and consists in the blending of the fullest measure of love and respect for those Great Ones who have evolved out those very attributes to perfection in their own case. The Jainas ask for nothing from their Tirthamkaras; no prayers are ever offered to them, nor are They supposed to be granting boons to their devotees. They are not worshipped because worship is pleasing to Them, but because it is the source of the greatest good--the attainment of Godly perfection-to our own souls....... The causal connection between the ideal of the soul and the worshipping of those who have already realised it, is to be found in the fact that the realisation of an ideal demands one's whole-hearted attention, and is only possible by following in the foot-steps of those who have actually reached the goal.

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950 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, supposed inferiority and servitude are constantly dinned into its ears.* The place which does not lead to the elevation of the individual will, but falsely impresses on it the necessity of assuming an attitude of a captive and beggar, can, therefore, in no sense of the term, be described as the House of God. * The recitation of holy mantras and texts at death-bed is also calculated to remind the soul of its true nature, so that it might be filled with thoughts of its own divinity, and thereby escape the torments of hell and the lower forms of life. For if the soul is filled with the ideas of goodness and power even at the last moment of its earthly career, it cannot then descend into the regions of pain and suffering or be reborn in unhappy circumstances any more. Accordingly, all religions enjoin the reading of holy texts, in some form or other, in the hearing of the departing soul. The recitation of scriptural text is at once calculated to divert the attention of the soul from bodily suffering and grief at the idea of being torn away from all it held dear and near in the physical world, in addition to imparting to it the consciousness of its own true and glorious Self, the one and the only Bestower of Moksha, so far as that particular soul is concerned. It must, however, be always kept in mind that merit is not in empty words, or in the recitation thereof, but solely and simply in their purport or import; and it must be evident now that weeping and crying in the presence of the departing soul can not only do no good to those whom it is leaving behind, in this Vale of Tears, but also actually go to deprive it of the last, and therefore, the most momentous and valuable, opportunity for Self-realization in the closing hours of its life on earth. The recitation of the Sura Y, S. enjoined on the followers of the creed of the Crescent also seems to have been intended to assist the departing soul on the spiritual path. The very letters Y and S are suggestive of this purport; for the numerical value of 's is ten which, as, a perfect or whole number, is the symbol of Perfection, and we is an abridgment of esse or Life whose divinity is the oneand the only theme to be dwelt upon in the hearing of a departing soul,

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RECONCILIATION. 951 Of the devotion to an unmanifest God it is sufficient to say that it is time wasted almost wholly, since the Unmanifest is only an abstraction, and as such devoid of existence, except in pure metaphysical thought. Hence, the worshippers of the Unmanifest are little better than those who personify thunder and lightning and other forces of nature as gods and goddesses, and then fall down at their feet in adoration. The idea of an image as an aid to meditation stands on the same ground as the photograph of one's intended. Both are a means to put the soul en rapport with the object of Love, the ideal of spiritual or domestic felicity and joy. And just as it cannot be said that the lover intends to marry the photograph of his intended, though he kisses and places it next to his heart, so can it not be said that the true worshipper takes the piece of stone to be his God. So far as the images of the non-Jaina gods and goddesses are concerned; obviously they do not possess sufficient merit to lead to the salvation of the soul, since they are mere symbols of the various aspects of Life. It is, however, true that the contemplation of the different aspects of Life is not without its usefulness, since meditation is the only means of jnana, which arising in the soul, enables it to turn to the true Godhead. But while it is true that the worship of symbolical gods and goddesses would ultimately lead to the true form of worship, it is not possible to minimise the value of time lost, in a fruitless pursuit, which has ultimately to be given up. As a matter of fact, mythology is only calculated to lead into error more often than

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952 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. otherwise ; and no soul eager to attain emancipation can afford to enter its labyrinthian domain. Besides, superstition seldom fails to implant itself on the worship of mythological gods, and misunderstood devotion usually degrades itself into a begging of favours--Lord do this, and Lord do that'---which is as far away from the spirit of renunciation as ignorance from Truth. As for the element of discord with respect to ritual, what has been said about the differences in the form of devotional worship, applies with full force to the differences in all other ceremonies, since the true aim of all forms of ceremonial worship is to raise the power of the soul. All rational religions, it may be seen at a glance, have the two following points in view, namely, (1) the ideal of happiness to be attained, and (2) the means to attain it with. Now, it is obvious that so far as the attainment of happiness is concerned, there are no material differences in the principal religions of the world. They all prescribe (i) discrimination between the Self and the not-self, (ii) renunciation, (iii) concentration, and (iv) devotion for the attainment of the great ideal of happiness. The Hindus classify these means as the different kinds of Yoga, Karma Yoga, Jnana Yoga, Raja Yoga, Bhaisti Yoga, and the like ; the Muhammedans describe them as belief, purification, resignation to the will of God, and devotion ; in other systems they are known by other names. We have already discussed them all in the

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RECONCILIATION. 953 different chapters of this book, from different points of view; and the subject of devotion has also been dealt with in this chapter. The facts established and the inferences drawn only point to one conclusion, namely, that there are no great differences in respect of the means prescribed by the different teachers of humanity from time to time, though, owing to misunderstanding and ignorance of the real truth, and not a little to our personal and racial prejudices also, the gulf has always been widening between the followers of the numerous faiths prevailing in the world. As regards the first point, namely, the ideal of happiness to be attained, it will be seen that most of the religions of the world fall under one or the other of the two classes, the philosophical and the devotional; and the difference between them lies in the fact that while the former insist on the true understanding of the nature of things, in the first instance, tlie latter lay all the stress they can on the element of devotion, leaving knowledge to arise from the depth, of the soul in the course of concentration. The disadvantage of this latter course is, however, too great to be minimised, since, devotion being a kind of emotion, no genuine feeling of devotion can arise in the soul so long as it is not clearly convinced of its special relationship as a devotee with the prescribed object of adoration and worship. Besides, the ultimate object of devotion being one's own Self, its being directed towards another, especially towards a mythological deity, in the first instance, is only waste of time. Our analysis of the nature of devotion and of how it leads to the acquisition of knowledge has 84

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954 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. enabled us to observe that short of perfect concentration it cannot even lead to knowledge. And, since perfect concentration is not possible on a subject which is involved in obscurity of thought, it follows that devotion is not the path to salvation. It must not, however, be forgotten that devotion is not to be altogether rejected as a useless pursuit, since it inculcates the principle of humility in the soul, at least for the time being, and also because it tends to keep it in the path of rectitude which leads to a re-birth in heaven. The difference between the schools of philosophy and devotion may, therefore, be said to lie in the fact that while the former enables the soul to attain Nirvana, the latter cannot aspire higher than to secure for it a residence in one of the heavens after death, when it is not a begging of favours, but the love of a bhakta. Christianity, Islam and certain sects of the Hindus are all mostly devotional in their nature, while Jainism, Vedanta, Buddhisin and the remaining five schools of Hindu philosophy are or aim at being philosophical. We have already dealt with most of these religions, and propose to deal with Islam before closing this chapter. The ideal of happiness each lays down for its follower has also been subjected to investigation, and has been seen to be nothing short of becoming God, which every soul already is in essence. There is no creed which does not teach it directly or indirectly, though in the devotional schools of religion the teaching is to be found with difficulty, and lies buried beneath myth and allegory. Even the religions of the philosophical type, with the

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RECONCILIATION. 955 exception of Jainism, are all more or less obscure on the point, as has already been seen. Thus, when purged of the elements of vagueness and error which have gathered round the nature of the Ideal, the Nirvana of Buddha, the 'aham Brahman asmi' of Vedanta, and the Father-li ke Perfection, or the Kingdom of Heaven, of Jesus, convey identically the same idea as that set by Jainism before mankind. Even amongst Mahomedans, the Sufis and some others believe in becoming one with God. Mr. Amir Ali points out ('Islam,' p. 15): " A large section of Muslims, especially those inclined to Sufi-ism, believe, however, that as the human soul is an emanation from God, the highest joy would consist in its fusion with the Universal Soul, whilst the greatest pain would be in a state of separation from the Divine Essence," That the same idea underlies the true teaching of the Qur'an will be demonstrated presently. There remains the question, whether it is possible to attain to the highest ideal of happiness ? On this point, it is refreshing to note that there is no difference of opinion among the founders of the different religions who all declare, with one voice, that one has only to try for it to realize it. But while this is so, so far as the main conclusion is concerned, there is, nevertheless, a slight misunderstanding as regards the various arguments which philosophers have advanced, from time to time, to support it with. The subject is divisible into three heads, namely, (1) God, (2) Nature, and (3) souls; and covers the whole field of philosophy. In the West

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956 TILE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. the object of philosophy has not been fully understood, for which reason people indulge in it as a mere scholarly pastime. Shakespeare makes one of his characters say to the physician :-- "If thy physics canst not cure me of such erils as the mind is heir to, Then throw thy physic to the dogs, I'll have none of it." This applies with full force to the philosopher as well in the West. But in the East the sole purpose of philosophy has been to relieve the suffering of humanity who are victims to those very evils alluded to by Shakespeare. Even in the West certain philosophers, especially the Greeks, imitated their brethren of the East, and tried to unravel the mystery of being. Some of them visited India and other countries and benefited by their learning and wisdom,--a fact which explains the remarkable similarity of thought between the Indian and the Greek systems, and also accounts for the minor differences existing between them. There are always more sides than one of looking at a thing; and when two persons look at the same thing from different points of view, their observations must differ, until one of them is able to make direct observations from both sides. Besides, the medium we possess for expressing our ideas is so defective that it is impossible to avoid all chances of error. One man may use a word to express a certain idea, another may express the same sense by a different word, meaning not to differ from the first, and yet a casual reader may be puzzled by the variation, and may even find it difficult to reconcile the two

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RECONCILIATION. 957 versions. The confusion becomes most aggravating when words having a special significance in one language are translated into another having no word to represent them with. If we would avoid the confusion of thought which has been a prolific source of trouble and has frequently led to bloodshed in the past, we must make up our minds to reject all but the most scientific method of study and metaphysical inquiry. We must avoid the pernicious habit of hasty generalization and reject the deduction which seeks to triumph over opposition by the broadest of assumptions and the cheapest presumption. True metaphysics, it will be observed, is wedded to science; it takes its facts directly from nature, and does not allow an inference to be drawn till all the arguments for and against a given proposition are sought out, investigated and duly weighed. It would not jump to a conclusion like the one we had had occasion to consider in connection with the permanency of the state of moksha--all things involved in Time and Space are evanescent, therefore moksha, too, must be a passing state of existence! As an argument it betrays advocacy of an indefensible cause; as a declaration of opinion, lack of sober judgment. If the propounders of the argument had taken the trouble to study the problem from the standpoint of physics, they would have observed that all things involved in Time and Space are not necessarily ephemeral; for all simple substances, e.g., atoms of matter, are eternal, although they exist in Space and continue in Time.

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958 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Jainism takes its facts direct from nature, and employs the further safeguard of nayavada (the 'logic' of standpoints) to ensure the accuracy of its deductions. The result is a Science of Thought of unrivalled perfection," the like of which has never yet been produced The charge of indefiniteness brought by the opponents of Jainism against the many-sidedness of the Jaina siddhanta rests on hasty judgment, and is easily refuted; for if they had taken the trouble to study the subject before criticising the Jaina view, they would have perceived that though vagueness is hostile to precision and certainty of thought it is not the same thing as manysidedness of aspects.' There can be no indefiniteness in a synthesis or summing up of conclusions obtained from different stand-points where the conclusions are definite and clear in themselves; nor is there room for the element of error in a system in which its very root-one-sidedness of outlook-is destroyed at the very outset. To illustrate the point, a man, e. g., a governor, may be a master with reference to certain individuals, and a servant with reference to his king; hence, there is neither error nor indefiniteness in describing him as a master from a particular point of view and a servant from another, but it will be a falsehood to regard him absolutely either as a master or as a servant. The man who says that the governor is a master in relation to certain individuals and a servant with reference to his king certainly knows more and is in no way less definite than he who knows him only as a master or he who is but aware of him as a servant. It is quite an error to read in the many-sidedness of the Jaina siddhanta, a device to entangle the unwary opponent into an ingeniously elaborated out system of 'either -or's; on the contrary, this very many-sidedness of its naya-vada is the true secret of its unrivalled perfection. This also disposes of the view that naya-vada implies the attribution of mutually contradictory attributes to objects and things; for just as a governor is both a master and a servant at one and the same time, so are all things the abode of seemingly hostile qualities, which are irreconcilable only when thought of with reference to the same group of facts, that is to say from the same point of view. Thus the true hall-mark of perfection of thought is the many-sided naya-vada,

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RECONCILIATION. 959 by any other system, whether oriental or occidental. It is a matter of daily experience that a set of rules applicable to a bundle of facts established with reference to a certain point of view do not hold good indiscriminately, that is, with reference to every other standpoint; yet there is not one non-Jaipa philosopher who has not fallen into a logical trap by mixing up his standpoints. Suppose we say, here is a jar of iron : if we remove its ironness, it will cease to exist. The statement is a metaphysical truth, for if the very substance of which a thing is made be conceived to be non-existent, it is evident that the thing itself can then have no manner of claim to an existence by itself. But now suppose further that we generalise upon this one instance and apply it to the case of a jar of x. It is conceivable that in certain cases the result may be true, but obvious that in certain others it must be simply disastrous; for x might not only stand for iron, copper, glass and other substances of which a jar may be made, but also for such things as water or butter which it might contain, as well as for the which, in the words of a great American thinker (see the Nayakarnika, pp. 24-25) is "competent to descend into the utmost minutiae of metaphysics and to settle all the vexed questions of abstruse speculation by a positive method......to settle at any rate the limits of what it is possible to determine by any method which the human mind may be rationally supposed to possess. It promises to reconcile all the conflicting schools, not by inducing any of them nec sarily to abandon their favourite 'standpoints, but by proving to them that the standpoints of all others are alike tenable, or at least, that they are representative of some aspect of truth which under some modification needs to be represented, and that the integrity of Truth consists in this very variety of its aspects, within the rational unity of an all-comprehensive and ramifying principle."

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960 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. name of a person to whom it might belong. As no jar containing butter would ever cease to exist by the removal of its contents, nor one belonging to a person by changing hands, the result would be a logical calamity resulting from the application of a rule especially suited to a particular set of circumstances to one not falling within its scope. It will be observed that in common parlance it is as permissible to say a jar of iron as it is to say a jar of butter or a bowl of Jolin, though the three statements are made from different points of view. The first holds true from what is known as the dravyarthic naya, the point of view which takes into consideration the nature of the substance of which a thing is made, while the other two are true only from what may be called the vyavahara, that is the practical standpoint. This is sufficient to show that the inability to distinguish between different points of view must eventually lead to confusion. It might be urged that confusion such as this seldom occurs in philosophy, and that we have needlessly magnified the possibility of error. It is true that the instance selected to illustrate our point is an easy one, and one hardly likely to be committed by a rational being; but its type has been repeated by all systems of thought which have not expressly adopted the principle of nayavada or which have deliberately sought to disprove its validity. Such, for instance, is the case with the Advaita Vedanta which deliberately challenges the Jaina method, and which is, consequently, plunged into the quagmire of confusion resulting from the mixing up of what is known as the paryayarthic naya (the standpoint

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RECONCILIATION. 961 of accident,' or form) with the dravyarthic (the point of view of substance). The distinction between these two standpoints may be brought out clearly by the instance of water which is gaseous matter in its essence, that is from the dravyarthic point of view, but a non-gaseous liquid in appearance or form (the paryayarthic side ofthe question). Similarly, the individual soul is a pure divinity in so far as its essential nature is concerned, as has been established in these pages, but from the paryayarthic point of view it is only an impure ego involved in the cycle of transmigration. But this view is not open to Advaitism, which fights shy of nayavada ; and the result is that the Advaitists have had no other alternative but to deny the very existence of the soul, calling all else but one solitary principle, or abstraction, an illusion pure and simple. It is evident what an amount of ridicule would one draw on oneself should one persist in describing water as an illusion ; but the mistake of Advaitism is exactly of the same type and form. Buddhism, too, has fallen a victim to its antagonism to nayavada; for it has only laid hold of the principle of change and shut itself out from all other points of view. Its notion of nirvana, consequently, is a conception of extinction, out and out which is clearly opposed to the nature of the soul from the dravyarthic point of view, that is as a substance. Coming to modern times, the metaphysicians of the materialistic school have also fallen into error like the Buddhists. They draw their inferences about the nature of the soul froin the fact that our consciousness is liable to be affected by musk, coffee and other like material things; 85

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962 but refuse to study its nature any further. Their observation is thus confined to the paryayarthic point of view, and consequently does not prove the existence of the soul as a self-subsisting reality. It is not that their observation is faulty, for the soul is actually affected by matter in the condition of bondage; but it is their metaphysical deduction which is to be rejected as a one-sided, and therefore necessarily inaccurate conclusion. The truth is that from the dravyarthic point of view, that is, considered as a thing in itself, the soul is a substance independent of matter; but from the paryayarthic side of the problem, no unredeemed soul-and it is only an unredeemed soul that is open to be experimented with- -can ever be found to be free from the companionship of matter. Hence the error of the materialist. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Jainism warns us not only against inexhaustive research, but also against being misled by the one-sided observations and statements of others. Itself a perfect master of the Science of Thought, it knows the shortcomings of language-how it is incapable of expressing the results of investigation from different points of view at one and the same time, and how misleading its expression becomes unless attention be constantly directed to the particular standpoint from which a statement proceeds. To guard against this huge possibility of error, Jainism suggests the simple device of mentally placing the word syat (lit., somehow, hence, from a particular point of view or in a certain sense) before every judgment. This would at once enable one to perceive that the statement is made from a particular

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RECONCILIATION. 963 point of view and holds good only thus far. The mind would then be directed on the right lines of enquiry and the ascertainment of truth be speedily attained. There are three kinds of predication, or judgment, which means the statement of conclusion in respect of a subject of enquiry. These are the affirmative, the negative and the one that neither affirms nor denies the existence of a thing, but declares it to be indescribable. The affirmative judgment merely affirms the existence of a thing from a particular point of view---syadasti ghata (somehow the pot exists). The negative predicts its non-existence with reference to some other point of view, e.g., the pot is not black, which means that with reference to the colour known as black the pot is non-existent. We are compelled to say this by force of the logic of words; for the word 'not' in the negative proposition 'the pot is not black,' cannot but qualify the verb 'is,' otherwise it would qualify black and thus affirm the presence of a negative element-not-black'--as an actuality of existence in the pot, which would be absurd. It is true that sometimes when a thing is to be distinguished from other things of the same kind we define it by pointing out what it is not at the same time as we describe it as what it is-a fact which has given rise to the popular fallacy of regarding a thing as the repository of positive as well as negative qualities that are conceived to inhere in it in some way. But the fact is that pure negations are mere words, and cannot abide in things. Hence, rather than suffer our thought to become estranged from the concrete reality, we should place that interpretation on our speech which would keep us in

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964 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. harmony with nature and at the same time permit the fullest degree of freedom of expression to human thought. The absurdity resulting from the positing of negative elements as positive qualities in things may be further emphasized by treating the proposition under consideration as an affirmative judgment. The pot is notblack' should then give us some positive content of knowledge, since it is an affirmative judgment; but it is obvious that absolutely no information is implied in the statement, since not-black is devoid of all positive elements being applicable to a green pot as much as to one that is yellow, or brown or red. It is thus clear that the judgment, the pot is not black, is really a negative predication, meaning simply that with reference to black the pot is not. We might now endeavour to read it as black is not with reference to the pot; but it will be seen that it upsets the construction of the original judgment which we had set out to analyse, but not to recast. Besides this, if 'black' can be the nominative of a negative sentence it is difficult to see why 'pot' should not be. Lastly, the conclusion that the pot is not black is reached by the mind only after it has compared it with the image of a black object furnished by the memory. Now, since the image of a black object is already present in the mind, the negative predication that would arise would naturally be with reference to the pot in which perception seeks but fails to find anything corresponding to the colour in the mind. This suffices to establish the metaphysical validity of the negative judgment. "

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RECONCILIATION, 965 The third kind of predication is concerned with things of which existence and non-existence are predicable at one and the same time. A striking instance of this kind of predication is furnished by certain delicate tints which resemble more than one recognised colour, but which one in particular it is impossible to say. We regard them as indescribable because we are compelled to affirm as well as to deny their existence with reference to particular colours which they seem to be and at the same time not. Thus, whenever existence and non-existence are to be thought of in connection with a thing at one and the same time, that is to say from the same point of view, we have to describe it as indescribable. In addition to these simple forms of judgment, there are four complex predications which arise from the different combinations of the simple ones. Taken together, the three simple and the four complex forms of judgment constitute what is technically known to the Jaina philosophers as the Saptaohangi (sapta=seven, and bhangi= branched), that is the seven-fold method. By affixing the word syat, with suitable grammatical variations, which Jainism insists on placing before every statement of conclusion for exact thinking, the form of the seven kinds of judgment may be easily seen to be: 1. Syadasti (affirmation of existence from some par. ticular point of view; 2. Syannasti (denial of existence from a particular standpoint); 3. Syidasti naisti (affirmation of existence from one point and of non-existence from another);

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966 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. 4. Syadavaktavya (the thing is indescribable in a certain sense); 5. Syadasti avaktavya (somehow the thing is and is indescribable); 6. Syannasti avaktavya (somehow the thing is not and is indescribable); and 7. Syadasti nasti avaktavya, (a thing may be existent from one point of view, non-existent from another, and yet be indescribable froin a third). This exhausts the whole range of predication, and shows the limits within which seeming contradictions not necessarily so. We may now revert from this somewhat lengthy but necessary digression, and take up the three subjects, namely, God, Nature and souls, with reference to which we proposed to study the differences amongst the principal religions of the world. Of these the idea of - God which, as we saw in the third chapter, has been understood in a variety of senses by mankind, is the first to claim our attention. The true idea of God is naturally that of Jainism, which signifies the Supreme Status of the Liberated Soul. The hypothesis of absorption in God as the summum bonum of life cannot itself mean anything short of this that the Emancipated Souls all enter the being of God, not to be destroyed in the process of absorption, but to co-exist with one another, in an interpenetrating manner. Here, also, the idea of God is only that of the Liberated Souls which have a common status and Essence.

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RECONCILIATION. 967 All Liberated Souls, thus, are the true Gods. The insistence on the number twenty-four as that of the most perfect Souls, is due to the fact that these Great Ones became Teachers of humanity before the attainment of Nirvana, while the rest of the Liberated Souls only applied themselves to attain their own salvation, although they also taught a few others to some extent. We have seen that the teaching of Christianity, Buddhism and Zoroastrianism recognises these twenty-four Gods. The Hindu Scriptures also acknowledge save of the Holy Ones, and the first Tirthamkara is even mentioned by name in the Bhagwata Purana and other works. Islam alone of the other more important creeds can be said to be silent about them, but the use of the plural form of the 1st person for Godhead can only indicate one of the two things, either that the word 'we' is employed with reference to a number of Gods, or in the sense in which it is used by earthly Kings, that is, as a mark of personal greatness. But except the word of the ignorant theologian of modern times, there is no authority for the latter interpretation, for the Qur'an is altogether silent on the point; and the former is supported by good reason and philosophy. It follows, therefore, that the former is the true interpretation. We thus find that Al Qur'an also contains the same teaching as to the nature of Godhead as is to be found elsewhere. But for this, Mahomed would never have said, "Man know thyself," nor God," I am nearer to you than your jugular vein." As for the remaining ideas of God, we have had occasion to point out that the notion of the Absolute

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968 TIIE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. is quite untenable philosophically, It has, however, largely entered into modern thought, and some sects lay stress on positing it by itself, describing it as the Unmanifested. The Hindu and the Christian views on this point bave already been discussed in the earlier chapters of this book, but the fact that Muslim theology bas taken the same view, will become clear on a perusal of the following abridged passage from the Philosophy of Islam': "In the beginning was God just as He now is-without any addition or participation * * * * There is no addition to or subtraction from the Divine Essence-It is the same. In the first stage, Unity is real and diversity is relational * * * * It is a stage where imagination cannot be exercised. He is beyond all knowledge. In this stage the essence had overwhelmed the attributes. He was as it were engaged in Himself. Then there is tho awakening of His love for Himself. He wanted to see Himself. 'I was a hidden treasure,' in a Hadis it is said, and loved to be known, and created the world to be known. There is the awakening to His attributes. In the second stage, (Wahdat) four relations are found, Vajud (essenco), llm (knowledge of self), Nur (Light, i.e., dawning of the essence in the knowledge,--the Ego), and Shahud (observation of self). He becomes conscious-I am that I am.'" It is needless to comment upon the impurity of the notion of tlie Unmanifest Absolute, since it is a pure abstraction like fluidity, or republic. In actual experience one never comes across fluidity, but only water, nor encounters a republic, but only men, institutions, and so forth, The conception of God as Ishvara, 'the Word,' and the like, is the next to demand our attention. But we have fully shown in the ninth and the tenth chapters that in actual life there is nothing to correspond to these conception which are pure personifications.

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969 There remains the idea of God as a creator to be dealt with. On this point, also, it has been shown that the creation of the universe, of individual souls and of their bodies cannot be truthfully ascribed to any one. The God who creates all things, including evil, cannot possibly claim our reverence. Jainism, Vaisheshika, Nyaya, Sankhya, Vedanta and the school of thought known as the Purva Mimamsa are at one in refusing to offer homage to any one who creates unhappy beings and then claims devotion from them. The freedom of Jaina thought appears at its best in the following argument (see An Introduction to Jainism,' by N. Rangaji, p. 61): RECONCILIATION. "Why should I call you my God? Is it your entrance into this world accompanied by all the splendour of Indras and more, that entitles you to my homage? Is it your power to work through the sky? Do then the two classes of immunity from physical pain, etc., constitute your claim to our reverence? Are you then our God by being the founder of a religion?" In this way a question is put about each and every attribute, till the list is exhausted, and the philosopher concludes that in a world, which is governed by the law of karma, or cause and effect, a god who declines to violate and is powerless to suspend that law, for the sake of his devotee, cannot be entitled to our reverence on any ground. Jainism also declines to believe that God is the source of all actions, because that leads to an absurdity in relation to the doctrine of punishment. To say that a thief commits theft, because he was so moved by the will of God, and, at the same time, to hold that God will punish him for the theft, cannot be considered just by any means. The 86

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970 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. acharya returns to the charge with the argument that if God is entitled to take credit for sending the rains, for producing milk in the mother's breast, and for tempering the winds to the shorn lamb, he must be censured for creating famines, for bringing on plagues, for causing devastation by earthquake, and the like. That there is considerable force in these 'daring speculations' has always been admitted by all rational theologians. The Sankhyas, the Mimamsakas and the Jainas have not been satisfied with the argument in support of the notion of an anthropomorphic Creator, demanding worship by virtue of his position as such. Why did he create at all? Obviously, a God who is desireless (and the true God must be so, in consequence of His high position) cannot be credited with a desire to create anything. Nor can it be granted that he has some aim of his to be served by his creatures, since he must be self-sufficient. If he is benevolent and has created the world out of his grace, he would not have created misery as well as felicity. If the creation be regarded as a mere play of his will, the supposition renders him childish. If it be said that he creates merely as an agent, according to the karmas of souls, that makes him dependent upon others for his activity. And so far as the teleological argument from variety in the world is concerned, it is obviously caused by the variety of karmas which are the actions of the soul. "The soul is therefore the cause of everything through its own actions. The soul is its own God" ('An Introduction to Jainism,' p. 88). Similarly, the philosopher asks about dissolution: Why should a god destroy that which he had created? If it is

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RECONCILIATION. 971 to stop the evil-doing of the wicked, why did he create the evil-doer at all ? Again, why not destroy the wicked alone? Why destroy the good as well as the wicked both ? It is thus clear that not only is the idea of a beneficent creator a self-contradictory concept, but that in no sense can such a creator be considered entitled to our devotion or respect. The Jainas, therefore, do not offer worship to the Siddhatmans on any other ground than that of Omniscience. As a guru is entitled to reverence from his disciple, so are the Holy Tirthamkaras entitled to worship on account of having shown us the moksha marga (the path of liberation); and as of all kinds of teachers in the world They alone attained to perfection, They alone are entitled to the fullest measure of our reverence. A necessary corollary from this is that when the disciple becomes perfect himself, be ceases to worship the Holy Ones. This is not opposed to but is fully in agreement with the teaching of the great Themselves. Jainism does not recognize the claim of any god or goddess, nor even of the great Tirthamkaras, to be worshipped on the ground of fear, or for obtaining boons from them. The Teacher (guru) alone is entitled to worship, and the true Teacher is he who imparts perfect knowledge in plain language, not he who has not sufficient knowledge himself, nor he who mystifies us with myths and legends. As regards the granting of boons, it is obvious that the soul is itself immortal, and possesses the capacity for perfect knowledge and bliss. Hence, no one can grant anything worth having to it from outside. Neither can any external agency destroy the force of its karmas,

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972 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. called destiny in Islam. It follows that worshipping an outside agency for the things which are already ours and which cannot be had from the outside, is only calculated to lead to greater trouble, inasmuch as all expectations of help from without only go to make the will negative. The true God to worship and praise, therefore, is the individual soul itself, whose omnipotence is kept back only so long as one insists on insulting it by regarding it as helpless and by applying to wrong sources for its help. Besides one's own Self, only those who have set the example of self-evolution and attained perfection and everlasting joy, and whom we must follow if we would free ourselves from the cycle of births and deaths, are alone entitled to respect and reverence from us. Just as he who would become a lawyer cannot derive any benefit from the worship of mythical heroes, so cannot the soul desirous of attaining nirvana be benefited by any but the Soul that has attained to liberation. A lawyer alone can help us in the study of law ; similarly, it is only a liberated Soul that can be of help to us in the attainment of perfection and bliss. We now pass on to a consideration of Nature, that is to say, of the universe, which, as scientists maintain, does not require the interference of an outside agency. Science undoubtedly is right to the extent that there is no creator of the world and that the universe, as a whole, discloses no teleological design in its evolution. But it is unable to explain the nature of the soul which has only baffled it hitherto. Failing to understand the true

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RECONCILIATION 973 sense of the teachings of the real Teachers of our race, it has unhesitatingly declared religion to be irrational and unscientific. And, since metaphysics only endeavours to ascertain the final causes of the word-process, and since its conclusions invariably agree with those of religion, wherever and whenever they are pushed to the final issue, it, too, has been dubbed unscientific indiscriminately. As a matter of fact, consistency of thought without which no department of knowledge can be perfect, however much it might be based on the observation of facts in nature, it is not the facts of observation themselves which constitute science, but their rational classification, and the ascertainment of their causes-is unthinkable without the aid of true metaphysics or philosophy. Hence, philosophy, which totally rejects the element of chance and its companion, arbitrariness, and which recognises only the sequence of Cause and Effect in its all-embracing sphere of activity, is the science of all sciences known to man. The absence of the knowledge of the soul in the West has been the cause of the development and growth of a system of thought which soon managed to shake itself free from religious dominion of every description whatsoever, and which, in consequence of the extraordinary abilities and forcible eloquence of some of the leading scientists, who took up its cause, evolved out, towards the end of the last century, into what has been termed Scientific Agnosticism. Carried away by the brilliancy of their scientific researches in the realm of what has been described as dead matter,and encouraged by the semblance of worldly prosperity which their discoveries and inven

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974 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. tions brought about, these scientific giants pushed on with their enquiries and discovered newer and newer secrets of nature, till emboldened by their successes they invaded the domain of Religion, forgetting that in that territory all those whose equipment for study consisted solely of the spectrum, the microscope, the knife and weights and measures were not, by any means, welcomed as guests by mother Nature, and that the only persons who could successfully hope to explore that region were those who had been initiated into the mysteries of the higher or spiritual science. Enormous is the debt of gratitude the world, and particularly the so-called civilized world, owes these indefatigable workers for their discoveries of electricity and the like, but equally great is the mischief which their opinions on the subjects connected with religion have done. But thanks to the growth of the science of Ner-Psychology, already a great deal of the lost ground has been wrenched back for Religion from the clutches of pyrrhonism ; and men who had come to look upon life as the result of a mere juxtaposition of atoms of dead matter have begun once more to look upon it as a thing which continues to exist after the dissolution of the body in death. In dealing with such subjects as soul, spirit and Time, it is not to be expected that the conclusions of religious philosophy would find any material corroboration from the researches of the modern scientific world. As a matter of fact, science is yet in its infancy, and still thinking of manufacturing life and consciousness from its lifeless matter and unconscious force. Science would take a living animal and say that its

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RECONCILIATION. 975 carcass, when placed at a certain height, is capable of doing so many foot-pounds of work, but would not worry itself about the work it is capable of doing as a living being. It feels baffled in the presence of life, and, therefore, prudently confines its operations to the calculation of foot-pounds of work which it can extract out of carcasses. And, since its system of energetics only professes to deal with the actual and potential motion of lifeless bodies, it is not surprising that its conception of energy should altogether leave out of account the innumerable virtues of the soul. Full of admiration and alarm as religion is for the wonderful vigour and daring of this strange child of its own declining years, it cannot be expected to lend its assent to its surmises about the production of life and consciousness from the motion of dead, unconscious matter, or about the end of existence being nothing more cheerful than the peaceful repose underground. Not a little of the confusion of thought which prevails in our midst to-day, is, however, due to the fact that Theology makes its man-like creator poke his nose everywhere, in and out of season ; and no one can wonder if men are led to prefer a matter-and-force world to its being a product, ex nihilo, at the command of a self.contradictory creator. Jainism shows that nothing alone comes out of nothing, and furnishes a complete explanation of the phenomenal world. The cause of the differences of opinion between the philosophical and the mystical schools of religion, on this point, is to be found in the personification of the different functions of the soul as Ishvara or the Word. When theology lost sight

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976 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of the fact of personification, and accepted the progeny of human imagination as an actual being, a creator was at once ushered into the world to be the harbinger of atheism in his turn. The tendency to a monistic conception of the world reached its culmination in denying existence to everything else, and leaving this man-made creator in the sole possession of the field. Hence, matter had to be created out of nothing to enable this pet of theology to exercise his creative function. The moment theology would come round to acknowledge the nature of the personifications which different orders of mystics have set up for themselves, that very moment would mark the termination of differences among the different creeds, and, in all probability, between science and religion as well. The cause of the theological error in maintaining the world to have been created from nothing might also be found to lie in the nature of matter, which can be studied at its best in the phenomenon of dreaming. Since the material of the dream-world seems to come from nowhere, and since the dreamer's mind is not conscious of its presence in the waking state, an inexact philosophy might come to the conclusion that it is created from nought. Arrived at a conclusion so highly satisfactory to mystical Thought, it is but natural that theology should have jumped to the further conclusion that the world was also formed of a matter which rushed into being from nothing at the creative fiat of its Causa Causans of things in existence. The absurdity of the argument, however, is apparent to any one who knows the nature of the material of which dreams are made. It is the

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977 same of which memory images are composed, and rationalism refuses to believe that it can be produced from nothing. Besides, if that were so, every soul would have the power to create matter from nothing, which, however, is not the position of the theologian. Thus, the statement that the material of the world was created from nothing is not philosophically true in any sense. We may now pass on to a consideration of the nature of differences about the RECONCILIATION. Soul. It is generally accepted by religion that there is an immortal essence behind every form of life which is the centre and source of the activities of living beings. We have fully examined the nature of this immortal essence already in the earlier chapters of this book, and, therefore, need only concern ourselves here with the question, what is meant by it in the different schools of religious philosophy. The reader is already familiar with the Advaitist's view according to which the one Brahman is the only realityand all else an illusion; but Sankhya defines the soul as an 'Absolute, all-pervading, unlimited, immaterial, quality-less intelligence, free by nature, and a spectator.' By the use of the term immaterial Kapila does not mean that the soul is devoid of substantiveness altogether, but only that it is not a product of matter, as materialism takes it to be. Nyaya considers the soul to be the ruler of the senses and body, and an all-pervading, active agent. Other systems of Hindu philosophy give more or less the same definition of the soul, and consider its nature to 87

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978 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. be immaterial,' blissful, eternal, unmanifest, without members, without modifications, and intelligent. In Islam the soul is regarded as an emanation from God, and is said to exist for ever ('Islam' by Amir Ali, p. 12). The Prophet himself was asked to explain the nature of the soul, and he declared : 'Ruh' (spirit or soul) is by the command of God (* The Philosophy of Islam,' by Khaja Khan,.p. 14). So far as Jesus is concerned, he certainly did not define the soul in philosophical terms, but he undoubtedly recognized that there was a certain something in man which could attain the perfection of Gods. Moses taught : "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life ; and man became a living soul." (Genesis II. 7.) In Zoroastrianism the soul is said to be a spiritual entity which passes after death into the place of reward, or punishment, according to the deeds performed in this world. According to certain Muslim philosophers the soul is the reflection of God. As Mr. Khaja Khan points out (The Philosophy of Islam, p. 9) : "The Shahudians consider that the alam (world) is a reflection of God. A man enters a glass-house and sees himself reflected in a hundred directions. These reflections virtually depend on the man and have no existence of their own. The attributes and the ego (Aniyat) of man are thus the reflection of the attributes and essence of God. The alam (the world) is the rupee of the juggler, which in reality is a piece of pottery (a nothing); but by the skill of the incolar shows itself like the silver of the rupee. Thus everything is 'with him," These views have all been subjected to a searching

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RECONCILIATION. 979 criticism already in the earlier pages of this book, and need not be dwelt upon here any further. We shall accordingly pass on to a consideration of whether all living beings be endowed with a soul. In certain systems of theology the soul is regarded as if it were the special property of man alone, whilst in others, sucb as Jainism and Islam, it is not denied to the lower animals and even to plants. Of these, the latter view is decidedly preferable to the former. So far as the higher animals are concerned it is obvious that there is a difference in respect of the degree of intellectualism, but not of any other matter, between them and man. If ary one doubt this, let him call his dog to himself, and find out which part of the animal understood his command, whether the matter of the physical body or the thinking principle within ? That will convince him that the consciousness of the animal is of the same type as his own, although in his case it is manifesting itself through fewer limitations, while in the dog it is very much cramped and restricted in its activity. The experiments made on animals by trainers and others conclusively prove the presence of the Thinker* in their bodies. Surely the doing of simple addition and the expression of such thoughts as 'I am tired*, and the like are sufficient proof of the presence of intelligence + among the * See the article entitled "Edricated Horses at Elberfeld" in "The Field,' dated April 19, 1913, Vol. CXXI., No. 3147. See also in this connection pages 172-174 of E, M. Smith's Investigation of mind in Animals. - + Ancient Scriptures record many instances of animals comprehending human speech, and the Jaina Tirthamkaras are said to have put some of them on the road to redemption. All these accounts

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980 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. animals. Even if these accounts be not true, there are innumerable other indications of inborn sagacity in them. The plants are very little removed from the lowest grades of animals, so that there is hardly any perceptible difference between the highest strata of the vegetable and the lowest ones of the animal kingdom. Even in the mineral kingdom death is not unknown, which means that metals are also endowed with life. This is amply borne out by the scientific experiments conducted by the great Indian Scientist, Prof. Sir J. C. Bose of Bengal. The fact is that there is no life without consciousness, and no consciousness without life. Hence, wherever there is life there is consciousness, whether it be fully manifested or not. Now, because the Thinker or soul is nothing other than consciousness, it further follows that wherever there is life there is soul. We now come to TRANSMIGRATION which, as has been already shown, is a truth of philosophy, So far as its recognition by the generality of mankind is concerned, undoubtedly all the ancient religions of the world were based on it. The conflict of opinion have hitherto been treated by the Orientalists and others as human inventions to claim additional glory for their religion, but truth has now, at last, begun to assert itself and to show that animals can understand and make themselves understood by man, Nicholson points out that some of the Mahomedan saints, also, were wellknown for holding converse with animals ("The Mystics of Islam,' p. 139).

