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140
Julius Laber
Bonn (Germany)
*
(1)
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Schloss Berg 24. ix. 1911.
Dear Sir,
Green water, blue sky and wooded banks are the factors going to form the paradise of the lake of Starnberg, in whose depths King Ludwg II seized with deep melancholy and having resigned his crown, sought death and found it. His Majesty was a king whose love of splendour can be compared only with that of the greatest monarchs of the East. In consequence of his ingenious disposition, he suffered more than any other human being from the terrible loneliness into which life sinks every high thinking soul. I am for the moment staying on the melancholy shores of this lake, in order to restore my impaired health, and there I received your welcome letter, which has clearly shown me what interest you follow the studies of learned Europeans in the department of Jainism. I need not now assure you that my ehthusiasm for the sublime teachings of the Jaina increases the more, the more deeply I study them. The buildings of a people form the best indication of the degree of civilisation it has attained. Who does not know the worldfamed temples Jains, with their dear, cheerful construction wanting in all elements, of darkness gloom and heaviness and expressing the disposition of a soul that with clear and quiet glance grasps the wonders of the world, secure in full confidence in the truth of its doctrine. I should have regarded it as a grateful task, Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
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