Great Indian Questions of the Day. .No. 8.
THE. CALL
OF
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
TO
AWAKENED INDIA:
" KINO OUT THE FALSE: IHNG IX THE TRUE."
" Awake ! Awake ! and stop not till the goal is reached."
Katlia Upan. I. iii. 4.
An appeal to Educated Hindus to give up Injurious Customs and
Religious Errors, changing the Kali Yuga into the Satya Yuga.
BY
JOHN MURDOCH, LL.D.
S'lHfetJlilJfTIONj #,.090 COPIES.
THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE SOCIETY FOR INDIA :
LONDON AND MADRAS.
1 9 0 '2 .
PREFATORY NOTE.
The Compiler will be glad of any suggestions for the
improvement of this pamphlet ; but he hopes that the motto will
be taken up by an Indian Luther, who will sound a trumpet
call throughout the length and breadth of the land.
" Ring out the False; ring in the True."
CONTENTS.
Page
INTRODUCTION ... ... ... ... 1
Excellencies and Defects of Hinduism and the
Hindus ... ... ... 3
Truth to he the Grand Aim ... ... ... 5
Causes which have hindered the Progress of Truth in
India ... ... ... 5
Stricter Criteria of Truth the Demand of the
Twentieth Century ... ... ... ... 12
Hinduism makes no distinction between Science and
Religion ... ... ... 12
^LSE BELIEFS AND INJURIOUS CUSTOMS
TO RE RUNG OUT ... ... .. 13
PART I.
RING OUT FALSE SCIENCE AND HISTORY; RING
IN THE TRUE ... ... 13
1. False Geography ... ... ... ... 13
2. False Astronomy ... ... 15
3. False Accounts of the Human Body ... ... 17
4. False History ... ... ... 19
PART II.
RING OUT INJURIOUS CUSTOMS : RING IN USE¬
FUL CHANGES ... ... ... ... 19
1. Ring out Custom; ring in Reason ... 19
2. Ring out the Money-Lender ; ring in the Savings
Bank ... ... ... ... ... 20
3. Ring out Extravagance at Marriages ; ring in Mod¬
erate Expenditure ... ... 22
4. Ring out Indiscriminate Charity ; ring in wise
Benevolence ... ... ... ... 22
5. Ring out Opposition to Sea Voyages ; ring in Free¬
dom of Travel ... ... 24
6. Ring out Early Marriage : ring in Marriage at a
Proper Age ... ... ... ... 25
7. Ring out Female Ignorance ; ring in Female Educa¬
tion ... ... ... 26
8. Ring out the Purdah; ring in due Intercourse ... 28
9. Ring out Widows' Wrongs; ring in Widows'. Rights. 30
10. Ring out Intemperance ; ring in Total Abstinence ... 31
11. Ring out Impurity; ring in Purity ... ... 32
12. Ring out Caste ; ring in the Brotherhood of Man ... 35
iv CONTENTS.
Page
PART III.
KING OUT FALSE BELIEFS IN OCCULT POWERS ;
RING IN TRUE KNOWLEDGE ... 39
1. Ring out the selfish Yogi ; ring in the Bene¬
volent Worker ... ... ... 39
2. Ring out relief in Tapas ; ring in true Self-Sacri¬
fice ... ... ... 41
.3. Ring out belief in Mantras, Charms and pretended
Sciences; ring in trite Knowledge ... ... 44
PART IV.
RING OUT RELIGIOUS ERROR; RING IN RELIG¬
IOUS TRUTH ... ... ... 48
1. Ring out Polytheism; ring in Monotheism ... 48
2. Ring out Pantheism; ring in a Personal God ... 52
3. Ring out Immoral Gods; ring in a God who loves
Righteousness and hates Wickedness 55
4. Ring out Idolatry; ring in God is Spirit ... 57
5. Ring out belief in the Eternity of Souls ; ring
in the Fatherhood of God ... G1
G. Ring out Ceremonialism : ring in Spiritual Wor¬
ship ... ... ... ... ... 65
7. Ring out false Promises regarding the Pardon of
Sin; ring in the True ... GG
8. Ring out Merit; ring in Grace ... .. G9
9. Ring out Fatalism ; ring in Man a Moral Agent ... 70
10. Ring out the Belief that to some Virtue and Vice
are alike j ring in the eternal distinction be¬
tween Right and Wrong ... 74
11. Ring out the Belief that Faith is Sufficient ; ring
in the doctrine that Faith must have a proper
Object ... ... ... ... 75
12. Ring out Religious Intolerance ; ring in Religious
Liberty ... ... .. 7G
13. Ring out Moral Weakness ; ring in Moral
Courage ... ... ... ... 78
CONCLUDING APPEAL TO EDUCATED INDIANS... 80
Supposed Wisdom of the Ancients ... ... 80
Obstacles to Reform ... ... 83
Encouragements ... ... ... ... 84
How to Promote Religious Reform ... 88
APPENDIX: PUBLICATIONS FOR INDIAN READ¬
ERS ... ... ... ... ... 91
THE CALL
OF
THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
TO
AWAKENED INDIA:
" Ring out the false, ring in the true."
INTRODUCTION.
The history of India during the last three thousand years is
a subject of very deep interest. In some respects, it is unique.
Among no other great people of the world can we trace for so
long a period their intellectual growth, and their search after
religious truth.
In certain subjects the Hindus have won a distinguished
place.
In their scientific treatises on Grammar, the Hindus surpassed
all the nations of antiquity. Panini was the most famous Hindu
grammarian, but a long succession of grammarians must have
preceded him. Hunter says, of his work: " The grammar of
Panini stands supreme among the grammars of the world, alike
for its precision of statement, and for its thorough analysis of the
roots of the language and of the formative principles of words."*
The civilized world is indebted to the Hindus for the
invention of the decimal notation, by which calculation has been
so much facilitated. The Hindus were acquainted with certain
proportions of triangles, and the proportion of the radius to the
circumference of a circle which were not known out of India tilt
modern times.
* Hunter's Qazeteer of India, "Vol. VI. p. 100.
•2
the call of the twentieth century.
Arabian writers translated Hindu works on algebra in the
8th century a.ix In trigonometry, too, tire Hindus seem to have
been the earliest teachers.
The works of Charaka and Susruta, the great Indian physi¬
cians, were translated into Arabic in the eighth century by
command of the Kaliphs of Baghdad. European medicine down
to the 17th century, was based upon the Arabic ; and the name
of Charaka repeatedly occurs in the Latin translation of Avicenna.*
Logic was a favourite study, and a number of works were
written on it. The Nyaya of Gotama may be specially mentioned.
India has produced poetical works, like the Sakuntala of
Kaliclasa, which have commanded the admiration of the world.
But all this noble record does not illustrate the main feature
of the Hindu mind. The following remarks are abridged from
a Lecture on " Indian and Greek Systems of Philosophy," by
S. Satthianadhan, Esq., m.a., ll.m., Professor of Mental and
Moral Science, Presidency College, Madras :
") "The Hindu mind, dreamy, mystical, and speculative, with the
' imaginative side more highly developed than the active, has taken a
delight in abstract thought from the very dawn of intellectual conscious¬
ness."
" Indian philosophical literature, moreover, is replete to saturation
with the theory of the misery of life. This also is, to a great extent,
the outcome of national character. The dark side of human life, the
vicissitudes of fortune, the inexplicable dissonance in existence—all
these intrude themselves on the notice of the Indian, and hence his
pessimism."
" No nation, no people under the sun has had the future after death
so constantly before their mind, has been so little wedded to this life
and so intent on their emancipation from it as the Indian ; and it is
this expectation of a renewal of a life of misery, in body after body, in
age after age, and aeon after aeon, and tbe feverish yearning after some
means of extrication from this black prospect that is the first motive to
Indian speculation. ' The sum and substance, it may almost be said, of
1 Indian philosophy,' writes Mr. Gough, ' is, from first to last, the misery
I of metampsychosis and the mode of extrication from it.' "
Every department of science is considered subordinate to
philosophy and theology. Mr. S. Satthianadhan says :
" Take for example the Nydya philosophy, which is the only
system of Indian thought that at first sight appears to have nothing to
do with metaphysics. It contains an elaborate system of logical doctrine;
but. on close inspection it will be found that it is not Logic that it
deals with so much as the Metaphysics of Logic. The Nyaya, just
as the Sankhya on the Vedanta, pronounces beatitude or (nihsreyas) final
excellence and (moksha) deliverance from evil, for a thorough knowledge
* Hunter's Gazeteer of India, Vol. VI. p. 107.
excellencies and defects of hinduism.
3
of truth, viz., the conviction of the soul's eternal existence separable
from the body." p. 3.
There have been great political changes, but the words of the
poet may be applied to India:
" The East bent low before the blast
In patient deep disdain ;
She let the legions thunder past,
And plunged in thought again."
The Hinduism of To-day the subject of Investigation.
The Indian Nation, referring to the Hinduism which Swami
Vivekananda preached in America, says :
" The pure and undefiled Hinduism which the Swami preached
has no existence to-day, has not had existence for centuries, and is at
the present moment only an affair of hooks and not of life, a thing,
therefore, of merely abstract interest. The only Hinduism that it is
practically worth while discussing to-day is sectarian Hinduism. It is
that Hinduism which resents the slaughter of kine, which keeps out
the England-returned Hindu, which proscribes re-marriage of widows
and marriage between different castes, which makes the early marriage
of girls compulsory. It is that Hinduism which is distinct from
Brahmoism. It is the only Hinduism that we can admit to be real."
May 21st, 1894.
EXCELLENCIES AND DEFECTS OF HINDUISM
AND THE HINDUS.
Bishop Caldwell says :
" I recognise also in Hinduism a higher element which I cannot
but regard as divine, struggling with what is earthly and evil in it, or
what is merely human, and though frequently foiled or overborne,
never entirely lost. I trace the operation of this divine element in the
religiousness—the habit of seeing God in all things and all things in
God—which has formed so marked a characteristic of the people of
India in every period of their history. I trace it in the conviction
universally entertained that there is a God, however diversely His
attributes may be conceived, through whom or in whom all things are
believed to have their being. I trace it in the conviction that a religion
—a method of worshipping God—is possible, desirable, necessary. I
trace it in the conviction that man has somehow become sinful and has
separated from God, and that he needs somehow to be freed from sin and
united to God again. But especially I trace it in the conviction I have
found almost universally entertained by thoughtful Hindus, that a
remedy for the ills of life, an explanation of its difficulties and mys¬
teries, and an appointment of a system of means for seeking God's favour
and rising to a higher life—that is, a Veda, a revelation—is to be
expected; nay more, that such a revelation has been given; the only
doubt which suggests itself to the Hindu mind being, whether the
'1
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
Indian Veda is the only true one, or whether God may have given
different revelations of His will to different races ol men at different
times. I trace the same element also in the important place occupied
in Indian classical literature, by moral and religious disquisitions and in
Indian popular literature and common life by moral and religious
maxims."
Excellencies in Hindus,—" I admire much that I see amongst
the people of India. I admire their religiousness, I admire their
temperance, I admire their patience and gentleness and courtesy. I
admire their care of their relations to the farthest remove, and in many
particulars I admire what remains of the primeval framework of
their village system and their social system."
The other side of the Picture.—Eishop Caldwell says :
" If we wish to make ourselves really useful to our people we must
not be content with eulogising what we consider good in them, I'u't must
also endeavour to help them to condemn and reject that which is evil.
There are not a few ol the people of this country who have acquired
sufficient enlightenment to perceive and approve what is good, but
unhappily the same persons are often found too timid in carrying into
practice what they approve, and are far too tolerant of evil; in conse¬
quence of which, though there is much room for reform m every
department of things in India—in social usages, in morals, and 111
religion—and though the necessity ol such relorms is admitted, many
persons gladly weicome any excuse for letting things remain as they
afeT What this country most urgently needs is a good supply of moral
p* courage.
" Not only is it a fact that evil as well as good exists in Hindu
f writings, but it is also a fact that the evil is in excess of the good, and
— t very much more popular and influential.
" There is hardly a virtue which is not lauded in some Indian book,
but on the other hand there is hardly a crime that is not encouraged by
the example of some Indian divinity. If any one will take the trouble
of reading from the beginning to the end the account given in the Maha-
bharata, as in the principal Puranas, of the origin of eclipses, he will
feel astonished, not so much at the false science of the account, as at
the low tricky morality and indecency attributed to the gods, superior
as well as inferior."
Hinduism judged by its Fruits.—Bishop Caldwell says :
" Judging of Hinduism in this way, the conclusion to be deduced
from the actual facts of the case is, that it has either originated or
aggravated many of the worst evils the country endures—especially its
ignorance, its superstition, its dreaminess, its slavery to the authority of
great names ; that it is one of the chief obstacles that exist to progress
of every kind—intellectual, moral, and even material ; and hence that
its disappearance from the scene and the peaceful extension of Chris¬
tianity would be as life from the dead."*
A zealous Madras Social Befornier says that India does not
need flatterers, but men who will throw light upon her dark spots.
* Christianity and Hindu ism. A Lecture addressed to Educated Hindus.
causes which have hindered progress.
Truth to be the Grand Aim.
Hinduism justly acknowledges the great importance of truth.
Muir (juotes the following from the Mahabharata :
" By weighing truth and sacrifice appraise,
A thousand sacrifices truth outweighs.
In one scale truth, in the other lay
A thousand Asvamedhas ; try ;
I doubt if all that pile so high,
Even half as much as truth would weigh.*
The motto of the Maharaja of Benares is said to be, " There
is no religion higher than truth." It is also acknowledged that
truth must triumph in the end, Satyam jayati.
For three thousand years the intellect of India has been
mainly directed to philosophy and religion. What are the results
of so much labour ?
Has it discovered some great truths which ought to be
treasured as precious gems ? On the other hand, has it also
gathered errors and superstitions which should be rejected as
rubbish ?
The saying of Sir Madhava Bow, probably the wisest Indian
statesman of modern times, should be pondered by educated
Hindus:
" What is not TRUE is not PATRIOTIC."
CAUSES WHICH HAVE HINDERED THE
PROGRESS OF TRUTH IN INDIA.
While the great advances made by the Indian intellect in
certain directions have been cheerfully acknowledged, the
reverse side has also to be considered. There are certain injurious
influences which have brought about the present unsatisfactory
state of things :
I. Isolation.—About nine centuries ago, Alberuni, an
intelligent Muhannnadan traveller, visited India. Mr. R. C. Dutt
says:
" With regard to the Hindus, the fact which struck Alberuni' laost
unfavourably is that which strikes most intelligent and even well-
disposed foreigners in the same way, viz., their complete isolation from
other nations of the earth, their ignorance of the outside world, their
want of sympathy and communication with other peoples, whom
they call Mlechchas. They are by nature niggardly in communicating
that which they know, and they take the greatest possible pains to
withhold it from men of another caste among their own people, still
much more, of course, from any foreigner." |
* Metrical Translations, p. 76 f Ancient India, Vol. iii. pp. 176, 477.
6 THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
It has been the policy of the Brahmans from the earliest times
to contine knowledge to themselves. From the legend of
Parasuraina filling five lakes with Kshatriya blood, it would
seem that there were sanguinary struggles to maintain their
superiority. Intercourse with foreign nations was prevented as
much as possible. They were denounced as Mlechhas, impure
barbarians. The objection to sea voyages and requiring inayas-
chitta, shows that his feeling still prevails among many.
Tiele has the following remarks on the effects of isolation :
" Isolation is prejudicial to development, while living intercourse
generally promotes it.
" The man who obstinately secludes himself, who ignores all ideas
which have not been formed in his own esteemed brain, and turns a
deaf ear to all ideas and convictions different from those in which he
has been brought up, remains narrow and stunted, constantly turning
round in the same circle and fails to advance a single step. It requires
no great knowledge of history to teach us that it is the same with
nations. Which are those that have developed a higher civilization,
and have therefore acted a more important part in the world's history,
and have taken the lead of all others ? Not those which have jealously
held aloof from intercourse with others, or happened not to come in
contact with them, shunned everything foreign, and clung tenaciously
to the traditions of their forefathers."
" The peoples that hold aloof from foreign influence remain station¬
ary ; but those which by intellectual intercourse, by letters, science, and
religious teaching, are in constant touch with what goes on in the
enlightened world around them, are sure to progress."*
China illustrates the effect of holding aloof from other nations
—a stationary civilization. Japan, on the other hand, shows the
benefit of intercourse.
2. Pride.—This follows from isolation. Hindus complain of
the pride of Englishmen, but they are themselves the protldest
nHTIbn on the face of tne earth. The Chinese look upon ituropeans
as-1'outside barbarians, but they will eat with them ; when they
shake hands with them, they do not, like the pandits of India,
consider it necessary to bathe to free themselves from the pollution
thus contracted. The 2,QUO subdivisions of Brahmans and other
castes arise from pride. ~ -
Alberuni says of the Hindus :
"According to their belief there is no other country on earth but
theirs, no other race of men but theirs, and no created beings besides
them have any knowledge of science whatever. Their haughtiness is
such that if you tell them of any science or scholar in Khorasan and
Persia, they will think you to be an ignoramus and a liar."I
* Science of Religion, Vol. I. pp. 233, 235.
f (Quoted in Ancient India, Vol. III. pp. 476, 477.
CAUSES WHICH HAVE HINDERED PROGRESS.
The same spirit still prevails. There are even educated men
who regard Hinduism as a " monument of ancient wisdom," a
" marvellously consistent and perfect system," " inferior in re¬
spect to the purity and practical character of its sacred truths to j
no other religion in the world."
The Hindu Patriot thus describes them :
" The orthodox Hindu has a profound contempt for every Shaster
but his own—nay, rather, he scouts the very idea of anybody but a
Hindu having a Shaster."
Monier-Williams says of Indian pandits generally :
" They have believed the whole circle of human knowledge to be
contained in Sanskrit writings. To this very day the most bigoted are
fully persuaded that to learn anything beyond the Sastras is quite
useless." Modem India, p. 287.
Max Miiller says of the late Dayanand Sarasvati :
" To him not only was everything contained in the Vedas perfect
truth, but he went a step further, and by the most incredible interpre¬
tations succeeded in per*suading himself and others that everything
worth knowing, even the most recent inventions of modern science,
were alluded to in the Vedas. Steam-engines, railways, and steam¬
boats, all were shown to have been known, at least in their germs, to
the poets of the Vedas, for Veda, he argued, means Divine Knowledge,
and how could anything have been hid from that ?"
The Indian Mirror, when the "only Native Indian daily,"
thus boasted of the superiority of Indian, over Western, science :
" Modern science is still very much in its infancy, and has yet to
make much greater progress to enable it to even approach one-tenth
part of the ancient Philosophy of the East. Our modern scientists are
not fit to hold a candle to some of these learned men of our country,
who are well versed in the scientific teachings of the East."
Some years ago the late Mr. Manmohan Ghose said at a
meeting of the Bethune Society, Calcutta :
" He felt a legitimate pride in the ancient civilization of India, but
he was bound to say that an undue and exaggerated veneration for the
past was doing a great deal of mischief. It was quite sickening to
hear the remark made at almost every public meeting that the ancient
civilization of India was superior far to that which Europe ever had."
He expressed the following opinion with regard to the ancient
civilization of India :
" It must be admitted by all who had carefully studied the ancient
literature of India that the much vaunted civilization of India was of a
peculiar type, and that it never could bear any comparison to what we
8
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
call modern European civilization. Whatever might have heen the case
in ancient times, he thought that this frequent appeal to our ancient
civilization could serve no good purpose at the present day, while it
was simply calculated to make the Bengalis more conceited than they
were."
