Indeed, the religious life of the masses is the truest index of the
real value of a religion, if it has wrought upon them many centuries,
as Hinduism has, in this land.

I

In the West the national evolutionist says to us, "Let the people of
India alone, that they may evolve their own faith. It is not by
cataclysmic change, but by growth, that they will ultimately find
their true redemption." Others, who have listened perhaps to the
pleasing words of a clever, yellow-robed Hindu Swami, ask the
question, "Why should we spend our money in sending the Gospel to
these wonderfully bright people of the East; are they not able to take
care of themselves; and is not their faith adequate to their needs?"

To this we simply say: "Come with us to India and see for yourselves.
Live, as some of us have, for a third of a century in this land, and
see, hear, feel, and understand what this Hinduism is. And, having
understood the situation, ask yourselves whether this ancestral faith
of India has in itself real saving power and redeeming efficacy for
any one." I maintain that, to know Hinduism, is to feel a deep
sympathy with the people who have inherited it as their faith, and to
desire to bring to them the Gospel of life and of salvation in Christ
Jesus. The people of India are, perhaps, the most religious upon
earth. In this respect they are very unlike the Japanese and Chinese,
who are worldly, prosaic, practical. Hindus are poetic, other-worldly,
and spiritually minded. They have a keen instinct for things of the
spirit. They are, also, very unlike the people of the West. Among
Westerners, religion is largely an incident in life. It has for them a
separate department, a small corner, in the life. In the East, on the
other hand, religion enters into every detail of life. There is hardly
a department or an interest in life which is not subsidized by faith
and which has not to be conducted religiously.

Moreover, the people of India thought out and elaborated most profound
systems of theosophic thought in the far, remote past. When our
ancestors were in the depths of savagery, Indian sages were indulging
in metaphysical disquisitions which are even to-day the admiration of
western sages. And there were many among those ancient Hindu rishis
whose self-propelled flight toward God and divine things, and whose
spiritual aspirations and yearnings were so beautiful that we can but
speak with profound respect and entertain the highest