Chapter V: Preface (5)

If we consider all the impediments that barred the way of a young Indian lady when conceiving the plan of studying medicine in a foreign country, we are amazed at Ânandibâi’s courage and perseverance, and we shall hesitate before we declare that Hindu women cannot be worthy peers of English women. Our own lady doctors, who have cut their way through the compact phalanx of prejudice and jealousy, can best judge of the heroism of their unknown Hindu colleague, whose name ought to hold its place on the roll of those who have fallen in a noble fight, and whose very death marks a victory. Though she had so painfully striven to preserve her caste in a foreign land, it seemed doubtful at first whether the Brâhmans of Poonah would receive her as pure, after her long sojourn among unbelievers. But humanity proved too strong even for caste. Men and women, old and young, orthodox and unorthodox, all received the young doctor with open arms, paid her friendly visits, and extended to her a most cordial welcome. Her own friends were astonished at the unprecedented concession made in her favour by the strictly orthodox party. And when the end came the whole of Poonah seemed to share in the mourning of the family, and the fear that the priests might raise objections to cremating her body according to the sacred rites of the Hindus, proved perfectly groundless. Not only on the occasion of her funeral, but earlier, when her husband offered sacrifices to the gods and the guardian planets to avert their anger and her death, the priests showed no sign of any prejudice against him or her. This, too, is a victory, for it shows that even the most inveterate social and religious diseases are not incurable when treated with unselfish love and generosity. If all this could be achieved by a frail young daughter of India, what is there that could be called impossible for the strong men of that country? Even now her example has been followed, and Ânandibâi’s life has not been in vain.

National Character of the Hindus.

No wonder that those who look upon the Indian nation as an inferior race should have so often protested against my judgment of them as prejudiced and as far too favourable. I know quite well that the men and women of whom I have here spoken are exceptional beings. They would be exceptional in England also, and anywhere else. But exceptions, after all, represent possibilities, and the good work achieved by such men as Rammohun Roy, Keshub Chunder Sen, and Malabâri, or by Râmabâi, shows how much of real power lies dormant in the people of India. If it is always wise in judging of people to look more to their strong than to their weak points; why should we, in trying to determine the average intellectual and moral stature of the Hindus, take account of their dwarfs rather than of their giants? Is it right, for instance, to say that all Indians are liars? It is a very hackneyed charge, but it is never forgotten, and it often crops up again when least expected. Because culprits before an Indian judge and witnesses before a jury, nay, even cooks and butlers in Anglo-Indian homes, have occasionally, or even frequently, told lies, does it follow that all Indians are liars? It is unfortunate that so many who have spent their lives as civil servants or officers in India should represent the few hundreds or the few thousands of people with whom they have been brought into contact at Calcutta, Benares, Bombay, or Madras as fair specimens of the people of India at large. It should never be forgotten that the true home of the Indians is in their villages, and that those who go to Calcutta or other great towns to take service in English families are by no means the best specimens of the Indian population. They are willing to submit for some time to the unkind treatment which they not seldom receive from men, women, and children of alien origin; but they can but seldom feel any real attachment or even respect for their employers, though here, too, there are most honourable exceptions. From the earliest times truthfulness has always been mentioned as a national characteristic of the inhabitants of India, and we are now told that all Indians are liars! We cannot open any of the ancient law-books or epic poems without coming across such sentences as “Truth is the ladder to heaven and the ship across the ocean”; “The end of all the Vedas is Truth”; “Seeking after all the virtues, I have nowhere found anything so purifying as Truth.” We appeal to the literatures of other nations as records of their true character, why not in the case of the Hindus? It is easy to say that all this is changed now, and that those who have been magistrates and judges in India ought to know best. But do these judges consider the peculiar difficulties with which the lower classes in India have to contend, being ruled by men of a different colour, of a different language, and a different religion? Would they expect or find much regard for truth even in an English sailor if examined by a French, ay, even by an English judge? It is easy to be truthful if you have nothing to fear, but we must not wonder if, to escape an oath or a kick, a native servant will now and then tell a lie to his master. Anyhow, one case, a hundred, nay, a thousand cases are not sufficient to condemn a whole nation of more than two hundred millions. It has been my rule through life never to accept any of these sweeping assertions about a whole nation. If I hear a man calling all Indians liars, I generally ask how many he has known, and I do the same when I hear all Frenchmen called monkeys, all Italians assassins, all Germans unwashed, all Russians savages, or even England _Perfide Albion_. I have never in all my life repented having had eyes for the bright side rather than the dark side of nations as well as of individuals. I hoped I had exposed the fallacy and folly of such undiscriminating accusations in the Lectures which I gave at Cambridge, to the candidates for the Indian Civil Service, Lect. 2, “On the Truthful Character of the Hindus.” But no, the old charge is brought up again and again. That some members of the Indian Civil Service who had for years to deal with native servants and tradesmen should have had some painful experiences, who can doubt? Even within the small circle of my own personal acquaintances I have met with Indians who disregarded the old commandment of telling the truth; but to generalise in such matters, from a limited number of instances, is surely against all the rules of inductive logic. This prejudice against the inhabitants of India as being a nation of liars may become really dangerous in its consequences. Even now, as the press is open to the ruled as well as to the rulers of India, the charge of ingrained untruthfulness has been hurled back most savagely by the accused on the accusers. It always is so, and there is in the end but one remedy, even when an inclination towards untruthfulness does exist, and that is trust. I have no doubt that I shall be much abused again for having ventured to say so much, and to stand up for the people of India, and particularly for having produced evidence in support of my opinion, taken from their literature, ancient and modern, from their sacred books, their law-books, and their philosophical systems. Such evidence is admitted when we judge of any other nation; why should it be ruled out of court in the case of the people of India?

