The Betterment Of Life

: THE NATURE OF MAN

Again, people nowadays seem to feel keenly the wound of the

economical results of war, but they are unfeeling to its moral

injuries. As elements have their affinities, as bodies have their

attractions, as creatures have their instinct to live together, so

men have their inborn mutual love. 'God divided man into men that

they might help each other.' Their strength lies in their mutual

help, their pleasure is in their
mutual love, and their perfection is

in their giving and receiving of alternate good. Therefore Shakya

Muni says: Be merciful to all living beings. To take up arms

against any other person is unlawful for any individual. It is the

violation of the universal law of life.



We do not deny that there are not a few who are so wretched that they

rejoice in their crimes, nor that there is any person but has more or

less stain on his character, nor that the means of committing crimes

are multiplied in proportion as modern civilization advances; yet

still we believe that our social life is ever breaking down our

wolfish disposition that we inherited from our brute ancestors, and

education is ever wearing out our cannibalistic nature which we have

in common with wild animals. On the one hand, the signs of social

morals are manifest in every direction, such as asylums for orphans,

poorhouses, houses of correction, lodgings for the penniless, asylums

for the poor, free hospitals, hospitals for domestic animals,

societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals, schools for the

blind and the dumb, asylums for the insane, and so forth; on the

other hand, various discoveries and inventions have been made that

may contribute to the social improvement, such as the discovery of

the X rays and of radium, the invention of the wireless telegraph and

that of the aeroplane and what not. Furthermore, spiritual wonders

such as clairvoyance, clairaudience, telepathy, etc., remind us of

the possibilities of further spiritual unfoldment in man which he

never dreamed of. Thus life is growing richer and nobler step by

step, and becoming more and more hopeful as we advance in the Way of

Buddha.



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