Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 571

SANNYAST PENANCES
Now it merely tends to increase
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gross idolatry.
the pride
of the recluses who practise it.
The latter indeed set up
a claim to unity and equality with the Supreme Being
himself
while they look down upon their fellow-creatures
as objects of supreme contempt, as beings who are still
wallowing in the mire of materialism and passion.
And how did these so-called penitents carry out their
doctrine of meditation, concerning which they made such
proud boasting ? Before idolatry had gained a hold on
the country, and while the tradition of the outward forms
as well as of the inward meaning of the religion with which
men worshipped the Deity after the Flood still lingered,
this doctrine of meditation, prompted as it was by lofty
motives, was doubtless capable of maintaining the soul in
a constant state of fervent piety towards God but at the
present time this religious exercise is undertaken with an
object very different and much less estimable.
I cannot better explain wherein this practice of medita-
tion consists for a modern sannyasi than by repeating what
I was told by two Hindus who had passed a long novitiate
under the direction of two celebrated recluses.
I was a novice for four months,' said one of them,
under a sannyasi who had built himself a hermitage in
a lonely spot not very far from the town of Bellapuram.
Following his instructions, I spent the greater part of
each night awake, occupied in keeping my mind an abso-
lute blank and thinking of nothing.
I made superhuman
efforts to hold my breath as long as possible, and only
;
;
'
breathed when I was on the point of fainting.
This
suffo