Chapter XXI Conclusion
“Draw the curtain close,
And let us all to meditation.”
SHAKESPEARE, Hen. VI. II.
Sailing, say to India, from Britain down through the Atlantic, close by the coast of Portugal and Spain, and then, within the Mediterranean, skirting the coast of Algeria, and so on, one is often oppressed with a sense of his isolation. We can see that the land we are passing is inhabited by human beings like ourselves; and those houses visible are homes; and signs of life we can see even from our passing vessel. What of all the tragedies and comedies that are daily being enacted in these houses—the exits and the entrances, the friendships and the feuds, the selfishnesses and self-sacrifices, the commonplace toil, the children’s play, that are going on the very moment we are looking? We are out of it, and our affections refuse to be wholly alienated from these fellow-beings, although the ship of which we form a part must pursue her own aim, and hurries along.
The Briton’s tie to India and Indians is of no passing accidental character. Our life-histories are not merely running parallel; our destinies are linked together. Christian feeling, duty, self-interest, and the interest of a linked destiny all call upon us to know each other and cherish mutual sympathy. Not that the West has ever been without an interest in India, as far back as we have Indian history, in the Greek accounts of the invasion of India by Alexander the Great in 327 B.C. Writing in the first century B.C. and rehearsing what the earlier Greek writers had said about India, Strabo, the Greek geographer, testifies to the prevailing interest in India, and even sets forth the difficulty of knowing India, exactly as a modern student of India often feels inclined to do. “We must take with discrimination,” he says, “what we are told about India, for it is the most distant of lands, and few of our nation have seen it. Those, moreover, who have seen it, have seen only a part, and most of what they say is no more than hearsay. Even what they saw, they became acquainted with only while passing through the country with an army, in great haste. Yea, even their reports about the same things are not the same, although they write as if they had examined the things with the greatest care and attention. Some of the writers were fellow-soldiers and fellow-travellers, yet oft-times they contradict each other.... Nor do those who at present make voyages thither afford any precise information.” We sympathise with Strabo, as our own readers also may. The interest of the West was of course interrupted when the Turks thrust themselves in between Europe and India and blocked the road Eastward overland. But the sea-road round the Cape of Good Hope was discovered, and West and East met more directly again, and Britain’s special interest in India began. Judged by the recent output of English books on India, the interest of Britons in things Indian is rapidly increasing, and, pace Strabo, it is hoped that this book, the record of the birth of New Ideas in India, will not only increase the knowledge but also deepen interest and sympathy. For even more noteworthy than the number of new books—since many of the new books deal only with what may be called Pictorial India—is the deepening of interest manifest in recent years.
That self-glorifying expression, “the brightest jewel in the British crown,” has grown obsolete, and India has become not the glory of Britain, but the first of her imperial responsibilities. The thought of Britain as well as the thought of new India has changed. To the extent of recognising a great imperial responsibility, the mission efforts of the Churches and the speeches of statesmen and the output of the press have converted Britain. India, what her people actually are in thought and feeling, what the country is in respect of the necessities of life and industrial possibilities—these are questions that never fail to interest an intelligent British audience. In this volume, the aim has been to set forth the existing thoughts and feelings, especially of new-educated India, and to do so on the historical principle, that to know how a thing has come to be, is the right way to know what it is and how to treat it. The history of an opinion is its true exposition. These chapters are not speculations, but a setting forth of the progress of opinion in India during the British period, and particularly during the nineteenth century. The successive chapters make clear how wonderful has been the progress of India during the century in social, political, and religious ideas. The darkness of the night has been forgotten, and will hardly be believed by the new Indians of to-day; and ordinary Britons can hardly be expected to know Indian history beyond outstanding political events. Not, however, to boast of progress, but to encourage educated Indians to further progress, and to enlighten Britons regarding the India which they are creating, is the hope of this volume. Further progress has yet to be made, and difficult problems yet await solution, and to know the history of the perplexing situation will surely be most helpful as a guide. What future is in store for India lies hidden. It would be interesting to speculate, and with a few ifs interposed, it might be easy to dogmatise. What will she become? is indeed a question of fascinating interest, when we ask it of a child of the household, or when we ask it of a great people rejuvenated, to whom the British nation stands in place of parent. In the history of the soul of a people, the century just ended may be but a brief space on which to stand to take stock of what is past and seek inspiration for the future, to talk of progress made and progress possible.