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981 among the followers of the different creeds about its truth has only arisen during the last 1,700 years or so, when the basic truths of religion had become buried under the cobwebs of superstition and the dogmas of a vague and mystic theology. The worship of personified gods has, no doubt, been responsible, in a great measure, for the error of modern theology. The transference of the 'fruit-bearing' properties of karmas to an imaginary godhead could not but end in positing a ruler divine on the one hand, and in robbing the individual deeds of their karmic force, on the other, with the result that transmigration had to give place to this manmade creator of theology, wherever the absence of philosophical illumination gave him a chance of establishing himself. RECONCILIATION. It must, however, be said in defence of the founders of the two non-Indian religions, whose followers now deny the doctrine of transmigration, that they themselves never denied its truth. The doctrine is there, sure enough, in their teachings, only it is not directly preached. Their less enlightened followers have, however, taken that which is not openly preached in their Scriptures as frivolous and false. It is a dangerous and highly mischievous rule of interpretation to read silence into contradiction. Not only have their venerable leaders not denied the truth of the doctrine of re-incarnation, but there is, on the contrary, much in their sayings to show that they were well aware of it, and spoke of it with approval. Why they did not preach it openly, might be due to two causes in the main. In the first place, they probably found their hearers not sufficiently

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982 versed in the higher metaphysics to understand such a subtle doctrine; and, secondly, they never professed to deal with religion exhaustively. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. That Jesus accepted the truth of the doctrine of transmigration, is clear from such passages as the following in the Bible : 1. "And if ye will receive it, this [John, the Baptist,] is Elias which was for to come."-Matt. XI. 14. 2. "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the son of man which is in heaven."--John III. 13. 3. "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit [i.e., shall be born as kings and rulers of men in, their next incarnation on] the earth."-Matt. V. 5. These passages are capable of sound sense only on the hypothesis of transmigration. In John, III. 12 is given the reason why Jesus withheld certain higher teachings of religion from his congregations. He is said to have declared: "If I have told you of earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things". This one quotation suffices to show that the New Testament was never intended to be a complete code of religion by itself, and the present work is a demonstration of the fact that neither the Holy Bible, nor the Qur'an, nor the scriptures of any other religion outside India can, in any sense, be treated as complete and exhaustive in themselves. Even the Vedas are so much involved in mysticism and unintelligibility of devotional poetry that, taken by themselves, they can only mislead one in the first instance. The inference to be drawn

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RECONCILIATION. 983 from this circumstance is that, unless there be something to contradict the teaching of an earlier scientific school, either expressly or by necessary implication, the founder of an incomplete later system of theology cannot be said to have denied the truth of any true and philosophically sound doctrine of religion. Applying this test to the Holy Bible and the Qur'an we find that they do not anywhere contradict the truth of re-incarnation.* The passage from Matthew (XI. 14) leaves no room for doubt about Jesus' acceptance of the doctrine of transmigration of souls ; for it is inconceivable how John the Baptist could be Elias on any other hypothesis This, coupled with those passages, which have already been interpreted by us in the earlier parts of this book, furnishes irrefutable evidence of the fact that re-incarnation was an integral part of the Messianic doctrine. Add to this the statement made in Luke, XX. 36, about the immunity of the Sons of God from death, and the evidence in support of our case is conclusive. The words used by Jesus are : " Neither can they die * The text, "whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him seven-fold" (Genesis IV.15), directly supports the doctrine of transmigration of souls. For it is inconceivable how a person can be killed seven times in revenge for Cain except on the hypothesis of re-incarnation, The precise sense of this passage is not at all difficult to grasp if we recall to mind what was said about Cain in the chapter on the "Fall", 1t simply means that having arrived at the stage when he can form an opinion about the nature of intellect, whosoever is foolish enough to throttle its voice shall have to undergo many re-births before he gets another opportunity of electing for himself whether he will be guided by it or not.

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984 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. any more," which would be meaningless except as implying freedom from a recurrent liability to death. Christianity and Islam would both have to reject a number of passages from their sacred scriptures, if they persist in denying the truth of re-incarnation. So far as Christianity is concerned, we hope we have said enough to convince the most obdurate Christian that his own religion teaches identically, and word for word, the same doctrine as is preached by the most ancient faith in the world, namely, Jainism. We shall, therefore, now turn to Islam to show that the same doctrine is contained in its sacred books. Mahomed even believed in the existence of souls prior to their embodied life on earth. He said : "Souls before having dependence upon bodies, were like assembled armies : after that they were dispersed; and sent into bodies. Therefore, those which were acquainted before tho dependence attract cach other, and those that wore unacquainted, repel" ("The Sayings of Muhammad,' p. 81). His writings also contain carefully concealed allusions to the highest form of belief. A few quotations will suffice to prove our statement. 1. "We are nearer to him (man) than the vital vein" (Al Qur'an, 1. 15). 2. "And He to whom you pray is nearer to you than the neck of your camel" ("Sayings of Muhammad'). 3. "God hath not created anything better than Reason, or anything more perfect, or more beautiful than Reason; the benefits which God giveth are on its account, aud understanding is by it, and God's wrath is caused by it, and by it are rewards and punishments" ("Sayings of Muhammad').

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985 People were not ripe enough intellectually to be told that He who is nearer than the camel's neck and the vital vein in one's own body is none other than the Self, and so the highest truth was not imparted to them in plain, undisguised language. This, we fancy, was the main consideration which led Mahomed to preserve silence on some of the most important problems of religion. However, the error which the followers of Islam have fallen into is one which nullifies the little good that may be found in their interpretation of their faith. If we start with a belief in the eternal and unbridgeable duality between God and man, thus investing the latter with all conceivable kinds of negative powers and qualities, the whole faith becomes self-contradictory; for belief, being the builder of character, can only build according to what is believed, never in opposition to it. Hence, if the belief in the irremediable, irremissible inferiority of the soul be deeply rooted in the mind, it is not possible for it to attain to higher spiritual unfoldment. It is our wrong interpretation of scriptures which leads us into conflicting and mutually contradictory dogmas, and causes us to adhere to them with the full force of stupid bigotry that never fails to attend on prejudice. We thus not only become the causes of our own undoing, but also richly deserve the scathing condemnation of all unbiased minds, of which Schopenhauer's opinion of the Qur'an furnishes a fairly good instance. Says the great Philosopher : "Consider, for example, the Koran, This wretched book was 88 RECONCILIATION.

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986 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, suficient to found a religion of the world, to satisfy the metaphysical need of innumerable millions of men for twelve hundred years, to become the foundation of their morality, and of no small contempt for death, and also to inspire them to bloody wars and most extended conquests. We find in it the saddest and the poorest form of theism. Much may be lost through the translation; but I have not been able to discover one single valuable thought in it."* If our Mahomedan brethren would escape criticism like that of Schopenhauer, they must endeavour to put a inore sensible interpretation on their tenets than they have done hitherto, for in the modern days of advancing intellectualism it is the force of reason which commands respect, not that of the sword of jehad. There is a great deal of truth in what Schopenhauer says about the Qur'an, but we are sure that that great book is not without its special merit. After a weary and tiresome plodding through its pages, which, for the most part, contain variants of the earlier traditionst of the Sabians, the Persians, the Egyptians, the Jews and others, the patient reader must acknowledge that the cardinal doctrine of the Qur'an is the great principle of absolute resignation to one's destiny. Most of us would regard a doctrine like this as fatalism pure and simple, but if we would reflect a little, we should see our error at once. Fatalism is essentially passive, and, for that reason, but another name for laziness, but religious life demands an active attitude of the soul, and would mean stagnation without it. Here we find the Bhagavad Gita explaining the situation admirably : Thy business is with the action only, never with its fruits ; so * See " The World as Will and Idea," Vol. II. pp. 361-362. See. The Sources of The Qur'an,' by Dr. Tisdall,

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RECONCILIATION. let not the fruit of action be thy motive, nor be thou to inaction attached. 987 "Perform action, dwelling in union with the Divine, renouncing attachments, and balanced evenly in success and failure: equilibrium is called yoga. "Man masing on the objects of sense, conceiveth an attachment to these; from attachment ariseth desire; from desire anger cometh forth. "From anger proceedeth delusion; from delusion confused memory; from confused memory the destruction of reason, from destruction of reason he perisheth. "There is no pure reason for the non-harmonised, nor for the non-harmonised is there concentration for him without concentration there is no peace, and for the unpeaceful, how can there be happiness? "Whoso forsaketh all desires and goeth onwards free from yearnings, selfless and without egoism-he goeth to peace. "This is the eternal state, having attained thereto none is bewildered. Who even at the death hour is established therein, he goeth to the nirvana of the eternal."-Discourse II. The main thing is to cultivate the habit of equanimity which prevents new karmic bonds from being forged even though asrava of matter still continue. The man who is resigned to his fate, who keeps his mind evenly balanced both in prosperity and adversity, who calmly and dispassionately employs himself exclusively in the performance of right action--such a man alone is said to practise resignation, none else. Fatalism is altogether out of place here, for while fatalism proceeds on the supposition of an inexorable fate, resignation is practised only to take the shaping of one's destiny in one's own hand. Active resignation, thus, is as different from physical laziness as is a living being from a corpse. It is this principle of resignation which is the pearl of

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988 great price in the Qur'an. So long as the followers of Islam carried this principle into practice, their religion was a living religion; but the times are changed now, and, like most other religions, Islam, too, has fallen into degeneration and decay. To any one who would critically look into the Qur'an, it would be obvious that so far as religion proper is concerned there are three remarkable features of that book, namely, THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (1) variants of the myths and traditions of the Jewish and certain other forms of faith, interspersed here and there with the folk-lore of the Arabs themselves; (2) a total absence of all reference to the scriptures, traditions and myths of other countries, such as India, China, and the like; and (3) a paramount teaching as to the great merit of the principle of resignation to one's destiny. Of these, the first tends to show that the traditions and myths are not to be taken as having an historical basis; the second points to one of two things, that is, either Mahomed was ignorant of those scriptures, or that they did not need correction in his opinion; and the third is but the practising of renunciation under a different name, As for the place of the Qur'an amongst the scriptures of the world, Non-Muslim writers, very naturally, were not to be expected to write much in favour of the book; but much of their criticism only goes to show that they possess no true insight into the nature of religion. The main defects pointed out in the great Book by

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RECONCILIATION. European writers may be classified under the following heads: (1) its errors, such as the denial of the death of Jesus on the cross, and the description of Isaac as the brother of Jacob, whereas, according to the Bible, Issac was the son of Jacob (Cf. Sura Hud with Genesis, XXV. 19-26); 989 (2) its childish fables; (3) its false geography; (4) its dishonouring representations, in some respects, of God; (5) its fatalism; (6) its religious intolerance; (7) its perpetuation of slavery; (8) its harsh punishment of theft and other kinds of offences; (9) its sanctioning of polygamy and unbounded license with regard to female slaves, as well as the unlimited and unrestricted power of divorce; (10) its contradictions; and (11) its mythology. To these may be added another and a more serious objection on account of the doctrine of animal sacrifice, which, as we have seen in an earlier chapter, is certainly opposed to the true spirit of religion. Besides the above, the point which is most frequently and hotly debated with reference to the Qur'an is the nature of its source. Muslims, naturally, claim it to be a revealed scripture, and base their claim on the peculiar style of its composition. This claim, in a way, originated with the Prophet

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990 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. himself, and time after time was the challenge to compose anything like it thrown out in the Qur'an. What this challenge actually means is not easy to understand ; for if it be a challenge to write something equally sensible, we fear the challenger has already had the worst of his challenge, for there are in existence works which are in no way inferior to the Qur'an, even if they do not surpass it in wisdom and philosophical merit. Is it, then, a challenge to compete with the Book in its argumentativeness ? Even here the contest can be decided in favour of Islam only if constant repetition and the use of arguments which do not convince any, but those who have faith in their hearts, or those who are interested in advocating its cause, be regarded as being in good taste and in keeping with the sound principles of elegant diction. We fear there is little to be said in favour of the great Book in this respect either. Next comes its composition. Undoubtedly its jingling rhyme went a long way to please the Arab ear, but that is purely a question of taste. Several of the world's scriptures are metrical in their composition, and it is not easy to imitate their rhyme. They are all, more or less, regarded by their respective followers as the best specimens of literature, poetry and composition. Besides, in every country there is always a book, which is confessedly the best piece of its literature. Suppose the author of such a work claimed divine inspiration for his work, and rested it on the inability of the people to produce one to equal it, would such a claim be recognized ? Surely, it is the feeblest argument in support of revelation to say that because the style of the writing

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991 is inimitable, it must, therefore, be the work of God. So long as Muslim writers do not take the trouble to put their religion on a sound philosophical basis, so long would the Qur'an continue to be a butt of ridicule and contempt for the philosopher. People, certainly, do not turn to religious scriptures to study poetry, or the art of elegant diction. Moreover, the Qur'an is not free from literary defects, even though its rhyming be unsurpassed. Carlyle thus expresses himself as to its literary merit: "A wearisome confused jumble, crude, incondite; endless iterations, long-windedness, entanglement; most crude, incondite ;-insupportable stupidity, in short! Nothing but a sense of duty could carry any European through the Qur'an."-Hero and Hero Worship, Lecture II. RECONCILIATION. The beauty of the jingling rhyme of Al Qur'an, thus, is more than sufficiently counterbalanced by its poor literary merit and lack of philosophical exposition. It seems to us that Muslim writers make a great mistake in laying too much stress on the literary merit of their Book, since that only goes to divert the attention from the question of practical worth, provokes the spirit of fault-finding in the reader, and ends by bringing into prominence matters which had best be left out of discussion. If our friends would seriously think over the matter, the challenge to compose anything like unto a single verse of the Qur'an, which, for reasons best known to the Prophet, was made, later on, in respect of ten verses, and at times, also, with respect to a whole chapter, would be found to be not one made to the whole world and for all times, but one meant only for those to whom it was made. The Arabs were well-known for

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992 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. eloquence, and it was the way in which the Prophet delivered his discourses which went a long way to captivate their hearts. They cared little, or nothing, for the science of religion, and were easily swayed by arguments which appealed to the ear and the emo tions. The sudden nature of the wholesale conversions made by the Prophet, after lie was firmly established at Medina, bears ample testimony to their causes being other tlan mental conviction. The widespread apostasy which followed on the death of Mahomed among his followers, also shows the superficial nature of these conversions ("The Preaching of Islam '). As Mr. T. W. Arnold points out, the acceptance of Islam was, in many instances, due to the fiery eloquence of the Prophet, as well as to political expediency, and, more often than not, in the nature of a bargain struck under pressure of violence, or from motives of worldly prosperity. But eloquence is too feeble as a means for altering one's deep-rooted convictions, since it only appeals to the emotional side of life, and causes a temporary effervescence of the emotion appealed to. It is incapable of producing permanent results. Hence, when philosophers come to look into the nature of the discourses of the Prophet, as contained in the Qur'an, they seldom find aught but long-winded entanglement,' as Carlyle calls it, in the Book. But, while agreeing with Carlyle as to the monotonous and uninteresting nature of the perusal it affords, we are inclined to the opinion that the Qur'an is not to be so easily rejected from consideration as that great writer would like us to do.

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RECONCILIATION. 993 To understand the merit of Al Qur'an properly, it is necessary to study the life of its author, and the circumstances in which he found himself placed. Mahomed was born at Mecca in Arabia, which geographically belongs to the same group of countries in Western Asia as Persia, Syria and Palestine. Close upon six hundred years had elapsed since the advent of the New Testament religion, and Christianity bad fallen into decline. Judaism had already been undermined; Jerusalem had been sacked, and the Jews had dispersed, many of whom had fled to Arabia. Idolatry, that is, worship of symbolical gods, mammonism, and sensuality had come to take the place of the purer form of religion established by the New Testament. Sale makes the following observations about the state of Christianity at the time of Mahomed's appearance :--- "If we look into the ecclesiastical historians even from the third century, we shall find the Christian world to have then had a very different aspect from what some authors have represented; and so far from being endued with active graces, zoal, and devotion, and established within itself with purity of doctrine, union, and firm profession of the faith, that on the contrary, what by the ambition of the clergy, and what by drawing the abstrusest niceties into controversy, and dividing and sub-dividing about them into endless schisms and contentions, they had so destroyed that peace, love, and charity from among them, which the Gospel was given to promote; and instead thereof continually provoked each other to that malice, rancour, and every evil work, that they had lost the whole sub. stance of their religion, while they thus eagerly contended for their own imaginations concerning it; and in a manner quite drove Christianity out of the world by those very controversies in which they disputed with each other about it. In these dark ages it was that most of those superstitions and corruptions we now justly abhor in the church of Rome were not only broached, but established : which gave great advantages to the propagation of Mahomed 89

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994 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ism. The worship of saints and images, in particular, was then arrived at such a scandalous pitch that it even surpassed whatever is now practised among the Romans.'* As regards the Arabs themselves, " Arabia was of old famous for heresies ; which might be in some measure attributed to the liberty and independency of the tribes, Some of the Christians of that nation believed that the soul died with the body, and was to be raised again with it at the last day : these Origen is said to have convinced. Among the Arabs it was that the heresies of Ebion, Beryllus, and the Nazaraeans and also that of the Collyridians, were broached, or at least propagated; the latter introduced the virgin Mary for God, or worshipped her as such, offering her a sort of twisted cake called Collyris, whence the sect had its name."| It was in such surroundings that Mahomed was born at Mecca some five hundred years after the compilation of the last of the canonical gospels. His early life has nothing out of the common in it. His father Abd'allah left little or nothing to him by way of inheritance, and he was practically a dependent on his grandfather and uncle, who seem to have taken great interest in him. Through the latter's influence, Mahomed became the factor of Khadijah, a noble and rich widow, who soon perceived the excellent qualities of his disposition and accepted him for her lord and husband. Mahomed had little or no education beyond what was customary in his day. He was, however, not deficient in the three accomplishments which the Arabs esteemed most, namely, eloquence, horsemanship-including the use of arms-and hospitality. The first two of these stood him in good stead in the propagation and protec * See . The Koran' by Sale. f Ibid.

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995 tion of the new Faith which he founded, and the last made him famous throughout the land. He had seldom any money in his house, and kept no more than was just sufficient to maintain his family. Mahomed had a contemplative mind; he was fond of seclusion. He often retired to a cave in Mount Hira, and there suffered himself to be lost in meditation. The state of religion prevailing in the country did not satisfy the inner longing of his soul for happiness. He wanted to think for himself, to get at the inner meaning of Life. Probably he came across some ancient Cabalist who imparted to him some of the true secrets of Judaism; perhaps he was also initiated into some sort of mysteries.' That he received inner illumination of some kind is beyond dispute. What took place in Mount Hira is not known; it might be that the veil was partially lifted from his eyes, before he set out to preach the doctrine of Islam; but the probability is that this did not happen till some time afterwards. Our opinion is supported by the fact that the miracle of the splitting of the Moon took place some time after he had set himself up as a public preacher. We may here point out that the significance of this miracle has been entirely misunderstood by the world. It does not mean the dividing of the sphere of the moon into two halves; it has no concern with the planet of that name, but refers to what is known to Occultists as the Astral Plane. It is wellknown in Esoteric circles that the matter of the Astral Plane largely enters into the composition of the moon, hence the penetration of gaze beyond that plane, that RECONCILIATION.

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996 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE is, the opening out of consciousness on the mental plane, is what is signified by the miracle of Shaq-ul-Qamar. Between the perfect illumination-roshan zimiri-of the Siddhatman and the obstructed vision of the ordinary humanity of the world, there are several veils of obstruction, which are composed of different kinds of matter. The first of these, which one encounters when trying to reach illumination, is the one constituted by the matter of the Astral Plane, and it is this veil which the Prophet of Arabia was enabled to partially penetrate. His knowledge, then, was derived from what he saw by the power of clairvoyance, * unconsciously developed by him. The Prophet does not anywhere claim to have transcended this region ; and there is not to be found a single passage in the Qur'an to show that his consciousness ever penetrated beyond the region known to Occultism as the Mental plane. It might be that the Prophet did not like to impart the knowledge of the higher regions to his followers, or it might be that he did not possess it himself: so far as the Scripture is concerned, it seems to favour the latter view, since there is no reason why the opening out of the Prophet's consciousness on the higher planes be concealed, when the fact that he had acquired clairvoyant vision is made no secret of. Only two other miracles are ascribed to him, and these are the Merajt and the * This would be a form of ku-avadhi inana according to strict metaphysics (see The Science of Thought). There are at least two instances in which the experience of Meraj is described by the prophets of Zoroastrianism, in almost the same way as Mahomed's. Upon the strength of these instances Rev.

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RECONCILIATION. 997 conversion of jinns. But Meraj only goes to suggest the penetration into the Upper Mental Plane ; and the W. St. Clair Tisdall thinks (The Sources of the Qur'an) that Mahomed borrowed the idea of Meraj from Zoroastrianism. Mr, Mohammad Ali, M. A., whose book, The Divine Origin of the Qur'an,' is an attempt at the refutation of Mr. Tisdall's opinion, makes the following comment on the subject : " The description given by the Holy Prophet of his spiritual ascent to heaven was, according to Rev. Tisdall, borrowed from the following passage of Arta Viraf Namak, a Pehlvi book written in the days of Ardashir, some 400 years before the Hejira: Our first advance upwards was to the Lower heaven...and there we saw the Angel of those Holy Ones, giving forth a flaming light, brilliant and lofty.' We are then told that Arta extended similarly to the second and third heavens and to many others beyond. "At the last,' says Arta, my Guide and the Fire-angel having shown me paradise took me down to hell.' * "The truth is that God has been raising prophets in all lands. They brought the same teachings and had similar experiences. Hence if certain passages of the Holy Qur'an correspond to certain contents of the ancient Zoroastrian scriptures, and if the Holy Prophet of Arabia had experiences similar to those of an ancient Prophet of Iran, this does not show that the Holy Prophet had found access to ancient Zoroastrian scriptures or had found means of communicating with men learned in Zoroastrian scriptures. On the other hand, such parallelisms and such analogies, in the absence of there being any means of communication, are a clear proof of the fact that all these books had originally come from a common source, and that all these teachers were the messengers of the same Being. These parallelisms are not confined to Islam and Zoroastrianism alone; they exist in all the great religions of the world." We agree with Mr. Mohammad Ali as to the possibility of similar experiences being gained by different prophets independently, but not when he denies, in his book, the familiarity of Mahomed with the traditions, the mythological lore and the general tenets of Zoroastrianism and certain other creeds. We shall give reasons for our opinion later on, when we come to deal with the subject of revelation,

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998 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. conversion of jinns is simply indicative of the fact that some beings of the goblin tribe were once seen listening to his discourses. The life of Mahomed, thus, is the life of a man whose habits of meditation and retirement in seclusion had enlarged his consciousness to a certain extent, and had brought to him knowledge of things generally unknown to humanity at large. His greatness, as such, cannot be denied ; and the greatest feature of that greatness is that he never claimed to be greater than what he actually was,--a prophet, or seer. There, in the seclusion of the caves of Mount Hira, he used to become absorbed in holy meditation. One day, all of a sudden and without warning, the scales fell off his eyes, and brought before his view things which are generally hidden from the gaze of the profane ; he found himself in the presence of the arch-angel. " * The angel Gabriel is but another aspect of one's own Soul This is borne out not only from the meaning of the word Jesus,' which, in Arabic, signifies both the soul and the arch-angel (see The Philosophy of Islam, p. 30), but can be easily verified by any one who would seriously practise yoga for a few months. The concentration of mind on the nervous plexus known as Ajna, situate in the brain behind the eye-brows, if sufficiently intense, will enable the soul to perceive its own lastre, reflected in the outer atmosphere. It is this lustre from the real Self which is described as the archangel Gabriel. The Shiva Samhita has it : "When the yogi thinks of the great Soul, after rolling back his eyes, and concentrates his mind to the forehead, then he can perceive the lustre from the great Soul. That clever yogi who always meditates in the above-mentioned way, evinces the great Soul within himself, and can even hold communion with 'Him." It is interesting to note in connection with the Gabriel legend that Sir Syed Ahmad Khan who was a staunch Mahomedan, declined

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RECONCILIATION. 999 Mahomed was frightened, and ran home in great fear and excitement. Perspiration broke out in great beads on his forehead, and be covered himself up with the wrapper of Khadijah. She knew something of the meditation her husband was in the habit of practising, and comforted him with the idea that the vision was not a nightmare. For three years the husband and wife waited in patience for the recurrence of the vision, and at last were rewarded by the sight of the angel once more. During this long interval of time, the mind of the Prophet was all the time filled with the noblest of expectations. Many a problem of religious philosophy must have occurred to him during this period. He had had no philosophical training in the strict sense of the term, but knowledge does not depend on study in schools; it is stored up in the soul. He must have come across teachers of different sects also, and must have discussed many of the problems with them. In the midst of the confusion which prevailed in the religious circles in his country, in the medley of theories and dogmas and doctrines which were perplexing him, truth at last flashed on his mind, like a ray of sunshine in the midst of winter clouds. He clearly perceived that the truth of truths, the quintessence of philosophy, the kernel of religion, was the rock of the Unity of the Essence of God whom he describes as 'that which seeth and heareth,' Mystic, as he was, in his tendencies, he to believe in the existence of the arch-angel, holding that when the Prophet said that an angel bad appeared unto him, he meant nothing more or less than the simple fact that an unknown person had met him.-(The Philosophy of Islam, p. 54).

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1000 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. personified this Essence as the Creator, after the manner of the school of mysteries; and believed that salvation lay only in the doing of his will, not in obedience to the personal will. Meditation led him to penetrate to the core of many a mythological legend, and enabled him to understand that their interpretation lay not in an historical reading, but in the symbolical sense. He thus perceived that his countrymen had drifted away from the true teaching of religion; and he felt tenderness and pity for their lost souls. Those were, however, the days of intolerance; and people used to meet argument with sword. What was he to do under the circumstances? To preach the truth openly was out of the question. He had the example of other prophets and saints who had preceded him in the divine mission. They had all been ill-treated, more or less. He recalled to mind what Hermes had said and Jesus repeated about the lips of wisdom being sealed, except to the ears of understanding.' The masses had to be told that their interpretation of the earlier Scriptures of Judaism and Christianity was wrong, yet he dared not do so openly. That would have only gone to make everybody his enemy. Thus it was that the great Prophet, too, was led to speak in allegory and concealed metaphor. His preaching at first had little or no effect on his hearers, who all seem to have resented him, more or less, with the exception of the faithful Khadijah. Gradually his influence extended to some members of his family, and even persons outside the family-circle often came to hear him. As is usually the case, the idea of a new religion excited animosity and resentment in the minds of the

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RECONCILIATION. 1001 tribesmen, and the sincere protestations of the Prophet to the effect that he brought nothing new to them, had little power to check the tide of adverse criticism and hatred which was surging up against him. The small band of the followers of the creed of the Crescent were exposed to all kinds of dangers, and had to fly from place to place. Even Mahomed had to flee for his life more than once. He, however, never abandoned his mission, and though the following increased exceedingly slowly, he remained undaunted by the paucity of the number of 'true believers.' A few years later, Hamza, a powerful and influential chieftain, embraced Islam. Other important conversions soon followed, till in the thirteenth year of the mission, the little band had acquired sufficient importance in the eyes of its enemies to lead them to seriously think of its extermination. Several conspiracies were formed to encompass Mahomed's death ; he was several times waylaid, and various other measures were resorted to for his destruction. The alternatives put before him were death or the renunciation of his mission. But the latter was out of the question ; so the only point left to him to decide was: whether he would prefer to be butchered peacefully, or die fighting, sword in hand ? His fiery nature, however, revolted at the former alternative; the idea of dying like a rat in a trap was not agreeable to his soul. The sword was, thus, the only alternative left, and he did not hesitate to draw it now. Hitherto he had preached toleration ; persuasion rather than compulsion had been his method. But that was out of the question now. The times were changed, and persuasion could no 90

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1002 longer be relied upon. Accordingly, he made a departure from the policy of peace. Fortunately, the followers of Masab, who had embraced Islam in the meantime, undertook to defend him. With their aid, he established himself at Medina. Then followed a series of expeditions, skirmishes and assaults in which the little band gave a good account of themselves. These were followed by the famous battle of Bedr, which may be reckoned as the foundation of the temporal power of Islam. The Prophet now became a warrior chief, in addition to a religious preacher. Rather than suffer his enemies to persecute his followers, he himself now declared jehad against them. He had no political ambition in his earlier days, but now the element of power, engendered by constant persecution and suffering, came to occupy a prominent place in his mind. He now became the militant prophet in which capacity he has become intimately associated with history. C In the Qur'an, which was admittedly compiled after the death of the Prophet, no distinction is observed between those of the sayings that emanated from the preacher' and those which originated from the statesman' in him. Possibly, a few of the sayings of others, erroneously ascribed to him, were also included in the manuscript. 6 The doctrine of the abrogation of the word of God, which is peculiar to Islam, obviously owes its origin to the exigencies of the political life the Prophet finally adopted. But, so far as we have been able to ascertain, from a perusal of the Qur'an, it is confined only to such of the sayings as are not the essential and eternal THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RECONCILIATION. 1003 truths of religion, and only touches matters of secondary import, e.g., as the changing of Kibla from Jerusalem to Mecca. Different writers have estimated the number of the abrogated verses from five to five hundred, but many of them are presumably still incorporated in the Qur'an. It is thus clear that, in order to understand the true teaching of the creed of the Crescent, one has to reject a number of verses, on the ground that they form no part of religion proper. Add to this the fact that Mahomed was not only a preacher and a statesman, but a law-giver as well, and the number of passages to be rejected becomes still greater ; for the law which the Prophet gave was suitable only to the exigencies and requirements of his own time, and essentially applicable to his own people, not of general or universal applicability. The salient features of the Qur'an may now be categorically stated. It consists of: (1) the essential and eternal truths of philosophy which are the true basis of religion, (2) the rules of law, essentially applicable to the circumstances of the country, at the time of the Prophet, (3) the verses which have been abrogated, (4) some stray observations of the Prophet, made from time to time, which are valuable only in so far as they emanate from a great person, but which possess little or no value otherwise, and (5) a large number of allegories and myths of the Zoroastrians, the Assyrians, the Jews and others, adopted and varied to suit the requirements of the Prophet's teaching A glance at the above classification of the contents and

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1004 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of the Qur'an would suffice to show that of the five main divisions into which we have divided them only the first is the true basis of religion. Thus, we need only consider the merit of the Qur'an under the following three heads which are comprised in the first and the fifth divisions : (a) philosophical truths and definitions, (b) mythology, and (c) ritual. To begin with the sub-division (a), it may be stated, without the least fear of contradiction, that the holy Qur'an contains identically the same teachings as are the basis of all true religions. It leaves no doubt as to the nature of the Essence of Life or God, which is described as that which seeth and heareth.* It is further * That the true idea of unity in relation to God had little in common with the modern conception of Anthropomorphism, may be seen from the following from "The Mystics of Islam," (page 79): "Both Moslems and Sufis declare that God is one, but the statement bears a different meaning in each instance. The Moslem means that God is unique in His essence, qualities, and acts; that he is absolutely unlike all other beings. The Sufi means that God is the One Real Being which underlies all phenomena." The Sufi doctrine, as a matter of fact, is the exact copy of the heretical' Vedanta, which seems to have been the creed of the wandering Calendars of Muslim origin. To what extent these bold free-thinkers of Islam went is apparent from the following couplet of Abu Sa'id ibn Abi'l Khayr, (See. The Mystics of Islam,' p. 90): " Not until every mosque beneath the sun Lies ruined, will our holy work be done ; And never will true Musalman appear Till faith and infidelity are one." The formula xi114118 (La ilaha Il-la 'l-lahu), which means, 'there is no God but God,' can, in the light of what has been said before,

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RECONCILIATION. 1005 conceived to be omnipresent, after the manner of the mystics, so that 'wherever thou turnest thy face, there is the essence of God' (Suratul Baqr). In the Suratul Nisa, we are told : "Really God surrounds everything." Suratul Hadid contains : "God is with you wherever you are." Finally, Suratul Rahman points out that He is the first and the last, the apparent and the real, and allknowing. Next, in reference to the individual soul, it is also easy to see that the teaching contained in the Qur'an is the same as has been found to be philosophically true. We may cite the following verses in support of our view : (1) "We are nearer to man than his jugular vein" (S. Zariyat), (2) "We are nearer to man than you, but yon do not observe" (S. Wakiya). (3) "I am in your individuality, but you do not see" (S. Zariyat.) (4) "He is the apparent and the real" (S. Rahman.) (5) "The people who strike palm with thee, do not strike it with thee, but with God. The hand of God is on all hands" (S. Fatah). These are some of the verses which are intelligible only in the light of the doctrines established in these only mean a denial of mythological gods, not of the true living Gods, or of the divinity of the soul. The most secret and sacred name of God, according to the traditions, is the Living, or the Self-subsistent, which is only understood and realized by Saints. The Prophet said that whoever calls upon God by this name shall obtain all his desires (see 'A Dictionary of Islam"). Since the saints are only those who have become conscious of their own Divinity and since occult powers spring from Self-consciousness, this most secret and sacred name, not to be disclosed to the profane, is that which indicates the nature of the inner Divinity. The * Ana 'l Haqg' (I am God) of Al-Hallaj, commonly known as Mansur, is only the . Aham Bralman asm' (I am Brahman) of Vedanta.

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1006 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. pages. The reason why the highest truths of philosophy were imparted to men in disguise,* is to be found in the attitude of the Arabs and the state of Society at the time of the Prophet. Their hidden sense is clear enough to any one who cares to think for himself, but otherwise might easily pass for poetical license or rhetorical flourish, without exciting comment. Mahomedan theologians found them difficult to understand even so soon after the Prophet as the second century of the Hijri era. Some of them, led by the spirit of enquiry, collected a large number of religious and philosophical books, including many Sanskrit Manuscripts, and a magnificent library was established at Baghdad in the second century after Mahomed. As already stated Mahomed's eloquence and personality, rather than the doctrines of the creed, seem to have been the causes of the spread of Islam even during the life of its founder. In many instances conversions were also due to political expediency and motives of power and greatness. "How superficial was the adherence of numbers of the Arab tribes, to the faith of Islam," writes Mr. Arnold ( The Preaching of Islam', p. 41), "may be judged from the widespread apostasy that followed immediately the death of the Prophet. Their acceptance of Islam would seem to have been often dictated more by considerations of political expediency, and was more frequently a bargain struck under pressure of violence than the outcome of any enthusiasm or spiritual awakening." * The spirit of intolerance was not peculiar to the Arabs; outside India it was widespread. The following from St. Augustine (see "The Mystics of Islam,' p. 118) is a fair sample of the dread which influenced the speech of saints: "If he (man) loves a stone, he is a stone : if he loves a man, he is a man; if he loves God- I dare not say more, for if I said that he would then be God, ye might stone me."

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RECONCILIATION 1007 This feature of weakness was, however, soon discovered by the leaders of the new faith, and steps were taken to establish the creed on a sound philosophical basis. Mr. Khaja Khan's interesting work, The Philosophy of Islam' (pp. 61 and 62), throws considerable light on the nature of these steps: "The presence of the Prophet and His companions had sufficient mesmerizing and spiritualizing power to purify the hearts of those who were brought under the influence of their magnetic personalities. After their days, people devised various ways and processes of keeping the torch burning. In the meanwhile, Islam came in contact with various phases of philosophical thought in its expansion on its Eastern and Western borders. " During the time of Mamun-ul-Rashid* several Grecian and Sanskrit works were translated into Arabic. While the discursive, ethical philosophy of the Greeks was absorbed on one side, the austerities of the Eastern nations leavened Muslim thought on the other. The Nicomachian Ethics of Aristotle with the commentary of Porphyry was translated intc Arabic by Ishaq, and the other two works of the same philosopher, Endemian Ethics and Magna Moralia, were translated by Abu Umar of Damascus. With the aid of these translations, the moralists of Islam began to write original works and to adapt the Islamic preaching to the ethical speculations of the Greeks and vice versa." Knowledge thus acquired proved to be the foundation of the school of Muslim thought which has come to be known as Sufeism, That there is no difference between the teachings of Islam and Hinduism on the essentials of religion, may also be shown by the following quotations from Muslim books : (1) "The veriest truth of truths of Arabic is the speech of the poet Lubaid who said, Know, everything besides God is non-existent." * 813-833 A. D. + The Philosophy of Islam,' p. 87.

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1008 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (2) "Verily God saith: I became ill, why didst thou not enquire after me; I became hungry, why didst thou not feed me; I begged of thee, why didst thou not give me.'* (3) "If you let down a bucket by a rope into a well, it will, of a surety, descend on God." (4) "What God created in the beginning was my soul." (5) "I was a hidden treasure and loved to know myself, and so I created Khalk to know myself." The above are consistent with the Vedantic theory we have examined in the earlier chapters of this book, and unmistakably point to the doctrines of Islam being identical with the tenets of Hinduism. The passage : "I was a hidden treasure and loved to know myself, and so I created the khalk (universe) to know myself" is, almost word for word, the same doctrine as is contained in the Vedantic formula "I This Not." Some of the Muslim Saints who have attained to greater wisdom have even gone so far as to maintain their identity with God, as was the case with Shams Tabrez, the poet, whose famous couplet, "Ajal man Shams i Tabraizam, ki gashtam shaifta bar khud, "Chun khud ra khud nazar kardam nadidam juz Khuda dar khud," || breathes the purest Vedanta. Ba'izeed is another ins* The Philosophy of Islam, p. 87. Ibid, p. 88. [Ibid p. 89. $ Ibid p. 89. tbryzm ki gshtm shyfth br khwd `jb mn shmsh chw khwd r khrd nZr khrdm ndydm jz khd dr khwd Tr.. What a unique being am I, Shams of Tabrez; When I came to look into myself, I discovered none but God in the self.'

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1009 tance in point, and many more can be cited. Maulana Rum says: RECONCILIATION. "O my soul, I searched from end to end. I saw in thee naught save the Beloved; Call me not infidel, O my soul, if I say that thou thyself art He. Ye who in search of God, of (iod, pursue, Ye need not search, for God is you, is you!" The Sufi thought touches perfection in the following couplet, ascribed to Farid-ud-din Attar, one of the most clear-headed thinkers Islam has ever produced: t tw hsty khdy'y dr khwb st * tw nmny chw w shwd bydr [Tr. So long as thou art in evidence a God is asleep; when thou shalt cease to be, He shall awake.] This is nothing but pure Jainism, and expresses identically the same idea as underlies the Biblical text: He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it (Matt. x. 39). 64 As for the idea of plurality in unity which is the characteristic of Godhead, we have already sufficiently shown that the very word Allah, the only Ism-'z-zat (the name indicative of the nature) of God, out of the 99 by which he is known in the Qur'an, indicates a plurality of knowing Lights,' the 'Illumined Ones,' and the use of the word 'we' in reference to God directly lends confirmation to our interpretation. It is also interesting to note that Alifuddin al-Tilimsani, the author of the commentary on Niffari, described the Qur'an as a form of polytheism (The Mystics of Islam, p. 92). So far as the theory of re-incarnation is concerned, it is admitted by Muslim writers that some of the pas 91

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1010 sages of the Qur'an do favour that doctrine; but they do not like to acknowledge its truth, on the ground that the subject is uncongenial to the spirit of the followers of Islam (The Philosophy of Islam' p. 90). One can only express surprise at a philosopher rejecting a doctrine without investigation on a ground like this. As a matter of fact, several Muslim philosophers have actually acknowledged the truth of the doctrine of transmigration, as Mr. Khaja Khan himself points out ('The Philosophy of Islam,' p. 37). Notable amongst these are Ahmad Ibn Habith, his disciple Ahmad ibni Yubus, Abu-Moslem of Khorassan and Ahmad ibni Zakarah. Jalaluddin Rumi, the poet-philosopher, too, openly taught re-incarnation. Some of his verses bearing on the point are: "We have grown like grass often; Seven hundred and seventy bodies have we taken. From the inorganic we developed into the vegetable kingdom, THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Dying from the vegetable we rose to animal; And leaving the animal, we became man. Then what fear that death will lower us; The next transition will make us an angel; Then shall we rise from angels and merge in Infinity. Have we not been told That all of us will return unto Him. ?"* *The original verses run as follows: hft Sd hftd qlb dydh m hmchw sbzh drh rwy'ydh m * * wz nm mrdm bHywn sr zdm z jmdy mrdm w nmy shdm ps chh trsm khh zmrdn khm shdm mrdm z Hywny w adm shdm arm z mly'kh bl w pr br dl dygr bmyrm z bshr * br dygr z mlkh prn shwm * anchh ndr whm nyd an shwm rj`wn lyh ps `dm khrdm `dm chwn rGnwn * gwydm khn C *

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RECONCILIATION 1011 Mr. Khaja Khan takes the idea to be that of circular movements.' "The seed germinates into a green sapling; this develops into a tree, blooms and blossoms; and the finale is the seed itself. So is Suluk, or the travelling of man towards God.". A Persian poet puts it : z dr bdr shd grchh dr m`sh * z an dr amd wl hm bdr shd [Tr. From the door he came, he went back through the same; though the search of Alza (livelihood, here experience,) took him from door to door.') According to Muslim writers, Jalaluddin does not mean anything more than the idea of circular movement in the above verses. Their idea of evolution takes the soul right up from the mineral kingdom to man, through the vegetable and the animal kingdoms, but there leaves it abruptly, either to enjoy an eternal life of pleasure in heaven, or to suffer eternal damnation in hell, forgetting the last portion of the teaching, "Have we not been told : That all of us shall return unto Him ?" Strange philosophy, indeed! Why stop the course of evolution in this abrupt fashion ? In reply, Mr. Khaja Khan relies on certain verses of the Qur'an, which, he maintains, indicate that the suffering of the soul in hell shall never terminate. But it seems to us that he attaches too great an importance to the word 'never,' which, in the verses he relies upon, is clearly a form of rhetoric. The word "never" uttered The English rendering, as given above, is from Mr. Khaja Khan's * Philosophy of Islam,' and is accurate enough for our requirements. The last couplet should, however, read: "I having annihilated non-existence (i.e., extinction), it is proclaimed to me, in a voice like that of an organ, that all of us shall return unto Him.

