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Brahmanism flourished in what we call the United Provinces: Buddhism arose in the regions to the east of this district and both Vishnuism and Śivaism are first heard of in the west. The earliest sect of which we have any record is that of the Bhâgavatas, who were or became Vishnuite.
Braham, Hazlitt might have said, is so obviously the anagram of Brahma that dulness itself could not mistake the object intended. Of course no one can hold Emerson responsible for the "Yoga" doctrine of Brahmanism, which he has amused himself with putting in verse. The oriental side of Emerson's nature delighted itself in these narcotic dreams, born in the land of the poppy and of hashish.
It appears from the laws of Manu that it was not unusual, in the earliest periods of Brahmanism, for those seeking a superior piety to turn hermits, and to live alone in the forest, engaged in acts of prayer, meditation, abstinence, and the study of the Vedas. This practice, however, seems to have been confined to the Brahmans.
It was from the Dravidian and Kolarian aborigines, we are told, that Indian religion took its later corruptions. The Vedic religion has no idols, it has no dark descriptions of hell, the caste system on which later Brahmanism was based is absent from it, it has no demons to be guarded against, and no bad deities. The doctrine of metempsychosis is not found here, except perhaps in germ.
For instance, the followers of Brahmanism relate miracles. From what evidence may we know that those are false and that these are true? If these are fables, the others also are fables; if these are generally accepted, so also the others are generally accepted. Consequently, these accounts are not satisfactory proofs.
During the last fifty years new attention has been paid to the systems of religion of the Eastern world, especially to that of Zoroaster among the Persians, and that which is called Brahmanism and the rival system known as Buddhism in the nations farther east. Especial interest belongs to these inquiries for us, because these religions are religions of the great Aryan race to which we belong.
In recording its history, we should consider, first, its oldest representative of which we have knowledge, the Indian race, with its literature, its social organization, and its religions, Brahmanism and Buddhism. Then come the Persians, with their religion founded by Zoroaster, and the Armenians.
But things of this kind practically solve the apparent difficulty. You have come all the way from America to study the Hindus and their religion; but you will never understand the latter if you do not realize how closely all our sciences are related, not to the modern ignorant Brahmanism, of course, but to the philosophy of our primitive Vedic religion." "I see.
This corruption had a renewal in the Neoplatonic philosophy; but it sprang from the Oriental philosophy of Brahmanism, and blends with its magic and enchantments. Theosophy is no more allied to Christian Science than the odor of the upas-tree is to the sweet breath of springtide, or the brilliant coruscations of the northern sky are to solar heat and light.
Ascetic observances, as a means of attaining perfection, were an inheritance from popular Brahmanism. Confucius steadily declined to teach anything about divine worship; Confucianism remained merely an ethical system, dealing only with the present life, until its founder, with disregard of his teaching, was divinized.
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