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diff --git a/old/hindu10.txt b/old/hindu10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8bec155 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/hindu10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1078 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Letter to a Hindu, by Leo Tolstoy +#17 in our series by Leo Tolstoy + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: A Letter to a Hindu + +Author: Leo Tolstoy + +Release Date: December, 2004 [EBook #7176] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on March 21, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A LETTER TO A HINDU *** + + + + +This eBook was produced by Chetan Jain at BharatLiterature. + + + + + +A LETTER TO A HINDU + + +THE SUBJECTION OF INDIA--ITS CAUSE AND CURE + + +__With an Introduction by__ M. K. GANDHI + + + +INTRODUCTION + + +The letter printed below is a translation of Tolstoy's letter +written in Russian in reply to one from the Editor of Free +Hindustan. After having passed from hand to hand, this letter at +last came into my possession through a friend who asked me, as +one much interested in Tolstoy's writings, whether I thought it +worth publishing. I at once replied in the affirmative, and told +him I should translate it myself into Gujarati and induce others' +to translate and publish it in various Indian vernaculars. + +The letter as received by me was a type-written copy. It was +therefore referred to the author, who confirmed it as his and +kindly granted me permission to print it. + +To me, as a humble follower of that great teacher whom I have +long looked upon as one of my guides, it is a matter of honour to +be connected with the publication of his letter, such especially +as the one which is now being given to the world. + +It is a mere statement of fact to say that every Indian, whether +he owns up to it or not, has national aspirations. But there are +as many opinions as there are Indian nationalists as to the exact +meaning of that aspiration, and more especially as to the methods +to be used to attain the end. + +One of the accepted and 'time-honoured' methods to attain the end +is that of violence. The assassination of Sir Curzon Wylie was +an illustration of that method in its worst and most detestable +form. Tolstoy's life has been devoted to replacing the method of +violence for removing tyranny or securing reform by the method of +non-resistance to evil. He would meet hatred expressed in +violence by love expressed in self-suffering. He admits of no +exception to whittle down this great and divine law of love. He +applies it to all the problems that trouble mankind. + +When a man like Tolstoy, one of the clearest thinkers in the +western world, one of the greatest writers, one who as a soldier +has known what violence is and what it can do, condemns Japan for +having blindly followed the law of modern science, falsely +so-called, and fears for that country 'the greatest calamities', +it is for us to pause and consider whether, in our impatience of +English rule, we do not want to replace one evil by another and a +worse. India, which is the nursery of the great faiths of the +world, will cease to be nationalist India, whatever else she may +become, when she goes through the process of civilization in the +shape of reproduction on that sacred soil of gun factories and +the hateful industrialism which has reduced the people of Europe +to a state of slavery, and all but stifled among them the best +instincts which are the heritage of the human family. + +If we do not want the English in India we must pay the price. +Tolstoy indicates it. 'Do not resist evil, but also do not +yourselves participate in evil--in the violent deeds of the +administration of the law courts, the collection of taxes and, +what is more important, of the soldiers, and no one in the world +will enslave you', passionately declares the sage of Yasnaya +Polyana. Who can question the truth of what he says in the +following: 'A commercial company enslaved a nation comprising two +hundred millions. Tell this to a man free from superstition and +he will fail to grasp what these words mean. What does it mean +that thirty thousand people, not athletes, but rather weak and +ordinary people, have enslaved two hundred millions of vigorous, +clever, capable, freedom-loving people? Do not the figures make +it clear that not the English, but the Indians, have enslaved +themselves?' + +One need not accept all that Tolstoy says--some of his facts are +not accurately stated--to realize the central truth of his +indictment of the present system, which is to understand and act +upon the irresistible power of the soul over the body, of love, +which is an attribute of the soul, over the brute or body force +generated by the stirring in us of evil passions. + +There is no doubt that there is nothing new in what Tolstoy +preaches. But his presentation of the old truth is refreshingly +forceful. His logic is unassailable. And above all he +endeavours to practise what he preaches. He preaches to +convince. He is sincere and in earnest. He commands attention. + +[__19th November, 1909__] M. K. GANDHI + + + + +A LETTER TO A HINDU + + +By LEO TOLSTOY + + + +__All that exists is One. People only call this One by different +names.