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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of India, Its Life and Thought, by John P. Jones
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: India, Its Life and Thought
+
+Author: John P. Jones
+
+Release Date: February 18, 2009 [EBook #28117]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INDIA, ITS LIFE AND THOUGHT ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Juliet Sutherland, and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: A HOLY MAN OF INDIA]
+
+
+
+INDIA
+
+ITS LIFE AND THOUGHT
+
+
+
+
+BY
+
+JOHN P. JONES, D.D.
+
+SOUTH INDIA
+
+AUTHOR OF "INDIA'S PROBLEM, KRISHNA OR CHRIST,"
+ETC., ETC.
+
+
+
+
+New York
+
+THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
+
+1908
+
+
+
+
+
+COPYRIGHT, 1908,
+
+BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+Dedicated
+
+TO MY DEAR CHILDREN
+
+WHO HAVE
+
+BRAVELY AND CHEERFULLY ENDURED
+
+THE SEPARATION AND THE LOSS OF HOME
+
+FOR THE SAKE OF INDIA
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+To the people of the West, the inhabitants of India are the least
+understood and the most easily misunderstood of all men.
+
+It is partly because they are antipodal to the West--the farthest
+removed in thought and life. They are also the most secretive, and
+find perennial delight in concealment and evasion.
+
+According to Hindu teaching, the Supreme Spirit forever sports in
+illusion. It continuously manifests itself through unreal and false
+forms, which delude and lead astray ignorant man. In harmony with this
+philosophy of the Divine--and may it not be as a result of it?--the
+people of India too often delight in unreal and deceptive exhibitions
+of themselves. At any rate, it is exceedingly difficult for a man of
+the West, especially he of the Anglo-Saxon type, to apprehend the full
+significance and the correct drift of life and thought of this land.
+
+It is amusing, when not discouraging, to witness travellers, who have
+rushed through India in a winter tour, publish volumes of their
+misconceptions and ill-digested theories about the people with an
+oracular emphasis which is equalled only by their ignorance.
+
+The author of this book makes no claim to a right to speak _ex
+cathedra_ upon this subject. Nevertheless, thirty years of matured
+experience in this land, living in constant touch with the people and
+studying with eagerness their life and thought, gives him an humble
+claim to speak once more upon the subject.
+
+Even now, however, his pride of knowledge is chastened by the
+oft-recurring surprises which the Oriental nature and life still bring
+to him. And he does not cease to pray, with a western saint, who, at
+the end of a half century of work for the people of India, daily cried
+out,--
+
+"O Lord, help me to know these people and to come into intimate
+relations of life with them!"
+
+If, in these pages, he can help others of the West to come face to
+face with the immense and intricate problems which confront all who
+desire to know, to help, and to bless India, and shall enable them to
+understand better the conditions and characteristics of life in the
+Land of the Vedas, he will feel amply repaid for his labours.
+
+I express my deep gratitude to the Rev. J. L. Barton, D.D., for his
+kind encouragement in the publishing of this book; and also to the
+Rev. W. W. Wallace, M.A., for his generous aid in the proof-reading.
+
+J. P. JONES.
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER
+
+I. INDIA'S UNREST
+
+ i. Extent of the Movement
+
+ ii. Causes of Unrest
+
+ iii. Conditions of Unrest
+
+ iv. Results
+
+ v. How shall the Unrest be Removed
+
+
+II. THE HOME OF MANY FAITHS
+
+ Hinduism--Madura and Benares
+
+ Demonolatry--Madura
+
+ Christianity--Travancore and Cochin
+
+ Judaism--Cochin
+
+ Parseeism--Bombay
+
+ Jainism--Bombay
+
+ Mohammedanism--Agra and Delhi
+
+ Buddhism--Delhi, Sarnath
+
+ Sikhism--Amritsar
+
+
+III. BURMA, THE BEAUTIFUL
+
+ The Extent of the British Empire
+
+ Burma's Triple Produce
+
+ The Land of Pagodas
+
+ Mandalay
+
+ A Land where Woman is Honoured
+
+ A Land where Caste is Unknown
+
+ The American Baptist Mission
+
+ The Karens and their Conversion
+
+ Ko San Ye
+
+
+IV. THE HINDU CASTE SYSTEM
+
+ What is Caste
+
+ i. Origin of Caste
+
+ (_a_) Religious Theory
+
+ (_b_) Tribal Theory
+
+ (_c_) Social Theory
+
+ (_d_) Occupational Theory
+
+ (_e_) Crossing Theory
+
+ ii. Characteristics of Caste
+
+ Intermarriage
+
+ Inter-dining
+
+ Contact
+
+ Occupation
+
+ iii. Penalties of Caste
+
+ Boycott
+
+ Caste Servants Interdicted
+
+ Domestic Isolation
+
+ Prayaschitta. (Travelling)
+
+
+V. THE HINDU CASTE SYSTEM (_Continued_)
+
+ iv. Occasions of Punishment
+
+ Change of Faith
+
+ Marrying a Widow
+
+ Beef-eating
+
+ Officiating as Priest to Outcasts
+
+ Marrying outside of One's Caste
+
+ v. The Results of the Caste System
+
+ Possibilities of Good
+
+ It arrays Caste against Caste
+
+ It narrows the Sympathies
+
+ It degrades Manual Labour
+
+ It opposes Commerce
+
+ A Foe to Nationality
+
+ A Foe to Individualism
+
+ It is Unethical
+
+ vi. The Dominance of Caste
+
+ Seen even among Christians
+
+ Roman Catholicism and Protestantism
+
+ Signs of its Decadence
+
+ Opposed by Western Progress
+
+ Government Opposition
+
+ Christianity its Foe
+
+
+VI. THE BHAGAVAD GITA--THE HINDU BIBLE
+
+ i. What is this Song
+
+ ii. What are its Purposes and Contents
+
+ 1. Its Teaching concerning God
+
+ Incarnation
+
+ 2. The Doctrine of the Living Soul
+
+ 3. The Doctrine of Liberation
+
+ (1) Through Knowledge
+
+ (2) Through Asceticism
+
+ (3) Through Works
+
+ Caste
+
+ Detachment
+
+ Bhakti
+
+ (4) Altruism.
+
+ 4. The Doctrine of Salvation
+
+ Reincarnation
+
+ iii. Conclusion
+
+
+VII. POPULAR HINDUISM
+
+ i. The Higher Faith
+
+ The Evolution of Faith
+
+ ii. Popular Hinduism
+
+ 1. Caste
+
+ 2. Polytheism
+
+ 3. Idolatry
+
+ 4. Devil-worship
+
+ 5. Fetichism
+
+ 6. Immorality
+
+ 7. Treatment of Woman
+
+ 8. The Hindu Ascetic
+
+ 9. Hindu Pessimism
+
+ 10. Astrology
+
+
+VIII. HINDU RELIGIOUS IDEALS
+
+ i. The Ideal of God
+
+ ii. Ideal of Incarnation
+
+ iii. Ideals of Life
+
+ Asceticism
+
+ Ceremonialism
+
+ Quietism
+
+ iv. Ultimate Salvation
+
+ Transmigration
+
+ Absorption
+
+
+IX. THE HOME LIFE OF HINDUS
+
+ The Home Sanctuary
+
+ The Building of the House
+
+ The Joint Family System
+
+ Priest and Astrologer
+
+ Place of Woman in the Home
+
+ The Devotion of Woman
+
+ The Influence of Woman
+
+ Marriage in the Home
+
+ The Hindu Widow
+
+ Mother-in-law and Daughter-in-law
+
+ Love of Jewellery
+
+ Clothing and Cuisine
+
+ Sickness and Death
+
+ Funeral Obsequies
+
+ Shradda
+
+
+X. KALI YUGA--INDIA'S PESSIMISM
+
+ i. The Astounding Length of the Chronological System
+
+ History and Legend in India
+
+ ii. The Cyclic Character of Hindu Chronology
+
+ No Progress in Time
+
+ The Source of Pessimism
+
+ iii. The Moral Characteristics of the Time System
+
+ Every Yuga has its Own Character
+
+ The Evil Character of Kali
+
+ _Cui Bono_
+
+ Astrology
+
+ Lucky Days
+
+
+XI. ISLAM IN INDIA
+
+ i. The History of Islam in India
+
+ ii. The Present Condition of this Faith in India
+
+ Ill-adapted to India
+
+ Its Conception of Deity
+
+ Intolerance and Tolerance
+
+ Contact with Hinduism
+
+ Compromise
+
+ Islam's Attempt at Reform
+
+ Islam's Redeeming Qualities
+
+ Muslim Sects
+
+ iii. The Mohammedan Population
+
+ iv. Christian Effort for the Mussulman
+
+
+XII. THE CHRIST AND THE BUDDHA
+
+ i. The Conditions of their Lives
+
+ ii. The Common Principles which controlled Them
+
+ Sincerity
+
+ Ethics
+
+ Universal Charity
+
+ iii. The Teachings which differentiate Them
+
+ 1. Teaching concerning God
+
+ 2. Their Conceptions of Human Life
+
+ 3. Their Ideals of Life
+
+ Character and Wisdom
+
+ Final Consummation
+
+
+XIII. MODERN RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT
+
+ Hindu Reformers
+
+ i. Hindu Sects
+
+ ii. Modern Movements
+
+ Ram Mohan Roy
+
+ Brahmo Somaj
+
+ Chunder Sen
+
+ Athi Somaj
+
+ Sadharna Somaj
+
+ New Dispensation
+
+ iii. Progress of the Movement
+
+ Weak in Numbers
+
+ Indian Spirit
+
+ Christian Basis
+
+ "The Oriental Christ"
+
+ Chunder Sen's Words.
+
+ Other Testimony
+
+ The New Dispensation
+
+ iv. The Arya Somaj
+
+ Its Progress
+
+ Its Principles
+
+ Its Antagonism to Christianity
+
+ v. The Theosophical Society
+
+ Its Reactionary Spirit
+
+ Mrs. Besant
+
+ The "Masters"
+
+
+XIV. THE PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY IN INDIA
+
+ i. Early History of Christianity
+
+ Converts
+
+ The Character of the Christian Community
+
+ Influence of Christianity
+
+ "Swadesha"
+
+ Protestant Effort
+
+ ii. Ultimate Triumph of Christianity
+
+ Not the Western Type
+
+ The Kingdom of God
+
+ iii. A Conquest of the Spirit
+
+ 1. Conquest of Principles
+
+ 2. Conquest of the Christ Ideal
+
+ 3. Conquest of the Incarnation of Christ
+
+ 4. Conquest of the Cross of Christ
+
+ 5. Conquest of the Christian Conception of Sin
+
+
+INDEX
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+A HOLY MAN OF INDIA _Frontispiece_
+
+THE GOLDEN LILY TANK IN THE MADURA TEMPLE
+
+TAJ MAHAL, AGRA
+
+MARBLE SCREEN IN TAJ MAHAL
+
+SHAH JEHAN'S FORT, AGRA
+
+AKBAR'S TOMB
+
+KUTAB-MINAR, DELHI
+
+CASHMERE GATE, DELHI
+
+SCHWEY DAGON PAGODA, RANGOON
+
+THEEBAW'S PALACE, MANDALAY
+
+JUNGLE PEOPLE OF INDIA
+
+A DRAVIDIAN SHRINE, SOUTH INDIA
+
+TWO HINDU IDOLS, SOUTH INDIA
+
+HUMAYAN'S TOMB, DELHI
+
+THE GREATEST IMAGE OF BUDDHA
+
+A CHRISTIAN VILLAGE SCHOOL IN SOUTH INDIA
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+INDIA: ITS LIFE AND THOUGHT
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+INDIA'S UNREST
+
+
+India has been called the land of quiet repose, content to remain
+anchored to the hoary past, and proud of her immobility. Invasion
+after invasion has swept over her; but--
+
+ "The East bowed low before the blast,
+ In patient, deep disdain;
+ She let the legions thunder past,
+ And plunged in thought again."
+
+Yet this same India is now throbbing with discontent, and is
+breathing, in all departments of her life, a deep spirit of unrest.
+This spirit has recently become acute and seemed, for a while, in
+danger of bursting into open rebellion, not unlike the Mutiny of half
+a century ago.
+
+
+I
+
+This movement is but a part of the new awakening of the East. The
+world has seen its marvellously rapid development and fruitage in
+Japan. It is witnessing the same process in China and Korea. The
+people of India, likewise, have been touched by its power and are no
+longer willing to rest contentedly as a subject people or a stagnant
+race.
+
+This movement is not only political, it permeates every department of
+life; and it partakes of the general unrest which has taken possession
+of all the civilized nations of the earth. It is really the dawning of
+India's consciousness of strength and of a purpose to take her place,
+and to play a worthy part, in the great world drama.
+
+This spirit found its incarnation and warmest expression in the
+opposition to the government scheme, two years ago, under Lord Curzon,
+for the partition of Bengal. The Bengalees keenly resented the
+division of their Province; for it robbed the clever Babu of many of
+the plums of office. He petitioned, and fomented agitation and
+opposition to the scheme. Then, in his spite against the government,
+he organized a boycott against all forms of foreign industry and
+commerce. This has been conducted with mad disregard to the people's
+own economic interest, and has, moreover, developed into bitter racial
+animosity.
+
+The Bengalee has striven hard to carry into other Provinces also his
+spirit of antagonism to the State. Though he has not succeeded in
+convincing many others of the wisdom of his method, he has spread the
+spirit of discontent and of dissatisfaction far beyond his own
+boundary. Even sections of the land which denounce the boycott as
+folly, if not suicide, have taken up the political slogan of the Babu
+(_Bande Mataram_--Hail, Mother!) and are demanding, mostly in
+inarticulate speech, such rights and privileges as they imagine
+themselves to be deprived of.
+
+The movement is, in some respects, a reactionary one; and race hatred
+is one of its most manifest results. It is not merely a rising of the
+East against the West; it is also a conflict between Mohammedans and
+Hindus. In Eastern Bengal, where the Mussulmans are in a large
+majority, and where the Hindus have become the most embittered, the
+former have stood aloof from the latter and have opposed the boycott.
+This has led to increasing hatred between the members of these two
+faiths,--a feeling which has spread all over the country, and which
+has carried them into opposing camps. This is, in one way, fortunate
+for the government, since it has given rise to definite and warm
+expressions of loyalty by the whole Mohammedan community.
+
+Disgruntled graduates of the University and school-boys take the most
+prominent place in this movement. The Universities annually send forth
+an army of men supplied with degrees--last year it was 1570 B.A.'s;
+and it is the conviction of nine-tenths of them that it is the duty of
+the government to give them employment as soon as they graduate. As
+this is impossible, many of them nurse their disappointment into
+discontent and opposition to the powers that be. Many of them become
+dangerous demagogues and fomenters of sedition. Not a few such are
+found in every Province of the country. And they find in the High
+School and College students the best material to work upon. These boys
+have been the most numerous and excited advocates of this movement. As
+in Russia, so in India the educational institutions are becoming the
+hotbeds of dissatisfaction and opposition to the State. But there is
+this difference. In Russia the University student is much more truly
+an exponent of public sentiment, and more ready to suffer for that
+sentiment, than are the dependent youth of colleges in India.
+
+This movement has not, to any considerable extent, reached the
+masses. Nine-tenths of the population of India are satisfied with the
+government and have no desire to change the present order of things.
+Indeed, they are deeply ignorant of the grievances which the higher
+classes nurse into bitterness. And yet it should not be forgotten that
+the ignorance of the people, coupled with their narrow superstition
+and lively imagination, make them very inflammable material under the
+influence of eloquent demagogues.
+
+
+II
+
+One of the most marked causes of this activity and discontent is the
+recent victory of Japan over Russia. It is hard for the West to
+realize how much that event has stirred the imagination and quickened
+the ambition of all the people of the East. They regard that war as
+the great conflict of the East and the West. India had not the
+slightest idea that Japan would come triumphant out of that conflict.
+But the victory of Japan instantly suggested to all men of culture in
+India the question, "Why should our land be subject to a far-off, and
+a small, western country? Why should we be content with our dependence
+and not reveal our manhood and our prowess, as Japan did?" These are
+inquiries which have opened up new visions of power and greatness to
+the people of India. Japan and its people have been immensely popular
+in India since their recent victory. And Hindus believe that the peace
+perfected at Portsmouth was the harbinger of a new era of liberty and
+independence for all the East.
+
+The growing influence of western education in India has had much to do
+with the present state of things. It is true that India is still a
+land of ignorance. It is a lamentable fact that only 1 in 10 of the
+males and 1 in 144 of the females can read. Only 22.6 per cent of the
+boys of school-going age attend school, and only 2.6 per cent of the
+girls. And yet the enrolment of more than five million scholars in the
+public schools is a significantly hopeful fact as compared with the
+past history of India.
+
+This education is distinctly on _western_ lines. And connected with
+the five Universities of India there are many thousands of young men
+and women who are devoting themselves to a deep study of western
+thought and of western ideas of liberty. The Calcutta University alone
+has, in its affiliated colleges, more students registered than
+Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Toronto combined. In that city, which is
+the centre of the present unrest, there are 12,000 young men in the
+Colleges, and 30,000 pupils in the High Schools. This host of young
+men and women are imbibing modern ideas of manliness, independence,
+and liberty such as India never knew in the past; and they go out into
+the world with new ambitions for their country and inspired with not a
+little "divine unrest."
+
+In close connection with this educational influence is that of western
+civilization and Christian ideals. The government of this land is
+built upon Christian principles and is animated by that spirit of
+civilization which dominates the West. And we know that these make for
+manhood and independence everywhere. It would be a sad thing for Great
+Britain, as it would be for the Christian missionary in India, if
+these lofty principles, which they inculcate, did not acquire
+increasing power over these youth.
+
+And it should not be forgotten that an increasing number of the elect
+youth of India go to England for the completion of their training, and
+return well equipped with Anglo-Saxon ideas of human rights and of
+manhood's claims.
+
+Nor is this merely a movement of the people of India. There is a
+strong body of Englishmen, several of whom are members of Parliament,
+banded together in England, for the purpose of promoting the political
+influence of the people of India in the conduct of the affairs of
+their own country. These men believe that India has a right to a much
+larger meed of self-government than she now enjoys. And they seize
+upon every opportunity to urge upon the Home Government the duty of
+granting added power to the people, and also to advise the leaders of
+Indian thought as to their wisest methods of procedure. There are not
+a few radicals in Britain who believe that India should govern herself
+as an independent colony. And they rouse within Hindu youth who go to
+England a radical spirit of discontent and disloyalty. It was only the
+other day that Lord Ampthill warned these men, because of the
+insidious influence which they were exercising for the overthrow of
+the British power in the East.
+
+The National Congress, which has just reached its majority, has a
+profound influence in the development of a national consciousness, and
+in the furtherance of the cause of independence and political power in
+the land. The very existence of this institution is one of the highest
+compliments to British rule in India. It would be impossible for one
+to imagine the Russian government permitting such a body of men to
+gather every year in solemn conclave to devote several days to a
+vehement criticism of all the principal acts of the State, to give
+vent to disloyal sentiments, and to promote the spirit of disaffection
+throughout the country. This Congress has devoted nearly all its time
+to a denunciation of the powers that be; and during these twenty-one
+years the writer has not seen one word of commendation or one vote of
+appreciation of the State in the reports of the proceedings of the
+Congress. And the demands of the Congress, inspired as they are by
+Anglo-Saxon friends in Great Britain, are becoming annually more
+definite and urgent.
+
+Until the meeting of 1906 there was no divergence of sentiment among
+Congress-wallahs. No dissentient voice or conflicting opinions were
+allowed. It is to the honour and highest interest of the Congress that
+this stage has now been passed and the healthy rivalry of parties is
+felt and heard in Congress councils. It is to be regretted that at the
+last Congress meeting, in Surat, these two parties--the Moderates and
+the Extremists--came into bitter conflict. It was largely due to the
+past supineness of the Moderates who permitted the other party (which
+is a small but noisy minority) to resort to bluster in order to force
+their pet and bitter schemes of disorder upon the Congress. When,
+ultimately, the Moderates determined to exercise the rights of the
+majority, the others resorted to force and caused the Congress to be
+suspended in disorder, thus revealing the sad spectacle of the present
+incapacity of the leaders of the people to govern themselves and the
+country.
+
+This is, however, perhaps the best thing that could have happened for
+the highest interest of the Congress itself. The two parties are now
+clearly defined--the one seeking, through constitutional agitation,
+self-government on colonial lines, like Canada; the other determined
+to overthrow the government of the foreigner and to establish its own
+upon the ruins. And agitation in this behalf is to be conducted in
+every possible way, constitutional or otherwise.
+
+The Moderates are now thoroughly roused and have driven out from their
+councils the irreconcilables and fire-eaters, and can now work with
+more harmony and success for the attainment of their wiser plans and
+more reasonable aims.
+
+A few years ago, the State ignored, when it did not ridicule, the
+National Congress. To-day none recognizes its power more than does the
+government.
+
+And it is most suggestive and instructive to see this body, of fully
+three thousand men, gathered together from all parts of this great
+peninsula--men who represent peoples that speak more than four
+hundred languages and dialects! They conduct their sessions in
+English, which is the only universal tongue of the country. And a
+purer English is hardly spoken in any deliberative or legislative body
+in any other land; and some of the addresses are delivered with a
+force, and are adorned with a logic and a rhetoric, which are truly
+eloquent. Verily, the weapon of popular power, though largely used
+against the government, is the best compliment possible to the State
+which has created it.
+
+The Press also has marvellously grown in power and in dignity during
+the last quarter of a century. At the present time there are scores of
+dailies, and many more weeklies and monthlies, published in the
+English tongue by the natives of the land. And they discuss, with
+intelligence and discrimination, if not with moderation, all matters
+of State and of political interest. Recently some of these papers have
+become thoroughly radical and oppose the government at all points.
+
+But it is the vernacular Press, representing, as it does, hundreds of
+newspapers in all the tongues of India, that carries its influence
+into the villages and homes of the uneducated millions. The present
+condition of discontent with the government has been disseminated
+among the common people more by these vernacular papers than by any
+other agency. Many of these are thoroughly disloyal and seditious.
+Very occasionally they are prosecuted for their inflammatory
+editorials, and their editors are imprisoned.
+
+As a matter of fact, there is hardly any country where the Press has
+greater liberties than in India; and there is no land on earth where
+that liberty is more abused. The very toleration of the government is
+turned as a keen weapon against it.
+
+The same thing is true of the freedom of public speech. There is not
+another land, save perhaps America, whose citizens have greater
+privileges in this matter. The seditious speeches which have been made
+in many parts of India during the last two years, by Bengalees
+specially, and by a few other radicals, have been such as would in
+Europe lead to imprisonment if not to deportation. Bepin Chandra Pal,
+of Calcutta, has just closed a tour during which he has made many
+addresses, attended, in all cases, by thousands of students and
+disaffected members of the community, and has not only denounced the
+government as the very incarnation of unrighteousness and cruelty, but
+has also urged the people to do all they can, both constitutionally
+and otherwise, to defeat and overthrow it and to establish a native
+rule upon its ruin. Any government, in order to ignore such language
+uttered in immense public assemblies, must feel very secure in its
+power. Mr. Pal is only one of many who have thus far been granted
+absolute freedom to sow broadcast the seed of revolution.
+
+
+III
+
+What is there in the recent condition of the country and of the
+people, which warrants this unrest and discontent?
+
+Disinterested persons will not say that the State is unprogressive or
+is administering its affairs unwisely. In its recent Annual Financial
+Statement we discover evidences of prosperity in all departments of
+State. There is no extensive famine to distress the people and harass
+the government. The revenue of the year exceeds, by nearly 30 million
+rupees, the estimates; there was a surplus at the end of the year of
+20 million rupees. Owing to this the government has reduced the opium
+cultivation, which has wrought, for many years, so much injustice to
+China. It has also increased postal facilities, which renders them
+cheaper and more convenient than in any other land. Moreover, the
+obnoxious salt tax has been reduced by 50 per cent; and it is hoped
+that the whole tax will be remitted shortly. The grant for education
+is also much enhanced beyond any former year, and the State is even
+planning for the introduction of a Free Primary Education, which will
+be an unspeakable boon to the people.
+
+And when it is said that taxation in India has been reduced, we should
+also remember that in this land "the taxation per head is lighter than
+in any other civilized country in the world. In Russia, it is eight
+times as great; in England, twenty times; in Italy, nineteen; in
+France, twenty-five; in the United States and Germany, thirteen
+times." In other words, taxation in India comes to only one dollar, or
+three rupees, per head.
+
+But it is claimed that India is a land of deepest poverty. This is
+perfectly true. But it is not true that her poverty is increasing. The
+Parsee Chairman of the Bombay Stock Exchange, in his last annual
+address, said that "it was the conviction of merchants, bankers,
+tradesmen, and captains of industry that India is slowly but steadily
+advancing along paths of material prosperity, and for the last few
+years it has taken an accelerated pace." The poverty of the people is
+a very convenient slogan of the political party; but there is
+everything to prove that the condition of the people, deplorable
+though it be, is, nevertheless, slowly improving.
+
+The State is, moreover, constantly yielding to the growing demand of
+the people for a larger share in the conduct of public business and in
+the emoluments of office. Even at the present time the Secretary of
+State for India has introduced a scheme, at the instance of the
+government, which will add materially to the power of India in the
+conduct of its own affairs.
+
+The British were never more firmly entrenched and possessed of more
+power in India than at the present time. The lesson of the Mutiny, of
+a half-a-century ago, was not lost upon the administrators of India.
+Since then, no Indian regiment can be stationed within a thousand
+miles of its own home, and thus be able to enter into collusion with
+the people. And the artillery branch of the army is entirely in the
+hands of the British force. Moreover, as we have seen, the Mohammedans
+and the Sikhs are loyal to the government, and would stand with the
+British against the Hindus in any conflict of arms.
+
+The Hindus themselves realize this situation perfectly well. One of
+the best-known Hindu gentlemen recently wrote as follows: "The truth
+is in a nutshell and may be described in a few words. The British
+cannot be driven out of India by the Indians, nor by any foreign
+Power. This fact is known to more than 90 per cent of the people. Of
+all the foreigners, the British are the best. We, as we are now, are
+the least able to govern India, being not equal to the worst and
+weakest foreign Power."
+
+The best class of Hindus are not only sensible of their own weakness,
+from a military standpoint; they are also dissatisfied with the action
+of extremists and believe that the present unrest is evil. A
+well-known Hindu writer describes the situation in the following
+words: "The class of people the Indian Extremists appeal to, consists
+of irresponsible and impressionable students and the ignorant
+populace; and the agitator, who is thoroughly cognizant of this fact,
+uses it for his purposes. He appeals to their feelings, and succeeds
+in making them believe in the soundness of his fallacies and
+mischievous preachings. The authorities have therefore to see that
+this class of people is protected from the insidious appeals of
+mischievous pseudo-patriots. After over a century of beneficent
+British rule in India, it is scarcely necessary to attempt to justify
+its existence or continuance. At the same time, it has to be
+recognized that discontent prevails among the people; though, speaking
+generally, it does not by any means partake of the character of
+disaffection or disloyalty. Discontent is by no means inconsistent
+with loyalty to government. On the other hand, it may even be said,
+with a certain degree of truth, that the deep-rooted and abiding sense
+of loyalty in the people has engendered the spirit of discontent, the
+healthy discontent with their lot."
+
+It should also be remembered that the Hindu caste system is an
+insuperable barrier to the progress of the people toward independence.
+The unity of the Mohammedans of India, who are only one-fifth of the
+population, is in healthful contrast to the myriad caste divisions and
+social barriers which separate Hindus one from another. One must be
+compelled to deny the sincerity of many who claim that this people is
+a nation which prides itself upon its patriotism, so long as the caste
+system dominates them and their ideas. The only tie which binds
+together these people is the spirit of opposition to this foreign
+government. Among the classes and the masses there is absolutely no
+coherence or unity of sentiment in any line of constructive activity.
+So that in the matter of self-government they would prove themselves
+to be sadly incompetent.
+
+
+IV
+
+The action of the Indian government, in view of the present situation,
+has been the subject of criticism. Anglo-Indians feel that the Viceroy
+and his Council have, for some reason or other, been too deliberate in
+their action. For two years things have been going from bad to worse.
+When, recently, Sir Bampfylde Fuller, the Lieutenant-Governor of East
+Bengal, took prompt and vigorous action to suppress the uprising in
+his Province, which was the centre of trouble, the Indian government
+declined to support him. He therefore resigned, and India lost one of
+the men who are the most competent to deal wisely and well with
+sedition-mongers. The State may have thought, and was probably right
+in thinking, that while the Bengal Babu is capable of unlimited noise,
+he has a mortal aversion to converting his noise into action. So the
+government preferred patiently to endure odium rather than suppress
+the movement.
+
+It was different in the Panjaub, whose people are less talkative, but
+are more given to action. These warrior tribes were being rapidly
+disaffected by political agitators; and they doubtless had definite
+grievances of their own to agitate them. The time came when government
+was compelled to do something to suppress the rising tide of feeling.
+It decided to act upon a law of nearly a century ago, and deported two
+of the leaders of the movement. They were at once sent to Burma, where
+they were held in surveillance for six months and then released. This
+action of the State was effective; for it quieted the people and
+nipped what promised to be a rebellion, in the bud. But it raised a
+storm of denunciation from all the Hindu papers, which spoke of it as
+a violation of the Queen's Proclamation and an act subversive of the
+most sacred rights of the people of the country and of the most
+elementary form of justice! One writer claims that "the meanest
+British subject is entitled to a writ of _Habeas Corpus_, and thus
+secure an effective protection against arbitrary imprisonment and
+arrest by the government." This is certainly true in ordinary times of
+peace; but the government had every reason to believe that the state
+of things in the Panjaub was anything but peaceable, and that it must
+act in view of the extraordinary condition of the Province. And its
+method of procedure has proved itself to be the most bloodless and
+inexpensive possible. It has been claimed that the chief deported man,
+Mr. Lala Rajpat Rai, is not an extremist; but this has to be proved,
+and it may be presumed that the government was more conversant with
+his acts and their influence upon the people, and the native army,
+than some of his defenders are. All must regret the necessity of so
+unconstitutional a method of dealing with this great evil; but when
+such a man as the Hon. Mr. Morley, the Secretary of State for India,
+agrees with the Indian government in this matter, it may be presumed
+to have been necessary.
+
+The government has also proclaimed and prohibited the assembling
+together of the people for political purposes in the most disaffected
+parts of the country, and more especially where the Hindus and
+Mohammedans are fighting each other. None can question the wisdom of
+thus saving the people from bitter feuds and the power of agitators.
+
+Another very important action of the State has been to warn the
+students of the Universities against participating in political
+agitation, and to threaten the withdrawal of affiliation from
+institutions of learning in which political agitation is encouraged.
+Nobody will dispute the wisdom of this action; for the school-boys of
+India seem as disloyal as they are irresponsible, and are the most
+pliant tools of radical demagogues.
+
+The Press also is receiving the attention of the government. The
+vernacular Press is in special need of being taught the lesson of its
+responsibility to the people and to the State. And the best elements
+of the community, both Anglo-Indian and Indian, believe heartily that
+editors and proprietors of papers should be brought to account for
+their seditious utterances.
+
+
+V
+
+Many are now asking, "How shall this trouble be removed and peace and
+good-will be restored to the land?"
+
+Nothing is more necessary than the cultivation of mutual understanding
+between the two races. It is very unfortunate that, in this matter,
+the situation has not improved during the last quarter of a century.
+Indeed, the racial problem is more acute now, as it is in America,
+than it was ever before. All seem too ready to accept, as conclusive,
+the statement of Kipling,--
+
+ "O! the East is East and the West is West,
+ And never the twain shall meet,
+ Till earth and sky stand presently
+ Before God's great judgment seat."
+
+And they too easily ignore the other part which conveys his lesson,--
+
+ "But there is neither East nor West,
+ Nor border, nor breed, nor birth,
+ Where two strong men stand face to face,
+ Though they come from the ends of the earth."
+
+The parties concerned in India to-day must learn the lesson of mutual
+forbearance and study to understand each other's peculiarities and
+enter more fully into each other's thoughts, sentiments, and
+idiosyncrasies.
+
+The Anglo-Indian stands most in need of this lesson of aptitude. The
+Anglo-Saxon is notoriously conceited and given to thinking that he has
+nothing to learn from other people, especially those who are
+politically subject to him. He looks with contempt upon the "mild
+Hindu," and maintains that it is the business of Brahman and Sudra
+alike meekly to submit to, and obey, his lordship. He tramples upon
+their sensibilities and declines to learn any lessons of wisdom from
+them. On the other hand, Brahman and Sudra have ineradicable
+prejudices, which they nurse with extraordinary fondness and cherish
+with unyielding tenacity. The leader of this people, the Brahman, is,
+in his way, even more haughty than the Anglo-Indian.
+
+This situation is full of difficulty. Here we have two races, the
+Aryan of the East and the Aryan of the West, standing face to face.
+Each in its way claims dominance. The Westerner claims superiority by
+right of conquest and of advanced civilization and general progress.
+And he is not backward in presenting his vaunted claims! The
+Easterner, on the other hand, has ruled India by right of intelligence
+and by every claim of social and religious distinction, for at least
+thirty centuries. He stands to-day a match for any individual, East or
+West, in intellectual prowess. But, more than this, socially and
+religiously he regards himself as the first son of heaven. Contact
+with an Englishman, even with the King-Emperor himself, is for him
+pollution, which must be removed by elaborate and exacting religious
+ceremonies. To eat with any such would be a sin of the deepest dye.
+How can one expect such a man to meet with a foreigner on even terms,
+or to treat him with equality and true friendship? Before India loves
+its conquerors, and sympathy and good understanding are established
+between them, both parties need to be born again. At least they must
+endeavour to lay aside their prejudices and to cultivate the kinship
+of their united destiny. The writer recently listened to an eloquent
+address delivered by a cultured Hindu gentleman, in which he implored
+Anglo-Indians to cultivate their friendship and to forget the
+different shades of their complexion. The prejudice of colour is, he
+maintains, as strong in India as it is in America, and is perhaps more
+bitter than ever. A man, said he truly, should not be condemned by his
+brother because of his slightly different shade of colour, which is
+only skin deep.
+
+It is also certain that Great Britain should and must give to the
+inhabitants of this land more influence and higher position in the
+direction of the affairs of the State. After a training of more than a
+century by England herself, India is prepared for a larger place in
+the direction of her own political destiny. Western civilization,
+western education, and the Christian religion have wrought wonders in
+India in the development of a new life and a new consciousness among
+many of the people. There are thousands of men, to-day, who are in
+every way competent to occupy high positions in government. And it is
+impossible that they should be kept loyal and contented under a regime
+which constantly reminds them of their subjection and their lack of
+worthiness to fill any but subordinate positions. It is true, as we
+have seen, that government is extending the privileges and multiplying
+the opportunities of such men. But it is not doing this with the
+pace, the grace, and the heartiness that circumstances demand.
+
+On the other hand, Indians must seek, increasingly, to cultivate
+social and moral aptitude, rather than to be forever claiming and
+demanding rights. The best friends of India believe that she has just
+as many political rights as she is able wisely to exercise.
+Representative Institutions have already been established here both in
+the conduct of Municipalities, District Boards, and of the Provincial
+and the Imperial Governments. The people are being trained for the
+wisest exercise of political rights. But many who have carefully
+observed the political corruption which they reveal in the exercise of
+already acquired rights, think that no greater evil could befall India
+than that of a sudden bestowal, by the State, of a great extension of
+these privileges.
+
+The root of India's present incapacity for self-government is not
+intellectual, but social and moral. No one doubts that there is
+ability enough; but many believe that India must develop much upon the
+lower ranges of domestic sanity and social ethics before it is
+prepared for enhanced political privileges. The ignorance and the
+disabilities of women in India are a crying injustice, whose influence
+penetrates every department of Indian life, and for the removal of
+which educated Indians will hardly raise a finger.
+
+The caste system, with its numberless stereotyped divisions, its
+myriad insurmountable barriers between class and class, and its
+countless petty jealousies and mutual antagonisms, is well known to
+all. And so long as Hindus continue to worship this demon, caste, it
+is impossible for them to become a united body to which, with any
+courtesy, the name Nation can be applied. Nor can they blend into such
+action as can in any sense be called National or patriotic. India is
+wofully lacking in the first essential of self-government--public
+spirit.
+
+In other words, the most urgent need of India at present is social
+reform, which depends entirely upon the people, and not political
+reform, which must come from the State. And yet the social reform
+movement in India is less rapid to-day than at any time during the
+last quarter of a century. And those who cry loudest for political
+rights are the ones who cast a sinister eye upon the social reform
+movement.
+
+And it must be remembered that the people who cry most loudly for
+national independence to-day are the very ones whose antecedents and
+whose fundamental conceptions of life and of society would forbid
+them to grant even the most elementary social, not to say political,
+rights to one-half of the population of the land. The way the Brahman
+and the higher Sudras, who are clamouring for what they regard
+God-given rights from the British government, deny in principle and
+practice, to their fellow-citizens, the so-called outcasts and other
+members of the community, the most elementary principles of liberty
+and privilege which they themselves now enjoy, is a significant
+comment upon their political sanity and sense of congruity.
+
+In connection with this same problem, Indians should not forget that
+in the multiplicity of antipathies which exist between the many races
+of India, and in the religious conflicts, which too often arise, there
+is need, and there will be need for many years, of one supreme power
+which has the ability to hold the balance of justice evenly between
+race and race, and to command social and religious liberty to the
+three hundred millions of the land. And this is what Great Britain has
+done and is doing for India. _Pax Britannica_ has been one of the
+greatest boons that the West has conferred upon the East.
+
+It may also be well to add that Indians should have regard to the
+limits of the rights of a subject people. It is useless to talk of
+self-government, until they are able to exercise the same; and even
+the most rabid Hindu cannot dream that India is ripe for
+self-government and could maintain it for a month if the British were
+to leave the country. And if the British must remain here at all, it
+must be as the dominant power. Canada and Australia, in their
+independence, may be ideals for India to pattern after; but India
+cannot enjoy the rights of those two independent colonies until her
+character becomes as steady, her ideas of liberty and her practice of
+social equality and her conception of human rights become as
+clarified, as they are in those two countries.
+
+The recent proposal of the Government of India to enlarge the
+Legislative Councils and to create an Imperial Advisory Council
+reveals the purpose of the State to grant to the people all that is
+consistent with the paramountcy of the British in India. But it is
+this very paramountcy which the extremists deny to Great Britain.
+Herein lies the gist of the trouble. It will erelong create a serious
+_impasse_.
+
+Great Britain cannot remain in this land and efface herself. At the
+same time, when India is prepared for absolute self-government, she
+will receive the blessing, and Great Britain will leave the land with
+a blessed consciousness that she has wrought for India the greatest
+blessing and the noblest achievement that any people has wrought for
+another and a foreign people in all the history of the world. And
+until that time comes, both India and Great Britain need to thank God
+that He has so strangely blended together their destinies for the
+highest elevation of both races.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE HOME OF MANY FAITHS
+
+
+The land of the Vedas justly boasts of being the mother, or the
+foster-mother, of nine great religions.
+
+It has given birth to the greatest ethnic religion the world has seen;
+it is also the motherland of one of the three great missionary faiths
+of the world. These two religions--Hinduism and Buddhism--count among
+their followers more than a third of the human race, and are, in some
+respects, as vigorous now as at any time in their history.
+
+It is the foster-mother of Mohammedanism and counts among her sons and
+daughters more of the followers of the Prophet of Mecca than are found
+in any other land.
+
+It has also been the asylum of many followers of the Nazarene for at
+least sixteen centuries; many even claim that Christianity has found a
+home here since apostolic days.
+
+There is no land comparable with India in the variegated expressions
+of its beliefs which add picturesqueness to the country and diversity
+to the people.
+
+I purpose to take the reader with me on a tour with a view to
+furnishing glimpses of these religions at those places where they
+reveal special interest to the tourist.[1]
+
+[Footnote 1: The principal faiths of the land, with their adherents,
+were as follows, according to census of 1901:--
+
+Hindu 207,147,026
+
+Sikh 2,195,339
+
+Jain 1,334,148
+
+Buddhist 9,476,759
+
+Parsee 94,190
+
+Mohammedan 62,458,077
+
+Jewish 18,228
+
+Christian 2,923,241
+
+These figures include Burma.]
+
+India is a land of immense distances. But its thirty thousand miles of
+railroad will enable the traveller, within a couple of months, to scan
+all its points of interest, and to feast his eyes upon visions of
+Oriental charm and splendour, of architectural beauty and grandeur,
+and of such monuments of religious devotion as no other land can
+present to the traveller and student.
+
+Let not the Westerner indulge his fears about the discomforts and
+dangers of travel in this tropical land. To an English-speaking
+tourist there are a few lands only which furnish more conveniences and
+facilities for travel than this same India; and travelling is cheaper
+here than in any other country. Comfortable second-class travelling
+rarely costs more than one cent a mile. And many, like the writer,
+have travelled thousands of miles in third-class compartments at less
+than half a cent a mile, and without much other inconvenience than an
+excess of dust and stiffened bones. The writer has seen many
+globe-trotters pass through India of whom few were not surprised at
+the relative comforts of travel here during the winter months, and no
+other time of the year should be chosen for travelling in India.
+
+It will be convenient to start upon our tour from Madura, the
+missionary home of the writer. It is a large, wide-awake centre of
+enthusiastic Hinduism in the extreme south of the peninsula. In the
+heart of this town, of more than a hundred thousand people, stands its
+great temple, dedicated to Siva. The principal monuments of South
+India are its temples. They are the largest temples in the world. The
+Madura temple is only the third in size; but in its upkeep and
+architectural beauty it far surpasses the other two, which are larger.
+It covers an area of fifteen acres, and its many _Gopuras_, or
+towers, furnish the landmark of the country for miles around. It is
+erected almost entirely of granite blocks, some of which are sixty
+feet long. Its monolithic carving is exquisitely fine, as it is most
+abundant and elaborate. Hinduism may be moribund; but this temple
+gives only intimation of life and prosperity as one gazes upon its
+elaborate ritual, and sees the thousands passing daily into its shrine
+for worship. It represents the highest form of Hindu architecture,
+and, like almost all else that is Hindu, its history carries us to the
+dim distance of the past. But the great Tirumalai Nayak, the king of
+two and a half centuries ago, spent more in its elaboration than any
+one else. And it was he who built, half a mile away, the great palace
+which, though much reduced, still stands as the noblest edifice of its
+kind south of a line drawn from Bombay to Calcutta.
+
+In this same temple we find, transformed, another cult. It is called
+the Temple of Meenatchi, after its presiding goddess, "the Fish-eyed
+One." When Brahmanism reached Madura, many centuries ago, Meenatchi
+was the principal demoness worshipped by the people, who were all
+devil-worshippers. As was their wont, the Brahmans did not antagonize
+the old faith of the people, but absorbed it by marrying Meenatchi to
+their chief god Siva, and thus incorporated the primitive
+devil-worship into the Brahmanical religion. Thus the Hinduism of
+Madura and of all South India is Brahmanism _plus_ devil-worship. And
+the people are to-day much more absorbed in pacifying the devils which
+infest every village than they are in worshipping purely Hindu
+deities.
+
+The prevailing faith of the Dravidians, therefore, is demonolatry; and
+the myriad shrines in the villages and hamlets, and the daily rites
+conducted in them, attest the universal prevalence of this belief and
+the great place it has in the life of these so-called Hindus.
+
+A run of a hundred and fifty miles directly south brings us to Cape
+Comorin, the southernmost point of India. It is also the extreme south
+of Travancore, "the Land of Charity," and one of the richest and most
+charming sections of India. It is a Native State under the control of
+the Brahmans.
+
+[Illustration: THE GOLDEN LILY TANK IN THE MADURA TEMPLE]
+
+It is unique in the large proportion of Christians which are among its
+inhabitants. Though the Christian community in India averages only one
+per cent of the population, in the State of Travancore it amounts to
+25 per cent. It is here that we find the ancient Syrian Church, with
+its three hundred and fifty thousand souls. Though it calls itself
+"the Thomasian, Apostolic Church," and though the Romish Church
+accepts the legend, modern historians deny its apostolic origin, and
+claim that it was founded no earlier than the third century. Even
+thus, it furnishes an intensely interesting study. The writer was
+deeply interested to see and enter its two churches at Kottayam, both
+of which are at least eight hundred years old.
+
+Four centuries ago, Roman Catholicism used all the resources of the
+Inquisition in order to absorb this Church. They succeeded only too
+well, and half of the Indian Syrian Church is now subject to Rome.
+Nearly a century ago, the Church Missionary Society of England lent a
+helping hand to the Syrian Church, and has brought new life and
+progressive energy, and a new spiritual power and ambition, into a
+portion of that decrepit type of ancient Christianity.
+
+Furthermore, a century of work given by the London Missionary Society
+and the Church Missionary Society has created a Protestant Christian
+community of more than one hundred thousand souls in that little
+kingdom alone.
+
+We pass from Travancore into the little State of Cochin, on the
+north. We are impressed by the colossal Christian church in the town
+of Cochin, in which, however, only a small handful of English people
+worship every Sunday evening. It was erected by the Portuguese four
+centuries ago, and is a charming study. It is here, shortly after
+Vasco da Gama had completed the first round-the-Cape journey, that
+this house of God was erected by his followers. Two centuries later,
+the Dutch came, conquered the Portuguese, occupied their house of
+worship, and desecrated their tombs. In that church to-day one can
+find tombstones inscribed on one side by the Portuguese to their
+departed friends, and, on the other side, in Dutch, to commemorate
+departed Hollanders.
+
+But the most interesting sight, by far, in this quiet old Indian town,
+is the community of white Jews who live on its southern side. No one
+knows when they came here. They probably arrived at the Dispersion of
+the first century of our era; or it may be later. But the community
+must have been reenforced from time to time, as they have maintained,
+in a marvellous way, the fairness of their complexion. It will not
+require much imagination, as one enters their synagogue, to think of
+the synagogue of Nazareth of old. As we ascend the stair-way into the
+little schoolroom above, and hear the little ones reciting, in pure
+Hebrew, passages from the Pentateuch, we can easily imagine that we
+are listening to the voice of a dear little Boy, nineteen centuries
+ago, reciting to His master those same passages in that same tongue in
+Palestine. There is hardly a place on earth where Judaism has met with
+fewer vicissitudes and changes than on this western coast of India.
+
+It is only a couple of hundred yards farther away that we find the
+synagogue of the black Jews--the descendants of those who were given
+by the ancient king to be slaves to the white Jews. They adopted the
+religion of their masters, and are still praying, like their masters,
+for the coming of the Messiah, of whose arrival and triumphs in India
+they seem to be oblivious.
+
+Leaving Cochin, we pass along the coast as far as Bombay, which has
+been called the "Eye of India," and also the "Gateway of India," two
+names which are equally appropriate to this beautiful city. There is
+hardly another city on earth where more races and religions blend. And
+its streets are made exceedingly picturesque by the many costumes of
+its polyglot population. Before the arrival of the plague, some eight
+years ago, Bombay was perhaps the most populous city in India. But
+this fell scourge has decimated its population and has robbed it of
+much of its ambition.
+
+Perhaps the most interesting people that we see here are the Parsees,
+with their "Towers of Silence." According to their belief, earth is
+too sacred to be contaminated, and fire too divine to be polluted, by
+the bodies of their dead, which, therefore, they expose in the towers,
+erected upon an adjacent hill, to be consumed by a crowd of hungry,
+expectant vultures. One usually sees forty or fifty of these filthy
+birds standing around the edge of each tower, watching the funeral
+cortege as it slowly winds its way up the hill, eager to pounce upon
+the body as soon as exposed by the bearers in the centre within. And
+from the time of exposure it takes hardly ten minutes before every
+particle of flesh has been consumed.
+
+The one hundred thousand Parsees of Bombay are almost the only
+representatives of the ancient faith of Zoroaster, perhaps the purest
+of all ethnic religions. They were driven out of their home land of
+Persia in the early onrush of Mohammedan fury, and fled, twelve
+centuries ago, to India, where they found asylum.
+
+The Parsees have the distinction of being the most advanced people of
+India, alike in wealth and philanthropy, in their treatment of woman,
+and in education and general culture. Their influence throughout the
+land is far beyond their numbers. And yet they are so narrow in their
+conception of their faith, that they declined, the other day, to
+receive into their fold the English bride of one of their number. Thus
+they decided that there is no door of entrance into their religion for
+any one who is not a born Parsee.
+
+It is in this city, also, that we find a large representation of
+another ancient cult--Jainism.
+
+Jainism is closely kin to Buddhism. It represents the same type of
+reaction from a debased Brahmanism. As its name indicates, it is a
+cult for the worship of "The Victorious Ones," that is, men who by
+self-discipline have triumphed over their passions and have attained
+perfection. Buddhism succumbed to, and was absorbed by, a new militant
+Brahmanism, which we call Hinduism. Jainism, on the other hand, has
+maintained itself as a distinct faith and now has 1,334,148 followers.
+Like Buddhism, it is an agnostic religion, knowing no object of
+worship save the seventy-two Victorious Ones.
+
+One of the leading characteristics of Jainism is its love of life,
+even in its lowest manifestation. Their devotion to this article of
+their faith is carried to such an extent that the devout will sweep
+the road lest they step upon insects, and cover their mouth with gauze
+cloth lest they swallow and destroy minute forms of life. In the city
+of Bombay, Jains have a hospital for animals, for the maintenance of
+which they spend large sums of money annually. Maimed cattle, stray
+dogs and cats, and decrepit animals of all kinds are sought and
+brought here for asylum and care. It is even said, I cannot say with
+how much truth, that they employ men to come and spend nights here
+with a view to furnishing food for the many kinds of vermin which
+infest the place.
+
+[Illustration: TAJ MAHAL, AGRA]
+
+In a sumptuous through train we now pass rapidly over nearly one
+thousand miles of a country which is intensely interesting,
+historically and ethnologically, and finally arrive in the famous city
+of Agra, which stands supreme among Indian cities as a centre of
+architectural beauty. We have here come into a distinctively
+Mohammedan region; and the edifices which crown the city with glory
+are not only connected with the Mohammedan faith, they are also the
+masterpieces of the greatest minds of the Mogul Empire, and culminate
+in the Taj Mahal, which is the most valued gem of Mohammedan
+architecture, and, perhaps, the most beautiful edifice in the world.
+We first turn our face toward the Fort, which is one of the
+magnificent fortresses of India. Two and a half centuries ago, Shah
+Jehan was the ruling Mogul. He was not only one of the greatest rulers
+of the dynasty; he had also a passion for building, and was a man of
+rare taste as an architect. The Agra Fort, whose stern walls of red
+sandstone extend about a mile and a half, represents to us, at
+present, not strength and protection, but an enclosure within which
+the emperor built his great palace, which is a marvel of beauty and of
+superb architectural workmanship. The most attractive of the many
+parts of this palace is the Pearl Mosque, which "owes its charm to its
+perfect proportions, its harmony of designs, and its beauty of
+material, rather than to richness of decoration and ornament. In
+design it is similar to most temples of this kind; a court-yard with a
+fountain in the middle, surrounded on three sides by arcaded
+cloisters; while on the entrance side and that facing it are
+exquisitely chaste marble screens." "Into the fair body of the India
+marble the Moguls could work designs and arabesques borrowed from the
+Persia of ancient history, and flowers of exquisite hue and symmetry
+suggested by the more advanced and civilized Florentine artists, who
+were tempted over by the well-filled coffers of Shah Jehan." As the
+Pearl Mosque was a part of the palace, it was only used by the royal
+court. Days of pleasure and improvement could be spent in the study of
+the various parts which have been preserved of this ancient palace.
+But we pass on a few miles to the Taj Mahal, which, like most of the
+best buildings of Mohammedan art in North India, is a mausoleum and
+was erected by Shah Jehan to his favourite wife, Mumtaz-i-Mahal. The
+Taj is erected in a beautiful garden, the gateway into which is
+perhaps the finest in India and is "a worthy pendant to the Taj
+itself." The garden is exquisitely laid out, with a view to setting
+off the unspeakable charms of that "dream of loveliness embodied in
+white marble." The Taj has well been described as a work "conceived by
+Titans and finished by jewellers." The grandeur of the conception and
+the wonderful delicacy of the workmanship cannot fail to impress even
+the most unlearned in the architectural art. Much has been written,
+and all in unstinted praise, of this incomparable edifice; and yet,
+like the writer, every visitor comes to its presence, feels the
+growing thrill of its beauty, and exclaims, "The half was never told!"
+And few leave the place without returning to be enthralled once more
+by a moonlight view of this thing of beauty. How great, indeed, must
+have been the love of that otherwise cruel monarch for his departed
+empress that he should have exhausted so much of wealth (some say that
+the Taj cost thirty million rupees) and conceived so much of beauty
+wherewith to embalm her memory. And as we enter the mausoleum and
+stand in the presence of the lovely shrines which it encases,--that of
+Mumtaz-i-Mahal, and that of the emperor himself,--the mind is awed and
+may find expression in Sir Edwin Arnold's poetic fancy,--
+
+ "Here in the heart of all,
+ With chapels girdled, shut apart by screens,
+ The shrine's self stands, white, delicately white,
+ White as the cheek of Mumtaz-i-Mahal,
+ When Shah Jehan let fall a king's tear there.
+ White as the breast her new babe vainly pressed
+ That ill day in the camp at Burhanpur,
+ The fair shrine stands, guarding two cenotaphs."
+
+[Illustration: MARBLE SCREEN IN TAJ MAHAL]
+
+And upon a panel of his own shrine the mourning emperor had inscribed
+these significant words from ancient traditions: "Saith Jesus, on whom
+peace be, this world is a bridge. Pass thou over it, but build not
+upon. This world is one hour; give its minutes to thy prayers, for the
+rest is unseen."
+
+We cannot but feel that the Taj is the highest expression of art that
+human affection and domestic affliction have ever achieved. This is
+not religion; but it is closely kin to it.
+
+Not far from the Fort is found another great mosque, or _musjid_,
+where the Mohammedans crowd for worship. This, also, is a wonderful
+specimen of art, and in its combination of simplicity and beauty is
+well calculated to rouse to enthusiasm the many worshippers of Allah.
+
+About six miles away from Agra is another specimen of architectural
+genius. It is the tomb of Akbar the Great. Some believe it to be
+almost equal to the Taj. It commemorates with great beauty the noble
+name of that most distinguished man of the whole Mogul dynasty,--a man
+who was famed for his breadth of view and sympathy, his wise
+statesmanship, and religious tolerance. He did more than any other to
+create sympathy between Hindus and Mohammedans. It was in this
+mausoleum that the famous Kohinor diamond found its place and was
+exhibited for years. It is a striking fact that this precious stone
+was undisturbed there, in the open air, for over seventy years,
+until the Shah of Persia, in 1739, invaded India and sacked the palace
+of the Moguls, and, with other fabulous wealth, carried this diamond
+also back to his own country.