Dr. Bhandarkar, late Professor of Sanskrit in the Deccan
College, Poona, similarly condemns the present tendency:
" Here I feel myself in duty bound even at the risk of displeasing
some of you, to make passing ailusion to the most uncritical spirit that
has come over us of praising ourselves and our ancestors indiscrim¬
inately, seeing nothing hut good in our institutions and in our ancient
literature, asserting that the ancient Hindus had made very great pro¬
gress in all the sciences, physical, moral, and social, and the arts,—
greater even by far than Europe has made hitherto —and denying even
the most obvious deficiencies in our literature, such as the absence of
satisfactory historical records, and our most obvious defects. As long
as this spirit exists in us, we can never hope to throw light on our
ancient history, and on the excellencies and defects of our race, and
never hope to rise.""
" Young Bengal " would do well to remember the words of
Pope :
'• Of all the causes which conspire to blind
Man's erring judgment, and misguide the mind ;
What the weak head with strongest bias rules,—
Is pride, the never-failing vice of fools."
3. "Boundless Credulity."—Monier Williams says:
" The capacity of an uneducated Hindu for believing the grossest
absurdities, and accepting the most monstrous fictions as realities is
apparently unlimited," !
It is believed that Hanuman carried mount Himavat through
the air and hid the sun under his armpit. Jahnu drank up the
Ganges, and gave it out at one ear ; hence it is called Jahnavi.
Agastya is called Samudra-pa, because he drank up the ocean.
There is a thorough belief in mnpical powers. A being may
make Tumself as large as a mountain or as small as a mouse.
Anything may be changed into anything.
Such beliefs are not confined ito the masses. The learned
claim to have the following among their sixty-four sciences :
12. The science of prognosticating by omens and augury.
14. The science of healing, which may include restoration to life
of the dead, the reunion of severed limbs, &c.
15. Physiognomy, Chiromancy, &c.
* The Critical Comparative and Historical Method of Enquiry, p. 24.
f Indian Epic Poetry, p. 50.
CAUSES WHICH HAVE HINDERED PROGRESS.
9
36. The art of summoning by enchantment.
37. Exorcism.
38. Exciting hatred between persons by magical spells.
41. The art of bringing one over to another's side by enchantment.
42. Alchemy and chemistry.
44. The language of brute beasts, from ants upwards.
47. Charms against poison.
48. Information regarding any thing lost, obtained by astronom¬
ical calculations.
50. The art of becoming invisible.
51. The art of walking in the air.
52. The power of leaving one's own body and entering another
lifeless body or substance at pleasure.
56. Restraining the action of fire.
57. The art of walking upon water.
58. The art of restraining the power of wind.
62. The art of preventing the discovery of things concealed.
63. The art by which the power of the sword or any other weapon
is nullified.
64. The power of stationing the soul at pleasure in any of the five
stages.
Modern science shows that the above are delusions.
4. A Tendency to Speculation instead of Investigation.—
This is a radical defect in the Hindu mind. In the West, before
describing countries, travellers examine them carefully and make
measurements. A Hindu philosopher sits in his house and dreams
of a great central mountain, with seven seas of glii, sugar-cane,
juice, &c. Even a divine origin is claimed for his vagaries. |
Mr. li. C. Bose says :— ^
" The Hindu philosopher claims prophetic functions, pretends to
either miraculous insight or preternatural intercourse with superior
beings, and brings out his excogitation as revelation to be implicitly
believed in; not as results of philosophic inquiry to be tested by the
ordinary appliances of the logical science. He is the guru, heaven-
appointed or self-raised teacher, and his utterances must be accepted
as divine revelations ; while all sorts of woes are pronounced upon those
impious wretches who have the audacity to call in question a jot or
tittle of his sayings."
The result is false geography, false astronomy, false
science. Professor -T. C. Bose shows the advantage of the other
course—careful observation and experiment. By his careful
researches and brilliant discoveries he has acquired a world-wide
reputation.
5. A. proneness to dwell on subtle distinctions instead of
grasping a subject as a whole.—The Hindu mirict resembles that"
bt Hudihras,
" He could distinguish and divide
A hair 'twixt south and south-west side."
2
10
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
One great difference between a good and a bad lawyer is that
the latter takes up some subordinate point, while he fails to see
the main issue on which the case turns. Sir Monier Williams
says that a Hindu disputant lias captious propensities, leading
him to be quick in repartee, and ready with specious objections to
the most conclusive argument. Mr. K. C. Bose says, even of the
Hindu master-minds, that they were defective in the following
respects:—
" A view broad and comprehensive, an investigation calm and
persevering, a thorough silting of evidence, and a cautious building up
of generalisations, in a word for all those processes of research and
reasoning which are the basis of reliable science."
(i. Accepting- Illustration for Argument.—The assertion that
all religions are true is supposed to be proved by the saying,
" As there arc several '•"r>ds tojtho same cily^so all religions lead
to~God." Max Midler gives ltamakrishnahTrenderrrrg^of this
Saying- :
"11. As one can ascend to the top of a house by means of a
ladder, or a bamboo, or a staircase, or a rope, so divers are the ways
and means to approach God, and every religion in the world shows
one of these ways."
The reasoning amounts to this, as there are several ways of
getting to the top of a house, so atheism, pantheism, polytheism,
and monotheism are all true.
The very opposite inferences may be drawn from two illus¬
trations, like the following : ' As there is only one sun in the
heavens, so there is only one God ' As the stars in the sky are
innumerable, so are tbe gods.' The argument in both cases is
equally unsound, although the inferences are in the one case true,
and in the other false.
7. Receiving Contradictory Statements as equally true.—
Max Midler says, " That one statement should be contradicted
by others, seems never to have been felt as a serious difficulty."
1 Dr. John Mihr, in his learned work, Sanskrit ~Texls, proves
by quotations that the Hindu Sacred Books contain fourteen
contradictory accounts of the origin of the Yedas.* He shows
also that they contain no consistent account of the origin of
caste; but, on the contrary, present the greatest varieties of
speculation on the subject. '
This error was pointed out by Kapila, who says in the
Siinkhya Aphorism, Book I:
* Sanskrit Texts, Vol. III. The Yedas, opinions of their authors and of later
Indian writers of their origin, inspiration and authority.
f Sanskrit Texts, Vol. I. " Mythical and Legendary Accounts of the origin of
Caste, with an inquiry into its existence in the Vedic age,"
CAUSES WHICH HAVE HINDERED PROGRESS.
11
" There is no acceptance of the inconsistent, unless we come to
the level of children, madmen, and the like.'"
8. False Patriotism-—Some educated Hindus are now the
greatest enemies of truth in India, her worst foes. Truth is not
what is wanted by them. Their feelings may he expressed in the
words addressed by the ancient Jews, " Prophesy nut unto us
right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits."
What is mainly wanted at present is, What will most
gratify the National Pride ? Rationality, truth, every thing-
must be sacrificed to Nationality. Their tactics are thus
described by Sir H. S. Maine in a Convocation Address :
" A mistake is committed by Educated Natives when they call in
ingenious analogies and subtle explanations to justify usages which they
do not venture to defend directly or of which in their hearts they
disapprove. I am not now referring to some particularly had examples
of this, though doubtless one does sometimes see educated Native
writers glorifying by fine names things which are simply abominable.
But I allude to something less revolting than this. There is no greater
delusion than to suppose that you weaken an error by giving it a colour
of truth. On the contrary, you give it pertinacity and vitality, and
greater power of evil."
Sir H. S. Maine, justly adds :
" Whatever the cause, there can be 110 greater mistake, and
under the circumstances of this country no more destructive
mistake."
Dr. Mohendralal Sircar thus describes the course of these
false patriots in Bengal:
" You must have observed a retrograde movement going on in our
midst which I fear is calculated to retard the progress of the Hindu
race. I mean a return towards superstitions and idolatries which lie as
the blackest blot upon this part of the world. The crude words and
hazy conceptions of the sages are looked upon as absolute truth. No
man is allowed to differ from them however much they may have
differed from one another, or however much they may differ from
modern science. Indeed, if we are to believe these reactionaries, it is
so much the worse for modern science if she will not conform her
doctrines to the transcendental nonsense of the sages."—The Epiphany,
November 5th, 1887.
Explanations are given showing that the Hindus are neither
polytheists nor idolaters. Krishna has been rehabilitated and
held up as the Hindu Ideal. Even the infamous Tantric rites have
their defenders, leading to the indignant remark of the learned
Jogendra Natli Bhattacharya, President of the College of Pandits,
Nadiya:
" Reverence ought to be by all means shown to persons and
institutions that have a just claim to it. But nothing can, in my opinion,
12
the call of the twentieth century.
be more sinful than to speak respectfully of persons who are enemies of
mankind, and to whitewash rotten institutions by esoteric explanations
and fine phrases."®
The aim of such men is largely political. As a rule, they
care nothing for religion themselves; but the result is to perpet¬
uate the reign of superstition among their ignorant countrymen.
A writer, signing himself a " Kashmiri Pandit," says :
" I think if there is any phase of our present revolution which is
really lamentable, it is that of the general hypocrisy of our educated
youths."
Happily there is an intelligent minority of truth-seekers, and,
according to the Latin proverb, "Truth is great and will prevail.'
Stricter Criteria of Truth the Demand of the
Twentieth Century.
Sir H. S. Maine says :
" Where the Indian intellect had been trained at all before the
establishment of the British-Indian Empire, it stood in need, before
every thing else, of stricter criteria of truth "
He describes the Indian intellect as " elaborately inaccurate ;
it is supremely and deliberately careless of all precision in magni¬
tude, number, and time."
"Time," says Monier-Williams, "is measured by millions of
years; space by millions of miles; and if a battle has to be
described, nothing is thought of it unless millions of soldiers,
elephants, and horses are brought into the field."
India has now trained lawyers, men accustomed to demand
and weigh eividence. Their knowledge and skill should be applied
to test the statements in the Hindu Sacred Books. Their accept¬
ance by men like Pundits is worthless.
HINDUISM MAKES NO DISTINCTION BETWEEN
SCIENCE AND KELIGION.
The Vishnu Purana, which describes Mount Meru and the
seven seas, claims that it is equal to the Yedas in sanctity. The
Kishi Parasara asserts that it was first spoken by the " Great
Sire" (Brahma) at the request of Daksha. All the statements in
the Purana claim divine authority. They stand or fall together.
If the sacred Books contain false science, the inference is that their
religious teaching is also untrustworthy.
* Hindu Castes and Seels. Preface p. v.
9
1. false geography. 13
*
The following are some of the changes which India requires:
FALSE BELIEFS AND INJURIOUS CUSTOMS
TO BE RUNG OUT-
ZP-A.IR/T X
RING OUT FALSE SCIENCE AND HISTORY;
RING IN THE TRUE.
1. False Geography.
The Vishnu Purana gives the following account of the Earth.
It is said to he made up of seven circular islands or continents,
separated by seven seas.
" The seven great insular continents are Jambu, Plaksha,
Salmali, Kusa, Krauncha, Saka, and Pushkara. They are sur¬
rounded severally by seven great seas, the sea of salt water
(Lavana), of sugar-cane juice (Ikshu). of wine (Sura), of clarified
butter (Sarpi). of curd (Dadhi), of milk, (Dugdha), and of fresh
water (Jala)."
14
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
" Jambudwipa is in the centre of all these: and in the centre
of this continent is the golden mountain Meru. The height of
Meru is H4,000 yojanas; and its depth helow the surface of the
earth is 10,000. its diameter at the summit is 82,000 yojanas ;
and at its base, 10,000; so that this mountain is like the seed cup
of the lotus of the earth."
The boundary mountains (of the earth) are Himavan, Heiua-
kuta, and Nishada, which lie south of Meru: and Nila, Sweta, and
Sringi, which are situated to the north of it. The two central
ranges extend for 100,000 (yojanas) running east, and west. Each
of the others diminishes 10,000 yojanas as it lies more remote
from the centre. They are 2,000 yojanas in height, and as many
in breadth.
In the centre is the golden mountain Meru. There are four
mountains as buttresses to Meru, each 10,000 yojanas in eleva¬
tion. On each of these stands severally a Kadamba tree, a Jambu
tree, a Pipul and a Yata ; each spreading over 1,100 yojanas.
From the Jambu tree the insular continent Jambudwipa derives
its appellation. The apples of that tree are as large as elephants ;
when they are rotten they fall on the crest of the mountain, and
from their expressed juice is formed the Jambu river, the waters
of which are drunk by the inhabitants ; and in consequence of
drinking of that stream, they pass their days in content and
health, being subject neither to perspiration, to foul odours, to
decrepitude, nor organic decay.
On the summit of Meru is the vast city of Brahma, extending
14,000 yojanas; around it are situated the stately cities of India
and the other regents of the spheres. The capital of Brahma is
enclosed by the river Ganges, which issuing from the foot of
Vishnu, and washing the iunar orb falls from the skies, and,
after encircling the city, divides into four mighty rivers flowing in
opposite directions. Book II. 2.
Account of Patala and Shesha.—The extent of the surface
of the earth has thus been described. Its depth below the surface
is said to be 80,000 yojanas, each of the seven regions of Patala
extending downwards 10,000. These seven are called Atala,
Yitala, Nitala, Gabhastimat, Mahatala, Sutala, and Patala. Their
soil is generally white, black, purple, yellow, sandy, stony, and of
gold. The Muni Narada, after his return from these regions
to the skies, declared that Patala was much more delightful than
Indra's heaven.
Below the seven Patalas is the form of Vishnu, proceeding
from the quality of darkness, which is called Sesha. He has a
thousand heads ; and the thousand jewels in his crest give light
to all the regions. Sesha bears the entire world like a diadem
upon his head, and he is the foundation on which the seven
Patalas rest.
2. false astronomy.
15
SUPPORT OP THE EARTH.
The earth, sustained upon the head of this sovereign serpent,
supports in its turn the garland of the spheres, along with their
inhabitants, men, demons, and gods. Book II. 5.
o nnn^V^r^ school boy knows that the earth is only about
8,000 miles in diameter and that it floats in the sky like the
moon.
Among Educated Hindus this false belief is already rung out,
although it still prevails among the Pandits.
'2. False Astronomy.
The ancient sage Gargi, having propitiated Sesha, acquired
ironi him a knowledge of astronomy and astrology.
The S°lar System.—According to the Hindu sacred books,
le earth is supposed to be the centre around which revolve, in
regu ar succession, the sun, the moon, the lunar constellations,
p ane s, Ac. The Vi.iJinu Pioana describes the whole as follows :
The solar orb is situated a lakh of yojanas from the earth,
and that of the moon an equal distance'from the sun. At the
same interval above the moon, occurs the orbit of all the lunar
cons e ations. The planet Budha (Mercury) is 2 lakhs of yojanas
a ove the lunar mansions. Sukra (Venus) is at the same distance
If) THE CAT.L OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
from Mercury. Angaraka (Mars) is as far above Venus: and the
priest of the gods (Vrihaspati or Jupiter) as far from Mars;
while Hani (Saturn) is 2^ lakhs of yojanas beyond Vrihaspati.
The sphere of the seven Rishis (The Great Bear, a cluster of stars)
is a lakh of yojanas above Saturn, and at a similar height above
the Seven liishis is Dhruva (the pole-star), the pivot or axis of
the whole planetary circle.
Above Dhruva, at a distance of acrore of yojanas, lies Mahar-
loka, the inhabitants of which dwell in it throughout a Kalpa or
day of Brahma. At twice that distance, is situated .Tano-loka,
at four times the distance, between the two last, lies the
Tapoloka and at six times the distance or 12 crores of yojanas,
is situated Satya-loka.
The Planets.—According to the Hindu accounts, there are
nine Planets, Surya, Chandra, Budha, Sukra, Mangala, or Angar¬
aka, Brihaspati, Sani, Rahu and Ketu.
Surya is supposed to ride through the heavens in a chariot
drawn by seven horses. The rays of light proceed from a brilliant
circular body placed within the car. His wife was Sanjna,
daughter of Visvakarma. As his brightness was too great for his
wife, her father cut away part of his effulgence, and with the
fragments made the weapons of the gods.
Chandra is said to be the son of the Rishi Atri. The chariot
of the moon has three wheels, and is drawn by ten horses of the
brightness of the jasmine. Like the sun, it is upheld by cords
from Dhruva.
The Padma Purana gives the following explanation of the
changes of the moon: Chandra is said to have married the
twenty-seven daughters of Daksha. His favorite among them
was Rohini. The other daughters having complained to their
father, he cursed Chandra, who became affected by consumption.
The wives of Chandra then interceded with their father, who
pronounced that the decay should be only for a time. Hence the
successive wane and increase of the moon.
The Vishnu Purana gives another account :
" The radiant sun supplies the moon when reduced by the draughts
of the gods to a single kala, with a single ray, and in the same propor¬
tion as the ruler of the night was exhausted by the celestials, it is
replenished by the sun, the plunderer of the waters ; for the gods drink
the nectar and ambrosia accumulated in the moon during half the
month, and from this being their food they are immortal. 36,333
divinities drink the lunar ambrosia. When two digits remain, the
moon enters the orbit of the sun and abides in the ray called Ama,
whence the period is termed Amavasya. In that orbit the moon is
immersed for a day and night in the water; thence it enters the
branches and shoots of trees; and thence goes to the sun. Conse¬
quently any one who cuts off a branch or casts down a leaf, when the
3. false accounts of the human body.
17
moon is in the trees (the day of his rising invisible), is guilty of
Brahmanicide. When the remaining portion of the moon consists of but
a fifteenth part, the progenitors approach it in the afternoon and drink
the last portion, that sacred kala which is composed of ambrosia."
Book II. Chapter 12.
Rahu and Ketu.—Eclipses of the sun and moon are said to
be caused by the severed head of the Asura Rahu seeking to grasp
them. The enmity of Rahu to the sun and moon arose during
the churning of the ocean. It is thus described in the Maha-
bharata:
" And it so fell out, that whilst the Suras were quenching their
thirst for immortality, Rahu, an Asura, assumed the form of a Sura,
and began to drink also- The water had but reached his throat, when
the sun and moon, in friendship to the Suras, discovered the deceit;
and instantly Narayana cut off his head, as he was drinking, with his
splendid weapon chakra. The gigantic head of the Asura, emblem of a
mountain summit, being thus separated from his body, by the chakra's
edge, bounded into the heavens with a dreadful cry ; whilst his ponder¬
ous trunk fell, cleaving the ground asunder, and shaking the whole
earth to its foundations, with all its islands, rocks, and forests. And
from that time the head of Rahu resolved on eternal enmity, and
eontinueth even unto this day, to strive at times to seize upon the sun
and moon."
§
Dhruva.—The Vishnu Parana thus describes the cause of
the revolution of the celestial bodies :
" As Dhruva revolves, it causes the moon, sun, and stars to turn
round also ; and the lunar asterisms follow in its circular path ; for all
the celestial luminaries are in fact bound to the polar star by aerial
cords." Book II. Chapter 9.
3. False Accounts of the Human Body.
The ancient Hindus thought that a man was rendered impure
by touching a dead body. Hence they did not dissect and ex¬
amine it minutely as is done in modern Medical Colleges. The
writers of the Upanishads simply framed an imaginary body out
of their own heads, and, to impose upon the ignorant, said that it
had been revealed by Brahma.
