Page:An Essay On Hinduism.pdf/17

developed a cosmopolitan philosophy (chap. IV) as they have produced a cosmopolitan terminology. In the case of theophratry the admission to or expulsion from the body is easy, similarity of belief gives admission and dissimilarity causes a fall. But in the case of Hinduism, which is not a theophratry, admission to Hindu society or expulsion from Hinduism is rendered difficult (chap. V). To explain as to how the modern conditions have affected the matter of expulsion from the Hindu society, and also how the Hindu society itself is changing its traditions rapidly and making the entire Hindu society better fit for the future world-community, I have described modern social conditions (chap. VI).

One question which troubles the minds of thinkers when they examine Hinduism is what is orthodoxy, and what is heterodoxy under Hinduism; that question is explained in the seventh chapter. The next three chapters expound the theoretical portion of the evolution of Hinduism and other developments, and make a forecast regarding the future of existing institutions, and discuss the question of reforming Hinduism in the light of the forecast.

The theory of Evolution in the book.— The book, while explaining the formation of Hindu society and making a forecast regarding the future development of Hinduism into Indianism, expounds a theory of evolution from facts which come within the history of Hinduism. This theory of evolution is scattered in three or four places. Starting from a point when the world was full of roving tribes each having to do very little with the others and when large political bodies and social philosophy or theology to bind numbers of tribes into larger groups were non-existent, I have tried to summarize the processes which have made