68 



SIR ANDREW WINGATE, K.C.I.E., ON INDIA. 



if the difference is the just recompense of the actions done in a 

 former life. Thus the doctrine and the Institution hang together : 

 nor is there any doubt that caste must go if Christianity is to 

 triumph. But the doctrine of Karma is admittedly a purely meta- 

 physical one resting on no evidential basis whatever and its offspring 

 caste is undoubtedly crumbling away. 



The spread of education and the democratic ideals which underlie 

 the new Indian constitution strike at the root of caste, while the 

 habit of demanding evidence as the basis of belief is fatal to the 

 doctrine of Karma. 



We have therefore reasonable ground for saying that the trend 

 of thought and the current of events in India are both in favour 

 of Christianity. 



There is one criticism that I think should be made upon the 

 statement on p. 53 of the doctrine of Karma. 



The doctrine is no doubt correctly stated as far as the definition 

 goes. But a following sentence, " The idea is that after innumer- 

 able lives during myriads of years, the soul rises to perfection . . 

 tends, I think, to give an incorrect view of the teaching of Karma. 

 It seems to imply a kind of evolution, the fiaal perfection being 

 arrived at as the outcome of a series of lives increasing in moral 

 value and ending in a life free from moral defect. 



This is not, I think, the doctrine of Karma. This is stated by 

 Prof. Deussen in his System des Vedanta as follows (pp. 381-2) : 

 " . . . . the clockwork of requital in running down always 

 winds itself up again ; and so on in perpetuity — unless there comes 

 upon the scene the universal knowledge which does not rest upon 

 merits but breaks its way into existence without connection there- 

 with, to dissolve it utterly, to burn up the seed of deeds and thus 

 to render a continuance of the transmigration impossible for ever 

 after." The release from Karma is thus to be obtained not by the 

 attainment of a morally perfect life, but by what is described as 

 knowledge which cuts away all motives for action and ends in a 

 state very hard to distinguish from annihilation. 



It is very encouraging to find a writer of Sir Andrew Wingate's 

 great knowledge and experience of India so hopeful, as the passage 

 in the middle of p. 64 and on p. 65 shows him to be, of the outcome 

 of the new powers given to native ministers : the ground of his 



