Introduction to the Study of the Hindu Doctrines

...stic This completes the word "characteristic" from the previous page. a very sharp break with the previous era, and the truth is that this so-called Renaissance was a death for many things, even from the point of view of the arts, but especially from the intellectual point of view; it is difficult for a modern person to grasp the full extent and scope of what was lost then. The return to classical antiquity resulted in a lessening of intellectuality In this context, "intellectuality" refers to the capacity for pure metaphysical understanding, which the author believes was more expansive in the Middle Ages and the East., a phenomenon comparable to that which had occurred in the past among the Greeks themselves, but with this crucial difference: it was now manifesting within the existence of the same race, rather than in the passage of certain ideas from one people to another. It is as if these Greeks, at the moment they were about to disappear entirely, had taken revenge for their own lack of understanding by imposing the limits of their mental horizon upon all of humanity. When the influence of the Reformation The 16th-century religious movement that led to the establishment of Protestantism.—which was perhaps not entirely independent of the former—was added to this, the fundamental tendencies of the modern world were clearly established; the Revolution Likely referring to the French Revolution of 1789, viewed here as the political culmination of modern individualism., with all that it represents in various fields, and which amounts to the negation of all tradition The author uses "tradition" to mean a body of sacred, perennial wisdom, rather than just social customs., was to be the logical consequence of their development. But we do not need to enter into the details of all these considerations here, which would risk leading us quite far; we do not intend to specifically write a history of the Western mentality, but only to say what is necessary to make understood what differentiates it profoundly from Eastern intellectuality. Before completing what we have to say about the moderns in this regard, we must return once more to the Greeks, to clarify what we have only indicated so far in an insufficient manner, and to clear the ground, so to speak, by explaining ourselves clearly enough to cut short certain objections that are only too easy to foresee.

For the moment, we will add only one word concerning the divergence of the West in relation to the East: will this divergence continue to increase indefinitely? Appearances might lead one to believe so, and in the current state of affairs, this question is certainly one of those that can be debated; however, as for us, we do not believe this to be possible; the reasons for this will be given in our conclusion.