The following assertion is made in the Chhandogya Upa-
nishad :
" There are a hundred and one arteries of the heart, one of these
penetrates the crown of the head; moving upwards by it a man reaches
the immortals; the others serve for departing in different directions,
yea, in different directions."
In the Taittiriya Upanishad there is the further account:
"There arise the hundred and one principal arteries; each of
3
18
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
them is a hundred times divided ; 7"2,000 are the branches of
every branch artery; within them moves the circulating air."
According to this calculation, the number of arteries in the
human body is 7'27,'20(),0()0 !
When the soul proceeds to • Brahma, it ascends by the
coronal artery, susliumna, which springs from the upper part of
the heart and goes to the top of the head. This is called the
door of rejoicing. When the soul goes out to some other body, it
proceeds by the other arteries.
It is again and again asserted in the Upanishads that the
heart has 101 arteries, by one of which the soul escapes at death.
The slightest examination of the heart shows that all this is
purely imaginary. There are just two branches of a large artery
from the heart containing impure blood, leading to the lungs, and
one great artery, which, afterwards, subdivided, conveys pure
blood to the whole body. In like manner, there are two great
veins carrying impure blood to the heart from the whole body,
and four veins, containing pure blood, leading from the lungs to
the heart.
J'HK HK MIT.
Ihe Taittiriya t panishad says that "within the arteries
moves the circulating air. Arteries mean air-pipes. They were
thought to contain only air, because after death they are empty.
When a person is alive, blood flows through them. This is
proved by the tact that if one of them is cut, blood gushes out.
1. IlING OUT CUSTOM; RING IN REASON.
ID
When a person dies, the heart loses its power to send out blood,
and the arteries are found empty.
It is plain that God cannot have inspired the Upanishads,
for He cannot give a false account of the human body, which He
made.
The Upanishads belong to the Sruti, the most sacred portion
of the Hindu Sacred Books.
4. False History.
Mr. Cowell, Sanskrit Professor at Cambridge, and formerly
Principal of the Sanskrit College, Calcutta, says :
" The very word history lias no corresponding Indian expression.
In the vernaculars derived from the Sanskrit we use the word ilihas—
a curious compound of three words, iti, hi, asn, which almost corre¬
spond in meaning to our old nursery phrase, ' There was once upon a
time.' In Sanskrit authors, the name means simply a legend. . . .
Prom the very earliest ages down to our own day, the Hindu mind
seems never to have conceived such an idea as an authentic record of
past facts based 011 evidence. It has remained from generation to
generation stationary, in that condition which Mr. Grote has described
so vividly in the first two volumes of his History of Greece. The idlest
legend has passed current as readily as the most authentic fact, nay,
more readily because it is more likely to charm the imagination ; and,
in this phase of mind, imagination and feeling supply the only proof
which is needed to win the belief of the audience."
Hindus generally accept the monstrous statements in the
Ramayana and Mahabharata as strictly true. The former
claims to have been written by the command of the "four-faced
Brahma," who promised to reveal all the details. He said to Val-
nn'ki, " No words of thine in this poem shall contain an untruth."
The historical faculty is wanting in ihe Hindus. Not a single
narrative that can properly be called history has ever been
written by Hindus except by those who have received an English
education.
II.
RING OUT INJURIOUS CUSTOMS; RING IN
USEFUL CHANGES.
1. Ring out Custom; ring in Reason.
" We must walk according to Custom," is a very common
Indian proverb. "Custom," says Pandit Vidyasagar, "is the
supreme ruler in this country ; Custom is the supreme instructor ;
20
the call of the twentieth centuby.
the rule of Custom is the paramount rule ; the precept of Custom
is the paramount precept." Custom is the great Sastra, superior
to Sruti and Smriti taken together.
The lower animals must walk according to custom. Though
they think a little, they cannot reason from experience so as to
be able to judge which course they ought to follow. But men
should not set aside reason, and behave like sheep or oxen.
The lower animals act now as they did thousands of years
ago, so the Hindus have maintained a stationary condition of
semi-civilization. Professor Bhandarkar says, "Indian imple¬
ments and arts are now in the condition in which they were in
the time of Manu."
Some may ask in astonishment whether it is proposed to
abandon the wisdom of our forefathers altogether, and do the
very contrary to what they did, because the rule of walking accord¬
ing to custom is not reasonable ? The reply to this is that it is
not necessarily wrong to follow custom. If a custom be wise,
and good, it is right to follow it—nay, it may be our bounden
duty. What is urged is, that as every man is endowed with
reason and a conscience, he is not blindly to follow custom, but
to examine the merits of the custom and judge whether it is such
as should be followed by those who wish to please God and do good
to themselves and their neighbours.
Some Indian customs are good and should be maintained.
Others are bad, and should be given up.
What is old is not necessarily good : it may be rotten. An
old house or an old bridge has sometimes been the death of some
who trusted in it. Hindus call this the Kali Tug when wicked¬
ness prevails. Such being the case, it follows that if we " walk
according to custom," we shall commit many sins.
2. Ring out the Money-Lendeb ; bing in the
Savings Bank.
Foresight, looking forward to the future and preparing for it,
is one great distinction between a savage and a, civilised man.
The savage thinks only of the present. To-day he may be gorged
with food ; to-morrow he may be suffering from tlie pangs of
hunger. There are people in this country similarly thriftless.
When a marriage is to take place or when they expect a confine¬
ment in their family, they make no preparation beforehand, when
it would be much easier to provide the necessary funds. When
their expenses will be increased, they borrow, requiring, in addi¬
tion, to pay interest. Not a few spend their month's pay at once,
and there is not a rupee left to meet any exceptional expenses.
" The borrower is servant to the lender." The Hindus are
so improvident and the rate of interest is so high, that whenever
2. RING OUT THE MONEY-LENDER.
21
a man gets into the money-lender's books, it is very hard for him
to escape. The money-lender does not wish it. He prefers that
the unfortunate creditor should toil for his benefit. He takes
over the ryot's crops, if he can, at his own valuation, and merely
gives him enough to keep him from starving. There are even
debts handed down from generation to generation.
The amount paid annually in interest is enormous. A man
on a debt of Its. 50 paid lis. 3-2-0 a month for three years, and at
the end of that period, having paid over Its. 100 as interest, the
debt of Its. 50 remained undiminished.
One great remedy is to exercise foresight, to look ahead and
have a fund on which one can draw without any charge for
interest.
Savings may be converted into jewels. With ignorant people
who cannot read, this is perhaps all that can be expected ; it is
certainly better than wasting them. Hut this plan has its disad¬
vantages. If a man invests a hundred rupees in jewels, he pays
some money to the goldsmith to begin with ; he gets no interest,
while his jewels are liable to be stolen. If he needs money, he
borrows the amount on his jewels, for which he lias probably to
pay 12 per cent.
To enable people to place their money in safe keeping where
it will also bear interest and be available at any time, the
British Government has established Savings Banks in different
parts of the country. Any person can go freely and pay in sums,
from four annas and upwards, when he pleases. He will obtain
a bank-book, in which those sums will be entered. No one
but himself or some person whom he has authorised, can draw
the money. Government takes care of the deposits, and allows
interest upon them. There is therefore no risk of being cheated
by fraudulent borrowers. The money lodged can be with¬
drawn at any time. Government does not allow so much interest
as needy debtors, but there are the great advantages that the loan
is perfectly safe, and may be called in at any time.
Savings Banks have been opened in connection with many
of the Post Offices in India, from which their rules can be
obtained.
Savings Banks are much better than jewels. If a man who
has an account with them requires money, he has not 12 per cent,
interest to pay-
It is satisfactory that the people of India, in increasing
numbers, are becoming depositors in Savings Banks. In 1000
there were 711,979 Native Depositors, whose deposits exceeded
eight crores of rupees, and who drew in interest upwards of 25
lakhs.
In England many school boys have Savings Banks accounts.
This helps to form habits of self-denial and thrift, which are of
22 the call of the twentieth century.
great value in future life. It would be well for Indian boys to
follow their example.
•'I. King out Extravagance at Marriages; ring in
mot>erate expenoiture.
Though the Hindus are generally frugal, on certain occasions
they fling away money like water. Some parents spend on
marriages the money they have been gathering for years ; but
most of them have to borrow. Half an anna a month on the
rupee, or 3(5 per cent, a year, is frequently paid by the poor.
Jewels are generally first given as security ; the ryot's cattle
sometimes follow, and even his land is mortgaged till he becomes
the mere slave of the money-lender. To avoid the ruinous
marriage charges, some of the Kajputs murdered their infant
daughters.
This insane conduct is not confined to the ignorant. The
Indian Mirror says : " It is well known that common sense and
prudence leave the Native, whether educated or uneducated, when
he has any social ceremonies to perform. On such occasions he
is sure to go beyond his means and involve himself."
Expense,' says Bacon, 'ought to be limited by a man's
estate ; ' but according to Indian notions it ought not to stop
short of one's credit with the money-lender."
A Governor of Madras justly said in a Convocation Address :
" He wlio could persuade his countrymen to give up theirs to us,
astounding expenditure on marriages, would do more for South India
than any Government could do in a decade."
It is satisfactory that there is a movement in India in favour
of the reduction of marriage expenses. In Kajputana a Society
has been established for this purpose. A scale of expenditure has
been laid down, which is now generally followed.'
I. King out Indiscriminate Charity ; ring in wise
Benevolence.
India has been called the " Land of Charity." It may be
called, with equal truth, the " Land of Beggars." In no other
country in the world is begging so respectable.
The love of laziness is natural to human beings. They are
unwilling to work if they can get others to labour for them.
Taking advantage of the charitable disposition of the Hindus,
there are lakhs of men who have chosen to subsist bv begging
o o o
* Sec 1'ice Paper, Indian Marriage Customs.
4. rtn(t out indiscriminate charity. -2:4
from door to door. This is done as a hereditary profession, and
not as a necessity forced upon them by misfortune. While
these men think it no disgrace to beg, they consider it a dis¬
honour and a great hardship to do honest work.
Besides the professional beggars, there are lakhs of able-
bodied men who wander about, in the name of religion, from shrine
to shrine. To feed them is supposed to be a special work of merit.
On certain days alms are distributed by some, to which beg¬
gars of both the above classes resort. There are also special
occasions, as Shraddhas, when large numbers collect. In this
way and through ordinary begging, great numbers contrive to
subsist fairly well without labour.
Many Hindus, who are otherwise very careful of their
money, will spend it freely in the above ways, thinking that they
have laid up a stock of merit for the next world.
False charity encourages vice. When people are busy with
their work, they have no time to think of evil things. When
they have nothing to do, they are tempted to wickedness.
What is the character of many of the beggars of India ? It
is notorious that not a few of them are obliged to wander about,
for if they remained long in one place, their vicious conduct
would become known.
There is a well known proof of the wickedness of many
Indian beggars. They abuse and curse those who refuse them
alms. Ignorant superstitious people, especially women, are thus
tempted to give them. If they were good people, they would go
away quietly, when aid was withheld.
Pandit Sivanath Sastri says :
" Hindu indiscriminate charity saps the very foundation of national
manliness, gives a premium to indolence, and trains up men and women to
the meanness of beggary, and not to the, dignity of labour."
Charity should be wisely directed.
Only a few general remarks can be offered.
The Christian religion teaches that if a man, able to work,
refuses to work, neither should he eat. It is no real kindness to
the man to support him in idleness, while it is a wrong to society.
Such men would be obliged to work if people were not foolish
enough to give them alms. If they will not work, they deserve
to starve.
Persons who are unable to support themselves wholly should
be assisted only so far as they are thus unable. Because a man
cannot do enough to support himself, there is no reason why he
should do nothing.
Those who are unable to do anything, should have every¬
thing done for them which their condition requires. Such are
young orphans, the sick, the disabled, and the aged.
■24
THE < ALL OK THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
There is ample scope for personal charity on the part of
educated Hindus, but they might also assist in directing benevo¬
lent action among their less instructed brethren.
In the principal cities of India Europeans have established
Friend-in-Need Societies, in which relief is given only after due
inquiry. In some cases also workshops have been established to
enable persons to earn their living. These are solely for Euro¬
peans and Eurasians. There ought to be similar Societies for
Indians, Educated Hindus might do much to secure their estab¬
lishment, and to have them wisely managed.
Industrial schools for poor children should be supported.
Education alone is of great value, but the benefit is doubled in the
case of the poor by being associated with labour.
The poor especially suffer in case of sickness. The able-
bodied among them lose their earnings ; expense is incurred for
medicines; attacks are lengthened and made more severe from
the want of proper attention. Hospitals and Dispensaries should
therefore be supported.
Instructing the ignorant is not giving money, but. if of the
proper kind, it is of far more value. The late Sir Madhava Row
justly said :
" Very many might labour to remove the ignorance of the
great masses of the people, an ignorance from which they suffer
infinitely more than from all other causes."
Worse than indiscriminate charity is the selfishness of
some Hindus who make its evils an excuse for spending all their
income on themselves.+
5. Ring out Opposition to Sea Voyages ; ring in
Freedom of Travel.
The Brahmans both gratified the pride of the Hindus and
secured their hold over them by describing Aryavarta as Punya
Bhiimi, the holy land, while in other countries, inhabited by
barbarous Mlechchas, the twice-born should not even temporarily
dwell. This is the policy of isolation whose effects have been
already described.
Some Indians have gone to England to study, as merchants,
or to compete for the civil service. Such objects, so far from I
being offences deserving of penance, are praiseworthy. Properly '
carried out, they would tend powerfully to elevate the condi¬
tion of India in every respect.
The Indian Social Reformer says :
" There is absolutely no doubt that this restriction on foreign travel
is characteristic of barbarous times, and is born of the hatred to and
* See Charity's False and True. Pice Paper. Sold by Mr. A. T. Scott.
6. KING OUT EARLY MARRIAGE.
25
suspicion oi foreigners which are the peculiar features of backward races.
There is no other Asiatic race which in this respect is so backward as
the Hindu. The Chinese, with all their indifference and crude ideas of
government, have no religious or social objection against sea-voyages."
The Bengalee thus shows the necessity of liberty in this
direction :
" Change we must. We cannot stand where we are. We are con¬
fronted by forces which will overwhelm us, if we choose to remain
where we are. Advance we must, if we wish to keep pace with the
times, and even secure the elements of self-preservation. Sea-voyage
and residence in foreign countries are necessary for purposes of material
prosperity, and in the long-run for purposes of national existence. But
if we choose to ensure our degradation, if we are content to remain the
hewers of wood and the drawers of water that we are, then by all means
oppose this movement, and by so doing drive the sensible portion of the
community into open disregard of Hindu traditions."
The usual prayaschitta for the sin of going to Europe is
swallowing the five products of the cow.
The Hindu Patriot, while edited by Ivristodas Pal, thus
referred to the "imbecile swallowers of penitential pills: "
" As Indians, we should feel humiliated to see any one of our fellow-
Indians, with silly caste-notions in his head, travelling to Europe—
especially, when the traveller pretends to represent the rising and
educated classes of this great continent."
The Indian Reformer, referring to such cases, says —•
" We sicken at the sight. We are weary of moral worthlessness
and cowardice. When will India be reformed if her foremost sons thus
ignominiously allow themselves to be bound by the fetters of custom,—-
thus tamely submit to the dictation of ignorance, of priestcraft, and of
folly '! These men will surely do no good to their country. We require
men of braver hearts, of greater moral courage, of a holier earnestness,
of a more heroic determination ; of a diviner faith."
6. Ring out Early Marriage ; ring in Marriage at a
Proper Age.
In most countries of the world, men do not marry till they
are able to support a wife ; but in India mere children are often
thus united. The first marriage is properly a betrothal, a contract
to marry at a future time. Practically, however, it has the force
of marriage, for if the boy-husband dies, the infant wife is con¬
demned to perpetual widowhood.
The great concern of a Hindu father is—not to educate his
children but to marry them. This is largely occasioned by
a false religious belief. A childless man who lias no son to make
26
the call of the twentieth century.
offerings for him is said to fall into the hell called put. Putru, a
son, is supposed to mean one who saves from hell.
This is a mischievous error. A Hindu may lead any sort of
immoral life ; if he has a son and plenty of money to spend on
his Shraddha, all is supposed to he well.
Space does not permit all the evils connected with early
marriage to be mentioned.*
It is strongly condemned by physicians. Dr. Nobin Krishna
Bose says :
" I have always regarded this custom to he among the principal
causes of our physical deterioration as a race, and also as a principal
impediment, in the way of intellectual advancement and social reform."
Dr. Mohendra Lai Sircar says :
" Early marriage, in my humble opinion, is the greatest evil of our
country. It has stood, so to say, at the very springs of the life of the
nation, and prevented the normal expansion of which it is capable."
Dr. Pechey-Phipson addressing Hindus in Bombay, said :
" For centuries you have been children of children, and there
is no surer way of becoming servants of servants."
Early Marriage she said :
"Is a retrogression from the early civilization of your race ; it is
a stigma on your religion; a blot on your humanity, which, were it
known, would disgrace you in the eyes of the whole civilised world.
Stamp it out at whatever cost from vulgar prejudice; blot out this
stain upon your character as men of honour and manly virtue."
At a large gathering in Eajputana, it was agreed that no girl
should be married till she is fourteen years of age ; and no youth
until he is eighteen.
7. Ring out Female Ignorance ; ring in Female
Education.
The words of Tennyson should be indelibly impressed upon
the minds of Hindus :
" The woman's cause is man's ; they rise or sink
Together, dwarl'd or godlike, bond or free."
The strong generally seek to tyrannise over the weak.
Among savages, women do all the hard work : men, when not
fighting or hunting, are smoking, drinking, or sleeping. Hindus
have reached a higher state of civilisation ; but in their treatment
of women they display much of the same spirit. Men, for their
* See Pice Paper On Early Marriage. Sold by Mr. A. t. Scott.
7. RING OUT FEMALE IGNORANCE.
•27
own selfish ends, have, from early times, taught women in India
to surrender all their rights, and to submit themselves in every
way to the wishes of their lords and masters.
It is true that women are commanded to be honoured ; but
it is for selfish reasons, by those who "desire prosperity" or
" wealth." Manu says :
" Women are to be honoured and adorned by fathers and brothers,
by husbands, as also by brothers-in-law who desire much prosperity."
" Therefore they are ever to be honoured at ceremonies and festivals,
with ornaments, clothes, and food, by men who desire wealth." III. 59.
Manu says that there are no religious duties for women ;
who are said to be " Falsehood itself "
" For women there is no separate sacrifice, nor vow, nor even fast;
if a woman obeys her husband, by that she is exalted in heaven.
" No religious ceremony for women should be (accompanied) by
mantras (except marriage),—with these words the rule of right is fixed ;
for women being weak creatures, and having no share in the) mantras,
are falsehood itself. So stands the law." IX. 18.
The following is from the Skanda Purana:
" Let a wife who wishes to perform sacred oblations, wash the feet
of her lord, and drink the water ; for a husband is to a wife greater
than Siva or Vishnu. The husband is her god, her priest, and religion ;
wherefore abandoning everything else, she ought chiefly to worship her
husband." IV. 35.
The denial of education was the crowning device of Hindu¬
ism. So long as women were kept in ignorance, they would
swallow the most astounding fables regarding the power of the
Brahmans, and be eager to carry out every superstitious observ¬
ance which was enjoined.
