“O God, in every temple I see people that see Thee, and in every language they praise Thee.
If it be a mosque, men murmur the holy prayer, and if it be a Christian church they ring the bell from love to Thee.
Sometimes I frequent the Christian cloister, and sometimes the mosque, but it is Thou whom I seek from temple to temple.
Thine elect have no dealings with heresy or orthodoxy, for neither of these stands behind the screen of thy Truth.
Heresy to the heretic and religion to the orthodox!
But the dust of the rose-petal belongs to the heart of the perfume-seller!”
Yes,—and an ancient Japanese poet, going yet deeper, says this thing: “So long as the mind of a man is in accord with the Truth, the Gods will hear him though he do not pray.”
I passed the night at a little rest-house and next day set out on the long journey to Polonnarewa, and beyond that to Trincomali, through a wild part of Ceylon, stopping each night at the rest-houses which mark the way. Jungle in India is often mere scrub; this is thousands of acres of mighty forest. A small road has been driven through it, and on either side rises the dark and secret wall of trees, impenetrable for miles, knitted with creepers and blind with undergrowth—a dangerous mystery.
“Thousand eyeballs under hoods,
Have you by the hair.”