sophie de l'Inde' (vol. ii, p. 24) has evidently felt this, and has kept the word âtman untranslated, 'Au commencement cet univers n'etait que l'âtman.' But while in French it would seem impossible to find any equivalent for âtman, I have ventured to translate in English, as I should have done in German, 'Verily, in the beginning all this was Self, one only.'
Thus again when we read in Sanskrit, 'Know the Self by the self,' âtmânam âtmanâ pasya, tempting as it may seem, it would be entirely wrong to render it by the Greek γνῶθι σεντόν. The Brahman called upon his young pupil to know not himself, but his Self, that is, to know his individual self as a merely temporary reflex of the Eternal Self. Were we to translate this so-called âtmavidyâ, this self-knowledge, by knowledge of the soul, we should not be altogether wrong, but we should nevertheless lose all that distinguishes Indian from Greek thought. It may not be good English to say to know his self, still less to know our selfs, but it would be bad Sanskrit to say to know himself, to know ourselves; or, at all events, such a rendering would deprive us of the greatest advantage in the study of Indian philosophy, the opportunity of seeing in how many different ways man has tried to solve the riddles of the world and of his soul.
I have thought it best therefore to keep as close as possible to the Sanskrit original, and where I could not find an adequate term in English, I have often retained the Sanskrit word rather than use a misleading substitute in English. It is impossible, for instance, to find an English equivalent for so simple a word as Sat, τὸ ὄν, We cannot render the Greek τὸ
