282 The Religion of the Veda

of the Jiltlmighty.”'1 And finally the same thinker arrives at the last possible conclusion: “ Knowledge and love of God are ultimately one and the same. There is no difference between pure knowledge and pure love.” We might have predicted the same result. To a religion which strives with all its might to know the truth, truth’s sister, love, does not long remain a stranger.

Yajnavalkya, as we have seen, abandons his wives and goes to live in the forest. Such “ Forest- Hermits ” (did/6101) must have been common in India several centuries before Christ. Buddha criti- cises them, and declares himself as against their ascetic life and practices as a hindrance rather than a help to a life of perfect freedom from passions and desires, a life of true emancipation. He himself advocates moderation in all things, salvation in- cluded. He prefers the “middle of the road,” as both he and we say (the media we, or mad/zymrm» merge). About 300 33.0. a clever Greek by the name of Megasthenes was the ambassador of the Grmco~ Persian king Seleukos at the court of Chandragupta in the city of Pataliputra (31 I--302 KC). Chandra- gupta—u—Sandrakottos or Sandrokyptos as the Greeks called himmhad succeeded, after the death of Alex- ander the Great, in founding the great Indian empire

' Remeerisfine, His Life and Sayings, p. 138 (number 172).