Page:Akbar and the Rise of the Mughal Empire.djvu/206

Rh to the admiration of posterity. We, who have watched his work, and have penetrated his motives, recognise the purity of his intentions. He did not wish, as the bigots of his Court declared that he wished, to have himself obeyed and worshipped as a God. No: he declared himself to be the interpreter of the religion of which the Prophet had been the messenger in the sense of teaching its higher truths, the truths of beneficence, of toleration, of equal justice irrespective of the belief of the conscience. His code was the grandest of codes for a ruler, for the founder of an empire.

'There is good in every creed; let us adopt what is good, and discard the remainder.' Such was his motto. He recognised this feature in the mild and benevolent working of Hinduism, in the care for the family inculcated by it, in the absence of the spirit of proselytism. He recognised it in the simple creed of the followers of Zoroaster. He recognised it in Christianity. There was good in all. He believed, likewise, that there was good in all men. Hence his great forbearance, his unwillingness to punish so long as there was hope of reform, his love of pardoning. 'Go and sin no more' was a precept that constituted the very essence of his conduct.

Such was Akbar, the founder of the Mughal dynasty. Such were the principles which enabled him to found it. They were principles which, if adhered to, would have maintained it. They were the principles by accepting which his Western successors maintain it at the present day.