+
+[Illustration: SHAH JEHAN'S FORT, AGRA]
+
+Delhi is only a few hours' ride to the north from Agra. It is perhaps
+the most interesting city in all India. From the earliest times of
+Brahmanic legends down to the present, it has been the centre of war
+and conflict, of royal display, extravagance, and treachery. Here,
+again, Mohammedanism has, from the first, exercised its power and
+revealed its religious warmth and enthusiasm. The Mohammedan mosques
+are equal to any in the land. And though the Persian sacked the city a
+hundred and seventy years ago, and robbed it of most that was
+beautiful and valuable, there still remains a part of what was
+probably the loveliest palace that was ever erected. It reveals to us
+also "the imperial grandeur of the Moguls, whose style of living was
+probably more splendid than that of any monarchs of any nation before
+or since that time. Their extravagance was unbounded. Their love of
+display has never been surpassed." It is claimed that the Peacock
+Throne of this Delhi Palace was of sufficient value to pay the debts
+of a nation. The marble walls are richly adorned with exquisite
+mosaics. Indeed, they are regarded as incomparable specimens of the
+art. One can pardon the builder who engraved over the north and south
+entrances to this palace of the Moguls the following lines:--
+
+ "If there be a Paradise on Earth,
+ It is This! It is This! It is This!"
+
+Eleven miles from the city are found splendid ruins which are crowned
+by the celebrated tower known as Kutab-minar, which is another of the
+most ancient and interesting monuments of India. Originally, this
+remarkable structure was a Hindu temple, and was erected probably in
+the fourth century of our era. But upon the invasion of the Mussulmans
+the temple was converted into a Mohammedan mosque, and the famous
+tower, which is 238 feet high, and is one of the most beautifully
+erected in the world, was allowed to stand. "The sculptures that cover
+its surface have been compared to those upon the column of Trajan in
+Rome and the Column Vendome in Paris; but they are intended to relate
+the military triumphs of the men in whose honour they were erected,
+while the inscription on the Kutab-minar is a continuous recognition
+of the power and glory of God and of the virtues of Mohammed, his
+Prophet."
+
+[Illustration: AKBAR'S TOMB]
+
+It is in this city that one is impressed most thoroughly with
+memorials of the great Mutiny of half a century ago, where the British
+were so hard pushed and suffered so terribly in those days of
+bitterness which tried men's souls. And there is no memorial of this
+bitter struggle, to which the British refer with so much of pride and
+glory, as they do to the Cashmere gate, which they blew up and thereby
+forced an entrance into the city, with a loss of much precious blood.
+
+But it was not the Mutiny nor the massive and gorgeous emblems of
+Mohammedanism which impressed the writer most in this city. It was a
+vision just outside the walls of the city--a vision of great
+simplicity--which thrilled his heart a few years ago. It was a very
+unattractive little ruined tower, from the centre of which rose a
+polished granite pillar, some thirty or forty feet high. It was
+inscribed from top to bottom, and the inscription was quite legible.
+It spoke not of the triumphs of war nor of the glory of human rule and
+conquest. It is one of the most eloquent testimonies to the nobility
+of the Buddhist faith. It was carried here only a few centuries ago by
+an enlightened Mohammedan monarch from the far-off plains of the
+north. It is one of the celebrated "Asoka Pillars." Asoka was the
+emperor of twenty-two centuries ago who wrought for Buddhism what
+Constantine the Great, at a later day, wrought for Christianity. He
+was converted to Buddhism and at once became the devout propagator of
+that faith. As the great emperor of his time, he exalted Buddhism and
+made it the State religion of India. He not only sent his missionaries
+all over the land; he decreed that its principal teachings should be
+everywhere inscribed upon rocks and upon pillars; and that these
+pillars should be erected in public places for the instruction of the
+people. This pillar in Delhi is one of about a dozen already
+discovered and preserved in North India. And it is, perhaps, the most
+fully inscribed of all that have been found. And of the fourteen
+Asokan edicts inscribed, most of them inculcate a high morality, and
+some of them a noble altruism. For instance, the first is a
+prohibition of the slaughter of animals for food or sacrifice. The
+second is the provision for medical aid for men and animals, and for
+plantations and wells on the roadside. The third is a command to
+observe every fifth year as a year of mutual confession of sins, of
+peace-making, and of humiliation. The ninth is the inculcation of true
+happiness as found in virtue. In all these inscribed edicts of that
+most tolerant and cosmopolitan Buddhist emperor, we see nothing of
+which Buddhism should be ashamed, and much of which it may be proud,
+in the way of ethical injunction. It is more than ten centuries since
+Buddhism, which had been the common faith of India for a thousand
+years, was absorbed into a new militant Hinduism and ceased to exist
+as a separate faith in this land. To-day, India proper has hardly half
+a million Buddhists. And yet we behold these mute prophets of far-off
+days scattered in many parts of the land, still pressing their
+message, but vainly, indeed, upon a people of unknown tongues. Buddha
+himself is now a part of the Hindu Pantheon; and his principal
+teachings have become an essential part of the faith which he tried to
+overthrow. But these pillars stand for Buddhism that was tolerant
+toward all save, perhaps, the Brahmanism which it existed to
+overthrow.
+
+[Illustration: KUTAB-MINAR, DELHI]
+
+From Delhi we pass on northward to the beautiful city of Amritsar,
+which is comparatively a modern town of one hundred and fifty thousand
+people. In the heart of this town stands the far-famed Golden Temple
+of the Sikhs, built by Ranjit Singh,--"The Lion of the Panjaub." The
+temple is not a large one, being only fifty-three feet square, and is
+built in the centre of a water tank, called "The Pool of
+Immortality." The peculiar external feature of the temple is that it
+is largely covered with gold plate; hence its name. It is a beautiful
+object to behold; and we are in haste to take off our shoes, which are
+prohibited in the sacred precincts, and to put on the shapeless holy
+slippers presented to us! We enjoy perfect freedom in passing through
+all parts of the temple, while devotees, under the guidance of the
+priests, sing their songs of praise with devout impartiality to their
+god and to their bible.
+
+The temple is the centre and inspiration of the Sikh religion. The
+Sikhs are an interesting people. They rallied round one of the
+multitude of the Hindu religious reformers, named Nanak Shah, who
+established this cult about the end of the fifteenth century. It may
+be called an amalgam of Mohammedanism and Hinduism. It unites the
+monotheism and the stern morality of the former with much of the petty
+ritual of the latter. It does not observe caste. Still, in outer
+matters of observances, Sikhs are not easily distinguishable from
+ordinary Hindus. They, also, have bound themselves into a military
+order, which gives them almost the distinction of a nation. For this
+reason they are among the very best material which the country
+furnishes for the native army, and are worthy to stand shoulder to
+shoulder with European soldiers.
+
+[Illustration: CASHMERE GATE, DELHI]
+
+This religion is peculiarly a _book_ religion. It has degenerated into
+a species of bibliolatry. Their bible contains the teachings and
+sermons of the founder of the faith; and it presents the highest
+standard of morality and courage, and appeals with special power to
+this sturdy tribe of the north. This book is called "Granth," and is
+generally spoken of as "Granth Sahib," which we may translate as "Mr.
+Book"! That is, they give it a dignity and a personality which is
+unique in any faith; and the Golden Temple is largely used as the
+receptacle of the "Granth," of which they keep a few copies protected
+by covers, which, however, they remove in order to show them to us as
+we pass by.
+
+In several particulars this faith is unique. They have no idols or
+altars, but meet once a week for prayer and praise. Their preacher
+reads passages from the "Granth" and prays to their god, who may be
+reached through the intercession of Nanak Shah, his prophet and their
+redeemer. They sing hymns similar to those used in Protestant worship,
+and celebrate communion by partaking of wafers of unleavened bread.
+Their congregation do not object to the presence of strangers, but
+usually invite them to participate in the worship. There are about
+two and a quarter million Sikhs in the Province of the Panjaub,--the
+land of the "five rivers."
+
+While in this city, one is tempted to look at the Khalsa College, one
+of the institutions established by government in different parts of
+the land for the suitable training of native princes. Here one may
+find young Sikh nobles and wealthy landlords, to the number of five
+hundred, being qualified for the high responsibilities which are
+before them.
+
+We hurry back from the north in a southeastern direction over a
+distance of eight hundred miles and reach the city of Benares, on the
+river Ganges. There is hardly a river in the world which produces more
+fertility and which brings sustenance to more people than the divine
+Ganges. The river is not only deified, but is regarded as one of the
+most potent deities of India.
+
+From time immemorial, Benares, or "Kasi," which is built upon the
+banks of the Ganges, has partaken of the sanctity of the river, and is
+regarded by devout Hindus as the most sacred spot in the world. To die
+within the radius of ten miles from its centre is sure and eternal
+bliss, even to the outcast and the defiling white man! Many thousands
+are brought annually from all parts of the land to die at this sacred
+place, and have their ashes scattered upon the waters of the holy
+river. Many thousands of others who die in all parts of the land have
+their bodies burned and their ashes brought, by loving relatives upon
+pilgrimage, to this city to be sprinkled upon the tides of the Ganges,
+which insures eternal rest to the departed souls.
+
+What Mecca is to Mohammedans, more than Jerusalem is to Jews, is
+Benares to devout Hindus. It has more temples and shrines than any
+other equal area in the world. Its priests, who are called
+_Gangaputhira_ ("the Sons of the Ganges"), are legion. They have their
+emissaries at principal railway stations for hundreds of miles from
+the city, always on the lookout for pilgrims, and gathering up pilgrim
+bands to lead them on with ever increasing numbers to their temples.
+The idols of this city are legion.
+
+But there is nothing here which impresses one more than its squalid
+filth, and the abject degradation of the people which crowd its
+streets. The temples are extremely dirty. There is not one of imposing
+size or of decent attractiveness. There stands the monkey-temple,
+where scores of mangy, tricky brutes are daily sumptuously fed by
+devout pilgrims. On one side of the precinct a clever butcher-priest
+severs with one stroke the heads of goats which are brought for
+sacrifice to the thirsty deity. As in Madura, so in Benares, the great
+god of the Hindu is Siva. But the character of the worship which is
+rendered to him and to others of his cult is far from ennobling when
+not actually revolting. And the phallic emblem of this god is
+everywhere found in his temples and is suggestive of definite evils
+connected with his worship.
+
+The saddest and most grewsome of all objects which impress one in this
+centre of Hinduism is its burning Ghaut. To the side of the river many
+bodies are brought daily, each wrapped in a white cloth, and are
+deposited just where they are half covered by the water. Within ten
+feet of this place we see parties of pilgrims bathing in and drinking
+of the sacred water of the river, utterly regardless of the proximity
+of corpses above stream! From time to time corpses are picked out of
+the water and placed upon piles of wood near by. Each pile is ignited
+and the body reduced to ashes. These ashes are carefully collected,
+later on, and sprinkled, with appropriate ceremonies, on the face of
+the river. Day after day, and year after year, this ceaseless
+procession of the dead takes place, while up stream and down stream
+the bank of the river is covered with men and women who fatally
+believe that by bathing in this dirty stream they are washing away
+their sins and preparing themselves for final absorption and eternal
+rest in Brahm!
+
+Benares reminded the writer of Rome. He never realized the degradation
+possible to Christianity until he visited "The Eternal City," with its
+huge shams and ghastly superstitions. He never saw Hinduism with its
+myriad inane rites and debasing idolatry half so grotesque, idiotic,
+and repulsive, as in this city of Benares, where one ought to see the
+religion of these two hundred odd million people at its best, and not
+at its worst.
+
+It is a positive relief to go out of the city, a distance of four
+miles, to Sarnath, where the great Buddha--"The Enlightened
+One"--spent many long years in establishing his faith and in
+inculcating his "Doctrine of the Wheel." It is a beautiful drive to
+the birthplace of one of the greatest world faiths. Very little but
+ruins meets the inquiring gaze of the visitor. Some of these, however,
+are very impressive, especially the great _stupa_, or tower. It now
+stands a hundred and ten feet high and ninety-three feet in diameter.
+It was very substantially built, the lower part faced by immense
+blocks of stones which were clamped together with iron. And this
+facing was covered with elaborate inscriptions. The upper part was
+built of brick. At the foot of this striking ruin, built in the remote
+past as a monument to an ancient faith, devout Buddhists from all
+parts of the world come for worship and meditation upon the vanity of
+life. The day before the writer arrived, the Lama of Tibet spent here
+a few hours worshipping and seeking the blessing of the "Enlightened
+One." Near by, government is making a series of excavations and is
+discovering very interesting relics connected with this ancient
+monastery founded by the Buddha. Already a beautiful specimen of an
+Asoka pillar and a variety of interesting sculptures have rewarded
+their industry. One can imagine no place more dear to the
+contemplative Buddhist than this centre of the activities of his great
+Master, where he spent many of the best years of his life in
+expounding the teachings of his new cult, and in leading many souls
+toward the light for which he had struggled with so much of heroic
+self-denial, and which had ultimately dawned upon him under the sacred
+Boh tree at Buddha Gaya.
+
+In this extended pilgrimage, during which we have sought ancient and
+modern expressions of the many faiths which have dominated, or which
+now dominate, the people of this land, we have come into touch not
+only with those tolerant faiths which have found their origin here, or
+which have found refuge and popularity in this peninsula,--such as
+Hinduism, Demonolatry, Buddhism, Jainism, Zorastrianism, and Sikhism.
+We have also come into touch with the three most intolerant faiths of
+the world,--Christianity, Mohammedanism, and Judaism. There is no land
+where these three religions have suffered less of opposition than in
+India. Indeed, it is not from persecution and opposition that they
+have stood in most danger, but from fraternal contact, growing
+appreciation, and ultimate absorption. The Hindu mind, like the Hindu
+faith, has a fatal facility for accepting, semi-assimilating, and
+finally absorbing, all of religious belief and conviction that may
+come into contact with it. And this never necessarily involves the
+abandoning of the old beliefs.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+BURMA, THE BEAUTIFUL
+
+
+In order to appreciate the wide extent of the British Empire in the
+East, one needs to travel over the main lines of India and then steam
+a thousand miles across the Bay of Bengal to Burma. Landing at
+Rangoon, which is the doorway of the land, he reembarks upon one of
+the sumptuous Irrawady River boats and steams northward another
+thousand miles into the very heart of the country. Thus without
+leaving the eastern empire one can spend weeks of most interesting
+travel, and pass through territories inhabited by peoples of separate
+racial types and of totally different tongues. Perhaps no other region
+of the world can furnish such a variety of climes and such marked
+contrasts of national habits and costumes. And yet, all this vast
+territory has been brought into subjection to the British crown and
+furnishes facilities and conveniences of travel which are really
+marvellous in the East. Burma is politically and industrially a part
+of India.
+
+It is a rich country, with four magnificent rivers reaching nearly its
+whole length, furnishing abundant facilities for cheap travel and
+commerce, and carrying fertility into all sections of the land.
+
+It is the land of rice, of teak, and of oil. These are the triple
+sources of Burmese industry, commerce, and wealth. Never was a land
+richer than this in alluvial soil, in refreshing rains, and in
+bountiful rivers. It is one great expanse of living, paddy green. The
+teak timber furnished by the mighty forests of this land is carried to
+many lands. The extent of this trade may be imagined from the
+statement that the Bombay-Burma Trading Company in Burma employs three
+thousand elephants for hauling its timber to the river. Every two
+elephants are under the care of three men; so that there are
+forty-five hundred men in charge of these animals alone.
+
+Burma is called the "Land of Pagodas." The first object which attracts
+the eye soon after the ship enters the river, and while still twenty
+miles from the harbour, is the far-famed pagoda of Schwey Dagon, in
+Rangoon. Buddhism is preeminently the faith of Burma. All the people
+have been for many centuries its adherents. And the pagoda is the
+outward emblem of that faith. What the church is to Christianity, and
+the temple is to Hinduism, the pagoda (sometimes called "dagoba") is
+to Buddhism. It is the farthest removed from the Christian conception
+of a place of worship. In Christianity, large edifices are erected
+where the multitude can meet to unite in public worship. In Hinduism,
+a temple is largely the abode of the idol, which is the outward emblem
+of their god. In it there is no place for public worship or for an
+assembled audience. In Buddhism, there is not even a god to worship,
+so that there is no interior to the pagoda. It is like the pyramid of
+Egypt, one massive solid structure, but of an elongated bell shape.
+The highest part of it, corresponding to the handle of the bell, is
+called "hti," and is usually covered with precious metal. It is a
+reliquary rather than a place of worship; and every pagoda of note is
+supposed to be the receptacle of a few hairs or bones of the Buddha!
+Indeed, if one believe the members of that faith, the anatomy of that
+great man was marvellous and is still very promiscuously distributed
+through various lands of the East!
+
+[Illustration: SCHWEY DAGON PAGODA, RANGOON]
+
+The Schwey Dagon pagoda is a very prominent object; for it is not only
+three hundred and seventy feet high, but is also built on an
+artificial mound which is a hundred and seventy feet in height. It is
+elaborately decorated, and its "hti" is mostly of solid gold,
+encrusted with precious stones presented to the pagoda by King Mindoon
+Min. But while the pagoda itself impresses one with its massive
+proportions, it is the exquisite group of numberless little shrines or
+temples which surround the pagoda, every one of which holds one or
+more large images of the great Buddha, that furnish the rich sense of
+beauty and charm which prevail. These little shrines are either built
+of marble or of richly carved teak, or of glass mosaic; and every one
+tries to excel every other in its delicate charm. And upon nearly
+every one of these shrines there are sweet little bells, which, as the
+wind blows, seem to respond to spirit hands and ring forth their
+gentle peals of sacred music to the great founder of the faith.
+
+Here, also, is a massive bell of forty tons,--the third in size in the
+world. It was once carried away by the British and lost in the Rangoon
+River. But the people later received permission to search for it. They
+found it, and with genuine pride and triumph raised it and restored it
+to their pagoda.
+
+It is one of the peculiar ironies of history that in this land of the
+Buddha, who was the greatest iconoclast, and who not only abhorred
+idolatry but also ignored deity, there should exist to-day numberless
+images of him in every town and hamlet. These are of all sizes, from
+the immense reclining Buddha of Pegu, which is a hundred and
+eighty-two feet long, and is built of brick and mortar, down to the
+tiniest figures carried on the persons of individuals. There is no
+pagoda or shrine in Burma around which is not found a large number of
+these images. They have not the hideous deformity of Hindu idolatry;
+but present either the benign and complacent, or the calm and
+contemplative, expression which cannot fail to impress itself upon the
+national character of the people. And one may say, with confidence,
+that in this matter the truth of the proverb is verified,--"Like god,
+like people."
+
+One may leave Rangoon in a comfortable train, and in about eighteen
+hours reach the old capital of Upper Burma, the beautiful Mandalay,
+which is nearly four hundred miles distant. The same journey may be
+taken by the river Irrawady if one has more leisure and means; and he
+may thus enjoy one of the most beautiful and sumptuous river journeys
+in the world.
+
+It was only twenty years ago that this part of the country was seized
+by the British without bloodshed, and the foolish and dissolute King
+Theebaw was made prisoner for his stupid insolence, and deported, with
+his two wives, to India, where they are still spending their days in
+retirement. Upper Burma has, however, put on new beauty and prosperity
+since the British have taken it over; and the people are abundantly
+satisfied with the new regime. Mandalay has also its famed Arrakan
+pagoda, which claims to have the only contemporary likeness of Buddha
+on earth. It is an immense brazen image; and it is the occupation of
+the devout to gild the same with gold-leaf. At least a dozen men and
+women can be seen thus constantly expressing their devotion. In a few
+years there will be tons of gold thus pasted upon his sacred body! But
+alas for the vandalism which lights up its shrine and the calm face of
+Buddha by electricity!
+
+Another famous pagoda of Mandalay is the so-called "Four Hundred and
+Fifty Pagodas of the Law." This is a kind of Buddhist bible in stone.
+It has four hundred and fifty small shrines, every one of which has a
+large polished granite slab, upon which is engraved a precept of the
+faith; and the whole make up a complete body of the law, which every
+member of the faith may come and read at his leisure.
+
+Here, as at all shrines, we notice the beautiful custom of these
+Burmese people in practising their public devotion with bouquets of
+flowers in their hands. It is touching to see this constant blending
+of beauty with piety. The abundant use of the candle, also, in their
+worship reminds us of the Romish ritual.
+
+We are taken through the royal gardens and the deserted palaces of
+Mandalay, which are constructed largely, as many of the houses of
+Burma are, of exquisitely carved teak, rising here and there in
+pointed spires, which are indeed beautiful, but which give the
+impression of the so-called gingerbread style of architecture.
+
+Upon one who has lived for many years in India there are two things in
+Burma which make a deep and a very pleasing impression.
+
+[Illustration: THEEBAW'S PALACE, MANDALAY]
+
+In the first place, the charm of the Burmese woman is marked. She has
+none of the cringing, retiring, self-conscious mien of the Hindu
+women. She is possessed of liberty and of equality with man. Her
+appearance in society is both modest and self-respecting. She is
+conscious of her own beauty, and knows how to enhance it with
+exquisite taste. She is a great lover of colours, as is the Hindu
+woman. But the latter loves only the primitive and elementary colours;
+the former, on the other hand, cultivates the delicate shades, and
+adorns herself with silks of various tints, such as attract and
+fascinate. It is for this reason that Burma is called "The Silken
+East." Her dress is clumsy and uncouth in form, and, in this respect,
+is incomparably inferior to the graceful cloth of India. But the woman
+herself is lovely, and the taste which she displays in her personal
+adornment is very attractive. It does not surprise one to know that
+not a few Europeans marry these Burmese ladies of beauty. But above
+her beauty is that pose of freedom and self-respect which commends her
+everywhere. Nor is this assumed. The woman of Burma is "the man of the
+family." In business, and in all forms of trade, she is far superior
+to her lord, and much of the support and the honour of the family
+depends upon her industry, cleverness, and independence. Certainly
+Buddhism has produced, in many respects, a higher type of womanhood
+than has Hinduism.
+
+Another aspect of life in Burma is one that instantly captivates one
+who goes there from India. It is a land free from the trammels of
+caste. The trail of this serpent is upon all things in India. It
+divides men at all points, and robs social life of much that is sweet
+and beautiful in other lands. The great Gautama vehemently attacked
+the Brahmanical caste system, and one is glad to see in Burma that
+that faith has adhered to this primitive enmity. One rejoices to see
+at the temples and on the public streets, everywhere, common eating
+and drinking houses, where the people meet for refreshment and for
+quiet social chat, without any thought of caste to disturb their
+relationship and mar their convivial pleasures.
+
+That which impresses the observant Christian visitor to that land is
+the triumph and wonderful achievement of missionary effort there
+during the last half century.
+
+All know the works, the sufferings, and the results attained by that
+great prophet of Burma, Adoniram Judson. He was a saint of the heroic
+mould, and his influence will affect the history of that people for
+centuries to come.
+
+The American Baptist Mission overshadows, by its numbers and success,
+all other bodies of missionaries in the land. And at the present time
+their splendid force of workers is making a deep impress upon the
+community.
+
+But their success has been mostly achieved among a very peculiar
+hill-tribe of that country,--the Karens. It was long after the
+Baptists had begun work there that this low hill-tribe, of less than
+two million people, was in the lowest depths of barbarism. Their
+language was not reduced to writing, and consequently, they had no
+literature whatever. But they had one interesting tradition. It had
+come down to them, generation after generation, that their bible had
+been lost, and that some day the Great Spirit would send a fair
+brother from the West to restore unto them the message of God which
+had disappeared. The "Fair Brother" came in the person of the American
+missionary; and his message was received in the assured faith that it
+was divinely sent and was the long-lost tradition of their tribe. From
+that day forward, thousands of the Karen tribe have everywhere
+accepted the Gospel of the Christ, until there are, at the present
+time, connected with that mission alone, more than one hundred and
+fifty thousand Karen converts.
+
+And this is by no means all of the wonderful story of the regeneration
+of this barbarous tribe. Either by a very wise missionary
+statesmanship, or by a rare inspiration, such as we do not see
+elsewhere in the East, these people have almost entirely assumed the
+financial burdens of their own religious training and institutions,
+and are always quick, even beyond their means, to respond to every
+Gospel claim upon their purse. The story of their offerings, in view
+of their extreme poverty, is marvellous in its self-denial and
+outgoing generosity. The writer spent a few days at the missionary
+centre in the outskirts of Rangoon. Upon that compound there was a
+memorial church that had cost $30,000, of which the Karen Christians
+had given all, save a grant made by government for a few adjoining
+class-rooms. Three bungalows and other buildings of value are also
+found there, and the whole property is owned, not by the mission, but
+by the Karens themselves. Ten miles away from this is the largest
+theological seminary in the East, with more than one hundred and forty
+students under training. For the maintenance of this, again, those
+poor Karen Christians gladly impose upon themselves a family tax, and
+have the sweet consciousness that their youth are being trained for
+Christian service through their own self-denying endeavour.
+
+These people were in social scale so low that they had practically no
+music of their own. They have therefore readily taken to western
+music. And it is astonishing to hear how well they sing our western
+tunes, and even render solos and quartettes at public European
+functions in a way that calls forth hearty encores. It is verily the
+birth of a nation in a day. So that in this land of many wonders the
+movement among the Karen people seems to be the most wonderful of all.
+
+Among the Karens, Ko San Ye stands forth as a unique figure of intense
+interest. He has been called the "Moody" of Burma. He is absolutely
+illiterate. When about thirty years old, he lost his wife and his only
+child; and finding no comfort in his ancestral demonolatry, he turned
+to Buddhism for relief and retired to a mountain retreat and became
+known and esteemed among his people as a devout ascetic and a holy
+man. With the offerings of his people he built two pagodas and a
+monastery. But his soul found no rest there. In 1890, he was baptized
+as a Christian, with one hundred and forty of his followers. He then
+obtained a grant of twenty thousand acres of waste land from
+government, and established a village which now numbers several
+hundred houses. His influence over his own people is amazing, and is
+the result of superstitious reverence and awe.
+
+He regretted that his ignorance prevented him from preaching the
+Gospel; but he thought that his influence over the people should be
+rightly used in the Lord's service. So he devoted himself to the
+collection of funds for religious purposes among his people. And in
+this work he has had almost fatal success, for his fellow-Christian
+Karens have responded to his appeals for money to the extent of at
+least $130,000. In view of the exceeding poverty of the people, this
+sum seems almost fabulous. Mr. Ko San Ye is known by all to be
+perfectly disinterested in the use of the money intrusted to him. Not
+a cent sticks to his hands; and he reverently and truthfully speaks of
+it as the "Lord's money." But his judgment is not commensurate with
+his piety. Even the most friendly cannot say that he has wisely
+administered this sacred trust of his poor brethren. He has erected
+churches, schools, and rest-houses which are altogether too sumptuous
+for the people. He spent thousands in the purchase of a fine
+steam-launch for the convenience of his people on the river side. He
+then purchased a rice-mill which brings a fair income to the mission.
+He has added to these two fine and expensive automobiles, in the
+smaller of which the writer had, for him, the unique pleasure of a
+delightful spin through the city of Rangoon and its suburbs, under the
+guidance of a Karen chauffeur! It was his first automobile ride; and
+to think of it as being enjoyed in a vehicle bought by poor Christians
+of Burma! Strange to say, the people continue to repose implicit
+confidence in him, even to the extent of mortgaging their property, in
+order to add to this public fund. It is to be hoped that this good man
+may soon submit more to missionary guidance.
+
+Ko San Ye is but an interesting episode in the wonderful progress of a
+nation from the depth of barbarism to Christian privilege and
+civilized life. The missionaries often dare not have him present
+during the baptism of new converts, lest they should think that they
+were baptized in the name of Ko San Ye rather than in the name of
+Christ! And yet it is said that the two leading characteristics of
+this strange man are his humility and his unselfishness!
+
+The Karens, with all their lowliness and barbarous antecedents, are
+excellent material to work upon, and are responding with wonderful
+eagerness to the missionary endeavour made in their behalf, and are
+already, in many noble qualities, revealing to the native Christians
+of the East the way of ascent to nobility of character and to the
+highest Christian possession.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE HINDU CASTE SYSTEM
+
+
+The word "caste" is derived from the Latin term _castus_, which
+signified purity of breed. It was the term used by Vasco da Gama and
+his fellow-Portuguese adventurers, four centuries ago, as they landed
+upon the southwestern coast of India and began to study the social and
+religious condition of the people. The word expressed to them the
+remarkable bond which held the people together; the subsequent
+generations of foreigners and English-speaking natives have adopted it
+as the most appropriate term to express the unique system which
+prevails all over India. No other people, in the history of the world,
+have erected a social structure comparable to this of India. For
+twenty-five centuries it has controlled the life of nearly one-sixth
+of the human race. Other countries have, or have had, tribal
+connections, class distinctions, trade unions, religious sects,
+philanthropic fraternities, social guilds, and various other
+organizations. But India is the only land where all these are
+practically welded together into one consistent and mighty whole,
+which dictates the every detail of human relationship and controls the
+whole destiny of man for time and eternity. For it should be
+remembered that India has consistently declined to recognize any
+distinction between the social and the religious. These are the
+reverse and the obverse of life; they are brought to the same rules
+and must yield obedience to the same authority. Religion, to the
+Hindu, permeates the whole social domain; and social order draws its
+sanctions from, and is enforced by the penalties of, religion. To
+marry outside one's caste, to eat food cooked by an outcast, to cross
+the ocean, to delay unduly the marriage of a daughter,--these, and a
+thousand other delinquencies which may seem absolutely harmless to a
+Westerner, are not only regarded as social irregularities, but also as
+sins whose penalties will harass the soul beyond the grave or
+burning-ground. Herein does caste reveal its uniqueness, and from this
+does it pass on to the exercise of its extraordinary tyranny over the
+people.
+
+
+I
+
+The origin of caste is a subject of much uncertainty and debate. In
+ancient Vedic times, caste was unknown. Society, in those days, was
+more elastic and free, and resembled that of other lands. And yet it
+showed a tendency toward a mechanical division which later grew into
+the caste system. It was not until the time of the great lawgiver,
+Manu, about twenty-five centuries ago, that the system crystallized
+into laws, and the organization became so compact as to force itself
+upon all the people and become an integral part of recognized Hindu
+law. Manu and other lawgivers found the basis of caste rules in the
+traditions of an ancient Brahman tribe. These they elaborated and
+enforced.
+
+The ancient name for caste was _varna_, which means "colour." This
+name is suggestive, and has led many authorities to trace back the
+whole system to original race-purity, as indicated by the colour of
+the skin. The first incursion of the fair Aryans from the northwest
+settled down, it is claimed, in the northern portions of the country.
+They gradually mingled and intermarried with the dark-skinned
+Dravidian and aboriginal population, with the natural consequence of
+a loss of race-purity and of whiteness of complexion. A subsequent
+descent of a new Aryan host upon the plains of northern India found
+the descendants of their predecessors of darker hue than themselves,
+which bespoke their race degeneracy; so they kept aloof from them.
+Later, however, they began to mingle with the former inhabitants, so
+that their descendants partly lost the ancestral complexion. A still
+later Aryan incursion declined to have intercourse with the
+descendants of those who last preceded them. Thus we have four classes
+divided upon the basis of colour, or _varna_, which may correspond
+with the four great original castes of India.
+
+The traditional theory of the Hindus themselves, in reference to caste
+origin, is admirably simple and quite adequate to satisfy ninety-nine
+per cent of the devotees of that faith to-day. Brahma, the first god
+of the Hindu triad, the Creator, was the immediate source and founder
+of the caste order; for he caused, it is said, the august Brahman to
+proceed out of his divine mouth, while the warlike and royal Kshatriya
+emanated from his shoulders, the trading, commercial Vaisya, from his
+thighs, and the menial Sudra, from his feet. And from these four
+primal classes have descended, through myriads of permutations and
+minglings, the present hydra-headed caste organization.
+
+But modern and scientific students of the social order of India
+entirely discard and ignore all Hindu mythical explanations and
+_Puranic_ legends concerning this subject, and endeavour to trace the
+present system to its sources and primal causes through patient
+historic research and through a most elaborate system of
+anthropometric and ethnographic examinations conducted all over the
+land. The subject, however, is so vast and complicated that
+authorities upon the subject are still considerably at variance in
+their theories of origin. We may conveniently classify the prevailing
+theories, according to their emphasis, as follows:--
+
+(_a_) _The Religious Theory._--This gives emphasis to the religious
+influence as the dominant one in the formation of the social order of
+the land. It is maintained that the clever and unscrupulous Brahman
+has, to a large extent, originated it and nursed it into its present
+wonderful proportions, in order to create and perpetuate his own
+supremacy among the people of India. As the spiritual head of
+Hinduism, and the recognized source of religious power among its
+devotees, he required and devised this organization, with himself as
+its undisputed head, and with a distinct recognition by all others of
+his supremacy in the Hindu faith as a _conditio sine qua non_ of their
+admission as castes into the Hindu system. Up to the present day, the
+public acceptance of the supreme religious authority of the Brahman is
+one of the two conditions which qualify any people to admission into
+the sisterhood of Hindu castes. The other condition is separation from
+all other peoples in matters which will be hereafter mentioned.
+
+There are potent reasons for accepting this theory; for the strongly
+entrenched position which religion still holds in the system, both as
+a basis and as a regulator, notwithstanding other antagonizing
+influences, is a testimony to its original place and power therein.
+Any social order whose direction is regulated by social injunctions
+and whose forms and ritual are enforced by religious penalties must be
+recognized as a mighty religious system.
+
+(_b_) _The Tribal Theory._--Moreover, there were many aboriginal
+tribes which entered the ranks of Hinduism through the formation of
+new castes. Mr. Risley, in the Census of 1901, refers to such. (See
+Vol. I, p. 521). They gradually abandoned their old tribal customs and
+entered upon new paths which brought them into conformity with Hindu
+usages. Or in some cases they preserved tribal habits and even their
+tribal _totems_, and baptized them into the new faith and thus became
+separate castes in the Hindu order.
+
+As in the past, so "all over India at the present moment there is
+going on a process of the gradual and insensible transformation of
+tribes into castes. The stages of this operation are in themselves
+difficult to trace.... They usually set up as Rajputs, their first
+step being to start a Brahman priest, who invents for them a mythical
+ancestor, supplies them with a family miracle connected with the
+locality where their tribes are settled, and discovers that they
+belong to some hitherto unheard-of clan of the great Rajput
+community." (Census 1901, Vol. II, p. 519.) It is precisely the same
+process which brought the many Dravidian and even more primitive
+tribes of South India into the Hindu fold; and it is a curious fact
+that these same people are to-day the greatest sticklers in the land
+for caste and its myriad rules.
+
+(_c_) _The Social Theory._--Some hold with Sir Denzil Ibbetson, in the
+Census Report of 1881, "that caste is far more a social than a
+religious institution; that it has no necessary connection whatever
+with the Hindu religion, further than that under that religion
+certain ideas and customs common to all primitive nations have been
+developed and perpetuated in an unusual degree." This is acknowledged
+to be an exaggerated statement. It may possibly be true that "caste
+has no _necessary_ connection with Hinduism," but it is emphatically
+true that caste, as understood by all, does not exist apart from that
+faith.
+
+It is, however, a fact that divisions have occurred within castes,
+owing to the development of slight social differences between the
+members. For instance, several castes have been created by the
+degradation of members of the existing castes on account of their
+marriage of widows. The Pandarams of South India are held in
+distinction among the begging castes because of their abstention from
+meat, alcohol, and widow marriage. Indeed, it is interesting to note
+that a former caste status has been more frequently lost by, and
+degradation to a new caste has been consequent upon, the adoption of
+widow marriage, than through almost any other act. And, at present,
+this prohibition of the marriage of widows, including child widows, is
+the most tenaciously and unrighteously enforced caste custom in India.
+
+(_d_) _The Occupational Theory._--All regard fellowship in the same
+trade, or occupation, as the most prolific source of caste alignment,
+in modern times at least. Ibbetson contends that "the whole basis of
+diversity of caste is diversity of occupation. The old division into
+Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaisya, Sudra, and Mlechha, or outcast, who is
+below the Sudra, is but a division into the priest, the warrior, the
+husbandman, the artisan, and the menial.... William Priest, John King,
+Edward Farmer, and James Smith are but the survivals in England of the
+four _varnas_ of Manu." (Census of 1881.) This statement needs serious
+qualification. Farming, which is followed to-day by a majority of the
+population of India, is an occupation which is subsidized by no caste
+and is followed practically by the members of all castes. The Brahmans
+are the only ones who are degraded by following the plough. And there
+is a growing number of trades, introduced by modern civilization,
+which have not yet been touched by the caste system, and which the
+enterprising youth of different grades of Hindu society are entering
+with eagerness. And yet, while this is a fact, it is equally true that
+the functional type of castes is developing and spreading much more
+rapidly than any other. In the town of Madura, a few of the families,
+from the weaver caste, opened a remunerative trade in the manufacture
+of fireworks. They at first began it as an extra, to add to their
+very meagre income. Gradually it encroached upon their time until it
+became their sole occupation. To-day they are prospering in their new
+trade. But to them and their castemen their change of trade involves
+the transfer of caste relations. No longer being weavers, they do not
+see how they can continue to be bound by ties to their former castemen
+or former fellow-tradesmen; hence the old connubial and convivial
+bonds of caste are relaxing, and the weavers decline to have
+fellowship with them as formerly on these lines. Thus, in all parts of
+the land, we have present-day illustrations of the creation of
+functional castes. And it is an interesting inquiry whether this mania
+for creating a new caste for every rising trade and occupation will
+finally overcome and absorb all occupations created by the demands of
+modern life and advancing civilization, or whether it will in time
+succumb to the spirit of modern progress until all occupations shall
+be emancipated from the tyranny of caste and shall be open to all men
+who desire to enter them.
+
+(_e_) _The Crossing Theory._--According to Manu's _Dharma Sastra_ one
+might be led to believe, as Hindus do stoutly maintain, that nearly
+all modern castes have been created by interbreeding. Those caste laws
+of twenty-five centuries ago taught that the offspring of the union
+of a woman of higher with a man of lower caste could belong to the
+caste of neither parent, and therefore formed a new and a separate
+caste. The names of castes thus formed are given with much detail in
+Manu's works. But it does not require much wisdom for one to perceive
+the absurdity of the working out of such a system, and the
+impossibility connected with it as an adequate basis for the caste
+organization of the present day. Yet interbreeding has doubtless been
+an important element in the elaboration of the stupendous caste
+organization. We have abundant illustration of this very process and
+its results in modern times. Among the Dravidians, especially, there
+are many castes which trace their origin to miscegenation. Among the
+Munda tribe we find nine such divisions; also five among the Mahilis,
+who themselves claim their descent from the union of a Munda with a
+Santhal woman.
+
+This will not be unexpected when it is remembered that endogamy is the
+prime law of most Hindu castes; and this, too, in a land where
+immorality and adultery are so prevalent. Other sources of Hindu
+castes are mentioned. Some, like the Mahrattas, have behind them
+national traditions, and a history to which they refer and of which
+they are proud. Others, still, have, by migrating from the home of the
+mother caste, severed their connection from the parent stock and have
+formed a separate and independent caste.
+
+It is unnecessary to state that not one of the above theories is
+adequate to account for all the existing castes of the land. These
+forces have entered, with varying degrees of efficiency, into their
+structure,--one being dominant as a causal power in one, and another
+in another. And yet it may be stated that of all these caste-producing
+forces religion and occupation have had marked preeminence; and they
+are more influential to-day than ever before.
+
+
+II
+
+We shall next consider the various Characteristics or Manifestations
+of Caste. The system is a very flexible one; and yet its
+characteristics are practically the same in all parts of the country.
+Perhaps the best way to clearly describe these to a western reader is
+to quote at length what we may call Mr. Risley's capital western
+paraphrase of the system in _Blackwood's Magazine_, a decade ago. "Let
+us," he writes, "imagine the great tribe of Smith ... in which all the
+subtle _nuances_ of social merit and demerit have been set and
+hardened into positive regulations affecting the intermarriage of
+families. The caste thus formed would trace its origin back to a
+mythical eponymous ancestor, the first Smith, who converted the rough
+stone hatchet into the bronze battle-axe and took his name from the
+'smooth' weapons that he wrought for his tribe. Bound together by this
+tie of common descent they would recognize as the cardinal doctrine of
+their community the rule that a Smith must always marry a Smith, and
+could by no possibility marry a Brown or a Jones. But, over and above
+this general canon, two other modes or principles of grouping within
+the caste would be conspicuous. First of all, the entire caste of
+Smith would be split up into an indefinite number of in-marrying
+clans, based upon all sorts of trivial distinctions. Brewing Smiths
+and baking Smiths, hunting Smiths and shooting Smiths, temperance
+Smiths and licensed victualler Smiths, Smiths with double-barrelled
+names and hyphens, Smiths with double-barrelled names without hyphens,
+Conservative Smiths and Radical Smiths, tinker Smiths, tailor Smiths,
+Smiths of Mercia, Smiths of Wessex,--all these and all other
+imaginable varieties of the tribe Smith would be, as it were,
+crystallized by an inexorable law forbidding the members of any of
+these groups to marry beyond the circle marked out by the clan
+name.... Thus a Hyphen-Smith could only marry a Hyphen-Smith, and so
+on. Secondly, and this is the point which I more especially wish to
+bring out here, running through this endless series of clans we should
+find another principle at work breaking up each clan into three or
+four smaller groups which form a sort of ascending scale of social
+distinction. Thus the clan of Hyphen-Smiths, which we take to be the
+cream of the caste--the Smiths who have attained the crowning glory of
+double names securely welded together by hyphens--would be again
+divided into, let us say, Anglican, Dissenting, and Salvationist
+Hyphen-Smiths, taking ordinary rank in that order. Now the rule of
+these groups would be that a man of the Anglican could marry a woman
+of any group, that a man of the Dissenting group could marry into his
+own or the lowest group, while the Salvationist Smith could only marry
+into his own group. A woman could, under no circumstance, marry down
+into a group below her. Other things being equal, it is clear that
+two-thirds of the Anglican girls would get no husbands, and two-thirds
+of the Salvationist men no wives. These are some of the restrictions
+which would control the process of match-making among the Smiths if
+they were organized in a caste of the Indian type. There would also
+be restrictions as to food. The different in-marrying clans would be
+precluded from marrying together, and their possibilities of
+reciprocal entertainment would be limited to those products of the
+confectioners' shops into the composition of which water, the most
+fatal and effective vehicle of ceremonial impurity, had not entered.
+Fire purifies, water pollutes. It would follow in fact that they could
+eat chocolates and other sweetmeats together, but could not drink tea
+or coffee, and could only partake of ices if they were made without
+water and were served on metal, not porcelain, plates."
+
+Mr. Risley might have added considerably to these restrictions and
+limitations without exhausting the catalogue.
+
+Let us briefly enumerate those elements which enter into caste. The
+first and the most important is intermarriage within the caste. None
+except members of totemistic castes can, with impunity, look beyond
+the sacred borders of their own caste for conjugal bliss. So long as
+castes remain endogamous they will preserve their integrity, and their
+foundations will never be removed. This is the _fons et origo_ of
+caste perpetuity. All other characteristics may pass away; if this
+remain, all is well with the organization. And it is this which
+remains with devilish pertinacity and mischief-working power in the
+infant Native Christian Church of India. It is this same extreme evil
+which the social reformers of India are trying to puncture. But all
+that they dare to struggle and hope for is the right of members of
+subdivisions of any caste to intermarry. A generation ago, there were
+1886 divisions in the Brahman caste alone, no two of which could enjoy
+connubial or convivial privileges together. It is not up to the most
+sanguine reformer of India to seek that all Brahmans enjoy the right
+of intermarrying,--he only asks that the divisions among the Brahmans
+may be reduced, and intermarriage may be sanctioned among
+subdivisions. Yet even this meagre quest is not likely to be
+gratified. This is not surprising, for the defenders of the system
+well know that if this stronghold of caste is at all weakened, the
+whole will speedily yield to modern attack. This, doubtless, is the
+reason why orthodox Hindus are so vehement in their opposition to any
+and all endeavour to remove the many disabilities and cruelties which
+the marriage regulations of the land inflict upon Hindu women. There
+is no land under the sun whose weaker sex suffer more from marital
+legislation than India; and yet the people can do nothing practically
+to remedy the crying evils of the same, simply because the mighty
+engine of caste is arrayed against them. Its perpetuity is linked
+closely with the resistance of all efforts at reform.
+
+Next in importance to the connubial is the convivial legislation of
+caste. It is the business of every member of a caste to conserve the
+purity of his _gens_ by eating only with his fellow-castemen. Under no
+circumstance can he inter-dine with those of a caste below his own.
+The dictates of caste in this matter are sometimes beyond
+understanding. Not only must a man eat with those of his own
+connection; he must be very scrupulous as to the source of the
+articles which he is about to eat; he must know who handled them, and
+especially who cooked them. Some articles of food, such as fruit, are
+not subject to pollution; while others, preeminently water, are to be
+very carefully guarded against the polluting touch of the lower
+castes. The writer has entered a railway car and accidentally touched
+a Brahman's water-pot under the seat, whereupon the disgusted owner
+seized the vessel and immediately poured out of the car window all its
+contents. It has been truly said that that monster of cruelty, Nana
+Sahib of Cawnpore, was able, without any violation of caste rules, to
+massacre many innocent English women and children at the time of the
+great Mutiny; but to drink a cup of water out of the hand of one of
+those tender victims of his treachery and rage would have been a
+mortal sin against caste, such as could be atoned for only in future
+births and by the fiery tortures of hell! The rationale of this
+interdiction is doubtless the desire to preserve the purity of caste
+blood. As food becomes a part of the body, and, as the Hindu thinks,
+of the life, it is imperative that all the members of a caste shall
+eat only the same kind of food, and also that which has not been
+subjected to the ceremonially polluting touch of outsiders.
+
+This urgency is increased by the fact that different castes proscribe
+different articles of diet. The _Sivar_, so-called, are strict
+vegetarians, and will have absolutely no communion in food with
+meat-eaters, even though the latter may belong to a higher caste than
+themselves. Meat of any kind is an abomination to them. Other
+respectable castes will touch only chicken meat, others mutton, a very
+few pork, while no caste will permit its members to eat beef. No sin
+is regarded by the orthodox with more horror than that of killing and
+eating the flesh of the cow,--the most sacred and most commonly
+worshipped animal of India.
+
+These convivial rules of caste are the greatest obstacles to social
+union and fellowship among the people of India. Westerners hardly
+realize the extent to which their communion is based upon the
+convivial habit. Many times a friendship which lasts a lifetime is
+formed by strangers sitting together at the common dinner table. And,
+in the same way, are the old friendships of life generally renewed and
+cemented in the West. And it is a significant fact that the Christian
+faith antagonizes Hinduism at this very point by enacting that its
+great Sacrament of love and communion of life in Christ be embodied in
+a perpetual and universal "drinking of the same cup and eating of the
+same bread." In nothing is Hinduism becoming more manifestly a burden
+to the educated community than in this restriction about inter-dining;
+and in nothing are they more ready, as we shall see later, to violate
+caste customs than in this matter.
+
+Then comes, as a natural consequence of the above, limitations to the
+contact of persons of differing castes. If a Brahman cannot eat with a
+Sudra, because it supposedly brings a taint to his pure blood, no more
+can he, with impunity, come into personal contact with him. The touch
+of such is pollution to his august and pure person; and the very air
+the low castes breathe brings to his soul and body taint and poison.
+This idea of ceremonial pollution by contact causes great
+inconvenience and trouble, and for that reason has been considerably
+mitigated or modified in recent times. The Rajah of Cochin, who lives
+temporarily near the writer, and who is evidently a stickler for caste
+observances, receives calls from European friends only before nine
+o'clock in the morning, for the obvious reason that that is the hour
+of his daily ablution. The Maharajah of Travancore bathes at 7 A.M.
+daily; hence, intending European guests find reception only before
+that early hour. In the State of Travancore, in which Brahmanical
+influence is great, even the high caste _Nair_ cannot touch, though he
+may approach, a Namburi Brahman. A member of the artisan castes will
+pollute his holiness twenty-four feet off; cultivators at forty-eight
+feet; the beef-eating Pariah at sixty-four feet. Like the Palestinian
+leper of old, the low-caste man of that part of India was, until
+recently, expected to leave the road when he saw a Brahman come, and
+remove his polluting person to the required number of feet from his
+sacred presence. Low-caste witnesses were not allowed to approach a
+court of justice, but standing without, at the requisite distance, to
+yell their testimony to the Brahman judge who sat in uncontaminated
+purity within. The falling of the shadow of a low-caste person upon
+any Brahman in India necessitates an ablution on the part of the
+latter. It is this frequency of contaminating and polluting
+contingencies in the life of the Brahman which requires of him so many
+ablutions daily, and which renders him perhaps the cleanest in person
+among the sons of men. So many are the dangers of contamination which
+daily beset him in the ordinary pursuits of life that relief in the
+form of dispensations is granted him, so as to reduce the ceremonies
+and diminish the extreme burden of religious observance. This law of
+contact and pollution must weigh heavily upon any genuine Hindu of
+high caste. The relation of the Maharajah of Travancore to his Prime
+Minister, who is a Brahman, is an interesting illustration. The Rajah
+is not a born Brahman; he is by many of his people regarded as a
+manufactured Brahman. But His Highness himself does not regard himself
+as equal, in sacred manhood, to his Brahman Prime Minister; hence he
+will never be seated in his presence. Nor will the Brahman Dewan
+deign to sit in the presence of his royal master, the Maharajah. Hence
+all the business of State (sometimes requiring conferences of three
+hours a day) is transacted by them while standing in each other's
+presence.
+
+Occupational limitations are observed, as we have already seen, by
+many modern castes. Trade castes not only prescribe the one ancestral
+occupation to their members; they also, with equal distinctness and
+severity, prohibit to all within their ranks any other work or trade.
+So in all those legion castes not only has a man his social sphere and
+status assigned to him, he is also tied to the trade of his ancestors;
+yea, more, he is expected to confine himself to ancestral tools and
+methods of work in that narrow rut of life. One day the writer was
+accosted by a weaver who was in a famishing condition. He made a
+pathetic plea for charity. Manchester cloths were flooding the market;
+they therefore could not sell the products of their labour at living
+rates. It was suggested that they take up some other trade that could
+furnish them a decent living. He lifted up his hands in horror at the
+impious suggestion, that they abandon their caste-prescribed
+occupation! He felt that he and his were ground between the upper and
+nether millstones. To suggest to him that they even change the kind or
+style of article which they prepared upon their looms for the market
+would have been equally impossible. Out in the villages, where these
+people live, it would seem almost as absurd for the weaver to become a
+carpenter as for the weaver who uses only cotton thread to become a
+silk-weaver, or for those who weave coarse white cloths to produce the
+finer coloured cloths worn by the women. No; for generations their
+people have given themselves to the production of only one article.
+"It is the custom of our people" is the final word. And what has
+become customary is by caste enactment made obligatory. And woe be to
+him who defies caste. And thus the caste-prescribed trade becomes the
+be-all and the end-all of life.
+
+These four--the connubial, the convivial, the contactual, and the
+occupational--are the constant factors of the caste existence and
+activity in India. But in addition to these, caste takes other
+functions and assumes other forms in certain localities and under
+certain circumstances. Definite forms of religious observance are
+often enjoined, certain places of pilgrimage are sanctioned, marriage
+forms prescribed, marriage obligations defined, divorce made possible
+or impossible, and the limit of marriage expenses set. There is hardly
+a department of life or a duty which men owe to their dead which does
+not enter the domain of caste legislation somewhere or other.
+
+A strange and very interesting peculiarity of certain castes is their
+totemistic aspect. This characteristic has only recently been
+discovered. "At the bottom of the social system, as understood by the
+average Hindu, we find, in the Dravidian region of India, a large body
+of tribes and castes each of which is broken up into a number of
+totemistic septs. Each sept bears the name of an animal, a tree, a
+plant, or some material object, natural or artificial, which the
+members of that sept are prohibited from tilling, eating, cutting,
+burning, carrying, using, etc." (See Census of 1901, Vol. II, pp.
+530-535.)
+
+Mr. J. G. Frazer, in the _Fortnightly Review_, gives the following
+description of the totem: "A totem is a class of natural phenomena or
+material objects--most commonly a species of animals or
+plants--between which and himself the savage believes that a certain
+intimate relation exists.... This relation leads the savage to abstain
+from killing or eating his totem, if it happen to be a species of
+animal or plant. Further, the group of persons who are knit to any
+particular totem by this mysterious tie commonly bear the name of the
+totem, believe themselves to be of one blood, and strictly refuse to
+sanction the marriage or cohabitation of members of the group with
+each other. This prohibition to marry within the group is now
+generally called by the name Exogamy. Thus totemism has commonly been
+treated as a primitive system, both of religion and of society."
+
+In absorbing the Dravidian tribes, Brahmanism appropriated the
+totemistic cult and incorporated it into the caste system. And many
+Dravidian castes which are identified with this cult have the striking
+peculiarity of being exogamous as contrasted with the endogamy of the
+Aryan section of Hindu castes.
+
+
+III
+
+The penalties which are inflicted by caste for violation of its rules
+are many and very severe. It is hardly too much to say that there is
+not on earth an organization more absolute in its power, more
+wide-reaching in its sweep of interests, and more crushing in its
+punishment, than is caste. In the first place, it so completely hems
+in the life of a man, imperatively prescribes for him the routine of
+life, even down to the most insignificant details, and thus shuts him
+up to his own clan, and with equal completeness cuts him off from the
+members of other castes, that it can reduce any recalcitrant member to
+certain and speedy obedience, simply because there is no one to whom
+he can flee for sympathy and refuge. Even if this whole system had
+not, as its first aim and achievement, the alienation of members of
+different castes, who is there among Hindus that would interfere with
+this function of a caste to discipline its members? For is not "Thou
+shalt obey implicitly thy caste," the first law of the Hindu
+decalogue, and the one most sincerely believed by all Hindus? The
+following are among the penalties inflicted upon one who is under the
+ban of his caste:--
+
+All the members of his caste are prohibited from accepting his
+hospitality. Not even his own household are permitted to dine with
+him. He is boycotted, absolutely, by all his best friends, associates,
+and companions. Not one of them dares, under penalty of complete
+ostracism, to harbour or favour him. Nor will he be invited to their
+homes. They dare not receive him under the shelter of their roofs nor
+offer him food. More than once the writer has seen the bitter tyranny
+of caste brought to bear upon those who had abandoned caste by
+becoming Christians. Here is a youth known to the writer. He is a
+member of a respectable caste. He accepts the religion of Christ
+publicly as his own. His parents and brothers and sister will cling to
+him with the hope of bringing him back to the ancestral faith. But
+caste authority steps in. It forbids the family to receive the son and
+brother, or to offer him a morsel of food. In that household a sad war
+of sentiment is inaugurated. Parental love and family tenderness cling
+to the Christian youth; and is he not the hope of the family for the
+years to come? But to harbour him means to be outcast as a family; and
+how can they endure that? And are they not at heart loyal to the caste
+of their fathers? So the conflict runs on for months. One night only
+the tender heart of the sister compels her to defy caste to the
+extent, not of eating with the dear brother and companion of her
+youth, but so far as to bring him the remnant of their meal, not in
+one of the home vessels from which he had eaten so often as a Hindu in
+the past, but on a plantain leaf and behind the house!