__ THE VEDAS. + +__God is love, and he that abideth in love abideth in God, and +God abideth in him.__ I JOHN iv. 16. + +__God is one whole; we are the parts.__ EXPOSITION OF THE +TEACHING OF THE VEDAS BY VIVEKANANDA. + + + +I + + +Do not seek quiet and rest in those earthly realms where delusions +and desires are engendered, for if thou dost, thou wilt be dragged +through the rough wilderness of life, which is far from Me. + +Whenever thou feelest that thy feet are becoming entangled in the +interlaced roots of life, know that thou has strayed from the +path to which I beckon thee: for I have placed thee in broad, +smooth paths, which are strewn with flowers. I have put a light +before thee, which thou canst follow and thus run without +stumbling. KRISHNA. + +I have received your letter and two numbers of your periodical, +both of which interest me extremely. The oppression of a +majority by a minority, and the demoralization inevitably +resulting from it, is a phenomenon that has always occupied me +and has done so most particularly of late. I will try to explain +to you what I think about that subject in general, and +particularly about the cause from which the dreadful evils of +which you write in your letter, and in the Hindu periodical you +have sent me, have arisen and continue to arise. + +The reason for the astonishing fact that a majority of working +people submit to a handful of idlers who control their labour and +their very lives is always and everywhere the same--whether the +oppressors and oppressed are of one race or whether, as in India +and elsewhere, the oppressors are of a different nation. + +This phenomenon seems particularly strange in India, for there +more than two hundred million people, highly gifted both +physically and mentally, find themselves in the power of a small +group of people quite alien to them in thought, and immeasurably +inferior to them in religious morality. + +From your letter and the articles in __Free Hindustan__ as well +as from the very interesting writings of the Hindu Swami +Vivekananda and others, it appears that, as is the case in our +time with the ills of all nations, the reason lies in the lack of +a reasonable religious teaching which by explaining the meaning +of life would supply a supreme law for the guidance of conduct +and would replace the more than dubious precepts of pseudo- +religion and pseudo-science with the immoral conclusions deduced +from them and commonly called 'civilization'. + +Your letter, as well as the articles in __Free Hindustan__ and +Indian political literature generally, shows that most of the +leaders of public opinion among your people no longer attach any +significance to the religious teachings that were and are +professed by the peoples of India, and recognize no possibility +of freeing the people from the oppression they endure except by +adopting the irreligious and profoundly immoral social +arrangements under which the English and other pseudo-Christian +nations live to-day. + +And yet the chief if not the sole cause of the enslavement of the +Indian peoples by the English lies in this very absence of a +religious consciousness and of the guidance for conduct which +should flow from it--a lack common in our day to all nations East +and West, from Japan to England and America alike. + + + +II + + +__O ye, who see perplexities over your heads, beneath your feet, +and to the right and left of you; you will be an eternal enigma +unto yourselves until ye become humble and joyful as children. +Then will ye find Me, and having found Me in yourselves, you will +rule over worlds, and looking out from the great world within to +the little world without, you will bless everything that is, and +find all is well with time and with you.__ KRISHNA. + + +To make my thoughts clear to you I must go farther back. We do +not, cannot, and I venture to say need not, know how men lived +millions of years ago or even ten thousand years ago, but we do +know positively that, as far back as we have any knowledge of +mankind, it has always lived in special groups of families, +tribes, and nations in which the majority, in the conviction that +it must be so, submissively and willingly bowed to the rule of +one or more persons--that is to a very small minority. Despite +all varieties of circumstances and personalities these relations +manifested themselves among the various peoples of whose origin +we have any knowledge; and the farther back we go the more +absolutely necessary did this arrangement appear, both to the +rulers and the ruled, to make it possible for people to live +peacefully together. + +So it was everywhere. But though this external form of life +existed for centuries and still exists, very early--thousands of +years before our time--amid this life based on coercion, one and +the same thought constantly emerged among different nations, +namely, that in every individual a spiritual element is +manifested that gives life to all that exists, and that this +spiritual element strives to unite with everything of a like +nature to itself, and attains this aim through love. This +thought appeared in most various forms at different times and +places, with varying completeness and clarity. It found +expression in Brahmanism, Judaism, Mazdaism (the teachings of +Zoroaster), in Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, and in the +writings of the Greek and Roman sages, as well as in Christianity +and Mohammedanism. The mere fact that this thought has sprung up +among different nations and at different times indicates that it +is inherent in human nature and contains the truth. But this +truth was made known to people who considered that a community +could only be kept together if some of them restrained others, +and so it appeared quite irreconcilable with the existing order +of society. Moreover it was at first expressed only +fragmentarily, and so obscurely that though people admitted its +theoretic truth they could not entirely accept it as guidance for +their conduct. Then, too, the dissemination of the truth in a +society based on coercion was always hindered in one and the same +manner, namely, those in power, feeling that the recognition of +this truth would undermine their position, consciously or +sometimes unconsciously perverted it by explanations and +additions quite foreign to it, and also opposed it by open +violence. Thus the truth--that his life should be directed by +the spiritual element which is its basis, which manifests itself +as love, and which is so natural to man--this truth, in order to +force a way to man's consciousness, had to struggle not merely +against the obscurity with which it was expressed and the +intentional and unintentional distortions surrounding it, but +also against deliberate violence, which by means of persecutions +and punishments sought to compel men to accept religious laws +authorized by the rulers and conflicting with the truth. Such a +hindrance and misrepresentation of the truth--which had not yet +achieved complete clarity--occurred everywhere: in Confucianism +and Taoism, in Buddhism and in Christianity, in Mohammedanism and +in your Brahmanism. + + + +III + + +__My hand has sowed love everywhere, giving unto all that will +receive. Blessings are offered unto all My children, but many +times in their blindness they fail to see them. How few there +are who gather the gifts which lie in profusion at their feet: +how many there are, who, in wilful waywardness, turn their eyes +away from them and complain with a wail that they have not that +which I have given them; many of them defiantly repudiate not +only My gifts, but Me also, Me, the Source of all blessings and +the Author of their being.__ KRISHNA. + +__I tarry awhile from the turmoil and strife of the world. I +will beautify and quicken thy life with love and with joy, for +the light of the soul is Love. Where Love is, there is +contentment and peace, and where there is contentment and peace, +there am I, also, in their midst.__ KRISHNA. + +__The aim of the sinless One consists in acting without causing +sorrow to others, although he could attain to great power by +ignoring their feelings.__ + +__The aim of the sinless One lies in not doing evil unto those +who have done evil unto him.__ + +__If a man causes suffering even to those who hate him without +any reason, he will ultimately have grief not to be overcome.__ + +__The punishment of evil doers consists in making them feel +ashamed of themselves by doing them a great kindness.__ + +__Of what use is superior knowledge in the one, if he does not +endeavour to relieve his neighbour's want as much as his own?__ + +__If, in the morning, a man wishes to do evil unto another, in +the evening the evil will return to him.__ + +THE HINDU KURAL. + + +Thus it went on everywhere. The recognition that love represents +the highest morality was nowhere denied or contradicted, but this +truth was so interwoven everywhere with all kinds of falsehoods +which distorted it, that finally nothing of it remained but +words. It was taught that this highest morality was only +applicable to private life--for home use, as it were--but that in +public life all forms of violence--such as imprisonment, +executions, and wars--might be used for the protection of the +majority against a minority of evildoers, though such means were +diametrically opposed to any vestige of love. And though common +sense indicated that if some men claim to decide who is to be +subjected to violence of all kinds for the benefit of others, +these men to whom violence is applied may, in turn, arrive at a +similar conclusion with regard to those who have employed +violence to them, and though the great religious teachers of +Brahmanism, Buddhism, and above all of Christianity, foreseeing +such a perversion of the law of love, have constantly drawn +attention to the one invariable condition of love (namely, the +enduring of injuries, insults, and violence of all kinds without +resisting evil by evil) people continued--regardless of all that +leads man