repudiation of the current Christian belief. He also sent me another book, The New Interpretation of the Bible . I liked both. They seemed to support Hinduism. Tolstoy’s The Kingdom of God Is Within You overwhelmed me. It left an abiding impression on me. Before the independent thinking, profound morality, and the truthfulness of this book, all the books given me by Mr. Coates seemed to pale into insignificance.
My studies thus carried me in a direction unthought of by the Christian friends. My correspondence with Edward Maitland was fairly prolonged, and that with Raychandbhai continued until his death. I read some of the books he sent me. These included Panchikaran , Maniratnamala , “ Mumukshu Prakaran ” of Yogavasishtha , Haribhadra Suri’s Shaddarshana Samuchchaya and others.
Though I took a path my Christian friends had not intended for me, I have remained forever indebted to them for the religious quest that they awakened in me. I shall always cherish the memory of their contact. The years that followed had more, not less, of such sweet and sacred contacts in store for me.