Oriental philosophy

“ As a traveler from the West, on reaching some Eastern land, finds it difficult at first to distinguish between the faces of different individuals, his mind being focused on the likeness pervading them all, so the Occidental student of Oriental thought is impressed with the remarkable similarity that pervades the entire Oriental civilization, modes of thought, and philosophy, finding it difficult to discover the differences which distinguish the various Oriental races. ”

“ And yet, I make bold to say, that during the last hundred, and still more during the last fifty years, Oriental studies have contributed more than any other branch of scientific research to change, to purify, to clear, and intensify the intellectual atmosphere of Europe, and to widen our horizon in all that pertains to the Science of Man, in history, philology, theology, and philosophy. ”

“ The Oriental adepts claim that they have learned much more of the laws of nature than is dreamed of in Occidental philosophy. Doubtless they have, if half the stories we hear of them are true. They have learned to produce phenomena which far transcend anything done by our spirit mediums. Moreover, they have learned the true source of the power, and they do not ascribe it to spirits of the dead. ”

“ In other words the Oriental is in his absorption less dominated by the personal relation, and consequently without the languish and yearning of self-interest: his longing, such as it is, remains a more impersonal delight in the object under comparison, and consequently more of a contemplation. He looks about him with a free mind, sees in everything which surrounds him, everything which stirs either his mental faculties or his heart, an existing image of that which actively concerns his sense-life and his spiritual forces, and with which he abounds. ”

“ An important reason for our Western thought, that the Japanese have had no independence in philosophy, is our ignorance of the larger part of Japanese and Chinese literature. Oriental speculation was moving in a direction so diverse from that of the West that we are impressed more with the general similarity that prevails throughout it than with the evidences of individual differences. Greater knowledge would reveal these differences. In our generalized knowledge, we see the uniformity so strongly that we fail to discover the originality. ”

“ For the Oriental nothing persists as really substantive, but everything appears as contingent, discovering its supreme focus, stability and final justification in the One, the Absolute, to which it is referred.
(γ) By means of this diversity of national traits and the evolutionary process of the centuries we find that what is shared by all mankind alike, no less than all that claims to be artistic, is drawn as a common element within the reach of other nations and epochs, intelligible and enjoyable to the same. ”

“ This movement necessarily will advance only by carrying with it, i.e. convincing step by step, the reason of man, and seeing that Oriental philosophy has the doctrines of re-incarnation and Karma at its foundation, these must be tested and the fact ascertained 304whether or not they are consistent with the laws of phenomenal existence already discovered and believed in by the Occidental mind. ”

“ This Series has a definite object. It is, by means of the best Oriental literature its wisdom, philosophy, poetry, and ideals to bring together West and East in a spirit of mutual sympathy, goodwill, and understanding. From India, China, Japan, Persia, Arabia, Palestine, and Egypt these words of wisdom have been gathered.
NEW VOLUMES.
Anthology of Ancient Egyptian Poems. ”

“ Are we going to pull them up to our level, to our high idealism, or are we going to sink to theirs? The Oriental mind is an old, old mind, richly stored with experience and memories,—not in the least gullible and immature. ”

“ In short, the discovery which the Oriental believed himself to have made was this—that neither the Great Man before him, nor the millions whom he led, had the faintest conception of the Meaning of Life ”

“ Of late, a number of European and American scholars have begun to study Oriental civilization and they realize that, while materially the Orient is far behind the Occident, morally the Orient is superior to the Occident. ”

“ To judge the East aright, we must know not only what she is, but also how she has become what she is; know, in short, some of the principal phases of her spiritual history as they are reflected in her ancient literature, especially that of India. To interpret to the West the thought of the East, to bring her best and noblest achievements to bear upon our life,—that is today the problem of Oriental philology. ”

“ Would it not be strange, if an Occidental education, continually exemplified by an Occidental civilization, had not wrought upon an Oriental such a metamorphosis in his inward nature as to make him feel and act as though he were a being coming from a different world, when he confronted one so diametrically different? ”

“ When the hard iron crust of Islam is broken up, and the elements begin to melt with fervent heat, the Eastern world may be moulded into new forms. Then will the Oriental mind be brought into an impressible state, in which argument and persuasion can act upon it; and it may yield to the combined influence of civilization and Christianity. ”

“ An Occidental entering the Orient is well-nigh overwhelmed with amusement and surprise at the antipodal characteristics of the two civilizations. Every visible expression of Oriental civilization, every mode of thought, art, architecture; conceptions of God, man, and nature; pronunciation and structure of the language—all seem utterly different from their corresponding elements in the West. Furthermore, as he visits one Oriental country after another, although he discovers differences between Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, and Hindus, yet he is impressed with a strange, a baffling similarity. ”

“ Now, if we do not, though enjoying absolute freedom, succeed completely in the pursuit of happiness, if we should even fail, which is a common experience, what have we, having destroyed the bridges of the soul behind us, what have we, I ask to turn to for comfort and consolation? Obviously, in this sense, the Oriental has the advantage. ”

“ They were not Orientals—it was their misfortune, not their fault—and it was not to be expected that they should bear either anguish of mind or anguish of body with the suave dignity that an Oriental both by instinct and by the teaching of precedent would. “No man is bound to impossibilities.” ”

“ Both are what Eastern faiths and Eastern training have ever been,-both are eminently adapted for the Oriental mind. When the people learn to appreciate ethics, and to understand psychics and aesthetics, the demand will create a supply. ”