Missionaries seem to imagine that they have a better chance of spreading their own religion by vilifying the popular religion of India, and trying to show that all the vices of the people are due to it. King Asoka, in the third century B.C., knew better, when he had his edicts engraved all over his kingdom, and declared “that people should never praise their own religion or disparage other religions without a cause; and that whenever there is a cause, our words should be moderate.” Our own missionaries might safely take these words to heart. At all events, no virtue stands higher in the eyes of the founders of the Indian religion than truthfulness, and if religion has any influence in forming the character of a whole nation, no nation should be more truthful than that of India.

I am far from being an indiscriminate admirer of India, and, if I am told that I exaggerate the good qualities of the people, I am quite willing to confess that even among the small number of young men who are now sent every year from India to England, and particularly to Oxford, I have myself had some disappointing experiences. Want of straightforwardness arising from want of moral courage, want of truthfulness arising from a desire to please, hollow pretence amounting in some cases to actual deception, all these I have witnessed among the young men who now come to spend two or three years at Oxford. But may we not look upon these defects as clouds that will pass? And are there never any cases of untruthfulness when there has been a disturbance in college, or when an election has to be carried, _coûte qu’il coûte_. The worst of it is that those who complain of untruthfulness in others, cannot help posing as patterns of truthfulness themselves.

I may mention some curious cases. A young Bengali told me that he came all the way from Benares to Oxford, because he had been told by his friends who had contributed money towards the founding of an Indian Institute there, that he would be received there and enabled to attend lectures in the University. How he had paid his passage money I cannot understand, but I believe the poor boy was actually starving when he came to me, and he was in despair, when I had to tell him that there was no such institution at Oxford, and no scholarships open to him as he had been led to imagine. He told me that he had been to the Indian Institute, but could get no help. He told me that he saw no students or teachers there, but only stuffed animals. “My friends in India,” he said, “have been asked to subscribe money for the benefit of Indian students at Oxford, but no one would even speak to me or help me there. If one of your students,” he added, “came to Benares, our Pandits would receive him with open arms, teach him all they know, and gladly give him food and lodging.” “Yes,” I said, “but the laws of Manu do not apply to England.” I gave him the little he wanted, but what became of him afterwards I cannot tell, nor how he found the means of returning to his own country. I confess I was at first a little suspicious, but, after all, his story may have been true, and what then?

The manners of the young Indians when they arrive at Oxford are generally excellent, but they soon acquire what they consider English manners, rough and ready, bluff and blunt, and by no means an improvement on their own. The same young man who at first enters your room with folded hands and a graceful salâm, will after a very short time walk in, sit down, stretch out his legs, and address you in the most familiar terms. They imagine that this is English. Some profess to know Sanskrit, and pour out a stream of words which at school they may have learnt by heart, but often with an utter disregard of case and gender. Some who had failed, as we afterwards were informed by the authorities, to even pass their matriculation examination in Sanskrit at the Calcutta University, posed as Pandits at Oxford, expressing at the same time their undisguised contempt for all who professed to know and to teach Sanskrit in the Universities of England. These men have a very curious way of blushing. If you convict them of a downright falsehood, their bright brown colour turns suddenly greyish, but their eloquence in defending themselves never fades or flags.

