istian doctrine no doubt reflects its want of force for
Christians themselves in this present positive age. For even Tennyson
himself was vague:

"That which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home."

[Sidenote: The new sects and the doctrine of Transmigration.]

[Sidenote: The _Text-book of Hindu Religion_.]

[Sidenote: A European's place on the ladder of transmigration.]

Of the sects of recent origin, only the Br[=a]hma Sam[=a]j or Theistic
Association rejects the doctrine of transmigration avowedly. We have
already said that the [=A]rya Sam[=a]j or Vedic Theists of the United
Provinces and the Punjab hold strongly to the doctrine. It is noteworthy
that _they_ should do so, the Vedas being their standards wherewith to
test Modern Hinduism, for the doctrine of transmigration is scarcely
hinted at in the Vedas, and in the oldest, the Rigveda, there is said to
be no trace of the doctrine.[118] It appears in the later writings, the
Upanishads, and is manifest throughout the Code of Manu (c. A.D. 200).
Mrs. Besant, chief figure among the Indian Theosophists, now virtually a
Hindu Revival Association, preaches the doctrine, and, in fact, lectured
on it in Britain in 1904. At the same time, transmigration is no part of
the Theosophist's creed. As might be expected, the _Text-book of Hindu
Religion_, of the Hindu College, Benares, gives the doctrine of
transmigration a prominent place, although the explicitness with which
it is set forth is very surprising to one acquainted with the way the
doctrine is generally ignored by the educated. I quote from the _Hindu
Text-book_, published in 1903, that Westerns may realise that in dealing
with transmigration we are not dealing simply with some old-world
doctrine deciphered from some palm-leaf written in some ancient
character. After describing--here following the ancient philosophical
writings, the Upanishads--how the Jivatma or Soul comes up through the
various existences of the mineral, plant, and animal kingdoms until it
reaches the human stage, the Text-book proceeds to describe the further
upward or downward process. It is declared that the downward movement
(from man to animal) is now much rarer than formerly--that concession is
made to modern ideas--but the _law_ of the downward process is as
follows: "When a man has so degraded himself below the human level that
many of his qualities can only express themselves through the form of a
lower creature, he can