Rabindranath Tagore, born in 1861 was one of India’s greatest religious thinkers. When he was fifty he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature then England knighted him two years later. His concept was that the various religions of humankind “are evolving expressions of the one Religion of Humanity, an eternal essence that lies within and beyond humanity’s historical religions, drawing the human family steadily forward toward greater and richer realizations of unity, love and freedom.”

I am fascinated with his writings and his uncaged spirit. You too, may enjoy the following excerpt from The Religion of Man.

“When I was a child I had the freedom to make my own toys out of trifles and create my own games from imagination. In my happiness my playmates had their full share, in fact the complete enjoyment of my games depended upon their taking part in them. One day, in this paradise of our childhood, entered the temptation from the market world of the adult. A toy brought from an English shop was given to one of our companions; it was perfect, it was big and wonderfully lifelike. He became proud of the toy and less mindful of the game; he kept that expensive thing carefully away from us, glorying in his exclusive possession of it, feeling himself superior to his playmates whose toys were cheap. I am sure if he could use the modern language of history he would say that he was more civilized than ourselves to the extent of his owning that ridiculously perfect toy.

One thing he failed to realize in his excitement – a fact which at the moment seemed to him insignificant – that this temptation obscured something a great deal more perfect than his toy, the revelation of the perfect child which ever dwells in the heart of man, in other words, the dharma of the child. The toy merely expressed his wealth but not himself, nor the child’s creative spirit, not the child’s generous joy in his play, his identification of himself with others who were his compeers in his play world. Civilization is to express Man’s dharma and not merely his cleverness, power and possession.”