SAIVA-SIDDHANTA

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THE SVETASVATARA UPANISHAT.
The following paras, we cull from a book called The
Woodlands in Europe" intended for Christian readers; and we
could not produce better arguments for the truth of our
conception of the Supreme Siva, the Destroyer and the Creator
and the Preserver (vide p. 6, Sivajnanabotham, English
Edition).
And how about the dead leaves which season after season,
strew the ground beneath the trees ? Is their work done
because, when their bright summer life is over, they lie softly
down to rest under the wintry boughs? Is it only death, and
nothing beyond ? Nay
if it is
; death, it is death giving place to
life. Let us call it rather change, progress, transformation. It
must be progress, when the last year s leaves make the soil for
the next year s flowers, and in so doing serve a set purpose and
fulfil a given mission, ft must be transformation, when one
thing passes into
another, and instead of being annihilated, begins
life again in a new shape and form.
"It is interesting to remember that the same snow which
weighs down and breaks those fir branches is the nursing
mother of the flowers. Softly it comes down upon the tiny
seeds and the tender buds and covers them up lovingly, so that
from all the stern rigour of the world without, they are safely
sheltered. Thus they are getting forward, as it were, and life
is already swelling within them ;
so that when the sun shines
and the snow melts, they are ready to burst forth with a
rapidity which seems almost miraculous.
"// is not the only force gifted with both preserving and
destroying power, according to the aspect in which we view The
it.
fire refines and purifies, but it also destroys; and the same
water which rushes down in the cataract with such over
whelming power, falls in the gentlest of drops upon the thirsty
flower cup and fills the hollow of the leaf with just the quantity
of dew which it needs for its refreshment and sustenance.
And in those higher things of which nature is but the type knd
shadow, the same grand truth holds good and from our Bibles
;