Page:The Message and Ministrations of Dewan Bahadur R. Venkata Ratnam, volume 2.djvu/181

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146

If by revelation is meant a book or a set of books whose origin is, as a rule, veiled in antiquity; within whose covers is confined the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth; whose authority is the highest on all conceivable things; to which the individual consciousness must ever yield priority or be postponed; before which reason must be silent, conscience dumb and the heart awe-struck; in who?e contents must be found clear indications, though under an esoteric shade* of the latest theories in philosophy and the most recent researches in science; and from whose dictates man should never, at the risk of the eternal welfare of his precious soul, swerve by a single inch, then we do not hesitate to reject the idea as a good old fancy. Man is a being of conditioned faculties, capable of unlimited progress; and a revelation made to him must, to suit and benefit him, partake of his nature. The soul's normal state is growth; and knowledge as acquired by the soul must also grow. Truth is like a mighty