Altogether the experiment of sending young Hindus to prepare for the Civil Service Examination in England has not, as far as I have been able to judge, proved a great success. At Oxford they find it very hard to make friends among the better class of undergraduates. Most of our undergraduates come from public schools, and have plenty of friends of their own. If they are asked to be kind to any of the Indian students, all they can do, or really be expected to do, is to invite them once or twice to a breakfast party. They have hardly any interests in common with them, and anything like friendship is out of the question. If the young students from India have money to spend, there is danger of their falling into bad company, and even if they pass their examinations, I am afraid that some of them return to India not much improved by their English exile. The worst of it is that they often return _désillusionné_. At first everything English is grand and perfect in their eyes, an Oxford degree is the highest goal of their ambition. But when they have obtained it, chiefly by learning by heart, they make very light of it. And this making light of it is soon applied to other things English also, which they hear constantly criticised or abused, particularly in the newspapers and in Parliament, so that they often leave England better informed, it may be, but hardly better affected towards the Government which they are meant to serve. The present state of things is certainly discouraging, particularly as it seems impossible to suggest any real remedy. But here also there are bright exceptions, and I have always held that we must judge of things by their bright rather than by their dark sides. There are, and there always will be, difficulties in the intercourse between Europeans and Orientals. It is wonderful to see how well they have been overcome in the Government of India. Natives in the Civil Service or at the Bar seem to work quite harmoniously with their English colleagues, and even after they have reached high employment, and have to exercise authority, little has been heard of conflicts, whether caused by arrogance or subserviency. There are Continental statesmen who, while they cannot help admiring the English system of governing India, look upon it as suicidal in the end. They consider the Russian system of complete repression as the only right system of dealing with Orientals, and as far more merciful in the end. Well, we must wait for the end; but, whatever it may be, it seems right to treat the inhabitants of India as they have been hitherto treated by the Government and by the wisest rulers of India, not as born enemies or as conspirators to be kept under by force, but as loyal subjects to be trusted. Of course, there sometimes will be troubles, for how can it be expected that in two or three hundred millions of conquered subjects there should be no grumbling, no disaffection, no fanaticism? The government of India by a mere handful of Englishmen is, indeed, an achievement unparalleled in the whole history of the world. The suppression of the Indian mutiny shows what stuff English soldiers and statesmen are made of. If people say that ours is not an age for Epic poetry, let them read Lord Roberts’ “Forty-one Years in India.” When I see in a circus a man standing with outstretched legs on two or three horses, and two men standing on his shoulders, and other men standing on theirs, and a little child at the top of all, while the horses are running full gallop round the arena, I feel what I feel when watching the government of India. One hardly dares to breathe, and one wishes one could persuade one’s neighbours also to sit still and hold their breath. If ever there were an accident, the crash would be fearful, and who would suffer most? Fortunately, by this time the people of India know all this, and they have learnt to appreciate what they owe not only to the _Pax_, but to the _Lux Britannica_. If one could dare to read the mind of three hundred millions, I should say that in the present state of things the people of India, as a whole, want no change except such changes as can be achieved by ordinary constitutional means. It is true that I have not known a large number of Indians, but I have known Indians who could well speak in the name of large numbers, and they speak to me more openly perhaps than to others, looking upon me as a kind of Mle_kkh_a, but at the same time as half an Indian. Some young Indian Râjahs while travelling in Switzerland, found themselves lately in the same railway carriage with some Russian princes and noblemen. They had been discussing among themselves some of their grievances in English, and the Russians, who of course understood English, after listening to them for some time, became very communicative, and began to explain to them the beneficent rule of the Tsar. They even went so far as to hold out a hope to them of an Indian Parliament, as soon as the Russians were settled in Calcutta. On parting they asked the Indian princes, “When shall we see you at St. Petersburg?” And they were not a little taken aback when the strangers bowed and smiled, and said, “We are going just now to be present at the opening of Parliament in London. We should like very much to see St. Petersburg afterwards, and to be present at the opening of your Parliament there....”

Again and again have I been urged to go to India, and have been told many a time by people who had spent a few months there that I could never hope to know the Indians, to understand Indian literature, or even pronounce Sanskrit properly without having passed a vacation at Calcutta or Bombay. I would have given anything to go to India when I was young. There was a time when I was on the point of becoming a missionary in order to be able to spend some years in India. But what a strange missionary I should have made! What I cared to know in India were not the Râjahs and Mahârâjahs, the streets of Bombay, the towers of silence, or the temples of Ellora. What I cared to see were the few remaining _S_rotriyas who still knew their Vedas by heart, who would have talked to me and shaken hands with me, even though I was a Mle_kkh_a. Had they not asked me even at a distance to act as one of the sixteen priests at their Shrâddhs (_S_râddhas), their funeral services? Had they not asked me to recite Vedic prayers for the souls of their deceased fathers? Had they not actually sent me the same presents which on those occasions they are bound to give to their priests, because, as they wrote, I knew the Veda better than their own priests? Had they not actually sent me the sacred Brâhmanic thread which I am as proud to wear as any more brilliant decoration?

Here is a letter which I received some years ago beautifully printed in gold:—

“RESPECTED SIR,—On the occasion of my departed fathers Shrâddh ceremony, which was celebrated some months ago, amongst the offerings to Adhyâpaks and Âchâryas (teachers), an offering was made to you in consideration of your eminent services to the laws of Sanskrit literature (_sic_). I am a believer in the New Dispensation of the Brahmo-Somâj of India, which teaches reverence to the great and good men of all lands and religions. I trust you will kindly accept the piece of shawl sent in separate parcels, and pronounce your blessing both for me and for the spirit of my honoured father in heaven.”

