Regret, _i.e._, repentance, was one of the forty-two deadly sins
of the Ancient Egyptians. "Thou shalt not consume thy heart,"
says the Ritual of the Dead, the negative justification of the
soul or ghost (Lepsius "Alteste Texte des Todtenbuchs"). We have
borrowed competitive examination from the Chinese; and, in these
morbid days of weak introspection and retrospection, we might
learn wisdom from the sturdy old Khemites. When he sings "Abjure
the Why and seek the How," he refers to the old Scholastic
difference of the _Demonstratio propter quid_ (why is a thing?),
as opposed to _Demonstratio quia_ (_i.e._ that a thing is). The
"great Man" shall end with becoming deathless, as Shakespeare
says in his noble sonnet:--

And Death once dead, there's no more dying then!

Like the great Pagans, the Haji holds that man was born good,
while the Christian, "tormented by the things divine," cleaves to
the comforting doctrine of innate sinfulness. Hence the universal
tenet, that man should do good in order to gain by it here or
hereafter; the "enlightened selfishness," that says, Act well and
get compound interest in a future state. The allusion to the
"Theist-word" apparently means that the votaries of a personal
Deity must believe in the absolute foreknowledge of the
Omniscient in particulars as in generals. The Rule of Law
emancipates man; and its exceptions are the gaps left by his
ignorance. The wail over the fallen flower, etc., reminds us of
the Pulambal (Lamentations) of the Anti-Brahminical writer,
"Pathira-Giriyar." The allusion to Maya is from Das Kabir:--

Maya mare, na man mare, mar mar gaya, sarir.