forward--to try to unite the incompatibles: the virtue +of love, and what is opposed to love, namely, the restraining of +evil by violence. And such a teaching, despite its inner +contradiction, was so firmly established that the very people who +recognize love as a virtue accept as lawful at the same time an +order of life based on violence and allowing men not merely to +torture but even to kill one another. + +For a long time people lived in this obvious contradiction +without noticing it. But a time arrived when this contradiction +became more and more evident to thinkers of various nations. And +the old and simple truth that it is natural for men to help and +to love one another, but not to torture and to kill one another, +became ever clearer, so that fewer and fewer people were able to +believe the sophistries by which the distortion of the truth had +been made so plausible. + +In former times the chief method of justifying the use of +violence and thereby infringing the law of love was by claiming a +divine right for the rulers: the Tsars, Sultans, Rajahs, Shahs, +and other heads of states. But the longer humanity lived the +weaker grew the belief in this peculiar, God--given right of the +ruler. That belief withered in the same way and almost +simultaneously in the Christian and the Brahman world, as well as +in Buddhist and Confucian spheres, and in recent times it has so +faded away as to prevail no longer against man's reasonable +understanding and the true religious feeling. People saw more +and more clearly, and now the majority see quite clearly, the +senselessness and immorality of subordinating their wills to +those of other people just like themselves, when they are bidden +to do what is contrary not only to their interests but also to +their moral sense. And so one might suppose that having lost +confidence in any religious authority for a belief in the +divinity of potentates of various kinds, people would try to free +themselves from subjection to it. But unfortunately not only +were the rulers, who were considered supernatural beings, +benefited by having the peoples in subjection, but as a result of +the belief in, and during the rule of, these pseudodivine beings, +ever larger and larger circles of people grouped and established +themselves around them, and under an appearance of governing took +advantage of the people. And when the old deception of a +supernatural and God-appointed authority had dwindled away these +men were only concerned to devise a new one which like its +predecessor should make it possible to hold the people in bondage +to a limited number of rulers. + + + +IV + + +__Children, do you want to know by what your hearts should be +guided? Throw aside your longings and strivings after that which +is null and void; get rid of your erroneous thoughts about +happiness and wisdom, and your empty and insincere desires. +Dispense with these and you will know Love.__ KRISHNA. + +__Be not the destroyers of yourselves. Arise to your true Being, +and then you will have nothing to fear.__ KRISHNA. + + +New justifications have now appeared in place of the antiquated, +obsolete, religious ones. These new justifications are just as +inadequate as the old ones, but as they are new their futility +cannot immediately be recognized by the majority of men. Besides +this, those who enjoy power propagate these new sophistries and +support them so skilfully that they seem irrefutable even to many +of those who suffer from the oppression these theories seek to +justify. These new justifications are termed 'scientific'. But +by the term 'scientific' is understood just what was formerly +understood by the term 'religious': just as formerly everything +called 'religious' was held to be unquestionable simply because +it was called religious, so now all that is called 'scientific' +is held to be unquestionable. In the present case the obsolete +religious justification of violence which consisted in the +recognition of the supernatural personality of the God-ordained +ruler ('there is no power but of God') has been superseded by the +'scientific' justification which puts forward, first, the +assertion that because the coercion of man by man has existed in +all ages, it follows that such coercion must continue to exist. +This assertion that people should continue to live as they have +done throughout past ages rather than as their reason and +conscience indicate, is what 'science' calls 'the historic law'. +A further 'scientific' justification lies in the statement that +as among plants and wild beasts there is a constant struggle for +existence which always results in the survival of the fittest, a +similar struggle should be carried on among human beings--beings, +that is, who are gifted with intelligence and love; faculties +lacking in the creatures subject to the struggle for existence +and survival of the fittest. Such is the second 'scientific' +justification. + +The third, most important, and unfortunately most widespread +justification is, at bottom, the age-old religious one just a +little altered: that in public life the suppression of some for +the protection of the majority cannot be avoided--so that coercion +is unavoidable however desirable reliance on love alone might be +in human intercourse. The only difference in this justification +by pseudo-science consists in the fact that, to the question why +such and such people and not others have the right to decide +against whom violence may and must be used, pseudo-science now +gives a different reply to that given by religion--which declared +that the right to decide was valid because it was pronounced by +persons possessed of divine power. 