THE KING’S BUSINESS
490
also essentially pantheistic. It is therefore quite within the facts to say that there is, at this time, far more Pantheism in England and Am erica than there is Christianity in India. It is a noticeable and significant fact that, while true Christianity en counters everywhere tremendous op position, gaining its victories only after much struggle and at great cost, the propagation of heathen philoso phies, on the contrary, proceeds with amazing swiftness. The reagon, of , course, is that the acceptance of Christ involves the pain and travail of a new birth,-,whereas false religions thrive in the, corrupted hearts and darkened minds of ,unregenerate men, requiring in them no change of heart —-no death to sin in the world. BORN IN INDIA. The foregoing comments have been suggested by the perusal of a pam phlet entitled, The Order of the Star in the Bast, by Professor E. A. Wodehouse, M. A. This pamphlet was issued in order to put before English-speaking people the- “princi ples” and purposes of a new Order, founded in 1911, in Benares, India. This Order, according to the pam phlet, “was born in January, 1911, and for some months after that, grew apace and gathered in members from many parts of India.” Subsequently it was taken up in England by -the President of the Theosophical Society, Mrs. Annie Besant, and has continued to “grow apace,” finding supporters and propagandists even among some who are nominally Christian minis ters. The purposes and principles of this Order have not received the attention they deserve; and, therefore, the ob ject' of the present article is to de scribe their true character, in order that the readers may be duly advised thereof. We take our statements
of the Gospel, and have consequently passed out of death into life, through faith in Jesus Christ. For all that has been accomplished through Christian missions, meagre though the results appear to be, we may well be ,deeply thankful; but it cannot be denied that, after a century of labours and sacri- .flees in the various mission fields, there are today many more heathen in the world than at the beginning. And, as matters now stand, the hurtful in fluence of the “New Theology,’’ Higher Criticism, and other rational istic ideas, which have found their way to the mission fields, and which meet with ready acceptance among Oriental peoples, goes a long way to wards neutralizing the effect of the pure Gospel testimony. But what, on the other hand, is the West receiving from the East in ex change for its factory products and civilized arts ? Very few are aware of the flood of false religious philoso- ' phies and vain deceits, which, during recent years, has been steadily poured 'forth from the East (mainly from India), and with which the minds of the intellectual classes of the West have' become thoroughly saturated. That process of transfusion of ideas from the East to the West has been going steadily forward on a large scale, yet so unobtrusively as to attract but little public attention. The writer has pointed out else where (Modern Philosophy; also Fun damentals, Vol. II, p. 85) that Pan theism, the religio-philosophical •cult existing in various forms in India, has-within recent years become the accepted philosophy of; the great uni versities of England and America, to the virtual exclusion of all rivals. The ’ spread of false religious ideas derived from the ancient sources of Error is also seen in the great headway made by Theosophy, “Christian Science,” and Bahaism. The various ‘‘New Thought” systems now in Vogue are
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker