The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c23.23

c23.23

While almsgiving was commended, the higher doctrine was taught that 'there is no such charity as the charitable gift of the Law of Piety; no such distribution as the distribution of piety'.³ The sentiment recurs in curiously similar language in Cromwell's earliest extant letter. He wrote from St. Ives: 'Building of hospitals provides for men's bodies; to build material temples is judged a work of piety; but they that procure spiritual food, they that build up spiritual temples, they are the men truly charitable, truly pious.'⁴