་ Without self-consciousness the ear does not make known any sound. My mind was absent,' he says, 'I did not perceive that sound.' Without self-consciousness the tongue does not make known any taste. My mind was absent,' he says, ' I did not perceive that taste.' Without self-consciousness the two hands do not make known any act. Our mind was absent,' they say, 'we did not perceive any act.' Without self-consciousness the body does not make known pleasure or pain. 'My mind was absent,' he says, ' I did not perceive that pleasure or pain.' Without self-consciousness the organ does not make known happiness, joy, or offspring. 'My mind was absent,' he says, 'I did not perceive that happiness, joy, or offspring. Without self-consciousness the two feet do not make known any movement. Our mind was absent,' they say,' we did not perceive that movement.' Without self-consciousness no thought succeeds, nothing can be known that is to be known. "Let no man try to find out what speech is, let him know the speaker. Let no man try to find out what odor is, let him know him who smells. Let no man try to find out what form is, let him know the seer. Let no man try to find out what sound is, let him know the hearer. Let no man try to find out the tastes of food, let him know the knower of tastes. Let no man try to find out what action is, let him know the agent. Let no man try to find out what pleasure and pain are, let him know the knower of pleasure and pain. Let no man try to find out what happiness, joy, and offspring are, let him know the knower of happiness, joy, and offspring. Let no man try to find out what movement is, let him know the mover. Let no man try to find out what mind is, let him know the thinker. These ten objects (what is spoken, smelled, seen, felt) have reference to self-consciousness; the ten subjects (speech, the senses, mind) have reference to objects. If there were no objects, there would be no subjects; and if there were no subjects, there would be no objects. For on either side alone nothing could be achieved. But the self of pragñâ, consciousness, and prâna, life, is not many, but one. For as in a car the circumference of a wheel is placed on the spokes, and the spokes on the nave, thus are these objects, as a circumference, placed on the subjects as spokes, and the subjects on the prâna. And that prâna, the living and breathing power, indeed is the self of pragñâ, the self-conscious self: blessed, imperishable, immortal. He does not increase by a good action, nor decrease by a bad action. For the self of prâna and pragñâ makes him, whom he wishes to lead up from these worlds, do a good deed; and the same makes him, whom he wishes to lead down from these worlds, do a bad deed. And he is the guardian of the world, he is the king of the world, he is the lord of the universe-and he is my (Indra's) self: thus let it be known, yea, thus let it be known! INTRODUCTION HE importance of the "Koran" lies in the fact that it ΤΗ is a religious book of the East, read and stored in the memory of a hundred millions of people of different races and civilizations, inhabiting countries extending from the western borders of China to the pillars of Hercules. It is considered by the Mohammedan to contain all the knowledge and all the literature necessary for men. When it was demanded of Mohammed to confirm the authority of his mission by some work of wonder, he pointed to the "Koran," and exclaimed, "Behold the greatest miracle of all." The learned men of Alexandria asked the Caliph Omar to give to them the vast library at Alexandria. "If those books," he replied, " contain anything which is contrary to the Koran' they deserve to be destroyed. If they contain what is written in the Koran,' they are unnecessary." He ordered them to be distributed among the baths of the city, to serve as fuel for their furnaces. The composition of the "Koran " is all the work of Mohammed. He himself claimed that he spoke merely as the oracle of God. The commands and injunctions are in the first person, as if spoken by the Divine Being. The passionate enthusiasm and religious earnestness of the prophet are plainly seen in these strange writings. Sometimes, however, he sinks into the mere Arabian story-teller, whose object is the amusement of his people. He is not a poet, but when he deals with the unity of God, with the beneficence of the Divine Being, with the wonders of Nature, with the beauty of resignation, he exhibits a glowing rhetoric, a power of gorgeous imagery, of pathos, and religious devotion, that make the "Koran" the first written work in the Arabian tongue. If we take Mohammed's own account of the composition of the volume, we must believe that the completed "Koran" existed from all eternity, on a tablet preserved in the upper heavens. Once a year, during the period of the prophet's active work, fragments of this tablet were brought down by the angel |