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1012 ' in reply to the petition for mercy of the hypothetical sinner of Sura Moumin-"O preserver, send me back that I may do good works in the world which I am leaving"-does not necessarily signify eternity, but might mean not till you have expiated your sins." In ordinary parlance also the word 'never' is not always intended to convey the idea of eternity. Its use in connection with the idea of life in heaven or hell, must, consequently, be taken to mean only a long period, if we are to remain in agreement with established truth. The Jaina Scriptures point out that the length of life in heaven or hell varies according to individual deeds, the longest term consisting of untold millions of years, which is as good as eternity, for all practical purposes of ordinary speech. The reason why moksha cannot be obtained from either the heaven or hell, is to be found in the fact that the soul is deprived of the opportunity for performing tapas in those regions. The continuous life of pleasure in heaven, and the unending experiences of pain in hell leave no time for the practising of meditation and concentration, to say nothing of renunciation and other forms of austerities, without which moksha cannot be attained. For this reason, are these two regions described as Bhoga Bhumis (the worlds of the resulting 'fruits' of action). "The place of just retribution," says the author of 'Al Bayan,' is the next world, where nothing of actions is to be found. The place of actions is this world" (page 166). That being so, it is inconceivable how spiritual evolution can be completed in heaven or hell, so as to enable the soul to Him,' which is the fulfilment of its destiny. ( return unto THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RECONCILIATION. 1013 Does it not strike our brethren of Islam that unless the doctrine of transmigration be an integral part of the teaching of their Prophet, their creed renders, it absolutely unnecessary that there should be such a thing as soul ? Their belief in the resurrection of the physical body on the Judgment Day would be quite inconsistent with the survival of the soul on the death of the individual, as well as with its existence prior to his conception and birth in this world of ours. The former, because it has no function to perform during the period intervening between its death here and the resurrection at the place of Judgment, and the latter, because it would directly lead to an admission of our claim. In short, they must altogether deny the existence of such a thing as soul and take the body to be the man. But in doing so they will find that they not only contradict the sound conclusions of reason, which, in the passage quoted from the 'Sayings of Muhammad,' is so highly extolled by the Prophet himself, but also attribute injustice and want of dignity to the Godhead, in addition to rendering a number of passages in their Scripture of no effect. If the soul be by the command of God (Al Qur'an, chap. XVII), and created, for the first time, to inhabit the body of flesh, by an Almighty God, he must be the author of its existence. If so, he must be blamed for creating differences in the circumstances of different souls, so that one is born ignorant, while another enjoys the light of wisdom, and so forth. If emphasis were needed on this last observation of ours, it is not wanting, for the Qur'an itself records :--

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1014 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "And unto whomsoever God shall not grant his light he shall enjoy no light at all" (Chapter XXIV). Also: "Whom God shall cause to err, he shall find no way to the truth" (Chapter XLII). We have already commented upon the injustice of unequal creation, and need not reproduce the arguments over again here. The conclusion is that if the creation of the world be ascribed to an Almighty God, he must be found fault with for differences and inequalities, but if, in agreement with the dictates of reason, we attribute the causation of differences to the working out of past karmas, in obedience to the laws of nature, all the difficulties vanish from our path at once. As regards the teaching of the Qur'an about the soul, it is certain that that great Book itself promulgates the truth about the pre-existence of soul before the formation of the physical body. The author of ' Al Bayan' (p. 144) tells us that the general Muslim belief on this point is that the souls were created by God 'thousands of years' before the making of the body. Sufeism, too, on the whole, is decidedly opposed to the idea of the creation of a soul there and then to inhabit a body. In order to arrive at a perfect understanding of the symbolic teaching of the holy Qur'an with reference to the nature of the soul, it is necessary to analyze the idea underlying the statement, 'soul is by the command of God.' A little thinking will show that 'command' differs as much from the uttered word which gives it expression as man differs from the body of matter in which he is ensouled. The spoken word is perishable, because it

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RECONCILIATION. 1015 is a kind of sound, which, as has been pointed out earlier, is only a mode of motion ; but 'command' is the injunction, or 'sense' which the word ensouls, and is unperishing, as such. The distinction is time-honoured, and has been well brought out in the Purva Mimansa Sutras of Jaimini, the founder of one of the six schools of Hindu philosophy. Sounds originate in two different ways : either they arise from the vibrations of material bodies, er are uttered by living beings. In the former case, they convey no 'idea' to the mind beyond that of noise of a pleasant, unpleasant or indifferent type, but in the latter, the mind is made aware of an 'idea,' in addition to the sensation of sound. Now, because the speech of a living being is determined by individual motives and is intended to convey an idea to the mind of the hearer, it is expressive of a purport. It is this sense,' ' meaning,' or 'word-purport,' collectively knowledge, which is eternal. If we now take a step in the direction of mythology and personify knowledge as God, we shall see the Prophet's description of the soul acquiring signification. For, as a soul is the command or injunction, that is to say, the idea underlying the word of command, all the souls taken collectively must be represented in the entirety of knowledge personified as a being. In other words, the relation between God and souls is the same as that between knowledge and ideas. It is interesting to note in this connection that the Sufis hold everything to be an'ism' (name) of God, and the Bible points out that the Lord God brought all living creatures unto Adam,

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1016 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and 'whatsoever Adam called any living creature, that was the name thereof."* The Qur'an, thus, rightly propounds the nature of the soul : it is the expression of thought, or knowledge, of the Essence of Life personified as God. Where the followers of Islam go wrong is in respect of the origin which they ascribe to it. For even from a purely speculative point of view, which mostly constitutes the logic of modern theology, the eternity of souls can be easily proved. That the soul is the uttered word of God, is the proposition agreed upon. Now, the question is: did God utter the word ' haphazard, or intelligently? If the former, God is not all-wise, but a thoughtless, chaotic being, who has neither control nor understanding of his speech, but who raves like one in delirium tremens-in short, a thoughtless monstrosity. If the latter, the sense of the word must be known to him prior to its utterance. Further reflection will show that the 'sense,' i.e., the idea, must be eternal. For, if it is not eternal, it must come into existence in time, in which case it will have both a beginning and an end. Hence arises the question : did God know the particular idea before it came into existence, or not? If he did not, his knowledge was not perfect, since he was ignorant in respect of that particular idea ; and, as all ideas, on the hypothesis of theology, must be said to have had an origin, there must have been a time when God had absolutely no idea in his mind, that is to say, when he was totally ignorant. But this contradicts the wisdom attribute of * Genesis, 11. 19.

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RECONCILIATION. 1017 God, and is, for that reason, absurd. Besides, how could that wbich has no existence whatsoever ever come into existence? If we say that God made the idea, the question again arises as to the volitional or thoughtless nature of the process of making, which has already formed the subject of discussion. The last loop-hole of escape may be sought in the statement that the idea did not exist, but that God knew it somehow. This is but another way of throwing up the brief, as the sense of the expression itself indicates the absurdity of the proposition ; for it means neither more nor less than this that the idea had no existence, and yet it existed in the consciousness of God--which is ridiculous. The denial of the past existence of the soul only aims at the root of the theory of transmigration, but it is evident that only confusion of thought results from such a course. It is thus clear that the followers of Islam fall into error when they try to fight shy of the theory of re-incarnation which is a philosophical truth. The true sense of the teaching, 'soul is by the command of God,' thus, is not that God created the soul at a particular point of time, in the history of duration, but that the differentiating principle of the jivic essence, i.e., pure Consciousness, is the sense,' or purport, or 'idea-ness.' That this is the true sense is further borne out by the text itself which is not, 'soul is the command of God,' but 'soul is by the command of God,' which clearly means nothing if not that the Essence of Existence is seated distributively among the 'ideas,' i.e., souls. In this sense the doctrine is not only a philosophical truth, but is, also, in perfect agree 92

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1018 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. ment with the teaching of all other rational religions of the world. From the practical side of the question, also, the doctrine of transmigration furnishes an explanation of all those hard problems of philosophy which have proved insoluble from the standpoint of theology, and which involve it in endless contradictions. It is more satisfactory to accept the blame for one's present condition one-self tban to throw it on a being who creates imperfect beings and then expects them to be perfect. It is also more wholesome to believe that the sojourn of the wicked in hell, in spite of the enormity of their sins, shall have an end, sooner or later, when one or more human incarnations will furnish them with the opportunity to manifest their hidden divinity, in the fullest degree of perfection. When setting themselves in opposition to the theory of transmigration, modern exponents of Muslim theology generally forget that their noble Propbet has acknowledged the fact that no origin can be ascribed to the soul. The following note of Sale, based on 'Al Beidawi,' is highly relevant to the point in issue :--- "It is said that the Jews bid the Koreish ask Mahomed to relate the history of those who slept in the cave and of Dhu'l Karnein, and to give them an account of the soul of man, adding, that if he pretended to answer all the three questions, or could answer none of them, they might be sure he was no prophet; but if he gave an answer to one or two of the questions and was silent as to the other, he was really a prophet. Accordingly, when they propounded the questions to him, he told them the two histories, but acknowledged his ignorance as to the origin of the human soul."** **The Koran' by Sale, p. 214 (note a.)

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RECONCILIATION. 1019 Mr. Khaja Khan tries to explain away Mahomed's acknowledgment of ignorance by saying that the Prophet, accepting the omission as the gauge of their (i.e., the Jew's) mental fitness, determined not to burden them with a definition beyond the grasp of their capacity ;'* but in the absence of anything showing that the knowledge of the origin of the soul would have been a 'burden,' too heavy for them to bear, the statement is hardly of any value. What should we think of a scientist who, in answer tu a question as to the origin of the law of conservation of matter and energy, propounded with a view to test his claim to learning, were to reply that he was not aware of it? Some would see in the reply only a confession of ignorance, and some only a compassionate regard for the 'feeble' intellect of the interlocutor ; bui the truth is neither in the one nor the other of these views. It is given out in the reply, though expressed facetiously. The above is quite sufficient to show the true nature of the soul ; but there are other passages in the Qur'an which conclusively prove the view we have taken above. In the 33rd chapter we are given a still greater insight into the nature of the soul. It is said there : "We formerly created man of a finer sort of clay; and afterwards we placed him in the form of seed in a sure receptacle : afterwa we made the seed coagulated blood; and we formed the coagulated blood into a piece of flesh : then we formed the piece of flesh into bones; and we clothed those with flesh: then we produced the same by another creation." The commentators would read the words "a sure receptacle" to mean the womb, but no one can seriously ** The Philosophy of Islam,'p. 31.

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1020 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. maintain that it is so sure as not to miscarry in any case. Surely the Prophet could have used the word himself if that was the sense intended, for there is apparently no reason for not using the right word here. And, if any one objects that it was not used out of decency, we reply that religion is generally disregardful of any pretensions on that score. In almost all religions matters relating to sex are spoken of without the least reserve, and the Qur'an is no exception to the rule. What is the precise sense of the expression "sure receptacle" would become clear if we realize the nature of the fiuer sort of clay of which, it is stated, man was formerly made. This passage is susceptible of sense only on the supposition that there is a subtle body inside the gross encasement of physical matter, and that this body of finer clay, in some way, corresponds to the Karmana body, as described before. When this subtle body was made is not given in the Holy Qur'an, but the Teader is left to find it out for himself from the only clue which is furnished by the use of the word "formerly". Thus there is nothing in the Qur'an to contradict the conclusion we have arrived at, in strict accordance with the rules of reason ; on the contrary, there is every agreement between our conclusions and the text of the sacred Book wherever it is explicit on the subject. The body of finer clay, thus, corresponds to the karina sarira of the Hindu scriptures, and the sure receptacle, which does not miscarry, like the female womb, is the sukshma sarira, which contains the essence or gist of indivi. duality, hence, character, in the form of seed, i.e., as a potency, and which by entering the mother's womb,

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1021 manufactures coagulated blood, etc., etc., as briefly described in the passage under consideration. The last sentence in the text, viz. : "Then we produced the same by another creation."is too significant to be overlooked. The commentators understand it to mean "the production of a perfect man composed of soul and body," but that cannot be the idea of the author, as his language signifies. The author of the original text had not before his mind the idea of completion, but of another creation; while the commentators ignore the notion of another creation, and talk of completion. The fact seems to be that in his ardour and zeal to differ from the creed of the 'idolatrous heretics, and, thus, unable to make sense out of a passage which is capable of interpretation only on the lines of reincarnationistic philosophy, the first pious commentator grabbed at the first idea which entered his head; and since the generality of the followers of Islam are not given to the study of philosophy, the opinion thus ventured acquired currency, and prevails to this day. The Prophet of Arabia had to contend against deep-rooted prejudices among the men of his time, and it might be that the use of guarded language the sense of which is obvious to the wise but mystifying and obscure to the uninitiated, was necessitated by the exigencies of a life constantly imperilled by the turbulent circumstances of the time. " RECONCILIATION. In the sixth chapter, the Lord is made to say :"It is he who hath produced you from one soul; and hath provided for you a sure receptacle and a repository."-('Al Koran,' Eng. Trans. by Sale, p. 98).

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1022 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Here we have a repository in addition to the sure receptacle, and the commentator is not slow to interpret it according to his fixed principle. He would have it that the repository is the loins of the male parent. But the true sense connot be that. This would become clear if we would look into the doctrine contained in the first half of the sentence. The question is, What is meant by the sentence: "It is he who hath produced you from one soul ?" Now, the soul, being itself a self-subsisting substance or reality cannot be created by any one. Hence, if we are to interpret the above text in the sense that God is the creator of souls, the interpretation does not coincide with the conclusions of rational thought; but, if we take the one soul' to mean the genus soul, the repugnancy vanishes at once, leaving the scriptural text in complete agreement with the conclusions of sound philosophy. Therefore, it is clear that the one soul from which all other souls were produced is none other than the 'Idea,' which, in its manifested aspect, is the Word, the First Born of Christianity for, as has been already demonstrated, 'sense' is the principle whereby the Essence of Life is differentiated into an infinity of souls from beginningless eternity. This warrants our interpretation of the two terms, 'the sure receptacle and the safe repository,' to mean the two subtler bodies of the soul. Here we may again refer to the saying of Muhammad already quoted : "Souls before having dependence upon bodies, were like assembled armies; after that they were dispersed; and sent into bodies, Therefore, those which were acquainted before the dependence

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1023 attract each other, and those that were unacquainted, repel" ("Sayings of Muhammad,' p. 81). Since this is not contradicted anywhere by the text of the Qur'an, but, on the contrary, is strictly in agreement with it, we may lay down the following propositions, as established from the scanty material of the Prophet's word: RECONCILIATION. (1) every soul is a living 'idea,' (2) souls existed prior to their being born in the world, and (3) all souls contain the Essence of God, and may be said to arise from one soul. Our first proposition compares well with: "And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us" (St. John, I. 14). These points furnish conclusive evidence of the fact that the teaching of the Qur'an is not at all different from that of Hinduism, in respect of the existence of souls prior and subsequent to their life on earth. The Muslim idea of predestination, which has brought upon Islam the stigma of fatalism, itself suffices to prove the theory of transmigration, if investigated philosophically. "Taqdir, or the absolute decree of good and evil," says T. P. Hughes in A Dictionary of Islam,' "is the sixth article of the Mahomedan creed, and the orthodox believe that whatever has, or shall come to pass in this world, whether it be good or bad, proceeds entirely from the Divine Will, and has been irrevocably fixed and recorded on a preserved tablet by the pen of fate." This preserved tablet is the Perspicuous Book, the Book of God's decrees, called lauh-i-mahfuz (b) in Arabic, and is said to contain all that has happened in the past and all that is to happen in the future.

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1024 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. " Nor is anything added unto the age of him whose life is prolonged, neither is anything diminished from his age, but the same is written in the book of God's decrees" (Sura XXXV), It is pointed out in the Sura Y. S. ;-- " Verily, it is We who will quicken the dead and write down the works which they have sent on before them, and the traces which they shall have left behind them : and everything have we set down in the clear book of our decrees," Thus, predestination is an established belief in Islam. The actions of men are determined according to what is written in the Book of Decrees, so that "all thing a have been created after fixed decrees" (Sura liv. 49). To the sainetect are the following: "No one care except by God's permission according to tho book that fixeta the term of life" (Sura iii. 139). " The Lord' hath created and balanced all things and hath fixed their destinies and guideth them," (Sura lxxxvii. 2). "By no means can aught befall us but what God has destined for us (Sura ix, 51)." It being established that Muslim theology regards all things to be predetermined by the decrees of God, written in the lauh-i-mahfuz, the question which remains to be answered is: how are the decrees contained in the Book of Fate enforced in the world of men ? There may be a book, or even a whole library, in the Cosmic archives, but unless there is a force which connects every individual soul with the actions it is destined to perform, it is inconceivable how the decrees can be worth anything more than the cash-value of the tablet on which they are inscribed. If our Muslim friends would take the trouble to work out the problem of the connection between the decrees of fate and the actions of men and other beings in the three worlds, they would not fail to perceive that the force which com

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RECONCILIATION. 1025 pels obedience to the decrees of fate is none other than the force of karma, and that the logicies and, the Perspicuous Book, whose decrees can never be challenged, is the Cosmic Memory,' the self-registering Ledger of karma, wherein are recorded all things that have happened in the past and also those that are to happen in the future, or, in the language of the Qur'an, all actions of men, including the works which they have sent on before them, and the traces which they shall have left behind them.' The reader has only to turn to the doctrine of karma as propounded in the Jaina Siddhanta to understand the nature of the Perspicuous Book and of the process which automatically records and registers the actions of men and their future, hence predetermined, fruits. The whole doctrine, thus, is a highly abridged and condensed version of the theory of karma. Hindu philosophers divide karmas into two main classes, prarabdha and adrishta, the former of which signifies the karmic force, or forces, which have begun to be active, and the latter the latent, and, therefore, the potential residue. They are called adrishta (from a, not, and drishta, visible), because they signify karmas whose effect is not yet visible, hence, the potentiality of future action. The other class of karmas, that is prarabdha, is the destiny which is beginning to shape the circumstances and environment. This is the true doctrine of takdir; to deny it would be to sever the connection between the logisme res and the individual soul, and, consequently, fatal to the doctrine itself. The passage"O my people ! how is it that I bid you to salvation, but that ye bid me to the fire ?" 98

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1026 which occurs in the fortieth Surah (verse 44), throws considerable light on the true tenets of the Qur'an, and is intelligible only on the hypothesis of transmigration. For the Arabic word najat (), employed in the text to denote the idea of salvation, would be meaningless except as signifying freedom from some kind of bondage or restraint, the true interpretation of which must be sought on the same lines as that of the famous Biblical text in John viii. 32-" And ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free." This is sufficient to show that the doctrine of the bondage of karmas is taught in secret both in the Bible and the Holy Qur'an. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Of all the objections which have been raised against the theory of transmigration by all sorts of investigators in the field of metaphysical speculation, the one that need be noticed here is the one which is based on the assumption of a beginning of the world-process. Unable to meet the thesis on the purely scientific or philosophical ground, the objector does not hesitate to mix up his own idea of a first beginning of things with what he sets out to refute, and then suddenly turns round to demand the origin of the karmic force, prior to the first beginning of things. His objection, thus, is not an argument of sound reason, but only an example of the sleight of hand the intellect is capable of when bent on finding a pretext to reject a doctrine against which it has been prejudiced by fanatical faith, insufficient research or any other like cause. The theory of transmigration of souls, in its original purity, as taught by the Tirthamkaras has nothing in common with the

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RECONCILIATION. 1027 idea of a beginning of the world-process ; hence it is bastardlising its concept to introduce the element of a first beginning into it. The objection is thus beneath the notice of both a serious philosopher and an earnest seeker after truth. As pointed out in the chapter entitled the Siddhanta, an infinity of souls have always been found existing in the condition of impurity--in Nigoda, poetically described as the loins of Adam in the Holy Qur'an. Think of Adam's loins in the literal sense, and you will be searching from now till eternity for them in vain ; but take the expression as a symbolic representation of Nigoda, the lowest part of the man-shaped Lokakusha and you not only avoid the error committed by the commentators, but also understand the true merit of the beautiful metaphor employed by the Prophet. The above is in perfect agreement with the text which points out that all existent souls have been produced from one* Soul. The one Soul is the genus in which exist all other souls as individuals. Islam does recognise that the power of perception and understanding is not in the organs of sensation or the material body, but in the soul, whose association with the organs of sensation is the cause of their functioning. It is said in 'Al Bayan,' at page 15 : " Which of the senses in man can feel and what is it that it feels ? Is it the eye that sees? or something else that sees through the eye? Is it the ear that hears, or is it something else that hears, by means of the ear, through the hole of the ear? A shallowminded person, not looking into the truth, might unhesitatingly say that it is the eye itself that sees and the ear itself that hears, *Al Qur'an, Chapter VI.

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1028 TBE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. But inquiring minds who look into and know the truth will say that they are not the senses that do it, because they do not feel at all, neither the eyes see, nor the ears hear, though they may be safe and sound, even when the original thinker is engaged in something else or intoxicated or made insensible by means of chloroform, etc. So far as careful examination and observation show, it is manifest that understanding or knowledge is the part of mujarradat or spiritual things only." Again, at page 16 :" What we want to prove is simply this, that matter or material things, by themselves are unable to have feelings or understanding. Now think what is it in man which, through the aforesaid holes or windows, gains knowledge of the external world ? The philosophers...make a distinction between the natural functions and the actions of the will. If a fool may not make a distinction between the two, and know not black from white, it will be a deficiency of his own understanding. Find out, then, what is it that go knowledge of the external world and grasps the ideas relating to moral truths ? Now I tell you, it is nafs-i-natiqa, which in the theological language is called soul." That this is also the view taken by almost all other rational systems of religion has been already demonstrated in this book. Thus, there is no essential difference between the teaching of other religions and Islam as to the nature of the soul. As regards the question whether animals are also endowed with souls, Al Bayan does not distinctly say, in so many words, that they have one ; but the argument is there to show that they are not soul-less. At page 9 we are told : These senses are not confined to men only. God's common gift reaches generally not only to all the animal kingdoms, but also some vegetables... The circumstances surrounding the animal kingdom, their instincts, their nature, the methods of nursing their young, the skill with which they collect their food for future wwe, union among their kind, the sympathy they show towards

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RECONCILIATION 1029 their species, and apathy towards their enemies, the love of their males towards their females, their sensibility towards their benefits and injuries, and the treatment of their sick, all create wonder, from which we are certain that they have senses and other means of knowledge." Now, since matter and material bodies are regarded by the author of Al Bayan as incapable of feeling sensa. tions and performing the functions of understanding, and are looked upon as the door-ways, or windows, of the goul, and since the animals are possessed of the power of feeling and knowing, so accurately described by him, it is certain that he regards the animals also as endowed with souls. The Qur'an* itself puts the matter more emphatically than the author of Al Bayan, for it says : "Dost thou not perceive that all creatures both in heaven and earth praise God; and the birds also, extending their wings ?" What is to happen to this vast army of 'creatures' and birds, who praise Life (God) with extended wings? According to the author of ' A Dictionary of Islam,' "It is believed that at the resurrection the irrational animals will be restored to life, that they may be brought to judgment, and then annihilated." But the Qur'an itself does not support the latter half of the statement, and points out, "There is no kind of beast on earth, nor fowl which flieth with its wings, but the same is a people like unto you; we have not omitted anything in the book of our decrees : then unto their Lord shall they return."f The italics are ours. Commenting upon the popular Muslim belief about the fate of the beasts, Sale observes:I * See chapter XXIV. See chapter VI. See The Koran,' by Sale, Preliminary Dis. Sect. IV.

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1030 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "Not only mankind, but the genii and irrational animals also, shall be judged on this great day, when the unarmed cattle shall take vengeance on the borned till entire satisfaction shall be given to the injured." This seems to contradict what Hughes thinks about the popular belief as to the fate of beasts, but we are not concerned with the opinions of either Sale or Hughes. The true sense of the text is simple enough, if we read it in the light of what has been established in the previous pages of this book. There is no reference to resurrection in the text, but even if there were, that would not make any material difference, since that expression merely signifies the liberation of the soul from bondage, not an universal rising of the dead on a particular day. The statement that animals also are a people like unto men, is an authority for the conclusion that their souls do not differ from those of men in respect of their essential nature, and the fact that their deeds are also recorded in the Book of Decrees clearly shows that they are not exempt from the operation of prurabdha, the force of karmic destiny. Lastly, there is the text-'then unto their Lord shall they return,' --to show that the animals* also are not debarred from the attainment of the great Ideal in Nirvana. Thus, there is no doubt whatever that the true interpretation of the Qur'an not only does not conflict with the * The return of the animals 'unto their Lord' clearly means the attainment of perfection by their souls, in the course of transmigration, not their resurrection in their present unevolved condition. The idea that the beasts shall appear'unto the Lord, kicking and butting and making a mess everywhere, and only to be destroyed by the order of their maker, is too absurd to be entertained for a moment.

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RECONCILIATION. 1031 doctrine of re-incarnation, but actually supports and upholds it. Indeed, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion that no consistent philosophy of Islam is possible which does not include transmigration as an article of faith. This finishes our survey of the philosophy underlying the religion of Al Qur'an. There remains the question of the ritualism of Islam, which is of a very simple type, consisting, as it does, in prayers, fasts, alms-giving and pilgrimage. These all aim at the purification of mind, and, as such, are steps in the right direction, though taken by themselves they are quite insufficient to enable the soul to attain nirvana. We may now turn to the objections raised against the Qur'an by non-Muslim writers, which have been specified on page 989 ante. (1) The first category refers to the errors of the Qur'an. But, as we have pointed out more than once in the course of the preceding pages, the contradictions in the description of persons and the accounts of their doings are due to a desire to guard against an historical interpretation of the traditions. They might, no doubt, be due to the Prophet's ignorance of these traditions, as Tisdall and other European writers maintain, but we prefer to believe that the non-historical hypothesis furnishes the better explanation of the two. We explained one of such contradictions in reference to the crucifixion of Jesus in the chapter on resurrection, and probably the same method would yield satisfaction in respect of inost of the remaining contradictions between the Bible and the Qur'an.

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1032 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (2) The above observations also apply to the fables of the Qur'an. As a matter of fact, fables form no part of any religion ; they are either statements of facts which occurred at some time, in the past, or mythologies intended to train the minds of the people in religious doctrines. When missionary writers object* to such accounts as show that the wind fran' gently at the command of Solomon, they forget that the wind also obeyed Jesus Christ (Luke, VIII. 23 & 24). (3) The geography of the Qur'an is, if anything, incomplete, as we had occasion to point out ere this. In its most complete form, the geography of the universe exists only in Jainism. European writers go wrong when they think it is the geography of our little planet, the Earth. As a matter of fact, it embraces the whole of the universe, visible and invisible both. Knowing this, one can only smile at the following statement in the 'Selections from the Qur'an': "With regard to geography, Muhammadan writers acted like the Hindus. They sat in their houses and framed seas and continents out of their heads." (4) In respect of the fourth category also, the Qur'an cannot be found fault with any more than any other mystic Scripture. Mr. Murdoch objects to the following passages, on the ground that they are incompatible with the dignity of God, who cannot be said to lead men astray : (i) "Whomsoever God shall direct, he will be rightly directed ; and whomsoever he shall lead astra y, they shall perish." (ii) "He whom God shall cause to err shall have no direction." (iii) "Verily, I will fill hell with jinns and men altogether." But Mr. Murdoch forgets that these passages are *See Murdoch's 'Selections from the Qur'an,' p. 134.

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1033 directly supported by the Holy Bible itself. The following from the book of Isaiah (XLV. 6 & 7) is admissible on the point : "That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none besides me. I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light, and, create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I, the Lord, do all these things.' RECONCILIATION. The Italics are ours. After the battle of Bedr it was said (Al Qur'an, chap. VIII): "And ye slew not those who were slain at Bedr yourselves, but God slew them." -- This compares well with the following from the Bhagavad Gita (Disc. XI.): "Conquer thy foes, enjoy the wealth-filled renown. By me they are already overcome, Be thou the outward cause, left-handed one. Drona and Bhishma and Jayadratha, Karna, and all the other warriors here, Are slain by me. Destroy them fearlessly. Fight! thou shalt crush thy rivals in the field." As a personification, the essence of Life, the Living Reality, is only one and indivisible, however much It may manifest Itself through innumerable forms. Hence, whatever is done is done by god, there being no one else to do anything at all. So the Qur'an teaches that there is none to intercede with him, and the Bible propounds : "I am the Lord, and there is none else."-Isaiah, XLV. 5. Many a time is the nature of the essence of God described in the Qur'an, but nearly always in the same 94

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1034 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. words.--' that which heareth and seeth.'* There are no qualifying words, or phrases, and their sense is plain to anyone who cares to think for himself. This is sufficient to show that Mahomed held the soul to be divine in its real Essence. The current Muslim interpretation to the contrary cannot be arrived at without the addition of certain words to the text; but this is opposed to the rules of interpretation, according to which the plain sense must be ascribed to the words in all cases, so far as possible. Besides, there is no reason why the author of these passages should not have used the correct expression himself, if his sense was different. Their true interpretation not only removes the repugnance in the theologian's view, but also renders the text in accord with sound philosophy, and reconciles it with other texts in the Qur'an itself. (5) So far as the fifth objection is concerned, we have already pointed out that the principle of resignation to one's destiny implies an active attitude of the soul which is not compatible with fatalism. Even here the objection is futile. But in saying this we wish to guard against being misunderstood by our brethren of Islam. There is such a thing as destiny, * Cf. the following from the Bhagavad Gita (Disc. XV. 15): sarvasya cAhaM hRdi saniviSTo matta:smRtinimohanaJca vedaizca sarvairahamevavedo vedAntakRdavideva cAham // 15 // Tr..." And I am seated in the hearts of all; From me are memory, knowledge (perception) as well as their loss; It is I who am to be known by all the Scriptures (Vedas). I am indeed the author of Vedanta and the knower of Vedas."

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RECONCILIATION, 1935 which is sure to lead some jinns and men into hell, as one of the verses in the Qur'an correctly points out; but this destiny is not the mandate of a super-human being, who arbitrarily and capriciously determines and seals the fate of his creatures, and foredooms some to eternal damnation in hell, and decrees to others the enjoyment of Olympian bliss. Destiny is nothing other than prarabdha, and means the potential karma of the past life, or lives, of the soul which is beginning to be actualized. It is hardly necessary to enlarge upon the theory of karma now, since the whole subject has been dealt with in the preceding chapter. (6) In reference to the religious intoleration of the Qur'an, there is little doubt that jehad is not an essential feature of Islam, as a religion, since Mahomed was led to proclaim it only after years of the bitterest persecution. The doctrine has been incorporated in the Book only on account of the inability of its compiler to distinguish between the different aspects of the personality of the Prophet, who was, at least in the later years of his life, a public preacher, a statesman, a pater familias and a law-giver, at one and the same time. Our friends, the Mahomedans, should by this time understand that true jehad is waged against kufr, i.e., those tendencies and inclinations which prevent the soul from turning towards the Self, but not against the kafir (an infidel), because the destruction of the former leads to bliss, and that of the latter only to hell. True Jehad, thus, is always against one's own lower, i.e., carnal self, never against another. It will profit us to bear in mind what Jesus said as to the power of the sword :

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1036 "All they that take the sword shall perish with the sword' (Matthew, XXVI. 52). THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE, (7) The perpetuation of slavery is certainly against the divine origin of the Qur'an, and the authorship of the passages countenancing and legalising it must be ascribed to Mahomed, the lawgiver, not to Mahomed, the Seer. (8) The punishment of theft and other offences provided for in the Qur'an is also against the dictates of conscience. This also cannot be said to have been prescribed by Mahomed, the Prophet. (9) The same is the case with regard to the laws of marriage and the libertinism allowed by the Qur'an. Possibly, the rules laid down by Mahomed with respect to these matters were intended only to control the greater laxity and wholesale libertinism which might have prevailed in Arabia in his time. It might also be that political considerations did not permit the imposition of greater restrictions on the people. Mahomed's fault, however, is that he openly countenanced evil. He should not have compromised matters. The excuse that the exigencies of a life constantly imperilled by circumstances beyond his control justified this kind of legislation, might be open to a politician, but it is no defence for a prophet. The fact is that Islam has always looked upon marriage as a civil contract, never as a sacred relation formed for life. Disregardful of the opinion of the outside world, which it defied with the sword, it framed its laws only to prevent internal friction and lawlessness. Hence the following in the Sura Maarij: "And who abstain from the carnal knowledge of women other than their wives, or the slaves which their right hands possess

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RECONCILIATION. 1037 (for as to them they shall be blameless; but whoever coveteth any woman besides these, they are transgressors)." The unrestricted power of divorce which the husband enjoys under the Mahomedan Law is also the outcome of the notion that marriage is merely a civil contract. Religion has, as a matter of fact, been always hostile to the very idea of divorce, not on the ground, as some might suppose, of its being a violation of the commandment of a super-human god, but for the reason that all relaxations of restrictions on libertinism and sensuality interfere with the spiritual advancement of the soul, retarding its progress and leading it to regions of suffering and pain after death. Even the re-marriage of widows is forbidden by religion, on this ground. Hard as this rule may seem in certain cases, it is nevertheless one framed in the interests of these individuals themselves, for those who aspire to the attainment of Nirvana have to practise much severer types of self-denial than abstention from marrying a second time. Sexual passion is a powerful foe of the soul, and has to be overpowered before it becomes too strong for control. Our observations against the re-marriage of widows have, however, no application to the cases of those unfortunate victims of social tyranny who are known as virgin-widows. In the eye of Religion they are still unmarried though forced to drape themselves in a widow's weeds. Religion would be a nuisance if it ever countenanced the perpetuation of the cruel injustice of forcing little children into matrimony, by enjoining a life-long mourning on an unfortunate child whom an unholy, inhuman custom declares to be a

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1038 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. widow. In her case there is no question of breaking the nuptial vow, of sullying the virgin purity of the heart or of prostituting the body to the embraces of another than the man deliberately accepted, in the name of Gods, as the sole companion, in weal or woe, and the only exception to the absolute impregnability of feminine modesty. Thus, no one can seriouly deny that the considerations which apply to the case of an ordinary widow have not the least application to those of little children forcibly joined in the unholy bonds of unlawful matrimony by parental tyranny; and it is really high time now that people made up their minds to give up, once for all and for ever, a custom of such evil repute and consequence as child-marriage has proved to be. So far as female slaves are concerned, happily the question of their rights and privileges does not arise under the present conditions of society; but the passage from the Sura Nisa which 'legalises' an unlimited number of slaves to every true believer is there to show that Muslim legislation concerning domestic matters is grounded upon a purely materialistic conception of life, and, consequently, falls short of the spiritual ideal of self-denial which religion insists upon. (10) Under the tenth head fall the contradictions in the Qur'an. Some of these are, no doubt, difficult to reconcile; but their explanation is to be found in the different capacities which their author filled at different times of his life. (11) The eleventh objection bears reference to Muslim mythology. But we need merely state as to this

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RECONCILIATION. 1039 that mythology appears ridiculous only when read from the standpoint of history. The additional objection raised against Islam is with reference to the doctrine of sacrifice. The observations we made in reference to the principle underlying the doctrine, in the eighth chapter of this book, are sufficient to show that the Maliomedans have not understood the true sense of the teaching in this respect. Junayd once asked a man who had returned from the pilgrimage to Mecca : "When you reached the slaughter place and offered sacrifice, did you sacrifice the objects of worldly desire ?" The man replied that he had not, whereupon he was told : " Then you have not sacrificed at all." Our survey of the tenets of Islam is now complete and justifies the statement that the Holy Qur'an, when purged of the element of allegory and mysticism, and of the tendency to personify elements and essences, that is characteristic of all religions of the mystical type, contains the seeds of the true philosophy of the Science of Salvation, though, owing to the spirit of compromise, which the Prophet was led to adopt on political and social considerations, truth is not to be found in his sayings in its naked grandeur and majesty. We may now conclude the subject of transmigration, and say that not only is the doctrine a perfect truth of philosophy, but has also been recognized by the founders of the principal religions now prevailing in the world, including Christianity and Islam. Even Sikhism is no exception to this, as its teachings show (see ' A Dictionary of Islam,' p. 590).

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1040 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. We now come to the differences of opinion about the being of The Evil One. Those who believe in his existence regard bim as an angel of evil. According to the myths which have gathered round his personality, he is said to have been ordered to prostrate himself before Adam, but he refused to obey the command, and the "Lord God," in consequence of his refusal, bestowed the kingdom of hell and evil upon him. Since then the sole aim of the Evil one has been to throw temptation in the way of the pious devotees of God, and to lead them astray, for which reason he is called the Tempter. The Mahomedans, the Christians, the Zoroastrians and some others believe in this traditional devil, in different forms. In the Old Testament, Satan appears on the scene very early, and is shown as one of the principal dramatis personae in the tragedy of the Fall. Innumerable are the accounts of his deceiving mankind, and many of them appear, at first sight, to be exceedingly conflicting. According to the Book of Job, he used to attend upon the Lord along with the Sons of God. Job, it seems, owed his misfortunes more to the decrees of the Lord than to the evil nature of Satan (Job, I. 6-12). The Lord God himself gave power to Satan over the family and possessions of Job, and the latter, be it said to his credit, did not exceed his instructions. In the book of Exodus, the Lord sends Moses to intercede with the Pharaoh for the freedom of Israel, brings plagues and pestilence on the Egyptians, and yet himself hardens the heart of the tyrant time after time; in other words, plays the part of the Devil himself.

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RECONCILIATION. 1041 The Qur'an and the Bible are silent as to the origin of this Evil Power, but Zarathushtra is said to bave pointed out that he is one of a pair of twins which exist from all eternity. He declared : "In the beginning there was a pair of twins, two spirits, each of a peculiar activity, and these two spirits united created,.............one the reality, the other, the non-reality."* Mythologically, these twins, or two spirits, each with its peculiar activities, which are inseparable from one another, represent Will and Intellect. Starting from the assumption of a first beginning of things which is characteristic of mysticism, two kinds of light have to be recognized as the causes of manifestation, namely, delight and its reflection, light. Accordingly, the Devil is an angel, but of darkness, i.e., of dark light, as distinguished from true light, that is, de-light. Islam and Christianity regard him as a creature, probably because of their monistic aspiration ; but Zarathushtra, recognizing the co-existence of Good and Evil, considers him to be eternal. Hence, light and de-light, that is to say, Good and Evil are twins, in his system of theology The refusal of Satan to bow to 'man' can be explained in two different ways. Firstly, he is a reflection, as shown above, and therefore, by nature, incapable of self-activity; hence, he can only bow with his original, never otherwise. And, secondly, in its psychological aspect Intellect is the tutor of Will, hence, entitled to object to prostrate itself before its pupil, here represented by Man. But whatever the true explanation of the myth, it is certain that the command to Satan to prostrate * Yasna 30%

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1042 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. himself before man is indicative of the divinity of the soul to whom the human incarnation furnishes the coveted opportunity to become like Gods. As pointed out earlier, the cause of bondage, suffering and hell is the pursuit of good and evil of things; hence the kingdom of hell and evil is said to have been conferred on Satan as the custodian of that kind of knowledge. Again, since the tendency of intellect is in the direction of doubt, in the first instance, and not in that of faith, the Evil One is said to be the enemy of the faithful. For the same reason, he is said to 'go to and fro,' and walk up and down' in the earth (Job, I. 7). The emphasis is on doubt which sways the Will now in one direction, and again in another. Dhu'l-karnein, the mythical person about whom Mahomedan commentators have ventured all sorts of fanciful speculations, is simply the intellect personified as an incarnated embodiment of Evil and Power. He is a wanderer, belongs to the class of horned beings, and reaches the con fines of the Eust and the West. He is also said to have reached the place where the sun sets, and to bave found it to set in a spring of black mud. Here, the horns are indicative of the evil tendency, the confines of the East and the West' refer to the entirety of the field of knowledge of good and evil, and 'wandering' suggests search for experience. The end of intellectualism is the discovery of the fact that 'the sun sets in a pool of black mud.' As the Sun is the symbol of Spirit and the pool of black mud of matter, the discovery of Dhu'l-karnein is indicative of the nature of the two kinds of substance, the jiva and ajiva, which are the final causes of the universe.

