chariot; the seat is not the chariot; the tongue is not the chariot; the axle is not the chariot; and so, taking up each individual part of the chariot, the assertion is made that it is not the chariot.  But if the chariot is not in any of its parts, then they are not essential parts of the chariot.  So of the soul—­the self; it does not consist of its various qualities or attributes or powers; hence they are not essential elements of the self.  The real self exists apart from them.

Now is it not evident that such a method of introspection deprives the conception of self of all possible value?  It is nothing but a bare intellectual abstraction.  To say that this self is a part of the universal self is no relief,—­brings no possible worth to the separate self,—­for the conception of the universal soul has been arrived at by a similar process of thought.  It, too, is nothing but a bare abstraction, deprived of all qualities and attributes and powers.  I can see no distinction between the absolute universal soul of Brahmanism and Buddhism, and the Absolute Nothing of Hegel.[CX]

Both are the farthest possible abstraction that the mind can make.  The Absolute Soul of Buddhism, the Atman of Brahmanism, and Hegel’s Nothing are the farthest possible remove from the Christian’s conception of God.  The former is the utter emptiness of being; the latter the perfect fullness of being and completeness of quality.  The finite emptiness receives and can receive no richness of life or increase in value by its consciousness of unity with the infinite emptiness; whereas the finite limited soul receives in the Christian view an infinite wealth and value by reason of the consciousness of its unity with the divine infinite fullness.  The usual method of stating the difference between the Christian conception of God and the Hindu conception of the root of all being is that the one is personal and the other impersonal.  But these terms are inadequate.  Rather say the one is perfectly personal and the other perfectly abstract.  Impersonality, even in its strictest meaning, i.e., without “conscious separate existence as an intelligent and voluntary being,” only partially expresses the conception of Buddhism.  The full conception rejects not only personality, but also every other quality; the ultimate and the absolute of Buddhism—­we may not even call it being—­is the absolutely abstract.

With regard, then, to the conception of the separate self and of the supreme self, the Buddhistic view may be called “impersonal,” not in the sense that it lacks the consciousness of a separate self; not in the sense that it emphasizes the universal unity—­nay, the identity of all the separate abstract selves and the infinite abstract self; but in the sense that all the qualities and characteristics of human beings, such as consciousness, thought, emotion, volition, and even being itself, are rejected as unreal.  The view is certainly “impersonal,” but