Page 102 - Hinduism

to get in the purely political society. A society composed as it is of various degrees of intelligence and capacity and personality, does not grasp the full significance of this discovery of religious consciousness. None the less, religion does help to integrate or unify the triple goals of liberty, law and love. To the lower nature these mean license, power and lust for things. But sublimated by Religion they become wonderful expressions of the nature of the soul or spirit.
The social life of man becomes transfigured and civilised by the sublimated direction given to all the activities of the ordinary man. The teachings and the practices of the masters of Hinduism are directed to the civilising of man, by taming his lower nature which revels in egoism and competition, jealousy and greed, violence and hatred. Religion being a higher power or force of the new dimension of the personal and social life seeks mastery over the past vital life of man. In Hinduism it is sought in fall conformity with the triple principles of liberty, law and love. That it has not been successful in Hinduism in a larger measure than we would like it to be only shows that generally there has been a stepping down of the ideals of religion everywhere. Religions become rigid and tend to repeat the mistakes of passion and greed of the lower levels on the higher levels of social and spiritual action and thus step down the force of the true impulse.
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