2) we find it stated with perfect truth that ostentations almsgivers _ἀπέχουσιν τὸν μισθὸν αὐτῶν_. (Get in full--exhaust their reward.) Although, in this respect too, the Vedas shed on us the light of a higher teaching. They repeatedly declare that he, who desires any sort of recompense for his work, is still wandering in the path of darkness, and not yet ripe for deliverance. If any one should ask me what he gets from a charitable act, my answer in all sincerity would be: "This, that the lot of the poor man you relieve is just so much the lighter; otherwise absolutely nothing. If you are not satisfied, and feel that such is not a sufficient end, then your wish was not to give alms, but to make a purchase; and you have effected a bad bargain. But if the one thing you are concerned with is that he should feel the pressure of poverty less; then you have gained your object; you have diminished his suffering, and you see exactly how far your gift is requited." Now, how is it possible that trouble which is not mine, and by which I am untouched, should become as direct a motive to me as if it were my own, and incite me to action? As already explained, only through the fact that, although it comes before me merely as something outside myself, by means of the external medium of sight or hearing; I am, nevertheless, sensible of it with the sufferer; I feel it as my own, not indeed in myself, but in him And so what Calderon said comes to pass: _que entre el ver_ _Padecer y el padecer_ _Ninguna distancia habia_. (_No Siempre lo Peor es Cierto_. Jorn. II., Esc. 9.)[8]