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1043 Dhu'l-karnein is also said to have built a wall to keep off two terrible monsters from preying upon the neighbouring countries in the North. These monsters, Gog and Magog by name, represent certain evil tendencies of the soul, probably, the carnal lust and egoism. The people for whose benefit the wall was built are described as those who could scarce understand what he said to them. These are they who follow the path of faith, hence incapable of comprehending the language of discriminative intellect. The idea is that Gog and Magog are prevented from invading the domain of Right Faith till the Judgment Day, which is equivalent to the Greek Kalends in rhetoric. The whole account thus appears to be a beautiful allegory describing the functions of intellect in its two aspects, i.e., as Tempter and Protector. RECONCILIATION. In comprehending the true nature of intellect we ought not to hastily jump to the conclusion that its sole function is to mislead mankind. As stated in the chapter on the fall, it is not the intellect that is bad in itself, but only its employment solely to determine the good and evil of things for our worldly ends. It is the tutor of will, it is true, but its pupil is by no means a docile, submissive child, as many would like to believe. Its helplessness before the freedom and explosiveness of its pupil is foreshadowed in the command to prostrate itself before him. It can only teach him knowledge which is agreeable to his disposition, and though it never fails to give the necessary warning when he takes a wrong step, it is powerless to prevent him from pursuing his own incli

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1044 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. nations.* It, however, does not desert him even then, and eagerly awaits its opportunity to lead him in the right direction. Hence, when the soul is disgusted with the pleasures and pursuits of the world, intellect at once draws its attention to its real nature, and points out its own short-comings. The language of Zarathushtra himself is clear as to the holy nature of intellect, even in its personification of the Evil One. He says: "I will speak of the Spirits twain at the first beginning of the world, of whom the holier thus spake to the enemy: Neither thoughts, nor teachings, nor wills, nor beliefs, nor words, nor deeds nor selves, nor souls of us twain agree." Here, Zarathushtra regards both Will and Intellect as Spirits, and considers them both holy, bringing out the distinction between them by describing Will as the holier of the two. That he is right in his description, is quite clear from our analysis of these faculties in the ninth chapter of the this book. It is also possible to regard these eternal twins as spirit and matter, since the latter is also liable to be personified as Evil, tending as it does to lead men away from God and to make them worship itself instead. The seducements of the Temptress consist in the fascinating forms which it eternally displays and with which it lures * Cf, the following from chapter XIV of the Qur'an: "And Satan shall say, after Judgment shall have been given, verily God promised you a promise of truth; but I deceived you. Yet I had not any power over you to compel you ; but I called you only, and ye answered me : wherefore accuse me not, but accuse yourselves. I cannot assist you; neither can ye assist me. Verily I now renounce your having associated me with God heretofore." + Yasna 452.

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RECONCILIATION. its admirers; hence, Satan is said to be constantly engaged in seducing mankind in different forms. Those whose ideals are confined to material happiness may, thus, be said to worship the Devil. Now, inasmuch as the worship of matter is frought with harm and spiritual degeneration, and leads to hell, the devil is said to lead men into hell, which, for that reason, is called his kingdom. However, evil lies in the pursuit of matter, not in matter itself. When we look at the allurements which it throws in our way, in the shape of the attractions of the senses, and forget that but for it there could be no world at all, we begin to fear the gentle Mother of all as if she were a monster of Evil. Forms must exist, because matter exists; but if we allow ourselves to be tempted by them, it is our own fault, not that of matter. Man, in his shallow conceit, is only too anxious to throw the blame for his own misdeeds on some one else, and since his unwholesome dread of supernatural agencies does not permit him to accuse the being whom he places at the head of the affairs of the world, there is no one else to be made a scape-goat of but intellect or matter. Evil, however, is a relative term, and lies only in our inclinations and pursuits, not in intellect or matter. 1045 That apart from our own inclinations and pursuits there is no such concrete existence as Evil, is beautifully brought out in the allegory of the Emancipation of Israel from the bondage of Pharaoh, the Egyptian. The same Lord appears to both Moses and Pharaoh, yet in one instance, he works for good, and in the other brings about the ruin of a whole nation. The idea which the narrator desires to impress on our minds is that the Lord is neither

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1046 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. good nor bad in himself, but appears differently to different persons according to their individual dispositions. Moses finds him the giver of freedom and joy, on account of his own goodness, while Pharaoh sees nothing but his evil genius in him, due to his own perversity. As a matter of fact, evil is not altogether devoid of utility, and may be used for our uplifting and betterment. The account of Job's trial and suffering is a beautiful illustration of this principle. Will is the essence of life, and is developed by fighting against evil. Self-denial, i.e., the curbing of desires, the stamping out of evil passions and inclinations, has to be practised, so that the power divine might be freed from its bondage, and nothing enables the Will to manifest its true Divinity so much as a fierce struggle against adversity. The function of evil in nature is not to cause us suffering and pain exclusively, but also to furnish us with an opportunity for building up our moral character, to become perfect like the Father which is in heaven.' We ought to remember that "the Gods in bounty work up Storms about us, That give Mankind occasion to exert Their hidden Strength, and throw out into practice Virtues that shun the day, and lie conceal'd In the smooth seasons and the calm of Life."-Addison. Virtue is Life, and, as such, is truly its own reward ; it is no authority for putting on an air of injured innocence, or for a display of hypocritical martyrdom. The righteous are ever tranquil in adversity; they care not for the mock, impotent sympathy of their kind ; nor do they deviate, in the least, from the strict path of truth and rectitude. Cheerfully do they welcome adversity when it comes, believing that

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RECONCILIATION. 1047 "the good are better made by ill: As odours crush'd are sweeter still!" And, when the trial of their moral character has proved their worth, the Voice of Love sweetly whispers in their ears, "Ye good distress'd! Ye noble few! who here unbending stand Beneath Life's pressure, yet bear up a while, And what your bounded view, which only saw A little part, deem'd evil, is no more; The storms of wintry Time will quickly pass, And one unbounded Spring encircle all."-Thomson. So long as man identifies himself with his material body, there is evil for him. Good and evil have no existence for the Siddhatman; they exist only in the imagination of the sinful man. Where the spirit is impervious to adversity, bodily suffering cannot retard the progress of the soul. The arrows of adversity do not penetrate the man of renunciation, for he has nothing to grieve for; but they pierce to the core the man of the world, because of his selfishness. We have seen how evil is caused by our own actions and how it may be converted into good by the emotions of equanimity and love. In the following beautiful passage Mrs. Annie Besant gives us her idea of the life which is worth having : "No life is worth the having which is filled only by selfish thought and cold indifference to the wants of the world around. That life is only fit to grow in the heavenly places which is a life of sharing, of giving of every thing that one has gathered. And there is this jovous thing about all the real goods of life: the goods of intelligence, of emotion, of art, of love-all the things which are really worth the having-that they do not waste in the giving ; they grow the more, the more we give. These physical things get smaller as we

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1048 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. take away from them, leaving so much less for future use; and so, when it is a question of sharing the physical things, men calculate and say: 'I have only enough for myself, for my wife, for my child. How can I give any away?' All that is matter is consumed in the using; but that is not true of the higher things, the things of the intelligence, of the heart, and of the spirit. If I know something, I do not lose it when I teach it. Nay! it becomes more truly mine, because I have shared it with one more ignorant than myself ; so that you have two people enriched by knowledge, by the sharing of a store that increases, instead of diminishing, as it is shared. And so with all taat is worth having. You need not fear to lessen your own possessions by throwing them broadcast to your hungry fellowmen. Give your knowledge, your strength, your love ; empty yourself utterly, and when for a moment you think you are enipty, then from the inexhaustible fount of love, and beauty, and power more flows down to fill the empty vessel, making it fuller, and not emptier than it was before" ("When A Man Dies Shall He Live Again', page 17). The lives of all great men teach us the same principle. Of Jesus it is said that he was constantly radiating virtue to heal the sick, to restore the mai med and to revive the dead, and yet his powers were never exhausted. He even taught his disciples : "Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils; freely ye have received, freely give."-(Matthew, X. 8). It is the one function of will to radiate peace, power and harmony all round. Saints and sages never check, but always increase its radiations, and, thus, acquire inexhaustible powers themselves. The selfish, worldly man, not knowing the peculiar virtues of the Essence of Life. grudges its outgoing radiations, and regards the operaticn in the light of a loss. The solar plexus in the body is the centre of Life which unceasingly radiates' virtue' all round. Health, bodily and mental, life and joy are the result of this

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RECONCILIATION. 1049 free radiation of Life. This silent, steady radiation, in a spirit of Goodwill and Love, transmutes enemies into friends, evil into good, disease and sickness into health, and poverty into wealth. The man who is selfish, who loves himself more than his neighbour, who is cruel, vicious or intemperate, interferes with the free activity of his solar plexus, which is known in Sanskrit as 'Swadishtan' (the abode of the Self). When such evil thoughts are persisted in for a number of years, the mind and body lose their virility in consequence of the poison of evil, and a process similar to that of the winding up of a going concern takes place. Life, instead of expressing itself, begins to shut up shop, till gradually the premises are vacated and shutters put up. The following story well explains this principle. There was a money-lender's firm which did excellent business, and was flourishing most promisingly. The director of the firm one day thought that it would be a grand idea if he could so arrange matters that inoney always came in but none went out, and so he promptly issued orders to his chief manager to stop the going out of money. The manager was stunned by the orders of the director, and sent him several messages informing him that no money could possibly come in unless the capital of the firm was allowed to circulate, but they remained unheeded by the director. Faithful to his position, the manager had to yield at last, and so he put all the money of the firm in an iron safe and locked it up. The result was that the income stopped, but not the expenses ; and as the capital in the safe dwindled, servants and creditors of the firm begau to press for 96

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1050) THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. immediate payment of their claims. Matters went on like this for some time, till one morning the director went to take some money out of the safe to pay off some of the most pressing employees and creditors, when, lo! and behold! the safe was only full of emptiness, with all its money already spent and gone. In vain did he try to beg and pray the manager to save him somehow, but so confused were his ideas that he could only curse his hard fate and abuse that faithful servant, calling him the devil, the evil one, and so forth. At last he began to march up and down the room in a state of mental frenzy, when accidentally he knocked against the iron safe, fell heavily upon its open door, and burst an artery. The lesson to be learnt from the story becomes obvious when we remember that the director of the firm is the illusory bodily self of man, the concern, the life of the body, and the good manager, the Divinity within, also called Providence, who carries out the wishes of the apparent physical ego. The director wished to shut up what he foolishly considered to be his possessions in the iron safe of selfish greed, heeded not the warnings from the Providence, and, finally, abused the same Providence for the evils which he had brought on himself, calling him the evil one and the like. Thus it is that man creates the devil for himself ; in reality the devil has no existence apart from one's thoughts. Let us now enquire into the Christian notion of sin. As early as I Kings VIII. 46 it was said : " For there is no man that sinneth not." in Romans (III. 23) we are told :" For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God."

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RECONCILIATION. Also: "For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all " (Romans, XI, 32). In Ecclesiastes (VII. 20) we have : "For there is not a just man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not." Again, in Isaiah (XLV. 6 & 7): "I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light and create darkness; I make peace, and create evil: I, the Lord, do all these things." 1051 Job declared (V. 7): " Yet man is born unto trouble, as the sparks fly upward. The question is, why is man born into trouble? Why, to use the words of Isaiah, does the Lord create evil? If he creates evil* there is an end of the matter, and man's responsibility ought no longer to be preached. What does this mean? Is the Lord to be blamed for a wanton creation of evil? Can we ascribe to him a design for creating that which we would abhor in the lowest and most degraded being amongst us? And, yet, this is what it comes to! The creator creates evil himself, is good enough to tell us that he has done so, and then turns on us, because we are evil? How absurd! But there is no escape from the dilemma. Either he did not create evil, or he did. If he did not, whence came evil into the world, since, according to theology, he is the creator of all things? But the matter is set at rest by the testimony of no less a person than Isaiah, in the passage already quoted. There remains the difficulty arising out of the mysterious conduct of the creator. He creates evil "" *The Qur'an also has it (chap. XLII): "Whatever misfortune befalleth you, is sent you by God."

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1052 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE himself, and then does his level best to remove its harmful effect! Why this change of attitude ? Was he at first actuated by the impulse which makes the cat play with the mouse? If so, why so great a solicitude for the welfare of humanity afterwards? If we call him Father, because he sent down his only begotten Son as a propitiation unto himself, what shall we call him for his catlike spirit of playing with us? Would it not have been infinitely better if he had left us uncreated ? Theology has no reasonable reply to give. The question of the origin of sin has taxed the brains of mankind from the very commencement of the dawn of discrimination, but it has remained as great a dilemma as ever to a great majority of the world. The reason for the misunderstanding lies in a defective and inexhaustive research. The moment the question is asked, 'does god create evil ?' we say, no, no, thinking that we ought not to ascribe its creation to him, but forgetting that in doing so we make him out to be a liar. He says: "I create evil;" we say he does not. The question is, does god know better, or do we? We make matters worse by saying that he means something else when he says, "I create evil," for in that case our statement comes to this that he either purposely misleads us, or is unable to express himself in plain, comprehensible language. The fact is that it is not God who deceives us, nor is he incapable of good expression, but it is we who, failing to understand the nature of the mythological personification which is represented as speaking, and of the language of the seer, deceive ourselves by perverting its sense. The fault lies in us, because we will not allow our pursuits

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RECONCILIATION. 1053 in life to leave us time to meditate on these vital problems, and are, therefore, forced to accept conclusions which are based on a defective enquiry. Let us, therefore, believe in the testimony of the Lord, when he says " ] create evil. " But what are we to think of a being who creates evil, and is then good enough to tell us that he has done so ? Should we worship him, because he is the author of evil, and, therefore, a being to be dreaded, or because he says: "Whatever misfortune befalleth you is sent you hy God."-Al Qur'an, Chap, XLII.-? He is repeatedly said to lead men astray, as will appear from the following passages from the Holy Qur 'an : 1. "Whomsoever God shall direct, he will be rightly directed ; and whomsoever he shall lead astray, they shall perish."-Chap. XIII. 179. 2. "For he whom God shall cause to err shall have no direction."-Ohap. XIII. 33. 3. "He will lead into error whom he pleaseth, and he will direct whom he pleaseth."- Chap. XVI. 95. 4. "We have created for hell many of the jinns and men."-- Chap. XVI 180. If emphasis were needed on the creation of men for hell, it is supplied by the Sura Sijda, which contains the following vei'se : " The word which hath proceeded from me must necessarily be fulfilled when I said, Verily, I will fill hell with jinns and men altogether." Since the punishment in hell is ordinarily understood to be eternal, and since there can be no worse fate for those who are sent, or are to be sent there, the question arises as to the obligation of the unfortunate

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1054 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. wretches who are to people that place of insufferable torment to worship the creator of their undeserved suffering and pain. Does Islam expect to convince mankind of the advisability of licking the hand that relentlessly inflicts the blows ? Can those who are created to fill the hell with their shrieks and yells be expected to find love in their aching hearts for the author of their everlasting misery ? Surely, the idea is too much even for a mystic ! Christianity is more or less in the same plight, since Isaiah's verse, quoted above, fixes the authorship of evil on the Lord. Zarathushtra, however, foresaw the force of the objection, and endeavoured to evade it by bringing in his twins of good and evil, and, by ascribing the creation of evil to the less holy of them. But though escaping out of the frying pan, he could not altogether avoid falling into the fire, for if the creator of Evil be regarded as the personification of intellect, he must be an aspect of his twin-spirit, the author of Good, intellect being, in reality, only a form or modification of will. The difficulty is not solved by regarding matter as the author of Evil, for matter cannot be considered as a creator and is certainly not a holy spirit. Zarathushtra's successors saw the difficulty, and tried to avoid it in different ways. Thus, Moses who introduces the serpent on the scene in the Garden of Eden does not call it the twin brother of God, while Isaiah and Mahomed carry the natural consequences of the doctrine of creation to its ultimate end, and, consequently, attribute the creation of all things, including evil, to God. The root of the error into which mysticism has fallen

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RECONCILIATION 1055 lies in the very personification* of karma as an anthropoinorphic creator. As a matter of fact, all actions which lead to good or bad results spring from souls themselves, so that they are truly the authors of their own miseries and woes. This is the truth which was fully known to the ancients, as is evident from our investigation. In course of time this simple truth was distorted by the followers of the mystic school of thought into a doctrine of creation, which reached its natural culmination in the 'inspired' utterances of Isaiah and the Prophet of Islam. The rise of mysticism itself seems to be due to the poetical genius which delights in puzzling the minds of men by the mythical creations of its fancy. The luxuriant growth of myth and legend and their widespread employment are suggestive of mythology having become, at some time in the long forgotten past, the Lingua Franca of all creeds excepting Jainism, which has always adhered to the simple matter-of-fact expression of scientific thought. When the true interpretation of the myths and legends was lost sight of by the efflux of time and the vicissitudes of human destiny, the mystically inclined mind had nothing left but the outer husk to cling to. Then arose the differences which have given rise to bitter feuds and wholesale butchery of men. Mythology seems to have found its staunchest ally in the yoga of devotion which professes to lead the soul to the goal by the shortest and cheapest route. For this reason people were delighted with it and flocked to it in large numbers. But they failed to see the far-reaching consequences which were sure to flow from concentration * See The Practical Path, Appendix, pagos 216-217, footnote.

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1056 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. of mind on a false and inadequate object. For devotion creates the worst form of prejudice in the mind, being nothing other than the constant strengthening of belief, in every possible way, in the existence and power of its object. The replacing of the true Ideal with a false and inadequate notion being thus a necessary element of the mystic's devotion, it is not surprising that his mind should stick to it with all the tenacity of prejudiced bigotry it is capable of, and shut itself out from the truth. Moreover, concentration can be of use only when it is on a subject, as distinguished from a purely imaginary personification, since the former presents an unlimited field for investigation while the latter has but a few details to offer which can be mastered in no time. Having installed the mythological personalisation in their hearts as a being, the devotees had no other alternative left but to invest it with the power to shape the destinies of all beings, now left, by the force of logic, as mere puppets in the hands of their supposed creator. Hence, the god of the devotee became the author of both good and evil. But Zarathushtra clearly saw the difficulty of ascribing the creation of evil to bis idol of devotion, and not being able to lay his finger on the root of the trouble, in consequence of his mystical inclinations, created his spiritual twins, to the less holy of whom he transferred the responsibility and blame for evil. Perhaps he was not unaware of the trouble arising from the splitting up of the creative function, but he was unable to escape from the dilemma which the school of devotional inystics has created for itself, and readily accepted the idea of the twins, since it

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RECONCILIATION. 1057 seemed to solve the difficulty, at least partially. It was at least calculated to remove the stigma of wanton cruelty and callousness from his ideal, and he was satisfied with the idea. He did not worry himself about the fact that the twins implied a primary duality, incompatible with the spirit of monistic thought, without which the god of the mystic cannot remain in full undisputed possession of the field. But later thinkers saw the trouble involved for their god in dualism, and, finding no other means of escape from the difficulty, boldly pushed the consequences of their belief to its bitterest, logical end. Hence, Isaiah did not hesitate to attribute the creation of evil to his god. Mahomed, likewise, seeing no way out of the difficulty, followed in the footsteps of Isaiah, and declared : "God misleadeth whom he will, and whom he will he guideth. Al Qur'an, Chap. XIV. 4. So far as the idea of sin is concerned, it is obvious that there can be no such thing as sin in the theological sense of the word. No one can sin against an imaginary mythological being; and since the soul is its own God, it follows that sin only signifies a wrong done to one's self. It has been shown that the soul's bondage is a condition which had no beginning in point of time, so that it cannot be the result of sin on its part. Man's suffering hitherto is the result of ignorance, but not of sin, for he is not to blame for it. But when the folly of a godless irreligious existence is pointed out to him, and also the way to salvation, and he perseveres in the path of evil, his obstinacy gives birth to sin. This is what Jesus meant when he said : 97

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1058 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. "If I had not come and not spoken unto them, they had not had sin ; but now they have no cloke for their sin" (John, XV. 22). Sin, then, is a wilful disregard of truth when it is known, or a stubborn and perverse refusal to better one's condition after the way to do so is pointed out. It follows from this point of view also that one can sin only against one's own Self. Even the Qur'an declares (chapter XVII): "If ye do well, ye will do well to your own souls ; and if ye do evil, ye will do it unto the same."* The Christ within is constantly speaking to man of his freedom and salvation, and is ready to point out the way as well. He it is who justly proclaims : " I am the way, the truth and the life." God is the ideal of absolute perfection for the imagination of man, and the Christ within is ready to manifest Himself, if we would but give Him a chance. So long, however, as we search for Him in the outer world, we display a disbelief in His presence within us, and, thus, prevent Him from revealing Himself. It is this state of disbelief which is all the sin, and its punishment consists in the non-manifestation of the Godhood of the soul, with all the ills of the flesh and worries of mind which are the necessary concomitants of such an un-godly condition. The lives of the Jaina Tirthamkaras show us the heights of glory to which man can rise by living the life enjoined by Religion proper, and we have to thank ourselves for being debarred from them now. We may now conclude the subject with the observation that man would find that all the sin he commits * Cf. " Whoso committeth wickedness, committeth it against his own soul."-Al Qur'an, chap. IV.

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RECONCILIATION. 1059 in the course of his career, as an incarnating ego, consists in his insulting his Soul by regarding another as his creator, and by paying his homage to a creature of poetical fantasies. Sinlessness, consequently, consists in a belief in the divinity of the soul itself. We may now enquire into the nature of REVELATION to which almost every religion attributes its Scriptures. Jainism, so far as we know, is the only creed which claims for its Scripture the authority of omniscient men. Many and bitter have been the quarrels which this unfortunate word--'revelation'-is responsible for ; for the disputants always take care to assert that their own books alone, to the exclusion of all other Scriptures in the world, are the repository of revealed truth, thus giving rise to a painful feeling of anger and resentment against, rather than to a sense of veneration for, the creed whose supremacy they would like to assert and establish. But nobody, it seems, understands the nature of the thing which they all unblushingly invoke in their aid. The misunderstood or half-understood Word of Law in the hands of fools and dunces, thus, becomes a prolific source of hatred and strife, rather than the harbinger of blessing and peace which it ought to be. If this is the immediate effect of the power of Revealed Word, we are glad that this book has so little to do with that kind of revelation. But let us proceed to meet the argument strictly logically. Taking the case of the Bible as a concrete instance, we can say of it that it is either a revealed Scripture, or not. In the former case, the truths con

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1060 tained in it could not be known otherwise than on revelation; and since the revelation itself took place only about two thousand years ago (in the case of the teaching of Jesus, at least), it follows, that before that auspicious time, in the history of religion, they could not have been known. For, if the matters revealed were, or could be, known independently of a divine revealer, revelation would lose all its special charm and the Almighty God would stand unmarked as a false pretender, who infringed the copyright of others and passed off their plagiarized knowledge with a label of his own, calling it revealed truth. This alone must be the test of the type of revelation with which we are concerned for the present, so that if knowledge already existed, there could be no revelation of it at all, however much that knowledge might have remained unknown to any particular people in the world. But not only the New Testament, but, also, the older portion of the Holy Bible pales at the very idea of this test. For the Bible, as a whole, and apart from the admixture of the myths woven round some stray historical events of the Jewish nation, contains nothing that did not exist, prior to its compilation, in the Zend Avesta, the Scriptures of the Hindus, or those of the most ancient faith of all, namely, Jainism. And the case with Al Qur'an stands no better, for it is principally based on the Old Testament of the Holy Bible and the Zend Avesta. Even the Zend Avesta has been shown* to be derived from the Vedas which are the oldest nonJaina Scriptures extant. Which, then, can be the properly revealed Word of God, that which is the source, *See "The Fountainhead of Religion' by Ganga Prasad. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RECONCILIATION. 1061 or that which is derived from the source ? We might cite a concrete instance to illustrate our point, Jesus said, 'do unto others as you would be done by;' but long before him Confucius had made identically the same statement, and both the scriptures of the Hindus and the Parsis also insist upon its observance. Assuming that Confucius was not inspired, and that the Zend Avesta and the Vedas are not revealed books, but were compiled by men, Jesus can only be said to have imposed on the credulity of his disciples if he gave out the passage in question as a revelation. The question that now naturally presents itself with the full force of rhetoric is : How came those religions which are older than Christianity to know that which was only revealed to Jesus in the Holy Land ? Did they discover the truth for themselves, or was it revealed to them also ? But in the former case revelation becomes a pure farce; and in the latter, the claim about the Holy Bible being the only revealed Book in the world falls to the ground. * * In the midst of all this clamour for a monopoly of revelation, it is refreshing to find such utterances as the following in the Holy Qur'an itself : " Every age hath its book of revelation........The Koran is not a new invented fiction ; but a confirmation of those scriptures which have been revealed before it.... There hath been no nation, but a preacher hath in past times been conversant among them.3...I swear by the instructive Koran, that thou art one of the messengers of God, sent to show the right way. .....Say, I believe in all the scriptures which God hath sent down 5...... We have heretofore raised up in every nation an apostle to admonish them, saying, Worship God, and avoid Taghut.'......Mankind was of one faith, and God sent prophets bearing good tidings, and denouncing threats, and sent down with them the scripture in truth'." 1 Chap. 13. 3 Chap. 35. 5 Chap. 42, Chap. 2. 2 Chap. 12. * Chap. 36. Chap. 16.

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1062 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. In its true nature revelation is the instruction in truth imparted by an omniscient Tirthamkara. It is called sruti (that which is heard), because of its having been originally heard by the ear. When reduced to writing it is called scripture. The reason why so much veneration is attached to it is to be found in its absolute freedom from doubt, ignorance and error which are the three constituent elements of falsehood. For its accuracy is guaranteed by nothing other than the infinite all-embracing knowledge of the Tirthamkara, who imparts it to us not because it will serve some end of His own, but because He is moved by mercy at the sight of the suffering of living beings. Hence, the chief characteristics of a true revelation are, (1) that it should proceed from an omniscient Teacher; (2) it should be free from falsehood of any kind whatsoever; and (3) it should be the gospel of mercy, which means that it should not mislead men by dubious, cryptic expression, nor promulgate false and cruel doctrines, such as that of animal sacrifice. The reason why there is no revelation to-day when it is most needed is to be found in the simple fact that we have no Tirthamkara in our midst now-a-days, the last* of the Holy Ones having entered nirvana 2445 years ago. What this means comes to this that revelation is possible only while the Tirthamkaras are still embodied in flesh, not after They have discarded the body of flesh to enter nirvana. * According to the Jaina Scripture, the present cycle of time will end 39,555 years hence, giving place to the next, the first Tirthamkara of which will be born when 42,000 years of it have elapsed, There will be fresh revelation then in our part of the world.

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RECONCILIATION. 1063 This will become clear if we bear in mind the nature of Sruti (revelation) which means that which is originally heard from an omniscient Teacher. Now, since all that is heard is sound in some form or other, and since sound consists only in a certain kind of movement the vibratory motion of material bodies--it follows that there can be no revelation where the circumstances are not favourable for the propagation of sound waves. Hence, the Siddhatmans in nirvana, whose being consists of pure effulgence of Spirit, and who have neither a material body nor any other kind of connection with matter, cannot communicate with men. Neither do the Holy Ones entertain a desire for such communication ; for the attainment of nirvana, the ideal of Perfection and Bliss, is possible only on the destruction of all kinds of desire, and is, consequently, indicative of the state of absolute desirelessness on Their part. It is thus clear that revelation can take place only prior to the nirvana of a Tirthamkara, that is to say during the period marked at one end by the acquisition of omniscience and at the other by the entry in nirvana. Applying these observations to the different scriptures now extant in the world, it can be seen at a glance that none of the non-Jaina books can lay any claim to being the Word of God. They do not proceed from an omniscient Tirthamkara ; and none of them is free from mythology, the source of misunderstanding and strife. They are also not helpful to all souls alike, most of them being even directly and openly the cause of the slaughter of innocent animals in the name of religion itself.

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1064 In this connection let it be further added that the utmost confusion has resulted in the non-Jaina religions from an indiscriminate incorporation in their sacred books of all sorts of contradictory and discordant utterances of half-illumined men, believed to be possessed of prophetic inspiration. Their knowledge is not derived from even true clairvoyance; but most of them seem to have developed what is known as ku-avadhi (false or imperfect clairvoyance) to the Jaina writers. In many cases fragments of fanatical or oracular speech by religious enthusiasts and mediums have also been known to be treated as divine revelation. Many of the messages said to have emanated from God are so full of indications of human frailties, passions and weaknesses that it is impossible to believe that Wisdom was responsible for them. The truth is that prophetic inspiration is no exception to the psychic law, and has its origin in the Subjective Mind. Many of the prophets of the Old Testament epoch were men not particularly noted for their renunciation, or wisdom, and were, consequently, subject to all or most of the faults and frailties of common humanity. Besides, they were seldom free from the taint of selfishness, their inner communion being at times even necessitated by their social and political environment and conditions. The effect of all these drawbacks was that when they entered into the presence of the Soul, they invariably did so wearing the tinted spectacles of national and personal prejudices, and, therefore, what they saw was not the pure Truth as it exists in and for itself, but as it appeared to them through the colour of their glasses. Hence the Jewish conception of Jehovah as a THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RECONCILIATION. 1065 militant god, delighting in bloodshed and strife, ever ready to get angry on the slightest provocation, and equally willing to be appeased by sacrificial blood-a god who constantly formed resolutions and then repented of them (Genesis, VI. 6; Exodus, XXXII. 14). Another form of the effect of prejudice is to be found in the fact that when religious clairvoyants find their vision penetrating beyond the physical plane they invariably see things according to their beliefs, e.g., the Mahomedans find the heavens and hells as depicted in the Qur'an, the Christians, as they are described in the Bible, and others, according to their individual beliefs. It cannot be that the same scene changes for different individuals or from time to time, but it may well be that the differences lie in the spectacles which the 'seers' put on, before starting on their clairvoyant expeditions. The explanation of these and similar errors is to be found in the undisciplined lives led by many of the so-called prophets. When people eat animal flesh and drink intoxicating liquors, they cannot but absorb their impurities, and if they happen to enter the yogic trance at a time when their minds are loaded with the filthy emanations from the animal carcasses and alcoholic fumes, they unconsciously impart the colour of their own desires, thoughts and prejudices to the subjective phenomena their subtler vision perceives. As Annie Besant holds, "If you want to see it justified, turn back to the records of Mystics and Saints, whose religions did not impose on them a strict discipline of Life. You will find much of unbalanced thought and judgment, much of hysterical emotion, mingled with a splendid insight into the worlds called invisible, and a marvellous response 98

Page #1087
1066 to the powers coming from beings of the higher world. That is so unchallenged, so unchallengeable, that some psychologists have used it as a proof that all religious higher vision is really a form of hysteria, and that all great Saints and Prophets and Teachers of religion are more or less unbalanced, when they have come into touch with the invisible worlds. If you would search safely, if you would keep your balance, your nervous system strong and sane and healthy, then you must be willing to pay the price that all have paid in the past and are paying in the present, that when they affront those keener vibrations, when they allow them to play upon their body, and especially on the brain and the nervous system, they must take up a life different from that led by men and women of the world, and must be willing to tune up the instrument on which the melodies of the Spirit presently are to be played."* THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Isaiah points out : "But they also have erred through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way; the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink, they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink; they err in vision, they stumble in jndgment. For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so tha there is no place clean" (XXVIII. 7 and 8). Joel puts it: "Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine; for it is cut off from your mouth" (1.5). The new wine' referred to is the wine which exhilarates, but does not inebriate; it is the ecstasy of Self-contemplation, the masti (intoxication) of ananda, that enlivens the soul but does not rob it of consciousness. He who would aspire for spiritual unfoldment must first break his connection with this curse of 'civilisation,' which, as Isaiah declares, is the cause of error in vision and judgment. This is why wine is strongly condemned by Jainism. The Mahomedans also forbid its use. *Initiation,' pages 38 and 39.

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1067 The case with meat is not a whit different; it does not make one unconscious, but all the same renders the finer matter of the nerves impure, and, thus, stands in the way of the full development of spiritual power. Prophetic vision, thus, cannot be perfect till the impurities deposited by animal flesh and intoxicating liquor are not removed from the system. RECONCILIATION. In order, therefore, to understand all the discrepant writings of the different prophets one must first of all find out the degree of purity of life attained by them. Thus warned, the reader is not likely to become confused by the bewildering mixture of truth and falsehood which he will come across in the records of prophetic inspirations, and will not lose his balance of mind in the presence of such utterances as: "My words are not contrary to the word of God, but the word of God can contradict mine and some of the words of God abrogate others (Jabir). Muhammad said, 'some of my words rescind others, like the Kur'an' (Ibn Omar)*." It is not the word of God which is ever abrogated, but the word of man erroneously ascribed to God. So far as mythology is concerned, there being no question of revelation concerning it, it is clear that when the myths and legends of two creeds are found to be the same, in principle and form, the younger of the two must be deemed to have borrowed its stock, directly or indirectly, from its elder sister. It is for this reason that we find it impossible to agree with Mr. Mahomed Ali+ when he denies that *Sayings of Muhammad,' p. 10. + See, 'The Divine Origin of the Holy Qur'an,'

Page #1089
1068 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. Zoroastrianism and other religions bad anything to do with the teaching of Islam. When he insists on direct proof of Mahomed having derived his wisdom from the Zoroastrians, the Jews and others, he forgets that most of the legends and aphorisms of religion were the common property of the people at large, having been related, times out of number, at halting places of caravans, by beggars at the roadside, and by hermits and monks of different faiths who had their monasteries in the neighbouring countries, to say nothing of those who used to travel abroad in search of truth. Unless we believe that the Prophet's mind was an air-tight compartment in which nothing from outside had been allowed to enter till the completion of the Qur'an, it is not possible to think that he had not become acquainted with the things which were the common property of all alike. Rather than take up a position untenable on the face of it, it might be more profitable to lay stress on the wisdom of Mahomed, which enabled him to get to the kernel of truth in those very legends which many repeated but few understood. The position and antiquity of Jainism can now be seen to assert themselves. It does not claim to derive its authority from any mystic or unintelligible source, but bases it on the authority of the Tirthamkaras, who saw, by their power of Omniscience, the things as they actually exist in the universe, and whose statements are verified by the most searching conclusions of reason. Add to this the fact that Their knowledge enabled them to attain the summum bonum, the great Ideal of Perfection and Bliss, which is the aim and aspiration of

Page #1090
RECONCILIATION. 1069 all, and the argument in support of the claim of Jainism is conclusive. It will be seen that no amount of revelation from one who has not himself undergone the experiences and trials which the jiva has to pass through, on the Path of Liberation, can possibly be helpful to the soul, since he would lack the merit of practicality, which only a guru with actual experience can possess. Just as he who is a pure quack, or has only read about surgery in books, cannot be employed to perform a surgical operation, which must be left in the skilled hands of a qualified surgeon, so cannot he who has not had the necessary practical experience, be entrusted with the spiritual welfare of the soul. In respect of the antiquity of Jainism, it is sufficient to say that if it be true that the ideal of perfection and bliss is realizable by mankind, there must be a number of men who have already attained to it. The very first* of these Holy Ones, must, therefore, be recognized to be the founder of the true religion which his teachings constitute. This Holy Lord, the first Tirthamkara, is Shri Rishabha Deva, who was the first to establish Religion in this cycle. His teaching has been confirmed by twenty-three subsequent Tirthamkaras whose holy feet have graced our little earth, from time to time. Jainism, thus, differs from the remaining creeds in the following essential particulars :--- * This statement is to be understood with respect to the Jaina divisions of time, for otherwise in a world which is eternal the question of the first man to attain nirvana can hardly arise. The Jaina teaching is that in each cycle of time there are 24 Tirthamkarus, the first of whom re-establishes religion among men. Hence, our statement.

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1070 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. (1) It is founded by thuise who have actually attained Liberation, not by mystics vaguely impressed with truth, whose writings cannot lay claim to precision and lucidity of thought, however much we may admire them for their cryptic unintelligibility, or poetic excellence; (2) it is a self-sufficient and complete explanation of all the departments of religion, neither fragmentary nor disjointed, like other creeds, which depend on extraneous light for their interpretation ; (3) it is the only scientific Path of Salvation, which in other religions lies buried beneath an amount of obscurity almost impossible for any ordinary man to remove; (4) it is the oldest religion, being founded by the first 'Conqueror ' in the present cycle; (5) it is free from the entanglements, pit-falls and snares of mythology, wbich only lead to wrangling and feuds; and (6) it is helpful to all living beings alike. Of these six distinctive features of Jainism, the fifth deserves a word of explantion, since it is fully characteristic of the Digambara sect alone. The other sect, known as the Svetambara, is, to some extent, inclined towards mythology. The literal significance of the words Digambara (naked) and Svetambara (veiled or robed) itself suffices to explain their differences, which, however, are too insignificant to be dealt with in detail. It is not necessary to comment any further upon these features of distinction after what has been established in the previous pages ; suffice it to say that they are the true characteristics of perfection of knowledge and method.

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1071 So far as the age of Jainism is concerned, it is now admitted on all hands that it is at least about 2,800 years old the Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics Vol. vii, pp. 465-466). This implies the historicity of the twenty-third Tirthamkara, Bhagwan Parasva Nath. But modern speculation is still exercised over the historicity of the earlier Tirthamkaras whom it is inclined to regard as a fiction invented with a view to claim the lustre of antiquity for a new creed. This is, however, absurd, for, as has been demonstrated in this work, not only Jainism but even some of those very creeds which to-day range themselves in opposition to it fix the number of the Holy Ones as four and twenty. Several works of authority on Hinduism, as for instance, the Bhagwat Purana, go even farther, and bear out the Jaina tradition, mentioning the first Tirthankara, Bhagwan Rishabha Deva, expressly by name, and describing Him as a great Teacher and muni, the Conqueror of samsara, and the obtainer of moksha. His parents and descendants are also expressly named, and He is described as the founder of Jainism. Such important testimony, coming, as it does, from the hostile camps, is of the greatest value, and, being itself, as it no doubt must in some cases be, of a very ancient date, conclusively establishes the fact that the great Tirthamkaras are not pure inventions of the Jaina writers. RECONCILIATION. Besides, the ancients were noted for sincerity and love of truth, and their records breathe the purest fragrance of ingenuousness and unsophisticated candour. It is plain that no true teacher of religion can afford to indulge in what is known as fabrication of evi

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1072 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. dence, since that can only go to retard his own spiritual progress which he must be presumed to be anxious not to mar in any possible way. It is simply absurd to impute fraud and forgery to men whose lives of piety and renunciation are models for our own, and who have never been excelled in righteousness. Moreover, the ancients whose wonderful insight into the nature of things has thrown the lisping 'wisdom' of the moderns into shade, must be presumed to know that they could not hope to dupe the whole of mankind into false beliefs for ever. They must, therefore, be fixed with the knowledge that the moment the fraud was discovered their whole teaching was liable to be discarded as the word of swindlers and rogues. We refuse to believe that they would incur this risk for no purpose. Besides, it is the nature of man to claim credit for a new discovery; hence, where we find not one's own, but another's claim advanced, the case assumes an aspect of sincerity which no amount of highHown rhetoric can displace. The study of human nature is as necessary for a historian as it is for a philosopher, and so long as our historians ignore that element, they can never hope to command the respect of philosophy, however much they might applaud one another. The question of antiquity, it may be pointed out further, is of little or no importance with reference to truth, because scientific facts are not valued by the number of centuries that may have elapsed since their discovery. It does not, similarly, matter whether religion be the most ancient system or only of recent growth ; if it is true and helpful, its utility will ever remain unimpaired

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RECONCILIATION. 1073 by all considerations of age. This suffices to dispose of the speculative childish thesis of the moderns. As regards the comparative antiquity of Jainism, its priority in point of time over all other creeds is apparent from the fact that it furnishes a complete explanation of the entire subject, dealing with the problem both from the point of view of science as well as that of metaphysics. The teaching of all other religions is mythological, not scientific even in a single instance; and wherever they tend to approach metaphysics, they make it amply evident that they have no conception of the subject. It is evident that religion is a science as exact as any other that we can think of, so that whoever be its discoverer, he could not have been a primitive savage on the eve of his emergence from monkey ancestry as modern research would have us believe.* The question * The assumption that the Vedic and other mythologies are the work of primitive humanity because they were composed in an age which is known, by the relics that have been since unearthed and discovered by us, to have been characterised by the existence of men who knew nothing of the potter's, the carpenter's or the blacksmith's art, is, in the light of what has been stated in the preceding pages of this book, as much devoid of merit as the one which insists on taking these different mythologies to embody the expression of the savage admiration for wind, cloud and rain, though it might well be that certain parts of the world were steeped in deep ignorance, at the time of their composition. We are not to be taken as denying the existence of any well attested and duly established fact tending to show that at a certain period of time, in the past history of our globe, certain parts of the world were inhabited by human beings who cannot but be classed as savages. Our thesis does not clash with any such well established fact; nor are we interested in disputing the existence of the cave-man who made his implements at first from stone, and then resorted to metal. What we do dispute is the sweeping inference which has been drawn-all too hastily as it 99

Page #1095
1074 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. now is: whether Jainism borrowed from others and perfected their teachings, or whether the fragmentary, incomplete and mythological scriptures of the others are grounded upon the scientific explanation of Jainism ? The answer to this is easily furnished by the fact that the literature of mythological sects could not be would seem--by the modern investigator that all men who lived contemporaneously with or prior to the time of the cave-man of Northern Europe or elsewhere must be as uncultured as he. For the different mythologies that have been examined by us in this book prove--as eloquently and unerringly as the implements left behind by the cave-dwellers of the past - that their authors were familiar with and have bequeathed to us truths which are almost wholly beyond the comprehension of the modern man. This is sufficient to show that the prevalence of gross ignorance in certain parts of the world is not necessarily incompatible with full enlightenment in other places at one and the same time. In India every thing points to the existence, for a very very long time in the past, of full enlightenment and high culture, as in the case of Jainas, side by side with extreme ignorance and savage barbarism characteristic of certain nomadic tribes who led a wandering life in the forests, shunning civilisation, and some of whom even lived by such inhuman practices as thugee. This co-existence of high culture with extreme barbarism, it would seem, is not peculiar to any particular country or age, for we find even to-day unmitigated cannibalism and savagery prevailing simultaneously, and, in some places almost side by side, with what has been claimed to be great enlightenment and culture. Suppose our descendants, some five or ten thousand years hence, were to discover the relics of cannibalistic barbarism in certain caves among the rocks of the Dark Continent and in some way to determine their precise age; would they be entitled to conclude that the whole world in the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries of the Christian era was inhabited by men who knew no culture and ate their fellowmen? Our laboured' conclusions about the pri mitive man are exactly of the same type, and are no more valid than the one of our descendants under the above-mentioned circumstances would be.

