ifestation of some exuberant force giving expression to itself in
joyous movement. Thus the Taittiriya Upanishad (III. 6) says: "Bliss is
Brahman, for from bliss all these beings are born, by bliss when born
they live, into bliss they enter at their death."

It is remarkable that Indian thought, restless and speculative as it is,
hardly ever concerns itself with the design, object or end of the world.
The notion of [Greek: Telos] plays little part in its cosmogony or
ethics[135]. The Universe is often regarded as a sport, a passing whim
of the divine Being, almost a mistake. Those legends which describe it
as the outcome of a creative act, generally represent the creator as
moved by some impulse to multiply himself rather than as executing some
deliberate if mysterious plan. Legends about the end of the world and
the establishment of a better order are rare. Hindu chronology revels in
periods, whose enormous length though expressed in figures leaves no
real impression on the mind, days and nights of Brahma, Kalpas,
Manvantaras and Yugas, in which gods and worlds are absorbed into the
supreme essence and born again. But there is no finality about these
catastrophes: the destruction of the whole universe is as certain as the
death of a mouse and to the philosopher not more important[136].
Everything is periodic: Buddhas, Jinas and incarnations of all sorts are
all members of a series. They all deserve great respect and are of great
importance in their own day, but they are none of them final, still less
are they able to create a new heaven and earth or to rise above the
perpetual flux of Samsara. The Buddhists look forward to the advent of
Maitreya, the future Buddha, and the Hindus to the reappearance of
Vishnu as Kalki, who, sword in hand and mounted on a white horse, will
purge India of barbarians, but these future apparitions excite only a
feeble interest in the popular conscience and cannot be compared in
intensity with such ideas as the Jewish Messiah.

It may seem that Indian religion is dreamy, hopeless, and unpractical,
but another point of view will show that all Indian systems are
intensely practical and hopeful. They promise happiness and point out
the way. A mode of life is always prescribed, not merely by works on law
and ceremony but by theological and metaphysical treatises. These are
not analogous to the writings of Kant or Schopenhauer and to study them
as if they were, is like trying to learn riding or