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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."
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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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