Outlines of Indian Philosophy

Author(s): Paul Deussen
Publisher: Crest Publishing House

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OUTLINES OF INDIAN PHILOSOPHY
People have often reproached the Vedanta with being defective in morals, and indeed, the Indian genius to too contemplative to speak much of deeds; but the fact is nevertheless, that the highest and purest morality is the immediate consequence of the Vedânta. The Gospels fix quite correctly as the highest law of morality: "love your neighbour as yourselves." But why should I do so, since by the order of nature I feel pain and pleasure only in myself, not in my neighbour? The answer is not in the Bible (this venerable book being not yet quite free of Semitic realism), but it is in the Veda, is in the great formula "tat tvam asi", which gives in three words metaphysics and morals altogether. You shall love your neighbour as yourselves,--because you are your neighbour, and mere illusion makes you believe, that your neighbour is something different from yourselves. Or in the words of the Bhagavadgîtâh : he, who knows himself in everything and everything in himself, will not injure himself by himself, na hinasti âtmanâ âtmânam. This is the sum and tenor of all morality, and this is the standpoint of a man knowing himself as Brahman. He feels himself everything,—so he will not desire anything, for he has whatever can be had; — he feels himself everything, SO he will not injure anything, for nobody injures himself. He lives in the world, is surrounded by its illusions but not deceived by them: like the man suffering from timira, who sees two moons but knows that there is one only, so the Jîvanmukta sees the manifold world and cannot get rid