Was it very wrong or sacrilegious that I did so? I extract a few sentences from the letter I wrote in reply:—

“I deeply sympathise with your Shrâddh ceremony; nay, I wish we had something like it in our own religion. To keep alive the memory of our parents, to feel their presence during the great trials of our life, to be influenced by what we know they would have wished us to do, and to try to honour their name by showing ourselves not unworthy bearers of it, that is a Shrâddh ceremony in which we can all partake, nay, ought to partake, whatever our religion may be. There is a real, though unseen bond of union (tantu) that connects us through our parents and ancestors with the Great Author of all things, and the same bond will connect ourselves through our children with the most distant generations. If we know that, and are constantly reminded of it by ceremonies like that of your Shrâddh, we are not likely to forget the responsibility that rests on every one of us. In that sense your Shrâddh is a blessing, on your parents because on yourselves, and whatever the future of your religion may be in India, I hope this communion with the spirits of your ancestors, or Pit_ri_s, will always form an essential part of it.”

Two or three years in India would certainly have been a delight to me, but short of that I did not care to go. I was quite satisfied with that ideal India which I had built up for myself, whether from their books or from those who had come to see me at Oxford. If my India, as I am often told, is an ideal India, is it more so than Greece as seen through the poems of Homer, or Italy as seen through the verses of Virgil? What is ideal is not necessarily unreal, it is only like a landscape seen in sunshine. Look at a landscape on a brilliant summer’s day bathed in light and verdure, and again on a bleak day of March with its bitter winds and cloudy sky. It is the same landscape, but which of the two is its true aspect? I shall not speak here of ancient Indian poets, of ancient Indian philosophers, or of ancient Indian heroes. What I feel, and what I wish my friends would feel with me, is that a country which, even in these unheroic days, could produce a Rammohun Roy, a Keshub Chunder Sen, a Malabâri, and a Râmabâi, is not a decadent country, but may look forward to a bright, sunny future, as it can look back with satisfaction and even pride on four thousand years of a not inglorious history.

I have never bestowed excessive praise on Indian literature, nor do I feel answerable for having filled the brains of native scholars with exaggerated ideas about its value. Its value to us is great, but chiefly from a historical point of view, and this is just what native scholars find it so difficult to understand. No wonder that after Goethe had bestowed such superlative praise on the Sanskrit play of “_S_akuntalâ,” the Hindus should have spoken of their Kâlidâsa as the equal of Shakespeare. They forget that what surprised Goethe was not only the beauty of Kâlidâsa’s poetry, great as it is, but its antiquity, and the fact that such refined poetry should have existed where it was least expected, and at a time when it could not have been matched by the poetry of any other country.

Indian Theosophy.

Empty panegyrics are always to be deprecated, and I am afraid that great and lasting mischief has been wrought, for instance, by Madame Blavatsky and her friends who went to India, ignorant of Sanskrit and Sanskrit literature, and who have for years been proclaiming to the world at large that Hindu philosophy, particularly that of the Vedânta and that of Buddhism, which they did not always distinguish very carefully one from the other, was infinitely superior to all the philosophies of Europe, that the Brâhmans even at the present day were the depositaries of the primeval wisdom of the world, and that by the united efforts of Madame Blavatsky and Dayânanda Sarasvatî a new theosophy would dawn on India and Europe which would eclipse all former systems of thought. Poor Dayânanda Sarasvatî had no idea of what Madame Blavatsky was thinking of; but, though bewildered for a time by the unaccustomed adulation poured on him and the extravagant veneration paid to him by Europeans, he soon recovered, and declined to have anything to do with the Polish prophetess and her vagaries.

Mme. Blavatsky might certainly have done a good work if she had joined some really learned Pandits, familiar with the six systems of Hindu philosophy; nor would it have been too much for a person endowed with such extraordinary, if not miraculous, powers as she was said to have possessed, to have mastered the grammar of Sanskrit. But what has been the result of all her labours? Indian philosophy has gained some Corybantic followers, but the true teaching of Bâdarâya_n_a and Kapila has been obscured rather than illuminated by being mixed up with poor and contemptible conjuring tricks. New prejudices have been roused against the noble philosophies of Vedânta, Sâ_m_khya, and Yoga which it will take many years to remove. Why not take the authoritative texts of these systems, many of which have been translated into English and German, and place their essential doctrines in a clear and intelligible form before the philosophic public of Europe? There is no mystery about that philosophy, or about the Mahâtmans who are versed in it. There is nothing esoteric in their teaching; all is open to those who are properly qualified and trustworthy. Their Upanishads and Dar_s_anas can be studied exactly like the philosophies of Plato or DesCartes—nay, even better, because every one of their tenets has been put down in their Sûtras very clearly and definitely by Indian philosophers far more so than by Plato or Hegel. It is difficult, therefore, not to get angry if one sees the elevated views of these ancient philosophers dragged down to the level of cloudy hallucinations, and rendered absurd by being mixed up with vulgar trickeries. “Corruptio optimi pessima.”

