would I think be impossible in India or in any
country to the East of it. There man is thought of as a part of nature
not its centre or master[57]. Above him are formidable hosts of deities
and spirits, and even European engineers cannot subdue the genii of the
flood and typhoon: below but still not separated from him are the
various tribes of birds and beasts. A good man does not kill them for
pleasure nor eat flesh, and even those whose aspirations to virtue are
modest treat animals as humble brethren rather than as lower creatures
over whom they have dominion by divine command.

This attitude is illustrated by Chinese and Japanese art. In
architecture, this art makes it a principle that palaces and temples
should not dominate a landscape but fit into it and adapt their lines to
its features. For the painter, flowers and animals form a sufficient
picture by themselves and are not felt to be inadequate because man is
absent. Portraits are frequent but a common form of European
composition, namely a group of figures subordinated to a principal one,
though not unknown, is comparatively rare.

How scanty are the records of great men in India! Great buildings
attract attention but who knows the names of the architects who planned
them or the kings who paid for them? We are not quite sure of the date
of Kalidasa, the Indian Shakespeare, and though the doctrines of
Sankara, Kabir, and Nanak still nourish, it is with difficulty that the
antiquary collects from the meagre legends clinging to their names a few
facts for their biographies. And Kings and Emperors, a class who in
Europe can count on being remembered if not esteemed after death, fare
even worse. The laborious research of Europeans has shown that Asoka and
Harsha were great monarchs. Their own countrymen merely say "once upon a
time there was a king" and recount some trivial story.

In fact, Hindus have a very weak historical sense. In this they are not
wholly wrong, for Europeans undoubtedly exaggerate the historical
treatment of thought and art[58]. In science, most students want to know
what is certain in theory and useful in practice, not what were the
discarded hypotheses and imperfect instruments of the past. In
literature, when the actors and audience are really interested, the date
of Shakespeare and even the authorship of the play cease to be
important[59]. In the same way Hindus want to know whether doctrines and
speculations are true, whether a man can