“ When we come to consider the mentality of the Oriental races we certainly have to acknowledge that Oriental culture—ethical, metaphysical, and poetical—has given birth to some of the grandest and noblest thoughts that mankind possesses, and has devised philosophical systems that have been the comfort and salvation of countless millions of souls. ”

“ At the bottom of the new departure lies the difference between the ideals—the conceptions of beauty and dignity of the political and social life—set up by the Oriental and Western man: 'A good master!' is the prayer and ideal of the Asiatic. ”

“ No doubt it is very difficult for the Western mind to put itself at the point of view of the Oriental and to seize the precise point (if it can be said to exist) where the divine fades into the human or the human brightens into the divine. ”

“ The spiritual isolation of an Oriental at his prayers in any big city of the Far East is the most significant feature of this life—so alien to all the mental, moral, and religious training of the Occident. ”

“ I Were I to ask any reflecting Occidental, who had passed some years in the real living atmosphere of Buddhism, what fundamental idea especially differentiates Oriental modes of thinking from our own, I am sure he would answer: "The Idea of Pre-existence." It is this idea, more than any other, which permeates the whole mental being of the Far East. It is universal as the wash of air: it colors every emotion; it influences, directly or indirectly, almost every act. ”

“ Manner and robe would be alike impossible in the busy breathless life of the West, where, if you pause for a moment even to gird your loins, half your competitors have passed you before you look up. The Oriental holds aloof, nor are the folds of his garments disturbed by any unseemly activity. He stands and waits the end; his day is past. There is much virtue in immobility if you take the attitude like a philosopher, yet to fade away gracefully is a difficult task for men or nations—the mortal coil is apt to entangle departing feet and compromise the dignity of the exit. ”

“ The West also has its symbolic figures, only they look like men as well as symbols. It will be answered (and most justly) that Oriental art ought to be free to follow its own instinct and tradition; that its artists are concerned to suggest one thing and our artists another; that both should be admired in their difference. Profoundly true; but what is the difference? It is certainly not as the Orientalisers assert, that we must go to the Far East for a sympathetic and transcendental interpretation of Nature. ”

“ Oriental positions, and those in the ascendant, especially if made by planets in their proper faces, [201] make men liberal, frank, self-confident, brave, ingenious, unreserved, yet acute. Oriental stations, and positions on the mid-heaven, or culminations, make men reflective, constant, of good memory, firm, prudent, magnanimous, successful in pursuing their desires, inflexible, powerful in intellect, strict, not easily imposed upon, judicious, active, hostile to crime, and skilful in science. ”

“ I would even go further, and say that the man who wishes to fit out the Oriental with a complete equipment of Western ideals proves thereby that he has either no understanding of or no true sympathy with Eastern peoples and Eastern modes of thought: and that if he tries to give practical effect to his theories he will prove himself that most dangerous of foes—the mischief-maker who comes in the guise of a smiling friend. ”

“ Such common ideas will be deep-seated and not obvious, for it needs but little first-hand acquaintance with Asia to learn that all generalizations about the spirit of the East require careful testing and that such words as Asiatic or oriental do not connote one type of mind. ”

“ There 16are branches of knowledge and art in which the East is deficient, and which she must learn from foreign sources. But there are other things all her own, and even your enlightened countrymen may turn with pleasure and profit to a leaf or two out of the books of the East to learn something new, to get a glimpse of vistas of thought with which they are not familiar. And you, Sir, have done not a little to open out before the world treasures of Oriental wisdom which only the diligence of scholars like you could unfold. ”

“ It does not follow that what we imagine ought to have happened has happened in reality; on the contrary, the course of Oriental history has usually been very different from that dreamed of by the European scholar in the quietude of his study. ”

“ In fact, it seems not improbable that the nation which, having from ancient times imbibed and assimilated the elements of Oriental civilization, has been swallowing and digesting Occidental civilization, may produce a new and strong tissue. ”

“ Coming home from the East, we can not fail to see, more clearly than before, how artificial are most of the conventionalities of our modern civilization, and how greatly such cares of the world tend to obscure the great distinction between the spiritual and the material which is ever present to Oriental thought ”

“ And perhaps were we to learn the lessons to which we now close our eyes and ears, but which are being put before us in the characteristics of Oriental civilization, we may in years to come, sooner than we expect, rejoice to think that we have something in return for what we have given ”

“ But when the barbarians broke in from the north upon Asia Minor, and the luxury of oriental manners and the fantasies of oriental mind stole upon the old order and changed it, to study the real was not necessarily to achieve the beautiful. ”

“ The conception of the tourist and the "old resident" crops up in nearly every article and book touching on Far Eastern peoples. Whatever the point of remark or criticism, if it strikes the writer as different from the custom of Occidentals, it is laid to the account of Orientalism.
This conception, however, of distinguishing Oriental characteristics, is not confined to popular writers and unscientific persons. Even professed and eminent sociologists advocate it. Prof. Le Bon, in his sophistic volume on the "Psychology of Peoples," advocates it strenuously. ”

“ I knew I should be questioned as to the motives that actuated me in undertaking such a journey. I knew that to an Oriental 'pure sang' it was impossible to assign a scientific {13} object. They would have considered it ridiculous, perhaps even suspicious, for an Efendi--that is, for a gentleman with a mere abstract object in view--to expose himself to so many dangers and annoyances. The Oriental does not understand the thirst for knowledge, and does not believe much in its existence. ”