CORRESPONDENCE.

Press, Volume LVII, Issue 17108, 1 April 1921, Page 7

CORRESPONDENCE.

LAKE COLERIDGE. TO THE EDITOR Of "THB PRESS."

Sir, —Doubt has been cast upon ths supply of water in Lake Coleridge as a force to produce electrical energy for light and power to machinery. In the absence of a handbook for Canterbury containing useful local information, I find by the lear Book Lake Coleridge h 11 miles long, 3 miles across the widest i>art, and its greatest depth is 680 ft. The "plumb-bobbing'' of the Progress League sets forth that the Lake has diminished Bft in depth—presumably all over. As its area is 18 square miles, this is a serious depletion, because the figures given for the greatest depth may only refer to a few yards square. Many lake"? have taken the place of extinct volcanoes, in which case the deepest sounding would be obtained in the crater, and the vast area of the water collected might be comparatively shallow. In my youthful days I did somo fishing in /in English lake, where th«. "Devil's Chimney," it was called, had no*; been successfully .fathomed. Thus I attach little value to the information as to the deepest sounding of Coleridge. If tho League gave us a survey of the Lake with tho depths shown in" lines up and down tho Lake, or nig-zaging across it, at, say, a mile intervals, it would bo doing a better work than spreading alarmist report* and only "plumb-bobbing", alon<j the banks. It iB clear that the Harper and the Acheron, with other little rivers diverted into Coleridge, will fail to produce the deficiency of 18 square miles of lake Bft deep, which is wanted to keep things going at top. A chart of the Lake, if" not already made by the Government and its experts, should be ins ; sted upon, to relieve the anxiety caused by the League's last official inspection.—Yours, etc., J.L.W.

TRAMWAY EXTENSION. to' the editor ot "the press."

Sir,^—l am glad to noto the moderate way Mr Sykes puts his case for a tram down llugby street, and trust ho will credit mo with a like wish to be _as non-contentiouj as possible. Allowing this, his caso for Rugby street is not improved. The Tramway Board undoubtedly,* for its own reasons, left the exact proposed route to Bryndwr a secret till it was too lato to make any public representation; it was understood that fear of land caused them to do this, but whatever ; t was, it was not just to the Bryndwr people. What really affects the Bryndwr people is their collective pocket, and this Rugby street tram, with its twopenny section halfway along it, is not going to give them justice, because it will still pay them to walk to the twopenny section at Leinster road, and get the quicker service there, the distance be ing equal to the proposed halfway stop in Rugby street, with its; slower ser-viv-e, whereas if brought "along Ros&all street direct from Rhodes street, the twopenny Eection would have been very appreciably nearer. The angle of Rugby street to the point of departure from either terminal is uneconomic, that's the whole trouble. After a man has travelled 40 chains along Rugby street, he is,' in reality, only about 10 chains nearer his objective. In other words, either end of Rugby street is only slightly further off tho two terminals than the other, although it is half a mile long. Surely tho extra amount of wear ana tear involved, over a period of along this unnecessary length, must have appealed to tho Board. Also thoy surely cannot havo overlooked the economio interests of the Bryndwr people, which, in tho long run, are their own interests. Tho cheaper they can make the faro the sooner will the region bo thickly populated, and tho more the trams will bo used. As it is at present proposed, east Bryndwr people will either continue to walk to the Leinster rood twopenny terminal, or pay 3d, and it is a considerable item. It seems quite certain that if the cars enmo along Rossall street from Rhodes street, that the twopenny section would extend to the end of Leinster road nt least, if not to Elmwood Park. The Ru£',by stteet proposal cannot clear itself from the half-chain road, and as an argument is ineffective. A glnnco nt tlu map will show "this. The further the twopenny section can be advanced for tho benefit of the Bryndwr people, the further they can afford to go but, aha there can be no possible doubt that the facilities thus offered will induce, a large growth of population and building in that suburb. If the cost of giving Bryndwr the line of route it ij, entitled to is at present" too great, it would be far better to postpone the construction till times improve. Mere expediency is a poor game in the long run.—Yours, etc., .'',■_ „

THE PROBLEM OF LIFE. TO THE EDITOB OF "TIIE PBESS."