Just as Bamabai, in modern times, was taught Sanskrit by
her father, so in ancient times a few women were taught by their
husbands. Such cases, however, were exceptional. For untold
generations women have been kept in ignorance, with the worst
results.
Ignorant women are not only unfit to train their children
properly, but they drag down their educated husbands to their
level.
The late Bishop Caldwell complained that, with few excep¬
tions and in some unimportant particulars, educated Hindus acted
just like their illiterate countrymen :
" Practically it matters very little in general what theosophy or
philosophy a Hindu professes, what his ideas may be about the most
ancient form of his religion, or even what his ideas may be about the
religious reforms that the age is said to require. As a matter of fact,
and in so far as his actual course of life is concerned, he is content,
•28 the call <)e the twentieth century.
except in a small number of exceptional cases, to adhere with scrupul¬
ous care to the traditionary usages of his caste and sect. His ideas
may have received a tincture from his English education, but ordinarily
his actions differ in no particular of any importance from those of his
progenitors."
The Hindu thus explains it :
" There is then the whole class of women who are illiterate, and
who live intellectually and morally in an infinitely lower plane than the
men. The educated Hindu is at every turn tempted to secure their
approbation and win their applause by sinking to their intellectual
level. . . So long as Hindu women are kept in the miserable ignorance
which now characterises them, all your Colleges and Universities are a
waste so far as their effect on the national prospect is concerned."
The late Madras Director of Public Instruction said:
" If Indian society desires to take its place among the foremost
peoples of the earth—to be a progressive instead of a stagnating or
decaying society—it must gird up its loins and resolve at whatever cost
to emancipate its women from the thraldom of ignorance. A society
composed of educated men and uneducated women can never be a
progressive society."*
8. Ring out the Purdah ; ring in due Intercourse.
It is allowed that only a small proportion of the women are
confined to Zenanas. The great mass of the people are Sudras and
castes below them, and in general their women go about freely.
Still, it must be confessed that, among the higher classes,
women are very much secluded, and there is a disposition among
those next to them to follow their example for respectability.
The conquest of India by the Muhammadans tended power¬
fully to degrade the position of women. The Koran permits
polygamy and divorce. Marriage can he dissolved at any time at i
the simple will and fancy of the husband.
Muhammadans are, therefore, compelled to keep their wives
closely confined, or the foundations of society would be broken up.
The Mussulman rulers of India took into their zenanas beau¬
tiful Hindu women, even although married. To avoid such
outrages, women were kept within doors or carefully veiled. In
course of time the Hindus, in the seclusion of women, acted like
Muhammadans.
No immediate sweeping changes are recommended, though
they will differ among certain classes according, to the stage
which they have reached at present.
* See Pice Paper, The Advantages of Female Education.
8. rinct out the purdah ; rind tn due' intercourse. '29
1. Free Intercourse between Husband and Wife-—Euro¬
peans are astonished at the Native ideas on this subject where
the Zenana system prevails. Mr. Mullick says that the young
wife can see her husband only " at night when the whole house
is asleep, and with the lark she must bid him adieu."
2. Free Intercourse between Parents and Children-—Pan -
dita Ramabai says: " Children enjoy the company of father or
mother alternately by going in and out when they choose."
What is wanted is the meeting of father and mother, brothers
and sisters, like that in the picture of an English home.
3. Intercourse with Relatives and Friends—The circle
should be gradually widened. Let relatives, male and female,
visit each other. Instead of calling separately, or the men talk¬
ing with men and the women going into the female apartments,
let all meet together and converse. The same course should be
followed at entertainments. Friends, who are not relatives, may
gradually be treated in a similar manner.
4. General Intercourse-—This is the last stage.*
* See Pice Paper, The Purdah, or the Seclusion, of Indian Women,
the call of the 'twentieth century.
9. King out Widows' Wrongs; ring in Widows'
Rights.
The oppression of women in India culminated in the case of
widows, who were especially helpless, having no husbands to
protect them. Their treatment by Hindus is the foulest blot
upon their character. It is only aggravated by the excuse which
is offered. Caird justly says: "The worst of all wrongs to human¬
ity is to hallow evil by the authority and sanction of religion."
The treatment of widows varies in different families. If
they have the good fortune to be in their fathers' houses, their
lot is less miserable ; but, as a rule, they have to spend the rest
of their days in the houses of their fathers-in-law, where, in
addition to their other sufferings, they are often treated as
domestic drudges.
The late distinguished Sanskrit scholar, Pandit Iswara
Chandra Vidyasagara, says in his Appeal on the Marriage of
Hindu Widows :
" An adequate idea of the intolerable hardships of early widowhood
can be formed by those only whose daughters, sisters, daughters-in-law
and other female relations have been deprived of their husbands during
infancy."
The young widow must wear a coarse dress and have no
ornaments. The ekadasi fast must be strictly observed for '24
hours twice a month. Her sight is a bad omen on a festive
occasion; her touch is pollution. Instead of being comforted
she is told, " You were a most sinful being in your previous
births; you have therefore been widowed already." In some
cases the results are prostitution and foeticide.
Hindu women have generally been so degraded by the men
that they do not feel their degradation. They mostly think
themselves as well treated as any women would wish to be. As
a class, they have no desire for education. So with the great
majority of widows. Their ideas have been so perverted that
they regard the inhuman treatment they receive as commanded
by the Shastras, and make no complaint. But the more thought¬
ful and intelligent among them feel bitterly their sad condition.
The barbarous treatment of women in India reached its
climax in widow burning. That sons should roast their mothers
alive when they became widows, seems too horrible an idea to
enter the mind. Yet Hindus, in the 19th century, contended
earnestly for the privilege.
To induce widows to submit to death in this cruel manner,
life was made bitter to them in every conceivable way. This,
however, was not sufficient, so they were told that they would not
10. ring out intemperance.
31
only be pre-eminently virtuous, but enjoy happiness for almost
endless ages in another world if they burnt themselves with the
dead bodies of their husbands.
" The wife who commits herself to the flames with her husband's
corpse, shall equal Arundhati and reside in Swarga."
" Accompanying her husband she shall reside so long in Swarga as
there are 35 millions of hairs on the human body."
The consequences of not observing this injunction are thus
stated :
" As long as a woman shall not burn herself after the death of her
husband, she shall he subject to transmigration in a female form."
In Yedic times widow-burning was not practised, and there
is not a single verse sanctioning it. The Brahmans sought to
support it by the wilful mistranslation of a text.
It was encouraged by relations who wished to prevent the
widow from having a life interest in her property, and by Brahmans
who obtained the Sati's jewels.
In 1830 Sati was forbidden by Lord William Bentinck.
In July, 1856, Lord Canning, in spite of warnings and
clamours, legalized the marriage of Hindu widows. It has proved
largely a dead letter. Orthodox native opinion has remained too
strong for the law, and the sad lot of Hindu widows, except in a
few cases, remains unchanged.
The few widow marriages were largely brought about by
money being contributed by the leaders of the movement towards
the heavy marriage expenses.
The wrongs of widows should be redressed.
Educated men should try to give their mothers and wives
enlightened views regarding them ; they should show the cruelty
and sin of their present treatment.
Such as have young widowed daughters, following the
example of Dr. Bhandarker and others, should give them in
marriage. In this course they should be encouraged by their
friends countenancing them in every possible way.*
10. Ring out Intemperance ; Ring in Total Abstinence.
The early Aryan settlers in India were very fond of strong
drink. A whole book of the Rig Veda is devoted to the praise
of Soma. Pulastya, an old writer, mentions twelve principal
kinds of liquor, besides Soma beer. The Mahabharata shows
that even ladies drank. In the Adi P'arva it is said that Drau-
pacTTahd SubadhraTlodiilarated with wine, began to give away
* See Pice Paper, Indian Widows and what should be done for them.
32
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
costly ornaments.'H The 130,000 sons of Krishna perished in a
drunken brawl.
Buddha saw the evils of intemperance, and one of his first
commands, binding upon all, is not to taste intoxicating liquors.
This had a considerable effect in promoting temperance. After¬
wards, by the laws of Manu, twice-born men were forbidden,
under severe penalties, to use strong drink. Drunkenness has
always prevailed in India among certain classes; but, as a nation,
the people have been temperate for many centuries.
When English began to be studied in India, some young
men thought that they must imitate English habits as well as
learn the language. Among other things it was considered a
mark of manliness and a proof of advance in civilisation to use in¬
toxicating liquors. The evil has been greatest in Bengal, where
the educated classes are the wealthiest, and English has been
longest studied. A Calcutta newspaper thus describes its effects:
"Wo have daily, nay hourly, evidences of the ravages which the
brandy bottle is making upon the flower of our society. Wealth, rank,
honor and character, health and talents, have all perished in the
blighting presence of this huge monster."
Good old habits should be retained. Of all European vices
none is more dangerous and destructive than drunkenness. It is
the curse of England, the chief cause of its misery and crime.
Unless checked, the same result will follow in India. Already
the increase in the use of intoxicants, opium, Ac., should
excite grave alarm. The revenue from these has risen from
lis. 2,838,021 in 1880 to lis. 5,759,913 in 1900. Thus in 20 years
the expenditure on them has doubled.
Every lover of this country should strive to the utmost to
check the ravages of a vice to which already some of the brightest
intellects in India have fallen victims. Vigorous efforts have
been made by some good men in England in favour of temperance
reform. One means has been the establishment of Societies,
the members of which agree to abstain entirely from the use ot
all intoxicating liquors. Societies of this kind have been formed
in India. All would do well to join them. It would prove a
blessing to themselves, to their families, and to their countr}'.
Municipal Commissioners and others should seek to reduce,
as far as possible, the number of arrack and opium shops.
11. Ring out Impurity; ring in Purity.
Impurity takes various forms in India, some of which will
be noticed.
Filthy Speech-—This is one of the commonest sins in this
country. Words abominably indecent are in such frequent use
* Translation, p. 615.
11. RING OUT IMPURITY, RING IN PURITY.
38
that nothing is thought of them. Parents allow their children to
use them in their presence ; many teachers do not check them
among their scholars. Worse than that, there are some fathers
so foolish and wicked that they teach them to their children
before they are scarcely able to speak, bid them use them to their
mothers, and then encourage them by their smile.
Many women in this •country pretend to great modesty.
They think it a great shame for their faces to be seen ; but they
will indulge in the most obscene railings. At marriages it is a vile
custom for women to use the most abominable language in sport.
At the Holi it is said, " Obscenity is the measure of piety."
Although the evil is worst among the lower orders, it is not
confined to them. Native Public Opinion, a paper formerly
published in Madras, says :
" We have not the consolation of flattering ourselves with the idea,
that it is only the lowest classes of Hindus, the offscouring of society,
that indulge in this habit, hut we find that even men of respectability
and of admitted worth, many times cross the hounds of decent speech,
and launch into the most obscene invectives, that even Billingsgate
would blush to hear."
The following means may be employed to check the evil :
1. Parents should never use improper languages themselves
and forbid its use by their children and servants.
2. Filthy speech should be strictly forbidden in schools.
Teachers should use their influence against it, and strive to enlist
their scholars in uprooting this evil custom.
8. In company every indelicate allusion should at once be
reprobated.
4. Efforts should be made to check the abominations of the
Holi.
Dancing Girls.—Professional dancers have existed in India
from an early period. In the Rig \reda, i. 92, it is said, " Ushas,
like a dancer, puts on her gay attire." Frequent references to
them are found in later books.
The Subodh Patrika, a Bombay Journal, thus exposes the
evils connected with such women :
" Not the least urgent of such subjects of reform is the institution
of dancing girls among us. Stripped of all their acquirements, these
women are a class of prostitutes pure and simple. Their profession is
immoral and they live by vice. Being never married they can never be
widows. Hence the wedding tie woven by these women is considered
propitious, and sufficiently potent to confer life-long wifehood on the
newly-married girl. Indeed their presence at marriage and other cere¬
monies is almost a necessity, and few persons who can afford the
expense and are unable to disregard the opinion of their neighbours
can forbear to call them to grace the occasion."
5
34
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTERV.
The number of men who have fallen victims to such women
is incalculable.
There is the additional evil feature connected with dancing
girls attached to temples, that they have the sanction of religion.
Dubois says:
" Next to the sacrificers, the most important persons about the
temples are the dancing girls, who call themselves dcva-dusi, servants
or slaves of the gods. Their profession requires of them to be open to
the embraces of persons of all castes.
" They are bred to this profligate life from their infancy. They
are taken from any caste, and are frequently of respectable birth. It is
nothing uncommon to hear of pregnant women, in the belief that it will
tend to their happy delivery, making a vow, with the consent of their
husbands, to devote the child then in the womb, if it should turn out a
girl, to the service to the Pagoda. And, in doing so, they imagine they
are performing a meritorious duty. The infamous life to which the
daughter is destined brings no disgrace on the family."
The gods of the Hindus are deified men. Just as "Rajas
had their dancing-girls, so Indra in heaven is said to have
the Apsarases.
Two thousand years ago, the temple of Venus at Corinth
had more than a thousand prostitutes connected with it, called
by a name equivalent to deva-da^L The priestesses were by their
very profession prostitutes, and the temple itself was made the
scene of the vilest degradation and shame. This led to the ruin
of many strangers who visited the city from all parts of the earth.
The indignant words of Bishop Lightfoot, applied to ancient
Greece, refer equally to India :—
" Imagine, if you can, this licensed shamelessness, this consecrated
profligacy, carried on under the sanction of religion and in the full blaze
of publicity, while statesmen and patriots, philosophers and men of
letters looked on unconcerned, not uttering one word and not raising
one finger to put it down."
The Hindu has the following remarks on the Indian
institution :
"The demoralisation it causes is immense. So long as we allow
it to be associated with our temples and places of worship, we offend
and degrade our religion and nationality. The loss and misery it has
entailed on many a home is merely indescribable."
Happily there is a growing feeling among intelligent Indian
against nautches, and especially against dancing girls being
attached to temples. This feeling should be promoted in every
way.
Obscene Pictures and Sculptures.—No instruction on duties
either to God or man is given in Hindu temples. The priest
mutters some wTords in Sanskrit which the worshipper neither
12. ring out caste.
35
hears nor understands. He goes away grossly deceived, thinking
that he has " seen God," and acquired a stock of merit.
While the worshippers receive no moral instruction, there
is much to corrupt their minds.
The Penal Code contains the following law against obscene
books, pictures, and images :
" 292. Whosoever sells or distributes, imports or prints for sale
or hire, or wilfully exhibits to public view, any obscene book, pamphlet,
paper, drawing, painting, representation, or figure, or attempts or offers
so to do, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for
a term which may extend to three months, or with fine, or with both."
Some Hindu temples and cars have indecent sculptures. Sir
W. Hunter referring to the temple of Jagannath at Puri, says :
" Lascivious sculptures disfigure his walls." Dr. R. L. Mitra
says of the sculptures in the Puri Audience Hall ; "A few of the
human figures are disgustingly obscene.' Such sculptures are
not confined to Puri.
To prevent prosecution, the Penal Code makes the follow¬
ing exception :
" This Section does not extend to any representation sculptured,
engraved, painted or otherwise represented on or in any temple or on
any car used for the conveyance of idols, or kept or used for any
religious purpose."
Do the temples of any other religion in the world require
such an exception?
It is well known that obscene objects suggest obscene ideas.
The morals of the Hindu worshipper are corrupted where they
ought to be purified. Such a religion could never have originated
from a pure and holy God. It must have arisen at a time when
men thought that God was like themselves, given to sensuality.
12. Ring out Caste ; king in the Brotherhood or Man.
Religion properly means our dutu to God. In this sense
Hinduism, strictly speaking, is not a religion. A Hindu may be
an atheist, pantheist, polytheist, monotheist, he may worship
anything or nothing ; but if he observe the rules of caste, no one
can find fault with him.
The sacred books of the Hindus contain no consistent
account of the origin of castes ; but, on the contrary, present the
greatest varieties of speculation on the subject.
The most common story is that the castes issued from the
mouth, arms, thighs and feet of Brahma. The Satapatha Brah-
mana says that they sprang from the words bhuh, bhuvali, svah.
The Taittiriya Brahmana says that they were produced from the
Vedas. In another place the same hook says the Brahman caste
36
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
is sprung from the gods; the Sudras from the asuras. In one
book men are said to be the offspring of Yivasvat; in another his
son Manu is said to be their progenitor; whilst in a third they are
said to be descended from a female of the same name. The Bha-
gavata Purana says that in the Krita or Satya Yuga there was
but one caste. The Vayu Purana says that the separation into
castes did not take place till the Treta Yuga.
When witnesses in a court of justice give conflicting
evidence, discredit is thrown upon all their testimony.
Max Miiller, who devoted a great part of his life to the study
of the Yedas, says :
" There is no authority whatever in the hymns of the Yeda for the
complicated system of castes. There is no law to prohibit the different
classes of the people from living together, from eating and drinking
together ; no law to prohibit the marriage of people belonging to differ¬
ent castes; no law to brand the offspring of such marriages with an
indelible stigma. There is no law to sanction the blasphemous preten¬
sions of a priesthood to divine honours, or the degradation of any
human being to a state below the animal " Chips, Yol. II.
Prom the legend of Parasurama filling five lakes with Ksha-
triya blood, it would seem that there were sanguinary struggles
for superiority between the Brahmans and Kshatriyas.
By degrees the Brahmans developed the system which is ex¬
plained in the Laws of Manu. The laws were never fully carried
out, but they show the aims of the Brahmans. The following
are some extracts.
Brahmans.
93. Since he sprang from the most excellent part, since he was
the first-born, and since he holds the Yedas, the Brahman is, by right,
the lord of all this creation.
100. Thus whatever exists in the universe is all the property of
the Brahman ; for the Brahman is entitled to all by his superiority and
eminence of birth.
380. Certainly (the king) should not slay a Brahman even if he
he occupied in crime of every sort; but he should put him out of the
realm in possession of all his property, and uninjured (in body). Book I.
Sudras.
413. But a Sudra, whether bought or not bought, (the Brahman)
may compel to practise servitude; for that (Sudra) was created by the
Self-existent merely for the service of the Brahman.
417. A Brahman may take possession of the goods of a Sudra
with perfect peace of mind, for, since nothing at all belongs to this
(Sudra) as his own, he is one whose property may be taken awav bv
his master. Book YIII.
12. RING OUT CASTE.
37
125. The leavings of food should he given (him) and the old
clothes; so too the blighted pavt of the grain; so too the old furniture.
Book X.
270. If a (man) of one birth assault one of the twice-born castes
with virulent words, he ought to have his tongue cut out, for he is of
the lowest origin.
281. If a low-horn man endeavours to sit down by the side of a
high-born man, he should be banished after being branded on the hip,
or (the king) may cause his backside to be cut off. Book VIII.
80. One may not give advice to a Sudra, nor (give him) the remains
(of food) or (of) butter that has been offered. And one may not teach
him the law or enjoin upon him (religious) observances.
81. For he who tells him the law and he who enjoins upon him
(religious) observances, he indeed, together with that (Sudra) sinks into
the darkness of the hell called Asamvrtta (unbounded.) Book IV.
It is granted that caste has some advantages. Tt, promotes a
stationary senn-civihsaupn. It binds together men of the same
class ; TF promotes cleTuIIiness ; and it is a check, in certain direc¬
tions, on moral conduct. But these are far more than counter-
balanced by its pernicious effects. A system based on fraud and
injustice must, on the whole, bear evil fruits. The opinions of
competent witnesses will be given on this point.
