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Law of Karma
their heads in vain against the iron wall of society like trapped birds in a cage. We see in them the essence of all tragedy, something noble breaking down, something sublime falling with a crash."37
Life is a growth and a growth is undetermined in a measure. Though the future is a sequel of the past, we cannot say what it will be. If there is no indetermination, then human consciousness is an unnecessary luxury.
The Law of Karma does not support the doctrine of predestination. The nature is governed by law, which consists of order and harmony. Dr. Radhakrishnan is against the view in which God is the sovereign, who works without law or principle. For him, life is a gracious gift of God, who expresses His sovereignty through law. He says, "such a view of divine sovereignty is unethical. God's love is manifested in and through law."38
The Law of Karma is closely connected with the doctrine of rebirth. It is the cardinal belief of the Orphic religion that the wheel of birth revolves inexorably. Throughout nature, life is preserved. Life is a perpetual going on, never resting, always straining forward for something that has not been but should be. The self of man is not an abstract quality which remains the same all the time. It is a living experience of which duration is an intrinsic characteristic. If everything else in nature arises from something continuous with it and passes into something also continuous with it, the self also is not an exception to the general scheme. In Kathā Upanishad it has been traced out, "Life corn the mortal grows; like corn is born again."'39
Dr. Radhakrishnan holds that it is an admitted principle of science that if there is some development, we may think about its past. The self enters this life with a certain nature and inheritance. We often watch talents that are inherited, an eye for beauty, a taste for music, which are not common qualities of the species. So, the self must have had some past history.
Rebirths are essential for the realization of the distant goal-salvation. It cannot be realised in a single life. A continuous pursuit from birth to birth can alone make selfrealisation possible. Dr. Radhakrishnan, therefore, concludes
