The Project Gutenberg EBook of India, Its Life and Thought, by John P. Jones

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Title: India, Its Life and Thought

Author: John P. Jones

Release Date: February 18, 2009 [EBook #28117]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: A HOLY MAN OF INDIA]

INDIA

ITS LIFE AND THOUGHT

BY

JOHN P. JONES, D.D.

SOUTH INDIA

AUTHOR OF "INDIA'S PROBLEM, KRISHNA OR CHRIST,"
ETC., ETC.

New York

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

1908

COPYRIGHT, 1908,

BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.

* * * * *

Dedicated

TO MY DEAR CHILDREN

WHO HAVE

BRAVELY AND CHEERFULLY ENDURED

THE SEPARATION AND THE LOSS OF HOME

FOR THE SAKE OF INDIA

* * * * *

PREFACE

To the people of the West, the inhabitants of India are the least
understood and the most easily misunderstood of all men.

It is partly because they are antipodal to the West--the farthest
removed in thought and life. They are also the most secretive, and
find perennial delight in concealment and evasion.

According to Hindu teaching, the Supreme Spirit forever sports in
illusion. It continuously manifests itself through unreal and false
forms, which delude and lead astray ignorant man. In harmony with this
philosophy of the Divine--and may it not be as a result of it?--the
people of India too often delight in unreal and deceptive exhibitions
of themselves. At any rate, it is exceedingly difficult for a man of
the West, especially he of the Anglo-Saxon type, to apprehend the full
significance and the correct drift of life and thought of this land.

It is amusing, when not discouraging, to witness travellers, who have
rushed through India in a winter tour, publish volumes of their
misconceptions and ill-digested theories about the people with an
oracular emphasis which is equalled only by their ignorance.

The author of this book makes no claim to a right to speak _ex
cathedra_ u