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REOONCILIATION. 1075 grounded on the principles of truth unless those principles were known to some one already. Moreover, * Cf." Pagan Religion is indeed an Allegory, a Symbol of what men felt and knew about the Universe ; and all Religions are symbols of that, altering always as that alters : but it seems to me a radical perversion, and even inversion, of the business, to put that forward as the origin and moving cause, when it was rather the result and termination. To get beautiful allegories, a perfect poetic symbol, was not the want of men ; but to know what they were to believe about this Universe, what course they were to steer in it; what, in this mysterious life of theirs, they had to hope and to fear, to do and to forbear doing. The Pilgrim's Progress is an Allegory, and a beautiful, just and serious one: but consider whether Bunyan's Allegory could have preceded the Faith it symbolizes? The Faith has to be already there standing believed by everybody :-of which the Allegory could then become a shadow; and with all its seriousness, we may say, a sportful shadow, a mere play of the Fancy, in comparison with that awful fact and scientific certainty which it poetically strives to emblem. The Allegory is the product of the certainty, not the producer of it; not in Bunyan's nor in any other case. For Paganism, therefore, we have still to enquire, whence came that scientific certainty, the parent of such a bewildered heap of allegories, errors and confusions? How was it, what was it? "Surely it were a foolish attempt to pretend "explaining,' in this place, or in any place, such a phenomenon as that far-distant distracted cloudy imbroglio of Paganism,-more like a cloud field than a distant continent of firm land and facts! It is no longer a reality, yet it was one. We ought to understand that this seeming cloud field was once a reality; that not poetic allegory, least of all that dupery and deception was the origin of it. Men, I say, never did believe idle songs, never risked their soul's life on allegories : men in all times, especially in early earnest times, have had an instinct for detecting quacks, for detesting quacks. Let us try if, leaving out both the quack theory and the allegory one, and listening with affectionate attention to that far-off confused rumour of the Pagan ages, we cannot ascertain so much as this at least, that there was a kind of fact at the heart of them; that they too were not mendacious and distracted, but in their own poor way true and sane." Heroes and Hero-Worship by Thomas Carlyle.

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1076 religion is like a chain no single link of which can be removed or displaced without destroying it as a whole This is exactly the case with Jainism whose doctrines are pre-supposed and implied in one another, so that it is impossible to treat them as isolated fragments or bits of knowledge. It follows from this that the knowledge of truth must have existed in a scientific way before the coming into vogue of the mystery-language of mythology. The field of enquiry is thus narrowed down to the question: where did this scientific knowledge exist-whether in Jainism or among the non-Jaina creeds? But the latter have nothing to show that might indicate that they were the discoverers of truth; on the contrary, we cannot imagine them to have thrown away the kernel and retained only some crushed and mutilated fragments of the outermost shell. It is clear, therefore, that they builded their pantheons on foundations not their own. Further, when we look out for a scientific source we do not find it anywhere else but in Jainism, which is the only scientific religion in the world. Jainism, it will be seen, fully meets the situation, furnishing a complete explanation not only of the Science of Salvation, as religion might be termed, but also of the doubts and difficulties of men which have arisen from a wholesale personification of the psychic and spiritual faculties of the soul. It follows from this that the frag mentary, incomplete and mystical doctrines of the nonJaina creeds belong to a later period in the history of religion when the evil tastes and passions of men had already created a belief in the wisdom of secret instruction, and that the plain statements of the Jaina Sid THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RECONCILIATION. 1077 dhanta, free from blood-stained symbolism, confounding myths and meaningless, degrading ritual, depicting truth in its naked majesty, are those of the earliest and, therefore, of the purest religion. That truth should have been known to the so-called primitive humanity is not surprising, since knowledge is the very nature of the soul, and only requires to be drawn out by simple living and high thinking, so that the ancients who certainly lived much simpler lives than ourselves were better qualified of the two for the acquisition of wisdom divine. It will be convenient to notice here an objection which has been raised in certain quarters against our thesis on the score of language. It is said that the language of the Vedas is centuries older than that of the Jaina Books, and upon the strength of this it is contended that Hinduism must be deemed to be older than Jainism. The objection is, however, devoid of force, and in no way incompatible with the conclusions we have arrived at here. It will be seen, first of all, that the language of the Vedas is not the language of the Jaina Books, the former being couched in Sanskrit, 'the polished' tongue, and the latter in Prakrit, or the language of the masses. That being so, it is not easy to arrive at a definite basis of comparison likely to yield conclusive results. Secondly, the Jaina Siddhanta was preserved, like the Vedas, in the memory of men, and was not reduced to writing till several centuries after the nirvana of the last Tirthamkara, Bhagwan Mahavira. As Max Muller points out, the whole literature of India in the ancient days was preserved by oral tradition only.

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1078 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. According to Tiele, writing was known in India before the third century B.C., but was applied only rarely, if at all, to literature. "But all this," observes Mr. J. M. Robertson (Christianity and Mythology, p. 143), "is perfectly compatible with the oral transmission of a great body of ancient utterance. All early compositions, poetic, religious, and historical, were transmissible in no other way; and the lack of letters did not at all necessarily involve loss. In all probability ancient unwritten compositions were often as accurately transmitted as early written ones, just because in the former case there was a severe discipline of memory, whereas in the other the facility of transcription permitted of many errors, omissions, and accidental interpolations. And the practice of oral transmission has survived." Even at the present day young Brabmans are taught Vedic hymns from oral tradition, and learn them by heart. "They spend year after year under the guidance of their teacher, learning a little day after day, repeating what they have learnt as part of their daily devotion............. In the Mahabharata we read, * Those who sell the Vedas, and even those who write them, those also who defile them, shall go to hell.' Kumarila says: "That knowledge of the truth is worthless which has been acquired from the Vedas if.........it has been learnt from writing or been received from a Sudra ?' How then was the Veda learnt ? It was learnt by every Brahman during twelve years of his studentship or Brahmacharya."* As pointed out in a footnote to p. 143 of Mr. J. M. Robertson's highly interesting work already cited, this description corresponds remarkably with Casar's account of the educational practices of Druids. He tells us that many entered the Druid discipline, learning orally a * Max Muller's History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, pp. 501-3.

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RECONCILIATION, 1079 great number of yerses ; some remaining in pupilage as long as twenty years ; and this though writing was freely used for secular purposes. This then was a common practice with mankind, and the Jainas were no exception to the rule as every scholar of note now admits. According to Mr. Barth (see the Revue de l'Histoire des Religions, Vol. III, p. 90, quoted in the Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XXII, Intro. p. XXXV), the Jaina Canon existed for nearly a thousand years before it was reduced to writing. Jaina tradition, too, is quite explicit on the point, and itself fixes the date of the redaction of the Books, adding that before that time teachers made no use of books when teaching the Siddhanta to novices, but after that time they did. Thus, both Hinduism and Jainism had their literature preserved in the same way, and it is evident that priority in point of time with reference to the date of redaction can be no test of greater antiquity between them, since it is conceivable that a more recent creed might resort to writing at an earlier date than the one that is more ancient. Besides this, it is possible for an earlier system when reduced to writing to exhibit strong linguistic traits that are suggestive of later development. This is bound to happen where the rivalry is between an earlier scientific system and a later poetical one; for while the very expression and wording of the latter is fixed rigidly and unalterably once for all at the moment of its composition, the former cannot but be reduced to writing in the language current on the date of its redaction. This is precisely what has happened in the case of the Jaina Siddhanta which had a

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1080 definite system of thought but no fixed expression, except as regards the numerous technicalities occurring in it-jiva, ajiva and the like. The Vedas, on the other hand, have a fixed expression in the idiom of the date of their composition, so that whatever be the time of their appearance in writing in a manuscript form, their language would naturally and necessarily point to the period of their authors. The issue, however, is not whether the expression of Vedic hymnology was fixed prior to the redaction of the Jaina Siddhantu, but whether that Siddhanta did or did not exist on the date of the composition of the Vedic hymns? But the determination of this point is not possible by the suppositionwhether assumed or real-of the greater antiquity of the language of the Vedic poetry, for the reasons given. It must, therefore, be left to be determined by those other considerations which we have relied upon in reaching the conclusion we have arrived at. It only remains now to look into the philosophy of the much despised school of thought whose followers were termed Charvaks. These were men who followed no religion, who denied the existence of the soul, who considered it useless to waste the short time at one's disposal in this world in the study of metaphysics or philosophy, and who fully gave themselves up to the enjoyment of the pleasures which the world affords. They had little or no philosophy, and the practical side of their lifee-we might call it their religion if we like-might be summed up in the formula, eat, drink and be merry.' That this palpably wretched creed at one time acquired the dignity of a school of philosophy is not " THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.

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RECONCILIATION. 1081 surprising, when we remember that the masses love anything which allows them the free indulgence of the senses, and care not to plunge into the study of any complicated system of metaphysics, or to practise yoga austerities. Probably Epicure was a follower of Charvakism, and the same seems to be the case with the author of the book of Ecclesiastes in the Holy Bible. Much of its literature, if it ever boasted of one, is now lost, because of the hostility and opposition which it encountered everywhere in the world of thought; and, beyond a very little more than what has been stated here, practically nothing is known about its founder, literature, or philosophy. So great was the opposition which prevailed against this sort of philosophy that anyone who had at all dabbled in metaphysics, and who could anathematize a bit, never felt any hesitation in emptying his broadside into its ranks. But, notwithstanding all these disadvantages, it seems to have made a considerable impression and to have secured a fairly large number of followers for itself, at least, in the early part of its history. So far as its merit is concerned, it might be that it was not intended to be a license for libertinism and sensuality. It is not impossible to interpret its tenet--eat, drink and be merry--in a highly technical sense ; for it might be argued that its insistence on remaining merry under all circumstances rendered its practical side as hard as that of any system of severe tapas or yoga, since cheerfulness is for all intents and purposes synonymous with equanimity which is the aim of religion to develop in the soul. But if that was the real doctrine of this school, it is a pity 100

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1082 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. that it should have allowed itself to become an agency for the spread of ignorance, falsehood and sensualism which alone seem to have been included in its purview. To conclude, our enquiry has brought us to the highly satisfactory conclusion that there are no real differences of principles amongst the rational religions of the world which we have examined here. Much has been said here, in this book, which throws light on the respective merits and demerits of each system of philosophical thought, and it has been seen that all the differences that prevail amongst us are due to inexhaustive research and hasty, defective generalisations. The spirit of personification is also responsible for a great deal of mischief. It might be that the differences of opinion on philosophical matters must prevail amongst us, for all of us cannot become wise at once, but that is assuredly no ground for there being any differences, much less bitter differences, of feelings on matters religious, when the whole humanity is at one on the essentials of religious and spiritual salvation. How much nearer the attainment of our goal would we be if, instead of dissipating our energies in bigoted discussions of religious principles, which in very truth are not different but identically the same in every religion, we were to settle down to understand the truth, to work out our salvation, to realize our Ideal. It is well to bear in mind that we should impart knowledge, but only in a spirit of sincerity, sympathy and love, never in any other mood. The object is not to convict, but to convince ; and harsh words, offensive arguments, and unsympathetic tone do more damage on such occasions than perhaps

Page #1104
* RECONCILIATION. 1083 even the sword drawn in the cause of jehad. Even when you come across a stone-worshipper, do not spit on the piece of stone before him, for that stone is as dear to him as his life, perhaps even dearer, but gently raise his ideals, so that he might be qualified to worship the true God from within. Your mission, as the messenger of peace, fails if you only make the stone worshipper an enemy of yourself and of the faith wbich you preach. It is well to understand that it is reason, and reason alone, which alters the convictions of men, and leads them to give up their unreasonable beliefs. Our chief fault is that we are ready to set up ourselves as teachers of our fellow men, without ever having learnt the subject of our discourses ourselves. We should first of all remove the beam from our own eye, so that we might be able to see the mote in our neighbour's. The world has had enough of dogmas and myths already, and has no more time to waste over them. It is now time to preach the Gospel of Truth which will carry PEACE AND JOY TO ALL BEINGS.

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CHAPTER XV. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. "Religion is the vital principle of the world, since it is the first cause of all felicity. It proceeds from man, and it is by it also that man attains the chief good. From religion, birth in a good family is obtained, bodily health, good fortune, long life, and prowess. From religion also spring pure renown, a thirst for knowledge, and increase of wealth. From the darkest gloom, and every dreaded ill, religion will ever prove a saviour. Religion when duly practised bestows heaven, and final emancipation."--The Kalpa Sutra. The motor spring of all volitional activity, the secret of all kinds of passions and emotions, the cause of all thinking and acting is soley and simply happiness. There is no being, human, angelic or animal, to say nothing of other forms of life, who does not strive to obtain as much joy as he can extract from his surroundings. There is equally truly no man, deva, demon, or animal, who does not fear death. "That all men fear to die," said J. J. Rousseau, * "is the great law dominating the thinking world, and without which all living things would soon cease to exist. This fear is the natural impulse, and is not merely an accident, but an important factor in the whole order of things. He who pretends to face death without fear is a liar." Death is terrible ; it terrifies all, and few, indeed, are the souls who have courage enough left even to think on the point. A * Quoted from The Nature of Man.'

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SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. 1085 captive slave of death, and usually its victim, too, man nevertheless aspires to attain happiness, to avoid all those accidents and incidents which might directly or indirectly tend to embitter life. Alas ! how often has not this dream of everlasting joy, almost beyond the conception of the majority of terror-stricken men and women, been nipped in the bud, by the physical body being taken to be the man? Many think : death is the dissolution of form, and man (body) only a compound; therefore, is it not futile to think of eternal life? And, since eternal life is taken to be a hallucination of the deceitful fantasy, unalloyed joy also becomes a delusion of the intellect. Such is the conflict of false conceptions and high aspirations of the human soul. Dogmatism, which fears rational intellect, and, therefore, prudently reserves its insinuating eloquence for those whose minds are either too immature or too much paralyzed for consistent thought, offers to help the soul over the stile by its promises of eternal life in the hereafter. Islam, the youngest of creeds, with the exception of Sikhism and one or two other minor faiths, such as the Brahmo-Samaj, may be assumed to be the first to open fire. Asked to prove its doctrine, it declares : 'Did not the Prophet say so; is not his word sufficient? who ever dared to deny his authority?' Christianity, finding the opportunity favourable, now puts in its appearance to ask : whom would you be guided by, the servant, or the Son ? The master, no doubt, is the Son, never the servant, or messenger. Here is the chance which Puranic Hinduism has been seeking, and it quickly silences both with the statement that the Father,

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1086 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and neither the Son nor the servant, is alone entitled to be heard. Bewildered by the confusing statements of the exponents of three of the leading religions of the world, the despairing soul is ill able to determine for itself which of them it should believe. In this state of mind it is that it comes across Buddhism, the socalled religion of light, which forth with assures it: 'Believing is the source of weakness; believing is the source of pain; believing is the source of misery; therefore, avoid believing. What kind of consolation does the soul derive from this argument is beyond conception, since that would be a believing too. Imagining it, however, to be foolish enough to believe that it derives little or no satisfaction from this kind of argument, we now introduce it to Vedanta which promptly whispers in its ear the vivifying formula, the That Thou art, Beloved.' The soul now leaps up with joy, but only to fall back into the trough of despond the next moment. 'If I am That,' it thinks to itself, "surely the That can mean nothing more than a despairing soul, since I, the despairing soul, am That.' Forlorn, troubled and disappointed, it is now more than ever in need of a Teacher and Guide to lead it to Life and Light. This guide it discovers in its own Intellect, in the first instance, since without its aid discrimination between a false and a true Teacher is out of the question. Therefore, taking intellect as our sole guide, we set out on an enquiry into the nature of bappiness which is the motor-spring of human activity. Investigation reveals the fact that pure joy does not exist outside the seeker thereof. None of the objects from which we may

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SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. 1087 expect to extract it contains it within its body or magnitude, nor can any outside agency bestow it on the soul; for the very idea of dependence on another would itself furnish sufficient cause for unhappiness. Analysis discloses the important fact that he alone of all beings who can be said to be free from all kinds of restraint, obligation and desire, who, in other words, is full and perfect in himself, and whose consciousness of supremacy places him beyond the temptations of the senses, can be happy in the true sense of the word. But such a condition is conceivable only in connection with God; hence, man must become God if he would enjoy perfect bliss. Logically, the position is clear enough, but the important question which it gives rise to is : Is it possible to become God? For the human mind, imbued, as it is, with the notion of practicability, cares little or nothing at all for its logical deductions, unless it be also made clear to it that what logic points to is capable of being realized by him. We, therefore, proceed to investigate the nature of Godhood and to ascertain if the difference between God and man is such as may be said to be bridgeable. The subject plunges us at once into the very thick of the battle that has been raging, from time immemorial, between religion and materialism, by which term we mean the philosophy which denies the existence of spirits. The problem presents itself under three heads, namely, (1) God, (2) souls, and (3) the world.

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1088 As regards the first of these points, we must reject the idea of a creator altogether, since there are no sufficient reasons to prove that a supreme being is responsible for the world-process, and because no one who sets himself up as a creator can possibly have happiness in himself, and also because the idea of a creator is a self-contradictory notion. The removal of a man-like creator from the field, however, does not mean the removal of Godhood from the universe, since that is the Ideal of fulness and perfection for the soul to aspire to. THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. In respect of souls, it will be apparent to any one who cares to think for himself that the knowing subject cannot possibly be regarded as a product of matter. You cannot have blood out of stones; neither can you have consciousness out of the concourse of dead atoms. The psychological functions of memory, judgment and the like, as also the higher faculties of the Subjective Mind, unmistakably point to mind being no secretion of the brain. The dependence of the discriminative intellect on the convolutions and development of the brain is not inconsistent with this hypothesis, and merely points to the functions of the physical brain being transmissive', but not productive. The consciousness of man, and for the matter of that of all beings in the world, is, therefore, quite independent of the groupings of atoms and molecules of matter, which some of us regard to be the things which give it birth. Soul, then, is consciousness, the nature of which is to know. Analysis further reveals the fact that consciousness cannot be subject to death, since it is not 6

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SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. 1089 a compound but a simple substance. Soul is, therefore, immortal by nature. It is also easy to see that true happiness only signifies perfect freedom, and that we are truly happy only when freed from the weight, or burden, of all extraneous relations and worries and desires. Hence, soul is also blissful by nature. Thus, the three characteristics of the soul are (1) knowledge, (2) immortality, and (3) bliss. Now, since God cannot have any greater or more fascinating attributes in Him, it follows that every soul is a God in potency. The difference between God and man, therefore, only lies in respect of perfection, not in that of any thing else. Hence, God is the great ideal of Perfection which has already been attained by a number of Perfect Souls, the Holy Ones, as Religion points out. In respect of power, also, it can be seen that the soul, as a substance, must be endowed with the same attributes as appertain to God. Hence, even in respect of power there is no difference between man and God, except that between an unevolved and a fully evolved being. The capacity for infinite knowledge, infinite bliss and infinite power, which is inherent in the soul, renders it necessary that some at least, if not all the souls, should perfect themselves sooner or later; and since one earthlife does not suffice for the purpose, it logically follows that there should be as many re-incarnations as are necessary to enable one to attain perfection. In each earth-life certain experiences are undergone by the soul, and the sum-total of them is carried over in the form of character, i.e., disposition, tendencies, and the like. This quintessence of character is carried over 101

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1090 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. by the ego in what is termed the sukshma sarira in Vedanta, described as 'soul' by St. Paul (I Thes. V. 23). That there should be some such thing as transmigration of souls, is put beyond the possibility of doubt by the differences of individual character, which the thesis of heredity is unable to explain. As Hoffding says, there must be a substratum to be acted upon by variations. Immortal by nature, the soul must have had a past, just as surely as it would have a future. When we look at the formation of the child in the parent's body, we are led to the same conclusion; for there is no one to make it unless it make itself. Karma is discovered to be the determining factor of the differences of form, understanding and circumstances, and furnishes a much more satisfactory explanation of the misery and unhappiness of which there is so much in the world than the hypothesis of the creation of each soul there and then at the time of conception. So far as the world, the third subject of the metaphysical problem, is concerned, we need only say here that investigation into its nature leads to the conclusion that it is without a beginning and an end in time, though certain portions of it may undergo periodical destruction and reformation from natural causes. What, then, becomes of the position taken by Idealism which reduces the world to an illusion, pure and simple, and the infinity of souls to one Brahman? The reply is that that which persists in time and is eternal, cannot be dismissed from the mind, even though it be the purest form of illusion. The thinking and willing 'I' is eternal, and the substitution of one 'I' for all the

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SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. 1091 multitude of the concrete "l's" in the universe, is the outcome of pure logical abstraction and personification. When it is said that the outer world is devoid of reality, being merely a state of consciousness spun out from the raw material of sensations, the fact that sensation is only the resultant of interaction between the outer and inaer currents of vibrations is generally lost sight of. It is true that without consciousness nothing whatever could be known of the world, but it is no less true that the data of sensations only come from without. Hence, the objects outside in the world are exactly of the same description as they are perceived by the knowing faculty, notwithstanding the fact that errors are committed, at times, in their perception. We may now unhesitatingly answer the question which necessitated the above enquiry by saying that it is not only possible for man to become God, but that he is already none other than God, in potency. The amelioration of his condition is, therefore, a matter which exclusively rests with him; and the power which enables him to attain this end is his own indomitable will. This leads us to a consideration of the means which speedily enable the soul to come into the realization of its great ideal. Investigation shows that the soul is in the bondage of its karmas the chains of which are composed of a very subtle kind of matter. Hence, the tearing asunder of the veils of matter which go to obscure the inner spiritual illumination, is clearly the means for the realization of the Self as a being, allknowing, all-powerful and naturally blissful. Now, since these veils of matter are inaccessible to the human hands,

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1092 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and may not be destroyed by hand-made weapons of destruction, the only power which can tear them asunder is will. But the very first requisite for self-exertion is faith, since people only live up to their beliefs and seldom act in opposition to them. Hence, Right Faith, Right knowledge and Right Conduct, that is the doing of the right thing at the right moment, are the true means of liberation. Different religions have pointed out, more or less, the same methods of realization, though some lay stress on Jnana, some on Bhakti, and so forth. But the difference is only a seeming one ; in reality, they all lead to one and the same result. For knowledge, i.e., Wisdom necessitates meditation and concentration, and cannot be had without them; and conversely, meditation and concentration lead to wisdom without anything further being necessary, so that wherever there develops the habit of deep concentrated meditation, or thoughtfulness, there wisdom must, sooner or later, come into manifestation. Thus, all the different branches of Yoga, such as Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, Hatha Yoga, and Raja Yoga, are so many means for developing the habit of concentration and meditation. When the mind is steadied and gives up the habit of wandering in the pursuit of the objects of desires, it becomes quiescent, setting the soul free to study itself, which, in consequence of the quieting down of the mind, now presents the appearance of the placid surface of a lake unruflled by storm or waves, and sees itself as the source of all knowledge and power and bliss. Right Discernment, or attitude of mind, having arisen, it speedily leads

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1093 to Right knowledge, without which the observance of the rules of Right Conduct is a matter of impossibility. The Path of Emancipation, thus, consists in Right Discernment, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct, which also constitute the three priceless jewels in the crown of glory of the Emancipated Soul, that is, God. The body of karmas (the karmana sarira), which accompanies the soul in all its incarnations, is made up of very subtle particles of matter, with consciousness 'embedded' in it; and so long as this body does not break up, the soul cannot attain liberation by any means. This subtle body is held together by the magnetic power of will, and carries with it the seeds of knowledge and character in the shape of modifications of its structure, from life to life. So long as ignorance prevails, individual desires hold it together; but with the advent of wisdom, and its concomitant state of desirelessness, the pole of magnetism changes, and the particles of matter, instead of being attracted and held together, are repelled and dispersed, thus destroying the body and leaving the pure Sachchidananda in place of the limited ego which ignorance may be said to have planted on Truth. The main thing, then, is to acquire wisdom, that is, knowledge of the Self. Knowledge is power, and, sooner or later, is bound to lead the soul to the highest heights of bliss. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. The above are truly the underlying principles of every rational religion in the world; but the one creed that teaches them fully and clearly is Jainism, which, as our enquiry reveals, is the most ancient of all. The

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1094 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. difference between Jainism and other creeds, then, comes to this that while in the other religions a handful of 'corn' lies mixed up with an enormous quantity of chaff in such a manner that it is almost impossible to pick out the useful grain, in Jainism the Holy Tirthamkaras have taken the utmost care to allow only the purest truths to be incorporated. Hence, while the other religions dread the search-light of intellect, Jainism insists on its full blaze being turned on the problems of Life. Hence, also, where the other religions demand faith in the pupil, Jainism only requires the employment of intellect to understand and appreciate its teaching. It is not that where intellect is not fully developed, its teaching may not be of help to the soul, if sincerely put into practice, but that exact and scientific knowledge is necessary for speedy progress, since religious truths are at once converted into beliefs the moment they are verified by intellect. Jainism, tben, is the Path of Liberation par excellence. There remains the point of the practicability of the high ideal set by Religion before mankind. Some of us might be inclined to think that if all men were to devote their lives to religion, civilization would come to an end, and a state of general confusion and chaos would be the result. Certainly, the kind of civilization which produces abnormal men and institutions would come to an end, for when it is realized that the soul has neither nationality, nor class, nor sex of its own, and that it may incarnate in any body, in any country, and in any sex, in its next incarnation, people would pay more attention to the welfare of their souls than to such matters as

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SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. 1095 give rise to evil karmas, Wars and strikes would then become things of the past, and peace and prosperity would be the lot of mankind on earth. As for the individual, it has been seen that the ideal set by Religion before mankind is the only practical ideal to cherish; for what shall a man profit if he gain the whole world but lose his own soul ? None of our worldly acquisitions can possibly prevent the force of evil karmas from harmfully affecting the soul. Hence, only such thoughts and actions are permissible as actually facilitate its progress on the path of Perfection and Bliss. The doing of the proper dharma, that is, duty, or conduct enjoined by religion, is the only means of progress for the soul. In whatever stage of evolution an individual might be, the observance of the principle of dharma would, without fail, facilitate his onward progress on the path, because dharma is the only force which enables the soul to realize its own glorious nature. Dharma is also the highest form of morality, without which peace and prosperity cannot be thought of. The lives of the great Tirthamkaras furnish ample proof of the practicability of Religion, and show the heights of power and glory to which a soul, conscious of its own nature, may aspire. Every detail of Their noble lives illustrates the supremacy of Religion over materialism, and invites us to follow the path They trod, to reach the heights which They attained. The path may be steep and thorny, but it has to be trodden, if not now, then, in some future incarnation ; and each backward step, or fall from our present position, only goes to make the journey to be performed, more tedious

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1096 THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE. and tiresome. Let us, then, gird up our loins to tread the path of the Tirthamkaras, the path which takes us out of this dreadful valley of suffering and sorrow and death, we call our World. Let us not be daunted or discouraged by its steep and thorny nature, but, providing ourselves with the three invincible weapons of Right Faith, Right Knowledge and Right Conduct, fearlessly march on to the conquest of Ignorance and Death. The 'fall' has to be reversed, and Death is a mighty warrior who overcomes all weapons except those tempered with vairagya, i.e., Renunciation. The Fountain-spring of Eternal life, from whose enlivening waters we all would like to quench our thirst for immortality and joy, lies in the Kingdom of Death, guarded over by the King of Terrors. And the sword of vairagya is held by the Self in pledge for the knowledge of good and evil, which is but another name for body-consciousness. Come up, then, to the Adytum of the great and glorious Divinity, your own blissful Self, to claim your birth-right, the ananda, by fulfilling the conditions of the pledge, so that by its addition to the Sat and the Chit which you already enjoy, you may yourself become the perfect Sat-Chit-Ananda, which you, in very truth, already are in essence. OM, PEACE! PEACE !! PEACE !!!

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APPENDIX. Day-Dreaming to Order.* In these days of cheap printing and of cheaper opinion we do not find it in our heart to blame the dreamer" for his rushing into print with his Dream Problem.' Some might, indeed, go further and thank him, not for the discovery of anything grand, or useful, or new, nor for the promulgation of anything genuine, but for his preaching, in a quaint and not quite uninteresting way, a certain cheap and worn out method of satisfying the natural craving for happiness which arises in every heart. One is almost tempted to congratulate "the dreamer"-whoever he be, whether the brilliant editor and compiler of the book or only some shy and backward friend of his, hiding himself behind the pseudonym to escape from the inevitable and naturally unpalatable cross-examination by friend and foeon the unique distinction of being initiated, and that in a dream, by his own mental-creature of whom it is said that he was also previously "required to act as the guru of Ram Chandra, who, born of worldly parents, had utterly forgotten bis Godhood' (p. 333). That our friend's method is cheap does not admit of doubt, for one has only to turn oneself into a day-dreamer to realise the promised reward, the only other condition being that one should not pry too closely into the nature of the stuff to be supplied to him. We are sure to find the whole thing simple and fascinating, if we only agree to accept it on trust on the word of its propounders. We are assured by the compiler, his phantom preceptor, Vasishta, and several of the contributors to the book, that the matter is essentially one for experience, not for intellectual analysis or controversy. The procedure prescribed is the simplest imaginable: deny the reality of the world, get into bed * A review of the "Dream Problem" by Dr. Ram Narain, L. M. S, of Delhi, published by the author himself, price in paper cover Rs. 3.

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xviii APPENDIX and dream as hard as you can of the condition which you want for yourself, Tinged with the colour of thought, as they necessarily are, one's dreams cannot but accord with one's most predominant wish, so that you can always make them what you wish them to be. Thus if you want to be a millionaire, you need only think of your millions somewhat forcibly before going to sleep, and even if you be a veritable pauper in actual life, there is not the least doubt but that you will have all the wealth you are intent on acquiring the moment your eyes close in repose. There is the case of the convict whom Prof. Macran of the Dubin University encountered in one of the prisons at Rome. "With determined effort he succeeded in having a continuous dream having an ideal life, rich possessions, beautiful wife, virtuous children and all happiness. He turned his mind to such a belief that his working as a convict was a dream and the other a reality. He was so happy in his prison cell and used to be so anxious to go into it for sleep to meet his beautiful family" (p. 12). Dr. Khedkar (p. 42) would have it that if a person were to control his mind and remain with non-attachment in this world, he may in course of time believe this to be a dream. That is what a yogi strives to earn, * Hence, the reality of the phenomena depends on personal habits, expectations and interests for the same, The "dreamer," too, fully endorses this view when, in describing his experiments with his dream-creation, he says: "The method proved so satisfactory that the dreamer was actually worshipped by every one of the dream-creatures and was pronounced to be the only true spiritual guide. He now considered himself in no way less fortunate than so many leaders of the various faiths, in the waking world, who enjoy the pleasure of being devotedly worshipped by their disciples. They enjoy it during the twelve hours of the day, while the dreamer enjoyed it during so many hours of night, and there seemed to be no enviable difference between the two" (the compiler's own italics). No need to dilate any further on the point; the strangest thing about it is that it does not strike "the dreamer" to improve his condition here in this waking world, which he also regards as a dream, instead of drowning his senses in the false and artificial intoxication of some agreeable form of hallucination in dream. Our "dreamer," however, insists that he enjoys the waking state of con * According to Babu Shivabarat Lal, a staunch follower of the Radhaswami Faith and the contributor of solution No. II printed on pp. 67--101 of the book : "A dreamer is not a bad being......... The seers, the holy men and the prophets were all dreamers."

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APPENDIX. xix sciousness throughout his dream, and says with reference to a dialogue between himself and his shadowy guru (preceptor) which is reported on pp. 308-369 of the book : "The reader will thoroughly appreciate it if he only bears in mind, first that the scene of the dreamer's interview with the sage is laid in the world of dream and secondly that the dreamer's waking consciousness is intact thronghout the discourse." This is, however, obviously, another charming instance of hallucination, if it be meant that the dreamer is awake in the same sense in which a man consciously cognizant of the waking world is said to be awake. The dreamer' would be able to understand his psycological condition better if he would try to discriminate between two different states of consciousness, one characterised by the conditions of normal wakefulness and the other by a dreamy state in which one dreams that one is dreaming. However much the continuity of the latter condition of consciousness might remain intact-- and it is bound to do so if the dream is not to be a summation of several dreams-it can never be described as the waking consciouspess. The dreamer gives himself away when he says (p. 370) at the end of the interview: "It appears that the dreamer pressed and pressed the last question on to the sage who answered it in complete Silence by tightening his lips, closing his ears and shutting his eyes and gradually all appearances vanished, resulting in the dissolution of the dream-world. Thus ended the dream of the dreamer, who, when awakened into the waking world, was sorry for asking the last question, but he had the consolation of acquiring the power of summoning the sage at will in his dream." On page 305 is given the ending of one such 'waking consciousness' dreams in the following words: "with these words he sa dream sadhu) strack the dreamer on his head with his heavy staff, who, in consequence woke up and found himself lying in his bed with his mind extremely puzzled." The following question and answer also tend the same way, and would be meaningless in any other sense : Q. "Dreamer.--You are right in saying that I do not want my dream-body to be injured or killed, and have indeed a strong love with this personality inspite of my knowledge that it is a dream, but if I do commit suicide here, will I be awakened ?" A. "Sage.--No you wlll not be awakened, but will have another dream where you will lose even so much knowledge that it is a dream" (p. 317). As regards the possibilities of hallucination, there is practically

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XX APPENDIX. no limit to one's mental creation; one ma eate for one's satisfaction any kind of worlds-even heavens of all or any of the famous or infamous divinities-or the company of saints and saviours, if one be inclined that way, or even a happy home a la the Roman Convict of Prof. Macran. Babu Sivabarat Lal Warman, the contributor of solution No. II, writes of the dream state: "Heaven and hell a man brings into manifestation, in this plane, just in proportion to his wickedness and good deeds. What a man sows he reaps his full harvest, even in this condition. Whatever he witnessess with his mental senses here, is his own thought creation and nothing else. Friends or foes, angels or evil spirits are all thought forms, and they deal with him as he was wont to deal with others when living on the earth" (p. 72). The phantom sage also corroborates this and says: "A sinner will see a scene of hell and a pious or good man will find himself in heaven, very much like the one depicted in religious books that he has read and followed. An athiest or materialist who believes in no existence after death, will see nothingness or darkness. A devotee of any deity will find himself in the dream world of his god and enjoy the beautiful scenery of that plane" (p. 325). Touching the return of the dead, the following words of wisdom flow from the shadowy lips : "But remember that the dead do not return in their original personalities. What people see is kalpit or a mere phantom of their own creation and it is why a large number of devotees can see the same guru or deity at one and the same time. Such occurrences or seances do not differ from dream creation" (p. 328). This unfortunately knocks the bottom out of the lovely visions of the Goddess Kali, of yogis in trance in the caves of Mount Girnar, and of others including that of a beloved parent, which Dr. Khedkar saw and which he has been at considerable pains to describe (pp. 45-58). The next question is how to control the type of our dreams? But as to this neither the compiler nor any of the other contributors who share his views has anything definite to say, all contenting themselves with pure wordy abstractions and the broadest generalities of expression. No endeavour is made to establish the causal connection between the means suggested and the end in view, but we are told that there are three different methods of reaching the goal, namely: 1. by impressing ourselves with the unreality of the world and contemplative meditation, 2. by ascetic penances, coupled with contemplation, and

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APPENDIX. xxi 3. by devotion to a particular god or goddess or even to a human guru, the culmination of which is reached when the devotee can "project* a perfect physical image of his deity, in whose company he continues to enjoy his full measure of ecstatic pleasure" (p. 344). As regards contemplation, the greatest stress is laid on the power of suggestion, which is described as the influence responsible for the creation of anything that is created, under the sun. It is said : "There is no limit to the power of suggestion. It is indeed the Key stone or basis to the whole edifice of creation of this and the waking world, as well as of all other worlds" (p. 350). The greatest obstacle to the first path is said to consist in the recognition of truth by the intellect alone. The most advanced soul on this path "sees no duality in any of his three avastha's--jagrat [waking) swapna (dreaming] and sushupti [deep-sleep]." His point of view is changed and he "sees himself and all others as one." The obstacle on the second path consists in the exhibition of extraordinary powers' acquired by the yogi which enable him to perform miracles, "altering the course of creation and stopping, changing, and even creating dreams just as he wishes." This results in pride which encompasses his fall. A yogi enjoys ananda (bliss) as long as he is in samadhi (self-induced trance), while a jnani [the follower of the first path] enjoys it in all the three conditions. The danger on the third path lies in that "the devotee is apt to labour under a sort of self-deception. He comes to look upon this feat of conjuring up his deity as the ultimate goal, and the sensation of ecstatic pleasure which he feels in the presence of his god inclines him to remain in his service. This keeps him from kaivalya moksha or final liberation. If, however, he goes beyond this stage, his power of concentration increases, and he succeeds in carrying his consciousness to the sushupti avastha [the state of deep-sleep), where he becomes one with his beloved, and realises that the object of his devotion was in reality his own self." We are, however, not * Some of our readers might be interested in recalling the statement of one of the leaders of Mystic thought who said of himself in one of his devotional paroxysms : pchhy pchhy hr phryn khht kbyr kbyr mn ysr nrml bhyr jysy gng nyr [Tn.--The mind has become clenr as the Ganges' stream ; [and] Hari (God) follows persistently, saying, Kabir, Kabir !

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xxii instructed as to the method of disposing of the phantom god invoked by the devotee. As to the state of final liberation which is the summum bonum, we are told (p. 329) :--- "Kaivalya moksha consists in complete dissolution of personality or separateness into one Absolute, Adwaita [non-dual]. It is inconceivable and beyond the reach of mind, and that is the reason why even the great rishis and arrhatas of Jain religion refuse to believe in a final liberation. None of the ancient or modern sages, of whom the name and form are known to you, has acquired Kaivalya moksha. Neither I (the phantom Vasishta], nor even the well-known Rama, Krishna, Budha, Christ, etc., have attained it. They are yet a long way from the goal." No wonder rationalism refuses to believe in a mythical state which can neither be conceived by the mind nor be pointed out as having been experienced by any known being? On p. 330 we are given the last word on the subject. It is said in answer to "the dreamer's" question: "Who, then, can go beyond the spheres of creation and attain what you call kaivalya moksha?" : "Those only who reach the highest stage.........in this life, have no disciples or adherents and leave no name and form after them.........Some of these.........you will find confined in your lunatic asylums....... They obtain Kaivalya moksha the moment their earthly sojourn.........comes to an end." There are said to be sixteen stages of advancement called bhumikas. Put in a tabulated form, they are as follows: Serial number. 1 2 3 APPENDIX. Name of the stage. Jagrat-jagrat Jagratswapna Jagratsushupti Characteristics. First dawn of consciousness marked by inability to discriminate between any two states of existence. To be found in newly born babies and lower animals. Knowledge, during the waking state, of the existence of dream state, but not of deep-sleep or turya. Retention of the memory of deep-sleep. Here people remember the minutest details of their dreams on waking up. Almost all human beings reach up to this stage.

