Note 5 — Chapter XI · “Tauhid-i-Ilahi.”1

“Wise Prince, pardon us if we are not at once ready with our answer; your important communication requires a moment’s thought. In the plan declared by you there is much that is tempting, and also, according to my humble opinion, much that is serious. The justness and grandeur of your images, borrowed for the greater part from our old poets and philosophers, I shall be the first to admit; but, may I ask, is there not great danger? These symbols once introduced amongst the people and accepted by them, would soon lose their original meaning, and in the end would sink to nothing but an outward and mechanical religious service. We must well consider that this same teaching, which you wish to proclaim, once actually belonged in truth to the faith of more than one people; and what did it become? Not only in these later days, but in ancient times, to which you refer, doubt arose respecting the object of worship, and then, as now, many a pious mind asked: ‘He who gives life, He who gives strength; Whose command all the bright gods revere; Whose shadow is immortality, Whose shadow is death; who is the God to whom we shall offer our sacrifice?’5 Even then, Surya, the sun, and Agni, the fire, did not satisfy men as emblems of the representation of life and force; and shall a happier future await the Tauhid-i-Ilahi than that of the sun and fire worship of old days?”