and most important chapter in the history of Hindu civilisation. In what we may call the straight line of development lie the works which may be regarded as the sources and authorities of the philosophy which is generally admitted to have most fully deduced the conclusions implied in the Vedas, and which is undoubtedly the completest expression of Hindu pantheism-the Vedanta philosophy. The chief stages of the growth of this philosophy out of its Vedic germ, can be traced by the help of the literary documents with considerable certainty; but I can, of course, merely indicate the general character of its doctrine.

The central idea in the Vedanta theory is, that there is only one real being, and that this being is absolutely one. All material things and finite minds are conceived of as but emanations from the sole entity, and all that seems to imply independent existence is referred to ignorance. The whole of science is comprised, according to Vedantism, in the one formula-" Brahma alone exists; everything else is illusion." The truth of this formula is held to be implied in the very idea of Brahma, as the one eternal, unlimited, pure, and perfect being. If there existed a multitude of realities which had an origin and an end, which were finite, compounded, and imperfect, they must have originated in Brahma. But this they could not have done, it is argued, unless Brahma had

within himself the real principle of multiplicity, limitation; or, in other words, unless he were really not one, not eternal, not perfect. To ascribe real being and individuality to anything but Brahma, is equivalent to denying that Brahma is Brahma. Nor can there be any qualities and distinctions in Brahma. The absolute unity must be at once absolute reality and absolute knowledge. Were absolute being and absolute knowing not identical, there could be no absolute identity, no being absolutely one. Brahma, the universal soul, is the absolute knowledge which is inclusive of, and selfidentical with, reality. But absolute knowledge cannot be the knowledge of anything, for this implies the distinction of subject and object, which is of itself a limitation both of subject and object. Absolute knowledge must exclude the dualism of subject and object, and every kind of synthesis and relation.

Thus argues the Vedantist. What are we to think of his argument? Merely that it is logically valid. It deduces correctly a false conclusion from a false principle. He who will hold to the belief in an absolute abstract unity must necessarily identify knowing and being, and deny that pure knowing admits of a distinction between subject and object. But such a unity as this cannot be reasonably entertained by the mind. To ask reason to start from it, is to ask it to

start with a contradiction of its own fundamental laws. Besides, no kind of multiplicity or diversity can ever be shown to be consistent with such unity. The existence in some sense, however, of a multitude of different things, cannot be denied and must be accounted for. We perceive a variety of separate finite objects and are conscious of imperfection and limitation in ourselves. We do not perceive an infinite unity which is neither subject nor object, and which is perfect and unlimited, nor are we conscious of identity with it. How are we to explain this on the Vedantist hypothesis? How are we to reconcile the reason which denies with the consciousness which affirms distinctions and limitations? How are we to connect the one and the many, the absolute and the relative?

The hypothesis of emanation may be had recourse to, but it is obviously insufficient. Emanation is a physical process, and only possible because matter is essentially multiple and divisible. The fire sends forth sparks just because it is no unity but a multitude-an aggregate. The sparks are not identical either with one another or with the fire; they and all other parts of the fire are distinct from one another, although all the parts are of the same sort. The notion of emanation and the notion of absolute unity are exclusive of each other. The Vedantists saw this, and confessed that all the similes which they made use

of drawn from instances of emanation in physical nature were radically defective. They claimed no more for them than that they might help intelligence in what they described as its dream-state, to believe that nothing exists except Brahma. In other words, they admitted that these similes were addressed, not to the reason, but to the imagination. Hence it was necessary for them to supplement the hypothesis of emanation by anotherthat of illusion caused by ignorance.

The problem which they had to solve was to reconcile their theory of only one being with their consciousness of many beings. It was a problem which they could not solve, but they so far concealed their failure to solve it by making, as Dr Ballantyne has said, "the fact itself do duty for its own cause." The soul does not know that God alone is, and that finite souls and finite things are not, because it does not know it-because it is ignorant. Were it not for ignorance the worlds of sense and consciousness would not appear God alone would be. It is ignorance which has made the appearances that we call worlds and souls, and these appearances are mere illusionsdeceits. They are māyā. It is impossible, of course, to find any satisfaction in such an hypothesis. Who is it that Brahma is deceiving? Himself. Why should he do that? And how can he do it? Ignorance and illusion are im

plied in our consciousness of the world and of self being false, but they are not implied in, nor even consistent with, its being true that there is no being save one absolute and perfect being. The latter supposition precludes the possibility of ignorance, appearance, illusion, &c. The Vedantists, however, could not dispense with ignorance and illusion. It was only thus that they could seem to adhere to their absolute unity. It was only in the state of illusion that they could think of Brahma, and only with the help even of very material imagery that they could speak of him.

I might now proceed to explain the Vedanta theory of the three qualities of ignorance, which, separately or in combination, obscure the knowledge which constitutes the essence of the soul; and of its two powers, the one originating belief in our consciousness of personality, and the other accounting for the dream that there is an external world. I might also dwell on the Vedanta theory of the nature and laws of the evolution of phenomena. The transformations of Brahma, of which the evolution consists, are supposed to take place according to both a diminishing and an increasing progression, the former being from more to less perfect, and the latter from less to more definite. I am compelled, however, to leave unconsidered these and other portions of the system, and must