FOREWORD
Mr. Gopaul Chetty's book on "Swedenborg and Saiva Siddhanta" is, indeed, what he announces, a new light upon Indian philosophy; at the same time, it may also be said to throw a new light upon the philosophy of Swedenborg; for while the book describes the remarkable and unexpected analogies between Swedenborg's teaching and the Saiva Siddhanta, it also reveals to the West the striking correspondence between some of the deepest thoughts of ancient India and the higher spiritual ideas to which, through Emanuel Swedenborg, the modern thought of Europe has given definite expression. Such a work was greatly needed, and the time of its publication appears to us to be truly opportune and highly significant. For as the author himself tells us, "the educated Hindus have lost faith in their Saiva Siddhanta because there is no one to explain it to them." On the other hand, "the illiterate masses of the country are plunged in deep ignorance, and their religion is but a religion of ceremonies and superstitions. The Roman Catholic and Reformed Churches, with their old traditional and theological statements, make no impression upon any thinking man in India." We know only too well how truly the same could be said of many parts of the Western World at present. In fact, both the East and the West equally need to-day more than ever a presentation of Christianity at once faithful to the teaching of its Founder and in harmony with the advances of modern knowledge; in other words, a religion in which are truly reconciled the claims of Faith and the facts of Science.
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