+
+Then, of course, comes the connubial ban whereby all the members of
+the caste are prohibited from giving any of their children in marriage
+to those of his household. To the Hindu who believes that marriage is
+not only the God-given right of every human being, but who also
+implicitly believes that it is a heavenly injunction whose fulfilment
+rests as a duty upon every father in behalf of his children, this
+interdict is the most oppressive of all. But it is enforced with
+heartless severity in every case; and any family which may defy the
+caste in this respect by entering into conjugal relationship with that
+of the one under ban, is at once outcast.
+
+Another mighty resource of the organization, in this connection, is to
+interdict to the recreant member the use of all caste servants. For
+instance, the caste barber and washerman are commanded to serve him
+and his no longer. The severity of this interdiction cannot possibly
+be realized by westerners, who are not always dependent upon these
+functionaries. But in India every one depends upon the barber and
+washerman for their service even more than a westerner does upon the
+service of the butcher or the doctor. The Hindu never dreams of the
+possibility of doing for himself the duties performed by these caste
+servants for him. Moreover, the barbers and washermen of other castes
+would, under no circumstance, be allowed to render him the service
+thus prohibited to him by his own caste.
+
+Add again to these inflictions the further one of complete isolation
+in times of domestic bereavement. Should a member of his family die,
+not one of the caste members is permitted to help in the last sacred
+rites for the dead. Even at that moment, when one would expect the icy
+barriers to melt away, the heart of caste is as hard and its severity
+as rigid as ever. The helplessness of a family under these
+circumstances is, to any one who is not a slave to the whole accursed
+system, most pitiful and heartrending.
+
+Another caste penalty which has received undue public prominence of
+late is called _prayaschitta_, which means atonement. It is usually
+applied as punishment to those who have had the temerity to cross the
+ocean for foreign travel, business, or study. More correctly, it is
+rather a process of cleansing and ceremonial rehabilitation than an
+act of punishment. The exclusiveness of caste delighted in calling all
+foreigners Mlechhas, which, though perhaps not as vigorous a term as
+the Chinese sobriquet, "black devils," connoted, and still connotes,
+to the caste Hindu, "unclean wretches," contact with whom brings
+ceremonial pollution and sin. He who crossed the ocean would
+necessarily be debased by these defiling ones and would be, as a
+matter of course, engulfed in the pollutions of their life! To
+prohibit travel, which necessarily involved such sin and degradation,
+became therefore the concern of the ancient lawmakers of India. Hence
+the _prayaschitta_, under which the educated community of India chafe
+so much at the present time. For many of the best and most promising
+youth of India travel abroad or reside temporarily in England, with a
+view to perfecting their educational training so as to qualify
+themselves for highest positions of usefulness in the homeland. Others
+go abroad on business or to behold and study the wonders of western
+life and civilization. All men of culture and power in India, at the
+present time, are convinced of the evil and absurdity of this caste
+law, which is common to all castes, because it is a part of the
+general legislation of their religion. They decline to believe that it
+is either sin or pollution to go in search of the best that the West
+and the East have discovered and can bestow upon one, and that which
+is to-day doing most in the elevation and redemption of India herself.
+And many of them are defying this obsolete and debasing law of their
+faith. Many others are crying for a modern interpretation of the
+law--an interpretation which will explain away its bitterness and
+render it innocuous. For it is not simply or chiefly the reactionary
+and absurd character of this legislation which exasperates the
+intelligence of the land; it is the very offensive and revolting
+_nature_ of the expiation which preeminently stirs up the rebellion.
+In former centuries of darkness, Hindus may have been willing to
+submit to the humiliation of eating the five products of the cow as an
+atonement for the supposed sin of sea-travel. The culture and
+intelligence of the present time is neither so abject nor so
+superstitious as to submit to this, without, at least, a vigorous
+protest. And yet, what the culture of India seeks to-day is not the
+abolishing of this law, which is equally repulsive to their taste and
+to their intelligence; it asks only that some way of avoiding the
+penalty may be found! And all that Hinduism and caste require of these
+foreign-travelled men is not an intelligent submission to its behests,
+but an outward observance of them. So the faith and its conservative
+defenders are satisfied to see these men of culture, as they return
+with the acquired treasures of the West, submit outwardly to this
+offensive rite, while their sensitive nature rises in rebellion
+against it. And these young scions of the East willingly practise this
+hypocrisy and submit to this indignity in order to live at peace with,
+and indeed to live at all in, their ancestral caste! It is only an
+illustration of the hollowness of the major part of the life of the
+educated community in this great land. Well may one exclaim, what can
+be expected from a people whose leading men of culture are living this
+double and mean life! This is verily "peace with dishonour"!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE HINDU CASTE SYSTEM (_continued_)
+
+
+IV
+
+The agency through which, and the occasion upon which, caste penalizes
+its members are manifold.
+
+Formerly, Hindu kings, under instruction from their pandit ministers,
+would enforce caste observances. But under the present non-Hindu State
+no such action could be expected. In many instances pandits have to be
+consulted both as to whether a member has really violated _shastraic_
+injunctions and as to the penalty which should be inflicted in that
+special case. In doubtful cases, pandits of various trainings and
+leanings are called who present conflicting opinions which end in
+confusion.
+
+In Southern India important cases of caste violation among
+non-Vishnuvite Hindus are under the jurisdiction of the Superiors of
+Sankarite monasteries. Some of these assume and exercise Papal
+authority in such matters among their people. Usually, however, each
+local caste organization deals directly with infractions of its own
+rules, and is competent to deal drastically, and as a court of final
+resort, with all cases of caste infringement within its own
+membership. It may be done in public assembly, when all male members
+are present and have a voice; or the caste _panchayat_, or council of
+five, may sit in judgment upon the case and have right of final
+action. This latter tribunal is the more common in South India, and is
+more in harmony with the spirit and methods of the land.
+
+There are a number of courses of action which are adequate as causes
+of removal from caste.
+
+One of these is a change of faith. The abandonment of the ancestral
+religion, which is the mother of caste spirit and organization,
+especially when the newly accepted faith repudiates openly caste and
+all that belongs to it, inevitably leads to expulsion from caste. In
+most cases this has resulted upon conversion to either Christianity or
+Mohammedanism. But this is not as universal as we could wish or as
+many suppose, as we shall see later on. It may be seen how, in a mass
+movement of a large body of men toward Christianity, for instance, the
+people may easily, and would naturally, carry with them into the new
+faith many of their old customs and habits, including much that
+pertains to, and is of the essence of, caste.
+
+Roman Catholicism has interpreted caste chiefly from a social
+standpoint, and has therefore regarded it as a social institution
+which can be adapted to, and adopted into, the Christian religion.
+Protestantism, or, at least, Anglo-Saxon Protestantism, has regarded
+caste as primarily and dominantly a religious institution, whose
+spirit antagonizes fundamentally our faith, and which must be opposed
+at all points. Hence it is a part of the pledge of every one who
+enters into the Protestant fellowship in India that he will eschew and
+oppose caste at all times. And it may be said that, though Hinduism
+loves dearly compromise and evasion, it has in the main held that a
+man who has accepted the Christian faith and has been publicly
+baptized into its conviction of the "fatherhood of God and the
+brotherhood of all men," has no place in its own caste system, and it
+consistently deals with him as with an outcast. As we have already
+seen, every man who has travelled abroad has lost thereby caste and
+has to undergo expiation before reinstatement. It matters not how
+thoroughly he has tried to preserve caste customs during his travels
+and in the foreign land, he is regarded by all as a _de facto_
+outcast.
+
+Marrying a widow is also an act which severs caste ties and places a
+man under the ban. Of course, this applies not to the few castes which
+allow widow-remarriage. But as the bulk of Hindus deny the right of a
+widow to remarry (though there is no caste obstacle to a widower
+taking unto himself a new virgin wife every year of his life), a man
+cannot enter into an alliance with a widow without losing caste
+thereby.
+
+Beef-eating is regarded as so heinous a sin that no member of a
+respectable caste would expect consideration for a moment. And yet Dr.
+J. H. Barrows has said that the famous Swamy, Vivekanantha, when with
+him at Chicago, ate a whole plateful of beef in his presence and with
+a great deal of relish. But he, of course, had graduated out of the
+ordinary level of Hindu-hood into the sacred heights of Swamyhood, in
+which a man is exempt from the mean limitation of caste, and when the
+vulgar sins of common Hindu life are transmuted into the ordinary
+blessings and privileges of saintdom.
+
+In like manner, vegetarian castes punish their members for the eating
+of any meat. The Hindu aversion to meat is very common; it is also
+sanitary and wholesome; for meat-eating in the tropics is neither
+necessary nor conducive to health. And yet the Pariah outcast has no
+scruples in this matter. It is indeed true that he would deem it a sin
+to butcher a cow or an ox; but he will not hesitate to poison his
+neighbour's cattle, that he may thereby have enough carrion to eat.
+For the carcases of the dead cattle of the village are the perquisite
+of the Pariah; and it is upon finding such that he enjoys his only
+feasts of plenty. But to the ordinary Hindu all bovine kind are
+divine, and the flesh of the same is strictly and vehemently tabooed.
+
+Punishment is also dealt out, as we have seen, to those who eat any
+food cooked by an outcast, whether he be Christian, Mohammedan, or
+Pariah. And the same is true of eating with an outcast, or with one
+who is of a lower caste than himself. Indeed, so far is this spirit
+carried by certain high castes that to be seen eating by a member of a
+lower caste, or to allow the shadow of a stranger to fall upon one's
+prepared food, is pollution. Hence the care with which all Hindus seek
+privacy and avoid the gaze of men during mealtime.
+
+Officiating as a priest in the house of a low-class Sudra is strictly
+prohibited to a Brahman, and he loses caste thereby. He and other
+"twice born" are also driven out of caste if they throw away the
+sacred thread which is the outer badge of their second birth and
+dignity.
+
+A woman, when found in open sin with a man of another caste, and a
+widow, when she can no longer hide the consequence of her immorality,
+are no longer in caste.
+
+It is hardly necessary to mention that marrying outside of one's own
+caste is a sin which finds no countenance, but severest punishment, in
+nearly all castes.
+
+Generally speaking, we may say that caste authority is exercised only
+in cases where ceremonial observance and social usages are violated.
+In matters that are purely ethical, and which bear upon the character
+and moral elevation of the individual and the clan, caste rarely acts;
+for it does not consider that its honour is compromised or its organic
+life impaired by such conduct.
+
+It should also be mentioned that caste is not even in the distribution
+of its dispensations and punishments. A man of wealth and social
+influence succeeds in staving off many acts of caste displeasure which
+would fall heavily upon the poor and friendless man. Such a man may,
+and often does, trample under foot every command of the decalogue,
+and at the same time defy and violate a good moiety of the injunctions
+of his caste. And yet, because of his wealth and general importance in
+caste councils, he stands unimpeached and unrebuked.
+
+In matters of caste observance and discipline, villages are much more
+conservative and strict than cities. In the latter, as we shall see,
+caste observance is much relaxed, and life is more on modern lines.
+
+
+V
+
+The results of the caste system in India are many and manifest. It has
+sown its seed for many centuries and to-day reaps a rich harvest in
+life and conduct. It should not be assumed, and it cannot be asserted,
+that this great system has always been an unmixed evil to the people
+of this land.
+
+No organization which has bound by its fetters for eighty generations
+nearly a sixth of the population of the globe, and which continues to
+grip them to-day with tyrannical power, can be devoid of any redeeming
+feature. The very perpetuity and prosperity of the scheme argues for
+its possession of some rational features, originally connected with
+it, which gave it sanction to the myriads who have submitted to its
+reign over them. But it is exceedingly difficult to discover that
+excellence which originally commended it to the people of this land.
+Nor do the writings of those who have striven to defend the system
+assist us in making this discovery. A modern Brahman defence by
+Jogendra Nath Bhattacharya (see "Hindu Castes and Sects," pp. 1-10)
+gives only one ray of light upon the subject when he observes that
+"the legislation of the Rishis was calculated not only to bring about
+union between the isolated clans that lived in primitive India, but to
+render it possible to assimilate within each group the foreign hordes
+that were expected to pour into the country from time to time." In
+those remote days when weakness through isolation threatened their
+very existence, and when there was no possibility of a general union
+of all the people for defence, thorough organization of clans into
+castes brought strength and confidence and was a conspicuous blessing.
+It was in those days a convenient and effective way of enforcing
+religious obligations upon the heterogeneous clans. It also was then
+probably useful in preserving purity of blood among the higher races,
+and in conserving the nobility of the Aryan who was destined to rule
+the mixed races of India for many centuries.
+
+Nor is the system without possibilities of good in modern times, as
+was illustrated recently by the action of a prominent North India
+caste in prohibiting large expenses in marriage and in raising, by
+legislation, the limit of the marriageable age of its girls.
+
+But, alas, any good that may possibly inhere in the system has largely
+remained _in posse_ rather than _in esse_. The history of caste has
+been one of evil, and it is no wonder that such a fair-minded writer
+as Mr. Sherring, who has probably made a more thorough study of the
+subject than any other man, should call the organization "a monstrous
+engine of pride, dissension, and shame" (see Preface to his "Hindu
+Tribes and Castes"). Considering the subject, therefore, in its
+bearing upon the life of India to-day, and studying its results as we
+now find them among all classes of the people and in their definite
+bearing upon the future of the land, we are compelled to pronounce
+against it at all points.
+
+It is, in the first place, the source of interminable discord and
+dissension all over the land. It not only arrays caste against caste;
+but bitter animosity is the order of the day among the subdivisions of
+castes. In every one of the numberless castes in the land there are
+divisions and subdivisions galore. And while the Sudras acknowledge
+the supremacy of the "twice born," among the myriad clans of the
+Sudras themselves there is endless assumption and contention, every
+one, fomented by pride, claiming primacy and distinction above the
+others. Recently, in South India, this feeling led to a serious riot,
+in which not a few lives were lost and villages devastated.
+
+It also narrows the sympathies of the people in a most lamentable way.
+Among the common people of India it is held that a man's duties to his
+caste embrace his whole obligation. When a fellow-being is in
+difficulty and his condition strongly appeals for sympathy, the first,
+and often the last, question asked is, "Is he a member of my caste?"
+If not, like the priest and the Levite of old, his conscience allows
+him to "pass by on the other side." Recently a woman perished in the
+streets of a town near Madura. She was a resident of a village some
+twenty-five miles away, and was, therefore, a stranger in this town,
+where she sickened and was carried to a public rest-house. But when
+her condition became serious and no relatives or caste friends came to
+her support, she was put out into the street, where she lay helpless
+for three days in the rain and sunshine. Hundreds of people saw her
+dying agonies as they passed by during those days; but no heart of
+sympathy went out to her; for was she not a stranger? And it was left
+to an American, who happened to pass that way on the third day, to
+demand of the town officer that she be put back in the rest-house,
+where she shortly afterward died. Let it not be thought that this is
+an isolated case. He who is familiar with Indian life knows it is not,
+for daily he has to witness the woful limitations which caste imposes
+upon human sympathy.
+
+Caste has also degraded manual labour. The loss of caste by any
+Brahman who follows the plough is only an application of this rule in
+the highest quarters. Caste has taught the people of this land that
+humble toil, however honest it may be, is more than mean; it is
+sinful. There are millions of the higher castes of India who deem it
+honourable to beg, and dignified to spend their years in abject
+laziness, but who would regard it as unspeakable degradation to take
+a hoe or a hammer and earn an honest living by the sweat of their
+brow. Nor will their caste rules permit of their undertaking such
+work. And this spirit has passed down the ranks until it pervades the
+whole of society in India, with the consequence that manual labour is
+universally regarded as degrading, and with the further natural result
+that a horde of five and a half millions of lazy, wretched, immoral,
+able-bodied, religious beggars are burdening this land. And thus
+mendicancy is made honourable at the expense of honest toil. It should
+be further remarked that there are a number of begging castes, in
+which all work is proscribed and mendicity exalted into a divinely
+ordained profession!
+
+Moreover, caste makes it impossible for India to become a commercial
+country. So long as foreign travel is banned and contact with other
+lands is regarded as a sin against heaven and caste, there is little
+hope that the people of this land will distinguish themselves in that
+kind of trade and commerce which has made India's mistress, Great
+Britain, so illustrious in wealth and dominion.
+
+And it is this caste spirit which so easily made the great peninsula
+of India a prey to the "tight little island" many thousands of miles
+away. For not only has caste made the Hindus an insular people, it has
+also so divided them that they do not realize any common sentiment,
+save that of opposition to the State, or seek any common good. Hence
+they have for many centuries been the easy prey of any adventurers who
+sought to overcome and despoil them. A genuine national feeling and a
+patriotic sentiment are all but impossible in the land. And all
+intelligent Hindus acknowledge this sad condition at present, and many
+of the best of them publicly maintain that national consciousness,
+self-rule, and a glowing, triumphant patriotism can be built only upon
+the ruins of the caste system.
+
+And even as it is a foe to nationality, so is it the mortal enemy of
+individualism. The caste system is really a glorification of the
+multitude as against the individual. Individual initiative and
+assertion, liberty of conscience, the right of man to life and the
+pursuit of happiness,--all these are foibles of the West which it has
+been the chief business of caste to crush; and upon their ruin it has
+erected this mighty tower of Babel. In India, it has been the business
+of men, from time immemorial, not to do what they think to be right,
+nor to find out, every one for himself, what they consider to be the
+best and to act according to the dictates of conscience; it has rather
+been submission to caste dominance. And it is the unblushing teaching
+of the _Shastras_ that obedience to caste is the fulfilment of duty
+and the _summum bonum_ of life. So omnipotent and omniscient is the
+arm and head of caste that men dare not defy it. Hence we are
+compelled to look in India to-day upon the saddest spectacle of abject
+manhood the world has known. To those who, like the writer, have spent
+a lifetime in trying to raise the outcasts and the lower strata of
+Indian society, the most difficult and discouraging obstacle is the
+inertia and the abjectness of the people themselves. Through a bitter
+experience of many centuries they have learned that it does not pay
+for the individual to assert himself against the dictates of the
+caste, or for the lower castes to rise in rebellion against their lot.
+They discovered that they were merely butting their heads against an
+adamantine rock. So they have lost every ambition and hope; and he who
+would lift them up must first remove that leaden despair which rests
+upon them like a mighty incubus.
+
+Nor is it much better with the educated classes of India. There are
+hundreds of thousands of these men of western university training who
+annually assemble in Congress and in Convention, and who in spotless
+English of Addisonian accent and in the sonorous phraseology of a
+Macaulay, discourse upon human rights and who denounce the bondage of
+caste tyranny. And yet they submit, in their own homes, to that same
+accursed tyranny and are in life as abject as the meanest Pariah in
+the face of caste edicts which they know to be unrighteous and
+demeaning to the core.
+
+It should also be remembered that caste is the foster-mother of all
+the manifold social evils of the land. In pre-caste days in India such
+evils as child marriage, prohibition of widow remarriage, temple
+women, excessive marriage expenses, etc., did not exist. They are a
+part of the caste regime supported and perpetuated by its authority.
+Remove this mighty compulsion, and these institutions would soon
+become things of the past.
+
+Another evil of this organization is that of ignoring the ethical and
+spiritual standard and of measuring everything from a purely formal
+and ceremonial standpoint. All life is reduced into an unceasing
+ritual under the perpetual priestly surveillance of caste. All that it
+asks of man is outward conformity. He may disbelieve and hate every
+commandment of his faith; but if he conforms, he is a faithful son. On
+the other hand, he may be a man of unblemished character, and he may
+even intend to be obedient to caste; but if, some night, a few enemies
+were to thrust into his mouth and compel him to swallow a piece of
+beef, no power could save him from the dreadful punishment that would
+follow. A man may write a tract in condemnation and ridicule of all
+the gods of the Hindu pantheon and still remain an acceptable Hindu;
+but if, in the agony of a burning fever, he should drink a spoonful of
+water from the hands of a Christian or of a Pariah, his caste would
+doom him to perdition for it.
+
+In other words, the whole system directly cultivates, in all the
+people, a hollowness of life which does more than anything else to rob
+India of her manhood and which makes nobility of character and ethical
+integrity most difficult things among the Hindu community. A Brahman
+gentleman described the whole system as a "vast hollow sham." And such
+it is.
+
+
+VI
+
+Paradoxical though it may seem, caste spirit is more prevalent and its
+influence more dominant in India at the present than in the past; yet
+there is more defiance and violation of caste rules and more frequent
+and sure evidences of the speedy termination of its reign than at any
+previous time.
+
+It has ruled so long and so supremely in this country that the Hindu
+accepts it without questioning; and it has become more than a second
+nature to him, even a necessity of his being. What would be
+intolerably irksome to a Westerner is to the Hindu a matter of course.
+To the rank and file of the Hindus, caste has ceased to be a matter of
+question. It is the only order of life with which he is conversant;
+and while he may be convinced by arguments which prove its cruelty and
+its many evils, he still clings to it as the only system under which
+he knows how to live and which he cares to obey.
+
+As we have already seen, the ramifications of caste are more numerous
+and its authority more general to-day than at any former time. Many
+Hindu reformers, especially of the Vishnu sects, have followed in the
+steps of the great Buddha, by denouncing caste, root and branch, and
+have established their own sects during the last ten centuries on a
+non-caste basis. But they have all succumbed to the demon which they
+antagonized and now generally observe caste rules with the same
+devotion as other Hindus.
+
+The lower the caste spirit has descended to the "submerged tenth" of
+the land, the more vehemently have they become inoculated with its
+virus. The outcast Pariah is not to be outdone in this matter; and so
+we have Pariahs and Pariahs. Many divisions are found among this
+wretched class, and they are more exclusive in their divisions and
+more rigid in their narrowness than are many of the high castes.
+
+Even those who have abandoned the Hindu faith and professed another,
+do not leave behind them this divisive spirit. Perhaps the converts
+from Mohammedanism have eschewed Hindu caste more than converts to
+other faiths.
+
+Among Christian converts, though caste is professedly abandoned, it
+clings with vital tenacity and almost unconquerable persistence to
+their sense of the fitness of things. Their deepest prejudices and
+unconscious tendencies, even against their intellectual convictions
+and sincere professions, unceasingly sway the vast majority of them
+and lead them into affiliations and narrow sympathies which are Hindu
+and not Christian. It is true that the oldest Christian community in
+India, the Syrian Church of Malabar, has long abandoned the Hindu
+caste organization, with even its mean remnant of caste titles. And
+yet that community settled down for many centuries into the
+conviction that it was merely one caste among the many of that region
+and must keep itself aloof from and untainted by the surrounding
+castes. Roman Catholicism, which has still the most numerous Native
+Christian community in India, has largely adopted the Hindu system and
+tries to utilize it in the furtherance of Christianity in the land! No
+greater mistake was ever made than this of trying to uphold and
+promulgate the meekness, the humility, the love, and the fellowship of
+Christ by means of the haughty pride, the cruel hate, and the bitter
+divisiveness of caste.
+
+[Illustration: JUNGLE PEOPLE OF INDIA]
+
+Protestant Christianity is to-day the pronounced foe of caste. It is
+war to the death between them, and the missionaries have not yet found
+a foe to their cause so subtle, deceptive, deep-rooted, persistent,
+and pervasive as this. It is fortified by a thousand ramparts and
+presents more discouragement to the Christian worker than all other
+obstacles combined. Even Buddhism and Jainism, the former of which was
+the ancient protest against Hindu caste, have fallen oft-times a prey
+to the subtle and damning wiles of this system. In Bengal, a number of
+Hindu castes are known to have been formerly members of the Jain and
+Buddhist communities (see Census 1901, Vol. II, p. 523).
+
+However, notwithstanding this growing prevalence and the marvellous
+tenacity of caste throughout the land, there are encouraging signs of
+its decadence. Its grip is certainly relaxing in many ways, and its
+asperities are softening.
+
+It may not untruthfully be said that the growing multiplicity of
+castes is one of the sure harbingers of the downfall of the system.
+For the divisions of caste are already beyond computation. The
+population is cut up into so many minute sections that the caste
+edifice overtowers everything else, so that it is in imminent danger
+of toppling over. It is claimed that war among civilized nations will
+soon become an impossibility because of the growing devastating power
+of modern weapons of warfare. In like manner, caste is speedily
+passing through its very excesses to a _reductio ad absurdum_; its
+spirit is so rampant, and its gross evils are becoming so intolerable,
+that even the patient inhabitants of India will soon cease to endure
+the ruin which this monster of their own creation carries on among
+them.
+
+Educated Hindus are already denouncing it with great vehemence and
+with considerable unanimity. They are convinced that India can never
+win independence and power under the regime of caste; and they
+proclaim their convictions upon the house-top. It is true, as we have
+seen, that caste has so powerfully thrown its spell over them, its own
+children, that they are too abject to withstand it openly and
+unitedly. But I believe that they will erelong be driven to action.
+Further, obedience and submission will mean ruin to them, their
+families, and their country.
+
+Even now, among the educated, especially in Bengal, caste restrictions
+upon dining are being increasingly ignored. A Bengalee gentleman
+enjoys ordinary hotel fare with apparently none to interfere with his
+liberties. In Madras, the writer has more than once rubbed shoulders
+with Brahman lawyers and others eating together the common fare of a
+well-known restaurant of the city. And he has known Brahman patients,
+high in society, who did not object even to buy and use nourishment in
+the form of "Liebig's Beef-extract," so long as they could cover its
+offensiveness to the women of their household by the euphemistic name
+"meat-extract."
+
+And to this they are being rapidly carried by a conjunction of many
+forces which are increasingly dominating the land.
+
+In the first place, they have the potent example of a host of western
+lives among them. This body of white people, from the far-off lands,
+is distributed all over India. They are the rulers of the land. A
+Brahman may deem their touch pollution. But that same Brahman is often
+glad to undergo that ceremonial taint if thereby he can only enjoy the
+white man's cultured society. He beholds in these people from the West
+a freedom from irksome caste restraints. He notices conjugal relations
+among them, such as furnish richest home blessings. Their social
+relations are untrammelled and abound in convivial privileges such as
+are denied to Hindu society. All this creates in him an uneasiness. If
+he is a man of culture and resides in some city of importance, he will
+wish to meet English friends upon lines of social equality; but this
+he will find to be impossible apart from his defiance of caste rules;
+for, to the man of the West, the common cup and the festal board are
+the essential conditions of true friendship and intimacy. Thus the
+life of the ruling race in India is a constant rebuke to the
+narrowness of caste and a source of discontent to the caste-ridden
+people, because it reveals to them a different and a better way of
+living.
+
+Nor is it merely this new type of non-caste western life that appeals
+to them. The modern civilization of the West, with its humanizing
+laws, its exaltation of the individual, its religious freedom, its new
+and broadening education and culture, its equal rights to every man,
+its many institutions through every one of which there breathes the
+Anglo-Saxon's blessed love of liberty, the home with its sanctified
+affection and its glorified womanhood, philanthropy which carries with
+an even hand its sweet services to the high and the low--to Pariah as
+to the Brahman,--all these institutions and influences are at work
+like a mighty leaven in the mind and heart of India. And the people
+cannot be blind to this influence; and it is gradually transforming
+their ideals and ambition.
+
+Connected with these more subtle western civilizing agencies are found
+the material agencies which are the dread foes of caste exclusion. The
+chief among these is the railroad, the thirty thousand miles of which
+are so many tongues to proclaim the doom of past narrowness. The
+Brahman, with all his mean pride, cannot forego the wonderful
+conveniences of the "iron road and the fire-carriage"; but in order to
+avail himself of them, he must sit an hour at a time cheek by jowl
+with a low-caste--it may be a Pariah--fellow-passenger. The railroad
+gnaws at the vitals of caste life and convictions.
+
+Next to it come the schools. Millions of youth are trained in them
+daily to regard caste as an unworthy classification. All sections are
+taught in the same classes; they play in the same playground. In both
+places the lower often excels the higher caste boy. The seeds of
+equality and a common regard are thus constantly sown among the youth
+of all sections of the land. If it astonished the recent educational
+(Moseley) Commission which went from England to the United States to
+study the educational conditions there, when it saw the children of
+the President of the country studying side by side with the children
+of day-labourers, so must it seem wonderful, and wonderfully good, to
+a student of social conditions in India, to behold the child of a
+Pariah and that of a Brahman preparing, side by side, in the
+schoolroom, for the responsibilities and the blessings of life.
+
+Many other agencies similar to the above are doing their benign
+levelling work.
+
+The government, however, is the great leveller. In all its gifts of
+offices, in all posts of honour and influence, it distributes its
+blessings with strict impartiality, so far as caste is concerned. It
+wisely ignores all social distinctions and depends upon qualifications
+of culture and character when it seeks men to conduct its affairs.
+This is something unprecedented in the land of Manu. That the outcast
+should stand an equal chance with the high castes for positions of
+honour and emolument was unknown in this land of sharp distinctions.
+
+And even more fundamental than this is the blessing of equal personal
+and political rights. In ancient India, such an idea was never
+entertained. Before British rule entered the land it was never dreamed
+that priest, prince, and beggar--and that Brahman and Pariah--had
+equal rights before the law. To-day they all recognize the justice of
+this and expect it.
+
+Finally, the advent of Christianity, with power, into the land has
+brought a new death-knell to caste supremacy. We have seen that Indian
+Christian converts abandon all other customs and superstitions with
+greater facility than they do those of caste. Its roots have sunk
+deepest into the soil of their nature. But let it not be thought that
+they do not grow stronger against caste than they used to be. In the
+Indian Christian community there is developing a most encouraging
+movement toward the complete eradication of caste sentiment and
+observance within the Church itself. They are more sensible than ever
+before of the gross inconsistency of a man's taking upon himself the
+sacred name of Christ and at the same time submitting to the dominance
+of caste. Indian Christian anti-caste organizations are now at work
+seeking to drive out of the Church of God in India this Antichrist,
+and to cultivate the true spirit and amenities of Christian fellowship
+and fraternal communion.
+
+The spirit of Christ is abroad in the land in regenerating and
+transforming power. His great message to the world was the common
+fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. And the Christian Church
+is growing increasingly true to the message of its Leader and Lord in
+this country. Men may not accept the Christian call to believe and to
+be baptized; but they cannot be blind and deaf to the work and call of
+the Spirit of Christ in these modern times of thrilling changes and
+opportunities.
+
+It is this Christian ideal which is running athwart the most ancient
+and cherished institutions and customs of India, and has precipitated
+a conflict such as the land has never before known.
+
+But the end is not yet, and caste will not be hurled down from its
+high pedestal in a day. It is a mighty institution which has its root
+in deepest sentiments and is sustained by cherished antiquity and by
+the strongest passions and prejudices. These will not succumb in a
+brief generation. And even when Christianity shall have triumphed and
+shall have driven out its rival faith from the land, as we have every
+reason to believe that it will, let it not be supposed that the
+Christianity of the East will have the social complexion of that of
+the West. In the earliest days of Christianity, we are told by the
+great Apostle to the Gentiles that there were "heresies" in the
+Church. These were _social_ heresies or class divisions. It was later
+in the West that "heresy" became an error of _belief_. The Indian
+Church will also have heresies of life rather than of thought. The
+caste spirit will not vanish entirely from India, even when it becomes
+Christ's land; because while India is always indulgent and tolerant
+concerning beliefs, she is particular about class distinctions. And
+this, doubtless, will be the weakness of the Indian Church of the
+future. But she will have her strong points, also, and in these she
+will glory and through them glorify her exalted Lord.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE BHAGAVAD GITA--THE HINDU BIBLE
+
+
+The Bhagavad Gita (translated "The Song of the Adorable One" and "The
+Divine Lay") is rightly regarded as the gem of all Hindu sacred
+literature. Hindus maintain (and few will question them) that in
+beauty of language and in elevation of thought it stands supreme among
+their _Shastras_, or sacred writings.
+
+Educated Hindus proudly claim for it superiority to all sacred books
+of other faiths.
+
+Of all ancient Brahmanical writings it is to-day the most cherished by
+the members of that faith. The ancient Rig Veda is at present only a
+book of antiquarian interest. The Upanishads, which are the
+fountainhead of Hindu thought and philosophy, are only the text-books
+and treasure-houses of philosophers and metaphysicians. But the Divine
+Lay is extolled and used alike by men of western culture, by
+conservative pandits, and by the masses as their highest book of
+doctrine and their richest treasury of devotion.
+
+Even many Hindus who have come under the fascination of the Christ,
+carry with them upon their journeyings the New Testament in one pocket
+and the Bhagavad Gita in the other, as the common guide and
+inspiration of their quiet hours of meditation.
+
+It is thus universally recognized that there is no book which wields a
+larger influence than this in the religious life of the two hundred
+and thirty millions of Hindus to-day; and there is none which is more
+worthy to be called the Hindu Bible.
+
+
+I
+
+In strange contrast with the bulky tomes of Brahmanism and of the
+great epic, Mahabharata (which, with its two hundred and forty
+thousand lines, is the longest epic ever written, being eight times as
+long as the Odyssey and the Iliad put together), the Bhagavad Gita
+contains only seven hundred _slohams_, and is not as long as the
+Gospel of St. Mark.
+
+The date of the origin of the Song is very much disputed. There are
+Hindu authorities who would carry it back to the fifth century B.C.,
+the time which is assigned for the first recension of the Mahabharata,
+of which the Bhagavad Gita is a very small part. But the highest
+authorities find conclusive proof that it originated about the second
+or third century of our era, and was then inserted as a part of an
+episode in the narrative of the great epic.
+
+The Mahabharata is a great poetic narrative of a conflict between the
+two branches of the Bharata family--the Pandavas and the Kauravas--for
+the petty kingdom of Hastinapura, near the modern city of Delhi.
+
+The two forces are already, in counter array, eager for the fray on
+the battle-field of Kuruchetra. The call to battle has already been
+blown upon the miraculous conchs of the leaders of both sides, who are
+seated in their chariots drawn by white horses. Over each one waves
+his personal ensign. Arjuna, the noblest of the five brave Pandava
+leaders, is a man of heroic traits of character; and yet within him
+breathes the tenderest sentiment of humanity. He pauses a moment ere
+he leads his mighty hosts against the enemy; and, as he looks upon his
+own kith and kin in the opposing ranks, he is overcome by the stern
+voice of conscience blending with humanitarian impulses. Is it right,
+can it _possibly_ be right, for him to go forth to destroy his own
+friends and relatives; shall he shed the blood of those who are
+nearest and dearest to him upon the earth? This is the agonizing
+doubt which seizes upon him at this time. And in his distress he turns
+to his friend and relative, Krishna, who has declined to participate
+in the war, but who had volunteered to act as Arjuna's charioteer. And
+he says unto him: "Seeing these kinsmen, O Krishna, standing (here)
+desirous to engage in battle, my limbs droop down; my mouth is quite
+dried up; a tremor comes on my body; and my hairs stand on end; the
+Gandiva (bow) slips from my hand; my skin burns intensely; I am
+unable, too, to stand up; my mind whirls round, as it were. Even those
+for whose sake we desire sovereignty, enjoyments, and pleasures, are
+standing here for battle, abandoning life and wealth--preceptors,
+fathers, sons as well, grandfathers, maternal uncles, fathers-in-law,
+grandsons, brothers-in-law, as also other relatives. These I do not
+wish to kill, though they kill me, O destroyer of Madhu! even for the
+sake of sovereignty over the three worlds, how much less than for this
+earth (alone)?"
+
+Krishna replied, with a view to soothe Arjuna's perturbed mind, and to
+urge him on to battle.
+
+It is this dialogue between the hero and the god which constitutes the
+Bhagavad Gita. And yet one can hardly call it a dialogue, since
+Krishna's remarks make up more than nine-tenths of the book.
+
+The dialogue is one of the favourite forms of Hindu literature. Most
+of the Puranas and the Tantras are cast in that form.
+
+It seems very strange that this book, which is the favourite exponent
+of a faith whose very essence is non-resistance, whose genius is to
+inculcate the passive virtues, should have found its motive in the
+purpose of the god Krishna to overcome, in the warrior Arjuna, those
+worthy, humane sentiments of peace and kindness and that noble
+resolution to forego even the kingdom rather than to acquire it
+through the shedding of the blood of his relatives. How incongruous to
+build up the lofty structure of a faith upon so unethical, unsocial,
+and cruel a foundation!
+
+
+II
+
+The Song evidently belongs to the _tendensschrift_ school of
+literature. It is written with a definite aim and purpose. It is the
+highest exponent of Hindu Eclecticism. The three great schools of
+Brahmanical thought and philosophy--the Sankya, the Yoga, and the
+Vedanta--were founded more than twenty-five centuries ago and have
+wielded resistless power in the shaping of religious thought in
+India. And perhaps this power was never more manifest than at the
+present time.
+
+But these schools are, in their main issues, mutually antagonistic.
+The Sankya philosophy is severely dualistic and even has little use,
+if indeed it has any place, for the Divine Being. On the other hand,
+the Vedanta is uncompromisingly monistic. Its pantheism is of the
+highest spiritualistic type and is radically opposed to the
+materialism of the Sankya school. In one school the Divine Being is
+nothing and materialism has full sway; while in the other Brahm is
+everything, and all that appears to men--the phenomenal--is false and
+illusive.
+
+Again, as to the method of redemption, the Yoga philosophy advocates
+renunciation, self-effacement, and all the forms of asceticism. On the
+other hand, the Sankya philosophy inculcates action as the embodiment
+of the duty of man, through which alone he can attain unto absorption.
+
+Even to the present time these different schools of thought not only
+prevail; they have also begotten and are nourishing different schools
+of religious life and practice which present different ideals and
+enforce different methods.
+
+The Brahman author, or authors, of the Bhagavad Gita was inspired with
+the laudable ambition of harmonizing these conflicting teachings and
+of blending their peculiarities into one consistent whole, which would
+appeal to all the followers of the many-sided Brahmanical faith. This
+he accomplished with rare beauty of language, and with a success which
+has won admiration and acceptance by nearly all the people of India.
+And this is the more remarkable since the worship of Krishna is
+distinctly a part of the Vaishnavite cult of Hinduism, and as such
+does not appeal to the Saivites, or the worshippers of Siva.
+
+But the author, naturally and inevitably, failed to produce a
+congruous scheme of saving truth and religious appeal. The result is
+that we see, on almost every page, contradictory teachings and
+conflicting methods of salvation. This, of course, is by no means
+fatal to it in the estimation of Hindus, with whom consistency has
+never been a foible, and in the eyes of whom two mutually
+contradictory teachings can rest peacefully side by side.
+
+Here we find dualism and monism locking hands together, and the three
+ways of liberation--that of ritual, of asceticism, and of
+knowledge--not only find full expression, but are also supplemented by
+the inculcation of faith and of the obligations of caste. To a
+Westerner, this jumbling together of such antagonistic ideas and
+methods would be as repulsive as it would be absurd. But the Oriental
+mind works on different lines from the Occidental, and is never
+hampered by logical inconsistency.
+
+The Song of the Adorable One is divided into three chapters, of six
+divisions each.
+
+The first extols the benefits of the Yoga method; but it also adds
+that action should be supplemented to Yoga for the speediest
+attainment of beatification.
+
+In the second part, the pantheism of the Vedanta is inculcated, and
+Krishna identifies himself with the universal Spirit and claims
+adoration as such.
+
+In the third part, an effort is made to blend the Sankya and the
+Vedanta conceptions, an effort which largely permeates the whole book.
+That is, it claims that _prakriti_, or elemental nature, and the soul,
+or _atma_, find their source in Brahm; and thus it practically
+vitiates the fundamental teachings of both systems. At the same time,
+it also teaches the separate existence of individual souls, which is
+anti-Vedantic.
+
+As we study carefully the contents of this remarkable work, we are
+impressed equally with its excellences and defects, with its sublime
+teachings and absurd contentions. Generally speaking, it may be said
+to be characterized by notions which are, at the same time, supremely
+attractive to the East and unintelligible and repellent to the West.
+
+1. Considering first its teaching concerning God, we find emphasized
+that monistic teaching of Hindu Pantheism which has been the dominant
+note in the faith of India from the first. But it is not the strictly
+spiritual and the unequivocal Pantheism of Vedantism, which is purely
+idealistic and which bluntly denies the existence of everything but
+Brahm itself. It is rather a mixture of the dual and the non-dual
+teaching of the two dominant, contending philosophies of the land.
+Krishna tells us that he is not only the supreme Spirit, but also that
+the material universe is a part of himself. "O Son of Pritha! I am the
+Kratu, I am the Yagna, I am the Svadha, I am the product of the herbs,
+I am the sacred verse. I too am the sacrificial butter, I the fire, I
+the offering. I am the father of this universe, the mother, the
+creator, the grandsire, the thing to be known, the means of
+sanctification, ... the source and that in which it merges, the
+support, the receptacle, and the inexhaustible seed.... All entities
+which are of the quality of goodness, and those which are of the
+quality of passion and of darkness, know that they are, indeed, all
+from me; I am not in them, but they are in me. The whole universe,
+deluded by these three states of mind, develops from the qualities,
+does not know me who am beyond them and inexhaustible; for this
+delusion of mine, ... is divine and difficult to transcend."
+
+"There is nothing else higher than myself; all this is woven upon me
+like numbers of pearls upon a thread. I am the taste in water, I am
+the light in the sun and the moon."[2]
+
+[Footnote 2: The translation which I follow here is that of Mr.
+Telang, in "The Sacred Books of the East," which is, on the whole,
+both exact and more intelligible than most other translations.]
+
+These and many other similar expressions represent an evident effort
+to graft the materialistic conceptions of the Sankya upon the Vedanta,
+which is in nothing more emphatic than in denying the existence of all
+that is phenomenal and material.
+
+Krishna gave to Arjuna, at the latter's request, a vision of his true
+Self separate from, and infinitely higher than, the humble and
+illusive garb of his incarnation. And it was to him "as if in the
+heavens the lustre of a thousand suns burst forth all at once." And
+what a vision! Gazing upon it, Arjuna exclaims, "O God! I see within
+your body the gods, as also all the groups of various being; and the
+lord Brahm seated on his lotus seat, and all the sages and celestial
+snakes. I see you, who are of countless forms, possessed of many arms,
+stomachs, mouths, and eyes on all sides. And, O Lord of the Universe,
+O you of all forms! I do not see your end, middle, or beginning.... I
+believe you to be the eternal being. I see you void of beginning,
+middle, or end--of infinite power, of unnumbered arms, and having the
+sun and the moon for eyes, and having a mouth like a blazing fire and
+heating the universe with your radiance. For this space between heaven
+and earth and all the quarters are pervaded by you alone. Looking at
+this wonderful and terrible form of yours, O high-souled one! the
+three worlds are affrighted. For here these groups of gods are
+entering into you.... Our principal warriors, also, are rapidly
+entering your mouths, fearful and horrific by reason of your jaws. And
+some with their heads smashed are seen stuck in the spaces between the
+teeth. As the many rapid currents of a river's waters run toward the
+sea alone, so do the heroes of this human world enter your mouths
+blazing all around. As butterflies, with increased velocity, enter a
+blazing fire to their destruction, so too do these people enter your
+mouths with increased velocity, only to their destruction. Swallowing
+all these people, you are licking them over and over again from all
+sides with your blazing mouths!"
+
+Here we verily have a fine combination of the sublime and the
+ridiculous! The Apostle of Jesus was given to witness a vision of
+heavenly things such as could not be uttered. This disciple of Krishna
+does not hesitate to paint in such glowing terms a vision of the
+divine, that, to all but a Hindu, the picture seems not only
+incongruous but highly absurd and disgusting. One can hardly imagine
+that any mortal, to whom a vision of the divine being had been
+granted, could fail so utterly to furnish us with an edifying
+description of the same.
+
+In this Song, Krishna claims to be, at the same time, absolute Deity
+and the supreme incarnation. In nothing do the East and the West
+differ more radically than in their teaching concerning incarnation or
+"descent." In Christianity, God only once became incarnate; and in
+that Incarnation every believing soul has found its needs fully
+satisfied. Never, in all these two thousand years, did our Lord Christ
+satisfy more completely the human soul and bring rest to more human
+hearts than at the present time.
+
+To the Christian, Jesus represents the ultimate of God's earthly
+manifestation, as He does the complete realization of human salvation.
+
+But in Hinduism, incarnation is presented as a continuous passion of
+the Deity. The absolute Spirit forever amuses itself with the "sacred
+sport" of ever changing emanations and manifestations. Myriads of
+"descents" are recorded in their sacred books, of all degrees and
+forms of grotesqueness, and not a few of unblushing vileness. It is an
+interesting fact that the same Krishna who poses, and by millions of
+Hindus is accepted, as the Supreme Deity, is nevertheless represented
+in the most popular books of Hinduism to-day--the Puranas, which are
+known in their legends to all Hindus and which wield a supreme
+influence over them in their life--as a very different being. In these
+books the story of Krishna is one of fetid, unblushing immorality and
+voluptuousness. The publishing of these narratives in the English
+language in a western land at the present time would be considered a
+crime punishable with imprisonment. And thus this Hindu god, who is
+the most popular in India and who appeals most to the imagination of
+the people, led a life upon earth whose record is a story of
+immorality which brings a crimson blush to the pure.
+
+But, to return to the Hindu conception of incarnation, it must be
+remembered that it is unique in this particular; viz. that it regards
+the Deity as continually returning to the world to visit and to help
+human beings. In the Gita, Krishna remarks:--
+
+ "Whensoever, O Descendant of Bharata! piety languishes and
+ impiety is in the ascendant, I create myself. I am born, age
+ after age, for the protection of the good, for the
+ destruction of evil-doers, and the establishment of piety."
+
+The inadequacy of any one incarnation is here proclaimed, and the idea
+of constant communication with and impartation of himself to humanity
+through repeated _descents_ is here inculcated. And it is a
+fundamental conception of Hinduism--a conception which differentiates
+it essentially from the Christian religion.
+
+From this remark of Krishna, who speaks here as the Supreme Being, one
+would suppose that Hindu incarnations have been, and still are,
+definitely intended to enhance human piety upon earth, and have been
+such as to accomplish this purpose. As a matter of fact, the historic
+or legendary incarnations of India, as they are now recorded in their
+sacred books, have practically no ethical or spiritual content. I defy
+any Hindu to take the narratives of these descents, as found in the
+Puranas and other books, and show from them that there was anything
+more than physical and social relief to men intended by them or
+accomplished through them. I have yet to find, in those narratives,
+the conception of human sin and moral depravity and of the purpose of
+the incarnation to break the fetters of sin and to bring spiritual
+light and moral beauty to those among whom it manifested itself. The
+gulf which thus stands between the Hindu ideal of incarnation and the
+real incarnations which are recorded in Hindu literature, including
+that of Krishna himself, is wide and impassable. One has well said
+that the incarnation of Krishna is an incarnation of lust, and the
+record of his 16,100 wives and 180,000 sons is but a suggestion of the
+correctness of this estimate. Even the incarnation of Buddha, which,
+doubtless, is the highest and best among those incorporated into the
+Hindu Pantheon, is expressly stated by Hindu authorities to be for
+the purpose of deceiving and destroying the people.
+
+When one begins to compare the picture of the Christian Incarnation
+with that of any and of all those that occupy the Hindu mind, and fill
+many volumes of Hindu literature, we pass from noon-day light into
+Egyptian darkness.
+
+2. The doctrine of _atma_, or the human self, or soul, is more in
+accordance with the Sankya than the Vedantic school. The individual
+soul is represented, not as a part of the Supreme Soul, which is the
+distinct doctrine of the _Adwaitha_ philosophy, but as a separate
+entity which is immutable and eternal. Listen to Krishna's argument to
+Arjuna, in order to urge him into battle and to shed the blood of his
+friends: "Learned men grieve not for the living nor the dead. Never
+did I not exist, nor you, nor these rulers of men; nor will any of us
+ever hereafter cease to be. As in this body, infancy and youth and old
+age come to the embodied self, so does the acquisition of another
+body; a sensible man is not deceived about that.... There is no
+existence for that which is unreal; there is no non-existence for that
+which is real.... These bodies, appertaining to the embodied self
+which is eternal, indestructible, and indefinable, are said to be
+perishable; therefore do engage in battle, O descendant of Bharata! He
+who thinks it to be the killer and he who thinks it to be killed, both
+know nothing. It kills not, is not killed. It is not born, nor does it
+ever die, nor, having existed, does it exist no more. Unborn,
+everlasting, unchangeable, and primeval, it is not killed when the
+body is killed.... But even if you think that it is constantly born,
+and constantly dies, still, O you mighty man of arms! you ought not to
+grieve thus. For to one that is born, death is certain; and to one
+that dies, birth is certain."
+
+There is a great deal more in this line of the indestructibility of
+the soul; but nothing is said of the Vedantic idea that the soul has
+no real, separate existence, and that even this illusory existence, in
+human conditions, will terminate when the self shall be recognized to
+be, as it really is, an unsevered and inseparable part of the Supreme
+Soul.
+
+The eternal existence of the soul is posited by every school of Hindu
+thought. In the Sankya philosophy, the human self, as we have seen, is
+a separate, uncreated entity; and the teaching of the Divine Lay
+concerning it is in harmony with this. And it must be confessed that
+in many respects this doctrine is inferior to the Vedantic, which
+emphasizes the spiritual character, and the divine origin and destiny,
+of the soul.
+
+3. The doctrine of Liberation, or of Redemption, as found in the
+Bhagavad Gita, is a strange combination of all the ways which
+Brahmanism has inculcated through its many schools, with other ways
+here added. "In every way men follow in my path," declared Krishna. In
+the pursuance of any religious practices whatever, men were assured
+that they would be acceptable if they were only Krishna-olaters.
+
+(1) But the highest path which leads unto God is the path of knowledge
+(_Gnana_). "Sacrifices of various sorts are laid down in the Vedas.
+Know them all to be produced from action, and knowing this you will be
+released from the fetters of this world. The sacrifice of knowledge is
+superior to the sacrifice of wealth, for action is wholly and entirely
+comprehended in knowledge.... Even if you are the most sinful of all
+sinful men, you will cross over all trespasses by means of the boat of
+knowledge alone. As a fire well kindled, O Arjuna! reduces fuel to
+ashes, so the fire of knowledge reduces all actions to ashes. For
+there is in this world no means of sanctification like knowledge, and
+that one perfected by devotion finds within one's self in time. He who
+has faith, whose senses are restrained, and who is assiduous, obtains
+knowledge. Obtaining knowledge he acquires, without delay, the highest
+tranquillity.... Therefore, O descendant of Bharata! destroy with the
+sword of knowledge these misgivings of yours which fill your mind, and
+which are produced from ignorance." "He who is possessed of knowledge,
+who is always devoted, and whose worship is addressed to one only, is
+esteemed highest. For to the man of knowledge I am dear above all
+things, and he is dear to me. All these are noble, but the man
+possessed of knowledge is deemed by me to be my own self."
+
+From time immemorial Indian sages have looked upon God as the Supreme
+Intelligence; He is the absolute Wisdom, and to know Him or it, and to
+know that "I am it" (_Tat twam asi_), this is the highest wisdom
+(_Brahma Gnana_), and it gives immediate entrance into the heaven of
+beatification or of absorption. And the only sin which such a man, and
+which this system of thought, recognizes is the sin of ignorance
+(_Avidia_); that is, the folly, or stupidity, of thinking that one's
+soul is separate from the divine Soul. To know, under these mundane
+conditions of delusion (_Maya_), and while under the tyranny of
+passion and of action (_Karma_), that I am, after all, identical with
+the divine Spirit, and that the thought of a separate existence is a
+snare and a bondage,--this is the immediate shattering of my earthly
+bondage and the full entrance of my soul (like a drop of water to its
+mother ocean) into the eternal peace and tranquillity (_Sayutcha_) of
+the godhead--a state of unconscious calm which shall never after be
+disturbed.
+
+Thus the highest way of salvation, as taught by Hindus of all classes,
+is the way of knowledge. It is the highest step in the progress of
+human redemption. All other ways of salvation are but preliminary, or
+stepping-stones, to this. There is no return to the bondage of this
+world of Him who has crossed the river of death "in the boat of
+knowledge." All others must again return and further, by new births,
+the cause of the soul's emancipation.
+
+(2) The second path of liberation here inculcated is that of
+self-restraint, of asceticism. From time immemorial the ascetic has
+been India's ideal of a man of piety. He is a man who has turned his
+back upon the pleasures of the world, even its harmless amusements and
+physical enjoyments, and has given himself to stern rigid self-denial.
+By thus denying himself every pleasure that body can bring and every
+satisfaction that human society can furnish; yea, more, by a
+renunciation of everything worldly to the extent of supreme physical
+pain and social deprivation, he separates and weans himself from all
+that is temporal, that he may pass on in sadness up the pathway of
+redemption. This is the way of Yoga; and the Yogi to-day finds highest
+admiration in India as its ideal of life.
+
+In the Divine Lay also this pathway of Yoga finds emphasis and
+exaltation.
+
+"The devotee whose self is contented with knowledge and experience,
+who is unmoved, who has restrained his senses, and to whom a sod, a
+stone, and gold are alike, is said to be devoted.... A devotee should
+constantly devote himself to abstraction, remaining in a secret place,
+alone, with his mind and self restrained, without expectations and
+without belongings. Fixing his seat firmly in a clean place, not too
+high nor too low, and covered over with a sheet of cloth, a deerskin,
+and kusa grass--and there seated on that seat, fixing his mind
+exclusively on one point with the working of the mind and sense
+restrained, he should practise devotion for the purity of self....
+Thus constantly devoting himself to abstraction, a devotee whose mind
+is restrained attains that tranquillity which culminates in final
+emancipation and assimilation with me.... The self-restrained,
+embodied self lies at ease within the city of nine portals, renouncing
+all actions by the mind, not doing or causing anything to be done."
+
+This path of abstraction and asceticism leaves the soul to theosophic
+knowledge, which is consummated in the supreme bliss of assimilation
+with the Divine.
