Carus, Paul

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THE HARMONY OF THE SPHERES.BY THE EDITOR."\"\ THILE pondering over the problem of man's moral aspirationsV V and the various forms which they assume in different reli-gions, I was deeply impressed with the similarity of sentiment inthe utterances of the several religious leaders who had attained theloftiest heights of moral truth, and if they have reached their con-clusions (as we must assume) in perfect independence, we cannotdeny that their agreement indicates a remarkable harmony in thespiritual spheres, and the dominant keynote of this celestial musicmay be characterized in Christ's noble word:"But I say unto you, love your enemies." Matt. v. 44.Nor is this word without resonance in the sacred writings ofother countries. The venerable Lao-Tze proclaimed the same greatmaxim in these sentences:"Requite hatred with goodness."—Lao-Tze, ch. 63.And"The good I meet with goodness.The bad I also meet with goodness.Thus I actualize goodness.The faithful I meet with faith.The faithless I also meet with faith.Thus I actualize faith."-—Lao-Tze, ch. 49.The Buddhist distinguishes as clearly as St. Paul between"love" and "lovingkindness." The former in the sense of sexuallove is kamo (in both Pali and Sanskrit), corresponding exactly tothe Greek epws, but there are two words for "lovingkindness" ; firstthere is the natural affection and friendliness, such as exists betweenbrother and sister, or parents and children, which is called pemam,and then the highest ideal of "lovingkindness" in the sublimestreligious sense, called mettd. The Dhammapada warns the disciplesTHE HARMONY OF THE SPHERES. 221not to be entranced by the snares of kamo. The word occurs forinstance in the following passage:"Be not yoked unto carelessnessTo love's delight and intimacy."The word pemava applies to all human affections as for instancein the following passage quoted from the Middling collection:"All those who have merely faith and affection towards meare sure of paradise hereafter."^Mettd, or lovingkindness in the religious sense, is made anobject of meditation, enjoined on the disciple who devotes his lifeto religion. It is higher than pemava, "affection," and is chief inthe long list of Buddhist meditations. The meditation of this loving-kindness embraces all living beings, and its praise is extolled inthe following passage,- which we quote in Mr. Edmunds' translation,as follows:"Eleven benefits, O monks, are due from the heart-emancipatingpractice of lovingkindness—from its cultivation and its increase,from making it active and practical, from pursuing, accumulatingand striving to the height thereof. What are the eleven ?"One sleeps in peace and wakes in peace ; he dreams no evildreams; he is dear unto mortals and immortals; the angels watcliover him ; fire, poison, sword can harm him not;quickly his heartis calmed ; the aspect of his countenance is serene ; he meets deathundismayed ; and should he fail of the Highest, he is sure to go tothe world of God."By "the Highest" is meant Nirvana ; the world of God is heaven.Mr. Edmunds adds the following comment:"God is here Brahma, the Supreme Finite Being who, thoughnot the Creator, enjoys otherwise all the Christian titles of theDeity. In Buddhism the Godhead is not a person, but an office, andBuddha himself once earned that office in a bygone universe by thesystematic practice of love."The story how Buddha in his former incarnations had reachedthe office of Godhead, how he was exalted as a Brahma, the om-niscient, omnipotent governor of the universe, is told in the Logia-Book (Itiviittaka), Chapter 22; and we quote the passage in fullagain in Mr. Edmunds' translation:"This was spoken by the Blessed One, spoken by the Arahat,and heard by me:'Majjhima Nikayo Sutta 22. Cf. Open Court j Feb., 1900, p. 118.''Numerical Collection {Anguttara Nikayo), Book of Elevens, section 16.222 THE OPEN COURT."O monks, be not afraid of good works : such is the name forhappiness, for what is wished, desired, dear, and dehghtfnl,—namelygood works."And for a long time have I known, monks, the wished-for.desired, dear, delightful, and severally enjoyed results of good worksdone for a long time."Having practised benevolence for seven years, I did not returnto this world during the revolution and evolution of an seon. Yea,monks, for the revolution of an aeon I was an angel of splendor,and during the evolution I rose again in the empty palace of theBrahmas. Yea, then, O monks, I was a Brahma, the great Brahma,conquering, unconquered, all-seeing, controlling. And thirty-sixtimes, O monks, was I Sakko, the lord of the angels ; many hun-dreds of times I was a king, a righteous emperor, a king of right-eousness,^ victorious in the four quarters, securely established in mycountry, and possessed of the seven treasures."Now what was the doctrine of that region and kingdom?This is what I thought of it, O monks : What deed of mine is thisthe fruit of? Of what deed is this the result, whereby now I amthus magical and mighty? This is what I thought of it, O monks:This is the fruit of three deeds of mine, the result of three deeds,whereby I am thus magical and mighty, to wit: alms, self-control,and abstinence."We will now quote from the Buddhist canon some of the bestknown .passages on lovingkindness.Buddha teaches** (Dhammapada 5) :"Hatred does not cease by hatred at any time : hatred ceases bylove, this is an old rule."In the world of sense everything bad is so loud and assertsitself with such pretentious noise, that the evil seems indeed to takepossession of the actual world and to crowd out everything goodand true and noble. How different is the domain of ideal aspira-tions as taught in the Dhammapada (verse 223) :"Let a man overcome anger by love, let him overcome evil bygood ; let him overcome the greedy by liberality, the liar by truth !"And again Buddha says (Sutta Nipata VHI, 147-150) :"Let no one deceive or despise another in any place, let himnot out of anger or resentment wish harm to another."As a mother at the risk of her life watches over her own child,^ Or "King by right," the epic title of a Hindu suzerain." This and the following translations are quoted from the Sacred Books ofthe East, Vols. X and XI.THE HARMONY OF THE SPHERES. 