I have often been blamed for the hard judgments which I have pronounced against Madame Blavatsky and her friends. I have been told that she and her friends have done good by rousing a new interest in their ancient philosophy among the people of India, and by attracting the attention of European thinkers towards it. If that is so, let it be to their credit; but I feel convinced that no good has ever come from anything that is not perfectly honest and straightforward; and what a lurid light has been thrown on the Theosophist Society at Adyar! There is no excuse for such things, however good the intention may have been, and even now, when I see well-intentioned men like Vivekânanda preaching the doctrines of the Upanishads, of Bâdarâya_n_a and Sa_m_kara in America, and gaining, as I read, numerous converts, I still seem to perceive now and then something of the old Blavatsky leaven, that has not yet been entirely thrown off. Vedântism requires no bush, no trappings, no tricks. What we want is a historical and critical treatment, just the same as that which has been applied to Plato and Aristotle.

When I saw hundreds of people running after Madame Blavatsky and her apostles, and the texts and the excellent translations of the philosophical Sûtras hardly looked at, an old Oriental story often came into my mind. The story is a mere illustration, a D_ri_sh_t_ânta, but it is full of truth.

“A certain man had the peculiar power of grunting exactly like a pig, so much so that whenever he grunted where pigs were grazing they would all turn round to see if any new member had come into their fold. This man’s fame spread abroad, and he began a tour to obtain money by means of his art. Wherever he went he erected a pandal, and issued tickets for admission, all of which got exhausted very soon, such was the eagerness of people to hear him grunt. While he was thus making money in a village a sage happened to pass by with his disciples, and it struck him that he could teach a good lesson to them through this incident. Accordingly he ordered a small pandal to be erected, and advertised that even better grunting would be heard here than in the other pandal, and that free of cost. The people were naturally very eager to hear it, and they visited it. The sage brought a real pig before them, and squeezing it a little, made it grunt. Really the grunt was much better than the man’s, but the people exclaimed, ‘Pooh, is this all? We hear this every day, but what is there in it? It is nothing wonderful,’ and went away. The sage said, ‘Here is a splendid lesson for us. We seldom care for reality, but always go in for imitation.’ That is why even this world exists, which is a mere imitation, a reflection in the distorting mirror of Mâyâ, of the great Âtman. No external help is required to see the Self, but very few care for it, and, even if you eagerly advertise it, none will go to you except those who love truth for truth’s sake. Reflect on this.”

This story is a mere parable, and, as such, cannot possibly offend anybody. At all events, if anybody might complain, it would be the showman of the real pig, not the mere imitator. I have never seen Madame Blavatsky. She threatened once she would come to Oxford to face and to confound me, but she never did. Though she preached to the undergraduates at Balliol, she never came near me. It is simply my love of genuine Indian philosophy that induced me to protest against what I knew to be a mere travesty of Vedânta, Sâ_m_khya, and Yoga philosophy. If even in this travestied form Indian philosophy has found friends, in India and Europe, owing to her preaching, I am quite content, but Satyam paramo dharma_h_, “Truth is the highest religion,” or the highest virtue, and nothing, I am deeply convinced, can prosper for any length of time that is mixed up with exaggeration or untruth. If it is right and our bounden duty to protest against foolish disfigurements of our own religion, why should misrepresentation of the Hindu religion and Hindu philosophy be allowed to pass unchallenged?

From what I have seen and read of Vivekânanda and his colleagues, they seem to me honestly bent on doing good work, and I feel the same about the propaganda carried on by Dharmapâla in favour of Buddhism. It is honest, it is unselfish, it is free from juggling. Vivekânanda and the other followers of Râmak_ri_sh_n_a ought, however, to teach their followers how to distinguish between the perfervid utterances of their teacher, Râmak_ri_sh_n_a, an enthusiastic Bhakta (devotee), and the clear and dry style of the Sûtras of Bâdarâya_n_a. The Vedânta spirit is there, but the form often becomes too vague and exaggerated to give us an idea of what the true _Gñ_ânin (knower) ought to be. However, as long as these devoted preachers keep true to the Upanishads, the Sûtras, and the recognised commentaries, whether of Sa_m_kara or of Râmânu_g_a, I wish them all the success which they deserve by their unselfish devotion and their high ideals.

My Indian Correspondents.

Were I to publish any of the innumerable letters which I receive from unknown correspondents from every part of India, some written in English, others in Sanskrit, they would surprise many readers by showing how like the present political, philosophic, and religious atmosphere in the higher classes of Indian society is to our own. My Indian friends are interested in the same questions which interest us, and they often refer us to their own ancient philosophers who have discussed the same questions many centuries ago. Many of them read and write English perfectly well, though there is a certain bluntness in their questions which would startle us in England.

