ulers of men; nor will any of us
ever hereafter cease to be. As in this body, infancy and youth and old
age come to the embodied self, so does the acquisition of another
body; a sensible man is not deceived about that.... There is no
existence for that which is unreal; there is no non-existence for that
which is real.... These bodies, appertaining to the embodied self
which is eternal, indestructible, and indefinable, are said to be
perishable; therefore do engage in battle, O descendant of Bharata! He
who thinks it to be the killer and he who thinks it to be killed, both
know nothing. It kills not, is not killed. It is not born, nor does it
ever die, nor, having existed, does it exist no more. Unborn,
everlasting, unchangeable, and primeval, it is not killed when the
body is killed.... But even if you think that it is constantly born,
and constantly dies, still, O you mighty man of arms! you ought not to
grieve thus. For to one that is born, death is certain; and to one
that dies, birth is certain."

There is a great deal more in this line of the indestructibility of
the soul; but nothing is said of the Vedantic idea that the soul has
no real, separate existence, and that even this illusory existence, in
human conditions, will terminate when the self shall be recognized to
be, as it really is, an unsevered and inseparable part of the Supreme
Soul.

The eternal existence of the soul is posited by every school of Hindu
thought. In the Sankya philosophy, the human self, as we have seen, is
a separate, uncreated entity; and the teaching of the Divine Lay
concerning it is in harmony with this. And it must be confessed that
in many respects this doctrine is inferior to the Vedantic, which
emphasizes the spiritual character, and the divine origin and destiny,
of the soul.

3. The doctrine of Liberation, or of Redemption, as found in the
Bhagavad Gita, is a strange combination of all the ways which
Brahmanism has inculcated through its many schools, with other ways
here added. "In every way men follow in my path," declared Krishna. In
the pursuance of any religious practices whatever, men were assured
that they would be acceptable if they were only Krishna-olaters.

(1) But the highest path which leads unto God is the path of knowledge
(_Gnana_). "Sacrifices of various sorts are laid down in the Vedas.
Know them all to be produced from action, and knowing this you will be
released from the fetters of this world. The sacri