Page:Monier Monier-Williams - Indian Wisdom.djvu/43

 think only of the effect of action's on the happiness or misery of future states of being. But, if personality and the remembrance of previous existences are not preserved, how can deatli be regarded in any other light than absolute extinction ?

2. Brahmanism rises to a higher level, for here there is a theoretical craving after union with the Supreme Spirit, as the grand aim and object of the system (see p. 500). This union, however, really means identification with or absorption into the One only self- existing Being, as the river blends with the ocean ; so that Brahmanism really ends in destroying man's personality, and practically, if not theoretically, lands its disciples in the same absolute extinction aimed at by Buddhists. In fact, the higher and more esoteric the teaching of both these systems, the more evidently do they exhibit themselves in their true colours as mere schemes for getting rid of the evils of life, by the extinction of all activity, individuality, self-consciousness, and personal existence.

3. Let us now turn to Islam. The end which Muhammad set before the disciples of the Kuran was admission to a material paradise (janttat1), described as consisting of shaded gardens, abounding' with delicious fruits, watered by flowing streams (anhdr), filled with black-eyed Hurls, and replete with exquisite corporeal enjoyments. It is certainly true that spiritual pleasures and the favour of God are also said to form part of its delights, and that the permanence of man's personality is implied. But a holy God is still immeasurably removed from His creatures, and intimate union with Him, or even admission to His presence, is not the central idea of beatitude.

4. In contrast to Brahmanism, Buddhism, and Islam, the one object aimed at in Christianity is, emphatically, such an access to and union with a holy God as shall not only secure the permanence of man's own individual will, energy, and personality, but even intensify them.

Perhaps, however, it is in the answer to the second question that the great difference between the four systems is most apparent.

How, and by what means is the object aimed at by each system avowedly effected ? In replying to this, let us reverse the order, and commence with our own religion.

1 Muslims believe there are seven (or eight) heavens representing degrees of felicity, and seven hells (ja/uinnam), the seventh or deepest of which is for hypocrites, the sixth for idolaters, the third for Christians.