While I am writing these lines, a letter signed by a number of Indian gentlemen is lying on my table, as yet unanswered, and, if the nature of the questions be considered, likely to remain unanswered for some time. To us some of these questions sound certainly very startling, but they are nevertheless interesting, because they show us the problems on which the Indian mind is brooding, and which to many of them are like their daily bread. We ourselves are more inclined to suppress questions of this kind, or to say with Sir Philip Sidney, “Reason cannot show itself more reasonable than to leave off reasoning on things above reason.” To Indian thinkers, however, there seem to be no regions at all which cannot be approached and penetrated by human reason.

The questions on which my unknown friends want my answer, and probably expect it by return of post, are:—

(1) What is your opinion regarding God and soul? Is the latter a reflection of the former, or is the one quite separate from the other?

Athanasius might have answered such a question, but how can I?

(2) If both God and soul are said to have been separated from the beginning, then how, when, and whence is the latter afflicted with Karman (acts and their results) which cause sad suffering to each individual soul?

(3) Is the universe eternal and self-abiding, or has it been created by some one?

(4A) Taking it for granted that there is some one to be considered the Creator of the universe, we want to know what was the period of the creation, and how long the creation will last; what it was at first, and what will it be hereafter? Did the Creator create all beings (old and young, children and parents) in a moment, or did He create them in succession? Were male and female created at the same time, or one after the other?

(4B) Did the Creator bestow rewards on the actions of men in a former life, or did He create them freely of His own accord? Is He the Giver of rewards, the Ruler of the Universe, or simply the Creator?

(4C) How is it, then, that God created rich and poor, happy and sad? What were the acts that could have produced such results?

(5) What is the real matter of the five elements—earth, water, fire, air, and ether, and of the soul? What is the origin of the smallest atoms (paramâ_n_u) and of time?

(6) Is there any method which, acted upon, will save us from anxieties and troubles of this world, and by means of which we may reach Nirvâ_n_a?

(7) What was the origin of idol-worship? Is it good, or is it contrary to the Sacred Books?

(8) Was Buddhism an offshoot of _G_ainism, or vice versa? or have both religions arisen separately from time immemorial?

(9) By whom were the Vedas compiled, and what do they treat of?

(10) Where does the soul go to after death? Is there any heaven or hell in which the rewards of actions, both good and bad, are to be enjoyed?

My correspondents, who are evidently men of cultivated minds, describe themselves simply as cloth-merchants. I know nothing more about them, but we may learn from their letter what is the unseen stream of thought running through India. They seem to belong to the Digambara sect of the _G_ain religion. I doubt whether any English cloth-merchants would have appealed to J. S. Mill or to Darwin for a solution of such metaphysical difficulties. We may consider such questions unreasonable, only we must not imagine that because we do not speak of these riddles, we ourselves have solved them. Nay, it may be useful to be reminded from time to time of the limits of our knowledge, so as not to trust too much to the omniscience of our own philosophers.

I often feel ashamed that I cannot answer such letters. But first of all, let me assure my kind correspondents that I am not omniscient, and never pretended to be so. On some of the questions they ask me, their own philosophers have said all that can be said, more even than our own. But let them consider likewise that with the best will on my part, I should have no time left for my own studies, were I to attempt to enter on a discussion of such problems as are set before me by my unknown friends in India and elsewhere. Every one who writes to me seems to imagine that he is the only person who does so. If they saw the chaos of unanswered letters on my table they would see that I do not exaggerate, and would understand that it would be physically impossible for any human being to answer all the letters addressed to me. Life has its limits, every day has its limits, and one hour out of the twenty-four might well be left to an old man for dreaming, for looking back on the years and the friends that are gone, and forward to that life to which our stay on earth forms, as he thinks, but a short prelude.

In one respect, as I pointed out before, the Indians differ from us very characteristically. They give very free expression to their sentiments, whether of love or of admiration, and even when they have to express their disapproval they do it in the gentlest and least offensive words. Some of them have expressed to me on several occasions their surprise, nay, disgust, at the rudeness and coarseness of certain Sanskrit scholars in their literary controversies. Some people may call Oriental gentleness and courtesy flattery, some dishonesty, and it certainly would be so for us. Even in French and Italian, however, there are some expressions which we would not use in English, and which, if translated into English, sound to us unreal and exaggerated, while not to use them would amount in French to a want of politeness. We are not so easily _enchanted_ or _ravished_, nor are we always _devoted servants_, but at the same time I must confess that our _yours truly_ sounds almost brutal in answer to the eloquent finish of the letters of our French friends. But though I fully admit that considerable deductions must be made from the panegyrics addressed to us by our Indian correspondents, it would be wrong to accuse them of intentional insincerity. If their panegyrics seem sometimes to come very near to an apotheosis, we must not forget that their Devas or gods are not looked upon as anything very extraordinary after all.

