held to a belief in reincarnation of the soul, from one form to
another. While to them everything was but a manifestation of One Life,
still the soul was a differentiated unit, emanated from the One Life,
and destined to work its way back to Unity and Oneness with the Divine
Life through many and varied incarnations, until finally it would be
again merged with the One. From this early beginning arose the many and
varied forms of religious philosophy known to the India of today; but
clinging to all these modern forms is to be found the fundamental basis
idea of reincarnation and final absorption with the One.

Brahmanism came first, starting from the simple and working to the
complex, a great priesthood gradually arising and surrounding the
original simple religious philosophy with ceremonial, ritual and
theological and metaphysical abstractions and speculation. Then arose
Buddhism, which, in a measure, was a return to the primitive idea, but
which in turn developed a new priesthood and religious organization. But
the fundamental doctrine of Reincarnation permeated them all, and may be
regarded as the great common centre of the Hindu religious thought and
philosophy.

The Hindu religious books are filled with references to the doctrine of
Reincarnation. The Laws of Manu, one of the oldest existing pieces of
Sanscrit writing, contains many mentions of it, and the Upanishads and
Vedas contain countless reference to it. In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna
says to Arjuna: "Know thou, O Prince of Pandu, that there never was a
time when I, nor thou, nor any of these princes of earth was not; nor
shall there ever come a time, hereafter, when any of us shall cease to
be. As the soul, wearing this material body, experienceth the stages of
infancy, youth, manhood, and old age, even so shall it, in due time,
pass on to another body, and in other incarnations shall it again live,
and move and play its part. * * * These bodies, which act as enveloping
coverings for the souls occupying them, are but finite things--things of
the moment--and not the Real Man at all. They perish as all finite
things perish--let them perish. He who in his ignorance thinketh: 'I
slay' or 'I am slain,' babbleth like an infant lacking knowledge. Of a
truth none can slay--none can be slain. Take unto thy inner mind this
truth, O Prince! Verily, the Real Man--the Spirit of Man--is neither
born, nor doth it die. Unborn, undying, ancient, perpetual and eternal,
it ha