22.3her only child, so also let every one cultivate a boundless goodwilltowards all beings."And let him cultivate goodwill towards all the world, a bound-less goodwill, above and below and across, unobstructed, withouthatred, without enmity."Standing, walking or sitting or lying, as long as he be awake,let him devote himself to this mind; this (way of) living is thebest in this world."And one of the disciples of the Buddha burst forth in admira-tion in these lines (Tevigga Sutta, III, 1-2) :"And he [the Enlightened One] lets his mind pervade onequarter of the world with thoughts of love, and so the second, andso the third, and so the fourth. And thus the whole wide world,above, below, around, and everywhere, does he continue to pervadewith heart of love, far-reaching, grown great, and beyond measure."Just, Vaseff/za, as a mighty trumpeter makes himself heard—and that without difficulty—in all the four directions ; even so of allthings that have shape or life, there is not one that he passes by orleaves aside, but regards them all with mind set free, and deep-feltlove."Plato records a speech redounding to the glorification of love.It was uttered by the Greek prophetess Diotima, upon whom thespirit of Socrates rested. She protested that the sentiment oflovers enraptured with beauty, pointed to higher ideals far abovethe pleasures of sense. She depicted a love that is absolutely pure ;a love of the divine, a love of the true, the beautiful and the good.The passage is quoted in condensed form by Mr. Frederic W. H.Myers in his interesting and voluminous work, Human Personality(Vol. I, pp. 113 ff.), and it will be convenient to reproduce it herefrom that source as follows"':"Plato begins by recognizing, as fully as pessimist or cyniccould do, the absolute inadequacy of what is called on earth thesatisfaction of this profound desire. Lovers who love aright willfeel that no physical nearness can content them, but what zvill con-tent them they cannot say. 'Their soul,' says Plato, 'is manifestlydesiring something else ; and what it is she cannot tell, only shedarkly prophesies thereof and guesses it from afar. But if Hephaes-tus with his forging fire were to stand beside that pair and say:"Is this what ye desire—to be wholly one? to be together by night° The passage appears in Plato's Symposiuin (pp. 192-212) and IVIr. Myers'version is based upon Jowett's translation. Jowett translates the word epoosby "love" and to. ipuiTiKo. by "things of love" or "mysteries of love."224 THE OPEN COURT.and day?—for I am ready to melt you together and make you growin one, so that from two ye shall become one only, and in this lifeshall be undivided, and dying shall die together, and in the under-world shall be a single soul ;"—there is no lover who would noteagerly accept the offer and acknowledge it as the expression ofthe unknown yearning and the fulfilment of the ancient need.' Andthrough the mouth of Diotima, Plato insists that it is an unfailingsign of true love that its desires are for ever; nay, that love may beeven defined as the desire of the everlasting possession of the good.And in all love's acts he finds the impress of man's craving for im-mortality,—for immortality whose only visible image for us onearth is the birth of children to us as we ourselves decay,—so thatwhen the slow self-renewal of our own everchanging bodies hasworn out and ceased, we may be renewed in brighter, youngerbodies which we desire to be born to us from whomsoever we findmost fair. 'And then,' says Plato, rising, as ever, from visible toinvisible things, 'if active bodies have so strong a yearning that anendless series of lovely images of themselves may constitute, as itwere, an earthly immortality for them when they have worn away,how greatly must creative souls desire that partnership and closecommunion with other souls as fair as they may bring to birth abrood of lofty thoughts, poems, statutes, institutions, laws,—thefitting progeny of the soul?"And he who in his youth hath the need of these things in him,and grows to be a godlike man, wanders about in search of a nobleand well-nurtured soul ; and finding it, and in presence of thatbeauty which he forgets not night or day, brings forth the beautifulwhich he conceived long ago ; and the twain together tend that whichhe hath brought forth, and are bound by a far closer bond than thatof earthly children, since the children which are born to them arefairer and more immortal far. Who would not choose to haveHomer's offspring rather than any sons or daughters of men ? Whowould not choose the offspring which Lycurgus left behind him,to be the very salvation of Lacedsemon and of Greece? or the chil-dren of Solon, whom we call Father of our laws? or of other menlike these, whether Greeks or barbarians, who by great deeds thatthey have done have become the begetters of every kind of virtue?—ay, and to these men's children have temples been set up, and neverto any other progeny of man . . . .'"'He, then, who to this end would strive aright, must beginin youth to seek fair forms, and should learn first to love one fairform only, and therein to engender noble thoughts. And then heTHE HARMONY OF THE SPHERES. 