I must mention at least one instance when I was agreeably surprised by the thorough sincerity of one of my Indian correspondents, who certainly meant far more than he said. The Mahârâjah of Vizianagram wrote to me some years ago expressing a wish to possess a copy of my edition of the “Rig-Veda” in six volumes. It had been published at £15, but when I applied to a second-hand bookseller he charged £24, and told me that complete copies of the book were getting very scarce. Soon after the Mahârâjah wrote again asking the bookseller to send him a second copy, but he was informed by his agent in England that he could not get a complete set for love or for money. The Mahârâjah wrote to ask me why I did not bring out a new edition, and I had to tell him what the expense of printing such a work would be, and that, though I should gladly give my labour for nothing, I could not find a publisher in England, not even a University Press, to undertake such a work. The Indian Government had for years used the first edition for making presents in Europe and in India, and though in this way it had fully reimbursed itself for the original outlay, it was not inclined to venture on a second edition. Upon this the Mahârâjah, who had hitherto been most lavish in his praises of the work, showed that the praise he had bestowed on it was not mere empty praise, but was really meant. After telling me what his Pandits had said to him, and sending me some valuable MSS., as a present, which they had prepared for me, he offered to pay himself for the printing of a new edition, if I would undertake the labour of revising the text.

This I readily accepted, and in two years, 1890 to 1892, a new, and I hope more correct edition, was issued from the Press at Oxford in four large volumes. The Mahârâjah paid to the Press not less than £4,000. I found out afterwards that this Indian nobleman was by no means a student, an antiquarian, or a theologian; but, on the contrary, a man of the world, very fond of racing and hunting. He distinguished himself on one occasion, as I was told, by riding up the staircase to the very roof of his palace. When in one of my last letters I asked him what had induced him to spend so large a sum on the Rig-Veda, he replied that India wanted its Bible, and he added, “It may benefit me hereafter.” That hereafter has come sooner than he expected. He died a comparatively young man, and as long as the Veda lives his name will certainly not be forgotten. The Veda has lived now for four thousand years, or, according to Indian ideas, it has existed from all eternity. Four thousand years is but a small slice of eternity, but are there many books that have lasted or will last four thousand years? I ought to add that his liberality did not stop at paying the expenses of the work, but that he placed a large number of copies at my disposal, which was more than I expected or deserved. Are there many Mahârâjahs or Zemindârs in Europe who would have spent so large a sum on a new edition of the Bible, or, in fact, of any other important book? Would any scholar even think of appealing to the millionaires of England or America to help him in bringing out an old forgotten book, if it “benefited them hereafter” only? Anyhow, I came to learn that Hindus are not simply grandiloquent, but that they can do grand things also, when the opportunity offers.

If I finish here the list of my Indian friends, it is not because I have no more names to add. We have lately had a book called “Representative Indians,” by C. P. Pillai, 1897, containing biographical sketches of thirty-six distinguished Hindus and Parsis. Many of them I have known or corresponded with, but of their sentiments, their hopes and disappointments, I know but little. The undercurrent of their life, the deeper motives of their actions, are under a kind of purdah, and we hardly ever get either autobiographical confessions or outspoken memoirs. This is a pity, and naturally deprives reminiscences of Indian friends of much of that human interest which everybody feels when catching glimpses of the more intimate life of distinguished persons. We seldom hear of a good or smart saying from a Hindu, such as we have in large numbers from English, German, or French statesmen or poets. The people of India are still a deep secret to us, and if I have succeeded in withdrawing the curtain from only a small portion of their inmost thoughts and feelings, if, here and there, I have helped to change mere curiosity about them into a warm human sympathy with them, my reminiscences will have fulfilled their true object. In some respects, and particularly in respect to the greatest things (τὰ μέγιστα), India has as much to teach us as Greece and Rome, nay, I should say more. We must not forget, of course, that we are the direct intellectual heirs of the Greeks, and that our philosophical currency is taken from the capital left to us by them. Our palates are accustomed to the food which they have supplied to us from our very childhood, and hence whatever comes to us now from the thought-mines of India is generally put aside as merely curious or strange, whether in language, mythology, religion, or philosophy. But however foreign Indian thought may appear to us, it has filled an important place in the growth of the human race, and that growth is important, whether it took place on the borders of the Ilissos or on the shores of the Ganges. In India we still see, as it were, the last traces of the primordial surprise at this world. Their earliest thinkers seem still to feel strange in it, while Greeks and Romans are thoroughly at home in their little world. No doubt the Greeks as well as the Indians saw the riddles of the world, were perplexed by them, and tried to solve them. But while Greeks and Romans, and later on the leading races of Europe also, settled down to their practical work in life, the Indians, at least the leading thinkers among them, never felt quite at ease even in their beautiful forests, by the side of their mighty rivers, or under the shadow of their gigantic snow-mountains in the north. They never cared so intensely for this span of life on earth as the Greeks did. Hence they never brought political life to its full development, like the Greeks and Romans; they never strove to conquer what was not theirs, or to govern the world which they had conquered; nor did they, like the Hebrews, look upon the exact fulfilment of the law as the highest object of their life on earth. Even while passing through this world, their eyes were for ever fixed on the Beyond. They strove to pierce through the dark roof of their forests, to travel to the distant sources of their rivers, and to transcend even the snowy peaks of the Himâlaya Mountains. Their hearts would never forget the life that lay behind them, and their minds were for ever set on the life that was to come.

