_19th August 1894._
The Vedanta seems to help many to free their minds from all doubt as to
the Universe and its First Cause, but my doubts remain undispelled. It is
true that the Vedanta is simpler than most other theories. The problem of
Creation and its Creator is more complex than appears at first sight; but
the Vedanta has certainly simplified it half way, by cutting the Gordian
knot and leaving out Creation altogether.
There is only Brahma, and the rest of us merely imagine that we are,--it
is wonderful how the human mind should have found room for such a thought.
It is still more wonderful to think that the idea is not so inconsistent
as it sounds, and the real difficulty is, rather, to prove that anything
does exist.
Anyhow, when as now the moon is up, and with half-closed eyes I am
stretched beneath it on the upper deck, the soft breeze cooling my
problem-vexed head, then the earth, waters, and sky around, the gentle
rippling of the river, the casual wayfarer passing along the tow-path, the
occasional dinghy gliding by, the trees across the fields, vague in the
moonlight, the sleepy village beyond, bounded by the dark shadows of its
groves,--verily seem an illusion of _Maya_; and yet they cling to and
draw the mind and heart more truly than truth itself, which is
abstraction, and it becomes impossible to realise what kind of salvation
there can be in freeing oneself from them.