+
+So enamoured has India been of this method of life throughout the
+centuries that Yoga has been reduced to a science, and has been
+elaborated to a degree which is ridiculous and almost idiotic. Listen,
+for instance, to Krishna's instructions where he speaks of the ascetic
+as "holding his body, head, and neck even and unmoved, remaining
+steady, looking at the tip of his own nose," etc. These ridiculous
+posturings and idiotic attitudes cannot, as has been well said by
+Barth, but lead to idiocy or to a loss of all mental aptitude.
+
+The ultimate aim of Yoga is to reduce the soul to tranquillity and
+quiescence, by abstracting the mind from all things earthly, and thus
+leading to cessation from action; for action is said to lead to new
+fruit, which must be eaten by the soul; and for this purpose new
+births are necessary, which delay final absorption in the deity.
+
+The spirit of Hinduism is thus evident in its exaltation of this
+method of life. It has made the path of abstraction and the
+elimination of every thought, emotion, and ambition, its ideal. In
+other words, man, by self-repression and the effacement of every
+faculty of mind and body, is to attain unto final beatification or
+emancipation. This is an end in itself, according to the Hindu plan of
+life.
+
+In Christianity, on the other hand, self-realization and not
+self-effacement must be the consummation of life. The way of the
+Cross, that is, the path of self-denial, is indeed most rigidly
+enjoined; but it is the denial of the lower self, the meanest passions
+of the soul, in order that the highest faculties may find complete
+realization. Thus, in Christianity, also, asceticism has a place of
+value; but it is as a means to a higher end, and that is, perfect
+growth and development of the man unto the "measure of the stature of
+the fulness of Christ."
+
+(3) It also possesses the distinction of emphasizing works or action
+as necessary to salvation. Indeed, the Bhagavad Gita is unique among
+the books of India in teaching that action is superior to
+renunciation.
+
+Sri Krishna says: "Renunciation and pursuit of action are both
+instruments of happiness. But of the two, pursuit of action is
+superior to renunciation of action."
+
+This is, indeed, strange teaching in the realm of Hindu literature,
+where action is universally taught to be both in itself an evil and to
+be the cause of sin. Krishna, by some magic of his own power, here
+reverses the ordinary Hindu teaching. "He who has controlled his
+senses and who identifies his self with every being, is not tainted,
+though he performs actions." "He who, casting off all attachment,
+performs actions, dedicating them to Brahm, is not tainted by sin, as
+the lotus leaf is not tainted by water." Indeed, we are told that some
+"perform actions for attaining purity of self." Thus we see inculcated
+the peculiarly un-Hindu doctrine that he who works for God is for that
+reason absolved from the fruit of his action; yea, more, by his very
+acts attains unto purity, and approaches the consummation of
+absorption. Still more, the very motive of Krishna, in this Divine
+Song, is to stir up the warlike courage of Arjuna and to lead him into
+the bloody activities of war. "Therefore do you, too, perform
+actions, as was done by men of olden times."
+
+But action, in order that it may be effective, must be according to
+prescribed rules. Any work which is inculcated in the sacred books is
+both sacred and useful in the scheme of redemption. And among these
+prescribed works, few are more useful than the performance of
+sacrifice. Men "have their sins destroyed by sacrifice. Those who eat
+the nectar-like leavings of the sacrifice prepare for the eternal
+Brahm. This world is not for those who perform no sacrifice. Thus
+sacrifices of various sorts are laid down in the Vedas. Know them all
+produced from action, and knowing this you will be released from the
+fetters of this world."
+
+Idolatry, also, is a part of this sacred duty. "Desiring the success
+of action, men in this world worship the divinities, for in this world
+of the mortals, the success produced by action is soon obtained."
+"Those who worship the divinities go to the divinities, and my
+worshippers, too, go to me." "Even those, O Son of Kunti, who being
+devotees of other divinities worship with faith, worship me only, but
+irregularly. For I am the enjoyer as well as Lord of all sacrifices.
+But they know me not truly, therefore do they fall," _i.e._ they
+return to the world of mortals. This teaching may be called polytheism
+rather than idolatry. And yet at the time this book was written,
+polytheism had already degenerated into idolatry.
+
+The most definite and multitudinous courses of action are those
+enforced by the caste system. And these also are emphasized in this
+song. Krishna here informs us that he is the author of the caste
+system. "The four-fold division of castes was created by me according
+to the apportionment of qualities and duties." Elsewhere, in Hindu
+writings, we are abundantly informed that Brahm created these four
+divisions of men from his head, his shoulders, his loins, and his
+feet, respectively.[3]
+
+[Footnote 3: See Chapters IV and V, on Caste.]
+
+He only lives well and works worthily who lives in strict accordance
+with caste rules, and who works in obedience to the dictates of caste
+tyranny. We are here informed that "one's own duty, though defective,
+is better than another's duty well performed. Death in performing
+one's own duty is preferable; the performance of the duty of others is
+dangerous." Here, of course, "one's own duty" is the duty prescribed
+to a man by the Hindu caste system. "The duties of Brahmans,
+Kshatriyas, and Vaisyas, and of Sudras, too, O terror of your foes,
+are distinguished according to the qualities born of nature.
+Tranquillity, restraint of the sense, penance, purity, forgiveness,
+straightforwardness, also knowledge, experience, and belief in the
+future world, this is the natural duty of the Brahmans. Valour, glory,
+courage, dexterity, not slinking away from battle, gifts, exercise of
+lordly power, this is the natural duty of Kshatriyas. Agriculture,
+tending cattle, trade, this is the natural duty of Vaisyas. And the
+natural duty of Sudras, too, consists in service. Every man intent on
+his own respective duties obtains perfection." And, again, "One's
+duty, though defective, is better than another's duty well performed.
+Performing the duty prescribed by nature one does not incur sin. One
+should not abandon a natural duty though tainted with evil."
+
+Thus the most stupendous system of social and religious evil that the
+world has ever known--the Hindu caste system--is here boldly taught
+and inculcated as the most sacred duty of life. One man is born for
+pious leadership, another born to fight, another born for menial
+service; and woe be to any one of them who abandons this so-called
+"natural duty" and strives for a betterment or a change of life! This
+is the divinely inculcated system of bondage which has enthralled
+India for twenty-five centuries.
+
+But it is gratifying to know that, though taught and inculcated in
+this highest book of their faith, Hindus are beginning to denounce the
+whole system. Both a social and a religious consciousness are
+beginning to rebel against its very existence.
+
+But we pass from this lowest aspect of "action" to the highest when we
+remark that all acts should, according to Krishna, be free from
+attachment. No duty is more frequently enforced in the Bhagavad Gita
+than that of detachment in religious activity; nor is there any higher
+than this within the whole compass of this Song. It is the duty of man
+to work out righteousness and to exercise virtue without regard to the
+results or the fruits of his action. It is the high-water mark of the
+teaching of the book.
+
+"Your business is with action alone; not by any means with fruit. Let
+not the fruit of action be your motive to action." "Wretched are those
+whose motive to action is the fruit of action." Therefore, perform all
+action, which must be performed, without attachment. For a man,
+performing action without attachment, attains the Supreme. "Forsaking
+all attachment to the fruit of action, always contented, dependent on
+none, he does nothing at all, though he engages in action. Devoid of
+expectations, restraining the mind and the self, and casting off all
+belongings, he incurs no sin."
+
+We must not, however, give to this detachment a Christian value. For
+it is a part of Hindu thought to condemn every emotion and sentiment,
+however lofty as an asset of life. It regards every desire, however
+noble in itself, and every sentiment, however exalted, as essentially
+evil; for it is a momentary barrier to that equilibrium and quiescence
+of soul which the Hindu has always maintained to be the highest
+cultivation of the self. Therefore, action, in order to be of any
+permanent value, must be severed from every passion, desire, or
+expectation. And thus the Hindu does not here seek so much the
+existence of pure altruism as he does the absence of desire, which
+means soul unrest and the removal of one of the barriers to soul
+emancipation. It is, he says, when love and every other passion cools
+off into a quiet intellectual calm, and the soul is animated, not by
+sentiment, but by clear vision, that _Sayutcha_, or absorption into
+the Brahm, is attained.
+
+If, then, detachment is a keyword to Higher Hinduism and man is
+forbidden to seek after any good, even the highest, in connection with
+his religious activities, what then can be an adequate motive to a
+religious life of good works?
+
+Here is introduced another keyword of this Eclecticism--the word
+_Bhakti_.
+
+The doctrine of Bhakti finds a supreme place in the Divine Song.
+_Bhakti_ means devotion or love to Krishna himself. Perhaps the
+Christian word "Faith" best expresses the full meaning of the word
+_Bhakti_. Krishna says, in substance, Have no attachment to the
+results of your acts; but be attached to me who am the supreme God,
+and live and act according to the noble impulse of that attachment.
+
+"Among all devotees, he who being full of faith worships me, with his
+inmost self intent on me, is esteemed by me to be the most devoted."
+"Even if a very ill-conducted man worships me, not worshipping any one
+else, he must certainly be deemed to be good, for he has well
+resolved." "Place your mind on me, become my devotee, my worshipper;
+reverence me, and thus making me your highest goal, and devoting
+yourself to abstraction, you will certainly come to me." "On me place
+your mind, become my devotee, sacrifice to me, reverence me, you will
+certainly come to me. I declare to you truly, you are dear to me. I
+will release you from all sins. Be not grieved." "No one amongst men
+is superior to him in doing what is dear to me."
+
+It is probable that the Bhagavad Gita was the first to introduce this
+doctrine of faith. It is, of course, a doctrine possible only in
+connection with a _personal_ God, and was doubtless introduced through
+the new cult of Krishna-olatry. It is foreign to Vedantism, whose God
+is the Impersonal and the Ineffable One; foreign also to the Sankya
+school, where God is neither known nor needed. It is essentially a new
+teaching, and is a peculiar feature of the worship of the incarnations
+of Vishnu.
+
+But, introduced by this Song of the Adorable One, it has been
+incorporated into the Hindu religion, and figures now as one of the
+most powerful motives of that faith. And this new doctrine brings the
+Hindu religion into warmer relationship to Christianity than at any
+other point. Sir Monier Williams truly claims that Hinduism, in no
+other teaching, so closely approaches Christianity as in the doctrine
+of faith.
+
+But, like all other teachings of Hinduism, this doctrine also has been
+considerably distorted in the process of appropriation; so that
+"faith" in the worship of Vishnu's incarnations, to-day, is more
+potential as an act than is "faith" in Christianity. For, in Hinduism,
+it matters not on what god or ritual the _Bhakthan_ places his faith,
+it has power to redeem him from all troubles.
+
+It should be remembered that _Bhakti_ is perhaps the most distinctive
+and mighty influence in Vaishnavism, if not in all Hinduism, at the
+present time.
+
+(4) Little is said in Hinduism with a view to inculcate and to reveal
+the efficiency of altruism, or the love of man for man. In the Bhagavad
+Gita hardly any reference is made to this which is so dominant a note in
+the Christian faith. Krishna does remark that one should have "regard
+also to keeping people to their duties," in performing action. "Whatever
+a great man does, that other men also do; ... wise men should not shake
+the convictions of the ignorant who are attached to action, but acting
+with devotion should make them apply themselves to all action." "He who
+identifies himself with every being is not tainted, though he performs
+actions." "The sages who are intent on the welfare of all the beings
+obtain the Brahmic bliss."
+
+This certainly is neither very clear, nor at all adequate, as the
+inculcation of the most fundamental of all duties, the love of our
+fellow-men and the sacrifice of self in the interest of common
+humanity. The Vedantin claims that the unity of all being, as taught
+by him, is a strong injunction upon him to love all the parts of that
+unity. But the Bhagavad Gita does not teach clearly even this Vedantic
+doctrine. Selfishness is too much stamped upon the Hindu faith. It is
+too exclusively an individualistic religion. It is every one for
+himself in the great struggle of man for redemption. It pre-eminently
+tends to cultivate in man both pride in his own achievement and an
+exclusively selfish devotion to the consummation of his own
+redemption.
+
+4. In the Bhagavad Gita little is said of the character of the
+salvation which is to be achieved by the devotee of Krishna. Indeed,
+the nature of this consummation is left very much in mystery. We are
+told that Krishna's worshipper will come to him. "He who, with the
+highest devotion to me, will proclaim this supreme mystery among my
+devotees will come to me freed from all doubts." Again we are taught
+that such a devotee, "understanding me, truly enters into my essence."
+This carries the definite and universal thought of Hinduism, that man
+will be absorbed in the Deity. In another place we are told that the
+worshipper "who is purified by the penance of knowledge has come into
+my essence."
+
+This is the eschatology of all Hindu _Shastras_. The peculiar teaching
+of the Bhagavad Gita concerning action and its emphasis upon a
+strenuous life in this world would have led us to expect the teaching
+of a future of some kind of activity. Instead of that, it falls back
+upon the old and hackneyed pantheistic idea, that the human soul,
+being ultimately divested of its human bodies, both gross and fine,
+passes on in its nakedness into oneness with the Absolute, and thus
+loses all the faculties which, so far as we know, constitute its
+greatness, power, and glory. In this condition of absorption the human
+soul is not only deprived of its separate existence, but also of all
+self-knowledge, which is the true basis of personality.
+
+As to the process of this salvation we are here taught, as in all
+Hindu writing, that it is attained through metempsychosis, or
+reincarnation. The human soul, like the divine, in Brahmanism, passes
+through many incarnations (some writers say 8,400,000) before it
+receives the crown of perfection, or of absorption. Krishna says: "As
+a man, casting off old clothes, puts on others and new ones, so the
+embodied self, casting off old bodies, goes to others and new ones."
+"I have passed through many births, O Arjuna, and you, also," says
+Krishna; "I know them all, but you, O terror of your foes! do not know
+them."
+
+This devious and tedious path of reincarnation is the one over which
+every soul must pass. And between every incarnation and that which
+follows, the soul, clothed upon with a subtle body, passes through
+many heavens and hells in order to eat the fruits of its past actions.
+And there is a remnant of these fruits left which necessitates the
+return to a new body and a new human existence.
+
+These upper and nether regions through which the soul passes and
+settles its accounts with the past, are not in any sense permanent.
+Concerning this, the Bhagavad Gita says that men, "reaching the holy
+world of the Lord of Gods, they enjoy in the celestial regions the
+celestial pleasures of the gods. And having enjoyed that great
+heavenly world, they enter the mortal world when their merit is
+exhausted." After, perhaps, millions of these human incarnations (and,
+indeed, the incarnation may be of lower animal and of vegetable), the
+self will gradually be perfected, they say, and will pass on into the
+calm essence of the supreme Soul, as a drop of water descends in rain
+and blends again with the ocean. I see absolutely no reason why this
+interminable process of metempsychosis should lead to the perfection
+of the soul rather than to its complete demoralization. Indeed, there
+is nothing ethical at all in the character of these reincarnations, so
+far as they are described by Hindu writers.
+
+
+III
+
+This, then, is the "Divine Lay" of the Hindu religion, the book most
+cherished and most highly extolled by more than two hundred and thirty
+million Hindus.
+
+We are, first of all, impressed by the many contradictions which
+disfigure the book. Hardly a page is free from conflicting doctrines
+and methods of life. It could not be otherwise in any effort to
+harmonize the mutually contradictory teachings of the conflicting
+schools of religious thought and practice in this complicated faith.
+
+On the other hand, we see in this Song an honest and an able attempt
+to bring the many tenets of that faith into a consistent whole. And we
+cannot help feeling that, while the view of God and man here
+presented, and the ways of salvation here enunciated, are not
+satisfactory, yet we find scattered through its pages gems of thought
+and beauties of religious conceptions and instruction which are beyond
+cavil, and which to-day _seem_ to satisfy many millions of our
+fellow-men.
+
+But, at the close of a careful perusal of the book, one feels that it
+is radically unsatisfying.
+
+In the first place, it is wanting in any power for life. In order to
+feel this, one has only to compare it, for a moment, with the Gospels
+of Christianity. We find here philosophical disquisitions on the
+Divine Being which few men can understand and none can hope to
+harmonize. In the Gospels, on the other hand, we see presented a
+scheme of life which, at the same time, satisfies the highest
+philosophy and is perfectly intelligible to the most simple-minded.
+Here a bewildering number of mutually contradictory ways of life are
+urged upon us, not one of which can appeal in fulness and power to the
+common man. There do we find one clear way of salvation--the way of
+faith in Christ; and in order to walk in that way the power of the
+Divine Spirit is promised to every one, even to the humblest soul and
+to the greatest sinner, that he might accept the Christ and live in
+and through Him a holy and a righteous life.
+
+Above all, we have here represented an incarnation the records of
+whose doings, in the sacred writings of the Hindus, shock us by their
+immorality and disgust us by their coarseness. And yet he arrogates to
+himself the nature and the functions, as he makes upon us the demands,
+of the supreme Deity. There, on the other hand, we witness the
+spectacle of the Christ who so lived the divine life, and whose
+immaculate holiness is so overwhelming, that His claim to be one with
+the Godhead brings no shock or sense of incongruity to any one to-day.
+He has so impressed men of all generations that untold millions, in
+all lands, have felt no hesitation in believing Him when He says, "He
+that hath seen me hath seen the Father." Here do we indeed find the
+supreme contrast between the manual of Hindu faith and the Gospels of
+Christianity; and it is a contrast at the most vital point of
+religion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+POPULAR HINDUISM
+
+
+In the last chapter we dwelt upon what may be called the Higher
+Hinduism--that system of thought and religious exercise which engages
+the attention, attracts the thought, and invites the devotion of the
+thinking classes of the Hindu fold. The Bhagavad Gita is only one of
+many writings which seriously present to the thoughtful Hindu some of
+the higher conceptions and deepest yearnings of the soul. Of all the
+faiths of the "Far East" none dwells so much upon these profound
+religious realities, or engages in such lofty flights of spiritual
+aspiration, as does this religion of the Brahmans. And no one can
+study these products of the greatest minds and most sensitive
+religious souls of India without entertaining a great and growing
+admiration for them.
+
+But it is well to remember these are not all of Hindu literature; nor
+do they represent the current thought or the general religious life of
+the people.
+
+[Illustration: A DRAVIDIAN SHRINE, SOUTH INDIA]
+
+They indeed reveal the highest and the best that has ever come to
+light in the thought and spiritual culture of this people. For that
+reason, the Bhagavad Gita is worthy of the name we gave it--the Hindu
+bible.
+
+In view of all these things, who would say that God did not visit this
+people, or left Himself without witness among them? While He was
+leading the Hebrews in the time of Moses, He was also stirring this
+people through its old rishis, or sages. While He was rebuking the
+degenerate Jewish people through their later prophets, He was raising
+and inspiring the great prophet of India, the Buddha, to protest
+against a debased Brahmanism.
+
+But let it not be supposed that this literature of "Higher Hinduism"
+is, in any sense, popular in India. Those religious books which engage
+the mind of the masses are of a very different class. They are the
+wild legends of the Puranas, and inane dialogues and lying
+incantations of the Tantras--two classes of works which are both the
+most popular and are lowest in the range of their ideas and most
+demoralizing in the cults which they present.
+
+These books were ostensibly written for the common people and for
+women. And the common people delight in them and are intoxicated by
+their religious exaggerations and excesses.
+
+Thus the faith of the people, as a whole, is far removed, in its
+grovelling thought, its idolatrous practices, and its thousand-headed
+ritual, from the teaching of Higher Hinduism.
+
+Above all, we must remember that the Hinduism of to-day is not the
+Brahmanism of thirty centuries ago. It has been the passion of that
+faith, from the beginning, to absorb all cults and faiths that have
+come into contact with it. Hinduism is an amorphous thing; it has been
+compared to a many-coloured and many-fibred cloth, in which are mixed
+together Brahmanism, Buddhism, Demonolatry, and Christianity. And all
+these, utterly regardless of the many contradictions which they bring
+together, form modern Hinduism.
+
+This is true also of the gods of India. The earliest of the Vedic gods
+had elements of nobility in them. The most universally recognized of
+their divinities in primitive times, Varuna, is free from the vain
+passions and moral obliquities of more recent gods. Indeed, as one
+follows the course of time and the consequent multiplication of
+deities in India, one sees in their pantheon a steady deterioration of
+character, until we come to the most popular of modern Hindu deities,
+Krishna and Kali, the one well-called "the incarnation of lust," and
+the other "the goddess of blood." One is the deification of human
+passion, while the other is an apotheosis of brute force. And yet the
+cults of those two deities have attained, at the present time, the
+maximum of popularity throughout the land.
+
+The same fact is manifest in connection with the customs of the
+people. In early Vedic times, hardly one of those institutions which
+now so disfigure this religion existed among the people. Idolatry, the
+caste system, and the many forms of degradation of women are of later
+growth. Never, in all the history of the country, did they exist and
+flourish as they do at the present time.
+
+Thus it will be seen that, while the religion of the Brahmans in its
+earliest, primitive stage was merely an ethnic faith and largely the
+echo of the spiritual yearning of the human soul, its development has
+neither added to its power nor broadened its horizon. On the contrary,
+it grows weaker and has, age after age, added superstition to
+superstition, until it has reached its maximum of error and of evil at
+the present time.
+
+It is wise neither to ignore nor to underestimate the best that is in
+a faith; nor is it fair to shut one's eyes to its achievement as
+revealed in the life of the common people.
+
+Indeed, the religious life of the masses is the truest index of the
+real value of a religion, if it has wrought upon them many centuries,
+as Hinduism has, in this land.
+
+
+I
+
+In the West the national evolutionist says to us, "Let the people of
+India alone, that they may evolve their own faith. It is not by
+cataclysmic change, but by growth, that they will ultimately find
+their true redemption." Others, who have listened perhaps to the
+pleasing words of a clever, yellow-robed Hindu Swami, ask the
+question, "Why should we spend our money in sending the Gospel to
+these wonderfully bright people of the East; are they not able to take
+care of themselves; and is not their faith adequate to their needs?"
+
+To this we simply say: "Come with us to India and see for yourselves.
+Live, as some of us have, for a third of a century in this land, and
+see, hear, feel, and understand what this Hinduism is. And, having
+understood the situation, ask yourselves whether this ancestral faith
+of India has in itself real saving power and redeeming efficacy for
+any one." I maintain that, to know Hinduism, is to feel a deep
+sympathy with the people who have inherited it as their faith, and to
+desire to bring to them the Gospel of life and of salvation in Christ
+Jesus. The people of India are, perhaps, the most religious upon
+earth. In this respect they are very unlike the Japanese and Chinese,
+who are worldly, prosaic, practical. Hindus are poetic, other-worldly,
+and spiritually minded. They have a keen instinct for things of the
+spirit. They are, also, very unlike the people of the West. Among
+Westerners, religion is largely an incident in life. It has for them a
+separate department, a small corner, in the life. In the East, on the
+other hand, religion enters into every detail of life. There is hardly
+a department or an interest in life which is not subsidized by faith
+and which has not to be conducted religiously.
+
+Moreover, the people of India thought out and elaborated most profound
+systems of theosophic thought in the far, remote past. When our
+ancestors were in the depths of savagery, Indian sages were indulging
+in metaphysical disquisitions which are even to-day the admiration of
+western sages. And there were many among those ancient Hindu rishis
+whose self-propelled flight toward God and divine things, and whose
+spiritual aspirations and yearnings were so beautiful that we can but
+speak with profound respect and entertain the highest admiration of
+them. Religion is not merely a philosophy, or even an aspiration; it
+is something vastly more than this.
+
+The Hindu Swami will visit the West and discourse sweetly, in
+persuasive English, upon Hindu philosophy. But he will not practise
+his religious rites or reveal his idolatrous habits and his bondage of
+caste to those western people who admire him. These things would at
+once create a revulsion of feeling against him and his philosophy. And
+yet these are much more an essential part of his faith than all his
+moral platitudes and eloquent disquisitions.
+
+And it should not be forgotten that this same Swami, in the very act
+of crossing the oceans to visit the West, violates one of the most
+prominent commands of his faith.
+
+
+II
+
+_What, then, is Popular Hinduism?_
+
+I shall endeavour to analyze it and present some of its outstanding
+features, such as are witnessed all over the land.
+
+1. That which obtrudes itself upon all sides and which is, perhaps,
+its most determining factor is its caste system. In other lands, mean
+social distinctions obtain and divide the people. In India only, Caste
+is a religious institution, founded by the authority of Heaven,
+penetrating every department and entering into every detail of life,
+and enforced by strictly religious penalties. One has well said that
+Hinduism and caste are convertible terms.
+
+2. Another outstanding feature of popular Hinduism is its Polytheism.
+
+While pantheism is the essential philosophy of the land,--a pantheism
+which denies the existence of all beings and everything save Brahm
+(the Supreme Soul),--nevertheless this pantheism has, in the popular
+mind, degenerated into the greatest pantheon the world has ever known.
+Even ten centuries ago its gods were said to number three hundred and
+thirty millions! And this army of deities has been multiplying ever
+since. Even twenty-five centuries ago, the fertile imagination of the
+Brahman had so peopled this world with gods and godlets of all grades
+that the stern and sensible mind of the great Buddha became disgusted
+with the whole pantheon; and he established his new faith as a
+reaction from the old to the extent of ignoring _any_ Divine Being.
+
+If, in these earlier days, such a man was unable to endure this
+manifestation of human folly, what can we not say in these days, when,
+in addition to the acknowledged host of well-known Hindu deities,
+every family has its god, and every hamlet its protecting demons; and
+when trees, rivers, mountains, and a thousand other objects represent
+to the popular mind separate godlets? One can well say that India has
+gone mad in its passion for populating the world with gods.
+
+3. Moreover, this pantheon has been incarnated. It has descended into
+a wild and hideous idolatry. There is no other land on earth where
+idolatry is so rampant as it is in India. Images are found everywhere.
+If the gods are numberless, how much more the idols which represent
+them, and which are found in every hamlet and house and upon
+roadsides!
+
+In addition to those idols which are made for regular and permanent
+worship, there are myriad others which are made of clay and other
+perishable substances, to be used for the time only, and then to be
+thrown into the river or to be washed away by the rain.
+
+And what hideous objects these idols of India are! The images of the
+gods of the ancient Greeks were beautiful, and one feels sometimes
+almost inclined to excuse an image-worship where ignorance weds art
+to religion and combines beauty with devotion.
+
+But there is no such excuse for the idolatry of India. In all my
+travels through this great land I have hardly seen an image, or an
+idol, which is what may be called an artistically beautiful object. On
+the other hand, many of them are peculiarly gross and revolting in
+appearance. The most universally worshipped god in all India is
+Ganesh. His idols are found all over the land, not only in temples and
+shrines, but on roadsides, and in all places where people assemble.
+And this Ganesh, the son of Siva, is represented by the grossest and
+most hideous idol. This "pot-bellied god" has his body crowned with an
+elephant head!
+
+Of course, Hindu taste cannot be judged by western standards. One
+cannot fail to recognize this fact in trying to judge types of human
+beauty in this land. But even Hindu types of beauty are not at all
+realized in their idols. It would often seem as if that which was most
+revolting in appearance is that which appeals most strongly to the
+Hindu, as an outward expression of the divine. In any case, it is true
+that the idolatry of India is farthest removed from the chaste, the
+beautiful, and the elevating.
+
+And this evil is intensified by the fact that all worshipped idols are
+bathed with oil, and therefore attract all the dust, dirt, and grime
+of the immediate vicinity.
+
+Educated Hindus, though they tell you that these idols are only for
+the ignorant masses, rarely decline to unite with their families in
+bringing their offerings to, and in worshipping, the same.
+
+Some will tell us that in idolatry people do not worship the idol
+itself, but the god who is supposed to reside within it. Even if this
+were true, one could not admire such a worship did he know the
+character of the god which is supposed to reside therein. But their
+statement regarding this is not true. I have personally inquired of
+many of the common people who are idolaters, and I have never yet
+found a man whose mind, in worship, passes beyond the idol itself. I
+admit that the educated mind may leap in thought behind the image; but
+the masses of the people do not. It is, at best, a debasing worship,
+and drags the people down to the level of the hideous objects before
+which they prostrate themselves.
+
+[Illustration: TWO HINDU IDOLS, SOUTH INDIA]
+
+A well-known Hindu writer said recently, in the _Christian College
+Magazine_:--
+
+"I do urge most emphatically that, whatever may have been the
+original intention, and whatever may be the esoteric meaning, the
+millions that perform idolatrous practice in this country see nothing
+symbolic behind the image and take the whole show quite literally. And
+can anything be more degrading to an intelligent human being? We know
+that all religions are necessarily more or less anthropomorphic. But
+our popular Hinduism surpasses everything else in this respect, too.
+There is a famous shrine in this Presidency where the deity's _chota
+hazri_ [early meal] begins with bread and butter, and he goes on
+eating without respite till midnight, when he appropriately takes a
+decoction of dried ginger to help his digestion before he retires to
+his bedroom with his consorts; there is another famous shrine where a
+cigar is left in the bedroom every night for his godship to smoke; in
+another shrine, under the management of a nominal ascetic, fetters are
+applied to the god's feet whenever the temple's exchequer runs low, to
+extort money offerings from the devotees and pilgrims; in numerous
+other shrines the deity is taken out in procession and whipped
+publicly for having committed petty thefts; in one shrine the whole
+process of a high-way robbery is acted out in detail during the
+annual festival; births, marriages, deaths, and similar occurrences
+are, of course, as common and frequent in our temples as in our homes.
+Gentlemen, can any amount of esoteric whitewashing justify these
+disgraceful and fairly incredible practices? Then there are the _deva
+dasies_, our 'vestal virgins,' of whom even small and poor temples
+have one or two to boast. They are the recognized prostitutes of the
+country, and many sociologists are of opinion that no 'civilized'
+human society can completely get rid of such a class. Is that any
+reason why we should associate them with our religion and tempt the
+devil himself with their presence in our holiest places and shrines?"
+
+4. Another marked feature of modern Hinduism is its devil-worship.
+This is peculiarly manifest in South India. In the Madras Presidency,
+whose fifty million population is mostly Dravidian, nine-tenths of the
+people follow the faith of their ancestors, which is Demonolatry.
+
+When Brahmanism came to South India, many centuries ago, it found
+intrenched among the people, everywhere and universally, this ancient
+cult. The Brahmans, recognizing this, did what they have always done;
+they said to the people: "We have not come to destroy your religion;
+we will take your demons and demonesses, marry them to our gods, and
+give them shrines and worship in our temples. Come with them and be a
+part of our religion. We will give to you the privileges, and confer
+upon you the dignity and blessing, of our great religion." The people
+were impressed by this offer, accepted the situation, and were
+absorbed, with their religion, into the Brahmanical faith. From that
+time forward they have been recognized as Hindus, and have, after a
+fashion, been loyal members of that faith.
+
+But let it not be supposed that, by becoming Hindus, they have
+deserted their ancestral religion, and have ceased to be
+devil-worshippers. Far from it. Hinduism proper is to them a mere
+plaything, or a festival pastime. On special Hindu holidays, and
+perhaps on occasions of pilgrimage, they will visit these Hindu
+temples and bring their offering to the deities of Brahmanism. But
+their chief concern and their daily religious occupation is found in
+the appeasing of the many devils whose abode is supposed to be in
+their countless village shrines and under well-known trees in their
+hamlets. They have not abated one jot of their belief in the supremacy
+of these devils in their life-affairs; and they always stand in fear
+of them, and do what they can to satisfy their bloody demands.
+
+Thus at least nine-tenths of the people of South India are, first of
+all, demonolaters, and secondly, but a long way behind, are Hindus.
+And yet a great many people in the West think of these people as the
+pure worshippers of the highest type of the Brahmanical faith!
+
+And it should not be forgotten that all over India there are probably
+fifty millions of people who are the so-called outcasts of the land,
+the miserable product of the caste system of Hinduism. They are "the
+submerged tenth" of India. They are not only socially ostracized, they
+are under the definite ban of the Hindu faith. They are the hewers of
+wood and drawers of water of Brahmanism. They have no place in
+Hinduism proper; they are not permitted to enter any of its temples.
+They have no right to receive whatever comforts religion may confer;
+its rights and its privileges are entirely denied to them. But the
+tyranny of the religion has been such, during the many centuries of
+the past, as to keep this class of people not only in absolute social
+servitude, but also in religious dependence; and has taught them
+(because it has compelled them) to be satisfied with the spiritual
+crumbs which are the meanest remnants of what the religion professes
+to give its members.
+
+I have often felt, as I have talked with these poor, miserable
+Pariahs, that I was incapable of understanding their willingness to
+remain thus loosely attached to a faith which denied to them its most
+elementary comforts and blessings. The mystery is doubtless to be
+explained by their supreme abjectness and helplessness, which have
+been ground into them by many centuries of bondage. The consequence
+is, that while these many millions of outcast people are numbered
+among the Hindus, and regard themselves as Hindus, Hinduism itself has
+for them nothing but curses, and, more than all others, they must be
+satisfied with the devil-worship of their fathers.
+
+5. Beneath all these lower aspects of popular Hinduism is still found
+what may be called its lowest stratum--Fetichism. There are many
+people and tribes in India who have not ascended sufficiently high, in
+religious conception, to make for themselves definite images of the
+gods they worship. Like the African, they are content to take natural
+objects, such as a rock or a stone, and regard it as possessed of some
+spirit and worship it. Sir Alfred Lyall, that well-known authority on
+India, has told us that one can find in India, as in no other land,
+religion of all forms and in all grades of development,--from the
+lowest step of animism to the most spiritual and abstruse pantheism. I
+myself have seen, within the area of one acre of land in South India,
+the instruments of these varied forms of worship, from a greasy, round
+stone, before which the lowest classes prostrated themselves, to an
+image of one of the supreme gods of Hinduism. There is not a phase of
+worship, however high or mystic, or however mean or degraded, which
+has not its devotees in this land.
+
+6. Modern Hinduism is also guilty of harbouring and fostering
+immorality.
+
+This is a cruel statement to make concerning any faith. But justice
+compels me to add this as one of the characteristics of Hinduism. Some
+of the most revered and popular writings of this religion are so full
+of obscenity and impure suggestion, that, to publish them in a
+Christian land, in the English tongue, would make the publisher liable
+to imprisonment. When, years ago, Lord Dalhousie, the Viceroy of
+India, enacted a law punishing obscenity, the leaders of the Hindu
+religion were so exercised by it that the government had to exempt
+religious writings of Hinduism, and emblems of that faith, from the
+action of the law. There are many religious books in India to-day
+which are classical in the beauty of their language, but which the
+Universities of India decline to use as text-books because of their
+gross obscenity.
+
+Among the most demoralizing institutions to the youth of India are the
+temple cars, which are found in every village of any consequence
+throughout the land. They are erected at great expense, by temple
+authorities, are most elaborately carved, and are used for the
+conveyance of the gods through the village streets upon festival
+occasions. There is hardly one of these cars, in South India at any
+rate, which is not disfigured by grossly sensual carvings such as
+ought to bring blushing shame to any decent and self-respecting
+community. They are open to the public gaze, and children of the
+village play under their shadow, and gaze daily upon their vile and
+disgusting sights. The government would forbid the erection of such
+cars to-morrow, if they had not pledged themselves not to interfere
+with the religion of the people!
+
+In the Vaishnava cult of Hinduism there is at least one sect, well
+known throughout the land, whose worship is loaded with impurity, and
+whose worshippers, at certain festivals, specially, yield themselves
+to all forms of sexual practices such as cannot be mentioned.
+
+Sakti worship, or the worship of the goddesses, lends itself
+definitely to this gross evil; and the leading Tantraic books of this
+cult are so filthy that they are not fit to be translated. In Bengal,
+where the worship of Durgai, the wife of Siva, is dominant, the Hindus
+themselves are beginning to protest against the lewdness, obscenity,
+and licentiousness which prevail at their great Holi festival, which
+is the annual festival of the goddess.
+
+Another institution connected with the temple worship of India, and of
+which Hindus ought to be heartily ashamed, is that of dancing-girls.
+Little girls in their infancy are devoted and dedicated by their own
+mothers to the temples. They are supposed to be married to the gods of
+the temple, and are called "the servants of the gods." They dance in
+attendance upon the gods, upon festival occasions, and are an inherent
+part of the temple worship. But the sad thing about these women is
+that their own mothers knew, when they dedicated them in infancy, that
+they were binding them to a life of shame. For the dancing-girls are
+the professional prostitutes of India. There are a host of these women
+(twelve thousand in South India alone) who, without their own consent,
+and in the sacred name of religion, have been handed over to this
+life of shame, to corrupt and debase the youth of the land. Their life
+is a loud cry against their mother-faith, which systematically devotes
+them to destruction of soul and body. Some educated men of the land
+denounce this as an evil which should be stopped. But the leaders of
+the faith turn a deaf ear to all such cries.
+
+7. The treatment of woman within Hinduism is worthy of attention.
+
+Hinduism has never looked with kindness or consideration upon women.
+It seems to have been its settled policy to treat them with contempt
+and unkindness. The consequence is that the girl babe is never welcome
+in the Hindu family. And from the cradle to the grave woman has no
+independence or right within the pale of this faith. During childhood
+she is in bondage to her father, during her marriage she must give
+implicit obedience to her husband, and as a widow she remains the ward
+of her sons.
+
+Look at the disabilities under which the Hindu woman labours to-day.
+
+She is held in ignorance. Only six Hindu women out of one thousand are
+able to read and write. She has never been regarded as worthy of
+education. Her ignorance has been regarded as her safety, and has
+been the studied policy of Hinduism.
+
+She has never been regarded as worthy to know the sacred books of her
+own faith. It is a sin in Hinduism to-day for any man to teach a woman
+the most sacred truths of the faith. Her mind is not a fit receptacle
+for such truths.
+
+While she has nothing to do in choosing for herself a husband, she is
+bound in infancy, through holy wedlock, to a child like herself. Her
+child husband may die before he attains manhood, when she becomes a
+widow. And, because her stars are supposed to have had influence in
+his death, she is treated with cruelty and is regarded as the evil
+star of the home.
+
+Owing to this evil custom of child marriage, there are to-day
+twenty-six million widows in this land, of whom four hundred thousand
+are under fifteen years of age. It is not simply that the lot of these
+poor women is one of greatest hardship and contempt; they also become
+the prey of lustful men and fall into grossest sins. In modern times
+the government has tried to lighten the burdens of womanhood in the
+land; but the representatives of Hinduism, and its custodians, all
+stand in the way of any helpful legislation, and are determined to
+keep woman in servitude at all hazards.
+
+8. The religious ascetic represents one of the characteristic features
+of modern Hinduism.
+
+Religious asceticism has been the ideal of the Hindu life from time
+immemorial. The man who has given up all earthly pursuits and wanders
+with beggar's cup in hand from place to place, making pilgrimages to
+the holy places of India, or who separates himself entirely from men
+and devotes years to the solitude of the wilderness in the cultivation
+of piety,--he it is who is the admiration of the whole Hindu
+community. And it is for this very reason that so many men in India
+to-day don the yellow robe of this profession, and make capital out of
+this sentiment of the people.
+
+There are millions of these religious mendicants who are entirely
+non-productive and live upon the common people. A few of them,
+doubtless, are sincere and are seeking after communion with God. But
+the vast majority are lazy and rotten to the core. Their life is known
+to be utterly worthless, and they are morally pestiferous in their
+influence upon the whole community. And yet the people accept them as
+the highest types of piety in the land. Even the poorest among them
+would give his last morsel to these worthless men. There are, indeed,
+very few in the community who would dare to refuse an offering to
+these beggars, because they are so ready to invoke dreadful
+imprecations upon those who decline to give anything to them. There
+are few things that an orthodox Hindu dreads more than the curse of a
+religious ascetic.
+
+Thus, though these men are known to trample under foot every law of
+God and are utterly useless to the whole community, the people
+nevertheless regard them very highly and shower their blessings upon
+them.
+
+In any land the maintenance of such an army would be a great burden
+upon the people; in India, where they are so poor, how heavy this
+burden must be, and how great must be the curse of such a host preying
+both morally and physically upon the rest of the community!
+
+It is equally disastrous to the conception of the common people
+concerning their faith that so large a body of recognized hypocrites
+should, nevertheless, be so highly esteemed as types of piety.
+
+The existence of this class of worthless men reveals, also, another
+striking fact which characterizes the religion of India, and that is
+the utter divorce of faith and morals. Hinduism has never recognized
+any connection, and least of all any essential union, between piety
+and ethics. As we have seen, the most pious men in the land, according
+to Indian ideas, may be the most immoral. This has been one of the
+fatal defects of Hinduism from the earliest times. Conscience has
+found very small place in this religion of the Brahmans.
+
+9. Modern Hinduism, also, inculcates the spirit of pessimism among its
+people. The Puranas tell us, and the people universally believe it,
+that we are now living in _Kali Yuga_, the iron age, in which all
+things are evil, and in which righteousness is a thing largely unknown
+to the people. All the forces of this age are against the good, and it
+leaves no encouragement to any one to try to do, and to be, good.[4]
+
+[Footnote 4: See Chapter X, Kali Yuga.]
+
+10. Add to this the even more potent belief of the people in
+astrology. The planets and the stars, the moon and the nodes are
+living gods, they say, which wield an influence over the life and
+destiny of human beings. The astrologer is perhaps the most important
+functionary in the social and religious life of the people. No
+marriage can be performed unless the horoscope of the bride and the
+bridegroom harmonize. No social or domestic event of importance, and
+specially no religious ceremony of any consequence, can be carried on
+save during what are called auspicious days and moments. Astrology is
+the right hand of Hinduism, and it has supreme authority in the
+direction of most of its affairs.
+
+Add to this the belief in omens, which enters very largely into human
+life and thought. A Hindu will not start upon a journey save on what
+is astrologically an auspicious day; and if even a crow crosses his
+path from left to right, after he has begun his journey, it is
+regarded as an ill omen, and he will at once return home. He spends
+much of his time in watching such omens; even an ass's bray carries a
+significance to him. If it is heard in the east, his success will be
+delayed; in the southeast, it portends death; in the south, it means
+wealth; etc. It matters not how important it may be that a man should
+undertake a journey or a task at a certain time, he will not do it at
+that time if he finds it to be inauspicious. When the new governor of
+Madras recently arrived at his destination, the reception to be given
+to him by the Hindus had to be postponed because it was ignorantly put
+at an hour which was _Rahu Kala_--an inauspicious hour!
+
+In a thousand similar ways, the Hindu people are controlled and
+handicapped by silly superstitions which make life a burden to them
+and which rob them of efficiency and sanity.
+
+This, then, is the Hinduism of the masses; and no other people devote
+themselves so faithfully to their faith as do these. And none, for
+this very reason, are more worthy of our sympathy and of our
+assistance to rise to better things in the realm of faith.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+HINDU RELIGIOUS IDEALS AS THEY AFFECT THE PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY
+
+
+To the student of comparative religion there appear many striking
+consonances between Hinduism and Christianity. Many a deep note in
+religious thought and life finds common expression in these two great
+faiths. Yet their dissonances are much more marked and fundamental.
+
+In nothing are Christianity and Hinduism more antipodal than in the
+ideals which they exalt, respectively, before their followers; and
+this conflict of ideals is the most stubborn, as it is the most
+pervasive, that Christianity has to face in India. The vision of God
+and of man, of human life and attainment, which we present before an
+orthodox Hindu, does not impress him as it should, simply because it
+does not fit into his thinking. It antagonizes his inherited
+prepossessions; it violates many of the most cherished ideals of
+religious life and spiritual endowment, which, from time immemorial,
+have been handed down to him.
+
+It is an interesting question how much of this difference is of the
+essence of the two religions, and how much is the product of the
+mental and spiritual make-up of the tropical East, on the one hand,
+and of the more northern West, on the other. The climatic and national
+idiosyncrasies are more potential in the complexion of the two faiths
+than we are wont to think.
+
+But whether these different ideals are, or are not, essentially
+characteristic of the two faiths, is not a question quite germane to
+my present purpose. It is enough to remember that the western
+conception of Christianity, which the missionary has inherited and
+which he is eagerly presenting, and can hardly avoid presenting, to
+the people of this land, is far removed from what the Hindu has always
+been taught to believe that a religion should bring into a man's life
+and possession.
+
+It is easy enough to prove to the man of ordinary intelligence the
+debasing influence of idolatry, the accursed slavery of the caste
+system, the gross immorality of the Hindu pantheon, and the dwarfing
+and degrading character of the ceremonialism of modern Hinduism.
+
+But behind and above all these, the Hindu has inherited a number of
+ideals which allure and command him. They are his ultimate criteria
+and resort, and they conflict with those which the supplanting faith
+presents as the _summum bonum_ of life. It is not until the Christian
+teacher can show to him, in a way that will move him, the excellence
+of the supreme ideals of Christianity above those of the old faith,
+that his work can be said to have achieved a triumph in his life.
+
+Hence the great--I might almost say the transcendent--importance of
+mission schools of all grades through which are sown the seed of a new
+philosophy of life. Herein also lies the even more valued service
+which a sane and a strong Christian literature in English and in all
+the vernaculars of the land can render, and is rendering, to the cause
+of Christ in India. For the fight in India is, more than it is or has
+been in any other land, one that gathers around basal conceptions and
+fundamental postulates about God and man and life; and Christianity
+can never seem attractive to an intelligent Hindu until it has
+conquered his assent at these points of vital importance.
+
+Let us consider a few of these ideals which everywhere and always
+obtrude themselves upon us in India.
+
+
+I
+
+_The Divine Ideal_
+
+In the conception of the Godhead which obtains in Christianity and
+that which dominates modern Hinduism there is found a difference of
+emphasis which amounts almost to a contrast. To the Hindu, the Supreme
+Soul or Brahm is idealized Intelligence; to the Christian God is
+perfect Will. To the former, He is supreme Wisdom; to the other, He is
+infinite Goodness. The devotees of each faith aspire to become like
+unto, or to partake of, their Divine Ideal. Hence the goal of the one
+is _brahma gnana_ (Divine Wisdom); of the other, it is supreme love or
+goodness. Thus at its foundation the religion of India has always
+placed _perfect intelligence_ as its corner stone, while the basis of
+the rival faith has been an ideal of _ethical perfection_. Hence, that
+process of intellectual gymnastics which so markedly characterizes the
+higher realms of Hindu sainthood and effort, on the one hand, and the
+altruistic fervour and outgoing charity of the ideal Christian, on the
+other. For this reason, also, the great root of bitterness which
+Hinduism has, from the first, sought to remove has been ignorance
+(_avidia_)--that intellectual blindness which persists in maintaining
+that the self and the Supreme Soul are separate realities and which is
+the only barrier to the self's final emancipation and final absorption
+into the Divine. To the Christian, on the other hand, the dread enemy
+is sin--that moral obliquity which differentiates the soul from the
+perfect ethical beauty of God. In consonance with this, the salvation
+which is exalted as the _summum bonum_, to be forever sought by the
+one, is self-knowledge, by the other self-realization in conformity to
+the Divine Will. I would not affirm that moral rectitude is absent as
+a desideratum from the ambition of the Hindu, nor that the Christian
+does not accept with his Lord that "this is eternal life to _know_
+God," and that he does not aspire with the great Apostle "to know even
+as I am known." But the supreme emphasis which is given by the one to
+nescience as the evil to be removed, and to wisdom as the crowning
+grace to be achieved, and, by the other, to rebellion of heart against
+God as the great sin, and to transformation to His moral image as
+perfected salvation, is much too marked to be overlooked by the
+student of these two faiths, and by the Christian missionary in the
+land.
+
+And all of this comes as a natural consequence from the different
+concepts which the two religions have of God Himself. Indeed, these
+two standpoints from which the Godhead is conceived account for the
+deepest divergencies of Hindu and Christian philosophy and theology.
+
+
+II
+
+_The Hindu and Christian Conceptions of Incarnation are similarly
+Divergent_
+
+Incarnation is a fundamental doctrine of the religion of Jesus. It is
+also an overshadowing tenet of modern Hinduism. For this reason, the
+Christian missionary finds in this doctrine the best leverage
+wherewith to raise the Hindu to our faith. Yet at this very point his
+efforts are largely frustrated by the very different conceptions which
+obtain in the two religions. The Christian incarnation must be, and
+is, first of all, of a perfect ethical type--an ideal of transcendent
+moral beauty and spiritual excellence. The least flaw or crookedness
+in His character would vitiate His pretensions, and would be the
+death-blow to the doctrine of His incarnation and divinity. In
+Hinduism, on the other hand, moral criteria have no application to
+the "descents" or incarnations of Vishnu. To his three first
+incarnations (of the fish, the tortoise, and the boar), moral tests
+are, of course, out of place; nor are they any more applicable to the
+grossly sensual Krishna, who is the only "full" incarnation of the
+god, and who is the supremely popular modern incarnation of the Hindu
+pantheon. Hindus have never dreamt of squaring the "going" of their
+incarnations with ethical demands and standards.
+
+Whatsoever of good Vishnu, in his descent, is said to have come to
+achieve in the world, it certainly was not a moral or a spiritual
+good. So an appeal to the moral excellence, or to the atoning work and
+purpose, of the Christ does not, at first, in any way impress them as
+an argument for His divine character or heavenly origin, any more than
+the moral obliquity of their own "descents" argues to the contrary.
+
+Moreover, the Hindu conception of incarnation largely resembles the
+Jewish. It must be a triumphant descent. Vishnu, in all his
+incarnations, came to destroy rather than to suffer himself to be put
+to death. A suffering and a dying god is to-day, to the Hindu, what it
+was twenty centuries ago to the Jew and Greek--a stumbling-block and a
+foolishness. It is true that Buddha, who was in more recent times
+adopted as an incarnation, in order to win over to modern Hinduism the
+followers of his faith, is somewhat of an exception to this rule. But
+not, according to the Hindu interpretation of it.
+
+So the two elements of glory in the incarnation of Christ--His
+spotless character and His Cross and death--do not ordinarily appeal
+to the inhabitants of this land as in any sense necessary or
+important.
+
+
+III
+
+_Ideals of Life_
+
+From the above considerations it will be natural to conclude that the
+ideals of life entertained by the East and West are far removed. The
+conflict of these ideals is the primary cause of the many strange
+religious and social movements which to-day send their ramifications
+into every town and hamlet of this land; and it creates the mighty
+revolution now at work in India.
+
+Consider first the religious ideals which dominate this land and the
+"Far West." Hinduism has exalted asceticism as the highest type of
+life and the best method of holy attainment. From time immemorial the
+religious mendicant, with his ideals of self-renunciation and ascetic
+practices, has found universal admiration among this people, and his
+motives and methods stand as the most highly approved in all the
+annals of this religion.
+
+It is true that this was universally exalted above all other forms of
+life among Christians also at one time, as it continues to be among,
+perhaps, the majority to-day. And is not the Cross, which is the
+emblem of self-renunciation and self-effacement, the motive power of
+our faith, as it is also the embodied ideal of our Life? True; but
+there is this marked difference between the two faiths. In
+Christianity the Cross is only a means. The Cross of self-effacement
+is the pathway of Christ and of the Christian to the crown of
+self-realization. We despise the lower good in order that we may
+attain unto the higher.
+
+In Hinduism, the rigours of asceticism are, indeed, sometimes a means
+to an end; but that end is not character or any spiritual achievement,
+but power with the gods. Nearly all the notable instances of religious
+austerities and self-torture practised by _yogis_, and recorded in
+Hindu legend and history, were undertaken for the purpose of
+accumulating thereby a great store of merit through which power might
+be acquired over men or gods. Thus many an ascetic is said to have so
+subdued and afflicted his body that nearly the whole Hindu pantheon
+trembled in the presence of the power thus acquired by him.
+
+But when the Hindu ascetic has not this object in self-renunciation,
+his austerities are an end in themselves. He renounces all--not simply
+the mean things of life, but also the noblest ambitions and the most
+heavenly sentiments--because they are a fetter which bind him to the
+world. He indeed calls a good deed, or a holy thought, a "golden
+fetter," but it is, just the same, regarded by him as an evil which
+prolongs his human existence; and these human conditions must be ended
+as soon as possible.
+
+The Christian, on the other hand, suppresses his passions in order
+that his holy desires may prevail; the Hindu struggles equally against
+the worst passions and the noblest sentiments of his heart; for they
+all delay that calm equilibrium of the _self_ which is the doorway
+into _sayutchia_ (absorption). Thus character, or the prevalence of
+the nobler sentiments of our nature above the meaner, is not, and
+never has been, the aim of Hindu asceticism. And in consonance with
+this fact is the other, namely, that nine-tenths of the five and a
+half million ascetics, sadhus, and fakhirs of India are universally
+recognized as pestilential in their morals, and as distinguished
+examples of what the laity of the land should avoid being or becoming.
+
+The Christian seeks, as his ideal, the perfect blending of the ethical
+and the spiritual in his life; in Hinduism, faith has always been
+divorced from morality, and there has never seemed to be any
+incongruity, in their minds, in the act of ascribing true saintliness
+and spiritual excellence to those who are known daily to trample under
+foot every command of the Decalogue.
+
+Thus the ideal life which has captivated India from time immemorial,
+and which at this present wields a mighty influence over the people,
+is not the generous, the upright, and morally spotless life, so much
+as the wandering, the monastic, or the secluded forest life of the
+ascetic, regardless of its spiritual character. In other words, it is
+not a stern and noble victory over sin and worldliness in the common
+relationships of life, but a fleeing from the sin and duties and
+responsibilities of life into the _mutt_, or wilderness, which has
+fascinated the inhabitants of this peninsula as the best type of life
+possible.
+
+Now, in view of all this, what shall the Christian teacher do in this
+land? Shall he also exalt this ideal and temper it with Christian
+wisdom and chasten it with Christian meaning? Doubtless the wise
+missionary will consider well the amount of emphasis which this aspect
+of life requires in India, in view of the ideal which Hinduism has
+presented to the popular mind. He will also, I think, hesitate, on the
+one hand, to bring his faith into comparison with Hinduism in the
+matter of mere ascetic rigour and severe self-mortification, in which
+the Christian has always lagged far behind the Hindu devotee and monk.
+On the other hand, he will not be likely to exalt over-much this type
+of life in a land in which, for more than three thousand years, it has
+ruled supremely but has had so little of moral significance and has
+achieved such meagre spiritual results.
+
+Another phase of life which furnishes to the people an ideal is the
+_ceremonial_. Among the myriad gods of the Hindu pantheon and all the
+sages of its history and legend, there is not one who is worthy to be
+exalted as an ideal of character. The reason is not far to find. With
+this, however, we are not at present concerned. It is enough if we
+remember that this absence of an incarnate ideal in the religion has
+led to the exaltation of rules and ceremonies as the safeguards
+of--yea, more, as the very essence of--a worthy and noble life. There
+is no sadder fact in India at present than that of this great
+religion, of two hundred and thirty million souls, being largely
+emptied of moral content as related to the common life, and built up
+of numberless petty external ceremonies which harass the individual,
+and grip the life with a dead hand at all points. The ceremonialism of
+the Scribes and Pharisees in the days of our Lord and which excited
+His supreme wrath, was not a consequence as compared to that of
+Hinduism to-day. From conception even to the burning-ground, every
+detail of life, individual and communal, religious and social (there
+is no social as apart from religious life in Hinduism), is cast into a
+mould of ceremony or ritual which robs it of ethical content, and
+makes it into what an indignant Brahman writer recently called "a huge
+sham." To the ordinary Hindu, all of life's values are measured in the
+coin of external rites. Let one be an atheist if he please, or even a
+libertine or a murderer, and his status in Hinduism is not impaired.