The old questions of Whence? Why? and Whither? fascinated and enthralled their thoughts. They may have but little of practical wisdom to teach us, for they paid but small attention to the arts of peace and war. But, though they fell in consequence an easy prey to their neighbours, they had something nevertheless which their barbarous conquerors had not. They had their own view of the world, and this view, different as it is from our own, deserves to be looked at carefully and seriously by us. Whatever we may think of the world which they had built up for themselves, and in which they lived, their idea of the Godhead is certainly higher, purer, and more consistent than that of Greeks, Romans, and Hebrews. They passed through polytheism, henotheism, and monotheism, and they arrived at last at what is generally called pantheism, but a pantheism very different from vulgar pantheism. They started with the firm conviction that what we mean by God must be a Being without a second, without beginning or end, without limitations of any kind. Whatever there is or seems to be, call it mind or matter, man or nature, can have one substance only, one and the same, whatever we name it, God, or Brahman, the Absolute, or the Supreme Being. They never say, like other pantheists, that everything in this phenomenal world is God, but that everything has its being in God.

How the change from the real to the phenomenal came about, or, as we say, how the world was created, they can tell us as little as we can tell them. They simply point to the fact that it has come about, that it is there, that it is and can be nothing but phenomenal to us, but that the phenomenal could not even seem to be without the real behind it. In order to restore the phenomenal world to its reality, they hold that all that is wanted is knowledge or philosophy, which destroys that universal Nescience which makes us all take the phenomenal for the real, the objective for the subjective. Their philosophy is chiefly the Vedânta, though other systems also pursue the same object. Each man is in substance or in self identical with God, for what else could he be? If they say that each man is God, that would, no doubt, offend us, but that man and everything else has its true being in the Godhead is a very different kind of pantheism. To regain that full self-consciousness or God-consciousness, to return to God, to break down the artificial wall that seemed to separate man from God, is the highest object of Indian philosophy, and in some form or other these thoughts have gradually leavened all classes of society from the highest to the lowest.

In order to be able to appreciate the true value of the Vedânta, we have to study its growth in the Upanishads, and in the minute disquisitions of the Vedânta-Sûtras and their commentaries. No doubt these are sometimes very tedious, and to us, in this age of the world, may often appear childish and useless. And yet the Vedânta view of the world has a right to claim the same attention as that of Heraclitus, Plato, Spinoza, or Kant. It is as true and as untrue as any of these philosophical intuitions, but it possesses an attraction of its own which has held the best minds of India captive for generations, and will continue to do so for ages to come.

Nay, as we have always had among us Platonists, Spinozists, and Kantians, the time will come, nay, has come already, when European philosophers will try to look at the world through the glasses of the Vedânta also. It is well known that Schopenhauer, no mean thinker of modern times, declared the Vedânta as taught in the Upanishads “the product of the highest wisdom” (_Ausgeburt der höchsten Weisheit_). May not these words make other philosophers pause before they reject as childish a philosophy which Schopenhauer placed above the philosophy of Giordano Bruno, Malebranche, and Spinoza?

India should be known, not from without, but from within, and it will require a long time and far abler hands than mine before we really know what India was meant to be in the development of mankind. Heinrich Simon remarked very truly, “Our history is miserable because we have no biographies.... If a man’s life lies open before me from day to day in all his acts and all his thoughts, so far as they can be represented externally, I gain a better insight into the history of the time than by the best general representation of it.” What we want to know is, how the prominent men of India imbibed the Vedânta, and how the principles they had imbibed from that source influenced their lives, their acts, and their thoughts. With us philosophy remains always something collateral only. Our mainstay is formed by religion and ethics. But with the Hindus, philosophy is life in full earnest, it is but another name for religion, while morality has a place assigned to it as an essential preliminary to all philosophy. Most of our greatest philosophers and of their followers seem to lead two lives, one as it ought to be, the other as it is. One of our greatest philosophers, Berkeley, knew quite well what the world is, but he lived as a bishop, unconcerned about the unreal character of all with which he had to deal. There have been cases of true Vedântists, also, who have led useful, active lives as ministers and organisers of states, but he who has grasped the highest truths of the Vedânta, or has been grasped by them, is driven at once into the solitude of the forests, waiting there for the solution of all riddles, for perfect freedom, and in the end for the truest freedom of all, for death—Θανοῦμαι καὶ ἐλευθερήσομαι.

MY INDIAN FRIENDS.

IV.

The Veda.

We live no longer in times when the head of a great publishing firm would ask a scholar who offered a translation of the Veda, as I know the late Professor H. H. Wilson was asked, “But what in all the world is the Veda, or what you call the Rig-Veda?” But nevertheless in spite of the years that have passed since, I am still asked from time to time much the same question, and I confess I cannot answer it in two words.