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176
LECTURES ON THE SCIENCE OF RELIGION.
and to be benevolent and charitable. This is the eternal law of the good.'
Mahabharata, Sânti-parva, cap. 160:
'Forgiveness and patience, kindness and equableness, truthfulness and uprightness, restraint of the senses and energy, gentleness and modesty and gravity, generosity and calmness, contentment, kindliness of speech, and absence of hatred and malice-these together make self-control.'
up
Mahabharata, Sânti-parva, cap. 110:
Those who are dreaded by none and who themselves dread no one, who regard all mankind like themselves, such men surmount all difficulties.'
Mahâbhârata, Anusâsana-parva, cap. 144:
Those who always treat friends and foes with an equal heart, being friends to all, such men shall go to
heaven 1.'
And as in Buddhism and Brahmanism, so again in the writings of Confucius, we find what we value most in our own religion. I shall quote but one saying of the Chinese sage 2:
'What you do not like when done to yourself, do
not do that to others.'
One passage only from the founder of the second religion in China, from Lao-tse (cap. 25)3:
"There is an infinite Being 4, which existed before heaven and earth.
1 See Muir, Metrical Translations,' passim;"the Pandit,' December, 1867.
2 Dr. Legge's 'Life and Teachings of Confucius,' p. 47.
3 Le Livre de la Voie et de la Vertu, composé dans le VIe siècle avant l'ère chrétienne, par Lao-tseu,' traduit par Stanislas Julien. Paris, 1842, p. 91.
Stan. Julien translates, Il est un être confus,' and he explains