+But let him eat beef, even unwittingly, or let him ignorantly drink
+water which has been touched by a man of lower caste than himself, and
+his doom is irrevocably sealed! Through this whole system the Hindu
+conscience is perverted, and the true distinction between right and
+wrong is buried deep under this greatest and most elaborate mass of
+ceremonial that the world has ever known. To a people who have thus
+inherited the ceremonial instinct, who are Pharisees by a hundred-fold
+heritage and by sweet choice, it is not an easy thing for the man of
+the West, with his natural distrust of all that is formal and outward
+in life, to present effectively his Lord, whose bitterest woes were
+pronounced against the formalists of His time, and whose commands are
+always ethical, and whose life is, first of all, and last of all,
+spiritual.
+
+Another ideal of life which has too exclusive emphasis in this land is
+that which is denominated _quietism_--an ideal which extols the
+passive virtues as distinguished from the manly, aggressive ones. I
+would by no means claim that these two ideals are Hindu and Christian,
+respectively. They are rather begotten of the countries and climes
+under which the two religions have been, for many centuries, fostered.
+To the eastern and tropical Christian, the teaching of our Lord
+furnishes abundant warrant for a glorifying of the passive and
+non-resisting virtues. And I am inclined to believe that we of the
+West have few things of greater importance and of deeper religious
+significance to learn from the East than the appreciation of such
+graces of life as patience and endurance under evil. We stand always
+prepared to fight manfully for our convictions, and to obtrude them at
+all points upon friend and foe alike. It is not in the nature of the
+East to do this. We say that he has no stamina. We call him, in
+opprobrium, "the mild Hindu." But let us not forget that he will
+reveal tenfold more patience than we under very trying circumstances,
+and will turn the other cheek to the enemy when we rush into gross sin
+by our haste and ire. His is one of the hemispheres of a full-orbed
+character. Ours of the West is the other. Let us not flatter ourselves
+too positively that our assertive, aggressive part is the more
+beautiful or the more important. Yea, more, I question whether ours is
+the stronger and more masculine part of life and character; for is it
+not to most of us an easier thing to fling ourselves in vehemence
+against an evil in others than it is to sit calmly and patiently under
+a false accusation, as our Lord Himself did? At least it must be left
+an open question as to whether the impulsive and domineering vigour of
+the West is preferable to the "mildness" of the East.
+
+What I wish to emphasize is the dissimilarity between our western type
+of life and the eastern, and to warn the Christian worker from the
+West against the danger of assuming that Christian life must be
+adorned with only those western traits and excellences of character
+which are foreign and unpalatable to the East--the very fault which
+also characterizes the Hindu on his side, and which makes him feel so
+superior at times and so inaccessible to Christian influence. For, let
+it not be forgotten that the Hindu regards what we call our foibles of
+petulance, arrogance, and intolerance, with the same disapprobation
+and disgust as we do their more frequent violation of the seventh,
+eighth, and ninth commandments of the Decalogue. And who is to decide
+as to which catalogue is the worse and the more heinous in the sight
+of God?
+
+
+IV
+
+_The Hindu Conception of Ultimate Salvation presents Another Point of
+Divergence from the Christian Ideal of Life Beyond_
+
+Even in the methods and processes of redemption pursued by the two
+religions we see fundamental differences. In Christianity, God is the
+prime Agent in human salvation. He worketh for us, in us, and through
+us. In our own redemption we are only co-labourers with Him.
+
+In Hinduism, man stands absolutely alone as the agent and cause of his
+salvation. And, as the stupendous task rests upon his shoulders, it is
+no wonder that he has sought relief in the doctrine of metempsychosis,
+whereby it is believed that millions of rebirths furnish to him an
+adequate time and a sufficient variety of opportunity for the great
+consummation. But he has never given to himself, or to us, the first
+reason for believing that this endless fugue of rebirths will
+accomplish that which he accepts without questioning; namely, the
+ultimate glorification of all souls. There is nothing in this long and
+tedious process itself which assures us that any soul will reach final
+beatification rather than permanent and irremediable degradation. And
+yet the ultimate absorption of all souls into the Divine is assumed as
+a matter of course by him. This process, and that of Christianity, are
+expressive of the characteristics of the two faiths and of the two
+peoples. The slow and patient East, and the faith which it has
+begotten, spins out its theory of time and of human existence almost
+_ad infinitum_. Multitudinous births alone can satisfy the demands of
+the tedious process of human emancipation. But, in Christianity, one
+passage through this world, with human hands clasped in the Divine,
+suffices to open the door of eternal bliss to the redeemed soul. And
+this idea is consonant with the more youthful nature of the West, to
+whose people one birth, followed by a life of energy, furnishes an
+entrance into eternal joy beyond.
+
+It is equally important that we take note of that which is connoted by
+the final consummation offered by each of these two faiths to their
+followers. To the Christian there is a conscious, blessed life beyond
+death--a separate, personal existence which will last throughout
+eternity in the sunshine of the Heavenly Father's presence and in the
+ineffable joy and glory of His fellowship. It is the idealized life
+built upon the foundation of what is best and most stirring and
+beautiful here upon earth. It is _life_, in all that this blessed word
+signifies of sweet contemplation, of blissful activity, of
+imperishable love, and of unspeakable joy. All the most beautiful and
+enticing imagery of earth has been used to portray, or rather to
+suggest, the "eternal life" of the Christian religion.
+
+But what is the picture which Hinduism has drawn of the finality of
+life to its followers? After the weary fugue of births and rebirths,
+with its interludes of many heavens and hells, the "self" passes on
+into final union with the Divine Soul. It loses all consciousness and
+self-knowledge; every vestige of personality and all that this implies
+is swept away; it is incapacitated for every emotion of joy and for
+every act of service. There is nothing that we associate with life at
+its best and sweetest which does not find here negation. It is a calm
+blank, a rest, indeed, but from every struggle of thought, will, and
+emotion. This is the consummation which India has for many centuries
+held aloft as an attraction to its weary pilgrims.
+
+Here, again, we observe how appropriate to the end in view is the
+supreme difficulty of the way. If the highest struggle of the soul in
+this world is against existence and its human actions and conditions,
+it is to be expected that a complete riddance of life and of all its
+accompaniments will be the _summum bonum_ of the final consummation.
+And if this struggle for emancipation is to continue through
+numberless births and earthly existences, it is natural that the
+coveted end should bring a loss of all that life connotes in highest
+sentiment as well as basest passion. I need not dwell upon the
+contrast between this and the anticipations entertained by every
+humble Christian.
+
+This whole eschatological system of Hinduism corresponds, as we have
+seen, to the teaching of that faith in reference to God, man, and
+earthly life and conditions. And the Christian preacher's or teacher's
+vivid portrayal of the Christian's heaven too often denotes to the
+Hindu only one of the many purgatorial heavens of his religion, and
+rarely suggests to him the supreme test of the value of our faith as
+contrasted with his own. The glories of our heaven do not appeal to
+the stolid, weary, transmigration-ridden soul of the Hindu as they do
+to the youthful, hopeful, buoyant soul of the Christian. And this is a
+fact which the missionary would do well to keep in mind at all times.
+
+I might continue the list of the incompatibilities of Hindu and
+Christian ideals. But I have gone far enough to show, I trust, that
+the two faiths are at many points antipodal, and that their ideals
+clash in matters fundamental and crucial.
+
+Further, I wish to repeat that I do not maintain that Christian ideals
+are always, or even ever, represented in their fulness, or with the
+right emphasis, by us of the West. Hinduism is an ethnic faith, and it
+must be weighed and valued by the ideals which the people of this land
+have imbibed from it and invariably connect with it. Christianity is
+a world faith, and no one nation or continent can be a full exemplar,
+or an all-wise interpreter, of its life and ideals. Hence I claim that
+one of the considerations which demand closest attention from a
+western teacher, as he imparts his faith to the people of India, is
+that of the choice and emphasis of ideals which he shall present to
+them. Let him neither assume, on the one hand, that Hindu ideals are
+unchristian, nor, on the other, that our western ideals, both in their
+emphasis and exclusiveness, are the all-in-all of Christian truth and
+life. Christianity in the East, when it becomes thoroughly indigenous,
+will reveal and glorify a different type of life from that of the
+West. It will be less aggressive and assertive, but more contemplative
+and more deeply pious and other-worldly than anything we have been
+wont to see in the West.
+
+The day has come when missionaries must study with more seriousness
+the religion of India, that they may understand its true inwardness
+and discover its sources of power. Above all, they must be conversant
+with its highest ideals and understand the relationship of the same to
+those of their own faith. And they must not forget that they must
+approach this study with genuine sympathy and appreciation, in order
+to find the best in Hinduism, as well as to be fortified against its
+worst features.
+
+Never before did the educated men of this land stand up with more
+determination for their old ideals, and this is a matter of serious
+concern to our cause. On the other hand, the most encouraging fact in
+the realm of Christian work in India at the present time is that of
+the marvellous place which our Lord has found among the people of the
+land, especially the educated, as the ideal of life. They will have
+none of Him as a Saviour, and His death has no significance to them.
+But His blessed life has become the inspiration and the ideal of life
+to the cultured classes of India, in a way which is transforming their
+ethical conceptions and which largely eclipses all other
+life-influences among them. Herein lies our hope and assurance for
+India. But what they crave, and what they say they _must_ have, is "an
+Oriental Christ," a Christ who is not presented in a western garb of
+life and thought. Herein do we learn a most important lesson for our
+life-work, as Christian missionaries in this land of the East.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE HOME LIFE OF HINDUS
+
+
+The home life of a people is one of the most decisive tests of its
+character and its state of civilization.
+
+In this chapter I shall attempt only to describe the home life of
+Hindus. And even within this limitation I can only refer to the
+general characteristics which obtain among nearly _all_ Hindus, and
+shall pass by the details, which differ so largely in different parts
+of the country and among different castes.
+
+It is in the home that the natural religious bent of the Hindu finds
+its full scope and most touching manifestations. Generally speaking,
+one may say that the house of a Hindu is his sanctuary, where the
+tutelar god has its niche or shrine to which daily worship is
+rendered. There is hardly any event connected with home life which is
+not religiously viewed and made the occasion of definite family
+worship. Of the sixteen events in the life of a man, from birth to
+death, there is not one which is not viewed from a religious aspect,
+and is not accompanied by an elaborate ritual.
+
+There is hardly a respectable Hindu household in which there is not a
+shrine containing an idol of stone or of some metal which corresponds
+in value to the measure of the family's wealth. "Every morning and
+evening it is worshipped by the hereditary _purohit_, or priest, who
+visits the house for the purpose twice a day, and who, as the name
+implies, is the first in all ceremonies, second to none but the
+_Guru_, or spiritual guide. The offerings of rice, fruits, sweetmeats,
+and milk, made to the god, he carries home after the close of the
+service. A conch is blown, a bell is rung, and a gong beaten at the
+time of worship, when the religiously disposed portion of the inmates,
+male and female, in a quasi-penitent attitude, make their obeisance to
+the god and receive in return the hollow benediction of the
+priest."[5]
+
+[Footnote 5: From "Hindus as They Are."]
+
+Even the building of the house is a matter which must be done
+according to the rules of faith. The selection of a site, the correct
+orientation of the building, the number and location of the rooms, the
+proper material for the structure,--all of these must be determined by
+the _Vastu Sastri_, or the architects, who do their business not so
+much on scientific lines as upon religious. They have their
+_Shastras_, or books of instruction, in architecture, whose basis is
+largely a consideration of the supposed sentiments of the gods and a
+proper harmonizing in the building of various religious conceits,
+crude superstitions, and immemorial customs.
+
+Even the day and hour of entering and dedicating the house must be
+fixed by rules of faith, which are as exacting as they are
+multitudinous. To enter and consecrate a house at the wrong
+astrological moment would bring in its train a number of domestic
+disasters. The house may be anything, from a most primitive hut to a
+many-aisled palace; but in every case the astrologer must be consulted
+as to the time; the spiritual architect must give his rules as to the
+structure; and the family priest must make the house habitable by an
+elaborate ceremonial and offerings to the god or gods of the family.
+
+It is only after all these have been accomplished that a householder
+may, with a clean conscience, enter his new home and expect a blessing
+upon his family therein.
+
+To a stranger who passes through the streets of a town or village it
+may seem strange that no two adjoining houses have exactly the same
+orientation. He may think it an evidence of carelessness, or a want
+of taste. But to the Hindu it is the result of pious conformity to the
+rules of his faith. To a non-Hindu it may seem peculiar that Hindus
+generally enter their new homes in the first half of the year. But to
+the Hindu it is the only half when the gods are awake; it would be
+unpropitious and almost sacrilegious to dedicate a house in that part
+of the year when the gods are supposed to be asleep!
+
+The Hindu home would not be, to a westerner, either pleasant or
+convenient. It looks dingy and dark, doors are small and massive,
+windows are few and generally closed. This is partly because they are
+intended to keep out the tropical glare, and partly because the people
+seem averse to occupying an airy room. A westerner would suffocate in
+a room in which Hindus would delight to spend a night. It has always
+been a wonder to the writer that they thrive on so little fresh air in
+their homes.
+
+Hindus, in the main, care very little for elaborate household
+furniture. Even in homes of wealth, articles of household furniture
+are few and are chosen merely for utility's sake, save in homes where
+western ideas are finding their way and a growing desire to ape
+western manners takes possession of a family. Some years ago, a
+wealthy Hindu gentleman welcomed the writer into his fine new
+three-storied bungalow, whose front door was elaborately carved and
+had cost Rs. 2000. It was furnished with fantastic articles of
+European furniture. Mechanical toys and speaking dolls had places of
+prominence; and among the pictures which adorned the walls the place
+of honour was given to a framed tailor's pattern-plate! A full-sized
+painting of the late British queen was specially honoured by being
+kept in a dark closet! The family did not live in this house, but
+occupied a comfortable one-storied building in the back yard. It was
+adequate to their needs and in harmony with their tastes.
+
+Hindus generally sleep on the floor. They spread a mat under them, and
+this suffices for the ordinary man. Many add to this a dirty pillow,
+which is a mark of extravagance and an evidence of degeneracy. The men
+of the house may sleep anywhere within, or in the verandah without,
+according to the season of the year. Recently, western ideas have
+encroached upon this primitive, sanitary custom, and cots are finding
+an ever increasing place in the household economy.
+
+The Hindu family system is widely different from that of the West.
+Among them the Joint Family System prevails universally. It is built
+on the old patriarchal idea, according to which three generations
+generally live under the same roof and enjoy a community of life and
+of interest. When a man and wife have reared a family, the sons bring
+to the paternal home their wives and live together and raise their
+families in the common home of their father. The supreme authority, in
+the direction of all their affairs, rests with the father. And the
+mother generally takes charge of the household commissariat. The whole
+income of all the members of the family is brought into the common
+treasury, out of which all expenses are met. There is no individual
+property, and no rights and privileges which any one can claim apart
+from another's in that home. In large Hindu families there is often
+found a small colony thus living together and dependent for guidance
+and instruction upon the father. This system entails a great deal of
+responsibility upon the head, whose authority is supreme. And so loyal
+is every Hindu to paternal authority that there is never any question
+raised by any one as to obedience to his commands.
+
+This system has its advantages. In early times, it brought strength
+and security to households thus consolidated. It is doubtless
+favourable to general economy. And it has the peculiar merit of
+developing a strong sense of responsibility in the whole family for
+its every member, however incapacitated she or he may be for
+self-support. The weak and the sick and the feeble-minded have the
+same claim upon the resources of the family as have the others, and
+the claim is universally recognized. For this reason, poor-houses are
+not needed in India.
+
+On the other hand, Hindus themselves are coming to regard this system
+as being out of joint with modern life, under the aegis of a
+progressive, civilized government. One of its chief defects is its
+encouragement of laziness in members of families. No one feels that he
+is responsible for his own maintenance. And no matter how industrious
+a member may be, the product of his labour is not his own--it belongs
+to the family. Such a system saps the foundation of industry and
+enterprise. It furnishes constant temptation to slothfulness and
+inactivity. In former times, this may not have been so manifest; but
+at present, when opportunities open wide their inviting doors, and
+means of accumulating wealth and influence multiply, the system has
+become a source of discontent and of serious difficulty in the
+community.
+
+A few years ago the educated Hindus of South India were so exercised
+over the injustice of the situation that they urged upon the Madras
+Legislature a new act, called "the Gains Learning Bill," whereby every
+man might claim the financial results of his own labours and
+accumulate wealth apart from the property of the family. The matter
+was fully argued in the Legislature, and the injustice of the Joint
+Family System was so clearly revealed in this matter, that the bill
+was carried through. Thereupon, orthodox Hindus raised such a storm of
+opposition to the bill and decried it so vehemently, as a subversion
+of their faith and an overthrow of their most ancient and cherished
+institution, that the governor never signed the bill; and it has
+therefore never become law.
+
+Nevertheless, the agitation against the system is increasing, and the
+incongruity of the Joint Family System with modern social conditions
+is becoming so marked that the day of its overthrow is approaching.
+
+A well-known Hindu writer describes the injustice of this system as
+follows: "As one of the usual consequences of a patriarchal system, a
+respectable Hindu is often obliged to support a number of hangers-on,
+more or less related to him by kinship. A brother, an uncle, a nephew,
+a brother-in-law, etc., with their families, are not infrequently
+placed in this dependent position, notwithstanding the trite apothegm,
+which says, 'it is better to be dependent on another for _food_ than
+to live in his _house_.'"
+
+Moreover, this system fosters family dissension. It requires an ideal
+family, under the strong guidance of an ideal head, to live in peace
+and harmony under this system. The writer above quoted, himself a
+Hindu who had long lived under the system, expressed himself strongly
+upon the subject: "The millennium is not yet come. Seven brothers
+living together with their wives and children, under one and the same
+paternal roof, cannot reasonably be expected to abide in a state of
+perfect harmony, so long as selfishness and incongruous tastes and
+interests are continually working to sap the very foundation of
+friendliness and good-fellowship. Union is strength, but harmonious
+union, under the peculiar regime indicated above, is already a
+remarkable exception in the present state of Hindu society. On careful
+inquiry it will be found that women are at the bottom of that
+mischievous discord which eats into the very vitals of domestic
+felicity. Separation, therefore, is the only means that promises to
+afford relief from this social incubus; and to separation many
+families have now resorted, much after the fashion of the dominant
+race, with a view to the uninterrupted enjoyment of domestic
+happiness."
+
+Outside of the family itself, perhaps the two most important
+functionaries are the family priest and the astrologer. And of these
+two the latter is doubtless the more influential. It is well known, as
+I have written on another page, that Hindus are not only firm
+believers in astrology, but also the abject slaves of this science,
+falsely so-called, in all the affairs of life. It is wonderful how
+many events in the life of a family come within the realm of
+astrological guidance and control. From birth to death, most of the
+important transactions of life are controlled by astrological
+considerations.
+
+And with the astrologer we naturally join the sooth-sayer, who is
+frequently in demand to pronounce his incantations and utter his
+_mantras_, to remove all kinds of maladies and misfortune that may
+overtake members of the family. It is impossible for a Westerner to
+realize how much of the life of the Hindu, in the home and in society,
+is circumscribed by superstitions and directed by omens only. In the
+case of a man setting out upon a journey forty-three different things
+may happen which prognosticate good, and thirty-four which forebode
+evil. In household matters, the eye of the Hindu man, and very
+specially of the Hindu woman, is ever open to any one of a thousand
+indications that may reveal the will of the god or the demon as to
+conduct on the occasion.
+
+The position of women in the Hindu home is fundamental, and much
+misunderstood by the people of the West.
+
+It is sadly true that woman in Hinduism has suffered, throughout the
+centuries, gross injustice, and has laboured under a thousand
+disabilities. But it does not follow from this, as those not familiar
+with Hindu lives are too apt to conclude, that woman is therefore a
+nonentity and a mere helpless drudge in the family.
+
+It is true that the great lawgiver, Manu, said, "No sacrifice is
+allowed to women apart from their husbands, no religious rite, no
+fasting; as far only as a wife honours her lord, so far is she exalted
+to heaven." In accordance with this, Hinduism has always consistently
+maintained that woman's well-being is entirely derived from her
+relationship to man. Her salvation is to be acquired through him. Her
+glory upon earth and her bliss in heaven and final emancipation
+depend upon her attitude to him, specially her obedience and
+devotion.
+
+It is also true, that in no stage of her existence can she be regarded
+as independent. She is dependent upon her father in childhood, the
+slave of her husband so long as he lives, and subject to her son
+during the days of her widowhood. Hinduism leaves her no opportunity,
+in this human existence, for liberty and independence.
+
+Hindu ideas of womanhood have always been low and unworthy. Rather
+than being considered a help-mate to man, she has ever been regarded
+as his tempter and seducer. The proverbs of India are full of these
+base insinuations concerning womanhood. "What is the chief gate to
+hell? Woman." This is only one of a host of common sayings which brand
+the womanhood of India with shame.
+
+It is for this same reason that woman has always been held unworthy of
+education. To educate a woman is compared to placing a knife in the
+hands of a monkey. The ignorance of the women of India to-day is not a
+matter of careless neglect, but rather of studied purpose to deny to
+them that which might change their relationship of subjection to man.
+
+One might suppose that in matters of religion, which is the peculiar
+consolation of the woman of India, a wide door of opportunity might be
+given to her. But here again Manu says, "Woman has no business with
+the texts of the Vedas; thus is the law fully settled. Having
+therefore no evidence of law, and no knowledge of expiatory texts,
+sinful woman must be as foul as falsehood itself; and this is a fixed
+rule."
+
+There are texts which command kindness and respect to womanhood. But
+the above quotations represent the tenor of Hindu literature.
+
+All of these represent the attitude of man toward woman in the home.
+In society, she has had no recognized place whatever, until the
+present, when, under the influence of western civilization, she is
+beginning to find a very limited scope for her legitimate activities.
+
+Nevertheless, in the seclusion of her own home, and inheriting the
+burden of this deep reproach heaped upon her from time immemorial by
+men, woman has created for herself a place of power in the Hindu home.
+Within this sanctuary she has erected her throne and reigns a queen.
+Has man kept her in ignorance? She will therefore apply herself the
+more assiduously to works of faith and piety. Has he heaped upon her
+abuse and called her "donkey" and "buffalo"? She has repaid the insult
+by a loving devotion to her lord, such as has conquered his pride.
+Whether it be as wife or mother, the women of no other land wield
+greater power than the much-abused women of India. There is no woman
+on earth who reveals, at this present time, more devotion and
+attachment to her husband than does the Hindu wife. The old system of
+_Sati_, whereby a woman immolated herself on the funeral pyre of her
+dead husband, what was it? It was, indeed, a custom instituted by man,
+enforced by religious rewards and penalties, with a view to reveal the
+woman as the abject subject of her husband. And yet she glorified that
+custom and often transmuted it into the most sublime exhibition of
+wifely devotion. Hear the description of a _Sati_, given by a Hindu,
+the subject of which was his own aunt. "My aunt," writes he, "was
+dressed in a red silk _sari_, with all the ornaments on her person;
+her forehead daubed with a very thick coat of _sindur_, or vermilion;
+her feet painted red with _alta_; she was chewing a mouthful of betel;
+and a bright lamp was burning before her. She was evidently wrapped in
+an ecstasy of devotion, earnest in all she did, quite calm and
+composed as if nothing important was to happen. In short, she was
+then at her _matins_, anxiously awaiting the hour when this mortal
+coil should be put off. My uncle was lying a corpse in the adjoining
+room. It appeared to me that all the women assembled were admiring the
+virtue and fortitude of my aunt. Some were licking the betel out of
+her mouth, some touching her forehead, in order to have a little of
+the _sindur_, or vermilion; while not a few, falling before her feet,
+expressed a fond hope that they might possess a small particle of her
+virtue.... In truth, she was evidently longing for the hour when her
+spirit and that of her husband should meet together and dwell in
+heaven. She had a _tulsi mala_ (string of basil beads) in her right
+hand, which she was telling, and she seemed to enjoy the shouts of
+'Hari, Hari-bole,' with perfect serenity of mind. We reached Nimtalla
+Ghat about twelve; after staying there for about ten to fifteen
+minutes, sprinkling the holy water on the dead body, all proceeded
+slowly to the Kultalla Ghat, about three miles north of Nimtalla. The
+dead body, wrapped in new clothes, being placed on the pyre, my aunt
+was desired to walk seven times round it, which she did while strewing
+flowers, cowries (shells), and parched rice on the ground. It struck
+me at the time that, at every successive circumambulation, her
+strength and presence of mind failed; whereupon the Darogah
+(government representative) stepped forward once more and endeavoured,
+even at the last moment, to deter her from her fatal determination.
+But she, at the very threshold of ghastly death, in the last hour of
+expiring life, the fatal torch of _Yama_ (Pluto) before her, calmly
+ascended the funeral pile and, lying down by the side of her husband
+with one hand under his head, and another on his breast, was heard to
+call in a half-suppressed voice, 'Hari, Hari,'--a sign of her firm
+belief in the reality of eternal beatitude. When she had thus laid
+herself on the funeral pyre, she was instantly covered, or rather
+choked, with dried wood, while some stout men with bamboos held and
+pressed down the pyre, which was by this time burning fiercely on all
+sides. A great shout of exultation then arose from the surrounding
+spectators, till both the dead and living bodies were converted into a
+handful of dust and ashes."[6]
+
+[Footnote 6: "Hindus as They Are."]
+
+The custom of Sati has been outlawed; but the spirit of Sati still
+dominates the womanly heart of the Hindu wife.
+
+It is this beautiful blending of piety and wifely devotion which has
+been the song of Hindu poets, and the admiration of the Hindu
+community, from time immemorial. It is true that a wife dare not utter
+the name of her husband. The name of the husband of a Hindu woman was
+Faith. When she came to read the Bible, she skipped this word every
+time it occurred in her reading. Why should she demean her lord by
+pronouncing publicly his sacred name?
+
+And yet, when it comes to matters of religion, her stern piety and her
+religious devotion in the home are the most potent factor of the
+household; and husband and father will bow to her supremacy in this
+realm. All public life and social functions have been proscribed to
+her; therefore, does she see to it that in her narrow home sphere,
+both religiously and in the training of her children, her influence
+shall be supreme. And it is.
+
+It is here that the progress of Christianity is much impeded in India.
+A man is often found ready to change his faith, and to abide the
+consequence of the same. It is much more difficult for a woman to
+transfer her affection. But the conversion of the husband will not
+abide in permanence so long as the wife persists in her devotion to
+the ancestral faith. The writer has often seen illustrations of this
+supremacy of the influence of the woman. But it is not always so. In
+1823, a Brahman child was born in Calcutta. When six years old, he
+lighted, by torch, the funeral pyre of his dead father and living
+mother. When he attained manhood and had received a University
+education, he became a Christian. He was then not only renounced by
+his family, but his young wife also spurned and denied him. In
+accordance with her faith, she regarded and treated him as dead,
+performed his funeral rites, and, with shaven head, unjewelled body,
+and the widow's white cloth, mourned his decease as if he had actually
+died. For Christ's sake he had been an outcast from his people and was
+twice dead to his beloved. This experience has been repeated a
+thousand times in India in the case of Christian converts. But, in
+this particular instance, there was a remarkable denouement. The young
+man, deserted, divorced, and ceremonially buried by his wife, married
+a Christian woman, with whom he lived happily for many years. But
+after her death he returned to his first love and _remarried the
+widow_ of his youth, who, in the meanwhile, had relented and become a
+Christian. This was the experience of Professor Chuckerbuthy, of the
+General Assembly College, in Calcutta, who died in 1901.
+
+Marriage among Hindus differs in many respects from the same compact
+among western people. It is in no instance dependent upon the
+initiative of the contracting parties, if such the bride and the
+bridegroom may be called in India. Neither of them is a direct
+participant in the arranging of the contract. It is all done by the
+parents or the guardians of the boy and girl. It is entirely a
+business, and not a sentimental, affair. No other system would be
+possible under past and present conditions in India. In the case of
+infant marriages, the children concerned have, of course, neither
+knowledge of, nor special interest in, the matter. Even in cases where
+the future bride and bridegroom have attained puberty, no sentiment is
+ever allowed to enter, as a consideration, into the matter. The first
+question asked is whether the parties belong to the same caste and are
+connected by family ties. If so, the marriage may be a suitable one.
+It is strange that the children of brothers and sisters furnish the
+most suitable marriage relationships. But the children of brothers, or
+those of sisters, furnish a prohibited relationship! It is regarded as
+improper for a boy to marry the daughter of his mother's sister, or of
+his father's brother, as it would be to marry his own sister. The
+marriage of those remotely connected by blood is rarely considered;
+the marriage of those not at all connected by blood relationship,
+never.
+
+The next matter of paramount importance is a consideration of the
+horoscope of the parties. Were the boy and girl born under
+astrological conditions which harmonize; or does her horoscope so
+conflict with his that their dissonance would bring evil and misery to
+the family? In the latter case, a marriage will be impossible, even
+though all other conditions are most inviting.
+
+Then follows the question of dowry; and here comes the great struggle.
+The girl's parents have to furnish, with the bride, a considerable
+dowry, whose size is directly related to the affluence of the boy's
+family, or to his education and prospects in life. The bickerings
+which take place in this matter are most unseemly; and the marriage
+compact is degraded into a sordid, mercenary transaction. Fathers of
+girls involve themselves in debts which they can never clear, in order
+to marry their darlings to sons of high families of good connection.
+It is this difficulty of marrying daughters, save at an intolerable
+expense to the family, which largely accounts for the universal and
+keen disappointment of Hindu families when they discover, at
+childbirth, that a daughter, and not a son, has been born.
+
+The contract having been sealed by definite religious ceremony, the
+children wait until the girl attains puberty, which may take place at
+any time, from the age of ten to fourteen. Then the rites of
+consummation are performed, and they live together as man and wife.
+Until the marriage is consummated, it is the height of propriety that
+the parties shall be apart and strangers to each other.
+
+It is very often the case that there is much disparity between the age
+of man and wife. A married woman is supposed to belong to her lord for
+time and eternity. A widow is therefore ineligible for remarriage,
+even though her husband may have died when she was an infant. The man,
+on the other hand, may contract any number of marriages. The rapidity
+and the businesslike way with which he proceeds to arrange new
+nuptials after the death of his wife seems appalling to a Westerner!
+It matters not how many wives he may have had, nor how old he has
+become, none but the very young is eligible to become his spouse. The
+consequence is that many men of matured, and even of old, age are
+wedded to mere girls.
+
+This is partly owing to the fact that the Hindu has not yet realized
+the need, or importance, of companionship between man and wife. This
+is very marked among the educated men of the Hindu community. Not only
+by age, but also by educational and other qualifications, a wife is in
+no condition to be a sympathetic companion to her spouse. So that the
+relationship has, to them, little of mutuality in it.
+
+The lot of the Hindu widow is, proverbially, a hard one. She is
+despised and hated, even though she be but a child, because her
+husband's family persist in believing that his death was caused by her
+adverse horoscope. She suffers every obloquy in her husband's home, is
+deprived of her jewels, has her head shaven, and is clothed only with
+a coarse white cloth. Her fastings are long and severe, and she is not
+allowed to attend any festivity; for the presence of a widow would be
+deemed an evil omen and a curse.
+
+Moreover, she is the object of suspicion, and is frequently the prey
+of men's passions. It is a strange comment upon the religious
+perversity of a people of the tender domestic nature of Hindus, that
+they should deal with so much cruelty and such apparent indifference
+to the bereavement and suffering of the unfortunate widow who bears
+so tender a relationship to them. Religion has never wrought greater
+cruelty and injustice to any one than to the Hindu widow, specially to
+the child widow. And, notwithstanding the fact that these suffering
+ones are a great host in this land, there are few of their people who
+raise their voice in their defence or strive for their relief.
+
+The relationship of son-in-law and mother-in-law is always a strained
+one. The wife's mother may live with her under very decided
+limitations. It is not permitted to her to eat in the presence of her
+son-in-law, or to enter a room where he happens to be!
+
+The situation is still worse between the daughter-in-law and the
+mother-in-law. The vernaculars of India abound in proverbs which
+illumine this relationship and reveal its strange character. The
+husband's mother apparently delights in nothing more than in
+exercising a cruel restraint over her son's wife. Nothing that the
+young woman can do will please her. And the husband too often sides
+with the older against the younger woman. When, however, the situation
+becomes intolerable to the wife, she takes French leave, and goes home
+to her parents. This soon brings her husband to terms; and it is
+etiquette that he go and ask her to return, apologizing for the
+troubles that she has endured. And so the situation is improved, for a
+while, until another visit to her parents becomes imperative. It is
+natural enough that the mother-in-law should thus deal harshly with
+her daughter-in-law; for is it not her revenge for the similar
+treatment which she received many years ago as daughter-in-law? The
+real attitude of the Hindu toward his wife is doubtless more cordial
+than it appears to a Westerner. He seems to delight in revealing an
+indifference to her feelings and a contempt for her position. In the
+household, she is not permitted to eat with him; she must wait upon
+his lordship and take the leavings of his meal. Upon a journey, it
+would be gross impropriety for her to walk by his side. Etiquette
+demands that she walk behind him at a respectable distance of, say,
+ten paces.
+
+The love of jewellery is a marked passion with the women of India.
+Millions of money are expended every year in the manufacture of female
+adornments. And in this work there are more than four hundred thousand
+goldsmiths constantly employed. The wealth of a family, especially
+among the middle classes, is largely measured by the amount of
+jewellery which the women of the household possess. No one would
+grudge to these women a certain amount of these personal ornaments;
+but when it becomes a mad craze to convert all their wealth into such
+vanity, and thus to render their wealth entirely unremunerative, it
+becomes a serious matter. The loading down of a woman or a girl with
+precious stones, gold, silver, or cheaper metal, adds anything but
+attractiveness to the person. It gives them a gross conception of
+personal attractiveness as well as a monetary value to beauty, which
+degrades the ideals of the country. When a woman's ears and nose, the
+crown of her head, her neck, arms, hands, waist, ankles, and toes are
+made to sparkle with the wealth of the family, and to bear down the
+frail body of the proud victim, they cease entirely to set off the
+personal beauty of the woman herself, and become rather a counter
+attraction; and she is admired not for what she is, but for what she
+carries.
+
+Moreover, it is well known that these women are not satisfied, on
+public occasions, to wear their own jewels only; they borrow also
+those of their neighbours and shine with a borrowed light, which
+reflects a great deal more their vanity than their beauty. Many a time
+has the writer seen bright little Brahman girls carrying upon their
+person the combined glittering wealth of several families upon
+festive occasions. Add to this again the fact that there are thousands
+of women and children murdered in India every year for the sake of
+these personal ornaments which they flaunt before the public, and with
+which they tempt criminals.
+
+It is claimed that higher-class Hindus are cleaner in their personal
+habits than almost any other people on earth. This is probably true,
+so far as a multiplicity of ablutions can make them. The religious
+washings of the Brahman are so frequent as to make him largely immune
+to epidemics of cholera and other filth diseases. And yet the lower
+classes of the people, in their homes and elsewhere, have little to
+boast of in the line of cleanliness. They all aspire to the weekly
+oil-bath, which is doubtless a wholesome thing in the heat of these
+tropics, where, through paucity of clothing, the skin is much exposed
+to the sun's rays. But oil has well-known attractive powers for dust,
+filth, and vermin too!
+
+It must also be remembered that the Hindu is given much more to
+seeking ceremonial than sanitary cleanliness. It matters not how
+filthy the water may be, chemically; if it be ceremonially clean, he
+uses it freely. If it be ceremonially polluting, it is eschewed. As
+one sees a village community make all possible uses of the village
+pond, he wonders why the whole village has not been swept away by
+disease. They are saved from their folly, doubtless, by the piercing,
+cleansing rays of the tropical sun.
+
+Hindu clothing is both beautiful and admirably suited to the tropical
+climate. The one cloth of the Hindu woman, which she so deftly winds
+around her body, and which is usually of bright colours, is perhaps
+the most exquisitely beautiful garment worn by any people. And this is
+altogether adequate to her needs. Unfortunately, western habits are
+now coming into vogue, and, in the case of men and women alike, the
+clothing of the West is partially supplanting that of the East.
+Nothing could be more unfortunate, from the standpoint of health,
+beauty, and economy.
+
+The culinary arrangements and the cuisine of the Hindu home are
+somewhat elaborate. Well-to-do Hindus, notwithstanding many caste
+restrictions, are somewhat epicurean in their tastes, and live well.
+As we have seen in the chapter on Caste, there are many limitations
+placed upon the selection of food, the method of its preparation, and
+of eating. Meat is entirely banned by the highest castes. None will
+touch the meat of the bovine kind, save the outcast Pariah. All are
+very particular in seeking seclusion for their meals. This is perhaps
+the reason why the Hindu home is, generally speaking, so much more
+secluded than that of other people. Hindus believe that fingers were
+made before knives, forks, and spoons. Consequently they eat their
+food entirely with their fingers. It seems offensive enough to
+Westerners. It has often taken away the writer's appetite as he has
+feasted with them, to have the cook dole out his rice to him with his
+bare hands! They eat entirely with their right hand, and never touch
+the food with the left, reserving that hand for baser purposes.
+
+In wealthy families, household duties are performed by many servants.
+It is amusing to see how many servants are required in India to
+perform the ordinary functions of one able-bodied servant in the West.
+The services which a Hindu will demand from his menials are far
+greater than those of a healthy Westerner. His languid nature and
+general effeminacy make him entirely dependent upon his servant for
+most of the activities and amenities of life. Recently the writer
+heard a Hindu companion in a railway car call his servant at night
+from an adjoining car to come and turn the shade over the compartment
+lamp that he might have a nap! A well-known writer, in describing the
+life of a Babu, says: "The _Khansama_ of a Babu is his most favourite
+servant. From the nature of his office he comes into closest contact
+with his master; he rubs his body with oil before bathing, and
+sometimes shampoos him,--a practice which gradually induces idle,
+effeminate habits and eventually greatly incapacitates a man for the
+duties of an active life. Indeed, to study the nature of a 'big native
+swell' is to study the character of a consummate Oriental epicure,
+immersed in a ceaseless round of pleasures, and hedged in by a body of
+unconscionable fellows, distinguished only for their flattery and
+servility."
+
+During times of sickness, the native doctor is in requisition. This
+functionary is not without his merits; for it is a hereditary
+profession, and not a little medical wisdom and experience have been
+transmitted from father to son down the centuries. Nevertheless, as
+compared with modern science, the ignorance of these men is woful, and
+the unnecessary loss of life through that ignorance is lamentable.
+Their pharmacy is as defective as many of their remedies are absurd
+and disgusting. The present government, by multiplying its hospitals
+and dispensaries, has done much to arrest disease and remove
+suffering. And yet the remedies do not reach one-tenth of the
+population. And many of the one-tenth are so suspicious of western
+science that in their extremity they will pass the well-equipped
+government hospital and its diplomaed attendants in order to consult
+the native doctor and to partake of his concoctions. One of the
+reasons for this prejudice is the largeness of the dose which the
+Indian doctor invariably supplies. How can the diminutive doses of the
+white man and his establishment remove important difficulties and heal
+serious diseases? The writer has known not a few well-educated Indian
+Christians living under the shadow of a well-equipped missionary
+hospital which furnished its medicines free, sneak away a few streets
+beyond to consult the man who is a compound of a quack and an
+astrologer. And yet, doubtless, the new pharmacy of the West brings
+healing in its wings to millions of this people annually; and it is
+one of the causes for the rapid increase of the population.
+
+At childbirth, the barber's wife is always called. She is the midwife
+of India, and the poor Hindu wife who is about to become a mother is
+the victim of the ignorance and stupidity of this woman. It is no
+wonder that so many die in childbirth or survive only to become
+invalids through the remainder of their lives. To remove this serious
+evil, government is putting forth strenuous efforts to bring
+intelligent relief to the mothers of India.
+
+The entrance of death into a Hindu family brings, as elsewhere,
+inexpressible sorrow. The women of the family resign themselves to
+their grief, which is expressed by loud wailings, with beating of
+their breast and tearing their dishevelled hair. While professional
+wailers are rare, nevertheless friends and relatives congregate and
+add volume to the dirge of sorrow. The leading women mourners will
+often express in weird chant and appropriate words their praises of
+the virtues and the beauties of the departed ones. The men of the
+household mourn in silence, as it is not fitting that the man should
+audibly express his sorrow in public.
+
+Hindus make immediate arrangements for burning or burial as soon as
+death has occurred; so that, usually, the funeral services are over
+within twelve or eighteen hours after death. This is desirable,
+because of the Hindu custom of fasting so long as a corpse remains in
+the house; and is also necessary because of the speedy decomposition
+of the body in the tropics. It is also made possible by the fact that
+Hindus do not use coffins.
+
+It is the custom of most of the higher-caste Hindus to cremate their
+dead; while many of the lowest castes and outcasts resort to burial.
+Cremation would doubtless be the more sanitary method, if the fire
+were not so inadequate in many instances. The Hindu burning-ground is
+a place of ghastly and disgusting interest.
+
+Funeral ceremonies do not terminate with the burning or with the
+burial of the body in Hinduism. The ritual connected with the dead,
+which is called _Shradda_, is, among the higher classes, a most
+elaborate and complicated one, and lasts, with intermissions, for a
+year. These are conducted with much effort by, and at great expense
+to, the oldest son of the family. And a great significance is attached
+to their rigid performance. It may be regarded as a part of the great
+ancestral worship of the East.
+
+The function of this ceremony is also kindred to that of Roman
+Catholicism, which, through prayer and offerings, seeks the release of
+souls from Purgatory. By this ritual, which involves also gifts to
+Brahmans and priests, the son makes more easy the pathway of the
+departed parent through the shades into the realms beyond, and
+relieves the departed soul of its encumbrances and facilitates its
+progress toward bliss. By some it is claimed that these ceremonies,
+when rightly performed, render unnecessary his suffering in hell or
+his returning to this world for rebirth. It is more likely that the
+purpose is to reduce the suffering and to enhance the progress of the
+soul between this birth and the next. In any case, all orthodox Hindus
+regard the _Shradda_ ceremonies as possessing great virtue and high
+importance. And this is one of the principal reasons why every Hindu
+man and woman is so eager for the birth of a son in their family.
+Without a son, who is there to relieve their soul from destruction,
+and to bring to them future peace and rest through the _Shradda_
+ceremony? Thus parents ever pray for male offspring; and the greatest
+disappointment in the life of a Hindu woman is not to be able to
+present her lord a son to solace him in this life and to assist him
+through the valley of death. One of the questions asked by the dutiful
+son, as he performs this laborious ritual, is,--
+
+ "O my father, my grandfather, my great-grandfather!
+ Are you satisfied? Are you satisfied? We are satisfied."
+
+If any son, by the dutiful performance of offering and ritual here
+upon earth, can bring help and peace to his dead ancestors, the Hindu
+son may be expected to succeed.
+
+The following, taken from an ancient Sutra, is regarded as a Hindu
+burial hymn:--
+
+ "Open thy arms, O earth! receive the dead
+ With gentle pressure and with loving welcome.
+ Enshroud him tenderly, even as a mother
+ Folds her soft vestment round the child she loves.
+ Soul of the dead, depart! take thou the path--
+ The ancient path by which our ancestors
+ Have gone before thee; thou shalt look upon
+ The two kings, mighty Varuna and Yama,
+ Delighting in oblations; thou shalt meet
+ The fathers and receive the recompense
+ Of all thy stored-up offerings above.
+ Leave thou thy sin and imperfection here;
+ Return unto thy home once more; assume
+ A glorious form."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+KALI YUGA--INDIA'S PESSIMISM[7]
+
+
+Many nations, during the period of their infancy and ignorance, have
+given to Time and its divisions the power and qualities of life and
+have clothed them with moral purpose and attributes. Chronos was to
+the Greeks of old the god of time, in whose hands were the destinies
+of men. Even up to the present day not a few ignorant people of
+Christian lands are influenced, to some extent, by an inherited
+superstition about "lucky" and "unlucky" days. But I know of no land
+which is suffering more than India from traditional, false, and
+injurious conceptions of chronology. Time is here endowed with life
+and enthroned among the gods. Sivan is "_Maha-Kalan_," the great
+incarnation of Time, and the mighty destroyer of all things. It is
+also said that "Time is a form of Vishnu."
+
+[Footnote 7: This chapter is a modified form of a lecture delivered to
+Hindus.]
+
+We are told that we are living in _Kali yuga_, and that we are subject
+to all the evil which is the permanent characteristic of this iron
+age. I believe that there are few things in India which so thoroughly
+influence the life, habits, and character of the people as do their
+many conceptions about chronology. And I am convinced that
+incalculable good would come to the country if all these old and
+exploded ideas were to give way to more rational ones--such as are in
+harmony with modern intelligence and civilization.
+
+Consider, then, the various aspects of the chronology which all but
+universally prevails in India in order that we may see wherein it
+touches the life and moulds the thought of educated and uneducated
+alike.
+
+
+I
+
+_The Astounding Length of the Chronological System_
+
+In ancient Vedic times there obtained here, so far as we can see, much
+more sober views of chronology than at present. It was much later that
+the imagination of Hindu writers took full wing and carried the people
+into the all but infinite reaches of Puranic chronology. One must wait
+for the elaboration of Vishnu Purana, for instance, in order to meet
+that apparent sobriety of mathematical detail which is utilized to add
+credibility to the most fantastic time system that imagination ever
+devised.
+
+Christians of the West have doubtless erred on the side of excessive
+brevity in their theories and beliefs about the beginnings of history
+and especially in their attempt to locate the origin of the human
+race. Until recently, it was thought that our human progenitor, Adam,
+was created no more than sixty centuries ago, and that the whole
+history of mankind is consequently confined to that brief space of
+time. In the same way the practical mind of the West has pictured to
+itself the termination of human life and history upon earth at some
+not very remote date in the future. Science has already shown the
+error of the former, as history is likely to demonstrate the falsity
+of the latter theory.
+
+But India has, with much greater daring and with more of unreason,
+carried back many billions of years the origin of mankind and has
+painted vividly a future whose expanse is as the boundless sea.
+
+We are now, it is said, at the close of the first five thousand years
+of _Kali yuga_. And this same _yuga_, or epoch, has 427,000 years
+still in store for us and our descendants! Before it arrived, the
+other three _yugas_--_Kritha_, _Tretha_, and _Dwapara_--had passed on;
+and these, together, were equal to more than ten thousand divine
+years, or to nearly four million human years! These four epochs equal
+a total of 4,320,000 human years, and this is called a "_maha-yuga_."
+This in itself would stagger the practical mind of the West. But it is
+only the very threshold of Hindu chronology! There are seventy-one of
+these great epochs in a "_Manuvanthara_," or the period of one Manu,
+or human progenitor. And there are many of these Manus with their
+periods. For instance, there are fourteen of them required in order to
+cover the time called "_Karpa_," or one day in the life of Brahma. And
+after Brahma has spent his modest day everything is destroyed and his
+godship spends an equal period in sleep and rest. Then begins another
+Brahmaic day, in which a new succession of Manus spend, with their
+progeny, their interminable epochs. And thus one series of epochs
+follows another, sandwiched in by equally long spaces of lifeless
+darkness. And this goes on until Brahma has completed his divine life
+of one hundred years; and then comes the final dissolution. Having
+gone on as far as this, there is no reason why the imagination should
+rest at this point; and so Vishnu _Purana_, which, of course, is
+composed in praise of that god, claims that one day of Vishnu is equal
+to the whole life of Brahma!
+
+No one can bring within the range of his thought or imagination one
+tithe of the years, divine or human, which are included in this
+marvellous chronology. A billion years are but as a day to the Hindu
+mind.
+
+And if any one is anxious to know the exact place at which we have
+arrived in this chronological maze, the same _Purana_ informs us that
+we are five thousand years advanced in the _Kali yuga_ of "_Varaha
+karpa_," or the first day in the second half of Brahma's life. And
+thus we are supposed to live not far (say a few billion years!) from
+the middle of the Hindu chronological system. One may better realize
+the length of the system if he remembers that we have yet to spend of
+the present _Kali yuga_ alone more than seventy times the whole of the
+old Christian chronology from Adam to the present time! And yet, as
+compared with the whole system described above, _Kali yuga_ is less
+than one day in a thousand years. And that largely measures the
+difference between the imagination of the West and the same developed
+faculty in the East!
+
+It is quite unnecessary to say that the prehistoric Manus of previous
+_yugas_ are absolutely imaginary creatures, since history can tell us
+practically nothing about the head of our race, even in the present
+Hindu dispensation. There is not a line of history or of reliable
+tradition that will enable us to reach farther back than five or six
+thousand years in this quest for the origin of our race. There was, of
+course, a beginning of human life on earth; and we may, just as we
+please, call the progenitor "Manu" or "Adam." But, according to the
+Hindu chronological system, six thousand years only carries us just
+back into the last _yuga_, and is as but yesterday in the march of the
+divine aeons of the past. Certainly, writers whose productions are
+unreliable as a guide to the events of the past century or two are
+only indenting upon their imagination when they descant upon the
+chronological data of the _Puranas_.
+
+One of the principal evils connected with this measureless time system
+is found in the fact that it helps to destroy the confidence of all
+intelligent men in the historicity of characters and events which
+would otherwise be worthy of our credence. For example, the question
+is asked whether such a man as Rama Chandra ever existed. We at once
+reply in the affirmative; for does not the Ramayana dwell upon his
+exploits, and are there not other reasons for believing that such a
+hero lived in ancient times in this land?
+
+And yet when the _Puranas_ tell us that this same Rama received his
+apotheosis and appeared as an incarnation of Vishnu in the _Tretha
+yuga_, say one or two millions of years ago, we are astounded at the
+credulity of those who could write such a statement as well as those
+who can accept it; and we are led to question whether, after all, Rama
+ever existed or is simply a poetic conception carried far away into an
+imaginary time. Thus the chronology of the land tends to cast a cloud
+of doubt and suspicion over all that is historical, traditional, or
+legendary in the literature of the people.
+
+Still greater than this is the unfortunate influence of such a system
+upon the people themselves, in helping to destroy any appreciation
+that they would otherwise have of historic perspective. It is well
+known that the people of India have throughout the ages been the most
+wanting in the ability to write and soberly to appreciate historic
+facts.
+
+They are great thinkers and wonderful metaphysicians, but they are not
+historians. The meagre history of India which has come down to us was
+not written by the people themselves. Not until recently, and then
+under the influence of western training, did any reliable book of
+history emanate from the brain and hand of a native of this land. All
+that we know of the ancient history of India comes to us in two ways.
+It is known indirectly through the language and literature and ancient
+inscriptions of the past. Historians of to-day have to study the
+science of language, and especially the growth of the Sanscrit tongue;
+and, through an intimate knowledge of the same, they arrive
+approximately at the time in which many of the most important books of
+the land have been written and at the dates of the events narrated in
+them. Or they may be helped, to some extent, to learn this history by
+a study of the teachings of the books themselves, which may indicate
+the time in which they were written. A few inscriptions and coins give
+the dates of certain reigns, which thus bring us directly and briefly
+into the correct era of certain important events.
+
+But the bulk of the history of India comes through foreigners. At
+different periods in the history of the land men of other
+nationalities visited India and then recorded their observations
+concerning the country and the people. The Greeks were great
+travellers and keen observers in ancient times. They came to India and
+left in their books such statements about the land as assist us to
+understand its condition at that period. Then the Chinese, in the
+early centuries of the Christian era, visited this land and recorded
+in their works much of interest about the social and religious
+condition of the people. Later, the Mohammedan conquest brought many
+foreigners into India, and some of the writers of Islam give us
+further insight into the affairs of the country. From the fifteenth
+century the Romish missionaries have conveyed, through their reports
+to Rome, much of information concerning the people and their life. And
+thus the history of India has largely depended upon the keen and
+careful observations and statements of men of other lands who came
+here for travel, trade, or religion. But Indians themselves have, at
+no time, contributed to this most important department of literature.
+We may search in vain for even one volume of reliable history out of
+the myriad tomes of embellished narratives which have emanated from
+the fertile brains of the men of India. How shall we account for this
+strange and very striking fact? It must be, in part, owing to the
+innate passion of India at all times for poetic embellishment and
+exaggeration. A cool, scientific, unadorned statement of a fact or of
+an event has never satisfied the soul of the children of the tropics.
+Hence, the history of the past becomes legend, human heroes are
+painted as divine, and epochs and eras are lengthened out to almost
+eternal proportions.
+
+Now the most serious result of all this is that the people have come
+firmly to believe that these wild exaggerations, which were written by
+some dreamy poets of the past, are the sane and cool expressions of
+simple historic fact; and thus they have largely lost the true sense
+of historic perspective, are unable to distinguish between fact and
+fancy, and are strangers to the lessons of the past. For it must be
+remembered that the teachings of former ages, and especially the
+life-lessons and character-influences of those generations of men,
+have less and less of significance to us the farther we throw them
+back into the dim and hazy realm of the prehistoric and legendary. The
+near past, with its familiar voices and its heroes of real flesh and
+blood, brings to us an appeal to life and noble endeavour to which we
+are always glad to respond; while the remote characters of myth and of
+legend neither impress us with their reality nor inspire us to a
+higher and better life.
+
+And, in the same way, these immensely drawn-out aeons of the past make
+it impossible for those who believe in them rightly to appreciate the
+significance and importance of the present. One's presence in the
+world and the value of his best activity for the world's good can mean
+something to him if he appreciate the fact that there is no great
+distance to the very beginning of human history. Though his span of
+life is small, it nevertheless has a definite relationship to the
+whole of history, and there is some encouragement for a man to work
+for the good of his race. But this encouragement dwindles into
+nothingness when a man believes in those many aeons of human life, each
+aeon being in itself an immense reach of billions of years.
+
+
+II
+
+_The Cyclic Character of Hindu Chronology_
+
+A very unique thing about this chronology is that it revolves in
+cycles. Each _maha-yuga_ is composed of four _yugas_, and these are
+ever the same series and of the same character. We pass on through the
+long vista of _Kritha_, _Tretha_, _Dwapara_, and _Kali_ only to begin
+once more on the same series; and thus forever we move in this
+four-arc circle without ever getting outside of it. It is claimed
+that this cycle of _yugas_ has already revolved about twenty million
+times and will go on spinning twenty million times more, attaining
+nothing and going nowhere. It is enough to make one dizzy to think of
+this mighty chronological wheel, spending 4,320,000 years for every
+one of its forty million revolutions, with nothing to vary the
+monotony of these ever recurring epochs!
