[113] Cf. I Cor. XIII, II. “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” This point of our ever-ascending spiritual progress is well illustrated in the _Saddharma-pundarîka Sûtra_. See Chapters II, III, IV, V, and XI. The following passage quoted from chap. II, p. 49 (Kern’s translation) will give a tolerably adequate view concerning diversity of means and unity of purpose as here expounded: “Those highest of men have, all of them, revealed most holy laws by means of illustrations, reasons and arguments, with many hundred proofs of skillfulness (_upâyakauçalya_). And all of them have manifested but one vehicle and introduced but one on earth; by one vehicle have they led to full ripeness inconceivably many thousands of kotis of beings.” As was elsewhere noted, this doctrine is sometimes known as the theory of Upâya. Upâya is very difficult term to translate into English; it literally means “way,” “method,” or “strategy.” For fuller interpretation see p. 298, footnote. [114] This is one of the most important philosophical works of the Yogacâra school. Vasubandhu wrote the text (Nanjo, No. 1215) which consists only of thirty verses, but there appeared many commentators after the death of the author, who naturally entertained widely different views among themselves on the subject-matter, as it is too tersely treated in the text. Hsüen Tsang made selections out of the ten noted Hindu exegetists in A.D. 659 and translated them into the Chinese language. The compilation consists of ten fascicles and is known as _Discourse on the Ideality of the Universe_ (a free rendering of the Chinese title _Chang wei shi lun_, Nanjo, No. 1197). [115] May I venture to say that the conception of God as entertained by most Christians is a Body of Bliss rather than the Dharmakâya itself? In some respects their God is quite spiritual, but in others he is thought of as a concrete material being like ourselves. It seems to me that the human soul is ever struggling to free itself from this paradox, though without any apparent success, while the masses are not so intellectual and reflective enough as to become aware of this eternal contradiction which is too deeply buried in their minds.