lone commanded and commended
[compare the controversy among Christian theologians about faith and
works]. The knowledge which saves and enfranchises may be reached by a
man in this present life, and will be, if the appropriate means are
employed.

OF BRAHMANHOOD

Meditation is a duty to be observed to the very close of life, and the
amount and intensity of it are the measure of a man's virtue and piety.
When he has reached the full knowledge of Brahman, a man is freed from
the consequences [karma] of all his evil deeds, past, present, and
future. [One would think that the state of Brahmanhood excluded the
possibility of sin, but this Sutra seems to imply the contrary. The
Sutras, however, make a distinction between a lower state of Brahmanhood
and a higher. See below.]

What happens to the knowing one (_vidvan_) at death? The soul of him who
has at death the lower Brahman knowledge merges into the subtler
elements. But when the highest knowledge is attained there is complete
absorption in Brahman. Whoever dies in possession of this highest
knowledge is at once merged in Brahman, and rests eternally and
perfectly in him.

The Upanishads describe the stations on the way which leads up to
Brahman. These stations are to be understood not merely as terminuses of
the various stages of the journey, but they denote also the divine
beings who direct the soul in its progress and enable it to move forward
and upward. According to some Sutras in this book the guardians of the
path conducting to the gods lead the departed soul, not to the highest
Brahman, but to the effected (_karya_), or qualified (_saguna_),
Brahman. But in other Sutras in this book the opposite view is stated
and defended, according to which the _vidvan_, or knower, goes direct to
the highest Brahman without halting anywhere short of that god.

The Sutras teach, on the whole, the doctrine that the enfranchised soul,
being identical with Brahman, is inseparable from him just as a mode of
substance is incapable of existing apart from the substance of which it
is a mode. Ramanuga points out, however, that some of the Sutras in this
book give it clearly to be understood that the freed soul can exist in
isolation and in separation from the great All.

The released soul can enter several bodies at the same time, since it is
not subject to space relations as other souls are.

* * * * *

THOMAS A KEMPIS

THE IMITATION