y rather imply that increasing
complexity involves the increase of evil as well as of good. This is
also the ground thought of the Agganna Sutta, the Buddhist Genesis (Dig.
Nik. XXVII.).

I think that the substance of much Indian pantheism--late Buddhist as
well as Brahmanic--is that the world, the soul and God (the three terms
being practically the same) have two modes of existence: one of repose
and bliss, the other of struggle and trouble. Of these the first mode is
the better and it is only by mistake[75] that the eternal spirit adopts
the latter. But both the mistake and the correction of it are being
eternally repeated. Such a formulation of the Advaita philosophy would
no doubt be regarded in India as wholly unorthodox. Yet orthodoxy admits
that the existence of the world is due to the coexistence of Maya
(illusion) with Brahman (spirit) and also states that the task of the
soul is to pass beyond Maya to Brahman. If this is so, there is either a
real duality (Brahman and Maya) or else Maya is an aspect of Brahman,
but an aspect which the soul should transcend and avoid, and for whose
existence no reason whatever is given. The more theistic forms of Indian
religion, whether Sivaite or Vishnuite, tend to regard individual souls
and matter as eternal. By the help of God souls can obtain release from
matter. But here again there is no explanation why the soul is
contaminated by matter or ignorance.

It is clearly illogical to condemn the Infinite as bad or a mistake.
Buddhism is perhaps sometimes open to this charge because on account of
its exceedingly cautious language about nirvana it fails to set it up as
a reality contrasted with the world of suffering. But many varieties of
Indian religion do emphatically point to the infinite reality behind and
beyond Maya. It is only Maya which is unsatisfactory because it is
partial.

Another attempt to make the Universe intelligible regards it as an
eternal rhythm playing and pulsing outwards from spirit to matter
(pravritti) and then backwards and inwards from matter to spirit
(nirvritti). This idea seems implied by Sankara's view that creation is
similar to the sportive impulses of exuberant youth and the
Bhagavad-gita is familiar with _pravritti_ and _nirvritti_, but the
double character of the rhythm is emphasized most clearly in Sakta
treatises. Ordinary Hinduism concentrates its attention on the process
of liberation and return to Brahman, but the Tantras recognize