+
+The first question which one would naturally ask, after assuming the
+truth of this breathlessly long system, is whether it could forever
+return upon itself after this fashion. Is there no _progress_ in time?
+Is it true, in this sense also, that "there is nothing new under the
+sun"? While other people are refreshed by the sense that they are
+moving forward and upward in the fulfilment of some great destiny, are
+ever adding new increments to their wisdom, and are rising higher upon
+"their dead selves" to ever nobler achievements, is it right that the
+people of this great land should be doomed to think that there is no
+permanent advance for India, but that she alone must forever return
+whence she started and repeat the weary cycle of the past?
+
+As a matter of fact, no people can be thus tied down to any mechanical
+order of time. Every race and nation is either making for progress or
+for degeneracy. It will never return to its old moorings. The past has
+told upon it. It has accumulated some wealth of knowledge, of
+experience, of character, which, as the centuries roll, brings it
+farther on in its career. It is true that a nation, like a man, may
+have lapses by which it may fall down a step or more in the ladder of
+its upward progress. But this cannot be a necessity of its nature or a
+relentless law of its being.
+
+This chronological system also accounts for much of the pessimism that
+pervades the minds and depresses the heart of the people of India
+to-day. It is everywhere claimed that the best things of India were
+found in the remote past. But, you ask, will not the _Sattia
+yuga_--the golden age--return again? Oh, yes, it is next in the
+procession, we are told. But we must not forget that there are about
+427,000 long years before this _Kali yuga_ comes to an end. Even
+supposing that the doctrine of transmigration is true, and that the
+soul of man must pass through many reincarnations; who can be expected
+to hold on to courage and hope through nearly half a million years of
+dreary existence? What India sorely needs to-day is a conviction that
+she is moving onward--that there is but one _yuga_ in her calendar,
+and that that is the _yuga_ of _opportunity to rise to higher things_.
+Thus alone can she be stimulated to her best efforts and most worthy
+activity.
+
+In this connection we must not forget another aspect of these changing
+and ever recurring ages of the _puranas_. Each _yuga_, _maha-yuga_,
+and _karpa_ is followed by a period of more or less complete
+destruction. The achievements of each period are forgotten, because
+its results are obliterated or consumed by a mighty cataclysm. And
+thus no gain acquired in any past age is available for the coming
+epoch. In this way, the whole idea of the puranic chronology is the
+most effective ever devised by man in any land to bring discouragement
+and despair into the heart of the people who live under it. Whether we
+look at the absurd length, the discouraging cycles, or the destructive
+cataclysms which are an essential part of the system, one and all
+bring in their train depression, stagnation, and the spirit of
+reckless waste. While we recognize that this chronology is a natural
+product of the dreamy, patient soul of the East, the most important
+fact for us to remember is that it also perpetuates and accentuates
+the very evil which gave it birth.
+
+
+III
+
+_The Moral Characteristics of the Hindu Time System_
+
+This, doubtless, is the most striking feature of this chronology and
+gives it a larger influence than any other in the thoughts and life of
+the people of this land. And I really believe that it is more
+deleterious in its influence upon the Hindu character than anything
+else connected with this system.
+
+According to this chronology, in its most elaborated form, every day,
+yea, every hour as well as every _yuga_, or epoch, has its peculiar
+moral character assigned to it. It is well known that the first era in
+the _maha-yuga_ is called _Sattia yuga_, or the era of truth. During
+this period the cow of righteousness stands upon four legs, and all
+living beings are good, beautiful, and happy. This indeed is the
+golden age of Hinduism. But, alas, its last departure was some four
+million years ago, and it will not return, they say, for nearly half a
+million years more. Then it is followed by "the silver age," in which
+the cow is said to stand on three legs only! In other words, virtue
+and happiness have suffered diminution, and evil and misery have crept
+into human life. If in the previous age asceticism was the crowning
+glory, in this second age knowledge is supreme. This is said to be
+the time of Rama's exploits and trials.
+
+We then come into the bronze era, the so-called period of Krishna's
+incarnation and "goings." The poor cow of virtue has suffered still
+further limitations and has but two legs to stand upon in this _yuga_!
+This is called the age of sacrifice--the time when sacrifice has
+preeminence as a source of power in salvation.
+
+Then we come down to the iron age in which we have the supposed
+infelicity to live. This is the time of evil, _par excellence_, in
+which the cow has been reduced to the last extremity and has to stand
+upon one leg! The gradual deterioration of the ages finds here its
+culmination. Of this fourth age there is a description in the
+Vishnu-purana, which is translated as follows:--
+
+ "Hear what will happen in the kali yuga.
+ The usages and institutes of caste, of order and rank, will not
+ prevail,
+ Nor yet the precepts of the triple Veda.
+ Religion will consist in wasting wealth,
+ In fasting and performing penances
+ At will; the man who owns most property,
+ And lavishly distributes it, will gain
+ Dominion over others; noble rank
+ Will give no claim to lordship; self-willed women
+ Will seek their pleasure, and ambitious men
+ Fix all their hopes on riches gained by fraud.
+ The women will be fickle and desert
+ Their beggared husbands, loving them alone
+ Who give them money. Kings, instead of guarding,
+ Will rob their subjects, and abstract the wealth
+ Of merchants, under plea of raising taxes.
+ Then in the world's last age the rights of men
+ Will be confused, no property be safe,
+ No joy and no prosperity be lasting."
+
+"Women will bear children at the age of five, six, or seven, and men
+beget them when they are eight, nine, or ten. Gray hair will appear
+when a person is but twelve years of age, and the duration of life for
+men will only be twenty years."
+
+Now the idea in all this is that each _yuga_, or era, has its fixed
+character. Rather than that the men of a _yuga_ should impart their
+character to the age in which they live, the age itself has a
+pronounced moral bent which is transferred to all who happen to live
+under it. Thus we see in the theory a perversion and contradiction of
+the facts; for an ethical character is assigned to days and hours
+rather than to moral beings, who alone are capable of such values.
+
+Therefore, for a thorough consideration of the system as a whole, it
+is only necessary that we consider the character assigned to this evil
+age in which we live. There is nothing more deeply wrought into the
+consciousness of the people of this land at the present time than the
+conviction that this time in which we live is indeed _Kali yuga_, that
+it is irremediably bad, and that it taints with its own character
+everything that has life.
+
+Pandit Natesa Sastri remarks: "In India when a young boy or girl
+happens to break, in eating or dress, the orthodox rules of caste, his
+or her parents will say, 'Oh! it is all the result of the _Kali
+yuga_.' If a Hindu becomes a convert to any other religion, or if any
+atrocious act is committed, the Hindu will observe, 'Oh! it is the
+ripening of Kali.' Every deviation from the established custom, every
+vice, every crime, in fact, everything wicked, is set down by the
+ordinary Hindu to the ascending power of the Lord of the Kali age."
+
+Nor is this merely a superstition of the ignorant. We remember how, in
+the year 1899, when it was said that great calamities were due, the
+Dewan of Mysore promised to place the matter of preparing for these
+calamities before the Maharajah. For was it not the five thousandth
+year of _Kali yuga_?
+
+Now it does not occur to one in ten thousand to ask whether this is
+really so. It is accepted as a dogma which must not be questioned; and
+all the evil and falsehood which this involves must be a dread of the
+soul and a bondage of the mind whether it become a fact of experience
+or not.
+
+But, accepting the universally received belief of India that _Kali
+yuga_ is now five thousand and eight years old, who can tell us what
+was the condition of things in India before this? Everything before
+that time is absolutely prehistoric. The best authorities, and indeed
+all authorities, claim that the Vedas were first sung, that the Rishis
+of India came into existence, that the Sanscrit tongue and the Indian
+Aryans who spoke it and the religion of Hinduism which they brought or
+cultivated,--all of these find their origin during the last five
+thousand years. All the evidences of history unite to assure us that
+there is practically nothing existing at the present time in this land
+which is not in some way the child of these last fifty centuries of
+_Kali yuga_. Who, then, can dogmatically tell us that these centuries
+have been better or worse than the eras preceding them? We know no
+more about the _Dwapara_ and the other previous eras, if any such ever
+existed, than we know about the inhabitants of other planets, if such
+there be. It is therefore futile, yea more, thoroughly wicked, to
+impose upon the people a chronological system which is so pessimistic
+and hopeless in its tenor as this.
+
+But even looking back through the probably four thousand years which
+embrace all that we really know about India, what do we see to
+encourage this pessimistic view of our era?
+
+Let it not be assumed that the people of India in the days of the
+Rishis of old were purer in life or loftier in ideals than many who
+live in India to-day. It is true that such evils as caste, infant
+marriage, and many similar customs did not exist at all in Vedic days.
+But it is also true that not a few serious evils of ancient times,
+such as drunkenness, human sacrifice, and slavery, do not generally
+exist in India to-day.
+
+But if we desire to know what the condition of the present time is, we
+should compare this beginning of the twentieth with the beginning of
+the eighteenth century and see what progress has been achieved. During
+the last two centuries numberless crimes and evils have been swept
+away. I need only mention such enormities as _thuggee_, _sattee_,
+infant murder, etc., all of which were thriving even a hundred years
+ago, but which are now things of the past. And what shall I say of a
+horde of other customs that have cursed the land, such as infant
+marriage, _thevathasis_, caste, all of which are beginning to yield to
+the enlightened thought of the present and will soon be driven out of
+the country?
+
+I need not add, however, that all of these wonderful changes and
+progress have not come out of Hinduism. They have been carried out and
+are progressing in the teeth of constant opposition from the orthodox
+defenders of the ancestral faith. It is the new light of the West that
+has dawned upon India and has brought to it a new era. Even while the
+people are insisting that they are in the midst of _Kali yuga_ and are
+confident that the days are "out of joint," they are nevertheless
+witnessing such a revolution in religious, social, and intellectual
+life all around them that any people who were not under the blind
+spell of the Hindu time-fallacy would rejoice with exceeding joy to
+see it.
+
+And herein do we find one of the great evils of this chronology: It
+incapacitates the people to accept or to appreciate any blessing which
+has or may come to them through religious and social advancement.
+They think that everything must be bad, as a matter of course, in
+_Kali yuga_, and so nothing can appear good to them, however
+beneficent and beautiful it may be.
+
+This conviction that things are now out of joint, and the settled
+purpose that all will continue an unmixed programme of evil, has more
+to do with the sad and universal pessimism of India than anything else
+of which I know. It crushes all buoyancy and cheer out of the mind and
+rests like a pall upon every future prospect.
+
+Then this expectation for the future robs men of any ambition to
+remedy present evils. For, they naturally will say, "Why flee from
+ills which are pressing upon us and which by experience we have
+learned to endure, if it be only to contract greater troubles in their
+stead; for freedom from evil is an impossibility in this age?" Is it
+not, to a very considerable extent, the reason why there are so few
+whole-hearted reformers in India? Why should a man seek, at the risk
+of opprobrium and enmity, to root out of the country some accursed
+custom if his inherited belief in the inherent badness of the present
+era is still with him? He must feel that all his efforts will be worse
+than vain; for even if he and others may succeed in overcoming this
+custom, it will be only to give room to another that may be worse.
+Hence the universal apathy in the face of crying evils and damning
+customs; hence also the helpless "_cui bono?_" to every effort of
+others to help the land out of the deep pits of injustice and ancient
+ills.
+
+Out of this belief comes another equally portentous danger, viz. that
+of easily yielding to the temptations of the time, and of a readiness
+to participate in the common sins of the day. For, say many, are not
+these immoralities and evils an integral part of the time; and, if so,
+what harm is there in our partaking of them? Or, at least, is it not
+our best interest to harmonize ourselves with the essentially evil
+environment of our age rather than vainly to combat the sins of the
+day and to strive to no purpose to remove them?
+
+And thus a belief in the divine order and purpose of the evil of our
+time and in the impossibility of changing the character of our age
+becomes one of the most prolific sources of sin, of weakness, and of
+moral and spiritual apathy in the land to-day. Do not many sin without
+fear and with increasing facility because they think it is the only
+life that best harmonizes with this _Kali yuga_ in which they live?
+
+Much of this conception of time is connected with the all but
+universal belief of the people in astrology. In India, astrology is
+still fed by popular ignorance and superstition, and continues to rule
+with an iron rod in this last stronghold among the nations of the
+earth. It would seem as if it controlled the conduct of individuals,
+of families, and of society in general. It claims that for one to be
+born under the dominant influence, or spell, of one of the heavenly
+bodies is for him to be its slave ever afterwards. And thus the life
+of every human being is said to be largely controlled by certain
+planets and constellations, some of which are malign, and some benign
+in their character and influence.
+
+For it must be remembered that it is not only the _yugas_ that are
+possessed of moral attributes; even years, months, days, and hours are
+also classified as good and bad, auspicious and inauspicious. For one
+to do a thing this month is auspicious, while on the next month it
+will be the reverse.
+
+In the same manner, almost every human activity has its "lucky" and
+"unlucky" times--occasions when effort is much less, or more safe or
+valuable, than at other times. For instance, the Hindu is warned
+against going eastward, Mondays and Saturdays; northward, Tuesdays and
+Wednesdays; westward, Fridays and Sundays; and southward, Thursdays.
+This, we are told, is because Siva's trident is turned against those
+points of the compass on those particular days, and one would
+therefore be in danger of being transfixed by this divine weapon!
+
+Then a man must not begin any important work on _Rahu-kalam_. This
+inauspicious time covers an hour and a half of each day of the week
+and is at a different hour every day. The only safe hour is from 6 to
+7.30 each morning. That hour is free from the influence of _Rahu_, and
+is therefore auspicious. And what is Rahu? It is not a planet at all,
+as was thought years ago; nor is it a mighty snake which periodically
+swallows the sun or moon. It is merely the ascending node in astronomy
+wherein alone the eclipses can take place. And yet this imaginary
+monster has a very real place in the life of this great people, and
+the foolish dread of it converts a period daily into an inauspicious
+occasion for important effort.
+
+I will present only one other illustration with a view to showing how
+extensively this moral attribute of time is ascribed and emphasized in
+the serious affairs of life in India. For instance, when a man is
+engaged in the performance of religious duties, it is regarded as of
+supreme moment that he know when certain acts are of no merit, or, on
+the other hand, of special merit. Now, there is a regular code of
+rules for this special purpose. By observing these rules carefully one
+may accumulate religious merit or power with the gods beyond any one
+who does not observe them. We are told that a rupee contributed in
+charity during the time of an eclipse, or at the time when the new
+moon falls upon Monday, brings as much merit to the contributor, with
+the gods, as an offering of one thousand rupees at any ordinary time.
+Who, then, would not choose the right time for his religious activity
+if time alone is the element which adds value to it, and if motive has
+evidently so little of importance in giving quality or value to our
+efforts in the religious life?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+ISLAM IN INDIA
+
+
+There are sixty-five million Mohammedans in India. This constitutes
+more than one-fifth of the total population, and is considerably
+larger than the whole population of the Turkish Empire. There are now
+under the British Empire more Mohammedans than under any other
+government in modern, or in earlier, times. For at least ninety-five
+millions of the followers of the Prophet of Mecca are prospering
+to-day under the aegis of Great Britain; which is probably five
+millions in excess of the Christian population of the same empire.
+This is a significant fact.
+
+And this Islamic population in India is growing, too. During the last
+decade it increased by 9.1 per cent, while the population of India, as
+a whole, increased only by 1.9 per cent.
+
+Of the Mohammedans of India, only a small portion are descended from
+the Mussulmans of the West; while the remainder are the results of
+conversions from Hinduism.
+
+[Illustration: HUMAYAN'S TOMB, DELHI]
+
+This population is scattered all over India, though North India is the
+home of the majority of them. Bengal, also, has a large Mohammedan
+element in its population. It is that part of the country where Islam
+has gathered in the largest number of converts; for, of the people of
+that Presidency, more than one-third (25,264,342) are Mussulmans. And
+in certain portions of East Bengal the Mohammedans are in the large
+majority.
+
+In South India, too, there is a fair representation of the members of
+this faith. One can hardly pass through any section of the country
+without seeing and recognizing them by their physiognomy, costume, or
+customs.
+
+
+I
+
+_The History of Islam in India_
+
+It is nearly twelve hundred years since the first military expedition
+of this triumphant faith entered this land. It is an interesting fact
+that the first attack of Islam (711 A.D.) upon India almost
+synchronizes with the end of the millennium of Buddhistic rule in
+India. Thus the incoming of the new Hinduism under Sankaracharyar
+almost coincides with the first onslaught of the western hordes of the
+Arabian Prophet upon the strongholds of India.
+
+It was a pure conquest of the sword which gave to Mohammed in India,
+as in other lands, a place and a possession. And those early days of
+Mohammedan triumph are, in the main, a record of cruel butchery and of
+widespread massacre. They fulfilled, to the letter, the command of the
+founder of their faith, which says: "When ye encounter the
+unbelievers, strike off their heads, until ye have made a great
+slaughter among them; and bind them in bonds; and either give them a
+free dismission afterwards, or exact a ransom; until the war shall
+have laid down its arms. This shall ye do." (Quran (Koran), xlviii. 4,
+5.)
+
+The fanaticism and bigotry of that people carried triumph everywhere;
+and their triumph meant to every Hindu the acceptance of the sword,
+the Quran, or tribute. For some centuries, indeed, the fortunes of
+Islam in India wavered, and its undisputed sway was not recognized
+until the time of Baber, the distinguished founder of the great Mogul
+Empire in the sixteenth century. It is also true that, among the mild
+and patient population of this land, the spirit of that militant faith
+gradually softened until the era of Akbar the Great--a ruler who was
+not only illustrious as a lawgiver, but also was justly celebrated
+for his cosmopolitanism and religious toleration. He was succeeded by
+another great name, Shah Jehan, a man of wonderful administrative
+powers, but one of narrow sympathies and occasionally given to cruel
+bigotry. And yet, if he did not possess the graces for a noble
+character, he adorned his realm with religious edifices which still
+stand unrivalled in their exquisite beauty.
+
+The cruel Aurangzeeb practically closed the Mogul dynasty by his
+weakness, bloodthirstiness, and uncompromising bigotry.
+
+It is strange that during the centuries of cruel dominion, of
+uncompromising fanaticism, and of religious intolerance, the whole
+population of the land was not absorbed into Islam. But the Mogul
+Empire passed away. And, while it left a strong impression on the
+country as a whole, and affected somewhat the faiths of this land and
+left marvellous monuments of architectural beauty, it did not
+seriously change the undercurrents of the life of the whole people.
+
+
+II
+
+_The Present Condition of this Faith in India_
+
+Like all other faiths in this peninsula, Islam is accepted and
+practised in all degrees of purity, from the orthodox worship,
+conducted in the grand and beautiful mosques of Delhi and Agra, to the
+grovelling, superstitious, heathenish ceremonies which obtain among,
+and which constitute the religious pabulum of, the masses of Islam in
+remote villages and in distant sections of the land.
+
+Generally speaking, the religion of Mohammed is not calculated to
+appeal to the highly poetic mind of India. It is too severe and
+prosaic in its character. The mind of India delights in mystical
+elaborations and in the multiplication of fanciful incarnations and
+other divine manifestations. The Allah of Islam is almost as remote
+and as unknowable a deity as is the Brahm of the Vedantist. But in the
+absence of a personal god the Vedantist and Hindus in general have
+built up a system of numberless incarnations which "play" upon the
+imagination of the votaries and give ample scope to the remarkably
+poetic genius of this people.
+
+Mohammedanism has nothing of the kind; it denies even the possibility
+of divine "descent," and its animus throughout the centuries has been
+one of antagonism to the incarnation doctrine of other faiths.
+
+The Quran is largely wanting in the tropical warmth and legendary
+lore which is such a resource and comfort to the Indian mind, and
+which therefore abounds in the sacred writings of the Brahmans.
+
+Doubtless, the simplicity and intelligibility of its creed--one God,
+one prophet, one book--commends Mohammedanism to the minds of many.
+But simplicity is not a foible of the religious mind of India. It has
+always craved the complex, the mystical, and the unfathomable. It
+delights in inconsistencies, and indulges freely in the irreconcilable
+mysteries of faith. Hinduism, being the child of the Hindu mind,
+abounds in tropical exuberance of spiritual exercise and "amusements,"
+which seem childish and inane to all other people.
+
+The teaching of Mohammed has, therefore, very little that can appeal
+with power, carry conviction, and bring contentment to the people of
+India.
+
+In nothing, perhaps, is this more manifestly marked than in the
+conception of the deity above referred to. Islam is a most
+uncompromising form of Unitarianism. It is bitterly opposed to any
+doctrine which brings God down to men and renders Him intelligible to
+the common mind. It denies the possibility of the divine putting on
+human, or any other, nature.
+
+Hinduism, on the other hand, is the very antithesis of all this. At
+first, this was not so. But its rigid pantheism gradually necessitated
+manifestations of the divine, in order that faith and devotion might
+be made possible. And, in later centuries, the doctrine of incarnation
+was accepted as a haven of rest to the Hindu mind and soon became a
+wild passion of its soul. There is no other people on earth who have
+carried the doctrine of incarnation (_Avatar_) to such excess of
+imaginings as to create such abundantly grotesque and fanciful
+appearances of their many divinities. Normally, then, the Mohammedan
+faith, at its very core, must be unsatisfying and even repulsive to
+the tropical Hindu mind. It was brought here at the point of the
+sword; and, for centuries, it was the faith of a ruling power whose
+custom was to tax heavily all people who did not conform, outwardly at
+least, to the State religion.
+
+After Islam had become established and secure in its success in India,
+when it could relax its grip upon the sword and relinquish something
+of the spirit of intolerance which characterized it, it had to meet
+and cope with a greater foe than that of the battle-field. Hinduism
+has always exercised a great benumbing influence upon all faiths which
+have come into contact and conflict with it. It has insinuated itself
+into the mind of the conquerors and laid its palsied hand upon every
+department of religious thought and life. So that, after a few
+centuries of prosperity in India, Islam began to forget its narrow
+bigotry and uncompromising severity and fraternized more or less with
+the religion of the country. Little by little a latitudinarianism
+crept in, which found its culmination in that remarkable man, Akbar
+the Great, who entertained the teachers of all faiths and encouraged a
+fearless discussion of their respective merits. Dr. Wherry writes:
+"The tolerance of Akbar, who not only removed the poll-tax from all
+his non-Moslem subjects, but who established a sort of parliament of
+religions, inviting Brahmans, Persian Sufis, Parsee fire-worshippers,
+and Jesuit priests to freely discuss in his presence the special
+tenets of their faith and practice, was remarkable. He went farther,
+and promulgated an eclectic creed of his own and constituted himself a
+sort of priest-king in which his own dictum should override everything
+excepting the letter of the Quran. His own creed is set forth in the
+following words of India's greatest poet, Abul Fazl:--
+
+ "O God, in every temple I see those who see thee, and, in every tongue
+ that is spoken, thou art praised.
+ Polytheism and Islam grope after thee,
+ Each religion says, 'Thou art one, without equal,'
+ Be it mosque, men murmur holy prayer; or church, the bells ring, for
+ love of thee;
+ Awhile I frequent the Christian cloister, anon the mosque:
+ But thee only I seek from fane to fane.
+ Thine elect know naught of heresy or orthodoxy, whereof neither stands
+ behind the screen of thy truth.
+ Heresy to the heretic,--dogma to the orthodox,--
+ But the dust of the rose-petal belongs to the heart of the perfume
+ seller."[8]
+
+[Footnote 8: "Islam and Christianity," p. 68.]
+
+This religious cosmopolitanism developed into what has been called an
+"Eclectic Pantheism," which welcomed all men and satisfied no one.
+
+Even though Aurangzeeb tried to stem this tide of liberalism and to
+rehabilitate the intolerance and cruelty of ancient Islam, his effort
+was not only unsuccessful, but was partly instrumental in bringing on
+the downfall of the Empire. And the faith of Mohammed in India has
+revealed, ever since, the sickly pallor and want of vigour which
+tropical life and contact with Hinduism necessarily entail.
+
+When the government of this land ceased to be Mohammedan, and the
+sceptre passed into the hands of the British, whose glory it has been,
+for centuries, to protect its subjects from the bloody hand of
+intolerance and to vouchsafe unto all not only the blessed boon of
+_Pax Britannica_, but also the inexpressible right and privilege of
+religious liberty,--then passed away, never to return, we hope, from
+this motherland of tolerance, the ghastly sceptre of bigotry and
+fanaticism. And thus Islam ceased to be enforced and propagated by the
+strong arm of law and by the pointed argument of sword and spear of
+the legions. It has, since then, enjoyed in this land a free and an
+open field for the exercise of its powers of persuasion. But its
+increase has not been marked. And what there has been of progress has
+been owing to its other characteristics, which we will mention later.
+
+Thus the faith of the Arabian prophet has lost, in India, not only its
+vigour, but also its prestige and purity, by contact with the lower
+faiths of the land, especially with the ancestral faith of India. From
+that religion it has taken unto itself many of the base superstitions,
+and not a few of the idolatrous practices, which have characterized
+it.
+
+Indeed, the great mass of the converts from Hinduism, and their
+descendants, have had but a distorted conception of the lofty faith of
+Mohammed, which they have unequally yoked with their ancient
+superstitions and errors.
+
+The Indian census of 1901 tells us how the pure monotheism of Mohammed
+has been debased by contact with worship at human shrines: "We have
+seen in the case of Hinduism that the belief in one supreme God, in
+whom are vested all ultimate powers, is not incompatible with the
+belief in Supernatural Beings who exercise considerable influence over
+worldly affairs, and whose influence may be obtained or averted by
+certain ceremonies. Similarly, in the case of Islam, while the masses
+have, on the whole, a clearer idea of the unity and omnipotence of God
+than the ordinary Hindu has, they also have a firm belief in the value
+of offerings at certain holy places for obtaining temporal blessings.
+Thus the shrine of Saiyad Salar, at Bahraich, is resorted to, both by
+Hindus and Mussulmans, if a wife is childless, or if family quarrels
+cannot be composed. Diseases may be cured by a visit to the shrine of
+Shaik Saddo, at Amroha in Moradabad; while for help in legal
+difficulties Shah Mina's dargah at Lucknow is renowned. Each of these
+has its appropriate offering,--a long embroidered flag for the first,
+a cock for the second, and a piece of cloth for the third. Other
+celebrated shrines are those of Bahauddin Madar Shah at Nakkanpur in
+the Cawnpore district, and of Ala-uddin Sabir at Piran Kaliar in
+Saharanpur." The same writer, in his report concerning Bengal, says:
+"The unreformed Mohammedans of the lower and uneducated classes are
+deeply infected with Hindu superstitions, and their knowledge of the
+faith they profess seldom extends beyond the three cardinal doctrines
+of the Unity of God, the mission of Mohammed, and the truth of the
+Quran; and they have a very faint idea of the differences between
+their religion and that of the Hindus. Sometimes they believe that
+they are descended from Abel (Habil), while the Hindus owe their
+origin to Cain (Kabil). Kabil, they say, killed Habil and dug a grave
+for him with a crow's beak."
+
+Before the recent crusade against idolatry it was the regular practice
+of low-class Mohammedans to join in the Durga Puja and other Hindu
+religious festivals, and although they have been purged of many
+superstitions, many still remain. In particular, they are very careful
+about omens and auspicious days. Dates for weddings are often fixed
+after consulting a Hindu astrologer; bamboos are not cut, nor the
+building of new houses commenced, on certain days of the week; and
+journeys are often undertaken only after referring to the Hindu
+almanac to see if the proposed day is auspicious. When disease is
+prevalent, Sitala and Rakshya Kali are worshipped. Dharmaraj, Manasa,
+Bishahari, are also venerated by many ignorant Mohammedans. Sasthi is
+worshipped when a child is born. Even now, in some parts of Bengal,
+they observe the Durga Puja and buy new clothes for the festival, like
+the Hindus. "Apart from Hindu superstitions, there are certain forms
+of worship common amongst Mohammedans which are not based on the
+Quran. The most common of these is the adoration of departed _Pirs_."
+
+In Rajputana, the Mohammedans of local origin "still retain their
+ancient Hindu customs and ideas. The local saints and deities are
+regularly worshipped, the Brahman officiates at all family ceremonials
+side by side with the Mussulman priest, and, if in matters of creed
+they are Mohammedans, in matters of form they are Hindus."
+
+In Baluchistan, we are told of the Mohammedan that "his practice is,
+to say the least of it, un-Islamic. Though he repeats every day that
+there is one God only who is worthy of worship, he almost invariably
+prefers to worship some saint or tomb. The Saints, or _Pirs_, in fact,
+are invested with all the attributes of God. It is the Saint who can
+avert calamity, cure disease, procure children for the childless,
+bless the efforts of the hunter, or even improve the circumstances of
+the dead. The underlying feeling seems to be that man is too sinful to
+approach God direct, and therefore the intervention of some one worthy
+must be sought."
+
+In South India, also, Hindus and Mohammedans fraternize not a little,
+especially in the religious festivities. Mohammedans do not hesitate,
+under certain conditions, to bring offerings to particular Hindu
+shrines. And it is a very common thing to see Hindus pay their
+respects to Mohammedan fakirs. The Mohurram, in South India, is
+participated in, at least in its festive aspects, by multitudes of
+Hindus. Many Mohammedans are feeling keenly the degradation of this
+contact. A well-known Mussulman writer moans over the situation in the
+following words:--
+
+"The baneful influence that Hindu customs have had on Mussulmans is
+painful to read of. Many a Hindu ceremonial has been incorporated by
+the followers of the Prophet. The marriage ceremonies, instead of
+keeping to the simple form prescribed by the Quran, have been greatly
+elaborated, and include processions. Even in religious matters, Hindu
+and Mussulman practices have become curiously blended. Hindus take a
+leading part in the celebration of Mohurram. Passages from the Quran
+are sometimes chanted in the Hindu fashion; Mohammedan women of the
+lower classes break cocoanuts at Hindu temples in fulfilment of vows.
+Strangest of all, there is said to be a Hindu temple at a village near
+Trichinopoly which is sacred to a goddess called the Mussulmans' lady,
+who is said to be the wife of the Hindu god Ranganatha at Srirangam.
+These are some of the sad features which the census report has brought
+to light. They tend to show that, except in a few dead formalities,
+the life of Mussulmans in South India is nothing different from that
+of the Hindus. In many cases the followers of the Arabian prophet
+would seem to have forgotten even the root principles of their
+religion--the unity of God, the formless, and the unincarnate. This
+fact alone is more than enough to fill the mind of the true Mussulman
+with anxious concern with regard to the future prospects of Islam in
+this country. His pious soul can find no rest with the view before him
+of hundreds and thousands of his coreligionists sunk deep in the
+degrading practices of the heathen around."
+
+In this connection it should not be forgotten that the Sikh faith in
+North India is really a compromise between these two faiths. Its
+founder, Nanak Shah, possessed the very laudable ambition of producing
+a religion possessed of the best elements of both of these faiths. And
+though the more than two millions of his present followers have
+drifted very much toward Hinduism, which is the drift of all things in
+this land, and are hardly to be distinguished from their neighbours in
+creed and custom, yet the religion stands as a testimony to the mutual
+influence of these two faiths.
+
+Nor should one forget what is now going on on this line among Hindus.
+Dr. Grierson tells us, in his recent interesting lecture, that "Allah
+the God of the Mussulman--the God of the Jews and ourselves--has
+Himself been admitted to the Hindu pantheon, together with His
+prophet, and a new section of the never completed Hindu bible, the
+'Allah Upanishad,' has been provided in His honour."
+
+Moreover, Hindus charge the Mohammedan faith with being the cause of
+the zenana system of this land. The seclusion of women began, they
+say, on account of the licentiousness of the Arabs. However this may
+be, it is true that the Mohammedan Purdah system, which separates so
+thoroughly women from the other sex, found adoption, or at least
+emphasis, among the Hindus. In ancient times, so far as we can learn,
+the women of Brahmanism found considerable freedom and independence of
+life. Probably the truth is that, as Hinduism developed certain types
+of doctrine which bore heavily upon the weaker sex, the range of
+privilege and opportunity which women enjoyed found gradual limitation
+and curtailment which found marked impetus upon the advent of the Arab
+hordes.
+
+And it should be remembered that the persistent attitude of
+Mohammedans toward slavery and toward polygamy has had a deleterious
+effect upon the Hindu people.
+
+Though Islam came to India uninvited, and though its pathway has been
+marked with blood, it has not been without great opportunity to
+impress the people of this land with its nobility. But, as we have
+seen, the opportunity does not seem to have been improved. After
+twelve centuries of active propagandism and some centuries of
+political rule and religious oppression, this religion is still an
+exotic, and finds, on the whole, small place in the affection of the
+people. This is owing in part to its want of adaptation and inherent
+lack of vital power. As Sir Monier William has said: "There is a
+finality and a want of elasticity about Mohammedanism which precludes
+its expanding beyond a certain fixed line of demarcation. Having once
+reached this line, it appears to lapse backwards--to tend toward
+mental and moral slavery, to contract with the narrower and narrower
+circles of bigotry and exclusiveness."
+
+Add again to this the fact, already mentioned, that its new
+environment in India has been deleterious to the vitality of the
+Mohammedan faith. "Mohammedanism, as a quiescent non-proselytizing
+religion, could only become corrupt and rotten. The effect of all this
+policy on the mass of Mohammedans was to deprive their religious
+sentiment of that intolerance which constituted its strength. Its
+moral power was gone when it ceased to be intolerant.... These two
+religions have thus settled down beside each other on terms of mutual
+charity and _toleration_. This does not imply any great change or
+deterioration in Hinduism, for its principles admit every belief as
+truth, and every religion as a way of salvation. All that it requires
+is acknowledgment of the same principle from other religions, and
+this is the position which it has practically forced Mohammedanism to
+assume in India. But such a position is utterly opposed to the
+principles and claims of the latter religion; and in forcing
+Mohammedanism to accept it, Hinduism has undoubtedly gained the
+triumph."[9]
+
+[Footnote 9: "Hinduism and Christianity," by Dr. Robson, pp. 168,
+173.]
+
+And yet let it not be supposed that Islam in India is either dead or
+moribund. It is evidently sensible of its defects and has made, from
+time to time, efforts to reform itself.
+
+Under the stress of circumstances and the sense of waning power they
+have even translated the Quran into Urdu, with a view to reaching the
+common people. This is an unique effort on their part. Like Romanists,
+in the use of the Latin service, the Mohammedans cling, with deathly
+tenacity, to their Arabic bible and Arabic worship, foolishly
+believing that to vernacularize their faith is to degrade and corrupt
+it. In Madura, where there is a mosque of some pretension, there are
+only two or three who can pronounce their Arabic Quran. And while they
+have learned to pronounce, in the ancient tongue, their beloved book,
+they do not understand the meaning of what they say, and merely parrot
+the whole ritual. But a break has been made from this inane method of
+worship, and their holy book has now been translated into one
+vernacular of India.
+
+Islam has also revealed definite redeeming qualities which seem
+distinctive and are worthy of enumeration.
+
+Its prohibition of the use of intoxicating drinks is definite, and its
+attitude toward that accursed habit has been consistently and
+vehemently antagonistic. Hence, the Mohammedan of India is recognized
+as a sober man, faithful to his religion in this matter wherein the
+Christian reveals so much weakness. It is true that in some parts of
+the country Mussulmans are too often addicted to the use of opiates.
+But a drunken member of this faith is rarely to be found. In this,
+Islam has joined forces with Hinduism itself in proscribing a habit
+which is the curse and ruin of too many Christian lands. And it is a
+distinct blot upon the Christian Church in India that many of its
+followers, in this land of sobriety and abstinence, so easily fall
+into the temptation of the cup and become the victims of intemperance.
+
+Islam also enforces the law of usury among its followers. With the
+Jew, the Mohammedan has been strictly forbidden to make money by the
+use of money. And though they find ways of evading this law, to some
+extent, the ideal which they have before them is a restraint and a
+blessing in a land where the usurer is a ubiquitous curse, because of
+his rapacity and the expertness with which he draws the common people
+into his net and leads millions to financial loss and ruin.
+
+The supreme place given in this faith to the duty of almsgiving, and
+the effective way with which it is carried out among its members, is
+another praise-worthy feature. At the time of their political rule and
+extensive sway there was a well-known tax whose purpose was to carry
+relief to the poor and the suffering. And Mohammedans feel to-day that
+there is hardly a religious duty which is more sacred and carries with
+it more of reward than that of distributing alms to the poor. Far more
+than Christianity has it given importance and distinction to this as a
+special form of its religious activity.
+
+Moreover, its command to observe the five seasons of daily prayer is
+important, with a view to maintaining and enforcing the ordinary forms
+and observances of a living faith. Many a time have I been impressed
+with the way Mohammedans, in this land, faithfully and boldly observe
+this rule and privilege of their faith by spreading their mats in
+most unexpected places, even in the presence of gaping crowds, and
+prostrating themselves in prayer with their faces Mecca-ward as a
+proof of their sincerity and as a testimony to the power of their
+religion.
+
+But there is nothing in which Islam exerts a more salutary influence in
+this caste-ridden land than in its attitude toward this monster evil of
+Hinduism. Islam is neither founded upon race, colour, nor nationality.
+It has been well said that in Islam "all believers belong to the highest
+caste." It recognizes to the full the brotherhood of all the members of
+its faith. Even its slaves have been exalted to its throne and have
+achieved highest distinction. The last census correctly says: "On its
+social side, the religion of Mohammed is equally opposed to the Hindu
+scheme of a hierarchy of castes, an elaborate stratification of society
+based upon subtle distinctions of food, dress, drink, marriage, and
+ceremonial usage. In the sight of God and of His Prophet all followers
+of Islam are equal. In India, however, caste is in the air; its
+contagion has spread even to the Mohammedans; and we find its evolution
+proceeding on characteristically Hindu lines. In both communities,
+foreign descent forms the highest claim to social distinction; in both,
+promotion cometh from the West. As the twice-born Aryan is to the mass
+of Hindus, so is the Mohammedan of alleged Arab, Persian, Afghan, or
+Mogul origin to the rank and file of his coreligionists."
+
+I admit that there are social distinctions and class cleavages among
+the members of this faith, as among all peoples. These are in no sense
+religious, however, as they are in Hinduism. Among the members of that
+faith there is equality of right; and every Islamite, by his own
+industry and character, can enjoy that right in this land. It is true
+that Islam has yet to learn the brotherhood of man as such, and to
+recognize that the non-Mussulman and the Mussulman alike are possessed
+of equal rights and favours in the sight of God. But within the faith
+itself, caste, as such, is unknown. This is much more than can be said
+of the Indian Christian Church at the present day, notwithstanding the
+spirit of our religion and its definite injunctions. The Hindu caste
+system has been transferred too much into the Christian fold. Most of
+the accessions from Hinduism to Mohammedanism at the present time are
+from the lowest classes of Hinduism, with a view to securing a
+definitely higher social status which Mohammedanism distinctly
+promises and invariably confers upon these newcomers. It were well if
+modern converts to Christianity from the outcasts could hope for and
+receive from the Hindus the same recognized advance in social position
+and esteem by becoming members of our religion, as they do by entering
+the faith of Islam. This is not the fault of Christianity, but the
+folly of its converts, who do not leave their heathenish conceptions
+and estimates outside the precincts of Christianity. This difference,
+which I have emphasized, is, as might be expected, more marked and
+manifest in South India than elsewhere. A Christian worker in this
+land cannot help envying Islam the noble stand which it has taken
+concerning caste.
+
+At the present time the Muslims of India are divided into two sects,
+something like the Catholics and Protestants of Christianity. The
+Sunnis are the traditionists, and constitute the large majority of
+that faith. The Shiahs are the dissenters. For twelve hundred years
+has this division existed, and the two parties are as irreconcilable
+to-day as ever. There is also a sect of mystics known as Sufis.
+
+In the seventeenth century a new sect of Purists was formed in Arabia.
+They reject the glosses of _Immams_, will not accept the authority of
+the Sultan, and make light of the great Prophet himself. They are a
+fanatical sect and delight in proclaiming _jihad_, or holy war,
+against the infidels. These are the Wahabbis. This sect was introduced
+to India by Sayad Ahmed Shah, and it has gained many converts. It is
+largely a movement toward reforming the faith from within. In spirit,
+it is not very unlike the movement of the fanatics known as Ghazis,
+whose zeal burns against all infidels, especially those of the
+European Christian type.
+
+
+III
+
+_What is the Character of the Mohammedan Population in India?_
+
+It will be interesting to appraise them largely by comparing them with
+the Hindu population which surrounds them. Generally speaking, they
+are morally on a level with their neighbours. In South India,
+especially, it is difficult to discriminate between the ethical
+standards which obtain among Mohammedans and Hindus. In both cases
+they are low and unworthy. This is unexpected, as Islam has always
+stood for a worthy ethical standing, while Hinduism has, from time
+immemorial, divorced morality from piety. Nevertheless, it is a fact
+that those who have passed on from Hinduism to Mohammedanism have
+rarely ascended in the ethical standard of life.
+
+The personal habits of the Indian Mussulman are not clean, to say the
+least of them. In this they are a contrast to the Brahmans, and to
+some other high-class Hindus, whose ceremonial ablutions are many. In
+South India, the Mohammedan is described by a vernacular expression
+which is as uncomplimentary as it is filthy, and which is intended to
+classify them among the lowest in their habits. When cholera and
+similar epidemics prevail in the regions with which I am familiar, the
+Mohammedan, with the Pariah, on account of unclean habits, becomes the
+first victim of its ravages.
+
+Add to this their strong belief in fate, which leads them, during
+these epidemics, to neglect or to decline the use of medical remedies.
+Many a Muslim perishes during such times because of his fatalistic
+convictions.
+
+They are also among the most ignorant of all classes in India. While,
+in the total population of the land, hardly more than 5 per cent are,
+in any sense, literate, the Mohammedans, as a class, have only 3 per
+cent. And of the Mohammedan population nearly all the women are
+analphabet. In the educational system of India the government places
+Mohammedans among the "backward classes," and every effort has been
+made by the State, even to the doubling of educational grants, to
+stimulate the members of this faith on educational lines.
+
+It is one of the most discouraging facts connected with the Muslim
+population that while they are brave in bearing arms and loyal to the
+government, they have an apparent aversion to the schoolhouse, and can
+with difficulty be induced to secure even an elementary education.
+This bears very heavily against their prosperity and influence. Public
+offices in India are wisely placed in charge of those who are
+competent, by a thorough training and a broad education, to well fill
+them. The consequence is that the Mohammedan has been gradually driven
+out from nearly all public positions of trust by the intellectually
+more alert Brahman, and even by lower-class Hindus, who are availing
+themselves of the opportunities for higher education.
+
+It is not strange that the political influence of this community has
+correspondingly waned, so that only a very small number relatively of
+Muslims is found to-day in the councils of the Empire.
+
+A new ambition, however, seems to be taking possession of the
+community. They have recently organized many schools under the
+direction of "The Society for the Aid of Islam." These schools,
+without neglecting the study of the Quran and their sacred language
+and the tenets of their faith, give instruction on western lines, and
+in the English language.
+
+They have established, also, under the inspiration of the late Sir
+Sayid Ahmed Khan, a college at Aligarh. Though the rationalistic
+teaching of the founder causes the institution to be discredited by
+orthodox leaders, the college has developed wonderfully, and is
+beginning to assume the proportions of a Muslim University. Of this
+institution a learned Mussulman remarked in an address:--
+
+"We want Aligarh to be such a home of learning as to command the same
+respect of scholars as Berlin or Oxford, Leipsic or Paris. And we want
+those branches of learning relative to Islam which are fast falling
+into decay to be added by Moslem scholars to the stock of the world's
+knowledge. And, above all, we want to create for our people an
+intellectual and moral capital--a city which shall be the home of
+elevated ideas and pure ideals; a centre from which light and guidance
+shall be diffused among the Moslems of India."
+
+Much may be expected from the institution. But what is one such school
+among the many millions of this community in India? Government is
+anxious to aid and inspire the community on these lines; and the
+present success of the institution is, in good part, owing to the
+smile of the State upon it.
+
+The recent organization of the Pan-Islamic Movement is full of hope.
+The leading representatives of the community in India seem anxious and
+determined to rouse their coreligionists from their lethargy and to
+create within them a new ambition for a higher and a more honourable
+place in intelligence and official usefulness. This is much needed,
+because the community has reached its lowest ebb of influence among
+the people.
+
+In the present unrest Mohammedans mainly stand with the government
+against the Hindu Extremists. They wisely realize that the British Raj
+presents to them, as a community, far better opportunity and larger
+favours than would accrue to them under any other possible government,
+even though their warlike traits might lead them once more to subdue
+and rule the land themselves.
+
+
+IV
+
+_Christian Effort in India in Behalf of the Mussulman_
+
+Missionaries have everywhere presented to Mohammedan and Hindu alike
+the Gospel Message. The follower of Mohammed has never been ignored in
+the proclaiming of Christ and in the work of the Mission school.
+
+Generally speaking, they are a very hard class to reach; they very
+rarely seem impressed, or are willing to consider the message as a
+personal call to themselves. The high character of their faith above
+that of the surrounding people partly accounts for this. Moreover, the
+religion itself inculcates intolerance, and naturally narrows the
+vision of appreciation and sympathy amongst its followers.
+
+It is also, in some measure, due to their supreme ignorance of the
+teaching of their own faith. They have many fantastic notions about
+Islam, such as intelligent members of their faith repudiate, and such
+as make them inaccessible to the Christian worker.
+
+And yet they are not reached and impressed with more difficulty than
+are the Brahmans and some other high-class Hindus. Though conversions
+from among them have been relatively few, accessions from Islam to the
+Christian faith have been continuous during the last century. There
+have not been many mass movements among them. It has been largely the
+struggle of individual souls from the trammels of one faith into the
+liberty of the other. Dr. Wherry informs us that: "In the North,
+especially the Punjab, and the Northwest Frontier Province, every
+congregation has a representation from the Moslem ranks. Some of the
+churches have a majority of their membership gathered from amongst the
+Mussulmans. In a few cases there has been something like a movement
+among Moslems toward Christianity, and a considerable number have come
+out at one time. But perhaps the fact that tells most clearly the
+story of the advance of Christianity among Moslems in India, is this,
+that among the native pastors and Christian preachers and teachers in
+North India there are at least two hundred who were once followers of
+Islam. Among the names of those who have gone to their reward (many of
+them, after long lives of faithful service), some of my readers will
+recall the names of the Rev. Maulvie Imaduddin, D.D., Maulvie Safdar
+Ali, E.A.C., Munshi Mohammed Hanif, Sayyad Abdullah Athim, E.A.C.,
+the Rev. Rajab Ali, Sain Gumu Shah, the Rev. Abdul Masih, the Rev.
+Asraf Ali, the Rev. Jani Ali, and Dilawur Khan. These faithful
+servants of God have left behind them memories which still live. Many
+of them have bequeathed volumes of literature, which have added much
+to the literary wealth of all the churches. They give an index
+wherewith to guide us as to what the strength and character of the
+Church of the future will be when the strong champions of the Crescent
+shall have become the Champions of the Cross."
+
+We are also told by the Rev. Maulvie Imaduddin, D.D., of North India,
+that "117 men of position and influence have become Christians, of
+whom 62 became clergy and leading men in many of the Indian Missions,
+and 51 are gentlemen occupying positions professional and official.
+Out of 956 baptisms of the Church Missionary Society in the Amritsar
+District, 152 were Mohammedan converts. In the Punjab there are at
+least two congregations made up entirely of Mohammedans, while in
+Bengal there is a body of more than 6000 Christians composed almost
+entirely of Mohammedan converts and their descendants, a large number
+having come over _en masse_ some years ago. These last were converts
+in the first instance from Hinduism to Mohammedanism, and hence were
+not bound so strongly to Islam."
+
+In South India, less attention has been paid to Mohammedans as a
+class, and the results therefore have been very meagre. A few
+individuals, here and there, have accepted our faith, and that is
+practically all. This is not strange when we remember that out of the
+eleven hundred Protestant missionaries, male and female, in Southern
+India, perhaps not a dozen have any special training and aptitude for
+work among Mohammedans, and hardly more than that number are giving
+themselves entirely to the work.
+
+The difficulty of this work should appeal more than it does to the
+heroic element in missionaries and missionary societies alike. The
+above facts indicate that there is encouragement for one who gives
+himself heartily to this people. In no other land has missionary
+effort for the members of this religion achieved greater results than
+in India. If their numbers are few, they are more resolute and
+pronounced in their Christian character than many others. In the roll
+of honour among the converts from Islam have been found the names of
+a number of distinguished pastors and able writers.
+
+In the recent Conference of Missionaries, held in Cairo, a new purpose
+was manifested to take up with more discriminating and pronounced zeal
+and better methods the work of reaching and converting the Mohammedans
+of the world.
+
+In India, a better organized and a wider campaign for the conversion
+of Islam is needed. Men and women who are to take up work in their
+behalf must not only be well trained for this specific work by a
+thorough knowledge of both faiths; they must also be imbued with
+abundant sympathy for the people, and with a sympathetic appreciation
+of the vital truths which have thus far animated the Mohammedan faith.
+The constructive, rather than the destructive, method of activity must
+increasingly animate all. The Mohammedans are peculiarly sensitive;
+and there is so much of contact between their faith and ours that
+through the pathway of the harmonies of the faiths men must be led to
+know and feel the supreme excellence and power of the faith of the
+Christ.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE CHRIST AND THE BUDDHA
+
+
+The study of the life and the character of noted and noble men is the
+most helpful and inspiring of all studies. It not only illustrates
+life at its best, it also fills men with an ambition to pursue the
+same noble purposes and to achieve the same lofty results in life. In
+presenting a brief glimpse of the two most powerful personalities that
+ever impressed themselves upon the world, I desire to place them side
+by side that we may appreciate the assonances and the dissonances of
+their wonderful lives and rise through the study into a true
+conception and love of the most perfect Life ever breathed upon earth.
+
+I have no apology to offer, as a Christian, for comparing the life of
+our Lord with that of any human being; for, though Divine, He was also
+supremely human; and human glory and achievement appear in their
+fulness only when we gaze upon Him as one of the mighty human forces
+of history.
+
+[Illustration: THE GREATEST IMAGE OF BUDDHA (183 feet long)]
+
+Christ and Buddha lived their brief lives upon earth many centuries
+ago; and yet never did they grip so many by the magic of their
+attraction as they do at present. Nearly two-thirds of the whole
+population of the world to-day acknowledges the lordship of the one or
+the other of these and loves to be called by their names. The
+influence of the one dominates all the life of the West, while that of
+the other is supreme in the East. And it is a curious and interesting
+fact that Buddha has not only been exalted as the ninth incarnation of
+Vishnu in the faith which he aimed to overthrow, he has also been
+adopted into the Roman Catholic Calendar and is worshipped on the 27th
+of November as a Christian saint under the title "Saint Josaphat."
+
+I am also convinced that the influence of the lives and teachings of
+Buddha and Christ will react upon each other with ever increasing
+power during the coming years. Indeed, we are now witnessing this very
+influence developing before our eyes.
+
+
+I
+
+Let us first observe the conditions under which these two lived their
+earthly lives.
+
+One was born into royal prerogatives and splendour and was surrounded
+in youth with all the luxuries and blandishments of an Oriental
+court. The other, though of royal lineage, was born in poverty,
+cradled in a manger, earned a meagre subsistence as a carpenter, and
+was able to say at the end of His brief career that the foxes had
+holes and the birds of the air had nests, but that He had not where to
+lay His head.
+
+Sidhartthan early married and became a father, but later renounced all
+the pleasures and responsibilities of a _grihastan life_. His great
+renunciation is one of the most striking and impressive acts in the
+history of mankind, and his subsequent asceticism was of the most
+thorough and rigid type.
+
+Jesus of Nazareth avoided the entanglements of married life and had a
+supreme contempt for the wealth and the pomp of the world. Yet He was
+not an ascetic. So freely did He associate with men, participating
+even in their festivities, that His enemies falsely charged Him with
+being a "glutton and a winebibber." He never countenanced the idea
+that highest sainthood must come through asceticism.
+
+He found His intimates not among the ascetic Essenes, but among
+householders and men of affairs.
+
+Both these great souls were similarly oppressed by the prevalence and
+the tyranny of an exclusive ceremonialism. In the one case, it was
+the innumerable bloody sacrifices and the all-embracing and crushing
+ritual of the Brahmans which roused the anger and opposition of
+Gautama; while, on the other hand, the myriad rites, the childish
+ceremonies, and the hollow religious hypocrisy of the Scribes and
+Pharisees filled Jesus with hatred and led Him to a denunciation of
+that whole class. "Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees," was the
+oft-repeated expression of wrath which He heaped upon them.
+
+Thus the religions which both established were, in part, reactions
+from the religious excesses and errors of the days in which they
+lived.
+
+It is strange that neither Christ nor Buddha left any writings behind
+them, even though writing was a known art in their times. Their mighty
+influence was through oral teaching and example. This was different
+from the method of other such world-leaders as Moses, Mohammed, and
+Confucius. It proves that whenever any one has truths of saving power
+to commit to the world, there are many who, as his messengers, are
+ready to convey them. Better indeed than to convey one's thoughts by
+printed page is it to impart them through the living voice to
+disciples who will thrill the world by the message coloured by their
+own mind and transfigured by their own enthusiasm. This was the method
+of Christ and Buddha.
+
+Both were surrounded by an Oriental environment. Their antecedents and
+their prepossessions were of the East, eastern; and at their births
+they were introduced to scenes and began to breathe the atmosphere of
+the Orient. All the great founders of the World Religions were men of
+the East. This was doubtless because the East kept more closely than
+the West in touch with deepest religious thought and was animated with
+highest religious emotions and heavenly aspirations. Certainly the
+world owes more to ancient Asia for its religious life and spiritual
+attainments than to all the other continents put together. And Asia is
+to be thanked, above all, because she gave to mankind the Christ and
+the Buddha. For the eastern flavour of their messages and the Oriental
+tints of their life we are deeply grateful. To those of the West,
+these have always brought quiet restraint and a hallowed, peaceful
+repose to counteract the hurry and worry of life to which they are so
+much exposed and which are a part of their very being.
+
+
+II
+
+_The Common Principles which controlled their Lives_
+
+Both were men of deepest sincerity. All sham and hypocrisy were
+foreign to their nature; they held insincerity in any one to be the
+meanest and most deadly sin. To this intense loyalty to the truth,
+Jesus bore emphatic testimony by an early martyrdom; while Gautama
+gave the same unwavering witness by a long and holy life. They both
+stood in the midst of communities which were rotten with hypocrisy and
+which were using religion as a sacred garb of duplicity and were
+raising temples of dishonesty to enraged deity. They stood like
+prophets in the wilderness and pronounced woe upon all hypocrites.