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Serial number. 4 5 6 7 8 3 Name of the stage. Jagrat-turya Remembrance of the turya state also. Exclusive students of religion and philosophy who possess highly developed intellectual power reach this stage. Devotees and yogis also attain to it. Turya is called super-consciousness, or cosmic consciousness. Not only do people who reach this stage "know that they had dream and dreamless sleep states, but over and above this, when they wake up, they remember the experiences of their turya state and say that immediately before awakening they felt an ecstatic pleasure which they are unable to explain in ordinary language," Swapna-jagrat Recognition, while dreaming, of a dream as a state of consciousness different from waking consciousness. Awareness of the additional fact that the dream will disappear ou waking up. In this stage a person "still believes it to be a creation of another creator and himself a created personality, separate from all other creatures of the dream world." Swapnaswapna Swoupnusushupti APPENDIX. Characteristics. Sushuptijagrat xxiii Swapna-turya Awareness of the fourth avastha (state of consciousness), that is turya, while still dreaming. Mastery over one's dream creation and the power to stop or alter it at will. In this stage one fully recognises "that he is dreaming, that the dream world is his own mental creation and that he will next pass into a dreamless sleep state; but he does not know his fourth avastha, the turya." Awareness during deep-sleep of the bare fact of one's existence. In this stage one" still believes that, though not seen by him, the waking world as well as other personalties like himself also exist."

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xxiv APPENDIX. Serial number. Name of the stage. Characteristics. 10 Sush uptiswupna Sushuptisushupti 12 Sushupti-turyu Recognition during deep sleep of the fact that one's previous states of waking and dreaming consciousness "were both merely the results of one's own mental activities." Full awareness during deep-sleep of the "mindless "condition of one's mind, that is to say full consciousness of one's own unconsciousness, i.e., of the unconscious condition of deep-sleep. This is but a temporary condition and either merges into the next higher stage, that is, turya, or lapses into the dreaming state, or is followed by waking up, due to a sensation similar to that of throttling. If the aspirant has no love for his personality left in him he will pass beyond this stage ; otherwise he will return to dreaming or wake up altogether. Expansion of the ego or self into the all-pervading ocean of life and joy, ever conscious, ever existent, ever blissful. Here one" sees the whole universe in him and himself in the whole universe, and actually feels that both the waking and the dream worlds are his own mental creation. This is called the state of samadhi by the yogis." He who reaches this stage is called a Jiwan-mukta. This is the description of turya. Beyond this is turya atit which will be described after four other stages that intervene on the path of knowledge unaccompanied by perfection in renunciation. Persistence of desire for doing good, and liability for "assuming a personality and appearing in the world as an uvatara or prophet." Turya-sugrat Turya-swapnia The desire for doing good now extends to devatas (gods or the residents of the celestial world). The 'dreamer' might now " come down as Brahma, Vishnu or Mahesh in creation."

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APPENDIX, XXV . Serial number. Name of the stage. Characteristics. Turyasushupti. Persistence of the desire of karun (seed) world." One might now become the Lord Hiranyagarbha (the golden egg). "He has practically achieved the goal, but the last obstacle is not yet removed, and he still remains the seed or the egg from which creation may spring at any time." 16 Turyu-turya Elimination of the desire for creation. Maya, however, still exists in this stage potentially. In this condition, "the Ishwara identifies himself with the world as its creator or source. He is an impartial spectator and rejoices in witnessing the play of maya, his consort, as a magician rejoices in the performance of tricks which he himself knows to be sham and baseless in nature." The goal beyond the sixteenth stage is the turya atit or final awakening, where maya and the trinity of the knower,' ' knowledge and the 'known' merge into the non-dual Absolute. It is beyond inind and speech both; and," says the guru Vasishta, "there are no means in my power nor in that of and body else to give you even an idea or a mental picture of this ultimate Reality." Such is the path of progress and such the goal depicted by the venerable Vasishta of the Land of Dreams. A glance at the tabulated description of the stages is sufficient to show that they are not the natural rungs of a ladder of causes and effects leading up to perfection in knowledge or happiness or anything else, but truly and essentially landings on an erratic flight of steps to the empty attic of hallucination ; for the artificial happiness induced by auto-suggestion is no more real than a juggler's rupee, which cannot pass current as a genuine coin. The force of suggestion is apparent at each stage beginning with the fifth, which is the first above the normal. The analysis of the mental condition of the dreamer " himself, who claims to have reached the sixth

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xxvi APPENDIX. stage has already shown us that his claim to a possession of his waking consciousness is utterly baseless and false, and that, on the contrary, he has fallen a victim to his own unbridled fancy, taking a complex phase of dreaming consciousness to be an unbroken continuity of waking existence. The seventh stage is characterised by the power to stop or alter one's dreams, to le acquired by the further suggestion for mastery over them. The eighth is the outcome of a suggestion for the dreaming of a condition of turya in addition to the preceding one. The ninth step is the result of a still more complex mental condition in which one fancies oneself to be sound asleep with just an awareness of one's existence, But it is no more deep-sleep than the sixth was a normal waking consciousness; for what is known as deep-sleep is, by the very sense of the words used to express its significance, a condition devoid of wakefulness. This stage, therefore, is marked by the curious illusion of a waking-sleeping, or sleeping-wakeful dream in which one actually dreams of himself as sound asleep. The tenth is characterised by a fuller sense of awareness ; and the eleventh is a still further elaboration of the same. Here one may be said to dream of one's own unconscious condition in deep-sleep with the awareness of the suspension of all mental operations. This cannot naturally last long, since the clement of inconsistency between the condition suggested the suspension of all mental operations--and the actual working of the wind (whence the awareness of the condition of deep-sleep) is a source of disturbance to the ego. The sensation of throttling which one is said to be liable to experience here is probably due to this disturbance, i.e., conflict between imagination and will, the former trying to force the latter into silence (suspension) and the latter refusing to be annihilated. Hence it is that those who neglect their egoity are regarded as qualified to pass on to the next stage, as they train their will to submit to the suggestion of 'suspension' of itself without offering opposition. All others must return to less violent forms of dreaming consciousness or wake up at once, Here again it is clear that the whole thing is pure and simple dreaming or hallucination. The twelfth stage is reached when the ego surrenders its personal likes and dislikes and visualises in its mind the notion of its being devoid of meum and tuum. The soul then has a vision of itself as a

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APPENDIX, xxvii pure subject of knowledge and as devoid of all tinge of private loves and hatreds. It is wrong to say that one becomes a jivan-mukta at the time; for as one cannot become a king by robing oneself in purple in one's imagination, so cannot one become a jivan-mukta by imagining oneself to be one. This stage is the last for the sarva-tyagi, that is for him who has perfected himself in renunciation, but for the follower on the path of ;nana (knowledge) there are four others to be traversed. The follower on the path of devotion, if he come up so far, is apparently not qualified to pass any farther, unless he get rid of his divine apparition which bars his further progress, as pointed out ere this. We are not told as to what would happen if he did get rid of his "god," but presumably he would somewhere fall in a line with the follower of knowledge or asceticism, and reach the 'goal' by twelve or sixteen stages. To proceed with the jnani (follower on the path of knowledge), the remaining four stages on his path are characterised by a refinement of desire which is for doing good generally in the thirteenth, for doing good to "gods" in the fourteenth, and for continuity of creation in the fifteenth. In the sixteenth the elimination of desire apparently raises the "dreamer' to the dignity of Ishwara, as he is actually called by that name by our author. He now plays with his consort, maya, and magician-like rejoices in the performance of tricks which she knows to be sham and baseless in nature"! Finally he passes into the " dissolution of separateness" and ceases to be in the Absolute. This is a condition so hopelessly beyond mind and words that it will not pay the reader to dwell upon it. If he wishes to understand it, he must borrow some of the abundant intuition which the compiler and some of his contributors claim to enjoy. So far, however, as these additional stages are concerned, it is clear that they are intended to bring the traveller by the first path to the same point which the follower of the second reaches in the twelfth stage; for it is presumed that love of personality can be destroyed by the ascetic in that stage but not by him who is unable to control his passions fully. The latter, who reaches the topmost point with regard to dream-making, but lags behind in respect of indifference to his own personality, must, therefore, qualify himself even in that particular before he can reach the goal. This is all the difference between the two

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xxviii APPENDIX. paths. It is said listinctly (p. 343) that the difference between the two paths yoga and jnizina is that while in the former the aspirant carries his waking state consciousness to the deep-sleep (suslu pti) state, in the latter the gushupti is brought into the waking state. It is called sahajya (easy) samadhi as distinguished from the samadhi (tranco) of a yogi." The idea seems to be that while the jnani is to advance hy practising auto-suggestion in his dreams, gradually reaching a point when he might dream of himself as involved in deep-sleep, the yogi should begin by approaching the state of deep-sleep in his waking mood till he reaches the breaking point in the twelfth stage, so that if the former be the method of dreaming par excellence, the latter is nothing but day-dreaming pure and simple. In different language, the one tries to create by auto-suggestion a dream in which he dreams of himself as sound asleep, and the other to obtain, by the same means, the riddance of the waking consciousness till it become reduced to the barest hallucination of awareness, with the suspension of all other forms of mental functioning. The final hallucination to be produced now is conceived to consist in the dream or vision of a mental world from which the dreamer's representation is eliminated,--when he sees his dream-creatures, but is invisible to himself and them both. In other words, his personality is to be suppressed in his own consciousness, so that he should be conscious of himself only as if he were a pair of eyes, This is to be merged in the cessation of duality which is the last representation minus the dual throng. If the reader would abstract away everything from the last vision, he would then have the invisible pair of eyes staring at Nothing. This is the final liberation, which, as the compiler tells us, "is to be attained by some of the inmates of our lunatic asylums." Docs the reader still persist in asking, how will the dual throng disappear? Well, our author's reply comes to this: beloved ! yon only know the world through your ideas or thought-forms ; you suppress these, us it were, and, e-r-r-r--well, and nothing will be loft but the INCONCEIVABLE! Such is the doctrine that is preached in the Dream Problem. But although many a philosophical term and expression find a place in its elaboration, it is actually supported by nothing more solid and substantial than bare assertions and asseverations in

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APPENDIX. xxix terspersed here and there with a handful of insinuating similes, analogies and paralogisms. Some of these assertions are too amazing even for the abnormal mental faculties of the irresponsible inmates of certain public intstitutions some of whom, we are assured, are on the point of obtaining Final Liberation. We have, for instance, the statement on p. 259 : - The sun is present as a whole in the minutest ray of light." Let us hope it only means that the qualities of the sun and not the sun itself are present, etc. On p. 274 we are told in reference to maya that being itself a non-existence, it possesses a wonderful shukti (power) of making an unreality look as real." It will serve no useful purpose to criticise the book any further ; suffice it to say that it is as much remarkable for its hasty assumptions as it is for its inconceivable ideas and illogical deductions, Perhaps the law of polarity which is the key note of the philosophy underlying the author's thesis might some fine morning succeed in demonstrating that good reason and fallacy are but two poles of one and the same thing, and are identical on the principle of "opposites being the same" (p. 260); but till that is done we are not called upon to take it seriously. It only remains to disabuse the mind of our author of the notion that all religions are equally true, and lead to the same goal. We shall compare the system which he himself advocates side by side with Jainism to enable him to perceive that there is little if anything at all in common between them. Our Author* Jainism. 1. The world is a created 1 1. Nobody ever created the world. world. 2. The world is not real, be- 2. The world is neither uning an imaginary creation in the real nor imaginary. It is nomind of its Creator. body's mental creation. 3. The Alisolute is the only 3. There is no such thing as reality. the Absolute. There are six substances, viz., Jivit (spirit, or souls), matter, etc. . The dialogistic form will be found to be best suited for the occasion, though, of course, it dose not represent an actual conversation.

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XXX APPENDIX. Our Author, Jainism. 4. Jimas (souls) are illusory. 4. Souls are real. 5. The goal is to bring about 5. The goal is to attain to a dissolution of one's personality, godhood. There can be no i.C., separateness into the non-merger of two or more real dual Absolute existences into one. 6. When the goal is reached 6. On reaching the goal every there will be no ideas of duality soul becomes omniscient, allleft in one's consciousness. perceiving, and perfectly happy, and possesses inexhaustible en ergy. 7. The condition of final 7. Not so; all things are liberation is beyond mind, speech | knowable. and words. It is altogether inconceivable. 8. The 'path' lies along the 8. The path' does not lie line of suggestion and contem. through hallucination or dream, plation as described in the but consists in the destruction, bhumikas. of karmas (see The Practical Path). 9. I also preach complete renunciation, 9. No doubt; but it can never be perfect; because of-pardon the observation - your hallucina. tions you are not in a position to judge of what is perfection in renunciation 10. It is not possible for me to point to a single sonl who might be said to have attained to final liberation, 10. We can give the biographies of a large number of souls who are now livicg in nirvana and enjoying the beatitude of final liberation. 11. We create onr mental 11. The happiest dreams have worlds as we proceed on the an ending. Suppression of ideas path, thus filling our creations | is no proof of their destruction. with whatever kind of popula. When the process reaches the tion we please, and destroying 1 breaking point, there is a rebellion the undesirable ones. in the region of the sub-conscious; suppressed ideas break loose and become turbulent, displacing the mental equipoise. Many people go mad then, and wander about in samsara, through

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Our author. APPENDIX. 12. Contemplation is necessary for progress on the path. 13 What is the difference between your process and mine when we both try to avoid ruga (attachment) and doesha (aversion)? Jainism, xxxi different forms of life. Meditation and contemplation do not certainly mean day-dreaming. Contemplate, if you can, in agreement with truth; but if you cannot, then don't contemplate at all. Nature can never actually and permanently accept a false suggestion, however forcibly given. One cannot make oneself a dog actually and permanently by auto or hetero suggestion; neither can one render that unconscious whose very nature is consciousness 12. Yes, but not day-dreaming. Our idea of contemplation has nothing in common with the dreamy state of consciousness you try to force on yourself. Contemplation for us means a process which augments the purity of consciousness, finally making it omniscient. 13. You should know that the effect can never be the same where the causes are different. You avoid raga and dveshu for things of this world to be free to enjoy your own mental creations, but we give them up to remove the impurities of our soul. Your case resembles that of Prof. Macran's Roman convict whose indifference to his convict's life only arose from his greater attachment for the beautiful wife and family of his dreams whom he was "so anxious to meet." This is clearly raga which is a cause of bondage. In our case there are no dreams and visions to be attached to. We do not give up one thing to fall in love with another. The difference between the results, yours and

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xxxii APPENDIX. Our author. Jainism our own, is great for this reason. If you were asked to separato the gold from the dross in a lum) of ore, you would simply daub the thing yellow and then hypnotizo yourself to regard it as gold; but we should not be content till we brought out the precious metal by separating every particle of impurity from it. 14. Contemplation as I prac. tiso it gives me pleasure. How, then, can you object to it? 14. Only artificial happiness can result from artificial means ; your pleasure is manufactured in the Land of Dreams and can never be real. Keal happiness is the very nature of the soul, and cannot possibly be had by a contemplation of natural or artificial dreams. The sensualist's pleasure has been condemned by all. Your happiness from your own creations can only be due to your perception or enjoyment thereof, and, therefore, must be sensual in nature. It makes no difference that your creations' are mental; for their enjoyment is no less sensual for that reason. 15. In deep-sleep we "dive, 15. Your language is meaningas it were, into the fountain less to 118. Do your words ro which is the source of our being present actual things and and energy, and enjoy the bliss processes in nature or are you of the everlasting glory in the only using a metaphor ? What lap of our father." is the significance of the word 'dive,' which you qualify by the phrase 'as it were'? What, again, is the idea underlying the expression the source of our being and energy'? Aliving being is a jive ensouled in a body; but surely you do not mean that the atoms of matter composing the body fall apart in deep-sleep, and fly back to their places at the first dawn of returning consciousness! Perhaps your idea only is that the

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APPENDIX. xxxiii Our author. Jainism. tha operation of "diving" is performed by spirit alone? But then spirit has no source whatsoever, being a simple substance! The writer of solution No. II understands this clearly (see p. 70.). Probably what you mean is that every soul becomes what you call. the all-pervading Absolute during the hours of deep-sleep every night? But that would be tantamount to saying that every soul obtains Final Liberation every night and after some six hours re-enters the body, which is in too violent a conflict with the doctrine of karma and transmigration of souls to be true. Lastly, it is difficult to understand what you mean by the expression the bliss of the everlasting glory'? In your conception of Final Liberation, which, in your own words, means only "a complete dissolution of personality and separateness into one Absolute, Adwaita" (p. 329), there is no room for such a thing as bliss. night an Finaj i 16. I had better give you my 16. We can only hope that it idea of bliss : if you read the is a case of misprint, and not a following passage at the top of deliberate statement on your part, p. 361 of the Dream Problem you when you say that a child is in would understand what I mean the state of bliss ananda) and by bliss: desireless (nirvasnic), though it is difficult to see how misprinting "A new-born infant and a could have occurred on such an puran gnani (he whose knowledge extensive scale. In case our sugis perfect] are apparently the gestion about a misprint be not same, but in the one ignorance acceptable to you, it would be and in the other knowledge interesting to know in which parpredominates. Both are in the ticular state of the infantine state of bliss (ananda), fearless existence may an infant be re(nirbhe), desiretess (nirvasnic) garded as blissful and desireless and so forth; but in the case of whether when it is "cross "and the infant, the instinct has to peevish, or when crying for milk, undergo a change or evolution a toy, or anything else ? (nirbhof bliss Both are wledge

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xxxiv Our author. APPENDIX, into higher states, while the puran gnani ever remains the same. The infant knows not that he is happy and blissful, while the gnani knows that he is absolute bliss incarnate." 17. But sushupti (deep-sleep) is not a myth. Jainism. 17. Deep-sleep is your stumbling block. You seem to think that because there is cessation of pain in that condition therefore, it is the end in view. This was the Hindu conception at one time; but it was soon realised that there could be no happiness unless it was consciously felt. Accordingly, a fourth state, the turya, was conceived as possible over and above the three familiar ones, jagrat, swapna and sushupti (Deussen's Philosophy of the Upanishads, p. 309). This accounts for your conception of happiness consisting in the condition of deep-sleep plus its awareness. But as this is impossible in the natural wayfor you cannot be asleep and awake at the same time-you try to create a state resembling it in your dreams with the help of auto-suggestion. Having thus created a dream in which you perceive yourself as sound asleep, you have next to console yourself for the loss of the waking reality. This you achieve by arguing that the waking world is itself a dream with a solitary "dreamer," the Absolute, which you are forced to regard as not a being, but an indefinable existence, to avoid some of the most glaring contradictions. Having arrived at this result, you naturally conceive your aim in life to consist in "waking up," in other words, to cease to dream, that is to say, to become the Absolute, without

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APPENDIX. XXXV - Our author. Jainism. name and form and figure. This additional notion you now engraft on your earlier conception of the fourth state, removing from your hallucination of the mental blankness of deep-sleep the mark of personality and "separateness," and leaving it a dream about pure and simple nothing by an invisible dreamer. This accounts for the wild enthusiasm about the state of deep-sleep which is apparent in your otherwise beautiful metaphor. The statement of Sister Deomata, which you accept, to the effect that the deep-sleep state is a withdrawing from the many to the one, from the manifested to the power that manifests (p. 233) is a pure assumption. It is no argument to say that because we feel refreshed after sound sleep, therefore deep sleep must signify the merger of the soul in the Absolute. Sleep is refreshing because during the hours of rest the physical system is enabled to absorb and dispose of the poisonous secretions of matter in certain sensitive parts of the nervous system caused by the activities of the life of wakefulness. No need to dwell any longer on the point ; there is so little in common between the two systems that if one of them be the path to nirvana, the other must necessarily lead to bondage and pain. To conclude, the Dream Problem would have been better written if its talented author had kept his mind in touch with the concrete reality, and taken the trouble to test the logical value of every statement to be made. Above all, it is incumbent on all writers to remember that thorny questions cannot be disposed of by making sweeping assertions, like the one on p. 273, to the effect that Vedanta is the basis of all religions. A clear issue should be framed as to each and every such point, and no opinion should be hazarded without a full and careful examination of all the available evidence and of the arguments both for and against each side's view,

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GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. A. Abhimana ( mara), pride, conceit. Acharya (*194], the spiritual leader of an order of saints ; also a philosopher. Achyuta [asya], the name of the sixteenth heaven. Adharma [***], a kind of substance the function of which is to be helpful in the cessation of motion ; vice; that which is opposed to proper dharma (duty or right conduct). Adho Loka (wala), the nether regions. Adwaita [nga), Monistic Vedanta. Aghatiya [smalfa], not ghatiya (see p. 897). Agni [afra), the god of Fire; fire. Agurulaghutva [atzagra], a quality of substances which pre serves them as such. Ahalya (affear], the wife of Gautama, the preceptor of Indra. Abam [+], 'I,' or I-ness. Ahamkara [wegre), individuality; egoity; pride of personality. Aharaka sarira (FETTENET], a kind of body (see page 896). Ahimsa (afegar), non-injuring. Ahmi (Zend.), I am. Ahura (Zend.), a Perfect Soul; God. Aja [91], a he-goat, or ram ; the soul. Ajiva [mfia), that which is not jiva ; the conscious substance ; the first tattva. Ajna (zas), a psychic centre in the forehead. Akasha (aurata), Space, Ether. Aloka (nera), that part of space which lies beyond the universe.

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GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISHI WORDS. xxxvii Anadisha [arfen), the places of residence of certain heavenly beings. Ananda [***], bliss. Anandamayakosha (wafanuara], that part, sheath or centre of the body which is supposed to be the seat of bliss; the body of bliss. Ananta [ aa], infinite. Anata (waa], the name of the thirteenth heaven. Anekanta [wwarra), many-sided. Asima [funi), a psychic power; the power to become as small as an atom. Anjana (2547), the name of the fourth hell. Antahkarana [wa:#), mind, comprising mana (attention), chitta (mind-, or memory-stuff), buddhi (intellect) and ahamkara (egoity). Antara (sat), not exceeding ; within ; less than. Antarakasha (sacraiu], the space or ether within the cavity of the heart. Antaraya [wratia), the group of karmic forces which interfere with the freedom of action. Anu, [-ag), an indivisible unit or atom; a particle of the sub stance of time. Anuttara (nant), the place of residence of certain heavenly beings. Ara (918), a spoke. Arana [uto), the name of the fifteenth heaven. Arhat or Arhant [wa, mera), a Deified Being, who has destroy ed his ghatiya karmas. Aristha (aragr), the name of the fifth hell. Arupa (9), the upper Mental plane. Asana [18a), posture. Asarira (27), a pure disembodied Soul ; a Siddha. Asat (wea], non-existent. Asbrama [ww8], one of the four stages--Brahmacharya (27)

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xxxviii GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. the period of study, Grihastha (trezz] the period of married life, Vanaprastha (a1982a] the period of retirement, and Sannyasa (santa] the period of homelessness--of life, Ashva [12], a borse. Asmi [f], I am. Asrava (14a), the inflow of matter towards the soul; the third tattva. Astikaya (HIFRATT), having a body or magnitude. Asura [wat], a demon. Atman (caa], a spirit or soul ; the substance of consciousness. Audarika sarira (@retromatra), the gross body of physical matter. Aujus [note], a kind of subtle force. Aust [www], he is. Avadhi-joana [zaragra), a sort of clairvoyance which includes a knowledge of some of the past lives of the soul. Avasarpini (waarint], a division of time consisting of ten sagars (oceans) of years. Avidya [mrazi), ignorance. Ayuh (ang:), the group of karmic forces which regulate and determine longevity or duration of life. Baluka prabha (argamm], the name of the third hell. Bandha [au], a bond, chain or fetter; the fourth tattva. Bhagwan (mara), God, or a deified Soul. Bhakta [an], a devotee; one who follows the path of Bhakti Yoga. Bhakti [with], devotion ; one of the four principal paths of Yoga. Bhiti [fa], terror Bhoga-Bhumi (Amaia], the region where the consequences of karmas are to be experienced, e.g., heavens and hells. Bhola [Arami), unso phisticated ; innocent ; guileless. Bhuta [wa), a phantom or demon.

Page #1140
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Brahma [], the name of the fifth heaven. Brahma, or Brahman [], a Hindu god; the Creator. Brahman [], God; the Absolute. Brahamanpura [gu], the abode of Brahman; the heart. Brahmottara [], the name of the sixth heaven. Buddhi [], intellect. XXXIX C. Chakra [], a psychic centre. Charvaka [af], the founder of the school of philosophy known as Charvakism whose views resembled those of modern Materialism. Chatushtaya [ga], four-fold; quartette. Chela [], a disciple. Chit [], intelligence, consciousness. Chitta [], the material substratum of memory; the mind stuff. Coolie [], a labourer; a porter. D. Dambha [], deceit. Darshana [], simple perception as distinguished from detailed knowledge; faith; a school of philosophy. Darshanavarniya [aa], the group of karmic forces which obstruct perception. Deva [], a god or an angel; a resident of heaven. Devayana [aa], the road to Nirvana. Dharma [], religion, duty, merit; a kind of substance, Ether. Dharma [], the name of the first hell. Dharana [], concentration, the process of holding the mind on to one particular point. Dhumaprabha, [], the name of the fifth hell.

Page #1141
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Dhyana [s1a), contemplation, meditation. Digambara [fanat), a sect of Jainism. Dik [feeri], space, or the force which determines localisation. 'Durga [ami], one of the names of goddess Kali. Durukti (garki, abuse. Dvesha (aq), hatred. Dwityo [igrai], the second, any other. Ekantic (micata), one-sided. Eko [t], one. Eshana [209 or ima), the name of the second heaven. G . Ganesha [na], the name of a Hindu god. Ganga [], the Ganges. Garuda (1153], a mythological being; the mount of Vishnu. Gautama (man), the name of the preceptor of Indra, also that of the founder of Buddhism. Gayatri (nraat), the name of a goddess. Ghanavatavalaya [wanatea), the dense air envelope surrounding the universe. Ghanodadhivatavalaya (taieraaraana), the humid air envelope surrounding the universe. Ghatiya (qaa), Jnanavarniya, Darshanavarniya, Mohaniya and Antaraya karmas are called ghatiya karmas because they interfere with the natural attributes of pure spirit. Ghee (a = ), clarified butter. Go [w], a cow; mythologically, that which moves, bence pranas or vitalities. Gopi [ara), a milk-maid. Generally, the word 'Gopi' refers to the women who joined Krishna in Rasa-lila (dancing). Gopika (aifaxi], after the manner of a gopi.

Page #1142
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Gotra (atm), the group of karmic forces which determine the gotra (family, or lineage) of an individual. Graiveyaka (haar), the heavenly abode of a certain kind of Devas. Guna (Tu), a quality. Guru [), a teacher ; a spiritual guide. Gyana (ura], see Jnana. H. Hama [ted], all. Hamsa [ra], a swan. Hari [FR:], the name of God. Hatha-yoga (rear), a branch of Yoga. Himsa [fier], injury. Iblis Lemstil], Satau. Ichchha[], desire; will; pleasure. Ida [], one of the principal nerves of the spinal column. Indra (Fra], one of the Vedic gods: the title of the king of the residents of heaven. Injil (Janul], the Bible. Ishwara (izar], the Creator. Ism [rw], name. Ism-'z-zat (wilawl], the name denoting the nature of the thing whose name it is. Itara-nigoda (sarladre), one who falls back into nigoda, after having emerged from it. Jagrat (sirna], the waking state of consciousness. Jambu Dvipa (wata], the central part of the Madhya Loka. Jara (or), unconscious. Jehad, [342), a holy war. Jina [f9a), a Conqueror of Samsara; a Perfected Soul. d

Page #1143
xlii GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Jiva [a], a kind of substance; the soul; the first tattva. Jivan-mukta [a], one who enjoys the state of Jivan-mukti. Jivan-mukti [af], the state of being redeemed or saved while living in the physical body. Jivatma [are], a soul. Jivic [], pertaining to a jiva. Jnana [], knowledge. Jnanaswarupa [], embodiment of knowledge, or of the form of knowledge. Jnanavaraniya [aa], knowledge-obstructing group of karmas. Jnana-yoga [am], a branch of Yoga. Jnani [], a follower of Jnana Yoga; a conscious being or knower. K. Kafir [], an infidel; an unbeliever. Kala [], Time; the substance of Time; death. Kala-chakra [], the wheel of time. Kala-purusha [g], a symbolical human figure, corresponding to the Zodiac. Kali [], one of the goddesses of the Hindu Pantheon. Kali [], strife. Kaliya [], the name of a serpent said to have been subdued by Sri Krishna. Kalpa [], a cycle. Kama [], passion, sexual love. Kapishta [g], the name of the eighth heaven. Karana-sarira [], the causal body. Karma [ action; the principle of bondage of souls; a kind 1 of force. Karmana-sarira [an], the body of karmic forces. Kathanchital, somehow ; in a way; from a particular point of view.

Page #1144
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Katha [], a narrative or biography. Kevala [], pure; perfect. Kevalin [], omniscient. Kharbhaga [], the name of a region below the Madhya Loka, Khayal [J], thought. Khuda [], God. Krodha [], anger. Kufr [] heresy; infidelity; scepticism. Kun [], do; let it be done. Kundalini [f] a Kind of psychic energy. Kuwwat [], power. Kuwwat-i-khayal [], thought-power. L. Lahaul [J], the formula uttered by Muslims to exorcise or frighten away evil spirits. Lakshmi [], one of the goddesses of the Hindu Pantheon. Langoti a bare strip of cloth worn round the loins. xliii - Lantava [ia], the name of the seventh heaven. Laub-i-mahfuz [], the Tablet of Destiny, the Perspicuous Book. Lavana Samudra [], the ocean which surrounds the Jambu-Dvipa. Lila [], play; sport. Lingam [f], the male organ. Lobha [], greed. Loka [], the region of souls, matter, time, etc., hence the universe. Lokakasha [], the portion of space occupied by the universe.

Page #1145
xliv GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. M . Madhya Loka (warm), the central or middle region of the universe. Maghavi [raw], the name of the sixth hell. Maghavi (*19at), the name of the seventh hell. Mahadeva [aa], a title of Shiva. Mahashukra (&19A), the name of the tenth heaven. Mahat [en], intelligence. Mahatma (1871), a great or pious soul. Mahatamah-prabha (HEIMA: H], the name of the seventh hell. Mahk-vakya (#6721era), a great saying. Mahendra [Fa], the name of the fourth heaven. Mahesha (7964), a title of Shiva. Mahurta (ned), a period of time equal to about 48 minutes. Makara (***), the Capricornus. Manahparyaya jnana (89:74951a], knowledge of the thoughts and ideas of others as well as of past lives. Manas [97], the seat of desires ; the lower mind; attention. Mantra [***], a holy text or formula. Marga (ar), a path or road. Mati-Jnana (aragra), knowledge obtained by means of the senses and mind. Maujud [0,= yo), present. Maya (arat), illusion; trickery ; the power of imagination, Mayavic (*127 fenti), illusory. Mazda (Zend.), God. Medha [4], sacrifice. Megheu [at], the name of the third hell. Meraj [lyen), an ascent; one of the miracles ascribed to Mahomed. Mesa [a], the Aries. Mimamsa [faiat), a system of philosophy. Mithya [Faxat), falsehood.

Page #1146
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. xlv Mohaniya-karma [], the group of karmic forces which produce delusion. Moksha [], freedom from births and deaths; nirvana. Mrityu [], death. Mujarradat [], simple substances, spirits. Mukhya [], principal, chief. Mukti [], liberation; freedom from bondage; salvation. Muladhara [], the basic plexus. Muni [3], an ascetic; a saint. N. Nafs [], animalism; sensuality. Nama [], the group of karmas which determine the type of the body. Nasti [fa], non-existent. Natha [], lord. Nigoda [], the lowest part of the universe. Nikshepa [], naming, see the footnote on pp. 118 and 119. Niraya [], hell. Nirguna [], quality-less. Nirjara [], destruction of karmas; the sixth tattva. Nirvana [fa], Emancipation; Redemption; Freedom from transmigration. Nishchaya [], that which is true under all circumstances and conditions; certain; one of the standpoints of Jaina philosophy. There are several standpoints according to Jainism of which the nishchaya and the vyavahara are the most important. Of these, that which describes things with regard to their nature, qualities or attributes, is called the nishchaya, while the other which only takes into account their form, conditions and changes is the vyavahara. Niyama [], one of the eight steps or accessories of yoga; a vow. Nyaya [], one of the six schools of Hindu Philosophy.

Page #1147
xlvi GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. P. Pancha-Parmeshti (9947 ), a collective name for the five kinds of divine souls, namely, Arhats, Siddhas, Acharyas, Upadh yayas and Munis. Pankabbaga (i 71), a region below the Madhya Loka. Paramanu (atarm], an atom of matter. Paramatman (at 1287 ], God. Parjanya (qoja], rain. Parvati [ga], the consort of Shiva. Patala (qrare), the nether regions. Pati (fa), a husband. Patni [qeni), a wife. Phala [98], fruit ; consequence, Pingale [Fanat), one of the two principal nerves of the spinal column. Pitriyana [famara, the path which leads to the regions of the manes. Pradesha [n@u], an imaginary point as big as a single particle of matter. Prajapati (naryfa), the Creator. Prakriti (nafa), material qualities or matter; a kind of force. Pralaya [eta], dissolation of the universe. Prameyatva (sauca), knowableness. Prana (oro), life ; vitality ; breath. Prasamaya-kosha (armaakra), the sphere of pranic activity in the body; the sheath of prana. Prapata [tra), the name of the fourteenth heaven. Pranayama [urutera), the method or process of controlling breath or vitality (prana). Prarabdha (aa], destiny; a kind of karmic force. Pratibimba (afafarra), a reflection ; an image. Pratyahara (straiere), the process or method of controlling the mind.

Page #1148
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. xlvii Preta (sa), a hob-goblin ; a demon. Padgala (gamo), lit. that which can become fused with other things, hence, matter. Purana (gre), sacred history or ancient tradition. Purusha (954), spirit; one of the primal causes of the world process, according to Sankhya ; a person of the male sex. Purva-Mimamsa [geniet), one of the six schools of Hindu philosophy. Pushkara [90), the name of a sacred place. Qamar [w], the moon. Raga (an), attachment ; love. Raja [trai), a king Rajas [cm], the quality of activity. Rajasic [cafeai], pertaining to Rajas. Raja Yoga [Truara), a branch of Yoga. Ratnaprabha (TACHI], the name of the first hell. Rishi (Rafa), a sage or holy man; an ascetic. S. Sachchida nanda [arganaaa), Sat-Chit-Ananda, lit. Existence Consciousness-Bliss, hence God. Sadhu [erg), a muni ; an ascetic. Sagara (ent), an ocean. Sagupa (ayol, possessing qualities. Sahasrara [arat], the name of the twelfth heaven ; the plexus of the brain. Samadbi (porfa], the trance of self-contemplation. Samaya [ema), the smallest part of time. Samsara (tiert), the cycle of transmigration ; the universe.

Page #1149
xlviii GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Samsari [], belonging to the samsara. Samskara [], an impression; a tendency. Samvara [], the stoppage of asrava; the fifth tattva. Sanat Kumar [], the name of the third heaven. Sannyasa [], retirement from the world to practise asceticism; the adoption of the vows of a muni. Saptabhangi, [], lit. seven-fold, a mode or system of predication, peculiar to Jainism. Sarira [], body. Sarvartha siddhi [eat fef], the name of a celestial region. Sat [], existence. Satara [art], the name of the eleventh heaven. Sathata [3], cruelty. Satsanga [], the association or company of pious men. Satsvarupa [a], the quality of being; existence. Satta [], essence; substantiveness; existence. Sattva [], the quality of intelligence. Sattvic [fa], possessing the quality of intelligence. Satya [], truth. Saudharma [], the name of the first heaven. Savitri [aa], the name of a goddess; one of the two wives of Brahma. Seen [], the letter 's."' Shaq-ul-Qamar [4], the splitting of the moon : one of the miracles ascribed to Mahomed. Sharkara-prabha [], the name of the second hell. Shastra, [], a sacred book, or scripture. Shiva [fa], the name of one of the gods of the Hindu Pantheon. Shri [], Lakshmi, the goddess of prosperity. Shruta-jnana [a], knowledge obtained by means of words, signs, etc., and by their interpretation. Shukra [], the name of the ninth heaven. Siddha [f], a Perfect Soul living at the top of the universe.

Page #1150
xlix GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. The characteristics of a Siddha are, bodilessness (ie., the absence of all physical bodies), infinite knowledge, infinite perception, infinite bliss and infinite power. Siddhanta [fa], established truth; the final conclusion. Siddhatman, [f], see Siddha. Siddha Sila [fr], the top-most part of the universe, corresponding, in all probability, to the arsh-i-moa'lla [ ] of Muslim Cosmogony, where the Perfect Souls reside. Siddhi [], an occult or psychic power. Sita [ar], a place on the top of the universe. Siyana, [art], a medium or magician. Soham [], a compound of 'Sa' (that) and 'aham' (I). Sravaka [], a Jaina householder. Sthula-sarira [], the gross body. Sakshma-sarira [], a kind of subtle body. Sushumna [], the hollow canal in the spinal column. Sushupti [], deep sleep. Svabhava [a], nature. Svapna [an], a dream. Svarupa [], form. Svastika [af] the form, for an explanation of which see 'The Jaina Philosophy,' by V. R. Gandhi. Swadhisthan [], a nervous centre in the spinal column. Swami [], a master; a spiritual guide. T. Tamahprabha [a], the name of the sixth hell. Tamas [], the quality of inertia. Tamasic [af], pertaining to tamas. Tanmatra [], a sensible quality; an atom, or particle. Tanuvatavalaya [agaaaaa], the rarified air-envelope, surrounding the universe. Tapas [a], austerities. e

Page #1151
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Taqdir [price] destiny. Tat twam asi (maafa), that thou art. Tattva [ata), an ultimate principle, a final subject of study; an essential truth. Tejasa-sarira (@auvat), a kind of body., Tirthamkara (aiu**), a title of the 24 Holy Ones of Jainism Tri beni (raafi], a confluence of three rivers. Turiya (ata), super consciousness, blissfulness. Tyaga (raro), renunciation. U. Upadhyaya (sqr419), a learned saint. Ordhva-loka ( @tex], the celestial regions. Utsarpipi (orafica], a division of time as large as an avasarpini. Uttara-Mimamsa (EpithAia], Vedanta. v. Vach (vak) [ar], speech. Vaikriyika-sarira [afafazni ak] a kind of body. Vairagya (arra), renunciation ; non-attachment. Vaisheshika (affar), one of the six schools of Hindu philosophy. Valukaprabha (arga19H), the name of the third hell. Vansh a (an), the name of the second hell. Vasana (arear], an impression or idea. Vayu [arg), air. Veda [a], lit., knowledge; one of the four great scriptures of the Hindus, Vedaniya (aeira), the group of karmic forces which control the experiences of pleasure and pain. Vedanta [aeia), lit. the end of knowledge; one of the six schools of Hindu philosophy. Veerya (are), power. Vijnanamayakosha [fagi makta), an envelope of subtle matter ; the sheath of thought.

Page #1152
GLOSSARY OF NON-ENGLISH WORDS. Viman (Fara]], an aeroplane; an aerial chariot. Vina [aut], a kind of banjo. Virochana [faden), the name of an asura. Viveka (faqah), discrimination. Vrisa (@), the sign Taurus. Vyavahara [saert), one of the standpoints of philosophy. W. Wajud [dgrz], being; existence. Y., Yad [92], that. Yajna [], a sacrificial rite. Yamaraja (47779), the god of death, Yat (Zend.), that. Yatana (917), torment. Yod [us], the letter'e' or 'y.' Yoga (@in), the method of self-realisation. Yogi (ata], one who practises Yoga, also a follower of the Yoga school of philosophy. Yojana [atta), a measure of distance. Yoni [ara], the female organ.

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BIBLE REFERENCES. 488 THE OLD TESTAMENT. Genesis. Chapter. Verse. Page. 648, 655 709 560 978 II. 16-17 170 II. 258, 480 II. 1016 668n 170 III. 171 III. 709 III. 171, 173 III. 180 III. 181 171 111. IV. Judges, Chapter, Verse. Page. I. 19 ... 657, 658 1.-Samuel XV. 22 1.-Kings, VIII. 27 124 VIII. 46 1050 Job. I. 6-12 1040 1042 V. 7 656, 1051 VI. 18 277 XIV, 11-12 277 Psalms, XVI. 10 253 XXVII. 219 XL. 490 488 LI. 15-16 488 LI. 17 492 LXIX. 30-31 491 CX, 1 Proverbs, VIII. 22-30 647 XV. 8 XXI. 488, 492 Ecclesiastes. IV. 8 ... 277, 501 VII.. 20 1,051 Isaiah. I. 11-15 VII. 14--15 552 XXVIII. 7-8 1,065 XLIII. 11 277, 501 XLV. 6-7 1033, 1051 XLV. 1033 LXVI. 489 792 15 . 26 III. 182 III. III. 182 171, 709, 740 191 IV. 191 IV. 191, 192 IV. 192,983 IV. 193 VI. 1-6 506 VI. 6 741, 1065 XXV. 19-26 989 Exodus. III. 119 XXXII. XXII. 14 1065 XXXIII. 784 XXXIII. Numbers. VI. 2 ... 471 Deuteronomy. XXI. 23 530 XXX, 258, 277 XXX. 257 488 11 20 784 488 19 20 ...

