duties," in performing action. "Whatever
a great man does, that other men also do; ... wise men should not shake
the convictions of the ignorant who are attached to action, but acting
with devotion should make them apply themselves to all action." "He who
identifies himself with every being is not tainted, though he performs
actions." "The sages who are intent on the welfare of all the beings
obtain the Brahmic bliss."

This certainly is neither very clear, nor at all adequate, as the
inculcation of the most fundamental of all duties, the love of our
fellow-men and the sacrifice of self in the interest of common
humanity. The Vedantin claims that the unity of all being, as taught
by him, is a strong injunction upon him to love all the parts of that
unity. But the Bhagavad Gita does not teach clearly even this Vedantic
doctrine. Selfishness is too much stamped upon the Hindu faith. It is
too exclusively an individualistic religion. It is every one for
himself in the great struggle of man for redemption. It pre-eminently
tends to cultivate in man both pride in his own achievement and an
exclusively selfish devotion to the consummation of his own
redemption.

4. In the Bhagavad Gita little is said of the character of the
salvation which is to be achieved by the devotee of Krishna. Indeed,
the nature of this consummation is left very much in mystery. We are
told that Krishna's worshipper will come to him. "He who, with the
highest devotion to me, will proclaim this supreme mystery among my
devotees will come to me freed from all doubts." Again we are taught
that such a devotee, "understanding me, truly enters into my essence."
This carries the definite and universal thought of Hinduism, that man
will be absorbed in the Deity. In another place we are told that the
worshipper "who is purified by the penance of knowledge has come into
my essence."

This is the eschatology of all Hindu _Shastras_. The peculiar teaching
of the Bhagavad Gita concerning action and its emphasis upon a
strenuous life in this world would have led us to expect the teaching
of a future of some kind of activity. Instead of that, it falls back
upon the old and hackneyed pantheistic idea, that the human soul,
being ultimately divested of its human bodies, both gross and fine,
passes on in its nakedness into oneness with the Absolute, and thus
loses all the faculties which, so far as we know, constitute its
greatness, power, and glory. In this conditio