“There you see,” said Akbar, triumphantly, to Faizi, “that our friend Kulluka, who is so well acquainted with all the learning of the Brahmans, does not look upon the Yogi system as so utterly unimportant.”
“I will willingly allow that it contains much that is valuable,” said Faizi, “if our wise friend says so, from whom we have learnt so much that is worth knowing. But excuse me, Kulluka, if I ask what it is you expect from this system of days gone by? So far as I know, it is nothing but a foolish mysticism, promising an impossible absorption of the individual in the supreme, brought about by charms and enchantment, or, to speak more plainly, by clever feats of jugglery.”
“I do not think so unfavourably of the system of Patanjali,”[3] answered Kulluka; “although I do not for a moment believe it can boast the possession of absolute truth. The union with, and resolution of the mortal into the immortal, of human existence into the spiritual, according to the Yogi view, is in itself not so great a folly. But no doubt this teaching is erroneous when it seeks, through absorption or union, to solve the mystery of the existence of the mind of man, by which in a kind of ecstasy the mortal is absorbed into the immortal. If this absorption were possible, it would in truth be self-annihilation. I do not think that the fundamental idea is to be so entirely rejected, or at least a part of it, of which all this is the result. Is it not a truth that, just because men find themselves so weighed down and bound within narrow limits, their spirits know no higher exaltation than that to which they rise in those rare moments when they lose the sense of their personality in nobler or higher and more comprehensive ideas? Provided the ideas remain no empty abstraction, but take their being from strong human life, from knowledge, art, and the contemplation of the social existence of men, what, I ask, can you place higher than so to lose the finite and self-seeking I in the universal good? From the place whence the individual drew the true spirit of life, to that place it should return if it in truth accomplished its destiny.”
“These are words after my heart,” said Akbar. “This same thought, that of self-denial, animates our own philosophical systems as well as the new doctrines that these missionaries from the West have come here to preach. But is there not another subject to which the thoughts of men should be directed, especially those of philosophers? However true and exalted this doctrine of self-abnegation is, what does it tell us of the eternal union of spirit and matter which pervades existence?”
“Indeed,” answered the Brahman; “he would be unworthy the name of philosopher who did not take as a chief subject of philosophical thought the contemplation of life and morals proceeding from it. But who will ever solve for us the enigma of life?”
“No one, certainly,” answered Faizi; “at least not at present. What future knowledge, in distant centuries may contribute to its solution we cannot even guess. But for the present should we not content ourselves with the conviction, shared by all wise men, both past and present, and expressed by many of them more or less clearly, that there is in the universe an eternal life without end and without beginning; a life and being through which everything is bound together or brought into union, of which the highest law is development—the development of the lower steps or forms of existence into those still higher. And what are we ourselves—we men? Always the same as that which surrounds us—a revelation of the universal being, each destined, in his own circle and according to his powers, to take his part in the general development. In proportion as we can clearly keep before our eyes the higher and more universal aims, so will narrow feelings of self-love retire to the background, making room for unselfish devotion to the good of our fellow-men, of society, and of the state.”
“Very well put, my worthy Faizi,” said Akbar; “but true as all that may be, does it content you? Do you not long for something else, something more?”
“Assuredly,” was the answer. “That one idea, in its abstruse generalization, does not satisfy. We would understand it more clearly, and learn to apply it; we would strive after the knowledge of immortal life and of the original compact by observing their manifestations here; and to attain this knowledge all those strive who devote themselves to philosophy.”
“You do not quite understand me,” said the Emperor; “but I will allow all that you have said. What I meant was: has the universal being, of which you speak, its origin in itself, or in another still higher intelligence?”
“Intelligence and thought,” was the answer, “are necessary attributes of this being, as well as that which we are accustomed to call matter or extension.[4] Both declare themselves in infinite manifestations; and how is it possible that that which is an attribute of a thing can at the same time be its cause?”