+
+Moreover, both Christ and Buddha were profoundly ethical in their
+teaching. They found that humanity was not only rotten with
+insincerity, it was also deceiving itself with the vain delusion that
+moral integrity and ethical nobility can be bartered for a
+multitudinous ceremonial. Men have always been prone to exalt ritual
+in proportion as they have neglected the eternal demands of conscience
+and the ethical foundation of character. The myriad-tongued
+ceremonial of the Brahmans of twenty-five centuries ago was the old
+evasion of righteousness in human life. Gautama saw this, and his
+noble soul rebelled against a faith which proclaimed that salvation
+was a thing of outward religious forms and not of the heart within.
+
+ "To cease from all sin,
+ To get virtue,
+ To cleanse our own heart,
+ This is the religion of the Buddhas."
+
+These were the words with which he enunciated his new principles and
+carried forward his campaign of reaction against the faith of his
+fathers. Nothing less than, or apart from, purity of the soul within
+satisfied his requirement.
+
+Indeed, he exalted so much the more highly this banner of heart purity
+and holiness, the less he had to say of the spiritual claims upon the
+soul. He had tried elaborate ceremonial and had found it wanting; he
+had practised the most severe religious austerities, but they had
+availed him little. In the quiet light which had dawned upon him under
+the sacred Boh tree he found that nothing wrought so mightily and
+beneficently as _Dharma_, or righteousness.
+
+ "The real treasure is that laid by man or woman,
+ Through charity or piety, temperance and self-control.
+
+ * * * * *
+
+ The treasure thus hid is secure, and passes not away;
+ ... this a man takes with him."
+
+"Let no man think lightly of sin, saying in his heart, 'It cannot
+overtake me.'"
+
+These are only a few of the many noble ethical deliverances of this
+great man's creed.
+
+And during all his life, subsequent to the great renunciation, he
+embodied in himself the ethical beauty of all that he had taught.
+
+And what shall I say of Jesus, the Christ? In the noble integrity of
+His heart, in the sublime ethical ideals which He ever exalted, in the
+moral rectitude which He practised and enjoined upon all His
+followers, who was like unto Him? In His day, also, men had forgotten
+the true foundation of character; and the religious leaders of the
+people were placing supreme emphasis upon human traditions and upon
+man-made rites as the way of salvation.
+
+They "tithed the mint and the cummin" and forgot the weightier matters
+of the law. To eat with unwashed hands, to consort with a Samaritan,
+to carry a load or raise a sheep from the ditch on the Sabbath,--this
+was a sin which, to the Pharisees, would weigh a man down to hell
+itself; while to lie or to use other foul language, or to trample
+under foot the whole decalogue was, by comparison, a venial offence.
+The whole moral code was rendered impotent by them, while ceremonial
+cleansing was the be-all and end-all of their system. Christ was daily
+thrown into conflict with these "blind leaders of the blind"; His soul
+abhorred their whole religious system. He characterized them as
+"whited sepulchres." He showed that it is the heart which defiles a
+man, "for out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries,
+fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies." "Blessed," says He,
+"are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." "It was said to them
+of old thou shalt not kill;" but Christ equally prohibited anger, the
+cause of murder. He not only denounced adultery, but the lustful look
+which is the source of adultery.
+
+To His followers He said "unless your righteousness exceed the
+righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees ye shall not enter into the
+kingdom of heaven." He prayed the Father that He would sanctify His
+own, and added that for their sakes He sanctified Himself. Holiness
+was a passion with Him, and at the basis of His teaching He enjoined
+moral cleanness and ethical integrity. And His life in this, as in
+other things, was a perfect exhibition of the virtues which He taught.
+And from that day to this His precept and example have mutually
+supported each other. In Him were wedded faith and conscience, piety
+and character. So that, where Christ is best known and most loyally
+followed to-day, there do we find a perfect sense of human relations
+and a supreme desire after ethical perfection.
+
+Furthermore, these two great souls were consumed with a broad and
+universal charity. Their environment was perhaps the most averse to
+general benevolence that the world could then show. In India, there
+had already grown to great power the caste system with its multiplying
+ramifications. Then, as now, it narrowed the sympathies of men, it
+arrayed one class against another, it cultivated pride and fostered
+mutual distrust and dissension.
+
+When Sakya Muni came upon the scene, he saw the terribly divisive
+system sending down its root like the banyan tree on all sides and
+absorbing the life and thought of the people. It repelled him, and,
+with all his mighty intellectual and moral energy, he attacked it. He
+proclaimed all men brothers and worthy of human sympathy, love, and
+respect. He opened the door of his faith to all classes on equal
+terms. He vehemently opposed every effort to divide men except upon
+the ground of character. He enjoined upon his disciples not only love
+and kindness to all men, he also insisted upon a similar attitude
+toward all forms of lower life.
+
+The fact that Buddhism is to-day one of the three great Missionary
+Faiths of the world, seeking all men that are in darkness, is the best
+proof that the founder of that faith had a heart which embraced the
+whole realm of life in its love. He felt that no man, however humble
+or however far removed in ties of race and kinship, should be deprived
+of the blessings of his love and sympathy. It is an interesting fact
+that nearly all past religious reformers in India--both those inside
+and outside the pale of Brahmanism--were anti-caste in their
+sympathies and teaching. But it is only Buddha who consistently
+maintained the broad foundation of a universal brotherhood and
+incorporated it into his faith as a cardinal principle.
+
+In like manner, Jesus of Nazareth lived His earthly life at a time of
+narrow sympathies, and with people who were among the most exclusive
+that ever lived on earth. The Jews believed themselves to be the
+specially favoured sons of Heaven. And, what was more, they thought
+that they were exalted because they were _worthy_, because they
+excelled all other people. Hence, they stood aloof from other
+nationalities and despised them as their inferiors, a social and
+physical contact with whom would be pollution. There is in many
+respects a strange correspondence between the Jewish social code of
+twenty centuries ago and that of Hinduism to-day--the same haughty
+mien and abjectness of spirit--the aloofness of pride and the cringing
+meanness of social bondage--representing the two extremes of society.
+Christ also turned His face like a flint against this mean artificial
+classification of men. He had a burning contempt for the proud
+Pharisee who lived upon the husks of his own contempt of others, and
+who trampled under foot men that were infinitely superior to himself,
+so far as character was concerned. But He consorted often with the
+outcast Publican who revealed an aspiration after better things. And
+He even chose men who were thus socially ostracized to enter His own
+inner circle of disciples and to be the standard-bearers of His cause
+upon earth. He taught that the most abject and socially submerged man
+upon earth is a son of God, and that at his moral and spiritual
+renovation there would be joy among the denizens of heaven. And it was
+while thinking of this same class that He said unto His own, in
+describing the judgment scene at the last great day, "Come, ye blessed
+of my father, inasmuch as ye have treated kindly and lovingly one of
+the least of my brethren ye have done it unto me, enter ye into the
+joy of your Lord." Though He was born a Jew, He opened wide the
+portals of His religion and invited all men of all conditions. "Come
+unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you
+rest." He sent forth His followers into all lands to disciple and
+bring to the truth all nations. And in all lands His method of
+procedure has been to reach first the lowest among the people and then
+gradually to rise to the highest, until He has taken possession of the
+whole land. His universal heart of love took in all men of all social
+strata. All that He asked was that men should come to Him with purpose
+sincere and with a longing for light and truth.
+
+
+III
+
+_The Principles and Teachings which differentiate and separate Christ
+and Buddha_
+
+Thus far we have seen these two great leaders of men standing side by
+side and revealing the same traits and principles.
+
+But they also revealed fundamental differences which it were well for
+us to consider.
+
+Though much united them, and that when more than five centuries and
+thousands of miles held them apart, we also discover that a gulf
+wider than that of time or space opened between them.
+
+Their lives and their doctrines and the faiths which they promulgated
+reveal strangely diverse contentions and tendencies.
+
+(1) First of all, and at the root of all, lies their attitude toward
+the Divine Being. Jesus was preeminently a God-intoxicated Being,
+while the most manifest mental attitude of Gautama was his
+agnosticism. Christ never ceased speaking of and communing with His
+Father in heaven. He was wont to retire regularly from human society
+in order that He might enjoy the Heavenly Presence whose very radiance
+shone in and upon Him daily. He declared that He did nothing without
+consulting with and receiving direction from God. And this was natural
+enough when we remember His declaration that He came into the world to
+reveal the Father unto men. Listen to His words, "My meat is to do the
+will of Him that sent me and to finish His work." "The Father that
+dwelleth in me doeth the work." "The Father is glorified in the Son."
+"I love the Father and go unto Him." "Believest thou not that I am in
+the Father and the Father in me?" "Oh, righteous Father, the world
+hath not known Thee, but I have known Thee." In all His expressions
+of oneness with God, of His living unto God, and of His drawing His
+daily strength from God, His experience was eminently unique. He lived
+more in heaven than on earth in those days of His incarnation. Apart
+from any consideration of His Divinity, He can truly be said to be a
+man of God whose soul was in harmony with the Father.
+
+How different the words and experiences of Gautama Rishi! Many have
+spoken of him as an atheist. I do not believe that he denied the
+existence of God. Yet it is evidently true that he has no use in his
+philosophy, any more than in his religion, for a Divine Being. There
+was doubtless reason for this in the conditions of his time; for it
+may be regarded as the reaction of a strong mind against the extreme
+spiritualism and polytheism of the day. For, in those days, the deep
+spirituality of the Brahman had overflowed its banks and had created a
+multitudinous pantheon which repelled this man of stern mind. It was
+to him only a short step from a disbelief in the _many_ gods to a
+doubt as to the existence of _any_ god. And in this agnosticism he was
+doubtless aided by his fondness for the _Sankya_ school of thought,
+which is Indian Agnosticism. In any case, his deliverances and his
+established religion, if such it really can be called, are such a
+reaction from the Theosophy of India as to lead one to wonder how,
+even with all its other excellences, it could have become in India a
+State Religion for any length of time. A religion without a God, a
+sacrifice, a priest, or a prayer, is certainly a dreary wilderness to
+a God-seeking soul. And yet, this is what the Buddha conceived and
+promulgated among his disciples. Under the stress of a growing
+consciousness of the ills of this life his mind did not, like that of
+others, rise to heaven for relief; but his salvation was to be a
+self-wrought one. With his own right arm of virtue he wished to carve
+his way into eternal life--or, shall I say, eternal death? Is it
+strange that under such a godless religious system its votaries should
+react from this fundamental error and deify and worship that very
+Buddha who had not a place for God in his whole scheme of life?
+
+At any rate, Christ and Buddha stand before us in striking contrast in
+this matter; the glory of the teaching of the one was that He caused
+His adoring disciple to fall upon his knees with uplifted eye and to
+say in filial reverence and trust, "Our Father who art in heaven."
+While the other taught his followers to lean only upon self, and to
+seek speedy relief from life itself, declaring that heaven returned
+only an empty, mocking echo to the helpless wail of the human soul.
+
+(2) Corresponding to this difference was another difference in their
+conception of human life. Jesus maintained that the human soul came
+from God, was made for God, and that God Himself was forever seeking
+to bring it unto Himself. According to His theory of life, man is not
+left alone at any stage in his career. He may decline to entertain God
+in his life. He may lead a life of rebellion against his Maker and
+Saviour; he may even deny the very existence of the Father of his
+being. But God, in the riches of His infinite patience, does not
+desert him to his own base thought and life. He follows him like a
+shepherd searching for his lost sheep. He longs for his return like a
+tender, forgiving father for the return of his prodigal son. Human
+life, according to this view, may be mean and sordid and may be spent
+in the grossest sin; but there is hope. All is not lost while there is
+a spark of life left. God is still seeking and trying to bring the
+soul to new life. The million agents of His loving will conspire to
+help man; and so the possibilities of his life are still great. Thus,
+to our Lord Christ, the vision of human life was a bright and
+optimistic one. God will not leave man to himself. He will bring all
+the resources of heaven and of earth to the work of saving him. "God
+is in His heaven, All's right with the world." Yes, all is hopeful for
+man because the Father is still seeking him.
+
+How different from this was Gautama Rishi's view of human life.
+According to him, man is a lone, helpless creature tossed on the sea
+of destiny. He is the only captain and steersman of his barque, and
+his own reason is his only compass; he must battle alone with the
+waves of circumstances and find for himself the unknown harbour of
+peace. There is no heaven above to hear his cry, no help or redemption
+outside of self. Is it a wonder that life is a weariness, and
+existence itself an unspeakable burden to such a man?
+
+Thus the Buddha sought in vain for light and cheer in life, and
+pessimism became to him, as it continues to be to his followers, the
+very atmosphere of life. Even as in Dante's vision of the Inferno, so
+in the Temple of Buddha's scheme of life there is inscribed above its
+portals the words: "Abandon hope all ye who enter here."
+
+I care not who the man may be, I humbly maintain that his scheme of
+life is seriously wrong if it be a cheerless, uninspiring one; and it
+is perfectly natural that men should prefer to follow a confident,
+buoyant leader rather than a heartless, despondent one. If God rules
+over the destinies of man, we have a right to expect that success and
+blessing will crown the efforts of the sincere seeker after a better
+life. Man has received life not that he may destroy it, but that he
+may cultivate it and find in it life abundant.
+
+A young mother whose child had died carried the dead body to Buddha,
+and, doing homage to him, said, "Lord and Master, do you know any
+medicine that will be good for my child?" "Yes," said the teacher, "I
+know of some. Get me a handful of mustard seed." But when the poor
+girl was hurrying away to procure it, he added, "I require mustard
+seed from a house where no son, husband, parent, or slave has died."
+"Very good," said the girl, and went to ask for it, carrying still the
+dead child astride on her hip. The people said, "Here is mustard
+seed;" but when she asked, "Has there died a son, a husband, a parent,
+or a slave in this house?" they replied: "Lady, what is this that you
+ask? The living are few, but the dead are many!" Then she went to
+other homes, but one said, "I have lost my son;" another, "I have lost
+my parents;" another, "I have lost my slave." At last, not being able
+to find a single house where no one had died, she began to think,
+"This is a heavy task that I am on." And as her mind cleared she
+summoned up her resolution, left the dead child in a house, and
+returned to Buddha. "Have you procured the mustard seed?" he asked. "I
+have not," she replied. "The people of the village told me, 'The
+living are few, but the dead are many.'" Then Buddha said, "You
+thought you alone had lost a son; the law of death is that among all
+living creatures there is no permanence." Little comfort in these
+words!
+
+Of course, we can see how these two conflicting views of life found
+acceptance and expression in these two great leaders of mankind. For,
+to Jesus, the keyword of life was divine grace or atonement, while to
+Gautama it was _Karma_--that word which has for so many centuries been
+to all India the truest expression of its philosophy and of its life.
+
+Christ taught that the grace of God was at the service of every man
+for his success in this life and for his redemption in the world to
+come. He ever emphasized the inspiring message that God's work and
+man's effort constitute the warp and woof of the life of every man. In
+His whole scheme of salvation there is no place for discouragement;
+for, walking through the path of life hand in hand with God, man can
+overthrow every enemy to his progress and achieve the best and highest
+in God's purposes for him.
+
+But when the Buddha adopted the doctrine of _Karma_ as the foundation
+of life, he and his system were doomed to despondency, gloom, and
+discouragement. It is indeed a noble truth that every man must drink,
+to its last dregs, the fruit of his own action--that the law of
+_Karma_ works with relentless force in every life in the world. Only
+let us understand that God may enter into each life to enable man to
+face successfully that law, and it is all right. But condemn man to
+everlasting isolation; cut away from him every ray of Divine help, and
+the working out of his _Karma_ becomes a terrible and an almost
+unending tragedy--a Sisyphean task with no hope of release save in the
+wiping out of life itself. And this is what the great Soul of the East
+believed and taught. He faced boldly the problem. He had, at the
+beginning, ignored the very existence of God, and thus denied himself
+the least hope of external aid in his own emancipation; and thus he
+held that stern, cruel, relentless _Karma_ became the all-controlling
+and universal law of life.
+
+To a Christian, among the most pathetic words ever spoken are those
+spoken by Buddha to his beloved cousin and disciple as death drew
+near--"O! Anantha,... My journey is drawing to its close. I have
+reached eighty years, and just as a worn-out cart can only with much
+care be made to move along, so my body can only be kept going with
+difficulty.... In future _be ye to yourselves your own light, your own
+refuge; seek no other refuge.... Look not to any one but yourselves as
+a refuge_."
+
+And that which farther, and very naturally, widens the gulf which
+separates them is their view of the adequacy or inadequacy of the
+present human life to satisfy the laws of their being.
+
+The law which Jesus believed to prevail, and which He constantly
+promulgated and emphasized, was that of the finality of the human
+life--that man has once only to pass through this earthly life and
+that then comes death, which introduces him to an eternal future
+corresponding with the character of his choices and life on earth.
+According to Him, this brief earthly existence, which will not be
+repeated, is a training school for the glorious life beyond. Blessed
+is he who faithfully submits himself to this training and passes
+through the gate of death prepared for an immortality of joy in God's
+presence beyond.
+
+Indeed, Jesus never gives the first intimation of any future birth or
+life, save that which would be permanent and eternal in heaven or
+hell.
+
+He felt the adequacy of this life as a determiner of the eternal
+destiny of all men. And He felt that the salvation which He wrought
+and offered to all was able to carry man through the single portal of
+death into unending bliss. Why another entrance into this world, if by
+passing through the world God could bring into the life the seed and
+power of His own grace and life which would blossom and bear fruit in
+the soul throughout eternity? "Marvel not," He sayeth, "the hour
+cometh in which all that are dead shall hear his voice and shall come
+forth; they that have done good into the resurrection of life; and
+they that have done evil into the resurrection of judgment." And as He
+described the final judgment upon all men after one earthly life He
+says that "these shall go away into eternal punishment, but the
+righteous into eternal life." Moreover, in describing the condition of
+the dead He makes the faithful Abraham say to the soul of a dead
+sinner, "Between us and you there is a great gulf fixed that they who
+would pass hence to you may not be able to pass and that you may not
+cross from thence to us." That is, He claimed that the life which we
+live here so fixes the destiny of men that eternity will carry its
+impress. Hence the urgency and the supreme importance of this one life
+to all men. The universal succession, according to His teaching, is
+life, death, resurrection, judgment, and eternal reward.
+
+To the Buddha, who, as we have seen, held that man is the only
+architect of his own destiny and that he must therefore abide the
+working of his _Karma_, a single brief apprenticeship in the school of
+life seemed altogether inadequate as a test of character and as a
+reliable foundation for the edifice of one's eternal destiny, or as a
+basis for the one irrevocable judgment. It is but natural, therefore,
+that this great Indian Rishi should have adopted as his own the
+doctrine of metempsychosis, or transmigration, and that he should add
+great emphasis to it. To him, life was a penitentiary rather than a
+school, a place, or an occasion, for eating the fruits of past action
+rather than a training for the future eternity which awaits every one.
+
+It is true that Gautama must have had some idea of the corrective
+influence and disciplinary character of this earthly existence; for
+there is a quiet assumption that in some unexplained and
+unintelligible way the soul is improved by this multitudinous process
+of reincarnation. And yet I fail to see any reason for expecting such
+a development. Philosophically and morally, the _raison d'etre_ of the
+doctrine of reincarnation is to explain the inequalities of life; and
+it does it not, as Jesus would do it, by means of the doctrine of
+heredity, but by the retributive power of _Karma_, or actions pursuing
+the soul through successive births and compelling it to reveal by its
+conditions and reflect by its experiences in each birth the
+experiences of the previous birth. The moral influence of such a
+doctrine is rendered all but impossible by the fact that there is no
+consciousness (the true basis of moral continuity) to connect one
+birth with another. I know of no one but Mrs. Besant who claims to
+know what his previous, assumed birth was, and I have not yet met any
+one who believes her claim in this matter. There is no moral
+discipline for one in his being punished for a thing of which he has
+absolutely no conscious knowledge.
+
+We must further consider the character of Gautama's philosophy. It
+was, as is well known, thoroughly materialistic--the antipodes of the
+orthodox Hindu philosophy, which is highly spiritual. To Buddha, there
+was no such thing as a soul apart from the body. What was there, then,
+to connect one birth with another, according to his teaching? In
+Brahmanism the doctrine of transmigration is at this point very clear,
+for there is the eternal _Atma_, or self, to connect and unify all its
+incarnations. But Gautama, who denied the separate existence of the
+soul, maintained that it was not the self, but the _Karma_, which
+passed from one birth to another; and thus there became the oneness of
+_Karma_ without an identity of soul passing through and uniting the
+myriad incarnations of the person involved. How can one substitute
+here a sameness of _Karma_ for identity of soul? Behold, then, the
+insuperable difficulties which such a materialism interposes to a
+belief either in the possibility or in the wisdom of the doctrine of
+reincarnation.
+
+And yet let it be remembered here that so long as one accepts the
+doctrine of _Karma_ he cannot evade the sister doctrine of
+reincarnation. They belong to the same system, and must be accepted or
+rejected together.
+
+If, however, we emphasize divine grace as an element in the solution
+of human problems and in the salvation of man, then it is natural to
+conclude that one earthly life will suffice for God and man together
+to prepare the soul for the consummation and beatification which
+awaits it beyond death. But if the whole problem is to be solved and
+the whole work of redemption achieved by man himself, apart from God,
+then Buddha must have been justified in believing that an
+inconceivable number of births and human lives are necessary in order
+to accomplish this.
+
+It was just at this point that Christ and Buddha faced the opposite
+poles. And it is just here, for this very reason, that the faiths
+which they promulgated represent, the one the perpetual buoyancy and
+cheer of youth, and the other the weariness of discouraged age.
+
+Christianity claims to do its work for the soul, so far as settling
+its destiny is concerned, in the brief life of a few years; and under
+the inspiring influence of this conviction the pulse quickens,
+youthful hope and energy multiply, and the whole soul is kindled by a
+close vision of its speedy triumph and release. The Buddhist, on the
+other hand, knows that it is a long, lonely conflict--the interminably
+long processions of births weary him and the dim vision of a release
+which is far away brings no inspiration. Life palls upon him, courage
+fails him, his steps grow shorter and his pace slackens.
+
+(3) This brings us to the ideals which these two world-leaders
+entertained. Often men's ideals are a better revelation of their life
+and character than are their achievements. These ideals which I wish
+to point out are two--that of inner attainment and that of final
+consummation.
+
+And what was the chief ambition for personal achievement sought by
+Jesus and Gautama? I believe that the very names which they acquired
+and which are at the head of this chapter answer this question for us.
+"Christ" and "Buddha" are not the personal names given in infancy, nor
+are they tribal designations. They primarily represent their official
+titles. "Christ" means "the Anointed One," and "Buddha" signifies
+"the Enlightened One"--the one is a term expressive of spiritual
+powers for service, while the other means intellectual enlightenment
+for communion. One sought and found the baptism of the spirit of God
+which touched and transfigured His character; the other was seeking
+more light on the problems of life; and for that light he sought with
+a wonderful longing and perseverance until the dawn broke on that
+remarkable day under the sacred Boh tree and he found the light and
+was hence called "the Enlightened One."
+
+Thus, in the Christ-life, the emphasis was upon ethical and spiritual
+attainment, while, in Buddha, the thing sought was the clear vision
+and transcendent illumination.
+
+Let me not be misunderstood. There is a sense in which the
+consecration and the vision are in the same line. It was Christ
+Himself that said, "This is eternal life, to know Thee the only true
+God and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent." Spiritual knowledge is the
+pathway to the highest life--it is life itself. It must be, in large
+part, acquired through spiritual experience.
+
+At the same time, it is an interesting fact that Buddha laid, as India
+has always laid, emphasis--_undue_ emphasis--upon knowledge as the
+consummation to be sought. _Brahma Gnana_ is the _summun bonum_ of
+life. To rightly know myself in my relationship, this, they say, is
+the only qualification for beatification. On the other hand, Jesus
+insisted always upon a right moral and spiritual attitude and
+relationship to God as the highest point of human attainment in life.
+Listen to the beatitudes which he uttered: "Blessed are the poor in
+spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that
+mourn; for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek; for they
+shall inherit the earth. Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after
+righteousness; for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful; for
+they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart; for they shall
+see God. Blessed are the peacemakers; for they shall be called sons of
+God. Blessed are they that have been persecuted for righteousness'
+sake; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."
+
+These are the beatitudes of His Kingdom, and all refer to the
+spiritual graces which He Himself exemplified and inculcated, and none
+refer to enlightenment.
+
+Thus in both we have, if not a contrast, a different outlook, which
+has not only impressed the student with a sense of divergence; but
+that which is more important--it has given to the devotees of these
+two faiths widely different aspirations, and has given to the two
+types of lives produced very dissimilar traits.
+
+But, that which is of more consequence, in these ideals, is their
+conception of what life tends to and must ultimately attain unto. The
+final consummation of life meant nought else to Jesus than
+God-likeness, which He called "Eternal Life." To have grown to the
+perfection of those moral and spiritual characteristics which adorn
+God Himself; to have the human will so subdued and directed until it
+runs parallel with the Divine will; to have the soul consumed with a
+love of all that He loves and with an abhorrence of all that He
+hates,--this is life indeed and the highest realization of the human
+soul. Yea, more, to pass out of this life into the conscious bliss and
+eternal felicity of the life to come, to dwell with God--one with Him
+in purpose and character, and yet living a separate conscious
+existence, basking in the eternal sunshine of His Presence and
+favour,--this is the fulness of blessing which Christ presented before
+His own as the end to be sought and the consummation which God placed
+within their reach.
+
+On the other hand, Nirvana is the word which holds condensed the whole
+realm of Buddha's ideals. It is not my purpose to discuss the original
+meaning of this word. I gladly concede that it meant a state of moral
+achievement when the powers of the soul were at equilibrium and when
+resultant peace pervaded the life. But we also know that it meant,
+preeminently, that state in which the soul had passed beyond contact
+with body, in which contact alone it found consciousness and sensation
+and human activity; when the soul, freed from births, had returned to
+its elemental condition of semi-nothingness, with neither thought,
+emotion, nor volition. This was a condition in which was found only
+the negative blessing of release from the turbulence and surging
+distresses of life. Without calling it non-existence, we claim that it
+is wanting in every element that we connect, or can conceive
+connected, with human existence.
+
+There is nothing in it to inspire hope nor to invite cheer. All we can
+do in its presence is to ask--is this all that man, the flower of
+God's universe, is to arrive at? Is there nothing better for him than
+to end his long, dreary existence in such an abject failure? Must he
+descend from the plain of even a wretched human life to this the
+lowest reach of existence, if such we must call it?
+
+In the eyes of Christ, there issues out of the mighty conflict of life
+a purified, glorified human being fit to dwell forever in the
+presence of His Father and adopted to enjoy that presence for
+evermore. To Buddha, this same human life ends in failure and must
+rest forever under the dark pall of oblivion, and robbed by Nirvana of
+all the possibilities of good and of joy that were implanted in it.
+
+In the absence of higher satisfaction, all that Buddha could do was to
+glory in his achievements, because of their pervasive influence upon
+the lives of others during all future time. We might imagine him
+joining with George Eliot in her noble aspiration:--
+
+ "O! may I join the choir invisible
+ Of those immortal dead who live again
+ In minds made better by their presence: live
+ In pulses stirred to generosity,
+ In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn
+ For miserable aims that end with self,
+ In thoughts sublime that pierce the nightlike stars,
+ And with their mild persistence urge man's search
+ To vaster issues ...
+ This is life to come."
+
+But Christ gave us a larger hope and a loftier purpose than this, even
+the conscious possession of abundant life ourselves and the growing
+knowledge of the boundless good which our earthly life has done for
+others. To live in men is joy indeed; but that involves an ability to
+feel that joy; and this, again, is a part only of the Eternal Life
+which He gives to all who believe in Him.
+
+It is His disciple only who can say:--
+
+"Beloved, now are we the Sons of God. But we know not what we shall
+be; but we know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him, for we
+shall see Him as He is."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+MODERN RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT
+
+
+In matters of faith, India has always been ultra-conservative. This is
+largely owing, not to any fettering of thought, but rather to the
+Hindu Caste System, which has been the most rigid guardian of the
+Brahmanic faith and the doughty opponent of any new and independent
+movements.
+
+India has offered to her rishis and reformers unbounded latitude of
+thought. And, as a consequence, her faith possesses within itself
+every shade of religious speculation and philosophic conclusions. The
+many antipodal and conflicting doctrines, theories, tendencies, and
+institutions which obtain under the all-embracing name of Hinduism,
+seem astonishing to every western investigator of this faith.
+
+Even in matters of ritual, Brahmanism has always had its protestants,
+sectarians, and "come-outers." During this stern dominance of the
+Caste System, which is the most rigorous, if not the most cruel,
+inquisition that the world has known, there have always been men free
+to think and determined enough to push forward their ideas and their
+new religious methods. And these have added picturesque variety to the
+history of faith in India.
+
+It is, however, a remarkable tribute to the power of caste and to the
+unheroic character of Hindu reformers, that, of the myriad reforms and
+protests against Brahmanism which have bristled throughout the
+centuries, only one--Buddhism--has stood apart in persistent
+isolation, and has maintained a separate identity and usefulness
+through more than two millenniums. Of all these protesting creeds, it
+alone has had sufficient masculine power and moral earnestness
+permanently to impress itself upon the world as a great religion. It
+has achieved this, however, not in the land of its birth, but in other
+lands and among other peoples. Like all other attempts to reform, or
+overthrow, the mother faith (and even after it had largely
+accomplished this for ten centuries), Buddhism finally yielded to the
+mighty absorptive power of Brahmanism, was overthrown as the dominant
+religion of India, and lost all power and acceptance among the people.
+This was because most of its vital teachings were appropriated by the
+rival faith, and Buddha himself was adopted into the Hindu pantheon as
+the ninth incarnation of Vishnu. Henceforward, it had no distinctive
+mission or message to the people of this land, and died a natural
+death.
+
+The well-known passion of Hinduism for absorbing the faiths that come
+into contact with it, and the maudlin tendency of the people of India
+to yield to pressure and to sacrifice all in behalf of peace, has been
+the grave of many a noble endeavour and many an impassioned attempt
+for new religious life and power.
+
+Nevertheless, there is no reform movement which has entered the arena
+of religious conflict in India, whether it still remains entirely
+within the Hindu faith or has possessed vigour and repulsive energy
+enough to step outside the ancestral faith, which has not left more or
+less of an impress upon Hinduism, and which does not to-day exercise
+some power or other over certain classes of the people.
+
+
+I
+
+All of the many modern sects of Hinduism were originally protests
+against the dominant Brahmanism of the day. The most popular Vaishnava
+sect, in South India,--the _Visishdadvaitha_ sect of Ramanuja,--was
+first a vigorous protest against the austere pantheism of Sankaran. It
+was the demand of a thoughtful and an earnest religious man for a
+personal God which could bring peace and rest to the soul, in
+contradistinction to the unknowable, unethical, and unapproachable
+Brahm, which the dominant Vedantism had thrust upon the people.
+
+The _Madhwachariars_ went one step farther and inculcated a dualism,
+which many to-day accept as the basis of their faith.
+
+In the region of Bengal, that other sect of Vaishnavism, which was
+inculcated by Chaitanya four centuries ago, is to-day the popular
+cult. It is a revivalism full of wild enthusiasm and ecstatic
+devotion; yet it attracts, in a remarkable way, many of the men of
+culture and learning throughout that Presidency.
+
+The Saivite sectarians, who call themselves _Sangamars_, were, a few
+centuries ago, a mere uprising against the supremacy of the Brahmans
+and the dominance of caste.
+
+Indeed, nearly all religious reformers in India propelled their
+reforms as anti-caste movements. But, later on, they have, with very
+few exceptions, been drawn again into the maelstrom of caste.
+
+The Sikh religion, itself, was originally a religious reform, which
+found its germs in the mind of the great Kabir, and afterward attained
+birth in the brave reformer, Nanak Shah, during the fifteenth century.
+It is a shrewd, an amiable, and also a brave attempt to harmonize
+Mohammedanism and Hinduism. At the present time, this also is
+gradually yielding to caste dominance and to the fascination of Hindu
+ritual.
+
+Thus every century has produced its reformers, and the banks of this
+great river of Brahmanism is strewn with the wrecks of protesting
+sects, while many other such barques are to-day adopted as the
+faithful messengers of orthodox Hinduism and are carrying its message
+to the people.
+
+
+II
+
+Modern movements of religious reform in India have not been wanting in
+number or vigour. And they have been largely movements away from
+Polytheism, on the one hand, and from Pantheism on the other, toward a
+modern Theism. Many intelligent men, and many uneducated, but earnest
+souls, have grown weary of their multitudinous pantheon, and of its
+hydra-headed idolatry, which charms and debases the masses. In like
+manner, many of them have ceased to be satisfied with the unknown
+Brahm of Vedantism, and are seeking after a personal Deity, who can
+meet the demands of their craving hearts.
+
+There is much of this thought and sentiment still inarticulate among
+the upper classes; but it is manifestly growing with the increase of
+the years.
+
+This theistic movement, as a growing search after a personal God, is
+to be traced definitely to the growth of western thought, and
+especially to the direct influence of Christianity. This is no less
+true of those theistic movements which are by no means amiably
+disposed toward our religion.
+
+The modern theistic movement first found definite expression and
+impetus in the life and teaching of that noble son of India, Ram Mohan
+Roy, who hailed from the Brahmanic aristocracy of Bengal. He was born
+in 1774--just before the birth of American Independence. He studied
+well the ancient writings of Hinduism and translated some of the most
+important into English. He also searched eagerly and enthusiastically
+the Christian Scriptures; for which purpose he made himself familiar
+with the Greek and Hebrew languages. So mightily did the New Testament
+and its precepts grip him that he wrote and published, in 1819, an
+excellent tract, "The Precepts of Jesus the Guide to Peace and
+Happiness." This is a remarkable testimony to the ethical preeminence
+of the Bible. He later declared that he "believed in the truths of the
+Christian religion."
+
+Being unwilling to abide alone in this discovery and in these
+convictions, he established, in 1815, the "Atma Sabha," or "Soul
+Society," in his own home. This soon developed into a small church,
+for which a suitable edifice was erected, that they might worship the
+one God free from the contaminating influence of popular idolatry and
+Hindu ceremonial.
+
+This truly great man, without the aid of any European missionary, in
+the quiet solitude of his own heart, and under the influence of the
+Spirit of God, rose to some of the highest truths of Theism, and,
+under the mighty influence of Christian literature, became a reformer
+of the first order among his people.
+
+But, during a visit to England he sickened, and died in 1833; and the
+theistic movement weakened and waned for a few years, deprived of his
+leadership and inspiring presence.
+
+It was in 1843 that the Brahmo Somaj of Ram Mohan Roy was united with
+another _Sabha_ organized by another great soul, Debendra Nath
+Tagore. Under the guidance of this sturdy reformer, the Brahmo Somaj
+movement put on new life and energy. Debendra Nath was very devout and
+courageous. He was opposed to the religion of his fathers, as
+practised by the people. Nevertheless, he was somewhat anchored to the
+past. He still clung to the Hindu scriptures and regarded the Vedas as
+infallible. Later, however, as these Hindu writings were studied with
+more care, his faith in them was considerably shattered, and he began
+to deny their supreme authority.
+
+He and the other members of the society here entered upon a great
+struggle which ushered them into an "Age of Reason." The Vedas were
+abandoned as an ultimate authority, and the Brahmo Somaj, for a time,
+became "a Church without a Bible," and without any anchorage but the
+higher reason of its members.
+
+In 1852, the society was reorganized. Reason was soon found to be
+inadequate as the foundation of faith; and they passed on to an
+intuitional basis. That again seemed to be even more unsatisfactory
+than reason itself. After a few years, the movement gradually
+developed a doctrine of inspiration, when the utterances of the
+leaders themselves were regarded as inspired and became the voice of
+God to the members. Thus, within a few years, Brahmo Somaj moved
+almost in a circle, in its search for a stable anchorage to its faith;
+and it returned to a point dangerously near to the Hindu position
+which it had left a few years before.
+
+The rapid movement above indicated was chiefly owing to an ardent
+youth, who rallied to the support of Debendra Nath, and who gradually
+took the reins into his own hands. This young man was Keshub Chunder
+Sen; and he soon became the leading figure, certainly the most
+striking, in the whole theistic movement of India. He acquired growing
+influence over Debendra Nath, became the controlling spirit, and
+continued until his death to be the central figure of Theism in India.
+
+Chunder Sen was a great enthusiast, full of intellectual resource,
+and, withal, a man of deep spirituality. He was an Oriental of the
+Orientals; his mind was of a thoroughly mystic type, and, like the
+devout Hindu, he loved the rigours of asceticism, and, in not a few
+instances, yielded to the fascinations of the methods of the Yogi.
+
+He was a restless soul. Hinduism had so much that was repulsive to
+him; and he felt that polytheism and idolatry had so crushed out of
+his people all the beauty of a living faith that he longed to hasten
+communication of his message of truth and of life the new and glorious
+day of Theism for India. His pace was so much faster than that of
+Debendra Nath that it took but a few years to make their separation a
+necessity. This took place in 1865. Thereupon, the old society became
+known as the "_Athi Somaj_,"--"The Original Somaj,"--while Sen and his
+party formed a new organization, which was pretentiously known as "The
+Brahmo Somaj of India." This happened in 1866.
+
+The old society settled down into inactivity, lost much of its spirit
+of reform, and has never since accomplished much in the realm of
+theistic advance.
+
+The new Somaj, however, soon acquired prominence and became the life
+and embodiment of the Indian theistic movement.
+
+But Chunder Sen had his serious dangers; and those lay in the very
+excess of his virtues.
+
+Hurried on by his intense nature, exalted to power by his brilliant
+intellectual qualities, and yearning with a passion for the release of
+his beloved India from the religious and spiritual thraldom which he
+witnessed all about him, he acquired irresistible charm and power with
+his followers, and his words became their undisputed law; and his
+deliverances were surcharged with what they regarded as divine
+inspiration. And there is no doubt that he soon came to believe
+himself to be a direct vehicle of God in the communication of his
+message of truth and of life to the world.
+
+Under the influence of this conviction or delusion (whichever one may
+choose to call it), he was swept on, and carried with him most of his
+followers, into startling novelties of ritual and of organization.
+
+Finally, however, he became so extreme and radical that some of his
+principal followers became frightened and grew restless. The occasion
+of another split was found in the marriage of Chunder Sen's daughter
+to the young Maharaja of Cooch Behar, in 1876. Chunder Sen had worked
+heroically for the enactment of a new marriage law for the members of
+the Brahmo Somaj, whereby no bride should be married before fourteen
+and no bridegroom under eighteen years of age. Yet, in the marriage of
+his own daughter, he ignored this law, which was passed chiefly
+through his own energy. Notwithstanding the fact that the leader
+claimed divine guidance in this affair, his leading followers
+attributed the marriage to his weakness and pride.
+
+This led to another secession, in May, 1878, whereby the majority of
+the societies and their members broke away from the Sen party and
+established the _Sadharna Somaj_--"The Universal Somaj." This schism
+was a terrible blow to Mr. Sen; and yet it released him from the
+trammels which the dissatisfied had hitherto thrust upon him, and gave
+him, among the remnant, an opportunity to launch out on new projects,
+and to introduce many religious vagaries, which to most men were
+striking and, to many, were shocking. Under the banner of the "New
+Dispensation," he practised a varied liturgy and cultivated an unique
+ceremonial which seemed to be a close imitation, and almost a mockery,
+of some of the most sacred institutions of Christianity and of other
+religions.
+
+The schismatic weakness of the theistic movement did not reach its
+consummation in this last division. It was almost immediately upon the
+death of Keshub Chunder Sen, at the beginning of 1884, that his
+immediate family and a few of his followers proclaimed that his spirit
+still abode in the Mandir, where he so often spoke, and that no one
+should succeed him or speak from the Mandir hereafter!
+
+Within these few short years a new cult had begun to grow around the
+person of Chunder Sen, like those around a thousand others well known
+in the history of India. He became to some of his followers not only a
+great religious teacher, but also something of an incarnation on his
+own account, so that it seemed to them blasphemy for any living being
+to aspire to speak from the pulpit of the beloved dead master.
+
+His natural successor was Babu Protap Chunder Mozumdar. He protested
+against this apotheosis of the departed leader, and insisted upon the
+fact that their movement must be open to new light, and must seek
+after ever increasing progress and advance. But the family were
+obdurate, and the new split became inevitable; and thus Chunder Sen
+has passed into the ranks of the Mahatmas of India and will erelong be
+promoted to a place among the incarnations of their deities.
+
+Mr. Mozumdar was, intellectually, not inferior to Chunder Sen himself;
+and he was possessed of deep earnestness of spirit and of a beautiful
+English style (both as a writer and speaker) which commended him and
+his cause to the public, and especially to English and American
+Theists. He visited the West more than once, and charmed many an
+audience of Christian men by his deep sincerity and eloquence.
+
+
+III
+
+The progress of this Brahmo movement has not been very encouraging.
+
+We have already seen its tendency to schism. There seems very little
+in the movement which makes for peace and unity. Any little pique or
+difference of views has not only created internal dissension, but also
+engendered new sects.
+
+The leaders of the movement have been both able and absolutely devoted
+to the theistic cause; but they have not revealed the highest
+qualities of leadership, especially that quality which exalts above
+the leader himself the principles and the cause which he advocates.
+Nor have they imparted to the members of the Somaj that altruistic
+fervour which enables them to deny themselves in behalf of their
+common cause and purpose.
+
+Numerically, the progress of the Brahmo Somaj has been most
+disappointing. At the last census there were only 4050 members. And,
+of these, more than three-quarters were in Bengal.
+
+This, however, by no means represents the strength of the movement;
+for it is said, with truth, that many who do not register themselves
+as Brahmos are in deepest accord with the movement. And it must,
+moreover, be remembered that the influence of the society is far in
+excess of the numbers represented. For the movement has drawn its
+membership, almost exclusively, from the upper class; and the majority
+of Brahmos are men of education and of position in society. Moreover,
+they joined this movement under the deep conviction of the utter
+worthlessness of Hinduism as a way of salvation, and with a purpose to
+seek after that which is best in thought and life.
+
+It is this aristocratic character of the movement which has largely
+militated against its popularity. Its appeal has been mainly to men
+and women of English training. It has not been possessed of any
+passion for the multitude; nor has it adequately appreciated the
+importance, for its own well-being, of a united endeavour to reach and
+bring in the man of the street.
+
+Nevertheless, the movement has been thoroughly permeated with an
+Indian spirit. The leaders have been particular in their desire to
+exalt and emphasize the Oriental aspect and method, as distinct from
+the Occidental. This is the reason why it has been so frequently and
+bitterly criticised. It has been judged by western standards and
+criticised because it has not squared with western ideals. From time
+to time missionaries and other Christian men, seeing no reason, from
+their standpoint, why these Brahmo friends should not come over in a
+body into the Christian fold, have been impatient with their lack of
+response. They failed to understand that, with these western
+principles and admiration, there were also eastern thoughts and
+prepossessions, and the invaluable inheritance of a past that kept
+them aloof from the foreign faith and led them frequently to deliver
+themselves vehemently against its most western manifestations. Even
+their conception of Christ was a distinctly Oriental one. And they
+denied that a man of the West could compare with them of the East in
+the deep appreciation of the Christ-character and in loving attachment
+to their "Brother" from the East--Jesus of Nazareth.
+
+Yet, the Christian basis of this movement is unmistakable. We have
+seen how Ram Mohan Roy received a new baptism of thought and life upon
+studying the Christian Scriptures. It gave a new direction and
+inspiration to his theistic conceptions.
+
+Chunder Sen found nearly all the inspiration from the Bible; and he
+lived under the spell of Christ's own power, and with a passion, such
+as few Christians possess, to follow Him and to be a full partaker of
+His blessings.
+
+The writer will never forget his own brief visit to Protap Mozumdar,
+not long before the latter's death. It was on the eve of Good Friday.
+He found this devout man with eighteen of his disciples (one of them
+an Oxford graduate) studying together the tender words of our Lord
+uttered to His disciples in the Upper Room on the night in which He
+was betrayed. They were thus qualifying themselves properly to
+commemorate His death on the coming morn. And Mr. Mozumdar gave a
+strong lecture on "The Suffering Christ" to a large audience in one of
+the city halls on the morrow. The thought occurred to us, how many
+Christians had met together that same evening, like these Brahmos, for
+the purpose of studying our Lord's Words upon that memorable occasion
+and bringing themselves thus _en rapport_ with Him whose atoning death
+they were to commemorate? As we parted, it was hardly necessary for
+that man of God to say to the writer in pathetic tones, "O, sir, I
+only wish you knew how near we are to you in these matters!" Some may
+have read that remarkable book, named "The Oriental Christ," written
+and published by this same gentleman in 1883. In the preface, he gives
+this strikingly beautiful account of his conversion:--
+
+"Nearly twenty years ago, my troubles, studies, and circumstances
+forced upon me the question of personal relationship to Christ.... As
+the sense of sin grew on me, and with it a deep miserable
+restlessness, a necessity of reconciliation between aspiration and
+practice, I was mysteriously led to feel a personal affinity to the
+Spirit of Christ. The whole subject of the life and death of Christ
+had for me a marvellous sweetness and fascination.... Often
+discouraged and ridiculed, I persisted in according to Christ a
+tenderness of honour which arose in my heart unbidden. I prayed, I
+fasted, at Christmas and Easter times. I secretly hunted the
+book-shops of Calcutta to gather the so-called likenesses of Christ. I
+did not know, I cared not to think, whither all this would lead....
+About the year 1867 ... I was almost alone in Calcutta. My inward
+trials and travails had really reached a crisis. It was a week-day
+evening, I forget the date now. The gloomy and haunted shades of
+summer evening had suddenly thickened into darkness.... I sat near the
+large lake in the Hindu College compound.... A sobbing, gusty wind
+swam over the water's surface.... I was meditating upon the state of
+my soul, on the cure of all spiritual wretchedness, the brightness and
+peace unknown to me, which was the lot of God's children. I prayed and
+besought Heaven. I cried and shed hot tears.... Suddenly it seemed to
+me, let me own it was revealed to me, that close to me there was a
+holier, more blessed, most loving personality upon which I must repose
+my troubled head. Jesus lay discovered in my heart as a strange,
+human, kindred love, as a repose, a sympathetic consolation, an
+unpurchased treasure, for which I was freely invited. The response of
+my nature was unhesitating and immediate. Jesus, from that day, to me
+became a reality whereon I might lean. It was an impulse then, a flood
+of light, love, and consolation. It is no longer an impulse now. It is
+a faith and principle; it is an experience verified by a thousand
+trials ... a character, a spirit, a holy, sacrificed, exalted self,
+whom I recognize as the true Son of God. According to my humble
+light, I have always tried to be faithful to this inspiration. I have
+been aided, confirmed, encouraged by many, and most of all by one. My
+aspiration has been not to speculate on Christ, but to be what Jesus
+tells us all to be.... I shall be content if what I say in these pages
+at all tends to give completeness to any man's ideas of the life and
+ministry of Jesus Christ.... In the midst of these crumbling systems
+of Hindu error and superstition, in the midst of these cold, spectral
+shadows of transition, secularism, and agnostic doubt, to me Christ
+has been like the meat and drink of my soul. His influences have woven
+round me for the last twenty years or more, and, outside the fold of
+Christianity as I am, have formed a new fold, wherein I find many
+besides myself."
+
+Chunder Sen also abundantly expressed himself concerning the Christ,
+His mission, and message. But to him, again, it is an Asiatic Christ;
+and He must be accepted in a truly Oriental, yes, even in a Hindu,
+way. He says:--
+
+"It is not the Christ of the Baptists, nor the Christ of the
+Methodists, but the Christ sent by God, the Christ of love and
+meekness, of truth and self-sacrifice, whom the world delights to
+honour. If you say we must renounce our nationality and all the
+purity and devotion of eastern faith for sectarian and western
+Christianity, we shall say most emphatically, No. It is _our_ Christ,
+_Asia's_ Christ, you have come to return to us. The East gratefully
+and lovingly welcomes back her Christ. But we shall not have your
+Christianity, which suits not the spirit of the East. Our religion is
+the religion of harmony."
+
+In further enforcement of this Oriental character he continues:--
+
+"Was not Jesus Christ an Asiatic? Yes, and His disciples were
+Asiatics, and all the agencies primarily employed for the propagation
+of the Gospel were Asiatic. In fact, Christianity was founded and
+developed by Asiatics and in Asia. When I reflect on this, my love for
+Jesus becomes a hundred fold intensified; I feel Him nearer my heart,
+and deeper in my national sympathies.... And is it not true that an
+Asiatic can read the imageries and allegories of the Gospel, and its
+descriptions of the natural sceneries, of customs and manners, with
+greater interest and a fuller perception of their force and beauty
+than an European?... The more this greater fact is pondered, the less,
+I hope, will be the antipathy and hatred of European Christians
+against Oriental nationalities, and the greater the interest of the
+Asiatics in the teachings of Christ. And thus in Christ, Europe and
+Asia, the East and the West, may learn to find harmony and unity...."
+
+And let it not be supposed that Mr. Sen was altogether wanting in an
+appreciation of the higher significance and vicarious efficacy of the
+death of Christ. Concerning this, he observes:--
+
+"Humanity was lost in Adam, but was recovered in Christ. He was the
+world's atonement....
+
+"His death on the cross affords the highest practical illustration of
+self-sacrifice. He sacrificed His life for the sake of truth and the
+benefit of the world. In obedience to the will of His Father, He laid
+down His life, and said, Thy will be done! And surely there is deeper
+meaning in the fact than even the orthodox attach to it, that the
+death of Christ is the life of the world...."
+
+In many of the lectures which he gave, and in many of the articles
+which he wrote, we have evidence of the wonderful place which Christ
+had in his heart and of the power which He exercised over his
+thoughts. He exclaims:--
+
+"Blessed Jesus, immortal Child of God! For the world He lived and
+died. May the world appreciate Him and follow His precepts!... All
+through my inner being I see Christ. He is no longer to me a doctrine,
+or a dogma, but, with Paul, I cry, 'for me to live is Christ!'" On
+another occasion he says:--
+
+"Where, then, is Christ now? He is living in all Christian lives, and
+in all Christian influences at work around us.... You cannot resist
+His influence; you may deny His doctrines, you may even hate and
+repudiate His name, but He goes straight into your hearts, and leavens
+your lives."
+
+Other leaders of this movement are imbued with the same spirit. The
+editor of the New Dispensation remarks:--
+
+"As a matter of fact the Brahmoists have accepted Christian truth in a
+more special sense than Hindus, or even some Christian sects, have any
+idea of.... The organization of the Brahmo Somaj of India is framed
+upon an essentially Christian basis. Its missionary staff is
+Christian, being guided entirely by the principle of 'Take no thought
+for the morrow.' In its mission office, mottoes are found upon the
+walls which are all Christian. Almost every Brahmo household has a
+picture of Christ. The only Life of Jesus in Bengali is by a
+missionary of the Brahmo Somaj of India. Its truly evangelistical
+work, the life and conversation of its members, breathe distinctly
+the spirit and influence of Christ...."
+
+Another Theist writes:--
+
+"Reverently have I sat at the feet of the Jesus of the Gospels to
+learn the exalted ethics of the Sermon on the Mount. But Jesus, other
+than a moral force, _the truer and higher Jesus_, long remained a
+sealed book to me. Who could know the veritable Christ of God without
+light from above?...
+
+"Jesus forms the heart-blood of many a Brahmo.... We are ready to
+sacrifice anything if only by that we are enabled to love and cherish
+Jesus in our hearts.... The Brahmo Somaj is born to honour and revere
+Jesus, whatever the result may be."
+
+From these quotations, which might be multiplied indefinitely, it may
+be seen that the movement has been, to a considerable extent, under
+the Christ spell and imbued with much of His Spirit. Inasmuch,
+however, as the movement is an avowedly eclectic one, the Brahmoist
+was never willing to rest completely under the Christ influence. He
+gave to Christ, perhaps, a supreme place, but not a unique position,
+in his life and thought. Jesus was to him one of many, though perhaps
+a _primus inter pares_.
+
+It is this eclectic character of the Brahmo Somaj which has robbed it
+of much of its power. It may seem, at first, a very fine thing to
+collect, classify, and codify the best from many religions and dignify
+them as a religion. But that can never become a unified message of
+life to any people. It may be ethically immaculate, but it has no
+vital power. The distinctive, life-giving, and inspiring element of
+every faith has been eliminated, and only the common, unimpassioned,
+and uninspiring elements have been retained.
+
+Moreover, Brahmos have failed to realize that Theism, as such, has
+never satisfied any people as a way of salvation. It is doubtless a
+correct apprehension of the Divine Being. But religion requires a
+great deal more than this in the way of exhibiting the characteristics
+of the Deity, and especially of revealing His attitude toward, and His
+work for, mankind, before it can possess and reveal the potency of a
+saving faith.
+
+It would seem as if this movement, up to the present time, has just
+missed its mark and failed of achieving greatness and power. As we
+have seen, the leaders have exalted our Lord in a wonderful way, and
+have exhibited even a passion for Him in some ways. And yet they have
+robbed Him of the distinct uniqueness of His nature and of His work
+for man. They are first eclectics, and then they are rigid Unitarians,
+and lastly they are Christians. They need to reverse this order so as
+to add efficiency and potency to the Brahmo Somaj.
+
+It is a significant fact that Chunder Sen, with all his declared love
+for Christ and his great admiration for Him and His work, mentioned
+neither the name nor the saving work of Jesus in the final creed of
+the New Dispensation. That creed is as follows:--
+
+ "One God, one Scripture, one Church.
+ Eternal Progress of the Soul.
+ Communion of Prophets and Saints.
+ Fatherhood and Motherhood of God;
+ Brotherhood of Man and Sisterhood of Woman.
+ Harmony of Knowledge and Holiness, Love and Work;
+ Yoga and Asceticism in their highest development.
+ Loyalty to Sovereign."
+
+It must not be forgotten, however, that this movement deserves much
+more our commendation than our criticism. It is a noble endeavour to
+pass out of an inherited bondage, a debased creed, a demoralized
+pantheon, and an all-embracing superstition, into the full wisdom and
+blessing of a correct vision of God and Duty. If they have failed of
+the best, they are, nevertheless, with their faces turned toward it.