Sir,— By her letter of the 28th, Miss Harband. appears to think that it is to Hinduism as a creed or system that I wished to invite "Student's" attention, but that is not so. The .mythology of any creed or system is interesting in its own way, but it is not in any mythology that Wo 'shall best seek truth; it is in the best arid most spiritual'conclusions so far obtained through* any way of thought and life. Where tho account of the genesis of life given by Miss Harband/may bo found, I do not know, but certainly it is neither in the Gita not the KathoUpanishad, and the contrast between its naivete and their grave nobility makes ono smile. This failure, however, to understand the difference in value between the mythology and tho Shilosophy of any faith, is not f.o umorous a matter. For one thing, so far as India is concerned, it aocounts 'quite largely for the attitude of 'educated Indians towards Christian propagandists, who. they feel, do not really understand the faith for which they are proposing a substitute. And, for another, it robs true Christianity of most valuable help. Far from the teaching of the Vedanta (which are not just the same as that of the Vedas) I being antagonistic to the highest teachings of the Gospels, Miss Harband would find, if she would give them a careful, prayerful and unprejudiced study, that there is no real quarrel between them. It is to the teaching of the Vedanta. in fact, obtained from modern Hindus, that I myself owe a reverence and love for the Gospel or St. John, which no earlier exposition bestowed on mo; and if the Gita and tho TJpanishads can really strike any reader merely as beautiful in style or impossibly abstruse in meaning, then I would beg such a reader, in tho name o? Truth, which is beyond all creed, to give them a little more study and attention, and -seo if something of very roal value cannot be learned from them. "What is needed is unity and love, not denunciation. We need true understanding, true fellowship, true, brotherhood. Our creed is living the life, living our ideals daily . . . all this talk of universal love and brotherhood falls to tho ground unless each man proves it by his life." These words were written recently by a Vedantist, who is an educated Hindu; and do they not breathe the grime spirit as essential Christianity?— Yours, etc., B. E. BAUGHAN. Clifton Hill, March 31st.

TO THE EDITOR OF "THE PRESS."

Sir,—The difficulties of "Student are just tlhose which have disturbed the minds of bo many, and the failure or our spiritual leaders to grappa with the enumerated problems is due to tlio growth of their knowledge not having proceeded pari passu with the growth of man's intellect. The idea of the full, and complete fnitih, once delivered, receives somewhat of a shook, when wo find its present-day interpretation to b-> utterly unsatisfying to the reason, always remembering that this faculty is a God-given one, and - therefore is presumably intended to play its due pan

in our guidance. If Professor Shelleydid state that life or' soul is absolutely inexplicable, because science cannot deal with it, he merely stated a truism: because material considerations alone—the only one 3 wthich science recognises—must necessarily be found .inadequate! when the investigation of non-material, matters is undertaken. But the.inference goes much further than this, and suggests that no information exists on this weighty subject, an inference which I do not think a. man of Professor Shelley's wide knowledge and outlook would desire to convey. __ As a matter of fact, such, knowledge is available; not merely in the Eastern. and Christian scriptures, where it is mostly to be found "veiled in allegory and illustrated by symbols," but also in modern publications, set out in plain, everyday. English, free from ambiguity, full of detail, and appealing with inescapable force to one's reason and intelligence. The dissemination of tikis information,-which has been garnered, corrected, and amplified during the last forty years, is the work of the Theosophical Society, its great value'being that it deals with, just those promlems—and dozens more —wlhich perplex your correspondent. Briefly put, the teaching is that man is a portion of the .Deity, in common witn all Nature, every form of the latter being regarded as varying, forms of the Divine Life in physical manifestation. Man must; therefore necessarily be immortal, and must also contain within himself at least the potentialities of (his Divine 'Father. It is part of the Great Plan that we shall consciously realise this inherent divinity, hence the many earthly pilgrimages' tare make with the i object of gaining experience, so tlhac we may," by our own unaided efforts, reach to the stature of the.perfect man. These truths are age-old. Ihey are no more a new discovery than they are the • possession of : Theosophiste, and all the ufoeosophical Society does ; and •all it wants to do, is to bring this ancient knowledge once more into the ■ light of day.. I earnestly recommend "Student" to take-up this line of investigation, and make use of the' Society's library; treat- '■;;•■' ing such facts as he comes across with, v just that measure of calm snd deliberate consideration which'he would give to any-material, problem; not regarding anything at the outset as more than an . hypothesis; and finally accepting only -those pronouncements which, absolutely satisfy hia reason. If he is as fortunate as many, thousands of others have been, he will find] there a safe anchorage from the troubled waters of religious perplexity.—-Yours, etc., 1 EDWARD BRANSCOMBE. :89 Hereford street, March 30th.