“Where lies the land to which the ship would go?
Far, far ahead, is all her seamen know.
And where the land she travels from away?
Far, far behind, is all that they can say.”132
But the past century is all the experience of India we Britons have, and we are bound to reflect well upon it in our outlook ahead.
Footnotes
1 The Senate and People of Rome—Senatus Populus-que Romanus.
2 In the Hindu College at Benares, affiliated to Allahabad University, certain orthodox Hindus also objected to sacred texts being read in the presence of European professors and teachers. Think of it, in that college preparing students for ordinary modern degrees!—Bose, Hindu Civilisation, I. xxxiii.
3 One of the Zoroastrian Persians who fled to Western India at the beginning of the eighth century A.D. At the census of 1901 they numbered 94,190. They are most numerous in the city of Bombay.
4 Asiatic Studies, I.
5 Ibid., I. iii.
6 Quinquen, Report on Education in India, 1897-1902.
7 For an apparently contrary view, see Census of India, 1901, Report, p. 430: “Railways, which are sometimes represented as a solvent of caste prejudices, have in fact enormously extended the area within which those prejudices reign supreme.” The sentence refers to the influence of the fashion of the higher castes in regard to child marriage and prohibition of the marriage of widows.
8 Sir W.W. Hunter, England’s Work in India.
9 The manifold origins of castes are fully discussed in the newest lights in the Census of India Report, 1901.
10 Miss Noble [Sister Nivedita], finds herein an apology for caste. “The power of the individual to advance is by this means kept strictly in ratio to the thinking of the society in which he lives.” (The Web of Indian Life, p. 145.)
11 Sir A. Lyall, Asiatic Studies, I. v.: “A man is not a Hindu because he inhabits India or belongs to any particular race or state, but because he is a Brahmanist.” Similarly Census of India, 1901, Report, p. 360: “The most obvious characteristics of the ordinary Hindu are his acceptance of the Brahmanical supremacy and of the caste system.”
12 Harvest Field, March 1904; Madras Decen. Missionary Conference Report, 1902.
13 Introduction to Translation of the Ishopanishad.
14 Benares Hindu Coll. Maga. Sept. 1904.
15 Karkarin: Forty years of Progress and Reform, p. 117.
16 Census of India, 1901, Report, pp. 496, 517, 544.
17 Miss Noble [Sister Nivedita], Web of Indian Life, p. 133.
18 Report, Census of India, 1901, p. 163.
19 Census of India, 1901, Report, p. 163.
20 Census of India, 1901, Report, p. 522.
21 Lux Christi, by C.A. Mason, p. 255. 1902.
22 In Italy, in 1891, the sexes were almost equal, being males 1000 to females 995.
23 Census of India, 1901, Report, p. 115.
24 A case of Suttee is reported in the Bengal Police Report for 1903.
25 Report, Census of India, 1901, pp. 442, 443.
26 Justice Amir Ali, Life and Teaching of Mohammed.
27 Sister Nivedita, Web of Indian Life, p. 80.
28 Church of Scotland Mission Record, 1894; East and West, July 1905.
29 Trotter, India under Queen Victoria.
30 P. 428.
31 Hindu was originally a geographical term referring to the country of the River Indus. It is derived from the Sanscrit (Sindhu), meaning river, from which also come Indus, Sindh, Hindu, Hindi, and India. The names Indus and India are English words got from Greek; they are not Indian, terms at all, although they are coming into use among educated Indians.
