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THE MEETING OF EAST AND WEST at a loss where to turn. Meanwhile, our academic secular philosophies are concerned rather with information than with that redemptive transformation which our souls require. And this is the reason why a glance at the face of India may assist us to discover and recover something of ourselves.
The basic aiin of any serious study of Oriental thought should be, not merely the gathering and ordering of as much detailed inside information as possible, but the reception of some significant influence. And in order that this may come to pass-in line with the parable of the goat-fosterling who discovered hc was a tiger--we should swallow the meat of the tcaching as red and rare as we can stand it, not too much cooked in the heat of our ingrained Occidental intellect (and, by no means, from any philological pickle jar), but not raw either, because then it would prove unpalatable and perhaps indigestible. We must take it rare, with lots of the red juices gushing, so that we may really taste it, with a certain sense of surprise. Then we will join, from our transoceanic distance, in the world-1 evcrbcrating jungle roar of India's wisdom.
The Steely Barb
BEFORE entering upon a study of philosophy one should clcar the mind with the question: What, really, do I expect from philosophy? There are many, secretly afraid, who spontaneously resist its revelations. They find philosophy difficult to cnjoyoccasionally exciting, but in the main complex, long-winded,
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