Shakti and Shâkta : essays and addresses on the Shâkta Tantrashâstra

SHAKTI AND SHAKTA

said which fosters them; nor was this the intention of the ShAstra.

I understand the basis on which these Tantrik practices rest. Thus what seems repellent is sought to be justified on the ground that the Sadhaka should be above all likes and dislikes, and should see Brahman in all things. But the Western critic will say that we must judge practice from the practical standpoint. It was this consideration which was at the back of the statement of Professor de la Vallée Poussin (Boudhisme. Etudesa et Materiaux) that there is in this country what Taine called a ‘reasoning madness’ which made the Hindu stick at no conclusion however strange, willingly accepting even the absurd. (Il y régne des lérigine ce que Taine appelle la folie vaisonante. Les Hindous vont volentiers jusquaé l’absurde). This may be too strongly put; but the saying contains this truth that the Indian temperament is an absolutist one. But sucha temperament, if it has its fascinating grandeurs, also carries with it the defects of its qualities; namely dangers from which those who make a compromise between life and reason are free. The answer again is, that some of the doctrines and practices here described were never meant for the general body of men.

After all as I have elsewhere said the question of this particular ritual practice is largely of historical interest only. Such practice to-day is, under the influences of the time, being transformed, where it is not altogether disappearing, with other ritual customs ofapastage. Apart from my desire to clear away, so far as is rightly possible, charges which have lain heavily on this country, Tam only interested here to show firstly that the practice is not a modern invention but seems to be a continuation in another form of ancient Vaidik usage ; secondly that it claims, like the rest of the ritual with which I have dealt, to be an application of the AdvaitavAda of the Upanishads; and lastly that (putting aside things generally repugnant and extremist practices

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