Mr. It. C. Dutt says, " The caste system threw an indelible
stain on the criminal law of India."
Sir H. S. Maine, one of the ablest Europeans that ever came
to India, in his Ancient Law describes caste as " the moot disas¬
trous and blighting of human institutions."
The following are the heads of a lecture by Pandit Sivanath
Sastri on Caste :—
(1) It has produced disunion and discord.
(2) It lias madelionest manual labour contemptible in this country.
(3) It has checked lnfmTaTand 'wtpirifd
(1) It has Brought on physical degeneracy by confining marriage
within narrow circles.- " "
(of It has been a source of conservatism in everything.
(6) It has suppressed the development of individuality and inde¬
pendence of character.
* (7) It has helped in developing other injurious customs, such as
early marriage, the charging ot heavy matrimonial fees^&c.
(8) It has successtullyAestrained the growth and development of
nation;il worth : whilst allowing opportunity of mental and spiritual
culture only to a limited number of privileged people, it ha.s rleni^rl
these opportunities th the majority oi the lower classes, conserpientlv
it has "rnltdrrtbe country negatively a loser!
" p.n it, hits p""'" gip (.nimtvy Ht. I'm" foi-.-i.rp slavery by previously
enslaving the people by the most abject spiritual tyranny.
Dr. Bliandarkar says: "The caste system is at the root of
the political slavery of India."
38
THE CALL OE THE TWENTIETH CENTURA*.
Guilt of the Claim of Divine Sanction.—The late lfev. l)r.
Krishna Mohun Banerjea says :
" Such of our readers as have not absolutely surrendered their
mental freedom to the pretended authority of the Yedas and Puranas,
should consider the guilt of conforming to a system which is falsely
attributed to a divine original. Of all forgeries the most flagitious and
profane is that, which connects the name of the Almighty with an
untruth. If the Brahman, the Kshatriya, the Yaisbya, and the Sudra
did not really proceed from different parts of the Creator's person, the
story is nothing short of blasphemy. He who professes assent to such
a story by his conformity to the institution of caste is p<niktp.s crimnm
(a sharer in the crime.)"
Principal Caird says of caste :
" Instead of breaking down artificial barriers, waging war with
false separations, softening divisions and undermining class hatreds and
antipathies, religion becomes itself the very consecration of them.'*
For untold generations useful and hard working classes
have been deprived of their rights, treated with injustice and
scorn by those for whom they toiled. Some of their wrongs
have been rectified by the intervention of the British Government ;
but what is wanted is an acknowledgment of the Brotherhood
of Man.
It is a pleasing sign of progress that many educated Hindus
now acknowledge the Fatherhood of God, that He gave us being.
Hons of the Same father are brothers. The Brotherhood of Man
follows from the Fatherhood of God.
An English poet says :
" Children we are all
Of one Great Father, in whatever clime
His providence hath cast the seed of life ;
All tongues, all colours."
Similar sentiments are expressed in the Fanchatantra.
" Small souls inquire ' Belongs this man
To our own race, or class, or clan?'
But larger-hearted men embrace
As brothers all the human race."
Caste is the keystone of Hinduism. Unrighteousness cannot
bear good fruit. Educated Hindus should ponder the burning
words of Kingsley :
"Foremost among them stands a law which I must insist on,
boldly and perpetually, a law which man has been trying in all ages, as
now, to deny, or at least to ignore; though he might have seen it if he
had willed, working steadily in all times and nations. And that is—
that as the fruit of righteousness is wealth and peace, strength and
honour; the fruit of unrighteousness is poverty and anarchy, weakness
1. ring out the selfish yogi. 39
and shame. It is an ancient doctrine and yet one ever young. The
Hebrew prophets preached it long ago, in words which are fulfilling
themselves around us every day, and which no new discoveries of
science will abrogate, because they express the great root-law, which
disobeyed, science itself cannot get a hearing."*
What a glorious change it would be if the people of India
regarded each other a,s brethren, dealing justly with each other,
hearing one another's burdens, and seeking to aid and comfort
one another in the manifold trials of life !
in.
RING OUT FALSE BELIEFS IN OCCULT POWERS;
RING IN TRUE KNOWLEDGE.
1. Ring out the selfish Yogi; ring in the
benevolent worker.
The Hindu ideal of piety is that of a Yogi, meditating
withinR an ob/ect. a supposed prelude to union wirhThe~1Yii-gurra
T'rn.hni.'i the lughest Hindu conception of divinity, or to the acqui¬
sition of occult powers.
The early Aryans, coming from a cold climate, were ac¬
customed to labour and enjoyed life. They were satisfied with
their happiness on earth, and they looked for a continuance of it
with the pitris. A change took place after their settlement in
India. Labour was a burden in a hot climate, and undisturbed
repose seemed the highest bliss. This feeling was intensified by
the wars that prevailed, but chiefly by the belief in transmigra¬
tion. The Jews of old were thus addressed by God, " Thou
thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself." The
Hindus imagined a Brahma after their own heart. He may be
compared to a Hindu Raja, who spends his life in sloth within his
palace, heedless of what is going on throughout his dominions,
and leaving everything to his ministers.
" Unencumbered by the cares of empire," says Dr. Duff, " or
the functions of a superintending providence, he effectuates no
good, inflicts no evil, suffers no pain. He exists in a state of
undisturbed repose—a sleep so deep as never to be disturbed by a
dream—even without any consciousness of his own existence."
The evil results of this belief will be pointed out, with the
change which is necessary.
* Limits of Exact Science applied to History.
40
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
1. Yoga exercises originate in Selfishness.—Crozier, in his
History of Intellectual Development, lias the following remarks on
this point:
" Hinduism represents the extreme of Individualism. The one
object of its votaries is to save their own souls, not by working for the
welfare of others, hut by attending solely to their own salvation, not
ljiy~following through love the footsteps of a high personal exemplar
wherever they may lead, but by practising a low and seltislrasceticfStn,
aricl bv keening a nrolit and loss account of merit and demerit. IfThas
ho regard therefore for the welfare of the family, let alone for that of the
State, or the world at large ; and to this disregard, the doctrine of re¬
incarnations, which means the incarnation in their children, not of their
own souls, but of the souls of other men, still further lends itself."
f The prayojana, or aim, of Hinduism is mukti, liberation,
/ freedom from the miseries of samsdru, the attainment of a state
of dreamless sleep. The last stage prescribed by Hinduism is to
retire to the desert. The hermit is to care only for himself. He
is not to give the young the benefit of his experience, he is not to
feed the hungry, instruct the ignorant, visit the sick, comfort the
1 sorrowing, extend a helping hand to those struggling in the ocean
I of life ; he is to care only for himself. It must be confessed that
\ in this he is simply imitating Brahma, in whom the doctrine
\ reaches its full development.
1— 2. Yoga exercises are worse than Useless.—They fail to
secure the objects in view—freedom from re-births or the acquisi¬
tion of occult powers. They are injurious to the individual him¬
self. Their only effect upon him is to produce a kind of mesmeric
sleep and ^onfusion~of the mental powers! Barth, an eminent
French Oriental scholar, says of theinT ■
" Conscientiously observed, they can only issue in folly and
idiocy."*
The same opinion is expressed by Professor Huxley, distin¬
guished for his knowledge of the human body :
" No more thorough mortification of the flesh has ever been
attempted than that achieved by the Indian ascetic anchorite ; no later
monachism has so""riearly succeeded in reducing the human mind to
that condition of impassive quasi-somnambulism, which, but for its
acknowledged holiness, might run the risk of being confounded with
idiocy. "
' "It was folly to continue to exist when an overplus of pain was
certain. Slaying the body only made matters worse; there was
nothing for it but to slay the soul by the voluntary arrest of all its
activities. Property, social ties, family affections, common compan¬
ionship, must be abandoned; the most natural appetites, even that
for food, must he suppressed, or at least minimised, until all that
* Religions of India, p. 83.
2. ring out belief in tapas.
41
remained of a man was the impassive, extenuated, mendicant monk
self-hypnotised into cataleptic trances, which the deluded mystic took
for foretastes of the final union with Brahma."*
Instead of " foretastes of final union with Brahma," the
result is incipient " idiocy !" —>
"As is the god, so is the worshipper." The believer in a
Nirguna Brahma would tend to become as selfish and as useless
as his god. Even for a man to act like the Nirguna Brahma
would now be condemned by enlightened public opinion ; much
more would it be considered degrading for the Supreme Deity
to act in such a way. The conclusion is that there is no
such being as the Nirguna Brahma; he is merely the invention
of"Hindu philosophers, \vh(rtootra pessimistic view of life, and
d3_not_realize_their duty to their fellow-men.
Xoga. exercises are a loss to the community. The time vainly
spent on them should be devoted to the benefit of the country.
Action—not meditation—rsthe" u feat "need of India and the:- t
tru(fldea]. We are surrounded by crores of our felToiv Beings,
inosFof them sunk in ignorance, leading to much sin and suffer¬
ing. Instead of selfishly seeking to get away from this evil
and sorrowful world, it is far nobler to try to make it less evil
and less sorrowful for those who remain in it. In doing so, we
shall also best secure our own happiness.
The Christian conception of God is briefly expressed in the
words, " Thou art good and doest good " The great Creator
watches unceasingly over the universe which He called into
being. He knows every thing that takes place throughout His
vast dominions, and He is unceasingly providing for the wants
of His creatures. Jesus Christ, the Great Teacher, holds up
our heavenly Father as our model: " Be ye therefore perfect
as your Father in heaven is perfect." We should seek to be
pure and holy like God, and like Him be engaged in doing good.
John Wesley gives the following rules :
2. King out belief in Tapas; ring in true Self-Sacrifice.
., Tapas, austerity, means self-imposed bodily mortification.
ThfTtheory is that a Hindu who aims at perfection ought to go
through six courses of tapas for twelve years, each rising by
" Do all the good you can,
By all the means you can,
In all the ways you can,
In all the places you can,
At all the times you can,
To all the people you can,
As long as ever you can."
*
Evolution and Ethics, pp. 64, 65.
6
12
THE CAEL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
degrees up to the highest order of all—the Parama-hamsa, who
is supposed to he wholly absorbed in meditating on Brahma and
to do nothing else whatever.
The following is one course : The ascetic eats leaves and is
clothed in grass. For one month he eats fruits every third day ;
for another month every sixth day ; for another month every
fortnight; and for the fourth month he lives on air, standing on
tip-toe with arms stretched out. The usual object is to gain
merit. The gods are supposed to owe their greatness to their
austerities.
In the Yana Parva of the Mahabharata the austerities of
Krishna are described. He lived for eleven thousand years on
water alone, he stood for a hundred years with arms upraised
standing on one leg living upon air, he stood on one leg for a
thousand years of the celestials, &c.
The Siva Purana gives the following account of the auster¬
ities of Taraka the demon king of Tripura. He went through the
following eleven series, each lasting 100 years: 1. He stood on
one foot holding the other and both hands up towards heaven,
with his eyes hxed on the sun. 2. He stood on one great toe.
3. He took only water for his sustenance. 4. He lived similarly
on air. 5. He remained in water. 6. He was buried in the
earth, but continued in incessant adoration. 7. The same in fire.
8. He stood on his head. 9. He hung on a tree by his hands.
10. He bore the weight of his body on one hand. 11. He hung
on a tree with his head downwards.
By these austerities he is said to have forced Brahma to
promise him any boon he should demand.
No person but a child in intellect can believe such stories.
They illustrate the " boundless credulity " of Hinduism.
There are men of the present day who undergo various
forms of austerity.
The Urdhvabahus (up arms) raise their arms till they are
unable to lower them. The Akasamuktis, 'sky-facers' hold
their faces towards the sky till the muscles stiffen and they
live thus always. The Nakhis, (Nail) ascetics allow their nails to
grow through their clenched hands which unfits them to work.
The Kapalikas, (Skull men) use a^kuii as a drinking vessel.
Some hang with their heads down, others have their legs up. A
very meritorious act is to sit in the midday sun with fires blazing
all around.
The Aghorapanthas are the most disgusting class. They pro¬
pitiate Siva by feeding on filth of all kinds. It is asserted that
some eat corpses stolen from Muliammadan burial grounds.
The head of the Aghoras is said to subsist upon scorpions,
lizards, and loathsome insects left to putrefy in a dead man's
skull.
2. RING OUT BELIEF IN TAPAS.
43
, J/U^ 'LUtTZZ
RAIVA ASCETICS.
What good does a sannyasi do 3 Most men become sanny-
asis because they are too lazv to work, nihfl"ciuTgiyln^^
by preying~upon the industrious. The withered arm, the vow of
"silence, Ac., are merely devices"to get more money. Such vows
are sins—not acts of merit. Suppose a servant rendered useless
some~of thWtdoIs^gTverPto him to work with, would he be
praised ? God has given us arms to provide food for ourselves,
ous families and the poor ; He has given us the gift of speech that
we may comfort the sorrowful, instruct the ignorant. The
withered arm and vow of silence defeat these ends. It would be
noble for a man to venture into a burning house to rescue
children ; but it is worse than useless for a man to sit in the
midst of blazing fires.
The wickedness of sannyasis is shown by their threatening to
curse those who refuse to give them alms. A truly good man,
would go away quietly ; even if reviled, he would bless rather than
curse.
A religion encouraging such austerities is the invention of a
dark age. King them out.
Ring in true self-sacrifice.—Hapily there are examples.
There are men of great ability, professors in the Fergusson
College, Poona, content with low salaries that they may benefit
their countrymen. Justice Ranade gave himself largely to the
promotion of social reform ; Vidyasagar devoted his life and fortune
to benefit Indian widows ; noble women, like Miss Nightingale,
have given themselves to nursing the sick. Father Damien went
among lepers and died of their disease ; missionary ladies have
sacrificed their lives to attend to the plague-stricken in India. All
such disinterested benevolnece is to be encouraged, but not useless
austerities.
44
THE CALL OE THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
3. RlNG out BELIEF IN MANTRAS, CHARMS, AND PRETENDED
Sciences; ring in true Knowledge.
The belief in mantras and magical powers is universal
among savages and semi-civilized nations. Lang says :
" The world and all the things in it being conceived of vaguely as
sensible and rational, are supposed to obey the commands of certain
members of each tribe, such as chiefs, jugglers, or conjurers. These
conjurers can affect the weather, work miracles, assume what shapes,
animal, vegetable, or inorganic, they please, and can change other
persons into similar shapes.""
An American Indian will give a form of incantation with
which he says you will be able to call to you all the birds from
the sky, and all the foxes and wolves from their burrow's. There
are supposed to be mantras which raise the wind ; which split
rocks ; by virtue of which the shape of any animal may be
assumed at will or a person can fly through the air.
In China charms are regularly sold. The Japanese carry
their charms in bags ; the Sinhalese have little cases tied to the
body. The Burmese can never lose their charms for they are
tattooed on their bodies. Some of these tattooed charms are sup¬
posed to prevent a person from feeling pain when beaten, others
guard against danger from snake-bite, musket-shots, drowning,
the spells of wizards, and evil spirits. It does not matter to the
Burmese although persons having tattooed charms are shot or
drowned. Their belief in their efficacy is practically ineradicable.
Belief in magical powers has existed among the Hindus from
very early times. There are some mantras even in the Rig-Veda.
Hymn ix. 69 is supposed to secure success in a chariot race ;
Hymn x. 145, to rid a jealous wife of a rival: x. 163, to cure con¬
sumption.
A great part of the Atharva Veda consists of supposed
magical charms, e.g.,
A charm against leprosy.
A charm to obtain invisibility.
A charm to ensure success in gambling.
A charm to banish vermin and noxious creatures.
A charm against tigers.
A charm to make a poisoned arrow harmless.
A love charm.
A charm to promote the growth of hair.
A charm to recover a sick man at the point of death.
* Myth, Ritual and Religion, Vol. I. p. 84.
H. KING OUT BELIEF IN MANTKAS, ETC.
45
Hir Monier Williams thus describes the claims of a Mantra-
sastri:—
" He can prognosticate futurity, work the most startling prodigies,
infuse breath into dead bodies, kill or humiliate enemies, afflict any one
anywhere with disease or madness, inspire any one with love, charm
weapons and give them unerring efficacy, enchant armour and make
it impenetrable, turn milk into wine, plants into meat. He is even
superior to the gods, and can make gods, goddesses, imps, and demons,
carry out his most trifling behests."*
It is supposed that the efficacy of the mantras is destroyed
unless the very words are used ; they are useless if translated.
Hindu Sacred Books show an equal belief in the power of
curses. Durvasas, the irascible rishi, is said to have cursed the
gods with tremendous effect. Krishna was to die from a wound
in the foot, because he did not remove some grains of rice which
fell upon the foot of the rishi.
Enlightened nations have no belief in mantras, charms, or
magic. Mere words have no power. What is considered the
strongest charm cannot hurt even a fly. People may trample
charms under foot, cut them in pieces, throw them into the fire.
If they cannot protect themselves, much less can they protect
those who wear them.
The nations of the world that suffer least from sickness and
live longest, who are the most prosperous, never use charms,
while they abound among savage tribes.
On the other hand, through true knowledge the most
wonderful inventions have been made, as the railway, the electric
telegraph, &c.
A list is given at pages 8, 9, of pretended sciences. It is true
that a mesmerist acquires some control over a person whom he
has mesmerised ; but, with this exception, the supposed sciences
are a delusion.
Only one or two of them can be noticed.
Belief in astrology has existed from very early times. The
heavenly bodies were regarded as divinities who had a great
influence upon human affairs. A better knowledge of them through
telescopes helped to dispel this belief. Careful observations also
showed that they had no more influence than passing clouds. In
ancient times eclipses were a source of great alarm ; now, among
civilised nations, they are only regarded as interesting sights.
Astrology can easily be proved to be false. People sometimes
ask for fortunate hours to commence a lawsuit. If both parties
consult an astrologer at the same time, they will receive the same
answer, although, one of them must lose and the other gain. If
* Brahmanism and Hinduism, p. 201.
4G THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURA7
a queen and a sweeper woman each give birth to a child at the
same moment, both will be born under the same planets. Their
horoscopes should be the same, but how different will be their
future lots !
Some things written in horoscopes come to pass. It may be
said of every one born in this world, that if he live he will have
sickness at some time or other, and that if he recover, he will not
then die ; that he will have seasons of prosperity and adversity ;
that he will have friends and enemies. These things may be
safely written in every horoscope. But when astrologers pretend
to tell how long a person will live, or such things, they are merely
right in a few cases by chance.
Success in business often depends upon doing things at the
right time. A little water will quench a fire at the beginning ;
but if allowed to go on, all efforts to put it out may be useless.
It is somewhat the same with the work of a farmer, merchant,
and every other employment. God has given to each one reason
to guide him ; but, if instead of using that, he consult an ignorant
astrologer, it is not surprising that he should fail.
Compare the different nations—those that are guided by
astrologers and those that are guided by reason. Look at a
Hindu almanac. It is filled with directions about lucky and
unlucky days and hours. Look, on the other hand, at an English
almanac. From beginning to end, there is not a single word
about lucky or unlucky times.
Long ago, the English, like the Hindus, believed in astrology.
They were then comparatively poor, and had not attained the
vast wealth and power they now possess. Wise men found out
by careful examination that horoscopes written by the best
astrologers were only right now and then by chance : the true
nature of the planets came by degrees to be understood.
Sir Madava Low thus shows the evil effects of astrology in
the case of marriages :—
" The difficulties attendant upon the choice of suitable husbands
for the girls of a Hindu family are generally many and great, and I am
bound to say that these difficulties are enormously aggravated by Hindu
Astrology.
The anxious parents and relatives of a girl, after much inquiry and
research, make a choice, good in many respects,—in respect of age,
health, appearance, education, and circumstances.
The horoscopes of the boy and girl are placed in the hands of
the astrologer, and he is asked for his opinion as to the proposed
match.
After much inspection, study and calculation—or rather the
appearance of the same—the astrologer perhaps says :
(1) The two horoscopes are not in accord; as they ought
to be.
3. RING OUT BELIEF IN MANTRAS, ETC. 47
(2) The horoscope of the boy shows that he will be short-lived;
and this means that the girl married to him will before long become a
widow !
(3) The horoscope of the boy shows that he is destined to lose
his first wife and to marry a second; and this means that the girl
married to him will die ere iong !
(4) The horoscope of the girl shows that she will not have a
father-in-law or mother-in-law ; and this means that, not long after
marriage, the parents of the boy will die !
Such predictions cause alarm to the parents of the girl and also to
the parents of the boy; and the proposed alliance is abandoned.
The parents of the girl begin again their inquiries and researches
for a husband for her. It having become known that her horoscope
has been declared objectionable in the way above stated, nobody will
accept her in marriage.
Similarly the parents of the boy renew their inquiries and
researches for a wife for him. It having become known that his
horoscope has been declared objectionable in the way above stated,
nobody is willing to offer him a girl in marriage.
Such embarrassments, and the unhappiness thereby caused,
afflict Hindu society in many and various forms."
All this mischief arises from belief in an imaginary science.
The great evil of astrology is, that it is a sin against God.
It is placing inanimate planets in the room of their Creator.
The one true God is King. He is Lord of heaven above,
and of the earth beneath. Agriculture, commerce, government,
&c., are all dependent upon His control. Mercury, Mars, Venus,
Jupiter, Saturn, the Sun and Moon, are all His servants. They
have no authority, not even over the most insignificant things.
They are but lifeless bodies, and faith in them is not of the
slightest advantage. Let us worship Him alone, who is their
and our Creator, the Most High, the Almighty, the Omniscient,
the All-holy, the infinitely Just, the All-merciful God.
God never changes, never ceases to reign. No one can
usurp His authority. No time is more lucky or unlucky than
another. Any time is proper for what ought to be done ; but
anything wrong is equally forbidden at all times, and the guilty
must suffer the consequence.
Omens are childish superstitions. There is not the slightest
connexion between meeting a horse or a Brahman and the good
success or bad success of any business. A lizard is not a prophet
to foretell future events. Can we suppose that God makes
known to a dog, a creature without a soul and without reason,
what He does not reveal to the wisest men 7 If the plaintiff and
defendant in a suit went to court together, they would meet the
same omens, yet one would lose and the other gain the case.
Alchemy is a pretended science by which common metals
can be changed into silver or gold. Every now and then we
48
the call of the twentieth century.
read of men giving alchemists their brass vessels to be changed
into gold, with the result that both alchemists and vessels
disappear.
Belief in these pretended sciences shows that India is still
in the Dark Ages. Happily the darkness is beginning to be dispel¬
led, and Professor Rose by his brilliant discoveries has gained the
admiration of European scientists.
Mr. Tata's Research Institute will be a great heip in this
direction.
IV- RING OUT RELIGIOUS ERROR; RING
IN RELIGIOUS TRUTH.
Of all reforms this is the most important, and, if secured, it
would lead to all other reforms.
1. Ring out Polytheism ; ring in Monotheism.
The intense misdirected religiousness of the Hindus is shown
in the vast number of their gods, popularly said to number 83
crores.
Monier AVilliams says that the Hindu will worship anything :
" There is not an object in heaven or earth which a Hindu is not
prepared to worship—sun, moon, and stars ; rocks, stocks, and stones;
trees, shrubs, and grass; sea, pools, and rivers; his own implements
of trade ; the animals he finds most useful, the noxious reptiles he
fears, men remarkable for any extraordinary qualities—for great valour,
sanctity, virtue or even vice; good and evil demons, ghosts, and goblins,
the spirits of departed ancestors; an infinite number of semi-human
and semi-divine existences, inhabitants of the seven upper and the
seven lower worlds—each and all come in for a share of divine honours
or a tribute of more or less adoration."™
Polytheism is a belief in the existence of many gods. It is
opposed to monotheism, a belief in only one God.
At a very early period the undivided Aryans, the ancestors of
the Romans, Greeks, English, German, Persians, and Hindus,
worshipped the same God, under the name of Heaven-Father.
Max Muller says :
" There is a monotheism which precedes the polytheism of the
Yeda, and even in the invocation of their innumerable gods, the remem¬
brance of a God, one and infinite, breaks through the mist of an idola¬
trous phraseology, like the blue sky that is hidden by passing clouds."
* Brahmaniim and Hinduism, p. 350.
1. kikg out Polytheism.
49
As time rolled on, the number of gods was increased. Some
Hindus, unacquainted with the Yedas, think that they contain a
pure monotheism. Such is not the case.
The gods are usually spoken of as thrice-eleven, with their
wives, as the following quotations will show :
In the third Mandala of the Rig-Veda, Hymn (5, verse 10,
Agni is thus addressed :
" Bring, with their wives, the gods, the three-and-thirty, after thy
godlike nature, and be joyful."
The following invitation is given to the Asvins :
" Come 0 Nasatyas, with the thrice eleven gods ; come, 0 ye
Asvins, to the drinking of the moath." 1.34.11.
A hymn to the Yisvedevas concludes thus :
"O ye eleven gods whose home is heaven, O ye eleven who make
earth your dwelling.
Ye who with might, eleven, live in waters, accept this sacrifice, 0
gods, with pleasure." I. 139. 11.
The '27th hymn of the first Mandala of the Rig-Veda con¬
cludes as follows :
" Glory to gods, the mighty and the lesser, glory to gods the
younger and the elder ;
Let us, if we have power, pay the gods worship ; no better
prayer than that, ye gods, acknowledge."
Sometimes all the gods were comprehended by one common
name, Visva Dcvas, the All-gods, and prayers were addressed to
them in their collective capacity.
There are different kinds of polytheism. The ancient Greeks
and Romans had a more or less organised system of gods, different
in power and rank, and all subordinate to a supreme God, a Zeus
or Jupiter. In the Yeda, the gods worshipped as supreme by each
sect stand still side by side, no one is always first, no one is always
last. Even gods of a decidedly inferior and limited character
assume occasionally in the eyes of a devoted poet a supreme place
above all other gods.
" It would be easy to find," says Max Midler, " in the numer¬
ous hymns of the Veda, passages in which almost every single god
is represented as supreme and absolute. In the first hymn of the
second Mandala, Agni is called the ruler of the universe, the lord
of men, the wise king, the father, the brother, the son, and friend
of men ; nay, all the powers and names of the others are distinctly
ascribed to Agni...Indra is celebrated as the strongest god in the
hymns as well as in the Brahmanas, and the burden of one of the
songs of the tenth book is ; Vis'vasmad Indra uttarah, " Indra is
7
60 THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTUllV.
greater than all.'' 01' Soma it is said that he was born great, and
that he conquers every one. He is called the king of the world ;
he has the power to prolong the life of men, and in one sense he
is called the maker ot heaven and earth, of Agni, of Surya, ot
Indra and Vishnu.
" If we read the next hymn, which is addressed to Varumi,
we perceive that the god here invoked is, to the mind of the poet,
supreme and all-mighty."
Max Mtiller coined a word, Iiciiathcisin.' to express what he
seems to regard as a " peculiar character of the ancient Yedkr
rehgion." ft denotes LhatTacirbf several divinities is regarded as
supreme, anil worshipped without reference to the restT The
sallle applies largely to modern Hinduism. Each person may
have his special god, his ishta clcoata, but whom he may change for
another if required. At the same time he may believe in many
others. Henotheism is'sinmlyirforni of polytheism.
' The Hymns of the liig-Veda were composed by many authors,
extending-over a period ol several centuries. Hence the theology
is often inconsistent. The polytheism of some hymns is very
marked and distinct. In others it is hazy. Some hymns, in the
absence of all others, might be regarded as monotheistic.
One poet says (Big-Veda I. 1(34, 4(3) : " That which is one,
sages name it in various ways—they call it Agni, Yama, Mata-
risvan." Another poet says: " The wise poets represent by their
words Him who is one with beautiful wings in many ways."
The liig-Veda contains upwards of a.thousand hymns. Only
in two or three of them, of a later date, are the gods said to be one.
Whitney says: " The great mass of Vedic hymns are
absorbed in the praise and worship of the multifarious deities of
the proper Vedic pantheon, and ignore all conception of a unity
of which these are to be accounted the varying manifestations."
Max Midler says; "If we must employ technical terms, the
religion of the Veda is polytheism, not monotheism."
The 33 gods of the Vedas were afterwards increased to 33
crores, thus described by Sir Alfred Lyall :
"A tangled jungle of disorderly superstitions ; ghosts and demons,
demigods and deified saints; household gods, tribal gods, local gods,
universal gods ; with the countless shrines and temples, and the din of
their discordant rites; deities who abhor a fly's death, those who
delight still in human victims, and those who would not either sacrifice
or make offerings. "
It is alleged that all the gods are the same though worship¬
ped under different names.
Take the three principal gods, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva :
their residences, wives, and children are all different. Brahma is
* Asiatic Studies, Vol. I. pp. 2, 3.
1. king out polytheism.
51
said to live in Batya-loka, his wife is Bavitri; Vishnu lives in
Vaikuntha, his wife is Lakshml; Biva lives in Kailasa, his wife is
said to be Parvatl. Different dispositions and actions are ascribed
to these gods. Several times they are said to have fought with
each other.
If the 33 crores of the Hindu gods are all the same, it may as
well be said that the 30 crores of people in India, with different
houses, wives, children, occupations, are all one. If the gods are
one, why are they reckoned as amounting to 33 crores ?
T^his is only an excuse for the folly of polytheism put forward
by those who are somewhat more intelligent than the masses.
ITammolmn Koy says: "The Hindus firmly believe in the real
existence of innumerable gods and goddesses who possess in their
own departments full and independent powers, and to propitiate
them, and not the true God, are temples erected and ceremonies
performed."
The Hindus themselves call their religions by the name of the
particular deity they worship, as Siva Bliakti, Vishnu Bhahti,
&c. The vast majority would be indignant at the supposition that'
their own religion and the detested heresy of their opponents,
are, after all, the same. <
One of the worst and most injurious features of some edu¬
cated Hindus is their attempts to defend popular superstitions,
thus prepetuating their reign, and inflicting a grievous wrong
upon their ignorant countrymen. A Calcutta Journal recently
denied that the Hindus are polytheists, and had the audacity to
assert that if Hinduism is polytheistic, so is Christianity.
Let India ring out the 33 crores of divinities, now acknowl¬
edged, and ring in the great Creator and Lord of the Universe,
who has the highest claims to our allegiance, reverence, and love.
He is the " I am," the self-existent, " without beginning of
days or end of years." " From everlasting to everlasting, Thou
art God." He is unchanging, " the same yesterday, and to-day,
and for ever." He is the Almighty God. He called the universe
into existence, and His Government extends over all. He is
never unconscious. He never slumbers nor sleeps. "The
Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, neither is weary."
He knows everything that takes place throughout His vast
dominions. Not a hair of our head can fall to the .ground with¬
out His knowledge ; every thought of our heart is known to
Him. His ear is ever open to the cry of His children.
The worship of any other is a defiance of God's authorit}',
a declaration that we will not have Him to rule over us. All the
guilt that lies in foul rebellion against the mildest and most
merciful of earthly monarchs—in disobeying the kindest and griev¬
ing the best of fathers, in ingratitude to a generous benefactor; all
this evil, multiplied a thousand times, there is in Hinduism,
52 the call of the twentieth century.
And whom do the Hindus worship instead of the one true
God, infinite in power, and wisdom, spotlessly holy ? Deities
stained with every crime. Even brute beasts, senseless blocks,
and stones are honoured in preference to the great Creator and
rightful Lord of all.
2. Ring out Pantheism ; ring in a Personal God.
Pantheism, from pan, all, tJieos, God, is the doctrine that
God is all that exists. Perhaps no dogTtnris held more iirmly 'by
the Hindus. It pervades all, even the most unintelligent. The
acknowledgment is universally made that God is one, while at
the same time the countless divinities of the Hindu Pantheon are
worshipped.
Pantheism is unmistakably taught in the Upanishads. The
Chhandogya Upanishad says:
Elcam evadvitlyam, " One without a second." vii. 2. 1.
Sarvam Kalvidam Brahma, " All this (universe) is Brahma." iii.
The first does not mean that there is only one God ; but that
nothing else exists, which is a very different doctrine. The
second states plainly that all that exists is Brahma.
According to the older view Brahma is both the material and
efficient cause of creation—that is, he forms it out of himself.
The following illustrations are given in the Mundukya Upanishad :
"7. As the spider casts out and draws in (its web), as on the
earth the annual herbs are produced, as from living man the hairs of
the head and body spring forth, so is produced the universe from
indestructible (Brahma).
" 1. This is the truth : As from a blazing lire in thousand ways
similar sparks proceed so, O beloved, are produced living souls of
various kinds from the indestructible (Brahma) and they also return to
him."
Souls are compared to the web which the spider forms out of
its own body, to sparks from a fire. The fiction of Avidya, (non-
knowledge) or Maya, illusion, was afterwards invented. The
universe has no real existence—all is illusion as in a dream.
The Nirguna Brahma of Vedantism represents the god of
Pantheism. -He is supposed to be in a state of dreamless sleep.
The following are some of the objections to Pantheism :
Professor Flint shows that under the pretence of exalting God, it
degrades Him :
" It would divest God of character : it denies to Him self-conscious¬
ness, fatherly love, providential care, redeeming mercy : under pretence
of exalting Him above all categories of thought and existence, it reduces
Him to the level of dead things, of necessary processes, of abstract
2 ring out pantheism; ring in a personal god. 58
ideas, or even to the still lower level of the unknowable and non¬
existent ; and it thereby leaves no room for that union with God in
rational, pure, and holy love, which is the only basis, the grand distinc¬
tion, the power, and the glory of true religion."
Lhrntheism stifles religion—T.m-.e q. GW is the very essence of
religion. Jhiw cannot, exist, towards a being like the
BnihiOiW Tt, is ntfeleqg in iiddress in prayer or worship a God
unconscious even of its own existence. The same truths are thus'
set forth by Professor Flint: ~
" Religion supposes faith, love, hone: hut pantheism when it
fLvnjog J-Ln pnrrrm'ilit-.y nf (4nr1 vpfii^cq fn Iliene il.ffoct.i ori s an appropriate
oiuept. It withholds from the view of the spirit what can alone satisfy
ifsbest and deepest feelings. The less of determinate personal charac¬
ter God is regarded as having, the less is it possible to love or trust
Him."
Vedantists admit that the common people cannot form any
idea of the Nirguna Brahma. They are therefore recommended
to worship the Puranic deities. As already quoted, Flint thus
characterises this recommendation :
"If it look upon the popular deities as mere fictions of the
popular mind, its association with polytheism can only mean a
conscious alliance with falsehood, the deliberate propagation of
lies, a persistent career of hypocrisy "
The two great sentences of Vedantism are Brahntitsmi, ' I am
Brahma,' and Tat ticam asi, 'That thou art.' So hum, ' I am it'
is another formula often repeated by Sannyasis. The meaning is
that God and the soul are identical.
The Prahuddhd Bhdrata says :
Vedanta " is the one philosophy which dares to call man God
Himself, not merely the son of God or His servant." Vol. I.
p. 75.
The Brahmavadin (Oct. 12, 1895, p. 30) makes the same
claim in terms equally blasphemous :
" Man is not the mere creature of a God; he is God himself. lie
has not simply the image impressed upon him of his Creator. He is
himself the Creator."
If the human soul and the Supreme Soul are identical, then
the latter is responsible for every action of the former. As He is
the sole Being, every action that is performed is an action of God.
The most wicked deeds which men vainly fancying themselves
free agents are tempted to perform, are actually perpetrated by
God. Flint says :
" The worst passions and vilest actions of humanity are states and
operations of the One Absolute Being. Man cannot he justly held
54
THE CALL OK THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
responsible for what truly belongs to God—for affections or deeds which
are necessarily manifestations of the Divine nature."
Gaudapurnananda thus contrasts God and Man :
" Thou art verily rifled, 0 thou animal soul, of thy understanding,
by this dark theory of MAya, because like a maniac, thou constantly
rawest, 11 am Brahma.' Where is thy divinity, thy sovereignty, thy
omniscience? 0 thou animal soul ! thou art as different from Brahma
as is a mustard seed from Mount Meru. Thou art a finite soul, He is
infinite. Thou canst occupy but one space at a time, He is always
everywhere. Thou art momentarily happy or miserable, He is happy
at all times. How canst thou say ' I am He ? Hast thou no shame ?"
The idea of a God in a dreamless sleep might commend itself
to philosophers whose great aim was to deliver themselves from
the miseries of rebirths, but such an idea of utter selfishness is
now condemned by intelligent men, and the Nirguna Brahma is
regarded as a mere fiction, without existence.
Person usually means having a body ; bnt-tlxe-Bornonahty of
God is not, to be sn nnrfprstnnd ft. i'q thna explained by Illings-
worth :
" The constituent elements of personality are self-consciousness, the
power of self-determination, and desires which irresistibly impel us into
communion with other persons—or, in other words, reason, will, and
love. These are three perfectly distinct and distinguishable functions,
but they are united as being the functions of one and the selfsame
subject." p. 38.
"1
The arguments in favour of the Personality of God are briefly
the following :
1. The almost universality of the belief in prayer.—Guizot,
the great French statesman, eloquently says:
"Alone of all beings here below, man prays! Among his moral
instincts none is more natural, more universal, more indestructible than
prayer. The child inclines to it with eager docility. The old man
betakes himself thither, as a refuge against decay and solitude. Prayer
comes spontaneously to young lips which with difficulty stammer out
the name of God, and to dying lips which no longer have strength to
pronounce it. Among all nations, celebrated or obscure, civilised or
barbarous, one meets at every step acts and forms of invocation."
This natural instinct is a strong proof of the existence of a
Personal God. Prayer would be useless addressed to a Being
unconscious even of its own existence.
2. The Argument from Evidences of Design in the Universe.
—Even an ordinary house requires a builder. If we see a mag¬
nificent palace, filled with beautiful furniture, we know that it Is
the work of a wise and skilful hand. Much more must this great
3. IllNG Ot'T IMMORAL GODS.
55
universe owe its existence to a Being possessed of infinite wisdom
and power.
3. The Moral Argument.—This consists in Hie fact that we
are conscious of being free, and yet under the obligation of a
moral law which can only be conceived as emanating from a
personal Author.
Sin is viewed as not only the breach of a law, but also of dis¬
obedience to a person. " ' Against Thee Thee only have I sinned
and done this evil in Thy sight,' has been the cry of religion the
whole world over."*
Existence in a dreamless sleep may be the highest ideal of the
Supreme Deity with persons who regard existence as a curse, but
not with others. The Christian belief is that God is not only
self-conscious, but cognizant of whatever takes place throughout
the vast universe which He has created. He also possesses
infinite wisdom, exerted for the benefit of His creatures.