'Science' says that these +decisions represent the will of the people, which under a +constitutional form of government is supposed to find expression +in all the decisions and actions of those who are at the helm at +the moment. + +Such are the scientific justifications of the principle of +coercion. They are not merely weak but absolutely invalid, yet +they are so much needed by those who occupy privileged positions +that they believe in them as blindly as they formerly believed in +the immaculate conception, and propagate them just as +confidently. And the unfortunate majority of men bound to toil +is so dazzled by the pomp with which these 'scientific truths' +are presented, that under this new influence it accepts these +scientific stupidities for holy truth, just as it formerly +accepted the pseudo-religious justifications; and it continues to +submit to the present holders of power who are just as +hard-hearted but rather more numerous than before. + + + +V + + +__Who am I? I am that which thou hast searched for since thy baby +eyes gazed wonderingly upon the world, whose horizon hides this +real life from thee. I am that which in thy heart thou hast +prayed for, demanded as thy birthright, although thou hast not +known what it was. I am that which has lain in thy soul for +hundreds and thousands of years. Sometimes I lay in thee +grieving because thou didst not recognize me; sometimes I raised +my head, opened my eyes, and extended my arms calling thee either +tenderly and quietly, or strenuously, demanding that thou shouldst +rebel against the iron chains which bound thee to the earth.__ + +KRISHNA. + + +So matters went on, and still go on, in the Christian world. But +we might have hope that in the immense Brahman, Buddhist, and +Confucian worlds this new scientific superstition would not +establish itself, and that the Chinese, Japanese, and Hindus, +once their eyes were opened to the religious fraud justifying +violence, would advance directly to a recognition of the law of +love inherent in humanity, and which had been so forcibly +enunciated by the great Eastern teachers. But what has happened +is that the scientific superstition replacing the religious one +has been accepted and secured a stronger and stronger hold in the +East. + +In your periodical you set out as the basic principle which +should guide the actions of your people the maxim that: +'Resistance to aggression is not simply justifiable but +imperative, nonresistance hurts both Altruism and Egotism.' + +Love is the only way to rescue humanity from all ills, and in it +you too have the only method of saving your people from +enslavement. In very ancient times love was proclaimed with +special strength and clearness among your people to be the +religious basis of human life. Love, and forcible resistance to +evil-doers, involve such a mutual contradiction as to destroy +utterly the whole sense and meaning of the conception of love. +And what follows? With a light heart and in the twentieth century +you, an adherent of a religious people, deny their law, feeling +convinced of your scientific enlightenment and your right to do +so, and you repeat (do not take this amiss) the amazing stupidity +indoctrinated in you by the advocates of the use of violence--the +enemies of truth, the servants first of theology and then of +science--your European teachers. + +You say that the English have enslaved your people and hold them +in subjection because the latter have not resisted resolutely +enough and have not met force by force. + +But the case is just the opposite. If the English have enslaved +the people of India it is just because the latter recognized, and +still recognize, force as the fundamental principle of the social +order. In accord with that principle they submitted to their +little rajahs, and on their behalf struggled against one another, +fought the Europeans, the English, and are now trying to fight +with them again. + +A commercial company enslaved a nation comprising two hundred +millions. Tell this to a man free from superstition and he will +fail to grasp what these words mean. What does it mean that +thirty thousand men, not athletes but rather weak and ordinary +people, have subdued two hundred million vigorous, clever, +capable, and freedom-loving people? Do not the figures make it +clear that it is not the English who have enslaved the Indians, +but the Indians who have enslaved themselves? + +When the Indians complain that the English have enslaved them it +is as if drunkards complained that the spirit-dealers who have +settled among them have enslaved them. You tell them that they +might give up drinking, but they reply that they are so +accustomed to it that they cannot abstain, and that they must +have alcohol to keep up their energy. Is it not the same thing +with the millions of people who submit to thousands' or even to +hundreds, of others--of their own or other nations? + +If the people of India are enslaved by violence it is only +because they themselves live and have lived by violence, and do +not recognize the eternal law of love inherent in humanity. + +__Pitiful and foolish is the man who seeks what he already has, +and does not know that he has it. Yes, Pitiful and foolish is he +who does not know the bliss of love which surrounds him and which +I have given him.