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BIBLE REFERENCES. liii Page. 41 VI. 19 491 Chapter. Verse. 304 44 303, 314, 321 48 1, 17, 276, 305, 347 313 VI, 19-20 313 VI. 313 VI. 25 312 VI. 347 VI. 462 VI. 347 VII. 502 57 277 303 22 13 Jeremiah. Chapter. Verse. Page. VI. 20 489 VII: 21-23 489, 490 VII. 491 VII, XIX. 278 LI. 268 Ezekiel. XVIII. 481 XVIII. 31, 32 XXXIII. 15 277 Hosea. VI. 489, 491 VIII. 13 489 XIII. 14 277 Joel. 5 ... 1065 Amos, V. 21-22 ... 489 Zephaniah, III. 5 Zechariah, 1. 5 ... 268 THE NEW TESTAMENT. Matthew. 111. 2 252, 295, 528, 558 III. 11 . 357 III. 13-15 237 III. 14-15 556 IV. 17 295 IV. 18-20 236, 237 285, 303, 402 303 251, 791, 982 303 455 297 297 287 285 303 303 303 303 303 303 seseoses 350 XI. XI. XI. VII, 303 VII. 303 VII, VIII. 20 313 VIII. 348, 398, 917 IX 490 295 1048 313 786,787 347 303, 348 349, 485, 1009 287,558 556 XI. 252, 360 82,983 552 XI. 517 XI. 643 XI, 28-30 Title page. XII. 490 XII. XII. 520 XIII. 515 XIII, 313 XIII. 45-46 313 XV. 544 XV. 503 XV. 503 XV. 504 XVI. 520 XVI. 22 520 XVI. 348, 528 XVI. 528 XVI. 443 XVI. 28 290, 781,787, 793 XVII. 22 620 XVIII. 8-9 253 XVIII. 11 503 XVIII, 18-19 520 398

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liv BIBLE REFERENCES. 33 24 29 Page. 509, 510, 520 3 401 360 16 520 313, 314 Page. 526 527 527 538 539 541 539 332 259 541 540 238,540 530 529 282,789 789, 790 792 790 788 788 788 392 282 531 Chapter. Verse, XVIII. 19 XIX. XIX. XIX. 30 XX. 16 XX. 18-19 XX, 25-28 XXI. 43 XXIV, 1--13 XXIV. 15 XXIV. 30 XXIV. 34-35 XXIV. 36 XXIV. 46XXIV. 49 XXV. 1XXV. 1--13 XXV. XXVI. XXVI. XXVI. XXVI. XXVI. 53, XXVI. 64 XXVII. XXVII. XXVII. XXVII. XXVII, 38, 44 XX VII. 44 XXVII. 46,50 XXVII. 51-52 XXVII. 62-66 XXVIII. 17 Chapter, Verse. XIV. XIV. 40 XIV. XIV. XIV. XV. XV. XV. xv. XV. XV. XV. 34, 37 XV. XVI. XVI. 5 XVI. XVI. 12 XVI. 16-20 XVI. 17, 18 XVI. 18 XVI. 19 Luke. 1. 41-44 II, 50 II, 52 III. III. IV. 16VI. VIII. 23 531 532 29 249 532 168 355 421 532 52 512 512 527 1036 523 539 541 541 239 530 541 540 530 220 237 218 244 232 350 244 291, 303, 903 1032 787 534 IX 534, 550 X . 375 115 252 291, 303 312 300 226 355 290, 787 511 227 308 :::::::::::::::: 312, 313 347 347 313 520 511 Marks. II, 27, 28 III. 28, 29 IX, IX. IX. 29 IX. 31, 32 IX, 43, 45, 47 X. 9 XI. 23 XI. 24 XII. 18 XII, 26-27 XII. XII. XIII. XIII. 33 XI. XI. XI. XII. 2-3 XII. 23 XII. 29 XII. 31 XII, XII. 50 XIII. XIII. XIII. XIV. XVI. 16 XVI. XVII. 20 - XVil. XVII. 31 253, 254 510 544 369 261 261, 266 291 30 26 264n 516 347 252, 360 514 248, 785 789 781 492 31 218 788 392 :::::

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BIBLE REFERENCES. Page. 791 791 791 13 511 784 785 230 249 324 343 261 278 *** 293, 296 297 Chapter. Verse. XVII. 32 XVII. 34-36 XVII. 37 XVIII. 32- XIX. XIX. 12-26 XIX. XX. XX. XX. XX. 34XX. 34 XX. xx. XX, XXI. XXI, XXI. XXI. XXI. XXII. XXII. XXII. XXII. XXIII, XXIII. XXIII. XXIII. 39-43 XXIII. XXIlI. XXIV. XXIV. XXIV. XXIV. XXIV. XXIV. XXIV.. XXIV. 36-37 XXIV. 39 XXIV. 50,51 John. I. 1 261 275 643 274, 275,983 267, 293 790 788 787 789 789 437 522 527 523 539 541 239 238, 540 555n 530 531 531 531 532 532 532 532 546 532, 533 532,550 Chapter. Verse. Page. III. 6-7 551 JII. 12 982 III. 255, 982 III. 25-35 237 III. 29-31 557 III. 559 IV. V. 291 V. 24-26 295 V. 34 291 VI, 47-51 295 VI. 57 278 VI. 57-58 268 VI, 61, 63 VI. 62 289, 290, 354 VI 301 VII. 16 291 VIIT. 12 VIII. 14 233 VIII. 233 VIII. 19 VIII. 31-32 291 VIII. 32 298, 899, 1026 VIII. 298, 900 VIII. 34-36 900 VII. 40 350 VIII. 41 VIII. 42-43 234 VIII. 50 VIII. 295, 300 VIII. 52-53 300 VIII. 53 279 VIII. VIII. 58 120, 279 VIII. 59 512 10 295 257, 522,858 30 297, 480, 483,792 110 XI. 257, 793,858 XI. 257,793 XI. 53, 54 512 XII. 522 XII. 32-34 534 XII. 34 511 XII. 35-36 294 XII. 36 XII, 44 291, 292 XIV. 6 299, 517, 792, 1058 XIV. 292 XIV. 792 XIV. - 292 XIV, 420 234 291 279 18 i 1-3 1. 295 1. 29-36 I. 35-42 1. 36 I. 46 III. 3 III. 5-6 123 646 123 123, 1023 643 237 237 557 71, 472 357 357

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Ivi BIBLE REFERENCES. 15 302 0 371 302 11. 302 894 Chapter, Verse. Page. XIV. XIV. XIV. XIV. 293, 302, 303, 785 XV. xv. 5-6 292, 293 XV. 10 302 XV. 302 XV. 1058 XVI. 354, 855 XVII. 16, 354 XVIII. 521 XVIII. 520 XVIII. 541 XIX. 539 XIX, 521 XIX. 239 XIX. 348 XIX. 542 XIX. 530 XIX. 217 XX. 531 XX. 531 XX. 14, 532, 516 XX. 15-27 532 XX. 532, 533 XX. 532 XX. 532,546 XX. 532, 533 XXT. 217,552 Acts Chapter, Verse. Page. 3-9 532 248 683n II. 1-4 1 XVII. 28 124 XXIV. 5 471 Romans. I. 3,4 477 III. 23 1050 VIII. 14 643, 786 VIII. 16, 17 779 VIII. 17 643 XI. 32 1052 XII. 1 492 I Corinthians. XV. 5-7 XV. 13-15 477 XV, 16 478 XV, 21-22 478 Hebrews. XII. 144 I Thessalonians, V. 23 109) Revelation. IV. 4-11 712 v. 1 ... 671, 714 533

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GENERAL INDEX. [The letter n at the end of a figure indicates that the reference is to the foot-note on the page indicated]. Abd'allah Abdullah Suhrawardy Abel Abhedananda, Swami Abraham Abrogation Absolute, the Adamzad f Page. 994 831 190, 191, 192, 506 73, 685 120, 213, 261, 266, 269, 279, 280, 281, 298, 300, 386, 518, 519, 900 1002, 1003, 1067 28, 123, 152, 648, 655, 658, 675, 676, 685, 706, 707, 727, 728, 730, 935, 967, 968, xxii, xxviii 728, 729 729 et seq. 94, 453 1004 n. 835, 838, 846, 854 see reflection. 734, 735 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 176, 179, 180, 182, 183, 190, 192, 202, 213, 290, 291, 350, 372, 374, 376, 397, 478, 480, 481, 505, 518, 523, 657, 709, 1016, 1040. 1027 372, 478 668n. 350 190, 191, 192 see under fall. 288 a pure abstraction ... conceived as a sum Absorption into God Abu Sa'id ibn Ab'il Khayr, Accidents Action, relation of, to reflection, Actuality Adam ** ... sons of, the fall of loins of the typical man the making of Eve from the rib of, the son of God A. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

Page #1159
Iviii GENERAL INDEX. ... 1010 Ahuras... Page. Adharma ... 692, 693, 761 et seq. Adholoka ... 716 Adonis, ... ... 549n. Adwaita, see Vedanta Age of the World ... 32 Agni ... 189 Ahalya ... 713n, Ahamkara ... 484, 485, 486, 492, 499, 494, 495, 555n, 821, 656, 661 et seq., 801 three kinds of ... 485 Aharaka sharira see under body. Ahimsa ... 829 et seq., 862, 883 Ahmad ibn Habith 1010 Ahmad ibn Yabus ... Ahmad ibn Zakariah ... 1010 710, 711 Aikanta see ekanta. Aja ... 495 Aliva 692, 742 et seg., 890, 1042 Akasha (Ether) 22, 81, 82, 463, 765 (Space) 77, 78, 82, 691, 692, 693, 696, 743 ct seq. Al-Hallaj 1005n. Alifuddin, al-Tilimsani ... 1009 Alladin ... ... 742 Allah ... 115, 116, 117, 709, 1009 Allahabad ... 672 Allen, James ... 1 Aloka 739, 750 Alokakasha ... 750 Amavasya ... 788 Amir Ali Syed 942, 955, 978 Amos ... 489 Analogy ... 660 Ananda , see bliss. Ananias 331, 914 Anelcanta 704, 706, 768 ; see also Nayavada Angels 261, 264, 265

Page #1160
GENERAL INDEX. lix Anger .. Page. 121n, 615, 893, 922, 923, 925 Antarakasha ... 241 Arachne 158, 159, 160, 161, 163 Archangel 559, 784, 998, 999n. Aries ... ... 491 Arjuna ... ... 418, 435, 678n. Ark ... see Noah, Arnold, T. W. 992, 1006 Arya Samaj ... 771 Asana ... 458, 463, 943, 949 Ascension 290, 533, 548, 549, 551 Asoka ... 942 Asrava ... * 623, 630n1, 770, 890 et seq., 900, 905, 906, 987. Association of ideas 597, 602 Astral plane 76, 995, 996 Asuras ... 484, 485, 800 Athanatism 258, 259 Athene Pallas ... 159 Atman ... see soul. Atom ... 22, 26, 81, 702, 761n. the fundamental--- **. .. 820 Atonement, Vicarious ... 482 see also under Jesus. Attar, Farid-ud-din ... 1009 Attention 2021, 20311, 586, 588, 589, 595, 603, 605, 608, 610, 613, 614, 621, 630 n, 641, 719, 753, 892 Attis ... 549n. Attraction 314, 315, 316, 725, 27 Audaraka shurira see under body, Augustine, st., 1006n. Augustus ... 259 Aum see om. Auto--Suggestion 164, 165, 178, 251, 378, 416, 430 Avagraha ... 621 Avasarpini 713 Avaya ... ... 622 Avebury, Lord Ayuh Karma $96, 898, see also longevity. .. : : : :

Page #1161
lx GENERAL INDEX. ... Page. Babylon 268 Bacchus 231 Baghdad 1006 Ba'izeed 1008 Balaram 506n. Banaji ... 318 Bandha 890, 893 et seq., 900, 904 Baptism 356 et seq., 551, 553, 556, 557, 558, 559 Barabbas ... 541, 559, 560, 562 Barret, B. F. 253, 437 Barth ... ... 1079 Bauer ... 219 Bayley, Harold, 116, 117, 118, 471, 562 Beasts, the four, 712, 713 *Becoming', 699, 700, 701, 702, 703, 704, 733 Bedr, battle of, ... 1002, 1033 Beginning of the world ... 30 Belief 166, 208, 251, 473, 889, 934, 985 distinguished from knowledge ... 473 Bergson, Henry ... 42, 46, 47, 187, 425n, 577, 531n, 588, 592, 601, 602, 603, 604, 612, 614, 632, 640, 641, 700, 701, 743, 745, 747, 748, 816, 817, 870 Berkeley ... 84, 85, 112, 599 Besant, Mrs. Annie 74, 166, 319, 469, 869, 1047, 1065 Bethany ... 535, 550 Bethlehm ... 793 Bhagavad Gita ... 17, 18, 90, 122, 123, 124, 280, 281, 292, 293, 435 II. 11, 348 VI. 13-14, 949 II. 12, 280 VII. 20-23, 18 II. 34, 312 IX, 6, 124 II. 47, 987 IX. 7, 122 II, 48, 987 IX. 25, 17 II. 53, 312 XI.- 435 II. 62 . 987 XI. 33-34 , 1033. II. 63, 987 XII. 5, 17 11. 66, 987 XIII. 15-16, 292

Page #1162
GENERAL INDEX, lxi Page. Bhagavad Gita. II, 71 , 987 XV. 1-2,524 II, 72, 987 XV. 15, 1034n. Ill. 34, 348 XVII. 8-10, 350 IV. 37-38, 358 XVIII. 62, 386n. v. 19, 312 XVIII. 65 , 386n, VI, 9, 348 Bhagwan Das 317, 656n. Bhakti ... 223, 224, 889 ; see also under Yoga Bhoga Bhumi ... 1012 Bible, authenticity of, as an historical record ... 212 et. seq., 500 not comprehensive ... 982 For quotations and references, see separate index. Biography ... 214 Birth, advantage of the human, 194, 498, 565, 809, 875 Virgin- see under virgin. advantage of, in a good family 875, 876 ---of Jesus, see under Jesus. second -, see baptism. deva , 548 Blindmen, the parable of the ... 689 Bliss ... 14, 15, 121, 140, 142 et. seq., 256, 304, 319, 320, 553, 559, 687, 713n, 870, 936, 938, 939 Blood, Mr. B. P., . ... 872 Body, ... 176, 259, 437, 492, 562, 620, 718, 814, 816, 842, 844, 863 made in the likeness of the soul 560, 816 the solar ... 795 the aharaka ... 827 the audaraka 827 the karanu .... 825, 820, 1020 the karmana 808, 821, 822, 823, 824, 825, 826, 834, 835, 836, 837, 842, 896, 905, 906, 912, 915, 937, 1020 the physical ... 842, 912, 937 the sukshma 92, 825, 826, 1020 the sthula ...826, 842, 912, 937 the taijasa ... 822, 825, 827, 834, 842, 896, 912, 937 the subtle 308, 822 the vaikriyaka ... 827

Page #1163
Ixii GENERAL INDEX. Page. Body, identification of self with , ... 176, 437, 770, 879 see also Self (the lower) resurrection of the--206 ; see also resurrection. Bolingbroke ... 563n, Bondage 6, 145, 189, 204, 299, 305, 584n, 629n, 872, 679, 769,770, 771, 773, 779, 807, 893 et seq., 900, 901 ; see also karma. Bose, Prof. Sir J. C. ... 980 Boswell .. ... 9421, Bowne, Prof. Brahma ... 115, 116, 184, 186, 187, 188, 190, 473, 484, 646, 647, 673, 674, 675, 676, 682, 685 Vishnu carrying--in his forehead ... 675 marriage of, 186 et seq. Brahman, see Brahma. Brahman ... 86, 90, 93, 99, 100, 115, 123, 152, 202, 204, 645, 646, 647, 649, 651, 052, 673, 679, 682, 687, 691, 707, 724, 727, 780, 731, 977 defined by silence 730, 731 as the Absolute, see Absolute. Brahmana ... 357 Brahmo Samaj ... 1085 Brain 600, 601, 614 et seq., 626 plexus of the ... 671 Bread ... 268, 278, 434, 435, 436, 437 and wine 434, 435, 436, 437 Breathing ! ... 463, 464, 465, 857; see also pranayama, Bribad Aranyaka Upanishad ... 114, 241, 650, 655, 665 Brotherhood of man ... 322 et seq., 346 Buddha .. 3, 223, 236, 243, 699, 702, 7141, 727, 730, 732 et seq., 794, 81311, 860 Buddhi ... 621, 673, 682 Buddhism ...730 et seq., 795, 954, 961, 1086 ; see also Buddha. Buddhic plane ... 76 Bull 490, 491, 492 Burkitt, Prof. F. C. ... ... ... 216 Butler, Bishop ... 40 Butter 186, 187, 552, 553 . . ::

Page #1164
Byron Caduceus Cain Calendars Calvary Camel Canaan, the woman of, Capital Capricornus ... Carlyle Carpenter Carus, Dr. Paul Causality Cause, the first, of the universe Caesar Celibacy Ceremonies Chitta Christ Chance Change, the philosophy of Chanting Character Charvakism Chatterji, Mr. J.C. Cherubim Chhandogya Upanishad, 144 ... GENERAL INDEX. Christianity, (early) conceived of Holy Ghost C. *** 343, 539, 1078 506, 507, 508, 911 942, 952 36, 38, 39, 40, 609, 803, 804, 973 701, 961 433, 438, 439, 440 316, 572, 573, 574, 575, 594, 595, 601, 607, 608, 724, 815, 816, 817, 820 1080, 1081, 1082 67, 802 202, 203 241, 481 621, 656 239, 257, 318, 350, 477, 478, 486, 528, 551, 552, 553, 779, 785, 792, 793, 1058 233, 552, 553 see also Christos, Krishna and Messiah. 683, 796 686, 687 954 993, 994, 1000 671 190, 191, 192, 213, 506, 6417, 983 1004n. 518, 529 493n. 503, 504 880 491 ... 947, 991, 992, 1075. 226 86, 470 666, 691, 772, 773, 906 30 lxiii Page. 687 E not a complete system belongs to the devotional type of religion,... state of, at the time of Mohamad,

Page #1165
Ixiv GENERAL INDEX. : : : Page. Christos ... 281, 282, 289, 294, 295, 297, 391n, 392, 454, 483, 499, 553, 559, 793 see also Christ. Cindrella ... 561 Cinematographical view of nature 654n, 655n, 765 Circle ... ... 609n. City, see holy city. Civilization 196 et seq., 388, 393 the ancient Indian, ... ... 199, 200, 201 Clairvoyance ... ... 198, 629, 700n, 848, 857, 996, 1064, 1065 Clergy, fatherhood of, ... 358, 359 Coats of skin ... 176, 658 Coche, Dr. ... 419, 420, 429 Colton ... 326 Comforter, the ... 682 Concentration 310, 311, 379, 380, 383, 384, 385, 386, 387, 392, 393, 394, 406, 431, 455, 456, 473, 527, 593, 683n, 782, 794, 943, 987, 1056 Concepts 597 et seq., Conduct, right, ... 454, 474, 475, 738, 886, 887, 888 909, 910, 913 et seq., 920 Confession ... 796 Confucius 566, 1061 Conqueror, the true, ... 833 Conquest of the world, see under world, Consciousness 26, 40, 48, 51, 53, 67 et seq., 73, 74, 75, 85, 89, 90, 105, 112, 115, 118, 152, 274, 567, 570, 575, 576, 577 et seq., 624, 640, 647, 650, 656, 699, 723, 795, 848, 961, 980 not a product of matter, ... 26, 67, 75, 76, 105, 112 degrees of, ... 619 nature of, ... 152, 567 et seg., see also soul. states of, ... ... 624 et seq., 663 a substance ... 105 a priori elements of ----, see understanding, Contemplation, ... see self-contemplation. Contentment ... 800 Contiguity 603 et seg.

Page #1166
Continuity Courage Cow Cowardice Creation, the Hindu theory ofof differences diverse reasons for Sankhya-Adwaita theory of, theory of-refuted Christian and Muslim notions of Creator Criminals Cross Crucifixion, of differences God not a-, 33, 34, cannot be defended on charge of favouritism, Cruelty, see himsa. Cryptomnesia Cumont, Prof. Curses of Savitri ... Dahlke, Paul Dahlmann Dakshinayana .. GENERAL INDEX. 121 et seq., 651, 652 648 et seq. 100 et seq. 19, 101 et seq. see also under God and soul. 100, 115, 120 et seq., 645, 647 et seq., 969 et seq., 975, 1000 131 35, 120 et seq. 131, 803, 804n. 343, 344, 345 239, 484, 521, 528, 534, 536, 543, 544, 545, 609n. 484, 520, 521, 528, 529, 531, 536, 540, 542, 544, 551, 553, 560 -pronounced on Adam etc. -on Cain Daniel Darkness, the outer Darsana Darwin David ... D. *** lxv Page. 726,752 849 495n, 849 1055 101, 110 1013, 1014 56 711 187, 188, 189 171, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183 191 734, 736 733 788n. 428 271, 715 621 47, 177, 317, 818 226, 488 ...

Page #1167
Ixvi GENERAL INDEX. Page. Death ... 174, 178, 183, 258, 263, 266, 269, 270, 273, 274, 275, 277, 279, 290, 296, 300, 477, 514, 529, 536, 543, 781, 884, 860, 983 causes of 174, 178 fruit of labour not destroyed by 914, 915 conquest of ,274, 275, 477,498, 529, 790, 797, 835, 838, 858 premature-- ... 844, 845, 859, 860 no- of the soul 183, 270, 271, 273, 834 illusion of 183, 271, 273, 276 Deceit 615, 893, 922, 923, 925 Definition ... 726, 728 Delight 147, 148, see also happiness and bliss. Desire... 4, 121, 148, 149, 150, 152, 153, 171, 173, 176, 183, 189, 194, 2031, 206, 285, 287, 289, 304, 314, 315, 352, 355, 397, 484, 568, 574, 575, 579, 581n, 5841, 610, 615, 631n, 670, 686, 732, 733, 769, 771, 773, 791, 810, 816, 817, 829, 843, 848, 858, 871, 893, 899, 902, 903, 936, 939, 941, 10:9 four kinds of ... ... 93 Desirelessness 287, 304, 910, 925, 927, 970, 1063 Despine, Dr. ... 413 Destiny 580n, 899, 972, 986, 987, 1934, 1035 Deussen, Prof. ... 161, 333, 730n, 748, xxxiv Devus, fight of, with asuras ... 484, 485 birth of ... 548 power of---to change form ... ... 547 Devil see the Evil One. sons of ... 288 De Voe, Walter . ... 792 Devotion 11 282, 741, 742, 943, 944, 951, 952, 953, 1053, 1056, xxi see also Blunkti yoga. Dhurundi 458, 468 (conceptual thought) ... 622 forms of --- ... 932, 933, 934 Dharma ... 189, 674, 682 (a substance) 692, 693, 759 et seq. rules of ... 908 Dhu 'l Karnein 1018, 1042, 1043

Page #1168
GENERAL INDEX. Ixvii ... 930 Page. Dlyana 366, 458, 468, 672, 980, et seq. arta- , raudra , ... 930 dharma 366, 930 sukla- , 366, 670, 920, 930, 931, 9:2, 934, 948, 948 forms of 992, 933, 934, 935 Diameter 609n. Diodorus ... 711 Disciples of Jesus see under Jesus. Disease 835, 838, 842, 814, 845, 858 Divide and rule, the principle of 341, 342 Divorce 989, 1037 Dods ... 500 Dods, Dr. 69, 8231. Doubt ... 544 Draupadi ... 418 Drayton, Dr. 536, 537 Dreams, the material of 107, 108 analysis of 96, 567, 622, 632 et seq. how caused 96, 507, 622, 632 et seq., 676 analogy of -- -- ... 91, 92, 95, 96, 97, 98, 100, 101, 104, 351 et seq., 436, 646, 686, 687, 743, 976 Dream Problem", reviewed (appendix), xvii et seq. ... 1078 Duality 94, 697, 985 Dupuis i... 563n. Duration 5821,751, 753, 870, 871 Durga Durvasa 418, 419 Dust Dwarka 5061, Dzyan, the book of 27, 28 Druids ... . ... 670 ... 181 East, the wise men of the Echo Eden, see the Garden of Eden. Education ... ... 235 157 572, 576, 594, 595, 628

Page #1169
Ixviii Edward Egg, the mundane, Ego, see soul. Egypt Ekanta Electrons Elements, Sankhyan view as to the origin of Elephant Elias Elliot Elohim Emotions Emptiness Energy Enjoyer Enos Envy Epicure Equanimity Essenes Ether Eucharist Eunuchs Evanson Eve Evil one, the Evil Evolution GENERAL INDEX. analysis of effect of correspondence of origin of, increases by resistance only a comparative term 26 661, 662, 664 689, 758 982, 983 46, 47, 701 116, 117 65, 177, 315 et seq., 577, 638, 841, 844, 865 315, 316, 448, 577 177, 178, 316, 317, 318, 841 316 see also passions. 748, 749 21, 24, 577, 656, 975 767, 769, 810 193 841 349, 883, 1081 365, 864, 910, 911, 987, 1081 240 22, 692, 695, 696, 759, 760 239, 434 et seq. 508, 509 230, 238 170, 171, 179, 180, 181, 182, 190, 397, 523, 668n, 673, 709 1040 et seq. 1040, 1041, 1045, 1047, 1052, 1053, 1054 1052 303, 305, 306 193 24, 25, 26, 41, 49, 53, 62, 111, 210, 715 1073n, 1074n. 773, 774 14, 210 modern theory of, refuted, of Jivas goal of 244, 282,283, 797 706, see also nayavada *** *** ... Page. 710 668 *** ***

Page #1170
GENERAL INDEX. Ixix Page. Evolution, Sankhyan view as to 774, 775 Muslim notions, as to-, ... 1011 Existence 698, 704, 705, 707, 708, 728, 729 Expanse ... 748 Experience ... 572, 585, 595 Eye, formation of ... 41 et seq., 905, 906 --sight recovery of ... .. 859 the third - 783 metaphor of the ... 712, 713, 71311. not the seer 781,782, 783, see also perception. F. Faith ... 166, 167, 168, 169, 185, 186, 192, 208, 251, 287, 298, 356, 358. 374, 378, 395, 492, 433, 454, 457, 487, 849, 911 personified 191, 192 right-- 474, 475, 553. 738, 886, 887, 888, 889, 895, 920, 922, 930 Fall, doctrine of the, 154-203 (Chapter iv), 207, 208, 290, 376, 397, 417, 478, 479, 480, 505, 506, 551, 774, 1040 not an historical affair ... 201 Farid-ud-din Attar ... ... 1009 Hascination 409, 856 Fasting 227, 846 Fatalism 986, 987, 1023, 1034 Father, the ... 115, 292, 293, 294, 297, 358, 359, 361 (with reference to Holy Trinity) ... 642 et seq., 682 Fault-finding ... 342 Fear ... 174, 176, 177, 178, 182, 307, 318, 325, 336, 337, 344, 849 Feelings, nature of ... 577 et seq. quantitative estimation of, ... 146 Finot, M. Jean 178, 430. 844, 859 Fire ... 800 First born, the ... 1022 Fiske ... 33 Flame 117, 656 Flaming sword, 171, 202 Flournoy, Prof.

Page #1171
1xx Food Force Frazer, Sir J. G. Free, see freedom. Page. 227, 349, 350, 465, 830, 832, 841, 844, 883, 915, 917, 918, 919, 1065, 1066, 1067 24, 25, 569, 584n, 610, 761n, 891 479 Freedom... Free will Freud, Prof. Sig. Function of substances Fusion of spirit and matter, see under spirit. G. Gabriel Galilee Gandhi, Mr. V. R. Ganesha ... ... Ganga Ganga Prasad Garden of Eden 998n 520 438, 703 679, 680 671 119n, 1060n. 170, 171, 291, 350, 374, 523, 1054 444 757 660n. 713. 157, 186, 187, 188 717, 989, 1032 32, 33 523, 544 Goat 490, 491, 492 God, 7, 8, 17, 110, 114-153 (chap. III), 208, 209, 224, 274, 371, 579, 739, 740, 741, 797, 799, 913, 914, 943, 944n, 966 et seq., 1004, 1009, 1015 94, 443 absorption into a pluralistic concept 115, 116, 117, 706, 707, 709 et seq... 740, 1009 ... Garga Garuda Gautama (Nyaya) ... GENERAL INDEX. 6, 7, 143, 144 et seq., 298, 579n, et seq, 871, 899, 900, 901 579n, et seq. 637, 638, 639, 806 36, 37, 151, 755, 768, 895 Gayatri Geography Geology Gethsemane (mythology) *** ... as the author of evil, see evil. as the source of all actions 969, 970 7, 128, 149, 208 a concept of perfection difference between-,and man 128, 152, 153, 198, 199, 372 ...

Page #1172
GENERAL INDEX. lxxi God, ... 813 Page. every soul is a- , ... 110 different conceptions of, ... 115-117 Fatherhood of, see father. freedom of --- from induction ... 132 function of --- heir of, 643, 779 infinity of, 91, 136-140 kingdom of, see kingdom of God. immanence of . ... 292 et seq. freedom of- from sleep 274, 275 --- from passions ... 17 desirelessness of, ... 17, 741 as "I am" 118, 119, 120 Muslim idea of the unity of, ... ... 1004n origin of modern error concerning -- ... 358 not the Supreme Ruler, ... 33, 34, 133, 134, 135, 361, 36311, 364n. not a creator, 33, 34, 35, 120 et seq., 358, see also creator. number of mythological ... 740 the 24- S of Jainism, 710, 711, 712, 714, 741, 943, 967 popular notion concerning ---self-contradictory 132, 133 signiticance of the word ---- 117, 118 --- names of God ... 1005n. son of- see under son, vision of, 781 et seq., see also under perception, vision and Self. Gods, wives of ... ... 190 Goethe ... .... 476 Golgotha 499, 540, 555 Good, the doing of 389, 390 --and evil, 170, 171, 175, 193, 349, 518, 551, 1042 see also knowledge of good and evil. Gopis .... 281, 282 Gospels ... 216 et seq., 239, 283, 284 Grave ... ... 545, see also sepulchre. --s, the opening of the ... ... 220 Gravitation ... 550, 727, 726, 762, 763, 853 Greed ... 615, 800, 801, 893, 922, 923, 924, 925 . .

Page #1173
lxxii Greeks Grief Group-souls Guru *** Habit Haeckel, Prof.. Hallucination "Hama aust," the doctrine of, Hamza *** artificial Hardships, endurance of 456, 457, 595, 596, 600,889 19, 25, 30, 32, 39, 41, 48, 49, 50, 51, 78, 111, 231 232, 259, 263 593, 633, 939, 941, xviii. 93 et seq. 1001 Hands, the unwashen 227 Happiness, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 89, 121n, 142 et seq., 182, 201, 211, 252, 255, 256, 354, 388, 392, 553, 680, 686, 952 xxxii. 909 Hatha yoga, see under yoga, Hatred Head ... GENERAL INDEX. ... He-goat, see goat. Hell, ... *** H. ... Henry VIII. Hercules Heredity 314 et seq., 810, 865, 867 574, 618, 722 Health, 177, 178, 316, 317, 318, 338, 423, 840, 845, 863, 865 Heart, 191n, 241, 455, 573, 574, 618, 722, 779, 782, 789, 790, 796, 864, 867, 942, 943 671 241, 574, 782, 783, 942 864, 865, 867 790 plexus of the... the dweller in the cavity ofthe lotus of the as the holy place ... Heaven, kingdom of, see kingdom of God. Heaven, names of different-s *** names of different-s 150 715 358, 432, 912, 1069 ... ... 205, 206, 211, 252, 253, 254, 255, 256, 259, 260, 265, 271, 273, 550, 717, 1012 272n, 716 Page, 956 253, 254, 255, 260, 261, 265, 271, 715, 716, 717, 922, 950. 1012, 1040, 1042, 1045, 1053, 1054 272n, 716 259 231 807, 818, 819, 820 ... ...

Page #1174
GENERAL INDEX. lxxiii Herod ... ... 683 Page. Hering, Ewald ... 599 Hermes 502, 1000 ... 217, 235, 516, 521 Himalayas 670, 672 Himsi ... 21, 832n, 83311, 881, 862, 877, 915, see also ahimsa, lineage of, 832n, 833n. Hiranya-Kasipu ... 799, 800 History, 213, 214, 219, 232, 323, 328, 419n, 548, 562 et seq. Hoffding, Harald ... 569, 577n. Holiness 133, 140, 153, 644 Holy city ... 786 Holy Ghost, the ... 352, 353, 355, 551, 552, 553, 642, 644, 682, 683 sin against, 355, 849 identical with Sarasvati Holy place, the, see under heart. Honey ... 552, 553 Hosea ... 489, 491 Horris ... ... 3, 4 House-holder 878, 912, 919, 930 Hudson ... 36, 57, 59, 164, 198, 378, 411, 412, 416, 428, 537, Hufeland ... 318 Huges, T, P. ... 1023, 1030, 1039 Hugo, Victor .... 55 Human birth, advantage of ... 194, 294 Husband and wife ... 508, 665 Huxley, Prof. ... 80, 111, 945n. Hydrogen ... 613, 895, 937 Hypnotism :56, 376, 408 et seg., 607, 806, 856 1. "I am", ... 118, 119, 120, 279, 280, 371, 372, 649, 651, 652, 656 "1-this-not", 650 et seq., 1008 Ida ... 554, 671, 788n. Idea 571, 577, 597, 60211, 625, 631, 616, 647, 677 - s, association of ... 597, 602 -s (Platonic) ... 665, 666, 667, 668, 669, 679, 705 Ideal, ... (Chapter I), 1, 2, 4, 7, 10, 11, 13, 18, 128, 151, 274, 281, 282, 348, 451, 454, 190, 741, 869, 886, 944

Page #1175
Ixxiv GENERAL INDEX. Page. Ideal, force of the 805, 806 Idealatry 18, 450, 451, 454, 877, 943, 949n. Idealism ... 83 et seq., 105-112, 271n, 436, 662, 663, 768 Muslim , 93 et seq. reconciled to Realism 106-110, 768 Idea-tion 646 Identity ... 573 Idolatry 18, 385, 454, 877, 943 et sect., 993 Ignorance 171, 173, 174, 176, 376, 848, 850, 876 Iha ... 622 Illusion ... 90, 94, 108, 109, 152, 210, 271n, 272n, 589, 590, 648, 650, 764, 902, 939, 961, 977 material substratum of, ... 107, 108, 109 Imagination 104, 115, 123, 124, 352, 567, 6291, 646 Immaculate conception see virgin birth. Immanence of God ... see under God. Immanuel 552, 553 Immortality ... 89, 172, 174, 176, 203, 211, 254, 271, 274, 275, 277, 296, 417, 514, 516, 565, 835, 865, 867 Impression ... see Samskara. India 245, 246, 282, 338 Indians ... 332 Individuality 96, 1261, 782, 818, 820, 821 (substratum of personality) ... 53 Indra ... 116, 186, 189, 562, 713n. Inextension ... ... 65 Infinity, types of ... 139 God's ... 136-140, 385n. Innocent, punishment of the see vicarious atonement. Inspiration ... 1064 et seq. Instinct 595, 619, 620, 817 Intellect 179, 181, 184, 187, 188, 409, 441, 452, 558, 559, 572 et seq., 583n, 602n, 614, 632 et seq., 655, 851, 852, 1041, 1042, 1043, 1044, 1054 personified 179, 181, 182, 186, 187, 188, 190, 800, 713n. nature of ... 198, 572, 5831. the power of Evil ... ... 1042 as a cause of death 849, 850, 851, 852

Page #1176
GENERAL INDEX. Ixxv Page. Intellect, not evil by nature ... 184, 190, 194 Intelligence see consciousness and intellect, Interaction between spirit and matter, laws of, 891 et seq., see also fusion of spirit and matter. Intuition ... 187, 188, 700, 701, 851 Isa 561, 562 Isaac 261, 266, 269, 989 Isaiah 488, 489, 500 510, 541, 552, 1051, 1054, 1055, 1057, 1066 Isavasya Upanishad 119n, 221 Ishvara ... 116, 562, 646, 647, 657, 968, 975 Isis .... 561 Islam ... 559n, 560n, 565, 678, 709, 779, 831, 952, 954, 968, 972, 977, 979, 984 et seq., 1034, 1068 Israel 117, 248, 513, 522, 797, 798, 1040 emancipation of, ... 798, 799 Itar-nigoda ... 715 Iyer, Mr. K, Narayana 67211, 673, 679, 800 Jacob 261, 266, 269, 989 Jacobi ... 1070 Jaimini 1015, 1032 Jainism 689-778 (chap x.), 793. et seq., 798, 877, 878, 890, 897, 954, 958, 962, 971, 975, 979, 984, xxii, xxix et seq., 1009, 1025, 1055, 1059, 1060, 1066 two sects of, ... 1070 antiquity of . 1068 et seq. cosmogony of 272n, 715, 716, 717 position of ... 1068 et seq. Jairus, daughter of ... 421, 425, 427 Jalal-ud-din 1010, 1011 James, Prof. W... 72, 73, 74, 166, 431n, 470, 537, 588, 616,619, 872, 888 Jamuna 181, 282, 671 Jehad 1002, 1035 Jehovah ... 118, 257, 258, 277, 488, 489, 678n, 792, 1064 Jeremiah ... 489, 490, 491 Jerusalem 520, 526, 787; 993, 1003

Page #1177
Ixxvi GENERAL INDEX. Page. Jesus ... 119, 221, 225 et seq., 256, 282, 325, 350, 529 et seq., 714, 784, 793, 81311, 858, 899, 902, 978, 982, 1032, 1048 a man ... 234, 350 a man of wisdom ... 244 et seq., 284 atonement of sin by, 204 et seq., 482, 498 a yogi ... 8131, birth of, 230 et seq., 287, 551, 552, 553 disciples of, 228, 241, 242, 248, 278, 511, 512, 520, 527, 531, 532, 534, 543, 544, 548, 556 distinguished from Christ ... 233, 280--282, 289, 499, 552, 553 life and teachings of, 225 et seq., 241 et seq., 501 et seq., 510 et seq., 531 et seq. meaning of the word 559, 561, 563, 998n. miracles of, ... 369, 420 et seq. plans of, ... 514, 515, 516 resurrection of, ... 529, 534 et seq. visit of, to Tibet and India ... 245, 246 what became of, after resurrection ... 544 et sey. worship of, counterindicated 291 et seq., 294 not a historical figure 219, 221, 231, 232, 562 et seq. Jews 332, 594 Jina 280, 474, see also Tirthamkara. Jina-bani ... 678 Jiva 692, 709, 724, 737, 890, 1042 nature of, ... 767 evolution of, 773, 774 not a reflection see reflection. personified 71311. earth bodied etc.---S, 713 size of, ... see under soul. state of, in moksha ... See moksha. see also God, soul, transmigration, etc. Jpa pa ... 189, 628n, see knowledge. Jnana yoga see under yogu. Jnani ... see knower. Job 656, 1049, 1046, 1051 Joel ... 1066 ...