32 Hindi is also used as a comprehensive term for all the kindred dialects of Hindustan. See R.N. Cust, LL.D, Oecumenical List of Translations of the Holy Scriptures, 1901. The above account follows that given in the Census Report for 1901.
33 The correct form, brahman, not brahmin, is employed by the majority of recent writers.
34 Quoted in Census of India, 1881.
35 The Web of Indian Life, pp. 101, 298.
36 I. xvi.
37 Ancient Geography of Asia, by Nibaran Chandra Das.
38 For other testimony to the new national feeling, see Decen. Missionary Conference Report, 1902, p. 305, etc.; Sister Nivedita, Web of Indian Life.
39 This may not be so in the extreme south-west, where there have been Christians since the sixth century.
40 The Indian National Congress, by John Murdoch, LL.D., 1898. (Christian Literature Society, Madras.)
41 Karkaria: Forty Years of Progress and Reform, 1896, p. 94.
42 The Indian National Congress, by John Murdoch, LL.D., p. 95. (Madras Christian Literature Society.)
43 The Indian National Congress, by John Murdoch, LL.D. (Madras Christian Literature Society), p. 142, etc.
44 Asiatic Studies, I. iii., II. i.
45 The Indian National Congress, by John Murdoch, LL.D., p. 153. (Madras Christian Literature Society.)
46 Smith, Life of Alexander Duff, 1881, Chapter V.
47 Asiatic Studies, II. I. 7, 37.
48 Report of Madras Decennial Missionary Conf., 1902, p. 311.
49 Acts iv. 33.
50 Acts xvii. 18, 32.
51 Statistical Atlas of India, 1895.
52 Census of 1901.
53 Hinduism and its Modern Exponents, by Rev. C.N. Banerji, B.A.
54 Monier Williams, Brahmanism, etc., p. 18.
55 Monier Williams, Hinduism, p. 38.
56 Youngson, Punjab Mission of the Church of Scotland, p. 27.
57 “The Arya Samaj,” by Rev. H.D. Griswold, D.D., Madras Decen. Mission. Conference Report; “The Arya Samaj,” by Rev. H. Forman, Allahabad Mission Press, 1902; Biographical Essays, by Max Müller—“Dyananda Saraswati”
58 For another explanation of the separation, see Lillie, Madame Blavatsky, chap. vii.
59 62,458,077 Mahomedans at Census of 1901.
60 Census of India, 1901, Report, pp. 371-73.
61 Disguised as Necharis in the Report, Census of India, 1901, p. 373. See Youngson, Punjab Mission of the Church of Scotland, p. 14; Madras Decen. Miss. Conf. Report of 1902, p. 341.