__ KRISHNA. + + +As soon as men live entirely in accord with the law of love +natural to their hearts and now revealed to them, which excludes +all resistance by violence, and therefore hold aloof from all +participation in violence--as soon as this happens, not only will +hundreds be unable to enslave millions, but not even millions +will be able to enslave a single individual. Do not resist the +evil-doer and take no part in doing so, either in the violent +deeds of the administration, in the law courts, the collection of +taxes, or above all in soldiering, and no one in the world will +be able to enslave you. + + + +VI + + +__O ye who sit in bondage and continually seek and pant for +freedom, seek only for love. Love is peace in itself and peace +which gives complete satisfaction. I am the key that opens the +portal to the rarely discovered land where contentment alone is +found.__ KRISHNA. + +What is now happening to the people of the East as of the West is +like what happens to every individual when he passes from +childhood to adolescence and from youth to manhood. He loses +what had hitherto guided his life and lives without direction, +not having found a new standard suitable to his age, and so he +invents all sorts of occupations, cares, distractions, and +stupefactions to divert his attention from the misery and +senselessness of his life. Such a condition may last a long +time. + +When an individual passes from one period of life to another a +time comes when he cannot go on in senseless activity and +excitement as before, but has to understand that although he has +outgrown what before used to direct him, this does not mean that +he must live without any reasonable guidance, but rather that he +must formulate for himself an understanding of life corresponding +to his age, and having elucidated it must be guided by it. And +in the same way a similar time must come in the growth and +development of humanity. I believe that such a time has now +arrived--not in the sense that it has come in the year 1908, but +that the inherent contradiction of human life has now reached an +extreme degree of tension: on the one side there is the +consciousness of the beneficence of the law of love, and on the +other the existing order of life which has for centuries +occasioned an empty, anxious, restless, and troubled mode of +life, conflicting as it does with the law of love and built on +the use of violence. This contradiction must be faced, and the +solution will evidently not be favourable to the outlived law of +violence, but to the truth which has dwelt in the hearts of men +from remote antiquity: the truth that the law of love is in +accord with the nature of man. + +But men can only recognize this truth to its full extent when +they have completely freed themselves from all religious and +scientific superstitions and from all the consequent +misrepresentations and sophistical distortions by which its +recognition has been hindered for centuries. + +To save a sinking ship it is necessary to throw overboard the +ballast, which though it may once have been needed would now +cause the ship to sink. And so it is with the scientific +superstition which hides the truth of their welfare from mankind. +In order that men should embrace the truth--not in the vague way +they did in childhood, nor in the one-sided and perverted way +presented to them by their religious and scientific teachers, but +embrace it as their highest law--the complete liberation of this +truth from all and every superstition (both pseudo-religious and +pseudo-scientific) by which it is still obscured is essential: +not a partial, timid attempt, reckoning with traditions +sanctified by age and with the habits of the people--not such as +was effected in the religious sphere by Guru-Nanak, the founder +of the sect of the Sikhs, and in the Christian world by Luther, +and by similar reformers in other religions--but a fundamental +cleansing of religious consciousness from all ancient religious +and modern scientific superstitions. + +If only people freed themselves from their beliefs in all kinds +of Ormuzds, Brahmas, Sabbaoths, and their incarnation as Krishnas +and Christs, from beliefs in Paradises and Hells, in +reincarnations and resurrections, from belief in the interference +of the Gods in the external affairs of the universe, and above +all, if they