Part 22

In the Mahabharata, the great epic of the Sanskrit, written by Indian moralists in various ages, and representing the accumulated wisdom of one of the most marvellous of all peoples, we find these words:

‘Treat others as thou wouldst thyself be treated.’

‘Do nothing to thy neighbour which thou wouldst not hereafter have thy neighbour do to thee.’

‘A man obtains a rule of action by looking upon his neighbour as himself.’

These same truths were also taught by Jesus, that godlike Galilean, the great teacher and saviour of the Western world:

‘Love thy neighbour as thyself.’

‘Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.’

Oh that these words were etched in fire, and stamped in scorching characters on the dull, cold hearts of this world!

Act toward others as you would act toward a part of your own self.

Look upon and treat others as you do your own hands, your own eyes, your very heart and soul—with infinite care and compassion—as suffering and enjoying members of the same Great Being with yourself. This is the spirit of the ideal universe—the spirit of your own being. It is this alone that can redeem this world, and give to it the peace and harmony for which it longs. Yes,

‘So many gods, so many creeds, So many paths that wind and wind, While just the art of being kind Is all the sad world needs.’

Oh the madness, and sorrow, and unbrotherliness of this mal-wrought world! Oh the poor, weak, poisoned, monstrous natures of its children! Who can look upon it all without pain, and sympathy, and consternation, and tears? What an opportunity for philanthropy, if the ‘All-mighty One’ of our traditions would only set about it!

Yes, do as you would be done by—and _not_ to the dark man and the white woman alone, but to the sorrel horse and the gray squirrel as well; _not_ to creatures of your own anatomy only, but to all creatures. You cannot go high enough nor low enough nor far enough to find those whose bowed and broken beings will not rise up at the coming of the kindly heart, or whose souls will not shrink and darken at the touch of inhumanity. Live and let live. Do more. Live and _help_ live. _Do to beings below you as you would be done by beings above you_. Pity the tortoise, the katydid, the wild-bird, and the ox. Poor, undeveloped, untaught creatures! Into their dim and lowly lives strays of sunshine little enough, though the fell hand of man be never against them. They are our fellow-mortals. They came out of the same mysterious womb of the past, are passing through the same dream, and are destined to the same melancholy end, as we ourselves. Let us be kind and merciful to them.

‘Wilt thou draw near the nature of the gods? Draw near them, then, in being merciful; Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge.’

Let us be true to our ideals, true to the spirit of Universal Compassion—whether we walk with the lone worm wandering in the twilight of consciousness, the feathered forms of the fields and forests, the kine of the meadows, the simple savage on the banks of the gladed river, the political blanks whom men call wives, or the outcasts of human industry.

Oh this poor world, this poor, suffering, ignorant, fear-filled world! How can men be blind or deranged enough to think it is a good world? How can they be cold and satanic enough to be unmoved by the groans and anguish, the writhing and tears, that come up from its unparalleled afflictions?

But _the world is growing better_. And in the Future—in the long, long ages to come—it will be redeemed! The same spirit of sympathy and fraternity that broke the black man’s manacles and is to-day melting the white woman’s chains will to-morrow emancipate the working man and the ox; and, as the ages bloom and the great wheels of the centuries grind on, the same spirit shall banish Selfishness from the earth, and convert the planet finally into one unbroken and unparalleled spectacle of Peace, Justice, and Solidarity.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Universal Kinship, by J. Howard Moore