62 Asiatic Studies, I. 1.
63 Guru-prasad Sen in Introduction to the Study of Hinduism, quoted in Madras Decen. Miss. Conf. Report, p. 280.
64 Sister Nivedita, Web of Indian Life, pp. 175, 179.
65 Cf. Philosophic Hinduism, p. 27, Madras, C.V.E.S.
66 Amy W. Carmichael, Things as they are in South India.
67 Monier Williams, Brahmanism and Hinduism, p. 54.
68 Indian Missions from the Outside.
69 Hinduism, p. 88. Things as They Are, iv. by Amy W. Carmichael.
70 Intellectual Progress of India, P. Mitter, p. 5.
71 Defence of Hindu Theism: Appeal to the Christian Public (II. 91).
72 Smith, Life of Dr. Wilson.
73 Rammohan Roy, Appeal to the Christian Public.
74 Vedic Hinduism, (Madras C.V.E.S.) 1888.
75 Bose, Hindu Civilisation during British Rule, i. 95.
76 Monier Williams, Modern India, 1878, p. 101.
77 Plato in the Timæus teaches the eternal existence of matter as a substance distinct from God. See also p. 134.
78 Max Müller, Ramakrishna, p. 48.
79 Sister Nivedita, The Web of Indian Life.
80 Monier Williams, Brahmanism and Hinduism, p. 25, etc.
81 For the Yoga System, see pp. 127, 128, 134.
82 Text-book of Hindu Religion, etc., p. 60.
83 See also Life of Rev. J.J. Weitbrecht, 1830, p. 318.
84 Max Müller, Ramakrishna, p. 8.
85 Weekly Statesman (Calcutta), 14 IX. 1905.
86 Rev. Dr. Griswold in Madras Decen. Missionary Conf. Report, 1902, p. 317.
87 Asiatic Studies, II. i. 11.
88 Sister Nivedita, The Web of Indian Life, pp. 191, 287.
89 Avatar=a descent.
90 Lillie, India and its Problems.
91 Smith, Life of Dr. John Wilson, pp. 63, 65.
92 Lillie, India and its Problems, p. 130.
93 Biographical Sketch of K.M. Banerjea, p. 79. K.M. Banerjea, Christianity and Hinduism, pp. 1, 2, 11. Monier Williams, Hinduism, p. 36, etc; Brahmanism and Hinduism, pp. 4, 14, 17, 33. Compare Hebrews i. 2, 3.
94 Hinduism and its Modern Exponents, Rev. C.N. Banerjea, B.A. Calcutta, 1893.
95 Sketches of Indian Christians (Madras C.L.S.), 1896.
96 Lectures in India.
97 P.N. Mitter, Intellectual Progress of Modern India.
98 U.F. Church of Scot. Mission Report for 1903; Madras Decen. Missionary Conference Report, 1903, pp. 310, 311.
99 Farquhar, The Future of Christianity in India (Chr. Lit. Soc).
100 K.C. Banurji, Esq., M.A., B.L., Registrar of Calcutta University.
101 Asiatic Studies, I. v. 143.
102 Madras Decen. Miss. Conf. Report, 1902, p. 345.
103 Translated by Rev. J.L. Thakur Das, of Lahore.
104 J.N. Farquhar, M.A., in The Future of Christianity in India, Madras C.L.S.
105 For a fuller statement, see Farquhar, The Future of Christianity in India. C.L.S., Madras.
106 Flint, Philosophy of History.
107 Asiatic Studies, I. i.
108 Bhag. Gita, v. 3, quoted by Max Müller in Ramakrishna, p. 3.
109 Asiatic Studies, II. i. 35.
110 John v. 11.
111 The term Nirvana is not used by ordinary uneducated Indians: it is known only to the educated.
112 Max Müller, Ramakrishna.
113 Sister Nivedita, The Web of Indian Life.
114 Rev. H. Forman, The Arya Sarmāj, Allahabad.
115 Madras Decen. Missionary Conf. Report, 1902, p. 276.
116 Hastie, Hindu Idolatry and English Enlightenment.
117 “The tendency of the doctrine of Karma has been to promote contentment.”—Bose, Hindu Civilisation, I. lix.
118 Sir M. Monier Williams’ Brahmanism and Hinduism.
119 Sister Nivedita, The Web of Indian Life, p. 198.
120 Taken from the Chhāndogya Upanishad.
121 Lilly, India and its Problems.
122 K.S. Macdonald, Sin and Salvation... in the Tantras, Calcutta Methodist Publ. House.
123 Brahmanism and Hinduism, pp. 25, 24; Hinduism, p. 39.
124 Monier Williams, Brahmanism and Hinduism.
125 The Ārya Samā[=i], by Rev. Henry Forman. Allahabad, 1887.
126 Religious Reform, Part IV. Madras C.V.E.S., 1888.
127 Religious Reform, Part IV. Madras C.V.E.S., 1888.
128 K.S. Macdonald, Sin and Salvation... in the Tantras. Calcutta Methodist Publ. House.
129 Monier Williams, Brahmanism and Hinduism, p. 63.
130 Monier Williams, Brahmanism and Hinduism, Chap. V.
131 Max Müller, Ranuikrishna Paramahansa, p. viii.
132 A.H. Clough. Quoted by Lord Curzon at Simla, September 1905.