freed themselves from belief in the infallibility of +all the various Vedas, Bibles, Gospels, Tripitakas, Korans, and +the like, and also freed themselves from blind belief in a +variety of scientific teachings about infinitely small atoms and +molecules and in all the infinitely great and infinitely remote +worlds, their movements and origin, as well as from faith in the +infallibility of the scientific law to which humanity is at +present subjected: the historic law, the economic laws, the law +of struggle and survival, and so on--if people only freed +themselves from this terrible accumulation of futile exercises of +our lower capacities of mind and memory called the 'Sciences', +and from the innumerable divisions of all sorts of histories, +anthropologies, homiletics, bacteriologics, jurisprudences, +cosmographies, strategies--their name is legion--and freed +themselves from all this harmful, stupifying ballast--the simple +law of love, natural to man, accessible to all and solving all +questions and perplexities, would of itself become clear and +obligatory. + + + +VII + + +__Children, look at the flowers at your feet; do not trample upon +them. Look at the love in your midst and do not repudiate it.__ +KRISHNA. + +__There is a higher reason which transcends all human minds. It +is far and near. It permeates all the worlds and at the same +time is infinitely higher than they.__ + +__A man who sees that all things are contained in the higher +spirit cannot treat any being with contempt.__ + +__For him to whom all spiritual beings are equal to the highest +there can be no room for deception or grief.__ + +__Those who are ignorant and are devoted to the religious rites +only, are in a deep gloom, but those who are given up to +fruitless meditations are in a still greater darkness.__ + +UPANISHADS, FROM VEDAS. + + +Yes, in our time all these things must be cleared away in order +that mankind may escape from self-inflicted calamities that have +reached an extreme intensity. Whether an Indian seeks liberation +from subjection to the English, or anyone else struggles with an +oppressor either of his own nationality or of another--whether it +be a Negro defending himself against the North Americans; or +Persians, Russians, or Turks against the Persian, Russian, or +Turkish governments, or any man seeking the greatest welfare for +himself and for everybody else--they do not need explanations and +justifications of old religious superstitions such as have been +formulated by your Vivekanandas, Baba Bharatis, and others, or in +the Christian world by a number of similar interpreters and +exponents of things that nobody needs; nor the innumerable +scientific theories about matters not only unnecessary but for +the most part harmful. (In the spiritual realm nothing is +indifferent: what is not useful is harmful.) What are wanted for +the Indian as for the Englishman, the Frenchman, the German, and +the Russian, are not Constitutions and Revolutions, nor all sorts +of Conferences and Congresses, nor the many ingenious devices for +submarine navigation and aerial navigation, nor powerful +explosives, nor all sorts of conveniences to add to the enjoyment +of the rich, ruling classes; nor new schools and universities +with innumerable faculties of science, nor an augmentation of +papers and books, nor gramophones and cinematographs, nor those +childish and for the most part corrupt stupidities termed art--but +one thing only is needful: the knowledge of the simple and clear +truth which finds place in every soul that is not stupefied by +religious and scientific superstitions--the truth that for our +life one law is valid--the law of love, which brings the highest +happiness to every individual as well as to all mankind. Free +your minds from those overgrown, mountainous imbecilities which +hinder your recognition of it, and at once the truth will emerge +from amid the pseudo-religious nonsense that has been smothering +it: the indubitable, eternal truth inherent in man, which is one +and the same in all the great religions of the world. It will in +due time emerge and make its way to general recognition, and the +nonsense that has obscured it will disappear of itself, and with +it will go the evil from which humanity now suffers. + +__Children, look upwards with your beclouded eyes, and a world +full of joy and love will disclose itself to you, a rational +world made by My wisdom, the only real world. Then you will know +what love has done with you, what love has bestowed upon you, +what love demands from you.__ KRISHNA. + + +YASNAYA POLYANA. + +December 14th, 1908. + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Letter to a Hindu, by Leo Tolstoy + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A LETTER TO A HINDU *** + +This file should be named hindu10.txt or hindu10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, hindu11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, hindu10a.txt + +This eBook was produced by Chetan Jain at BharatLiterature. + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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