3. King out Immoral Gods ; King in a God who
loves Righteousness and hates Wickedness.
Without an exception, the character of every nation and tribe
of the human family has been formed and modified in a great
degree by the character attributed to their gods.
An old writer says. " Show me your gods, and I will show
you your men." This is acknowledged in the Indian proverb,
Yatha clcva, tatha hhaktah, ' As is the god, so is the worshipper.'
There is no more important question for a nation than this, What
is the nature of the God it worships V
Principal Fairbairn says : " Iyhnt. Qgiigtitutes a religion is a
iii /, cinri m• !n mul* • what differentiates religions is
dngs and gods are supposed to
be above all law, and not bound by the ordinary rules of morality.
The Bhagavata Purana makes the following admission and
defence :
" Even the lords of people (Brahma, Indra, etc.,) deviate from the
path of virtue and become guilty of ravishment. But these acts do not
bring any sin on the powerful and dispassionate ones (who perpetrate
them), even as lire is not to be blamed for burning all things."
According to the Bhagavata Purana, such conduct is natural
to them, and they should not be blamed for it, as fire is not to be
blamed for burning. The proverb is, Samarthi ho dosh nahin,
' To the mighty is no sin.' When the Hindus framed their gods,
* Abridged from Illingsworth's Personality, Human and Divine.
o(»
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
tliey took their kings as models. Their gods are deified men,
representing themselves.
So far from divinity excusing a crime, it vastly enhances its
guilt. If a child commit a fault, he is blamed : if an ordinary
man do the same, his guilt is greater; if a king does it, the guilt
and evil consequences are still greater. Krishna says in the
Bhagavad Glta :
" Whatever the most excellent practise, other men practise likewise.
The world follows whatever example they set."
The evil is inccmyxirahly—increased when a being rever-
enceft"tts-a god scBrrrTfaJexainple. "
The Bhagavata Purana thus cautions against following the
evil example of the gods :
" But those who are not masters of their passions should not commit
such acts even in their mind ; if they do these acts out of foolishness,
they are sure to meet with destruction even as persons, except Rudra,
meet with destruction having drunk poison."
It is a trite proverb that "History repeats itself." We see
the change going on in India which took place in Europe
eighteen centuries ago.
The gods of ancient Europe very much resembled those of
modern India. They sometimes fought with each other like the
gods of the Hindu pantheon. Jupiter was notorious for his
adulteries. He assumed the form of a husband to seduce a
faithful wife. Juno, his wife, bitterly complained of his con¬
duct.
Christianity taught higher conceptions of God. To charge
Him with lying, theft, or adultery, was felt to be blasphemy.
Attempts were made in ancient Europe to purify the popular
system, and several features of Christianity were copied. The
immoral stories about Jupiter and other gods were treated as
allegories, and spiritual meanings were given to disgraceful rites.
Heathen priests, like the Christians, were to instruct the people,
and exhort them to holy living. The heathen, like the Christian,
were to care for the poor.
As the standard of morality rose, such attempts at reform
were seen to be inadequate, and they disappeared before Chris¬
tianity. There is not now in Europe a single worshipper of its
ancient gods.
A similar movement is now going on in India. Men, par¬
tially enlightened through Christian morality, feel that the old
explanations of the crimes of the gods cannot bear the fierce
/ light of the twentieth century. As in ancient Europe, aHehl^ts
^-^are made to give a spiritual meaning to their evil deeds and to
initiate other reforms.
4. ring out idolatry ; ring in god is spirit. 57
Intelligent men, like Sir Alfred Lyall, foresee the change
that will take place in India. He says :
" It seems possible that the old gods of Hinduism will die in these
new elements of intellectual light and air as quickly as a net-full of fish
lifted up out of the water; that the alteration in the religious needs of
such an intellectual people as the Hindus, which will have been caused
by a change in their circumstances, will make it impossible for them
to find in their new world a place for their ancient deities. Their
primitive forms will fade and disappear silently, as witchcraft vanished
from Europe, and as all such delusions become gradually extin¬
guished."*
With increased light, it will be seen that the old gods of
Hindus are the inventions of men in an unenlightened age, and
that they ought to be rung out like the gods of ancient Europe.
Ring in a God who loves Righteousness and hates Wicked¬
ness-—The one true God revealed by Christianity is a God of
truth ; He is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. His most
glorious attribute is His spotless holiness. Sin is that abominable
thing which He hates. " Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God of
hosts." He is continually doing good to His creatures. His
character is expressed in one word—God is Love. Still, it is not
the feeling which looks upon good and evil with equal eye. If a
king allowed crime to be unpunished, his kingdom would become
like a hell. But God's own declaration is, " As I live, saith the
Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked ; but
that the wicked turn from his evil way and live."
This great Being deserves our worship. He first called us
into existence ; we have been dependent upon Him for every
breath that we draw ; we live upon His earth ; everything we
possess is His gift. He is both our Father in heaven and our
King, deserving our warmest love and utmost respect. To
worship Him is both our duty, and would have an excellent influ-
ence upon our character.
What a glorious change would be produced in India if this
great Being were truly .and universally worshipped !
4. Ring out Idolatry ; ring in God is Spirit.
Ap idol, from the Greek eidos, form, usually denotes an
iinage which is worsmppect. The change irom a stone to am
idol may be Veiy slight. A few chips or daubs of paint suffice to
convert the rude block into an idol.
Idolatry occupies a kind of middle place in religion. Savages
employ natural objects. Idolatry begins with lower races above
* Asiatic Studies, Vol. i, pp. 299, 300.
8
58
the call ok the twentieth century.
barbarism, and attains its greatest development among semi-
civilised nations ; among the enlightened it ceases.
In the Vedas idols do not seem to he mentioned ; hut now it
may he said of India, " the land is full of idols." They are found
in nearly every Hindu dwelling.
Excuses for Idolatry-—One of the saddest features of Indian
\ public opinion is that many educated Hindus, instead of seeking
to raise their ignorant countrymen above degrading superstitions,
_j seek to defend them by esoteric explanations, some of which they
must know to he false.
- ^ Babu Bulloram Mullick, b.a., thus refers to idolatry :
" Young India is prone to identify Hinduism with idolatry ; with
Cointe and Spencer in his head, he feels ashamed to acknowledge that
he is a Hindu. A more regrettable thing it is difficult to conceive.
What in the name of goodness is idolatry ? It is nothing more than
symbolization, i.e., you employ certain symbols for a particular
purpose. Is Young India prepared to eliminate all symbols from his
process of ratiocination and thought? Even in matters intellectual,
social and political, such symbols cannot he dispensed with. And is
not every phasis of human faith idolatry in the sense in which the
word is commonly used ? The Mahomedan conjures up the idea
of the Prophet in his visions, the Christian of Christ on the Cross, and
the Monotheist of Holiness and Love. In one case it is a material
figure, in the other it is a brain figure. And what Hindu of culture
worship the image per se? Ignorant Hindus rua}' not understand the
symbolization, but that is a charge which may be made against
ignorant Christians and ignorant Mussulmans also."*
It has been shown that some educated Hindus deny that the
people are polytheists. In like manner some deny that Hindus
are idolaters. Mr. S. B. Thakur, at a meeting in England, said
that idols are only like photographs, serving to remind us of those
we loved. To this Mr. Desmukh well replied : " It is true we
like to retain photographs of people we love to remind us of their
form and features ; hut your blocks of stone or your deformed
hideous brazen images, bought at a shop in the bazaar, of what
sort of Divinity do they remind us'?"
If Mr. Thakur had brought out to this country the image of
a donkey with an ape's head on it to show to his friends as a repre¬
sentative of the Queen of England, this would have been an
outrage against propriety infinitely less revolting than that for
which he pleaded.
Kammohun Boy explains how the above excuse for idolatry
originated :—-
" Some Europeans, imbued with high principles of liberality, but
unacquainted with the ritual part of Hindu idolatry, are disposed to
* Krishna, and Krishnaisvi, p. 5.
4. RING OUT IDOLATRY ; RING IN GOD IS SPIRIT.
59
palliate it by an interpretation which, though plausible, is by no means
well-founded. They are willing to imagine that the idols which the
Hindus worship, are not viewed by them in the light of gods or as real
personifications of the divine attributes, but merely as instruments for
raising their minds to the contemplation of those attributes, which are
respectively represented by different figures. I have frequently had
occasion to remark that many Hindus also who are conversant with the
English language, finding this interpretation a more plausible apology
for idolatry than any with which they are furnished by their own guides,
do not fail to avail themselves* of it, though in repugnance both to their
faith and to their practice. The declarations of this description of
Hindus naturally tend to confirm the original idea of such Europeans
who, from the extreme absurdity of pure unqualified idolatry, deduce an
argument against its existence."
Rammohun Roy further shows the falsity of the excuse :—•
" Neither do they regard the images of these gods merely in the
light of instruments for elevating the mind to the conception of those
supposed beings ; they are simply in themselves made objects of
worship. For whatever Hindu purchases an idol in the market, or con¬
structs one with his own hands, or has one made under his own superin¬
tendence, it is his invariable practice to perform certain ceremonies,
called Prait Pratishtha, or the endowment of animation, by which be
believes that its nature is changed from that of the mere materials
of which it is formed, and that it acquires not only life but superna¬
tural powers. Shortly afterwards, if the idol be of the masculine
gender, he marries it to a feminine one : with no less pomp and
magnificence than he celebrates the nuptials of his own children. The
mysterious process is now complete ; and the god and goddess are
esteemed the arbiters of bis destiny, and continually receive bis most
ardent adoration."
The life which by one ceremony has been brought into the
idol, can by another ceremony be taken out.
Another excuse is that idolatry is allowable for the ignorant.
To this it is replied, how is it that every Muhammadan and every
Protestant Christian can worship God without images ? Jlhe
ignorant do not need images to remind them of God. They cannot
understand His form toi lie has none:—They can remember then-
parents when far distant ; they can love a benefactor whom they
have never seen ; they can obey the authority of a King-Emperor
though he never set foot on their soil. They can worship God
who is a spirit in spirit and in truth. Idols are a hindrance—not
a help to true worship. They give most degrading ideas of God.
Folly nf Tdolatrv-—Idolatry has been well compared to
child'Spfay. Little children talk to their dolls as if they had life.
They dress them, pretend to give them food, put them to sleep,
and so forth. Grown up people do just the same. They treat
their idols as living beings. They offer them food, though they
60
THE CALL OE THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
cannot eat ; they have different kinds of music before images that
cannot hear ; they wave lights before what cannot see. In the
cold season they furnish them with warm clothes; in the hot
season they fan them ; and lest musquitoes should bite them, they
place them within curtains at night.
Instead of the idols taking care of their worshippers, it is the
latter who have to protect the former.
Nearly 3,000 years ago the folly of idolatry was thus shown
in the Bible :—
Their idols ar-e silver and gold,
The work of men's hands.
They have mouths, but they speak not,
Eyes have they, but they see not,
They have ears, but they hear not,
Noses have they, but they smell not ;
Feet have they, but they walk not,
Neither speak they through their throat.
They that make them are like unto them,
So is every one that trustet.li in them. Psalm, cxv, 4—8.
Hindus admit that Brahma is ntrdkdr, without form. Chris¬
tians say that God is a spirit. A sculptor may make an image of
a man's body; but can he make a representation of his soul ? It
is equally impossible to make an idol like God. " To whom will
ye liken me or shall I be equal?" saith the Holy One.
" Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath ci-eated these
things, that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by
names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power;
not one faileth.". I so. xl. 26.
Degrading- Effects of Idolatry —Krishna says in the Bhagavad
Gfta : " The mind by continually meditating on a material object
becomes materialized." People who worship senseless images end
by bec""""p lil-p tpmn They am deceived and cheated by their
religious teachers in every possible wayTbTTt they do not see through
the fraud.
Die debasing influence of idolatry is thus described by Bam-
mohun Boy :—
" Idolatry, as now practised by our countrymen, must be looked
upon with great horror by common sense, as leading directly to immo¬
rality and destructive of social comforts. For every Hindu who devotes
himself to this absurd worship, constructs for that purpose a couple of
male and female idols, sometimes indecent in form, as representatives
of his favourite deities ; he is taught and enjoined from his infancy to
contemplate and repeat the history of these, as well as their fellow
deities, though the actions ascribed to them be only a continued series
of debauchery, sensuality, falsehood, ingratitude, breach of trust, and
treachery to friends. There can be but one opinion respecting the
moral character to be expected of a person, who has been brought up
5. ring out belief in the eternity of souls. 61
with sentiments of reverence to such beings, who refreshes his memory
relative to them almost every day, and who has been persuaded to
believe, that a repetition of the holy name of one of these deities, or a
trifling present to his image or to his devotees, is sufficient not only to
purify and free him from all crimes whatsoever, but to procure to him
future beatitude."
Educated Hindus and Idolatry-—Many educated Hindus
take part in idolatrous rites, pretending that they are harmless
customs, kept up by female influence, and that they conform to
them simply to avoid giving offence.
The desire to please parents and relatives, within proper
limits, is a praiseworthy feeling ; but to break God's first and
great command at the wish of any human being is a plea which
cannot be sustained for a moment. Suppose a parallel case.
Parents urge a son to take part in a robbery ; they will he vexed
if he does not consent. Would a judge accept such an excuse?
Would it be true kindness to his parents to join them in such an
act ? Is he not rather bound, not only to abstain entirely from
any participation in the crime, but to do his utmost to dissuade
his parents from engaging in it? It would be great cruelty to
behave otherwise.
An intelligent educated man countenancing idolatry is guilty
in the following respects :
1. Of cowardly hypocrisy.—Insincere and faithless observ-
ance of the rites of religion must be degrading and dtHtuc Live-to
evervthina that is best and noblest m human nature. Religion is
thus made a huge hypocrisy, from the want of courage and honesty.
2. Of cruelty to his relations and countrymen.—Women are
the chief supporters of idolatry in India. Poor creatures they
do' not know betLeri "Those who are mainly responsible- for
i't and to be blamed are the educated men, who by their
example encourage them in error. The women of India are
naturally both intelligent and affectionate. If their husbands,
instead of behaving as at present, would lovingly teach them to
worship their great Father in heaven instead of idols, the reign
of superstition would soon come to an end. The change is so
reasonable as easily to be understood. It is so simple that it may
be made intelligible even to a child.
3. Of high treason against God.—The call may be repeated,
' Ring out Idolatry, ring in God is Spirit
5. Ring out belief in the Eternity of Souls ; king
in the Fatherhood of God.
Probably no doctrine has exerted a greater influence over the
Hindus than that of re-births, samsara. Monier Williams says :
" Transmigration (re-births) is the great bugbear—the terrible
nightmare and daymare of Indian philosophers and metaphysicians. All
62
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
their efforts are directed to the removal of this oppressive scare. The
question is not; What is truth? The one problem is: How is man
to break this iron chain of repeated existences and to shake off all
separate personality ?":;:
The doctrine pervades the whole of the later sacred books of
the Hindus, and is universally received. " It is," says I)r. Hooper,
" as if every Hindu imbibed it from his mother. "With the excep¬
tion of the few whose thoughts have been changed by \\ estern
education, no Hindu seems able to conceive a condition of the
universe, which does not involve the truth of this doctrine."
All the six schools of Hindu Philosophy hold that the soul is
eternal. The Bhagavad Gita says of it:
" It is not born nor does it ever die; nor having existed before does
it exist no more." (II. 20.)
" It is everlasting, all-pervading, stable, immovable, and eternal."
(II. 24.)!
The eternity of souls is based on two assumptions.
1. That God cannot create.
2. Whatever exists has always existed.
By creation Christians understand calling into being what
did not exist before. Hindus of all schools deny that this is
possible. A carpenter cannot work without materials ; in like
manner it is supposed that God must have formed all things from
eternally existing matter.
" Ye do err, not knowing the power of God," applies to
Hindus as well as those to whom the words were addressed by the
Great Teacher.
If souls are eternal, what have they been doing during the
countless past ages?
To explain this, Hindu philosophers invented the doctrine of
re-birtlis. Souls may pass into gods, demons, beasts, birds,
reptiles, fishes, insects, into plants and even into inanimate
objects. Who can estimate the number of the svayambhu souls !
They had no beginning, but have been eternally transmigrating,
some rising, some falling, some stationary.
Trnnsoiiigrntion is an attempt to account for the state of^the
world. Tt. is pnppnspd tp he nppfqgpry to explain the unequal
distribution of hanpin.ess.and misetx^bickLO-xists.~ If "an infant
agonize, it is supposed to arise from a great sin committed in a
former birth. On the other hand, if a wicked man prospers, it is
thought to be plainly the reward of meritorious actions in a
previous state of existence.
Only in this way, it is imagined, can God be saved from the
charge of injustice.
* Brahmunism ami Hinduism, p. 11.
t Transmiqratian, p. 2.
5. RING OUT BELIEF IN THE ETERNITY OF SOULS. 03
It is admitted that there are certain truths underlying this
strange belief. It witnesses to the continued existence of the
soul in a future life. It also hears testimony to the great truth
that sin is inevitably followed by suffering, although it may he
long delayed. ~ ~
Christianity also teaches " Whatsoever a man soweth that
shall he also reap" (Galatians, VI. 17); but it differs from the
Hindu doctrine in teaching that we shall reap only what we sow
in the present life.
There is no doubt that the unequal distribution of happiness
in this world is a problem which has exercised the minds of think¬
ing men from the dawn of philosophy. On investigation, how¬
ever, it will be seen that the doctrine of transmigration is attended
with far greater difficulties than the one which it attempts to solve.
According to this doctrine every soul is a miniature god,
as eternal as Brahma himself. If a man denied the existence of
his earthly parents, it would be a great sin ; but it is a much
greater sin to deny that God is our Maker and Heavenly Bather.
Whether is it more reasonable to suppose God gave each
individual life or that countless souls have been transmigrating
from all eternity?
Other objections to the doctrine can only be very briefly
stated.
1. It is contrary to our experience.—No one has the slightest
recollection of former births. To explain why the soul does not
remember, it is reduced to a nonentity, and the fiction of the Antah-
Ttarana has been invented.
2. It is contrary to Science.—Like produces like. An
animal never gives birth to a plant, nor a plant to an animal.
3. It is Unjust-—According to transmigration, people suffer,
not on account of their own deeds ; but, as it were, for those of
their ancestors of which they know nothing.
For if a man is so changed at each birth as to forget all his
previous- history, lie becomes virtually a new being. What he
Suffers now he suffers on account of sins committed by another ;
and these sufferings he has no choice but to endure. His present
happiness is the reward of a previous person's good deeds, his
present good deeds will be rewarded in some future person. In
all this there is an absence of justice.
4. It denies Divine Mercy-—According to transmigration,
the fruit of every action must be eaten, leaving no rnnnTfur
pardonr God TTTtn only look on and witness the sufferings of His
Vreafufes. ' -
—fr.—It leads people to impute the results of their own miscon¬
duct in tliisTife to sins ill a former birth-—The cinei sufferings of
inen~aTE~~caused bv poverty, sicknessrand evil conduct! Poverty
is often occasioned by laziness or want of thrift. One great
04
the (.'all oe the twentieth century.
reason why the people of India are poor is their extravagant ex¬
penditure on marriages. Most sickness is caused by bad water,
iilth, and unwholesome food. AVhen people believe that their
misfortunes arise from sins in a former birth, they rest contented,
and make no efforts to remove them.
