BOOKS, SACRED, OF THE EAST In relation to the comparison between the rela tive merit of the various "Sacred Books of the East" Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Professor of Sanskrit, Oxford Univ., Eng., says: "(1) When I began investigating Hinduism and Buddhism, some well-meaning friends expressed their surprise that I should waste my time by grubbing in the dirty gutters of heathendom. After a little examination I found many gems there, and I began to be a believer in what is called 'the evolution and growth of religious thought.' These imperfect systems,' I said to myself, 'are clearly steps in the development of man's religious instincts and aspirations. Nay, it is probable that they were all intended to lead up to one true religion, and that Christianity is, after all, merely the climax, the complement, the fulfillment of them all.' "Now, there is unquestionably a delightful fas cination about such a theory, and, what is more, there are elements of truth in it. But I am glad of an opportunity of stating publicly that I am per suaded I was misled by its attractiveness, and that its main idea is quite erroneous. The charm and the danger of it, I think, lie in its apparent liber ality, its breadth of view, and toleration.
"(2) Now, to express sympathy with this kind of liberality is sure to win applause among a cer tain class in these days of toleration and religious free trade. We must not forget, either, that our Bible tells us that God has not left Himself with out witness, and that in every nation he that feareth God and worketh righteousness is ac cepted of Him.
"Yet I contend that this flabby, jelly-fish kind of tolerance is utterly incompatible with the nerve, fiber and backbone that ought to characterize a manly Christian. A Christian's character ought to be exactly what the Bible intends it to be. Take that Sacred Book of ours. Handle rever ently the whole volume; search it through and through, and mark well the spirit that pervades it. You will find no limpness, no flabbiness about its utterances. Vigor and manhood breathe in every
page. It is downright and straightforward, bold, fearless, rigid and uncompromising.
"It tells us plainly to be either hot or cold. If God be God, serve Him. If Baal be God, serve Him. We cannot serve both. Only one name is given among men whereby we may be saved.
"(3) These non-Christian Bibles are develop ments in the wrong direction. They all begin with some ashes of true light and end in utter dark ness. Pile them, if you will, on the left side of your study table, but place your own Holy Bible on the right side—all by itself, all alone, and with a wide gap between.
"(4) And now I crave permission to give at least two good reasons for venturing to contra vene in so plainspoken a manner the favorite philosophy of the day. Listen to me, ye youth ful students of the so-called Sacred Books of the East ; search them through and through, and tell me, do they affirm of Vyasa, of Zoroaster, of Con fucius, of Buddha, of Mohammed, what our Bible affirms of the founder of Christianity?—that He, a sinless man, was made SinP Not merely that He is the eradicator of sin, but that He, the sinless Son of Man, was himself made sin.
"Vyasa and the other founders of Hinduism enjoined severe penances, endless lustral wash ings, incessant purifications, painful pilgrimages, arduous ritual, and sacrificial observations, all with one idea of getting rid of sin. All their books say so. But do they say that the very men who exhausted every invention for the eradication of sin were themselves sinless men made sin? "(5) As a layman I do not presume to inter pret the apparently contradictory proposition put forth in our Bible that a sinless man was made sin. All that I now contend for is that it stands alone—that it is wholly unparalleled ; that it is not to be matched by the shade of a shadow of a similar declaration in any other book claiming to be the exponent of any other religion in the world.