Page #1178
John, the Baptist Johnson Jonas Joseph Josephus Joy Judah Judaism Judas Iscariot Judgment Judgment Day Junayd Jung, Dr. Justice Kabir Kala GENERAL INDEX. Kala purusha Kali personified Page. 237, 238, 357, 360, 556 et seq., 982, 983 947n. 520 232 218, 221 143, 144 et seq., 211, 286, 582n, 670, see also bliss. 677 993, 1000 516, 526 963 et seq. 125, 251, 252, 253, 258, 260, 261, 262, 264, 350, 791, 796, 1013, 1030 1039 *** panchama Kaliya Kalki Kalma Kanada Kant Kapila Karanasarira, see under body. Karma K. *** ... lxxvii ... E ... ... *** 638 335, 336, 339, 346 262 779 ... 10041. 22, 23, 81, 82, 696, 697 50, 77, 78, 86, 756 20, 82, 658 et seq., 774, 775, 977 813n, xxi 757 223 492, 497 670 181 132, 140, 189, 214, 262, 263, 271, 273, 274, 299, 334, 452, 455, 494, 579, 627, 628, 630n, 807, 821, 893, 895 et seq., 910, 922 et seq., 981, 1014, 1025, 1035, 1055 explains variety and inequalities, 132, 803, 804, 1013, 1014 operation of the law of, 765, 850 aghatya-s 897, 898, 928, 932 ghatya-s 897, 898, 912, 920, 922 et seq., 931 no judge needed to determine the effect ofs, 904, 905 ***

Page #1179
Ixxviii GENERAL INDEX. ... Page, Karma, personification of, 2621, 1055 kinds of, 895 et seq. nature of, 189, 807 et seq., 894 - phala ... 262n. --prakritis ... 808, 812, 827, 898, 923 modifies subtle bodies ... 808 destruction of 812, 922 et seq. predeterminism and 579 et seq., sce also fatalism. - pudgala .. 764, 903 Hindu classification of- S, ... ... 1025 Karmana sarira, see under body. Karma yoga, see under yoga. Kashayas 898, 920, 922 et seq. four degrees of -- ... 920 Kashmere 245, 545 Katha Upanishad ... 175, 2741, 657 Kelly, Major M. ... 756n. Kevala Jnana, see omniscience. Key of knowledge ... 300, 372, 379, 483, 543, 551 Khadija ... 994, 999, 1000 Khaja Khan 978, 1007, 1011, 1019 Khan, Sir Syed Ahmad ... 998n. Khedkar, Dr. xviii, xx Khema ... 733, 794 Khuda ... ... 118 Killing, see himsa. Kingdom of God ... 12, 13, 168, 241-372 (chap. VI), 508, 528, 564, 784, 787, 955 means of getting into 284 et seq., 302 et seq., 357 not an affair of the hereafter ... 252, 257 significance of ... 248 et seq., 284 et seq., 290, 291 Kingdom of heaven, see kingdom of God. Kingsford, Dr. Anna ... 55 Knower 87, 88, 628n, 630n, 705, 708, 709, 732, 769 Knowledge 139, 140, 141, 142, 298, 311, 454, 472, 473, 571, 572, 574, 576, 578 et seq., 596, 624 et seq., 705, 708, 709, 736, 854, 936, 938, 939 29

Page #1180
GENERAL INDEX. lxxix Page. Knowledge, personified ... 1015 a priori elements of 161, 162, 163 obstructed by manas 612, 630n, 631n. by karmas, see ghatya karmas. distinguished from belief ... 473 future, - of 01 ure- ... 607 good and evil,---of 170, 171, 173, 174, 175, 199, 207, 210, 213, 256, 258, 304, 480, 499, 524, 551, 656, 809, 852 Jaina theory of,... ... 621 et seq. key of, ... 300, 372, 379, 483, 543, 551 past, of, 601, 607, 608, 634, preserved in will ... ... 571, 572, 602 right454, 472, 474, 475, 555, 561, 738, 886, 887, 888, 889, 890 et seq. second-hand, useless 185, 186 Vedantic theory of 83 et seq. Koran, see Qur'an. Krishna 181, 236, 281, 282, 391n, 419, 420, 454, 506, 551, 675, 676, 793 Kumarila ... 1078 ... 101 Kundalini 555, 671, 788n. Kurukshetra ... 435 Kun ... are Labour ... ... 880 Lakshmi ... 157, 187, 190 Lamb 557, 557n, 714 Land of Nod 191, 641n. Lauh-i-mahfuz, 1023, 1024, 1025, 1030 Laws of Nature ... 38, 87, 349, 350 personified 26211, of interaction between spirit and matter 891 et seq. Lazarus Lebanon, see Mount Lebanon. Leibnitz 579 Leila Levitation 549, 550, 763 ... 426

Page #1181
1xxx GENERAL INDEX. *** ... 110 Page. Life, 47, 73, 74, 75, 76, 110, 123, 152, 211, 220, 257, 258, 278, 280, 289, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299. 321, 485, 522. 559, 560, 561, 573, 643, 684, 732, 746, 793, 850, 858, 864, 866, 980, 1004, 1029, 1033, 1046, 1048, 1049 a necessary substance for word-process ... 75, 76 Book of- * ... 714 a flux ... 42, 700 entering into-- .. 200, 254, 255, 278, 483, 509, 565 divinity of, identical with Christ 257, 258 identical with God, 110, 118, 119, 257, 679, 1029 - Consciousness ... 73, 74 personified, ... 191, 220, 435, 437, 7131, 758, 1016, 1033 statutes of, ... 277 types of, in transmigration ... 770 ---Waves 653, 654 see-saw of, 483 et seq., 497, 499, 518, 549 tree of, 170, 171, 172, 202, 203, 213, 417, 524, 656, 852 * whoso loseth his- etc." .. ... 289, 485, 1009 Light 102, 103, 116, 117, 118, 294, 295, 297, 299, 312, 561, 562 Lion . ... 497, 800, 801 Lingum ... ... 190 Lodge, Sir Oliver 32, 83, 106, 193, 195, 435, 7371, 846 Logic ... ... 660n. Logos ... ... 116, 217, 435, 436, 609, 645, 647, 6531, 675, 682 (logoi) ... 115, 645, 668, 682 Loisy, ... ... 219 Loka ... 739, 750 Lokakasha 717, 750, 755, 761, 1027 Longevity 835, 836 Loofs, Dr. Lord's prayer 369 Lord's supper 435 Lot 213 Lot's wife 791 Love, 175, 314 et seq., 319 et seq., 381, 442 et seq., 6781, 810, 855 861, 863, 864, 865 Loyalty .. 339, 340 ... 232

Page #1182
GENERAL INDEX. lxxxi Lucas, Bernard Lukens, Herman T. Lunatic asylums, ... Page. 482, 483, 500 ... 600 ... xxii. ... 76 Macran, Prof. xviii Macrocosm 717 Magnetic fluid 855, 856 Magnetisation 404, 405 Magnetism ... 855 Mahabharata .... 6781 Mahaparanirvanic plane Mahat 661, 662 Mahavira, Bhagwan ... 223, 877, 1077 Maher, S. J. 65, 66, 67, 722, 723 Mahomed, .. 114, 125, 153, 209, 388, 560, 8131, 367, 984, 985, 988, 992, 993, 994, 1001, 1036, 1054, 1055, 1057, 1068 life of, ... 994 et seq. miracles of. 995, 996, 997 Malomedans ... 332 Mahommad Ali 99711, 1067 Maitland, Edward ... ... 55 Maitrayana Upanishad ... 645 Maitri ... 779 Malefactors 238, 529, 540, 541 Mallock Mammon 12, 209, 222, 223, 224, 444, 880, 993 Mamun-ul-Rashid ... 1007 Man 193, 194, 199, 254, 256, 367, 375, 386 place of, in nature son of -, see son of man. zodiacal, 490, 491, 492, 497 constituents of, ... ". ... 151 as a symbol difference between God aud-, see under God. 621, 661, 662, 664 see also manas and mind. Manas ... 179, 180, 181, 194, 202, 203, 383, 455, 495, 610, 613, 615, 631n, ... 151 ... 801 Mana ...

Page #1183
1xxxii Manas, Manna Mansur Mantras Manu 10 evolution of, 304 1005n. 433, 438, 439, 440, 933, 950n. 668 45, 816 45 292, 705, 707, 709 716 55 217, 219 261, 264, 506, 508, 509, 510, 1036 653n, 261 et seq. 186, 190 Masab 1002 Materialism, refuted 2, 40, 47, 48, 66, 67, 70, 71, 74, 75, 105, 106, 109, 110, 111, 112, 233, 961, 962 198, 961, 962 see also science. 546 557n. Materialization Maternus, Fermicus Matter 26, 40, 47, 74, 80, 101, 104, 108, 112, 585, 624, 630n, 692, 693. 695, 725, 743, 744, 761n, 895, 929, 934, 976, 977, 1044 personification of, 191, 713, 7ES 761n, 764 et seq., 773 764 101, 105, 976, 977 nature of, kinds of, origin of, theistic notions concerning the, ... -- Manufacturing act of, Many, the one in the Map of the Universe Marie Antoinette Marle, Dr. R. Van Marriage ... *** of the soul, No-sin nirvana Brahma's defects of, GENERAL INDEX. Vedantic views of Sankhyan notions as to a reality fusion of Maulana Rum Maxwell, J. C. Maya inflow of, towards spirit, see asrava, *** ... ... Page. 656, 661, 694, 697, 791 661, 662 295 ... ... *** ... with spirit, see spirit and bandh. 804, 1009 762n. 94, 104, 109, 262n, 648, 691, 698, 699, 798, 804n, 902 86 et seq., 764 765. 105, 107, 108, 112, 764

Page #1184
GENERAL INDEX, lxxxiii . . . . . Page. Mazda Ahura 710, 711 McCabe, Joseph 33, 34, 35, 39, 134, 479, 549n, 557 McGregor, Dr. . 537 Meat-eating ... 349, 350, 1065, 1066, 1067 Meditation 368, 379, 440, 472, 473, 683n, 908, 909, 911, 930 et seq., 943,951, see also dhyana. Mehdi . ... 779 Mejnun ... 223 Memory ... 66, 559, 567, 573, 585, 593 et seq., 632 et seq. of past lives, ... 54 et seq., 62, 63, 601, 607, 608, 634 personification of, ... 220, 221 product of fusion of spirit and matter ... ... 610 Mental plane 76, 996, 997 Meraj ... 996, 997 Mercury, Caduceus of ... 671 Mesmerism ... see hypnotism. Messiah ... 193, 280, 281, 282, 478, 553, 556, 557, 558, 559, 779 et seq., see also Christos. the coming of the, 779-801 (Chap. XI). Metals ... 980 Metchnikoff, Prof. 317, 839 Microcosm ... 717 Milk ... 188 Mind ... 71, 82, 86, 104, 124, 198, 352, 567, 571, 575, 602, 603, 607, 646, 719, 720, 721, 938 (dravya mana), .. 611 et seq., 664, 719, 720, 826, 938 presence of, ... 853 Minos ... 155 Minotaur 155, 181 Miracle 167, 297, 369, 402 et seq., 418 et seq., 846, 847, 853 boiled herb, the-of the 419, 420 the-of raising the dead 421 et seq. -s of S. Rama Tirtha 427, 428 -s of Jesus 369, 420 et seq. -s of Mahomed 995 et seq. -s of Jain saints ... Mission ... 504 Misunderstanding, causes of 689 et seq. ... 855

Page #1185
lxxxiv Mittra Mohammad Ali Moksha Money Monism Moon why no from heaven or hell Moncrieff, A. R. Hope Morality Moses state of soul in impossible in Vedanta no clear idea of-in Buddhism not a temporary condition Most High, the Motion Mythology new the splitting of the origin of, GENERAL INDEX. Moulton Mount Hira Mount Lebanon Muladhara Muller, Max Mundaka Upanishad Muni Murdoch Myers, F. W. H. Mysticism Page. 549n, 557n. 997n. 1067 675, 688, 714, 890, 913, 930, 939, 957 738, 739, 1063 731, 732 732 et seq. 771 et seq., see also nirvana. 1012 159 4, 460, 461, 805, 875, 880, 881 82, 83 et seq., 93, 111, 112, 659, 745, 976; see also Vedanta. 671, 788n, 789, 790 488, 788n. 995, 996 *** 344, 458 et seq., 857; see also love and virtue. 79 711 995, 998 545 671, 788n. 48, 114, 123, 375, 645, 1077, 1078n. 656 878, 907, 913, 918, 920 1032 55, 61, 62 362, 441, 690, et seq., 777, 780, 935, 938, 939, 941n, 975, 976, 981, 1041, 1055, 1056, xxi. see also mythology. 154 et seq., 262, 263, 359, 479, 492, 493, 497, 549, 551 et seq., 561 et seq., 609n, 642 et seq., 665 et seq., 688, 718n, 740, 778, 779, 788n, 797 et seq., 119, 169, 261, 266, 489, 648, 797, 978, 1040, 1045, 1046, 1054 115 79, 725, 726 ... ...

Page #1186
Hindu Biblical, Nanak, Guru Nandlal Sinha Narada Narcissus Nature, Laws of Nayavada Nazarenes Nazareth Negativity Greek-, Muslim Teutonic a source of error lxxxv Page. 951, 952, 989, 1004, 1015, 1038, 1041, 1043, 1052, 1055, 1063, 1067, 1070, 1073n, 1075n, 1076 154-203 (Chap. IV), 169 et seq., 190 et seq., 215 et seq., 549n, 551 et seq., 563n, 564n, 642 et seq., 668, 681, 682, 683, 713, 714, 788, 797, 798, 799 157, 181, 262, 263, 562, 665 et seq., 713n, 788n. 799, 800, 832n, 833n. 155, 157, 158, 159, 160, 161, 163, 181, 561 493n, 554, 1023 et seq. 680n. 689 et seq., 777, 778 plexus, Newton, Sir Isaac Nicholson Nicodemus GENERAL INDEX. Nelson Nemi Nathji, Bhagwan Nervous centres Nicoll, Mr. Maurice Nigodu Nikshepu Nirjara ... N. 444, 445, 481 157, 163 38, 87, 262 958 et seq. 240, 471, 472 470, 471, 472 464, 468, 769, 771, 848, 850, 861, 863, 893, 903, 906, 972 ... 394, 545 659 9 980n. 357, 358, 551 638 714, 715, 716, 771, 774, 1027 118, 119n. 890, 910, 922 et seq., 940 Nirvana... 3, 7, 181, 185, 189, 263, 272, 273, 274, 275, 276, 295, 454, 643, 674, 732 et seq., 763, 790, 792, 795, 921, 981 does not mean extinction 94,99 948n. 506n. see psychic centres. see psychic centres. ***

Page #1187
Ixxxvi GENERAL INDEX. Page. see also moksha, ... 76 . ... ... 458 668 Nirvana Nirvanic plane Niyama Noah's ark Nod, the land of No-Kushayas Noman Non-attachment Non-Word, the Nothing ... Noumenon Nudity Nyaya ... see Land of Nod. 894, 898, 922, 925 ... 561 396 et seq., 457, 987 ... 645 27, 28, 29, 30, 104, 105, 127, 651, 655, 976, 977 ... 703 171 et seq., 183, 282 22, 969, 977 .. Objectification, principle of ... 560, 569n, 814 et seq., 842, 843, 863 Objective mind 198, 412, 413, 414, 429 Odin ... ... 680n Odysseus ... 561 Old age 573, 839, 840, 844, 860 Oldenberg, Prof. ... 703 Om, significance of ... 433, 438, 439 Omnipresence 136, 137, 138, 139, 140 Omniscience ... 140, 141, 142, 187, 192, 355n, 5551, 559, 612, 624 et seg., 7001, 713n, 739, 769, 783, 784, 846, 877, 921, 927, 929 One, the---in the many 292, 705, 707, 709 Order and regularity in nature 35 et seq. Organising, act of 45,816 Organism ... 821 Origen . 213, 231, 994 Osiris ... 549n. Oversoul . 100, 436, 437 see also Universal Mind Oxygen ... 613, 895, 937 Pain ... 2, 14, 142 et seq., 390, 400, 538, 542, 574, 582n, 718, 719, 732, 814, 852

Page #1188
GENERAL INDEX. Ixxxvii 223 um kala 785 ... 76 Page. Pancham kala Parable of the blind men and an elephant ... 689 of the nobleman and his ten servants of the wicked servant ... 788 Paramatman, see God. Paranirvanic plane ... Parasva Nath Bhagwan ... 1071 Parvati ... 670, 672 Pasendi ... 733, 794 Passion ... 276, 615, 6301, 631n, 810, 841, 858, 898. sexual 507, 877 see also emotions, anger, etc., etc. Passivity, see negativity. Past lives, memory of, see memory of past lives. Patanjali ... 82, 287, 458 Path 200, 264n, 286, 886, 887 stages on the ... 921 et seq., 930, 931, 932 Patriarchs, the Jewish 261, 266, 267, 269, 270 Paul, St. ... 124, 471, 477, 478, 492, 532, 533, 643, 786 Pentecost ... 6831. Percept ... 597 Perception ... 68, 69, 70, 71, 83, 84, 585 et seq., 621, 622, 623, 661, 662, 789, 870, 928, 1027 of self ... 781 et seq. see also under vision. Perpetual motion ... 759 Persistence 106, 107 Personality 49, 50, 51, 53, 72, 73, 252, 259, 278, 555, 792 multiple 739, 795 228, 520, 523, 527, 531, 535, 544 Pharaoh ... ... 797, 798, 1040, 1045, 1046 Pharisees 225, 226, 227, 228, 262, 279, 285, 296, 298, 300, 320, 526, 534 Phenomenon Philanthropy 389n, 573 Philip ... 292 Philo Philosophy ... 955 et seq., 973 multiple Peter ... 703 ... 21

Page #1189
1xxxviii GENERAL INDEX. Page. Pilate 521, 529, 534, 539, 541 Pineal gland ... 782, 783, 790 Pingla ... 554, 671, 78811. Plato 155, 561, 645, 665 Pleasure ... 14, 15, 142 et seq., 399, 400, 574, 582n, 718, 719, 814 Plutarch ... 561 Point 608, 609n. ---of view, see standpoint. Politics 195, 327 et seq., 349, 881 Posture, see asana Practical side of religion, the see religion. Prahlada 799, 800, 801 Prajapati 647, 683, 667, 668, 669 Prakriti 20, 82 Pralu ya 650, 656, 693 Prana 22, 82 Prancaycima 458, 463 et seq., 554, 939 Pratibimba ... see reflection Pratimas 915, 916, 917, 918 Pratyahira 458, 468 Prayer 16, 359 et seq., 394, 395, 527, 782 Lord's ... 369 Pre-destination ... 1023 et seq. see also destiny. Pre-determinism ... 579n et seq. Pre-incarnation, memory of . see under memory. Prejudice 985, 1065 Prestige 325, 342 Preyer ... 50 Pride ... 616, 893, 922, 923, 925 Providence ... 1050 Pryse, J. M. ... 792 Psychic centres 555, 671, 714, 794, 801, 865, 1048, 1049 Psychical Research Society, ... 54, 857 Psychology 401, 567, 587, 647, 669 see also perception, intellect, memory and will, Pudgala ... see matter. Purusha ... 82, 775, see also Sankbya.

Page #1190
GENERAL INDEX. 1xKhxix Page. 186 Pushkara Pythagoras ... 55 Quality ... ... 91 67, 768 negative--ies ... 63, 964 Qur'an. Al... 52. 123. 154. 452. 493n. 495, 554. 55- 559, 560, 562, 565. 690, 824, 831, 967, 982, 983, 984, 98 986, 988, 989, 990, 991, 1002, 1003, 1004, 1013, 1014, 1010, 1020, 1021, 1023, 1024, 1025, 1026, 1027, 1029, 1030, 1031, 1033, 1034, 1036, 1037, 1038, 1039, 1051n, 1053, 1057, 1058, 1060, 1061n, . 1068 its three characteristics ... 988 its defects 988, 989 its composition and style 989 et seq. five kinds of contents of, ... 1003 - on animal life ... 831 sources of 989 objections against --- ... 989, 1031 et seq. ... 722 Radium ... 26 Raja yoga see under yoga. Rajas 21, 660 Ram ... 490, 491, 492 Ramanuja Rama Chandra 330, xvii Ram Krishna Paramhansa, Sri 114, 440 Ram Narain, Dr. . 414, xviin. Ram Tirtha, Swami ... 210, 369, 377, 389, 390, 391, 394, 396 427, 428, 432, 439, 463 Rangaji, N. 698n, 699n, 705, 969 Ranjit Singh Ray, Prof. P. C. ... 20 Realism 106--110, 768, see materialism. Hindu 20, 81, 82 Reality ... 29, 75, 90, 106, 107, 118, 152, 652, 693, 703, 704, 750 test of, 106, 107 nine- ies of Vaisheshikas .... ... 81, 694 et seq. ... 537 h

Page #1191
XC GENERAL INDEX. Page. Reason ... 132, 185, 188, 1911, 192, 199, 849 dethronement of, 132, 856 personification of, 191, 192 Re-birth see re-incarnation and transmigration, Reclaiming of criminals 343 et seq. Recognition ... 699 Recollection 701, see memory. Reconciliation (Chap. XIV), ... 942-1083 Redeemer, the true 212, 294 Redemption ... 204--240 (Chap. V), 256, 258, 355, 357, 359, 506 551, 781, 793, 796, 903 Christian conception of, ... ... 204, et seq. true significance of, 205, 256, 257, 551 not to be had by the favour of another 902, 903 Reflection ... 597, 601, 606, 608 et seq. is soul a--- 97, 978 Regularity in nature ... 35 et seq. Re-incarnation 802-884 (Chapter XII), 983n, 1009 see transmigration. Relations 347, 348, 391, 400, 401 Religion, 8, 9, 11, 12, 14, 15, 113, 235, 236, 275, 276, 565, 794, 974, 975, 1075, 1076 antiquity of 1069, 1072, 1073 practicability of 100, 690, 868 et seq. science of bliss... 8, 14, 235, 236 aims at perfection as old as humanity 10 three kinds of belief in, what it offers ? ... 1084 differences of various----S 942-1083 (Chapter XIV). two main types of ... ... 953, 954 Remarriage ... . .. Sch .. 1037 Renan Scl ... 219, 241 Renunciation, 14, 15, 133, 15 310, 313, 314, 351, 364, 365, 386, 369, 370, 391, 396 et seq., 40 Sc 57, 551, 644, 670, 674, 874, 910, 930, 952, 988 Repulsion ... 314, 315, 316, 827 Resignation ... 386,952, 986, 987, 988, 1034 8

Page #1192
Restoration to life Resurrection, ... 253, 257 et se 498, 511, 512, 518, 529, 51 ... Revelation Reymond, Du Bois Rhythm, 422, 424, 465, 466, 576, 603, 626, 629, 631, 650, 667, 668, 693, 723, 737, 746, 747, 766, 768, 810, 811, 856, 893 285 1069, 1071 Righteousness Rishabha Deva, Bhagwan Ritual, see ceremonies. Robertson, Rod, symbolism of Rousseau, J. J.... Rudra Sabbath Sacrifice Sa'di Sadducees Sahasrara GENERAL INDEX. Saint, see Muni. Sakya Muni Sale Salvation Samadhi 225, 226, 227, 488 191, 288, 386n, 486, 518, 519, 989, 1039, 1062 of lower nature enjoined not of another the doctrine of... 288, 486, 565 492, 497, 498 the Bible on, Al Qur'an on, a symbolism only Vedas against animal-s of Abel and Cain 200 SA Christian conception true significance of, S. xci Page. 421 et seq. 276, 300, 476-565 (Chapter VIII), et seq., 548, 549n, 551, 557n, 793, 796, 797, 1013, 1029, 1030 678, 1059 et seq. 79 014 Sel Sel Sci *** ... ... ... 563n, 1078 671 1084 673,679 """ 490 et seq. 496 191,487 327 261, 263, 266 671 486 et seq. 487 et seq. 493n. see Buddha. 998, 994, 1018, 1021, 1029, 1030 204, 205, 360, 797 204 et seq. 205 ... see also redemption. 383, 458, 468, 469, 494, 542,670

Page #1193
xcii GENERAL INDEX. Page. Samantabhadracharya ... 941, 945n. Samayika 365 et seq., 909, 916 Samitis 907 Bampson, Revd. H. E. ... 505, 506 Samskara 621 et seq. Samson ... 471 Samuel ... 471, 487 Samvara 890, 906 et seq., 940 Sanat Kumara... 481 Sandilya 444 Sankhya 20, 82, 648 et seq., 687, 765, 969, 970, 977 refuted ... 658 et seq., 774, 775 metaphysics of, ... 659 et seq. Sapphire 331, 914 Saptabhangi ... 985, 966 Saranya 262n. Sarasvati (the river) ...671, 672, 683 (the goddess) ..,155, 678, 679 Sarasvatirahasyopanishat 679 Sastri, Pt. G. K. 470 Satan 1040, 1041, 1042, 1044, 1045 Sat-chit-ananda ... 7, 8, 88, 89, 111, 152, 173, 174, 210, 255, 257 310, 351, 372, 388, 682, 730 Satrupa 665, 668, 669, 679 Sattva ... 21, 660, 661 Satya ... 650 Savitri 186, 187, 188, 190 Schleirmacher... 219 Schmiedel ... 216 Schopenhauer ... 191n, 560, 568, 573, 576, 583, 585, 591, 618, 665, 666, 687, 756, 804n, 814, 821, 843, 871, 985, 986 Science 20, 24 et seq., 30, 39, 40 et seq., 77, 78, 79, 81, 113, 361, 362, 580n, 846, 886, 887, 972, 973, 974, 975 two , ... .. ... 193, 194 Scriptures, mythological, not to be read historically ... 213 et seq. 548,563, 564 Secrecy 502 See-saw See under Life. . .

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GENERAL INDEX. xciii 2. OD Page. Segregation of species ... ... 505, 506 Self ... 175, 179, 211, 233, 256, 321, 354, 558, 559, 798, 853, 952, 953,985, 998n. the lower...175, 193, 233, 266, 288, 289, 371, 528, 558, 559, 798, 853 ---knowledge... ... 114, 386, 579, 580, 685, 854 ---contemplation, see dhyana (Sukla). See also personality and Sea-saw. Selfishness 857 Sensation ... 84, 85, 586, 587, 591, 600, 603, 616, 618, 021, 630n, 663, 664, 697, 719, 720 Senses 83, 84, 85, 585, 603, 628n, 629n, 632, 656, 157, 661 et seq., 695, 696, 699,794, 938, 1027, 1023, only media of perception ... 628 Sankhyan view as to evolution of the ... 661 et seq. correspondence of the, to elements ... 694, 695 Sensualism ... 200, 201 Sepulchre ..,534, 535, 562 Sermon on the mount 196, 286, 287, 297, 303, 307, 360 Serpent ... ... 171, 172, 173, 179, 180, 181, 376, 609n, 1054 the--King ... 181 Servant, the parable of the wicked,... 788 ---of sin 900, 901 tens, parable of the ... Seth ...192, 193 Sex 64, 265, 275, 506, 507 Sexual segregation 505 et seq. Shahudians ... 978 Shakespeare ...337, 956 Shams Tabrez 426, 1008 Shankaracharya 48, 194, 494, 727, 804n, 813n. Sheaths ... 935, 936, 937, 938, 941 Shewbread ... 226 Shiva ... 189, 190, 670, 672, 674, 675, 682 Shivabarat Lal Warman xviiin, xx Shivu Samhita, quoted 784, 998n. Siddha Sila 714, 716, 718, 739, 763, 822, 828, 837, 913, 932 Siddhatman 1047, 1063 10 ... 785

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xciv GENERAL INDEX. ... 239 ... 979n. Page. Sikhism 394, 1039 Silence ... 730, 731 Similarity 603, 605 Simon .. Sin ... 140, 170, 183, 204, 205, 299, 309, 355, 356, 357, 360, 366, 462, 468, 483, 494, 900, 901, 903, 1040 et seq., 1050 et seq.,. 1057, 1058 only against one's own soul, ... 1058 - the Holy Ghost 355, 356, 849 Sinha, Nand Lal ... 659 Sinha, P. N. ... 832n, Skin, coats of 176, 658 Slavery... 879, 989, 1036, 1037 Sleep ... 274, 275, 633, 634, 651, 660, 877 deep- , xxxiv, XXXV Smell 661, 664 Smith, Dr. W. B. ... ... 471 Smith, E. M. ... Smith, Mlle. H. ... 55, 56 Solar Plexus 1048, 1049 Solomon ... 282, 312, 1032 Soma ... ... 713n. Somnambulism ... 69, 577 Son, the ... 642 et seq., 682, 902 of God, 264, 265, 269, 274, 275, 280, 287, 288, 299, 501, 502, 503, 504, 506, 510, 512, 518, 556, 561, 786,792, 983 so also Holy Trinity. --of man, 226, 255, 256, 288, 290,503, 511, 512, 520, 522, 786,787, 788, 789, 792 Song of Solomon ... ... 282 Sonship ... 900, 901 Soul ... 51, 82, 90, 97, 130, 131, 141, 142, 145, 151, 220, 257, 282, 298, 299, 559, 588, 630n, 193, 694,725, 938, 977 et seq. are animals devoid of - ... 979, 980, 1028 Muslim views of, ... 560, 978, 984, 1013 et seq. the maker of its own body 131, 132, 724, 821, 822 diverse definitions of ---, 977 et seq. survival of 59, 60, 68

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GENERAL INDEX. XCV ... 151 . . Page. locus of, ... 722, 723 eschatology of, 262 et seq. significance of, ... ... 559n. eternity of, ... 126, 127 simplicity of, ... 65, 66, 67, 68, 723 a substance ... 64, 723 incorruptibility of, 65, 66, 68 capable of existing without bedy ... 68 the subject of knowledge 68 et seq. is there only one ? 91, 92, 97, 98, 99, 706 potentially divine sexlessness of, ... ...264, 265 not a created article 126, 127 size of,... 137, 220, 713, 719, 720, 721 et seq. See also jiva. Sound ... 81,661, 664, 695, 196, 1015, 1063 Sower, parable of the ... 311 Space ... ... 77, 78, 83, 691, 692, 693,696,743 et seq. speculations about the origin of, 743 et seq. two kinds of, ... ... 750 a reality or substance 747, 748, 750 occupation by spirits 136 Spark ... Spear ... 544 Species, segregation of 505 Spectacle 659 et seq. Spectator 659 et seq. Speech, see Vach, Spencer, Herbert ... 77, 106, 135, 818 Spinal Canal, ... 555, 671 __ column ... 714, 789, 801, 865 Spirit, 47, 75, 126, 127, 135, 136, 183, 184, 233, 257, 278, 552, 559, 579, 624, 653, 718, 723, 725, 743, 758, 773, 779, 823, 913, 929, 934, 1044 disembodied- S, ... 57, 58, 438, 644 immateriality of,... ... 135, 136 fusion of ---with matter... 610, 612, 629n, 630n, 695, 822, 891 et seq., 937, 938 Sravaka, see house-holder, ... 656

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khsui GENERAL INDEX. 440 Page. Srirupa Goswami... 446 Stages, see under path. Standpoint apoint. ... ... ... ... 704, 705, 795 see also naya-vada. St. Paul ... 124, 471, 477, 478, 492, 532, 533, 643, 1090 Sthula-sarira, see under body. Strauss ... 219, 564 Sturdy, E. T. ... 444 Sub-conscious system 850 et seq. Subjective mind, 164, 165, 166, 198, 368, 411, 412, 414, 415, 424, 425, 427, 429, 607, 850, 851, 852, 1064 Substance, 27, 29, 30, 32, 36, 37, 38, 47, 105, 107, 126, 127, 141, 151, 691, 692, 693,728, 728 characteristics of a ... 702, 703 interaction between different --S ... 768, 769 only bundles of qualities ... ... 708 not made by any one ... 692n. the six- S, ... 691 et seq. Succession ... 758, 759 Sufeism, 93 et seq., 804n, 942, 955, 1004n, 1007, 1009, 1014, 1016 See Hama aust. Suggestion ... 55, 56, 58, 164, 165, 166, 167, 178, 251, 368, 408, 410, 412, 415, 416, 420, 425, 427, 429, 430, 499, 537, 538, 841, 844, 849, 850, 851, 860, 939, 940, 941 Suhra yardy, Abdullah ... 831 Sukhdeva ... 114 Sulcshma sarira, see under body. Summary and Conclusions ...1084-1096 Sun 262n, 671, 788, 790 darkening of the-- 555n, 791, 801 Superiority ... 325 Superstition 362, 796, 952, 981 Supper, the parable of the 284 Lord's- -, 435 Surya Swedenborg ... 204, 437 Swetaswatara Upanishad Sword, the flaming 171, 202, 417 262n, 19

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Syed Ahmad Khan, Sir Symbolism of circle, point and triangle T. Taijasa-sarira Tamas Tammuz Tao Tapas Taste Tattvas Tau Taurus Taxation Teacher, qualifications of a true Telepathy Theology Theosophists Theseus Thieves Temple Tennant, Revd. W. Tennyson Testimony Tetrahedron 200 ... Tibet Tiele Time *** GENERAL INDEX. *** See also malefactors. Thing in itself, the Thought, primary mode of power of, Science of, Thread, investiture of sacred, Thunder and lightning *** *** subjective aspect of, relation between--and belief ... *** See under body. 21, 660, 661 549 566 272, 846, 878, 911 832, 892 889 et seq., 930 609n. *** ... 56912, 576, 584 96n. 123, 164, 165, 166, 167, 850, 919 958 et seq. 73, 724 208 See alse reflection. 357 712, 713n. 245 1078 28, 77, 78, 81, 655, 691, 692, 693, 696, 713, 726, 743, 751 et seq.. xcvii Page. 998n. 609n. ... ... 609n. 3, 39, 112 73, 609n, 653n, 682, 779, 782 155 540, 541, 554, 555. 491 329, 343 876, 877 198, 629n. 395 536 207, 872 185, 186

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xcviii consciousness of, a substance end of the present cycle of nature of the substance of Tirthamkaras two kinds of, the Avasarpini and Utsarpini arcs of, mythological description of, ... worship of Tisdall, Revd. W. St. Clair Toleration Tortoise Touch Trance Transmigration proved from the Bible supported by Al Qur'an Triangle Tribeni Trinity, the Holy, GENERAL INDEX. 752,753, 754 1062n. 753, 754 756 713 713 63, 359, 366, 449, 451, 454, 463, 529, 678, 712, 741, 773, 796, 813n, 827, 855, 873, 911, 967, 979, 1058, 1062, 10 63, 1068, 1069 451, 454, 877, 884, 912, 943, 944, 945n, et seq., 971 997n, 1031 514 220,758 661, 664 536, 537, 542, 651, 872, 1065 92, 265, 266, 272, 273, 274, 275, 298, 299, 356, 365, 608, 612, 620, 770, 802-884 (Chap. XII), 828, 860, 930, 980 et seq., 1039 261 et seq., 899, 900, 901, 1026 1010 et seq., 1026 See also Karma. Tree of Knowledge of good and evil, Tree of life, ... significance of, the Hindu Truthfulness Turiya Twins (Zoroastrianism) Tyndall, Prof. ... of Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh correspondence of the Hindu and psychological correspondence of, see knowledge of good and evil. see life. 608, 609 671, 672, 683 (Chap. IX) 566-688 642 et seq., 682 670 et seq., 682 670 et seq., 682 Christian doctrines of, 645 et seq., 682 et seq. 645 et seq., 681 336, 337, 338, 339 93, 730, 870 *** Page. 752,752 TAB 1040 et seq., 1044, 1054, 1056, 1057 ...40, 872

Page #1200
GENERAL INDEX. xcix Page. U. ... 299 Understanding ... 161, 162, 163, 182, 622, 649, 650, 651, 652, 656 Universe map of the ... 716 Universal Mind 28, 112, 435, 436, 444 Unknowable, the ... ... 141 Unmanifested, the 951, 968 Unwashen hands Utsarpini Uttarayana ... 788n. ... ... 227 713 rach . 646, 647 Vaikriyaka surira, see body. Vaisheshikas ... 22, 23, 81, 694, 695, 196, 697, 989 Vaishesika philosophy, See Vaisheshikas. Varaha Mihira ... 491 Vedas ... ... 481, 485, 486, 495, 496, 669, 634, 982, 1034n, 1077, 1078, 1080 the mother of - ... 186, 188 Vedanta, 7, 82, 83-100, 123, 202, 210, 271n, 272n, 333, 396, 436, 463, 568, 645 et seq., 682, 685, 686, 687, 691, 697, 698, 699, 704, 727, 728, 730, 731, 794, 795, 954, 955, 969, 977, 1005n, 1008, 1086 Philosophy of, ... 83--93, 663 refuted, 87, 93 et seq., 691, 704 et seg., 727 et seq., 803n, 8041, 960, 961 a one-sided system 704, 960, 961 different kinds of bodies in , 825, 826, 827 Veil of the temple ... 220, 221, 239 Vicarious atonement ... 482 Vice 166, 672, 674 Vijnana Bhiksu ... ... 658 Vine, the parable of the 292, 293 Viola ... ... 398 Virgin (Mary) ... 994 parable of the ten- S 282, 392 birth 230 et seq., 287, 551, 552, 553

Page #1201
GENERAL INDEX. Page. Virochana ... 562 Virtue 166, 319, 672, 874, 884, 861, 863, 1046, 1048 (magnetic fluid) ... 855, 856 Vishnu ... .... 157, 187, 189, 236, 673, 675, 678, 682, 757, 800 Vision 42, 43, 46, 47, 73, 790, 859, 999 God 440, 446, 452, 455 ---of Self ... 781 et seq., 794, see also perception. Vitality 838, 839, 840, 841, 842, 843, 844, 845, 866 Vivekananda, Swami ... 22, 92, 296, 371, 373, 380, 383n, 430, 463, 467, 568, 693 Volney ... ... 564 Voltaire 563n, 947n. 907, 911, 916 Vyasa ... 444 Vows 26 Wade, Sir Claude ... ... 537 Wallace, Dr. Alfred Russell 79, 761n. War, the modern European ... 363n. Warp and Woof of understanding 161, 162, 163 Warren, Herbert .. 862 Watson, Rev. F. D.D. 487 Weber ... 405 Weight ... Wenzlic, Dr. W. ... 531 Widow ... 1037, 1038 Wife 400, 508 Wilkins, W.J. 669n, 713n. Will, 79, 80, 179, 184, 187, 188, 189, 358, 382, 408, 409, 411, 456, 457, 550, 558, 568 et seq., 632 et seq., 656, 670, 7131, 732, 782, 794, 795, 814, 822, 848, 859, 1041, 1042, 1044, 1046, 1048 nature of, ... 79, 80, 356, 411, 550, 570 et seq., 847, 850, 853, 867 objectification of 560, 569n, 814 et seq., 842, 843, 863 exaltation of- ... 409, 856 training of, ... 382, 456, 497, 498, 507, 857, 911, 916 every act of- is also one of body ... 617 freedom of, 579n, et seq. .

Page #1202
GENERAL INDEX. ci Page. Will, increases by self-sacrifice 497, 498 repository of education 572, 573 action of suggestion on, ... 860, see also suggestion. not unconscious 568 et seq. Will to be ... 585 Williams, Sir Monier . ... ... 537 Willing, distinguished from wishing 858, 867, 868 Wine ... 552, 1065, 1066, 1067 ; see also bread and wine. Wise man of the East, see under East. Wishing, distinguished from willing 858, 867, 888 Wives of gods ... 190 Woman 180, 348 Word, the, 116, 123, 644 et seq., 668, 682, 683, 968, 975, 1022, 1023 Work, 2641, 360, 396, 397, 398 S . 264n, 360 World, different views as to the nature of the ...95, 112 not a non-entity ... 106, 108, 109 eternity of, ... 31, 32 age of, the Christian belief as to ... 32 management of, 133, 195 et seq., 276 World-process 37, 648 et seq., 691, 742 diverse notions as to ... 110, 111, 112 Samkhyan theory of, 661 et seq., Worry ... 177, 182, 307, 308, 844, 865, 868 Worship ... 16, 17, 18, 223, 395, 684, 685, 742, 884, 919, 942 et seq., 971 Significance of, ... 684, 714 Places of, 396, 397, 942 Jaina idea of, ... ... 742 See also under Tirtham karas. Blind , doctrine of 223, 224 See also Bhakti. collective 393, 394 -entity ... 1 ... : ... Yajna Yama ... Yamaraja 394 458 262

Page #1203
cii GENERAL INDEX. Page. Yami ... 262n. Yeast 249 Yoga, 11, 373-476 (Chap. VII), 542, 580, 714, 781 et seq., 865, 987, 998n. a school of Philosophy ... 22, 765 Bhakti ... 224, 380, 381, 383, 440 et seq., 470 et seq., 889, 952, 954 different kinds of, ... 380 et seq. effect of, on nervous system ... 430. 431, 789, 790 Hatha ... 380, 381, 382, 383, 456, 936 Jnana ... 380, 381, 383, 432, 470 et seq., 474, 952 Karma- ... 952, 987, see also non-attachment. nature of, ... 373, 374, 375, 382, 456 necessity of a teacher for, ... 431, 432 Raja 380, 381, 383, 455, 456, 472, 952 Steps of--- ... 458 Yogas . 931, 934, 935 Yoga Vashishta .. ... 421, 484, 485, 939, 940, 941 Y. S., recitation of Sura, ... 950n. significance of the letters ... 950n. z. ... 398 Zanoni ... Zarathushtra ... Zauk Zimmern Zodiac Zoroaster Zoroastrianism ... 1040, 1041, 1044, 1054, 1056 ... 779n. ... 711 ... 490, 491, 492, 497, 711 ... 243 119, 710, 967, 978, 996, 997n, 1003, 1068

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