The Soldier and the Hunchback ! and ?

THE SOLDIER AND THE HUNCHBACK Little brother, he says, let us rather consider that as the pendulum swings more and more slowly every time, it must ultimately stop, as soon as the shaft is of infinite length. Good! then it isn’t a pendulum at all but a Mahalingam— The Mahalingam of Shiva (amo Shivaya namaha Aum !) which is all I ever thought it was; all you have to do is to keep swinging hard—I know it’s hook-swinging!—and you get there in the End. Why trouble to swing? First, because you're bound to swing, whether you like it or not; second, because your attention is thereby distracted from those lumbar muscles in which the hook is so very firmly fixed; third, because after all it’s a ripping good game; fourth, because you want to get on, and even to seem to progress is better than standing still. A treadmill is admittedly good exercise. True, the question, “Why become an Arahat?” should precede, “‘ How become an Arahat ?” but an unbiassed man will easily cancel the first question with “ Why not?”—the How is not so easy to get rid of. Then, from the standpoint of the Arahat himself, perhaps this “Why did I become an Arahat ?” and “ How did I become an Arahat?” have but a single solution! In any case, we are wasting our time—we are as ridiculous with our Arahats as Herod the Tetrarch with his peacocks! We pose Life with the question Why? and the first answer is: To obtain the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel. To attach meaning to this statement we must obtain that Knowledge and Conversation : and when we have done that, we may proceed to the next Question. Itis no good asking it now. 131