+And there is every hope that a kind Providence, through the
+instrumentality of Christian thought and western civilization, will
+lead them unto it. If they have not accepted our western Christianity,
+it may be that God has something better in store for them, in training
+them toward the realization of that form of Christian life and thought
+which will not only be more in consonance with Indian taste and
+ideals, but will also grip the country in such a way as the western
+type of our faith has not yet been able to do, and _seems_ incapable
+of doing.
+
+
+IV
+
+The Arya Somaj is a movement somewhat kindred to the Brahmo Somaj, in
+so far as it is a definite protest against modern Hinduism and is
+theistic in its teaching. The Theism of this Somaj, however, is quite
+different in character from that of the Brahmos.
+
+Dayanand Saraswati was a Brahman, born in the Gujarati country about
+1825. He developed into a man of keen intellect and of deep
+convictions. He also studied the Christian Scriptures and was
+slightly versed in the Hindu Shastras. He became dissatisfied with
+the Pantheism of his mother faith; the caste system grated upon his
+nerves, and the idolatry and the superstitions of the land, and
+especially the gross immorality of the people, roused him to deep
+thought and activity. He appealed to the Pandits, but found no
+sympathy or help from them. He found his Theism in the Vedas
+themselves, and ever after proclaimed, with great vehemence, that the
+God of the Vedas was one and was a personal God; and he found an easy
+way of interpreting those ancient books in harmony with his
+convictions!
+
+Jesus Christ did not appeal to him in the least. Indeed, he indulges
+in very cheap and gross criticism of the life of our Lord. His
+attitude toward Christianity was not at all kindly; indeed, the
+movement, up to the present, has been distinguished for nothing more
+than its hostility to the Christian religion. Nevertheless, it is
+doubtless true that some of the best ideas that Dayanand possessed
+were gleaned from the Bible; and the Arya Somaj has learned and
+inculcates some of the important lessons of our faith.
+
+When Dayanand found no encouragement in his appeal to the Pandits, he
+turned ultimately to the people and founded, in 1875, the Arya Somaj
+at Bombay. And from the first the movement has been a popular one,
+addressing itself to the masses and seeking to bring them over to its
+way of thinking and living. In this it has been, as we have seen,
+entirely removed from the Brahmo Somaj, which has been too content to
+remain a religion of the classes. Like the other movement, however, it
+has been largely local in its spread and influence. Of its one hundred
+thousand members at the present time, more than 70 per cent are in the
+United Provinces, and nearly all the remainder are in the Panjaub.
+
+Moreover, it has recently gathered its recruits mainly from the
+educated classes, among whom the higher castes largely prevail; nearly
+four-fifths of the Aryas are said to be of the twice-born castes,
+which is a very significant fact. So that both in its popular
+character and methods, as well as in the high social position and
+educational training of its members and in its rapidly growing
+numbers, the Arya Somaj is a movement of considerable importance.
+
+The principles of this Somaj, as enunciated in its creed, are not such
+as to grip men with power. They emphasize the unity of God, the
+infallibility of the Vedas; and the general aim of the Somaj is "to
+do good to the world by improving the physical, social, intellectual,
+moral, and spiritual condition of mankind." Its moral code is of a
+high order.
+
+It is thoroughly national in its spirit, and makes much capital out of
+the present spirit of racial antagonism. It is a significant fact that
+during the recent season of "Unrest" the government regarded the Arya
+Somaj as a hotbed of sedition and a nourisher of hostility to the West
+and to western things.
+
+The Arya Somaj is awake to the importance of training men as
+messengers of its Gospel of Theism. It has established a _Guru Kula_
+at the foot of the Himalayas, where quite a number of young men are
+being trained in its doctrines and supplied with its enthusiasms. From
+this theological seminary many have already gone forth, in the
+orthodox style of religious mendicancy, to impart their teaching and
+spread their movement far and wide, without any expense to the
+society.
+
+There is to-day, in North India, no enemy to the Christian cause so
+wide awake and so bitter as the Arya Somaj. It is so thoroughly
+national in its spirit, is so compactly organized, and lends itself
+so easily to the racial and political agitation of the day, that
+Christianity finds in it its greatest foe in those regions.
+
+Let it not be thought, however, that we do not appreciate the living
+spark of theistic truth which this movement represents, combined, as
+it is, with hostility to the caste system, which is India's greatest
+curse, and its antagonism to many of the superstitions and unworthy
+ceremonials of the ancestral faith.
+
+That movement must not be condemned too severely which is a bulwark
+against drink, caste, idolatry, early marriages, and which vigorously
+promotes female education, the remarriage of widows, and various
+philanthropic institutions.
+
+
+V
+
+It may not be improper to close this chapter with a reference to the
+Theosophical Society in India. It is true that the leaders of this
+movement, which was established in America in 1875, and transplanted
+into India a short time afterward, disavow its claim to being a
+religion; though that claim was definitely made and warmly pushed a
+quarter of a century ago. It is now extolled by its members as "the
+cement of faiths," "the harmonizer of religions." It is said that
+Arya Somaj became affiliated with it in 1879, though we have seen no
+result of this affiliation.
+
+The objects of Theosophy are said to be three: (1) The establishment
+of a universal brotherhood. (2) The study of ancient languages. (3)
+Investigation of the hidden mysteries of nature and the latent
+psychical forces of man.
+
+These aims seem thoroughly worthy, though the last mentioned, under
+its original founders, led to mystical claptrap, and to the abuse of
+the strong superstitious instincts of India.
+
+The society was founded by a Russian adventuress, Madame Blavatsky,
+and by an American soldier, Colonel Olcott, who was the easy tool, if
+not the accomplice, of his clever and unscrupulous associate.
+
+In the early history of the movement, at its headquarters in Madras,
+Madame Blavatsky gathered around her a numerous coterie of ardent
+Hindus, whom she duped with various tricks and seances. This was with
+a view to convincing them of her constant communication with
+_Koothoomi_ and various other Tibetan Mahatmas, of whom she seemed to
+be the special agent! These and other similar performances might have
+continued had it not been for her French accomplices, who quarrelled
+with her, because she did not pay them adequately, and who exposed her
+mercilessly. The whole matter was published in the _Madras Christian
+College Magazine_, and the Russian lady was speedily sent away from
+India to the West for a judicious season of rest. The leaders of
+Theosophy have never been unwilling to impose upon the stupendous
+credulity of their Indian followers.
+
+Nevertheless, it is undeniable that, with all its failings, Theosophy
+has exercised considerable influence upon the educated classes in this
+country. This has resulted largely through its readiness to utilize
+the recent movement of the people toward higher political privileges
+and their deep spirit of religious unrest.
+
+Since the advent of Mrs. Besant, the society has been largely moulded
+by her erratic powers. She has not hesitated to use her ability and
+influence toward the creation and the development of a strong
+reactionary religious spirit throughout the land. She has bitterly
+denounced every tendency among the people toward Christianity. By her
+eloquence, which is remarkable, she has extolled the faith of India,
+and has revived and embalmed many of its worst features which were
+rapidly passing away; and has even defended idolatry and kindred evils
+by trying to harmonize them with modern and scientific ideas! She has
+herself become practically a Hindu, expounds Hindu doctrines, and
+practises Hindu ceremonies. She has persistently maintained eastern
+thought and customs as against western, and has thus endeared herself
+to English-speaking Hindus, who regard her as the goddess Saraswati
+herself, and are willing to give her a place in their pantheon as one
+of the great defenders of their faith against the mighty influences of
+the West!
+
+In this matter, Mrs. Besant may be said to have caused irreparable
+injury to the people, as she has helped to arrest the tendency toward
+religious reform and progress, and has rendered articulate and given
+power and expression to the reactionary spirit which is now so rampant
+in India. More than any other person, and chiefly because she is of
+the West, and speaks in the accents of the West, she has antagonized
+progress in this land, not only religiously but also socially, and has
+done the greatest disservice to the people of India. In her eyes,
+Hindu philosophy and ritual, Hindu institutions and domestic life,
+have practically nothing to learn from the West, and need only to be
+known in order to be appreciated and loved!
+
+This, doubtless, in good part, accounts for her present popularity.
+
+Yet, one cannot fail to recognize the value of some things which she
+is doing. She has recently begun to speak with some emphasis upon
+lines of reform. She has been instrumental in stirring within the
+people a wider desire for higher education; though one can hardly
+understand why she has done so much for the establishment of a college
+for men, and has done practically nothing to advance the educational
+interests of her much-neglected sex in India.
+
+Upon the death of Colonel Olcott, the President Founder of Theosophy,
+in 1907, Mrs. Besant became his successor. So far as the Indian vote
+was concerned, this was a foregone conclusion; since her avowed
+sympathy with Hinduism in all its forms had gained for her a strong
+place in the Hindu heart.
+
+The method by which she was elected, however, is suggestive of the
+future course of the movement in India.
+
+When nearing death, Colonel Olcott was induced by Mrs. Besant to
+invoke and to consult the "Masters"--the convenient ghosts of the
+dead--with a view to a choice of his successor in office. There was no
+doubt about his preference for the Englishwoman. The Mahatmas wisely
+agreed with the Colonel and Mrs. Besant, and a powerful fulcrum was
+secured for lifting her into the presidency. And Mrs. Besant to-day
+claims that it is better for her to have been chosen by the dead than
+to have been elected by the living. Upon her inauguration, she
+insisted upon it that all Theosophists must cling to the "Masters" and
+adhere to their decisions.
+
+If we mistake not, this marks the beginning of a new era in
+Theosophy,--at least in India,--an era during which the movement will
+be entirely directed and worked by those who are the authorized
+mouthpieces of the glorified dead! Thus the movement is fairly
+launched upon a course which will inevitably lead it to something very
+much akin to a religion, with its accumulated mysteries and with a
+host of propelling superstitions of its own. More than any other land,
+India will lend itself admirably to the development and the
+propagation of such a cult.
+
+Theosophy is not represented by a very large number of organizations
+and members. But the movement has the sympathy of many who have not
+taken upon them its name; and the society, at the present time, is
+certainly in favour with a large number of the educated classes.
+
+Orthodox pandits, however, are thoroughly suspicious of the movement;
+and Mrs. Besant's recent attempts to thrust upon them her own
+interpretations of certain Hindu doctrines--interpretations, too,
+which are foreign to their own--has led to a spirit of opposition,
+where but recently appreciation and favour existed.
+
+Theosophy, as a harmonizer of faiths, is not likely to accomplish much
+that will be permanently good. Religions to-day have lost much of
+their asperity one toward the other. The study of Comparative Religion
+has led men everywhere to magnify the assonances, rather than the
+dissonances, of the Great World Faiths. Theosophy magnifies into a
+cult this function of bringing religions together. It ignores,
+however, the fundamental differences which exist, brings all faiths
+into the same equational value, and assumes that they are equally
+effective as ways of salvation.
+
+With such profound ignorance of the essential qualities of the faiths
+which are to be harmonized, and with a placid assumption that these
+religions are of the same efficacy, only to different peoples, it is
+impossible to see how Theosophy can ever render a service to any of
+the faiths or to the people who are their adherents which will not
+ultimately prove a disservice to all. Peace without truth, like peace
+without honour, will not ultimately redound to the promotion of
+religion or to the salvation of men.
+
+Whatever Theosophy may render toward the development of an Oriental
+literature will depend largely upon its attitude toward truth and
+religion in general, and toward Hinduism and Christianity in
+particular. Its bitter attitude toward Christianity in the past does
+not encourage one to believe that hereafter the literature fostered by
+it will be either very impartial or very sane. And yet we shall be
+thankful for anything it may accomplish in the preservation of
+Sanskrit manuscripts and in the development of a wholesome literature
+of any kind on lines purely Oriental.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+THE PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY IN INDIA
+
+
+I
+
+For at least seventeen centuries Christianity has found a home in
+India. The Syrian Church was the first to gather converts, and it
+still exists as a separate sect of 300,000 souls in a small part of
+Malabar. Roman Catholicism, also, has had here its six centuries of
+struggles and varied fortunes, and now claims its 1,500,000 followers.
+On July 9, 1906, the Protestants celebrated the bicentenary of the
+landing of their first two missionaries at Tranquebar, on the
+Coromandel coast. Ziegenbalg and Plutscho were truly men of God, and
+inaugurated a work which to-day has its ramifications in every part of
+this vast peninsula.
+
+They introduced a new era of missionary effort for India. Former
+endeavours were ecclesiastical. Great men, indeed, had wrought for
+Christ in this land; but their chief aim had been to establish a
+religion of forms and ceremonies. In the matter of ritual in
+religion, Hinduism has little to learn from, and has much to suggest
+to, western ecclesiastics. The early failure of our faith to secure
+marked and permanent success in this land finds its chief cause here.
+
+Ziegenbalg began in the right way. He identified himself with the
+people; he studied well their language, and hastened to incarnate his
+faith in vernacular literature; and, above all, he proceeded at once
+to translate into the language of the people the Word of God. Never
+before had the Bible been translated into an Indian tongue. After
+thirteen years of service, this great missionary died; but he left to
+his successors the heritage of a vernacular Bible, which has wrought
+mightily in South India for the redemption of the people. He also set
+the pace for subsequent missionaries of his persuasion, who, in these
+two centuries, have practically translated God's Word into every
+important Indian dialect. The Bible in his own vernacular lies open,
+inviting every native of India to-day; and in many vernaculars the
+translation has been revised more than once. This stands as a notable
+triumph of Protestantism during these two centuries in India.
+
+The writer has a copy of one of the earliest Tamil books prepared by
+these pioneers of our faith. These books have already grown into a
+large library--the best-developed Christian literature in any
+vernacular of the East. All over the land mission presses are annually
+pouring forth their many millions of pages both to nourish and cheer
+the infant Christian community, and to win to Christ the multiplying
+readers among non-Christians. The press has already become, perhaps,
+the most important agency in the furtherance of Christian thought and
+life in this land.
+
+One is impressed with the manifoldness of the work which began in so
+much simplicity two centuries ago. The missionary is no longer the
+preacher under some shady tree, addressing a few ignorant, ill-clad
+peasants. He is actively engaged in all departments of Christian
+effort. A Protestant mission is an elaborately organized activity,
+pursuing all lines of work for the elevation of the people. It has not
+only churches which engage in varied forms of pastoral effort; it has
+also its staff of evangelists and Bible women who carry the message of
+life to all the villages. In these missions there are not only 10,000
+day schools, with their 375,000 scholars, besides 30,000 youth who are
+in the 307 higher institutions. There are also thousands of young men
+and women, in many institutions, undergoing careful preparation as
+teachers and preachers. There is also the medical host who treated
+2,000,000 patients last year; there are industrial institutions under
+well-trained men, peasant settlements for the poor oppressed ryots,
+and schools for the blind and the deaf-mute. There is hardly an agency
+which can bring light, comfort, life, and inspiration to men which is
+not utilized by modern missions in India.
+
+[Illustration: A CHRISTIAN VILLAGE SCHOOL IN SOUTH INDIA]
+
+But the progress of these two centuries has been chiefly on lines
+which defy the columns of the statistician and elude the ken of the
+ordinary globe-trotter.
+
+The number of people that have been brought to Christ, and who now
+represent Protestantism in this land are, indeed, far fewer than might
+have been expected. A round million of a community after two centuries
+of effort among a population of 300,000,000 is not a thing of which to
+boast. And this may seem the more discouraging when it is remembered
+that there are now engaged in this work ninety-one different
+missionary societies of many lands, and supporting a missionary force
+of 4000 men and women. There is also a native Pastorate of 1100
+ordained men, with a total Indian agency of 26,000 men and women.
+
+So great a force of workers would, indeed, warrant us in expecting
+larger results in conversions.
+
+But it should be remembered that this agency is chiefly the product
+of the last few decades only, and is now multiplying in numbers and
+increasing in efficiency at a very rapid rate. At the present time,
+fully 200 of the Indian agents of our missions are university
+graduates, and a still larger number are of partial college training.
+
+The Indian Christian community itself, though in the main of low
+social origin, has made remarkable progress in education and manly
+independence. It is, already, perhaps the best-educated community in
+India. And it is feeling increasingly its opportunities and its
+obligations. It was only recently that its growing sense of national
+importance and its duties led it to organize a "National Missionary
+Society," which is directed by Indian leadership, supported by Indian
+funds, and its work is to be done by India's own sons. This society
+enters upon its career very auspiciously, and is not only symptomatic
+of present conditions, but is also pregnant with hope for the Indian
+Church of the future.
+
+It took many years to lay deeply the foundation of our mission
+organization. Indeed, the foundation is not quite completed. And yet
+the work of superstructure has already begun, and more rapid results
+may now be expected.
+
+But the more hidden and indirect results of Protestant Christian
+efforts in this land encourage the Christian worker more than all the
+direct results.
+
+During the last century, at least twenty laws have been enacted with a
+view to abolishing cruel religious rites and removing revolting
+customs and disabilities, such as Hinduism, from time immemorial, has
+established among the people. These laws were enacted in the teeth of
+opposition from the religious rulers of the land, and, in more cases
+than one, led to serious riot and religious fanaticism. But the
+growing spirit of Christ in the land could not tolerate these
+heathenish customs; so they had to go.
+
+The new spirit which has taken possession of the classes in India is
+in striking contrast with the spirit of the past. The new education,
+imparted on modern lines, in thousands of institutions scattered over
+the land, has brought its revenge of sentiment upon former thinking
+and believing. Western philosophy has had a noble share in the
+achievement; and the schoolmaster has been a pioneer in the work of
+transforming the sentiments and ideals of the people. The holy men of
+India,--the ecclesiastics,--by their conservatism, have lost all
+influence over the many thousands who have passed through the
+universities, and who represent the intelligence, culture, and
+advancing power of India.
+
+It is no empty boast to claim that our mission schools and colleges
+have had a conspicuous share in this work of enlightenment, and in the
+transformation of popular and fundamental thoughts and sentiments.
+
+The religious unrest of the day is one of the most prominent features
+of this advance. It is true that, during the last few years, there
+passed over India a peculiar wave of religious reaction in favour of
+old Hindu conceptions and ancient rites. But these are entirely the
+result of a new and vigorous, though not sane, patriotism. A loud cry
+of "_Swadesha_" (homeland) has swept over the country. It demands
+affection and acceptance for everything that is of the East, and the
+opposite sentiments for things western. All that is of Hindu origin,
+and everything of eastern aspect, is, for that very reason, regarded
+as sound and delectable. Of course, this reaction has found its widest
+utterances in matters religious; and Hindu men of western culture
+to-day will applaud, though they will _not_ practise, religious
+customs and ideas which were laughed at by their class a quarter of a
+century ago. As a matter of fact, however, this wild Orientalism is a
+thing which should neither be discouraged nor condemned. It needs
+balance and sanity; but it is a true expression of the awakened
+self-assertion and the dawning sense of liberty among the people. In
+time, the movement will become chastened, and will throw off much of
+its present folly. It will then render for India and its redemption
+more than anything else has in the past.
+
+In the meanwhile, however, there is a quiet revolution, both religious
+and social, doing its blessed work in all sections of the community.
+
+New religious organizations have sprung into existence and are winning
+followers among the best members of the community. The Brahmo Somaj
+and various other Somajes furnish, as we have seen, asylum and rest
+for many men of culture who have abandoned polytheism and all that
+pertains to it. The Arya Somaj appeals to, and gathers in, men from
+all ranges.
+
+Social reform has its organizations and its gatherings all over the
+land where the Hindu orator finds abundant opportunity to denounce the
+social evils which are a curse to all the people; and, alas! then
+returns to his home, where he meekly submits to these same social
+tyrannies which dominate his own family. What India needs to-day, more
+than anything else, is even a small band of men who are imbued with
+convictions and who are willing to die for the same. India's
+redemption will be nigh when it can furnish a few thousand such men
+banded together to _do_ something or to _die_ in the cause of reform.
+
+It is Protestantism which has laid growing emphasis upon the ethical,
+rather than the ecclesiastical, aspect of our faith; and to this fact
+can be attributed most of its influence in the development of this new
+life and thought.
+
+Of course, the British government has politically and socially
+represented and promoted these ideas. It could not do otherwise and be
+true to its own principles. Its influence has been the most pervasive
+and marked in the development of what is best in thought and truest in
+life.
+
+Perhaps no change has overtaken Protestant missions during these two
+centuries greater than that which has transformed the missionaries
+themselves. There is a wide gulf between Ziegenbalg and Carey. There
+is a still wider one between the Carey of a century ago and his
+great-grandson who is a missionary in North India to-day. In devotion
+and zeal for the Master, they are all one; but in their conception of
+Christianity, of Hinduism, and of the missionary motive, they are
+much wider apart than many imagine.
+
+It should also be remembered that Protestant missionaries, as a body,
+are no longer isolated from each other and animated by mutual
+suspicions and impelled by petty jealousies, as in the past. Their
+development in amity, comity, and organized fellowship, even during
+the last decade, is marvellous. Federation and organic ecclesiastical
+union are becoming the order of the day. Four denominations of America
+and Scotland are now perfecting such a scheme in South India; and this
+is only the beginning of an ever expanding movement for Christian
+fellowship all over the land. No one knows what grand results it will
+achieve. We all know, however, that the fraternal regard, sympathy,
+and confidence is far removed from the sad divisiveness of the past,
+that it is pregnant with blessing in the coming of the Kingdom of God,
+and that it is far in advance of the spirit of union which prevails in
+England or America. In this we believe that the East is to open the
+way for the West.
+
+These and many other facts encourage those who look to the speedy
+Christianizing of this land. And yet we cannot, I repeat, ignore the
+fact of the relative meagreness of the results. It is a sad truth
+that the total Protestant Indian community, at the present time, is
+only one three-hundredth part of the population!
+
+I would not be pessimistic, however, even in this matter of numerical
+growth. In the past, we have too much made a fetich of figures, and
+our faith has been too much pinned to statistics.
+
+But the lessons of history must be well learned and thoroughly
+digested, if the future of Christianity is to improve upon her past in
+India. For, be it remembered, Christianity never met with so doughty a
+foe as that which confronts it in this land. The ancient faiths of
+Greece and Rome, which Christianity overcame, were infantile and
+imbecile as compared with the subtle wisdom and the mighty resistance
+of Brahmanism. The conditions of the conflict in India are different
+from those ever met before by our militant faith. The subtle and
+deadening philosophy of the land, the haughty pride of its religious
+leaders, the great inertia of the people, the mighty tyranny of caste,
+the debasing ritual of Hinduism and its debauching idolatry,--all
+these constitute a resisting fortress whose overthrow seems all but
+impossible.
+
+
+II
+
+And yet I strongly believe in the ultimate triumph of our faith in
+India. Under God this mighty fortress of Hinduism will capitulate. Nor
+do I think that the day of Christian dominance is so far away as many
+missionaries are inclined to think. There is an accumulation of forces
+and a multiplication of spiritual powers which are now operating in
+behalf of our faith and against the ancestral religion of India, such
+as will work wonders in the future religious development of the land.
+But this conquest of our faith will not be that which too many of us
+are wont to anticipate and to pray for. The religious forms of life
+and of thought, which we of the West have inherited and in whose
+environment we have grown up, we have come to identify with the
+_essence_ of our religion; and it seems all but impossible for us to
+think of a Christianity apart from these outward forms. I believe that
+there is to be a rude awakening for our children and grandchildren, if
+not for ourselves, in this matter.
+
+The western _type_ of Christianity will not survive the conflict in
+India. Western modes of thought and forms of belief will be supplanted
+by those better suited to the land. Occidental doctrines and aspects
+of our faith will give way to those conceived from the Oriental
+standpoint. I believe, for instance, that the most mischievous
+doctrine of pantheism will surrender its elements of truth (for it has
+an important admixture of truth) to the formation of a new conception
+of God, which will appeal to and captivate the Indian mind and heart.
+Indeed, we are witnessing, this very day, even in the far West, the
+influence of India in her monistic overemphasis upon the divine
+immanence, working toward a new Christian conception of God. Modern
+interchange of thought is thus giving to India, even in America, her
+influence in the shaping of modern belief. And if it be thus in
+matters of fundamental belief, much more will it be so in matters of
+outward expression and in the unessential forms of Christian truth.
+Some of us of the West are seeing increasingly the serious incongruity
+which exists between our way of thinking and of putting our thought
+into living form, and the way of the people about us. And we are not
+convinced, as we perhaps once were, that it is the obtuseness, or the
+religious perversity, of the Indian mind which is the cause of this.
+The sooner the better we realize that between the people of the East
+and of the West there is a wide mental gulf which may, indeed, by our
+associating together, be narrowed, but never eliminated. And the
+outward type of Christianity, after western pressure has been taken
+away from this land, will depend upon the mental make-up and peculiar
+spiritual aspect of the Indian Christian. And until he is able to
+furnish and to enforce this, which I call the Oriental type of
+Christianity, he will never be able to make his faith appeal to his
+brothers, and to make it an indigenous faith in India.
+
+Nor do I think that the Christianity which is to prevail in India will
+be encased in the present ecclesiasticism which assumes and claims
+monopoly of our faith. I can conceive the possibility of there being a
+vast amount of Christianity--a living and a self-propagating
+Christianity--outside the pale of organized and institutional
+Christianity in India. It is so in the West to-day. The organized
+churches of the West have within themselves an ever diminishing
+portion of the vital Christian life and aspirations of the country.
+Christianity has overleapt ecclesiastic bounds. Its spirit is
+overflowing, in living streams, into the life of a thousand
+organizations which are altruistic and philanthropic, outside the
+limits of ecclesiastical Christianity. It will be so in India, and
+throughout the world. And the Christian Church must take this into
+account and shape its policy accordingly.
+
+However this may be, East Indians will increasingly claim, as the
+Japanese are now claiming, the right to decide for themselves the
+forms of polity and the types of ritual which they will choose and
+cultivate as their own.
+
+I do not say, of course, that the present forms will be entirely
+discarded. But they will be so modified and supplemented that they
+will present an ecclesiastical type of their own.
+
+And why should they not, if our faith is to fit well the Oriental
+mind, and is to become a gracious power in its life? The growing
+opposition among the educated men of India, at the present time, is
+not really antagonism to Christianity itself, but to its western garb
+and spirit. And there is much reason for this attitude of mind.
+Conciliation and adaptation has not been the characteristic of the
+mind of the West in presenting its faith to the East. This did not
+make so much difference, so long as the Indian was submissive and had
+not waked up to the spirit of self-assertion. But to-day, when that
+spirit is so rampant, and when a new nationalism and a half-spurious
+patriotism glories in everything eastern and is annoyed by all that
+is western, the matter of adaptation has become all-important.
+
+The relative barrenness of our faith during past centuries in India
+was largely, if not entirely, due to its foreign ecclesiastical forms
+and its shibboleths pronounced in foreign tongues. The Christianity of
+the future in India must breathe of the spirit, and speak forth in the
+language and life, of the people.
+
+I am inclined to believe that the battle cry of the Christian Church
+will soon be lost in the ever swelling tide of enthusiasm for the
+Kingdom of God. Christians will seek less to promote this or that
+denomination, and more and more to cause to come in power the Kingdom
+of Heaven. And India is a land which will lend itself very readily to
+this transfer of emphasis. There is much in the mystical type of the
+Hindu mind that leads us to anticipate preeminence for India in this
+change of emphasis from outward organization to deep-working spiritual
+forces and realities.
+
+India, which has been the most prolific land in giving birth to
+religions, and in being at present the asylum of all the great faiths
+of the world, will not be slow to give to Christianity that form and
+aspect which will most please her.
+
+It is therefore important that all the Christian leaders of India
+should not only take note of these facts, but should also do their
+utmost to help in the desired consummation, and make Christianity in
+India a faith that will appeal to every man and woman in the land.
+
+
+III
+
+The conquest of our faith in India will be not the less, but the more,
+thorough, because it will be not only of the letter but also and
+chiefly of the spirit.
+
+There are a few things which are fundamental to our faith, and which
+will become the universal and permanent possession of India.
+
+1. The spirit and principles of Christianity will prevail and will
+dominate the land. Christian, as distinct from Hindu, principles are
+already making wonderful headway in the country. Many new institutions
+have been organized in the land, whose principles are those of Christ,
+and not of Manu. Even the oldest institutions of the country are
+becoming affected by the desire to appear modern, which really means
+an ambition to introduce Christian methods and principles. Educated
+Hindus, especially, add to this the peculiar weakness of interpreting
+things Hindu by a Christian terminology. The philosophy which they
+have imbibed and the standpoint to which they have been accustomed are
+western and, chiefly, Christian. So that when they study their own
+faith they do so with these Christian prepossessions; and even when
+they defend their ancestral religion, they really defend not the
+indigenous product of India, such as is taught by the Hindu pandit and
+believed by the mass of the people, but Hinduism Christianized and
+clothed in the garb of the West and spoken in the accents of a
+Christian.
+
+Hindu Swamis, who have been educated in Christian mission schools, and
+have spent a few years in the far West, surrounded by a Christian
+atmosphere, imbibing Christian sentiments, and unconsciously adopting
+the Christian viewpoint, return to India upon a wave of popular
+excitement and give public addresses and receive the plaudits of their
+grateful countrymen. But what is it that such men as Vivekananda and
+Abhedananda, and all the rest of the _Ananda_ tribe, teach upon their
+return to India? It is certainly not an orthodox Hinduism, nor is it
+the pure philosophy of the East. It is rather a strange compound in
+which Christianity figures as prominently as does Hinduism, and,
+perhaps, more conspicuously. What was the caste system recently
+enunciated by Abhedananda in Madras? It is certainly not a thing
+known in India by that name. And I have no doubt that his whole
+audience smiled when he presented his conception of a caste system so
+foreign to all Hindu ideas and practice. It is just so with his
+Vedantism, and with his interpretation of all the religious teachings
+of this land. They are now construed in terms foreign to the rishi and
+to the pandit. But (and this the point I wish to emphasize) these
+interpretations meet increasingly with the applause and acceptance of
+educated Hindu audiences. In other words, a Christian colouring and
+glamour thrown over Hinduism is adding to its popularity in the land.
+
+In the general way of looking at religious things, and especially of
+apprehending religious thought, there is to-day almost as wide a gulf
+between the educated and cultured Hindu, on the one hand, and the
+authorized religious instructors of India, on the other, as there is
+between the same learned man of the East and the thoughtful man of the
+West.
+
+Or, if we look at the multiplying institutions of the country, which
+truly represent the thoughts and sentiments of the leading people of
+India, we can easily see that they are imbued with non-Hindu, if not
+anti-Hindu, ideas and motives. The various Somajes and other religious
+movements, which mean so much in the life of India to-day, are more or
+less an endeavour to interpret life from a non-Hindu standpoint, which
+often means a Christian standpoint. In any case, the religious reform
+movements of India at the present time breathe largely the spirit of
+rebellion against old Hindu conceptions.
+
+When we think of such important movements as that of Social Reform, we
+can see the spirit of Christianity completely dominant, and in sharp
+antithesis to Hindu teaching and ritual. The Social Reform movement in
+India is the spirit of Christianity, trying to express itself with as
+little offence as possible to orthodox Hinduism, and yet constantly
+antagonizing its deepest principles and eating into its very vitals.
+
+The two forces which, next to direct Christian effort, do most for the
+promulgation of Christian principles in this land, are the public
+schools and the government itself. The educational system which now
+prevails, and which is growing in power, is distinctly a promoter of
+Christian thought and principle. We often call these schools godless;
+but we do them an injustice. Their work may be largely negative; but
+their teaching turns the mind of the young away from the silly
+superstitions and the absurd practices of popular Hinduism, and
+establishes modern conceptions, which, indeed, are Christian
+conceptions of life and of conduct.
+
+The government is, in an important sense, established upon Christian
+principles; and in all its administrative processes exemplifies the
+Christian, as distinct from the Hindu and Brahmanic, view of justice
+and of right conduct; so that, if one were able to perceive clearly
+the spiritual forces at work in the institutional and social life of
+India, he would see not only that the foundation, but also that
+largely the superstructure, is becoming Christian in its character.
+
+2. In the second place, the Christ Ideal of Life is acquiring ever
+increasing attraction and power in the land. India has never possessed
+an incarnated ideal of her own. No god in all her pantheon, and not
+one among all her noble sages, has ever posed before the followers of
+Hinduism, or has ever been thought of by Hindu devotees, as the
+exemplar of men and the ideal of human life. To many thousands who are
+outward members of the Hindu faith, and who would not dream of being
+baptized into institutional Christianity, Jesus Christ has become the
+Ideal of Life. He represents to them that moral type of perfection
+and ethical nobility of manhood to which they daily aspire. Krishna
+may be praised by the millions, notwithstanding his immoralities; and
+Rama may be extolled and even loved for his limited virtue; Yudhistra
+may be called "Dharman," notwithstanding his unrighteous passion for
+the dice. But Christ only, in the eyes of modern educated India,
+stands the perfect test of character. All over the land, Hindus of
+culture, of serious thought, and of ambition to reach after high
+ethical standards see in Jesus Christ the only inspiration and
+immaculate example of life that all history, myth, and legend present.
+And there is not a town in India to-day where there are not found
+these men of power and influence who are studying eagerly the life of
+Jesus, are pondering over the Gospel narratives; and are reading such
+books of Christian devotion as Thomas a Kempis's "Imitation of
+Christ." This last-named book is now being translated by a Brahman
+gentleman, a friend of the writer, and published by a Hindu firm for
+its Hindu readers! I have known such men for many years, and am
+assured that their tribe is increasing; they are men who for the first
+time have found the deepest yearnings of their soul answered in the
+example of Jesus.
+
+Ask any of them for their reason, and they will tell you that Christ
+is of the East, like themselves, and that His example appeals to them
+with unique power.
+
+In India, the ideal of life has been one of restraint. Starting with
+the conviction that human life is an unmixed evil, the restraint of
+passion and the elimination of every human emotion (the best as well
+as the worst) has been to the Hindu the goal and consummation of life.
+Nothing can be more inadequate than this; and the Hindu is beginning
+to feel it. Jesus represents Culture _and_ Restraint. With him the
+restraint of the lower passions is with a view to the culture of the
+higher. The man of sin must die, that the man of God may live and
+prosper. This is the Christ ideal, as opposed to the Brahmanic. And
+the leaven of this ideal of life is spreading all over India and is
+transforming the aspirations of millions. There is nothing more
+inspiring or comforting than the assurance which we have that the
+Christ life is becoming the dominant ideal among the classes of India,
+as it is to a less degree among the masses.
+
+A Brahman gentleman had the presumption to say to me, recently, that
+he and his fellow-Brahmans and other Hindus were able to understand
+the Christ much better than we of the West. He also claimed that they
+could understand the deep significance and the delicate shading of
+His thought better than we who are not of the East, like them. As a
+man who had taught and had tried to live the Christ in this land for
+more than a quarter of a century, I smiled at the audacity of his
+remark. And yet I knew that that man had visions of Christ that I had
+not; and that he has a fondness for Thomas a Kempis's book, beyond,
+perhaps, what I myself possess. There are aspects of the teaching and
+of the life of Jesus which appeal more powerfully to his Oriental and
+deeply mystical nature than they can possibly to the minds of all
+western men. Of one thing, however, I am assured; namely, that there
+is a growing host of Hindus in high position, and in low, who are
+enamoured of that ideal of life which our Lord taught and exemplified;
+and the fact that they interpret that life differently from myself
+causes me less sorrow than it does a desire to understand better their
+standpoint of appreciation.
+
+3. I believe also that the Incarnation of our Lord, in its uniqueness
+and supreme power as the true manifestation of God, is finding rapidly
+increasing appreciation among the people of India.
+
+India is the land of a myriad incarnations. The doctrine has run to
+seed, as it were, among this people. They are burdened with the excess
+of their eagerness to find God, and with their manifold imagination
+in giving Him form and earthly existence. There is no doctrine in
+Hinduism which has been carried to such a _reductio ad absurdum_.
+
+Hindus to-day would gladly accept Christ as one of Vishnu's
+incarnations, if Christians would permit. I am not sure but that the
+tenth incarnation of Vishnu was meant to represent Christ. In any
+case, their growing familiarity with Him is gradually creating in
+their minds a disgust with the monstrosities of their own
+incarnations. Many of them are learning that God's Incarnation in
+Christ is the only one which has "descended" to the earth for the
+spiritual uplifting and redemption of our race; and, therefore, that
+it is the only incarnation which has within itself the seed of
+permanence and of universality. The petty, grotesque, and local
+"descents" of India will satisfy no one in these days of growing
+breadth and union, when the people are aspiring after an all-India
+nationality.
+
+In Christ only is India finding the perfect revelation of God, because
+He alone revealed Him as the Father of boundless love; God, the Father
+of all men, loving them with an infinite passion and seeking them even
+unto death,--that is the message of the Christian Incarnation. And
+how strangely does it contrast with the moral obliquity and selfish
+indifference to human interest which characterize Hindu incarnations!
+In Christ do we find that God is the ever present, personal, loving
+Father, seeking to bring home again His lost children. He is supremely
+just and holy as Ruler and Provider; but His justice and holiness are
+illumined and transfused by His love. And as the Eternal Spirit He is
+striving in the hearts of men to bring them to Himself. This is the
+incarnation which is gaining ever increasing power in this land and
+whose worship is spreading from Cape Comorin to the Himalayas.
+
+4. The cross of Christ will be accepted in India as the highest
+expression of God's love to man.
+
+It is true that, among many Hindus to-day, as among the Greeks and
+Jews of old, the cross of Christ is an offence and a stumbling-block.
+The idea of vicarious atonement runs counter to the long-cherished
+doctrine of _Karma_. And it is possible that the universal prevalence
+of the _Karma_ doctrine in the land will give to the doctrine of
+atonement the same one-sided aspect which it has obtained among many
+Christians of the West, in the present day, whereby the element of
+vicariousness, or its God-ward efficiency, has been considerably
+eliminated. They may remain content to consider the cross merely as a
+supreme manifestation of love, as that part of the divine example
+which has infinite power to attract men toward the highest life of
+lowest service and self-effacement. However this may be, at present,
+the cross in India has more significance than the trident to the
+Hindu. And the language of the cross appeals with increasing force to
+all men of thought. And I am encouraged to think that the modern
+commendable habit, among educated Hindus, of harking back to the
+oldest and the best of their religious writings, may carry India away
+again from its emphasis upon _Karma_ to the original, pre-Buddhistic
+idea of vicariousness, when, for instance, in the _Purusha Suktha_ of
+the Rig Veda, the _Purusha_ is represented as being sacrificed by the
+gods. In the _Brahmanas_, also, it is said that the _Prajabathi_
+sacrificed himself in behalf of the gods.
+
+Indeed, it has been well said that the doctrine of _Karma_ itself, as
+connected with the doctrine of transmigration, carries within itself a
+strong element of vicariousness; since the person suffering in this
+birth knows nothing of the experiences of a supposed previous birth,
+and is, therefore, suffering for a past of which he is ignorant and
+for which his conscience cannot hold him responsible.
+
+5. I believe, also, that the Christian conception of sin is gaining
+ever widening acceptance in India and will ultimately prevail as
+against the Hindu idea.
+
+The doctrine of atonement and the doctrine of sin are intimately
+related; where the atonement is ignored or slighted, the conception of
+sin is apt to lose its ethical content and to become formal. India,
+through Buddha, abandoned, largely, its long-cherished principle of
+vicariousness and the multiplicity of its sacrifices. The consequence
+has been the gradual emasculation of the principle of atonement, until
+the word has become emptied of content and degraded so as to mean only
+the eating of a filthy pill because of a certain ceremonial
+uncleanness, which all the best people of the land know to be no
+uncleanness whatever.
+
+It is natural, under these circumstances, to see the idea of sin also
+cease to have reference to moral obliquity and violation of ethical
+principles, and to refer only to intellectual blindness and (more
+commonly) to ceremonial laxness and ritualistic malfeasance. It is not
+surprising, therefore, that under this double departure from the
+truth, conscience should have lost its place of importance and of
+authority to so large an extent in this land.
+
+But the day of better things has dawned upon India. The ethical
+concept and the moral significance of life are beginning to grip India
+very thoroughly. And I believe that the day will soon come when sin
+will cease to be connected with intellectual delusion and ignorance,
+and also with ceremonial irregularity, and will be recognized in its
+true moral hideousness as a thing of will, and not of intellect, a
+thing of deepest life, and not of puerile ritual.
+
+Thus, with the coming of Christ and the emphasis of western thought
+and western civilization upon moral integrity and nobility of
+character, there is growing also a vision of sin in its right colour
+and perspective. The gradual training of the people in British law and
+in the social ethics of the West, and in the true meaning of the
+righteousness of the Kingdom of God as promulgated by the Christian
+faith, will, erelong, drive out the old pantheistic idea proclaimed by
+Vivekananda, when he said that the only sin that man was capable of
+was the sin of regarding himself as a sinner! It will also make it
+impossible for murderers to excuse themselves, as one did recently to
+our knowledge, as he was led to be executed, by saying that it was not
+he, but the god within him, that slew the man!
+
+India is really passing through a quiet, but, nevertheless, a mighty
+ethical revolution. Its fundamental principles of morality and of
+religion, as the interpreters of life, are being rapidly transformed.
+Christianity is sowing everywhere its seed of life and of character,
+as they are exemplified in the perfect life of Jesus, and are
+elaborated in the four Gospels, in comparison with which the message
+of the four Vedas and of all subsequent Hindu literature is but as the
+dark and feeble groping of the blind after light.
+
+These, then, are the five fundamental aspects of our faith which are
+among the eternal verities and which have come to India smiling with
+the impress of universality, and which are finding gradual acceptance
+in all portions of the land. These represent what one has aptly called
+"Substantive Christianity," as distinct from "Adjectival
+Christianity," which men are prone to overemphasize and to exalt unto
+the heavens. This latter we may love and cherish and promote with all
+our hearts; but it is sectional, partial, and transitory. The former,
+on the other hand, is abiding, and will shine throughout the ages of
+eternity. It will grow in influence and increase in its prevalence
+throughout this land until we all can say, with the late Chunder Sen,
+and with much more assurance than he, "None but Jesus is worthy to
+wear this diadem, India; and He shall have it."
+
+
+
+
+INDEX
+
+
+Abhedhananda Swami, 431.
+
+Abul Fazli, 311.
+
+Agra, 42, 308.
+
+Akbar the Great, 50, 311.
+
+Aligharh College, 331.
+
+Allah Upanishad, 319.
+
+Almsgiving in Islam, 324.
+
+Altruism in Hinduism, 183.
+
+Amritsar, 61.
+
+Amritsar District, 335.
+
+Animism, 210.
+
+Arjuna and his Vision, 154, 161.
+
+Arnold, Sir Edwin, 49.
+
+Aryans and Caste, 94.
+
+Aryans of the East and the West, 23.
+
+Arya Somaj, 400-404.
+
+Asceticism, the Way of, 171, 215, 228.
+
+Asia, the Mother of Faiths, 344.
+
+Asoka's Pillar, 57.
+
+Astrologer, 251.
+
+Astrology, 217, 299.
+
+Athi Somaj, 383.
+
+Atma Doctrine, 167.
+
+Atma Sabha, 380.
+
+Aurangzeeb, 307, 312.
+
+Auspicious Days, 218, 299.
+
+Avidia, 170, 223.
+
+
+Bande Mataram, 3.
+
+Baptist, Americans, 84.
+
+Barber's Wife, Midwife, 271.
+
+Barrows, Dr. J. H., 126.
+
+Beatitudes, the, 369.
+
+Beef Eating, 126.
+
+Benares, 66.
+
+Bengal, Partition of, 2.
+
+Bengalees and Caste, 145.
+
+Besant, Mrs., 406, 409.
+
+Bhagavad Gita, 152, 189.
+
+Bhagavad Gita and Bhakti, 182.
+
+Bhakti, 181.
+
+Blavatsky, Madame, 405.
+
+Boh Tree, the, 368.
+
+Bombay, 39.
+
+Boycott, 2.
+
+Brahma, 279.
+
+Brahma Gnana, 170, 223.
+
+Brahmo Somaj, 380-400.
+
+Buddha, 227.
+
+Buddha and "Saint Josaphat," 341.
+
+Buddhism, 69.
+
+Buddhism isolated, 375.
+
+Burma's Produce, 73.
+
+Burmese Women, 80.
+
+
+Calcutta University, 6.
+
+Caste and Commerce, 134.
+
+Caste and Contact, 109.
+
+Caste and Inter-dining, 107.
+
+Caste and Intermarriage, 105.
+
+Caste and its Results, 129.
+
+Caste and Totemism, 114.
+
+Caste and Occupation, 98, 112.
+
+Caste Decadence, 144.
+
+Caste Penalties, 115.
+
+Caste System, 17, 22, 91-151, 177, 199.
+
+Caste unknown in Burma, 84.
+
+Census, 313.
+
+Census on Caste, 96.
+
+Chaitanya, 377.
+
+Chakkerbutty, Professor, 259.
+
+Characterization of Caste, 102.
+
+Child Marriage, 214, 260.
+
+Chinese, 109, 284.
+
+Christ and Buddha, 338-373.
+
+Christ Ideal, 434-437.
+
+Christ Incarnation, 225, 437.
+
+Christ, the Cross of, 439.
+
+_Christian College Magazine_, 202.
+
+Christian Effort for Mohammedans, 333.
+
+Christianity and Caste, 149.
+
+Christianity--its Progress in India, 412-443.
+
+Chunder Sen, Keshub, 382.
+
+Civilization, Western, 7.
+
+Cleanliness of Hindus, 267.
+
+Clothing, Hindu, 268.
+
+Congress, National, 8.
+
+Contradictions in Bhagavad Gita, 187.
+
+Cooch Behar, Maharajah, 384.
+
+Crossing Theory of Caste, 100.
+
+Culinary Arrangements in Hindu Home, 268.
+
+Cycles of Hindu Time, 286.
+
+
+Dalhousie, Lord, 210.
+
+Dancing Girls, 106, 212.
+
+Dante's Inferno, 206, 212, 357.
+
+Debendra, Nath, 381.
+
+Dedication of a House, 244.
+
+Delhi, 53, 308.
+
+Deportation, 20.
+
+Detachment, 179.
+
+Devil Worship, 206.
+
+Dharma, 346.
+
+Dowry and Marriage, 260.
+
+Dravidians and Caste, 101.
+
+Dravidians and Devil Worship, 34.
+
+Durgai Pujei, 315.
+
+Dutch Conquest, 38.
+
+Dayanand Saraswati, 400.
+
+
+Eclecticism, 156.
+
+Education, 6.
+
+Educational Works of Protestants, 414.
+
+Eliot, George, 372.
+
+Epicure, Hindu, 268.
+
+Eschatology of Hindu Shastras, 185.
+
+Evolutionist, 196.
+
+
+Fate, Doctrine of, 329.
+
+Fetichism, 209.
+
+Financial Statement, 13.
+
+Fish Incarnation, 226.
+
+Frazer, J. G., 114.
+
+Fuller, Sir Bampfylde, 18.
+
+Funeral Ceremonies, 272.
+
+Furniture of a Home, 245.
+
+
+Ganesh, 201.
+
+Golden Temple, 65.
+
+Government and Caste, 148.
+
+Greek Images, 200.
+
+Greeks, 276.
+
+Grierson, Dr., 319.
+
+Guru Kula, 403.
+
+
+Hindu Architecture, 33.
+
+Hinduism amorphous, 194.
+
+Hinduism, Higher, 106, 190.
+
+Hinduism, Popular, 190-219.
+
+"Hindus as they are," 243, 257.
+
+Hindus not Historians, 282.
+
+Home Life of Hindus, 242-275.
+
+Horoscope, 261.
+
+House Building, 243.
+
+
+Ibbetson, Sir Denzil, on Caste, 97.
+
+Ideal, Divine, in Hinduism, 223.
+
+Ideals, Hindu Religious, 220.
+
+Idolatry, 176.
+
+Idol whipped, 176, 205.
+
+Iliad, 153.
+
+Imaduddin, Dr., 335.
+
+Immorality in Hinduism, 210.
+
+Incarnation, Hindu and Christian, 163, 200, 225.
+
+India, the Mother of Faiths, 30.
+
+Irrawaddy River, 72.
+
+Islam and Caste, 325.
+
+Islam in India, 302-337.
+
+Islam, its History in India, 305.
+
+Islam Purists, 327.
+
+Islam Unitarian, 309.
+
+
+Jainism, 41.
+
+Japan, 2.
+
+Japan's Victory, 5.
+
+Japanese, 197.
+
+Jesus an Asiatic, 394.
+
+Jesus and the Pharisees, 348, 351.
+
+Jewels, Love of, 285.
+
+Jews of Cochin, 38.
+
+Jogendra Nath Bhattacharya, 130.
+
+Joint Family System, 246.
+
+
+Kali, 195.
+
+Kali Yuga, 276-301.
+
+Karens, 85.
+
+Karma, Doctrine of, 359.
+
+Kauravas, 154.
+
+Kipling, Rudyard, 21.
+
+Knowledge, the Way of, 169.
+
+Kohinoor Diamond, 50.
+
+Ko San Ye, 87.
+
+Krishna, 155, 165, 195, 291.
+
+Kuruchetra, 154.
+
+
+Lala Lajpat Rai, 20.
+
+Laws abolishing Hindu Rites, 419.
+
+Legislative Councils--Enlargement of, 28.
+
+Length of Hindu Time System, 277.
+
+Liberation, Doctrine of, 169.
+
+
+Madura--its Temple and Palace, 32.
+
+Madwachariar, 377.
+
+Mahabharata, 153.
+
+Maha Yuga, 279.
+
+Mandalay, 78.
+
+Manu, 281.
+
+Marriage not a Sentiment, 260.
+
+"Masters" of Theosophy, 409.
+
+Metempsychosis, 236.
+
+Moderates, the, 10.
+
+Modern Religious Movements, 374-411.
+
+Mohammedan Loyalty, 15.
+
+Mohammedan Population, 302.
+
+Mohammedanism, 42, 140, 302-337.
+
+Moral Character of Time, 292.
+
+Mother-in-Law, 264.
+
+Mourning in a Hindu Home, 272.
+
+Mozumdar, Protab, 386-391.
+
+Mutiny, the, 1.
+
+
+Nana Sahib, 107.
+
+Nanak Shah, 319, 378.
+
+Natesa Sastri, Pundit, 293.
+
+Native Doctors, 270.
+
+New Dispensation, 399.
+
+New Dispensation's Creed, 396.
+
+
+Obscenity, Law punishing, 210.
+
+Occupational Theory of Caste, 98.
+
+Odyssey, the, 153.
+
+Olcott, Colonel, 405, 408.
+
+Omens, 217.
+
+"Oriental Christ," 391.
+
+Origin of Caste, 93.
+
+Outcastes of Panjamas, 208.
+
+
+Pagoda, the Land of the, 73.
+
+Pal, Bepin Chandra, 12.
+
+Pandavas, 154.
+
+Pan Islamic Movement, 332.
+
+Panjaub--its Difficulty, 18.
+
+Pantheism, 160.
+
+Pariahs and Hindus, 209.
+
+Parliament, Members of, 7.
+
+Parsees, 40.
+
+Pax Britannica, 312.
+
+Pessimism, Hindu, 217.
+
+Plutscho, Rev., 412.
+
+Polygamy of Mohammedans, 320.
+
+Polytheism, 199.
+
+Prakriti, 159.
+
+Prayaschitta, 120.
+
+Press in India, the, 11, 21.
+
+Prosperity in India, 14.
+
+Protestantism and Caste, 143.
+
+Protestantism, its Bicentenary, 412.
+
+Protestant Missionary Force, 414.
+
+Proverbs about Women, 253.
+
+Puranas, 156, 277.
+
+
+Quietism, 233.
+
+Quran, the, 318.
+
+
+Rahu Kala, 300.
+
+Railroads and Caste, 147.
+
+Rajputana Mohammedans, 316.
+
+Ramachandra, 281.
+
+Ramayana, 157, 281.
+
+Ram Mohun Roy, 379.
+
+Rangoon, 72.
+
+Religious Theory of Caste, 95.
+
+Renunciation, 233.
+
+Revenue of Government, 13.
+
+Rishis, 295.
+
+Risley, Sir H., on Caste, 102.
+
+Robson, Dr., 322.
+
+Romish Missionaries, 284.
+
+
+Sadharana Somaj, 385.
+
+Sadhus, 215.
+
+Saivites, 158.
+
+Sakti Worship, 212.
+
+Salvation in Hinduism, 184.
+
+Sarnath, 69.
+
+Sati, 255-257.
+
+Sayuchya, 171, 229.
+
+Schools and Caste, 148.
+
+Schwey Dagon, 74.
+
+Sedition, 12.
+
+Shah Jehan, 45, 307.
+
+Sham, a Huge, 232.
+
+Shiahs, 327.
+
+Shradda, 273.
+
+Sidhartthan, 342.
+
+Sikhs and their Faith, 62, 319.
+
+Sin, Christian Conception of, 441.
+
+Site of a House, 243.
+
+Siva's Trident, 300.
+
+Sleeping on the Floor, 246.
+
+Social Reform, 26, 98, 419.
+
+Social Theory of Caste, 97.
+
+Soothsayers, 97, 251.
+
+South India Islam, 317.
+
+Statistics of Indian Faiths, 31.
+
+Sunnis, 327.
+
+Superstitions of Islam, 315.
+
+Swadesha, 420.
+
+Swami, Hindu, 198.
+
+Sword of Islam, 306.
+
+Syrian Church, 34, 140, 412.
+
+
+Tantras, 156.
+
+Taxation in India, 14.
+
+Temple Cars, 211.
+
+Theebaw, 79.
+
+Theism, 378.
+
+Theism unsatisfying, 398.
+
+Theosophical Society, 404-411.
+
+Thomasians, 35.
+
+Totemism and Caste, 114.
+
+Towers of Silence, 40.
+
+Transmigration, 362.
+
+Travancore, the Land of Charity, 34.
+
+Travancore Maharajah, 111.
+
+Travel in India, 31.
+
+Tribal Theory of Caste, 96.
+
+Triumph of Christianity, 425.
+
+Triumph of Christian Principles, 430.
+
+
+Ultimate Salvation in Hinduism, 235.
+
+Universities and Politics, 20.
+
+University Graduates, 6.
+
+Usury, 323.
+
+
+Vaishnava Cult, 158.
+
+Vedantic Philosophy, 156.
+
+Vishnu, 279.
+
+Visishdadvaitha, 376.
+
+Vivekananda, Swami, 126, 431.
+
+
+Western Christianity inadequate, 240.
+
+Western Medical Science, 271.
+
+Wherry, Dr., 311.
+
+Widows, Hindu, 213, 263.
+
+Williams, Sir Monier, 321.
+
+Women in Hinduism, 213, 252.
+
+Works, Doctrine of, 174.
+
+
+Yama, 257.
+
+Yoga Philosophy, 156, 172.
+
+
+Ziegenbalg, 412.
+
+ * * * * *
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's India, Its Life and Thought, by John P. Jones
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