AN ECLECTIC RELIGION 283 of all the influences which were brought to bear upon him, there grew (as gradually as the outline on a stone) the conviction in his heart that there were sen- sible men in all religions, and abstemious thinkers and men endowed with miraculous powers among all na- AKBAR'S TOMB AT SIKANDRA. tions. If some true knowledge was thus to be found everywhere, why should truth be confined to one religion or to a creed like Islam, which was compara- tively new and scarcely a thousand years old? Why should one sect assert what another denies, and why should one claim a preference without having superior- ity conferred on itself? Moreover, Hindu ascetics and Brahmans managed to get frequent private interviews with his Majesty.
