the mobility of belief. "The educated Hindu," he writes, "has largely
lost his belief in the old myths about the gods and goddesses of the
Hindu pantheon, and has learned to smile at many of the superstitions of
his uneducated countrymen. But Hinduism as a religion that tells a man
not only what he shall eat, what he shall drink, and wherewithal he
shall be clothed, but tells him how to perform innumerable acts that men
of other nations never think have anything to do with religion at all,
Hinduism as an intricate social code, stands largely unaffected by the
flood of Western education that has been poured upon the country. He
instances a brahman, one of his own subordinates, college-bred and
English-speaking, who, when away from home with his superior officer,
had to cook his food for himself, because the brahman servant he had
with him was of a lower division than his own, and he could not afford
to hire a man of his own status among brahmans."

[Sidenote: Thought independent of act.]

We ask again for the cause of this progress in thought and stagnation in
practice. In India, creed and practice go their own way; thinking is
independent of acting. Listen to the naive standpoint assumed in the
Confession or Covenant of a Theistic Association established in Madras
in 1864. We read in article 3 that the person being initiated makes this
declaration: "In the meantime, I shall observe the ceremonies now in
use, but only where indispensable. I shall go through such ceremonies,
where they are not conformable to pure Theism, as mere matters of
routine, destitute of all religious significance--as the lifeless
remains of a superstition which has passed away." And again in article
4: "I shall never endeavour to deceive anyone as to my religious
opinions." In the revision of 1871, both articles were dropped, but in
the earlier form there was no attempt to disguise that thought was