225will perceive that the beauty of one fair form is to the beauty ofanother near akin ; and that if the Beauty's self he seek, it weremadness not to account the beauty of all forms as one same thing:and considering this, he will be the lover of all lovely shapes, andwill abate his passion for one shape alone, despising and deemingit but a little thing. And this will lead him on to see that the beautyof the soul is far more precious than any beauty of outward form,so that if he find a fair soul, though it be in a body which hath butlittle charm, he will be constant thereunto, and bring to birth suchthoughts as teach and strengthen, till he lead that soul on to seethe beauty of actions and of laws, and how all beauty is in truthakin, and the body's beauty is but a little matter; and from actionshe will lead him on to sciences, that he may see how sciences arefair ; and looking on the abundance of beauty may no longer be asthe slave or bondman of one beauty or of one law ; but setting sailinto the ocean of beauty, and creating and beholding many fair andglorious thoughts and images in a philosophy without stint or stay,he may thus at last wax strong and grow, and may perceive thatthere is one science only, the science of infinite beauty."'For he who hath thus far had intelligence of love, and hathbeheld all fair things in order and aright,—he drawing near to theend of things lovable shall behold a Being marvelously fair; forwhose sake in truth it is that the previous labors have been under-gone : One who is from everlasting, and neither is born nor per-isheth, nor can wax nor wane, nor hath change or turning or altera-tion of foul and fair ; nor can that beauty be imagined after thefashion of face or hands or bodily parts and members, nor in anyform of speech or knowledge, nor as dwelling in aught but in itself;neither in beast nor man nor earth nor heaven nor any other crea-ture ; but Beauty only and alone and separate and eternal, which,albeit all other fair things partake thereof and grow and perish,itself without change or increase or diminution endures for ever-lasting. And whoso being led on and upward by human loves be-gins to see that Beauty, he is not far, I say, from reaching the endof all. And surely then, O Socrates (said that guest from Man-tinea), man's life is worth the living, when he beholds that PrimalFair ; which when thou seest it shall not seem to thee to be madeafter the fashion of gold or raiment or those forms of earth,—whomnow beholding thou art stricken dumb, and fain, if it were possible,without thought of meat or drink, wouldst look and love for ever.What would it be then, were it granted to any man to see VeryBeauty clear ;—incorruptible and undefiled, not mingled with color226 THE OPEN COURT.or flesh of man, or with aught that can consume away, but single anddivine? Could man's life, in that vision and beatitude, be poor orlow? or deemest thou not (said he), that then alone it will be possiblefor this man, discerning spiritual beauty with those eyes by whichit is spiritually discerned, to beget no shadows of virtue, since thatis no shadow to which he clings, but virtue in very truth, since hehath the very Truth in his embrace? and begetting and rearingVirtue as his child, he must needs become the friend of God ; and ifthere be any man who is immortal, that man is he.' "Plato is a true son of Hellas when he reaches the highest aimof the aspiring soul by a love of beauty, but in the end his idealcoincides closely with that of Buddha and with that of Christ.It is peculiar that even the words are similar. When Buddhistsdescribe Nirvana as that state where there is neither birth nordeath, Plato says of the highest Being that it "is neither born norperishes, nor can it wax nor wane, nor hath it change or turningor alteration," etc.Agathon, a tragic poet of Athens, who expressed his views onlove at the same convivial feast in which Socrates took part, treatsthe same subject as follows:"Do we artists not know that he only whom love inspires hasthe light of fame? He whom love touches not, walks in darkness.Love has set in order the empire of the Gods. Therefore PhgedrusI say of Love that he is the fairest and best in himself and the causeof what is fairest and best in all other things."And I have a mind to say of him in verse that he is the godwho"Gives peace on earth, andcalms the stormy deep,Who stills the waves, andbids the sufferer sleep."He makes men to be of one mind at a banquet such as this,filling them with affection and emptying them of disafifection. Insacrifices, banquets, dances, he is our lord, supplying kindness andbanishing unkindness, giving friendship and forgiving enmity, thejoy of the good, the wonder of the wise, the amazement of the gods;desired by those who have no part in him and precious to those whohave the better part in him, parent of delicacy, luxury, desire, fond-ness, softness, grace, careful of the good, uncareful of the evil."In every word, work, wish, fear he is pilot, helper, defender,saviour, glory of gods and men, leader best and brightest in whosefootsteps let every man follow."THE HARMONY OF THE SPHERES. 22/And Agathon was echoed by Paul when he said:"But now abideth faith, hope and love (dydTrrj), these three,but the greatest of these is love (dyaTr??)."All these notes and voices merge into one grand harmony, theharmony of the spheres of the spiritual life that pervades the entirecreation of whirling universes.

The Harmony of the Spheres.

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The Harmony of the Spheres.

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