A dying Hindu, if thoughtful must leave the world in despair,
as he cannot tell what may next befall Mtttt To expiate a sin
committed thousands of years ago, he may require to pass into
some dreadful hell.
Christianity, on the other hand, teaches that we did not exist
before this present life, and we have to account only for actions
during it.
Acknowledgment of the Fatherhood of God.—It is a pleasing
sign of progress that the Fatherhood of God is beginning to be
admitted by educated Hindus. Some even claim that this doctrine
is taught in their own sacred books. In the Sastras, Father may
be one of the many names given to God ; but not ax the xource of
our existence. What particularly distinguishes an earthly father
is, that, under God, he is the author of the child's existence. This
can be said of no other person. In that sense neither Brahma nor
any other Hindu deity can be called father. According to
Vedantism and all other systems of Hindu philosophy, souls are as
eternal as Brahma himself. The Bible, on the other hand, says,
that God is our Father by creation. " Have we not all one
Father'? Hath not one God created usChristianity teaches us to
address God as our " Father in heaven." It is true that we have
been disobedient, rebellious children, but we are earnestly invited
to return, asking forgiveness.
The ancestors of Europeans and Aryan Hindus once worship¬
ped the same God under the same name, Dyausli-Pitar, Heaven-
Father. Max Miiller beautifully says :
" Thousands of years have passed away since the Aryan nations
separated to travel to the North and the South, the West and the East:
they have each formed their languages, they have each founded empires
and philosophies, they have each built temples and razed them to the
ground ; they have all grown older, and it may be wiser and better; but
when they search for a name for that which is most exalted and yet
most dear to every one of us, when they wish to express both awe and
love, the infinite and the finite, they can but do what their old fathers
did when gazing up to the eternal sky, and feeling the presence of a
Being as far as far and as near as near can be ; they can but combine
the self-same words and utter once more the primeval Aryan prayer,
Heaven Father, in that form which will endure for ever, ' Our Father,
which art in heaven.' "
The Christian doctrine is briefly as follows :—
God alone is self-existent, without beginning or end. He is
omnipotent, able to call beings or things into existence out of
6. king out ceremonialism.
65
nothing. He gave us a body and a soul. The soul never existed
before our present birth. The body is mortal; the soul returns
to God who gave it. At the great day of judgment, all must
appear before God, to answer for the deeds done in the body,
whether good or evil.
As already mentioned, it is unphilosophie to maintain that
there are innumerable self-existent beings, when One possessed of
almighty power is sufficient. The explanation given by Chris¬
tianity is beautifully simple, and meets all the requirements of
the case.*
6. King out Ceremonialism ; King in Spiritual Worship.
By " ceremonialism" is meant attention to the outward forms
of religion without regard to spiritual worship.
According to Hinduism, a man who dies at Benares is sure
of going to heaven whatever his character. Men guilty of the
foulest crimes come to end their days there, comforted with the
treacherous lie that from this fact alone all is safe for the next
world.
There is equal belief in sin being washed away merely by
bathing in the Ganges or other supposed sacred waters.
Even the bare repetition of the name of a god, without
reference to him, is sufficient.
Shraddhas are another of the false promises of Hinduism.
The impression is given by them that a man's welfare in
another world depends mainly, not upon his own conduct, but on
the offerings made after his death. He may lead any sort of life,
however immoral and wicked, provided he leave enough to feed
the Brahmans, and especially to have his shraddha performed at
Gaya. Thus encouragement is given to sin, and much wicked¬
ness is the result. On the other hand, a childless man is said to
fall into the hell called Put. The great Judge of all the earth
will do that which is right. A man will be rewarded or punished
for his own deeds—not for those of others over whom he has no
control.
Religion is supposed to consist in the worship of the gods
by sweeping temples, offering garlands, lighting lamps, &c. Bishop
Caldwell says :
" The duties of life are never inculcated in any Hindu temple.
The discharge of these duties is never represented as enjoined by the
gods, nor are any prayers ever offered in any temple for help to enable
the worshippers to discharge these duties aright. Hence we often see
religion going in one direction and morality in another. We meet with
a moral Hindu who has broken altogether away from religion ; and
* See Transmigration and Karma, by the Rev. T. E. Slater, 2 As.
9
fib
the call oe the twentieth century.
what is still more common, yet still more extraordinary, we meet with
a devout Hindu who lives a flagrantly immoral life. In the latter case
no person sees any inconsistency between the immorality and the
devoutness."
Bishop Caldwell thus describes Hindu festivals :
"The ' divine-worship' which they perform in their festival nights,
consists merely in drumming and shouting, in flags and guns and fire¬
works, in the dragging of the idol car by tumultuous noisy crowds, in
singing and dancing, in the incantations and sleight of hand tricks of
the priests, and in all sorts of shows, noises and riots."
Ring in Spiritual Worship-—Jesus Christ said, " God is
spirit, and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and
truth." Since God is spirit, He cannot be represented by an image.
Mere outward ceremonies cannot satisfy Him. Heart worship is
required. The prayer of the true worshipper will be, " Create in
me a clean heart, 0 God, and renew a right spirit within me,"
for only the pure in heart see God.
In Christian Churches worshippers confess their sins, ask
God to have mercy upon them, to give them grace to keep His
commandments better in future, and pray to Him to bless their
neighbours. Is not this greatly preferable to Hindu worship V
7. Ring out False Promises regarding the Pardon
of Sin ; ring in the True.
Nearly the whole human race, in all ages, have acknowl¬
edged themselves to be sinners.
The many millions of Hindus, by bathing in the Ganges
and other supposed sacred waters, with one voice, make the
same confession.
It is only pride and ignorance that make a man deny that he
is a sinner. The holiest men are the first to acknowledge it.
Some Brahmans daily make this acknowledgment.
Papo'ham papakarmaham papatma papasambhava.
" I am evil ; evil in origin ; evil-minded ; evil in deed."
Why is it that the holiest men are the first to admit their
own sinfulness ? Most people take their neighbours as their
standard, and are satisfied if they think that they come up to
their conduct. Some, indeed, compare themselves with persons
guilty of flagrant crimes, and are proud of their supposed moral
superiority. On the other hand, a man whose conscience is
enlightened, judges himself by God's law.
The two great sins chargeable against every human being
are ungvtflinc?t$. and telfix/nit'**.
This world was created by God. He is, therefore, its
rightful lord. He is also our Father in heaven, He formed our
7. KING OUT FALSE PROMISES, ETC.
67
bodies, He is the Father of our spirits, He is our Preserver and
Benefactor. Upon Him we are dependent for every breath we
draw : the food which nourishes us, the clothes we wear, the
houses which shelter us, the friends who have cheered us, all
have come from Him. He is likewise our rightful sovereign,
Whose laws, which are holy, just, and good, we are bound to
obey.
Have we loved, honoured, and obeyed our heavenly Father
and King as we ought ? Instead of that, we have lived regard -
lessly of Him as if no such Being existed, and as if we had noth¬
ing to do with Him. In this country the great bulk of the people,
instead of loving and serving their heavenly Father and King,
have set up gods of their own, whom they have worshipped
instead of their rightful Lord.
God contrasts the gratitude of the very beasts with the re-
gardlessness of man : " I have nourished and brought up children,
and they have rebelled against me. The ox knoweth his owner
and the ass his master's crib ; but Israel doth not know, my
people doth not consider."
There are other sins besides those directly against God.
Every envious, proud, lustful, covetous desire is a sin. We sin
not only by doing things which ought not to be done, but by not
doing the things which ought to be done. Who can number his
sins V
Hindu Promises regarding the Pardon of Sin.
On this point Hinduism is inconsistent. According to Karma
the fruit of every action, good or bad, must be eaten. Hence the
belief in re-births. On the other hand, it is asserted that sin may
be washed away by the most frivolous means.
According to Vedantism sin may be reduced to ashes by
guana, knowledge.
What is the knowledge which is supposed to have such an
effect ? To be able to say, Brahmasmi, ' I am Brahma."
Taking the words in their plain meaning, the climax of
Hindu philosophy is a blasphemous falsehood, too horrible almost
to mention—for a puny, ignorant, proud, sinful mortal to say " 1
am God !" Such assertions can be compared only to the ravings
of a madman in a lunatic asylum who fancies himself a king. Yet,
according to Hindu philosophy, he is the only wise man !
Hindus generally, however, hope to obtain the pardon of sin
by certain ceremonial acts, some of which will be mentioned, as
bathing in the Ganges and other supposed sacred waters, listen¬
ing to certain books repeated, Ac. The First Book of the Vishnu
Purana concludes as follows :
" Thus, 0 twice-horn one, the first portion of the Purina has been
related to you, hearing which one may be freed from sins."
OK THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
Sins may be pardoned by blinkti; — faith in some god,
irrespective of' moral conduct.
Even the repetition of the name of the god without any reier-
ence to him is supposed to be efficacious. In proof of this the
following story is told :
Ajamila had committed the most enormous crimes, having
killed cows and Brahtnans, drunk spirits, and lived in the practice
of evil all his days. He had four sons ; the name of one was Nara-
yana. In the hour of death, Ajamila was very thirsty, and thus
called to his son : " Narayana, Narayana, Narayana, give me some
water." After his death, the messengers of Yama seized him, and
were about to drag him to a place of punishment; when Vishnu's
messengers rescued him and carried him off to Vishnu's heaven.
No one sensible of the great evil of sin can believe in its
being washed away by the above means.
Vishnu and Siva—in the sacred books of the Hindus are them¬
selves—described as guilty of gross sins. This shows that they are
imaginary beings, the inventions of men in a dark age of the world ;
they can never pardon sin.
All such supposed means of obtaining pardon should be rung
out.
Suppose a child has been disobedient to a wise, good, and
loving father ; what is his duty? He should feel truly sorry for
his misconduct; he should confess it to his father, ask forgiveness,
and try to be loving and affectionate in future.
We should act similarly towards God, our Heavenly Father.
There should be deep sorrow for sin, confession of sin, and
prayer for pardon.
The Christian Veda says :
" It we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the
truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to
forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."'
An Atonement needed.—-A father may forgive his disobedient
children when they are sorry for their conduct and try to be
loving in future. It is different, however, with a king or judge.
A criminal may be sorry for his conduct, and wish to reform ; but
he is not let off on that account. If this were done, men would
be tempted to break the laws, hoping to be pardoned on their
repentance.
The question is, How can God's justice and mercy be
reconciled ? how can we be forgiven and the honour of God's
law maintained ?
In all ages the hope has been more or less entertained that
God would become incarnate to deliver man from the burden of
* 1. John, i. S, h.
8. ring out merit; ring in grace. 69
sin and misery under which the world is groaning. Hinduism
has its incarnations. The Kalki Avatara is yet to come, when
Vishnu, at the end of the Kali Yug, is to appear seated on a
white horse, with drawn sword in his hand blazing like a comet,
for the destruction of the wicked, and the restoration of purity.
Christianity also teaches that man is so deeply plunged in sin
and his guilt is so great, that a Divine incarnation was necessary
for his deliverance. The first promise of this was given by God
Himself thousands of years ago. The Son of God, pitying the
human race, came down from heaven for our salvation. By His
death on the cross He bore the punishment due to our sins ; by
His obedience to the law of God He wrought out a perfect right¬
eousness, which, like a spotless robe, is given to His followers.
Reformation.-—It is not sufficient for a disobedient son to feel
sorry for his conduct and to ask forgiveness. He must show that
his sorrow is sincere by being obedient and affectionate in future.
Sad experience will teach us that we need Divine help to
resist temptation and overcome sin. Here the Christian doctrine
of the Trinity is felt to be adapted to our needs. Although
Christians firmly hold God's unity, yet in some mysterious way
there is a Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who all unite for man's
redemption. The peculiar office of the Holy Spirit is to sanctify,
to enable us to overcome sin, and to be adorned with all the
beauties of holiness. His help is given in answer to prayer.
Besides prayer for the Holy Spirit, there must be watchful¬
ness against sin, avoidance of tempation, study of the scriptures
and other good books, observance of the Lord's day, attendance
at public worship, association with good men, etc.
Contrast the Hindu and Christian doctrines regarding the
pardon of sin. Which of them commends itself to oiu:.reason V f-
Which of them will prove a true refuge in the day of trial when '
we stand before God's judgment seat ?
8. Ring out Merit; ring in Grace.
By merit is meant good conduct deserving honour or reward.
Here religious merit is to be understood, supposed good actions
entitling us to heaven. By grace is meant undeserved favour.
Giving alms to beggars, gifts to Brahmans, repeating the
names of gods, and offerings to temples are the means usually
employed in this country to "make merit." Man is naturally
proud ; he overlooks his faults; magnifies his supposed good
deeds, and thinks that he has a fair claim to heaven. Examina¬
tion will show that those who believe this are trusting to refuges
of lies which will fail them in the day of trial.
It has been shown (see pp. 66,67) that we have sinned against
God and been more ungrateful than the beasts of the field. Who
70 the ('A.el ok the twentieth century.
can number the angry, envious, lustful, and covetous thoughts
which have passed through his mind !
It is impossible to tell whether a garment is clean or dirty
by examining it in a dark room. To judge properly, it should be
taken out in the sun. Somewhat in like manner, if we would
ascertain our true condition, we must view ourselves, as it were,
in the dazzling splendour of God's presence. A holy man of old
said to God, " Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, our secret
sins in the light of thy countenance." Another confessed, " We
are all as an unclean thing ; and all our righteousnesses are as
filthy rags." A third said, " I have heard of thee by the hearing
of the ear ; but now mine eye seeth thee, wherefore I abhor
myself, and repent in dust and ashes."
The holiest men therefore do not hope to be saved through
their good deeds. —.
Salvation by Grace.—Christianity jjgclares that salvation is
not of K-QjWi^lxut-of we enter heaven, it must be
through the merits of another, not through our own. The truth
of this will appear on a little consideration.
The laws of a country require perfect obedience. Suppose a
thief and murderer were to reform, this would not atone for the
past: if he live honestly and in peace, he does no more than his
duty. So it is with the Divine government. We have been
breaking God's commands every day of our lives. Even if we
could hereafter yield perfect obedience, it would not blot out the
long black catalogue already recorded against us. But there is
no man, even the best on earth, who is not daily adding to his
sins. Tried by our own actions, every mouth must be stopped,
and the whole world be found guilty before God.
It has been shown in the preceding chapter that God, in His
infinite love, has provided a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ.
Christians do not hope to be saved on account of their own good
works. Their language is,
" In my hands no price I bring."
While " zealous of good works" they do not trust to them,
but take refuge in Christ.
There is thus no room for spiritual pride, while feelings of
deepest love are awakened towards Him through whom salvation
is obtained.*
9. King out Fatalism ; Ring in Man a Moral Agent.
The belief is universal among Hindus that all our actions are
determined beforehand. The common expression is, " Whatever
is written on our heads will come to pass." Some ascribe it to
* This important subject is treated very imperfectly. The reader is referred to
Short Papers for Seekers after Truth. (1 An.)
RING OUT FATALISM.
71
God. As in a puppet show all the strings are in hands of the
Sat rod liar, so all men are in the hands of God, who is the Sdtrail-
hari of the universe. As puppets are moved according as the
strings are pulled, so must men act as God has determined. Others
consider that things are determined by Karma. When persons
are charged with wrong-doing, the excuse is constantly made.
" What could we do? It was our karma/'
There are good money and bad money in the world. If a
man takes whatever is offered without examination, he will suffer
loss. 80 there are sayings true and false, current among men.
A prudent person will seek to distinguish the one from the other!"
In the following remarks the folly and sin of ascribing our
evil actions to God will first he shown ; Karma will afterwards be
considered.
Supposed writing 011 the Head-—Many people imagine that
God has written on each man's head what is to happen to him.
The joinings of the bones of the skull are called the letters of
Brahma. Let this be tested. Above is a picture of the skull.
The skull is not formed of one bone, but of several, to enable
it to grow and to suffer less from injury. The bones firmly inter¬
lace each other, as shown in the picture. Looking at them from
a distance, people without consideration might think the joinings
to be writing, but this is foolish. Suppose some ignorant person
on seeing two boards skilfully united by a carpenter should point
to the line of their junction and pronounce in writing, would you
not laugh at him ? It is just as absurd to call the joinings of the
skull the writing of Brahma.
Proofs that People do not really believe in Fate.—This is
shown as follows :
Suppose a man has a wife and children. Does he say, " If
Fate has so decreed, I and my family will be supplied with food
n
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
and clothing ; but if Fate lias decreed otherwise, all I can do will
be useless. There is no use in working for support. All I have
to do is to sleep and set idly in a corner of my home V" Not at
all. He goes out and works. If he cannot get a living by one
kind of labour, he seeks it by another, and goes on working till he
has supplied his own wants and those of his family.
Take another case. Suppose a boil has broken out upon
your back. It is filled with matter, and gives you such pain, that
you cannot rest day nor night. Do you say, " This is the result
of Fate ; let it have its course. If this boil is to get well, it will
get well ; if not, it won't ; there is no use of my doing anything
to it ?" Not at all. You use medicine, and are careful about your
diet, and do everything in your power to rid yourself of the pain.
Suppose a thief breaks into your house at night. You catch
him just as he is making off with your money, jewels, and clothes.
The thief says to you; " Friend, you ought not to arrest me: this
robbery is not my action at all, but that of Fate. As 1 am inno¬
cent, release me and let me go." Would you accept his excuse?
Would you not rather say, "You villain, you yourself know
perfectly well that robbing is a great sin. Now that you are
caught in the act, you talk nonsense about the crime not being
yours, but Fate's. A rogue who makes such excuses as you do
will never leave off stealing. A double punishment is what you
richly deserve." So saying, you would hand him over to the
poiice. By so doing you would declare your full conviction that
men are not puppets, but free agents, responsible for their actions.
The same thing may be proved in another way. Your own
conscience bears witness that you are not a puppet. When the
doing of a certain action is proposed to you, you unquestionably
have the power either to perform that action or to refrain from
doing it, as you choose. Suppose for example, that I tempt you
saying, " Give false evidence for me, and I will give you a hundred
rupees." Coveting the money offered, you have, on the one hand,
power to tell the lie if you choose. Or reflecting that lies are sin¬
ful, you equally have, on the other hand, power not to tell it, if
you so choose. Hence the doctrine of Fate is false.
The excuse is only offered by people to avoid doing what
they dislike. A lazy man makes it when told to work. But it is
chiefly urged when people are asked to attend to religion. They
say, "What can we do ? who can resist the decrees of Fate?"
Thus reasoning, they live in unconcern. They must reap the
consequences, just as a farmer who refused to cultivate, trusting
to Fate for a crop.
To ascribe our evil actions to Fate as to make God the author
of Sin.—It is very common for a thief to charge an innocent
person with the crime, that he may escape the punishment which
he deserves. In like manner, many people try to throw the
9. RING OFT FATALISM.
73
blame of their bad conduct on God. The folly and wickedness of
this may easily he shown.
The one true God is a Being of spotless holiness. He abhors
sin; it is that abominable thing which He hates : can He lead
men to do that which He detests'?
If God Himself is the author of sin, how can He command
men not to sin ? That He has given such commands even
Hindus admit. He has written the law upon our hearts. Our
consciences tell us that sin is in opposition to His will.
If God is the author of sin, how can He punish men for
their sinful acts'? It would he most unjust to force men to sin
and then punish them for it. Can this he attributed to Him who
is infinitely just'? It shows that the supposition is false.
It may he objected that when we sin we act with the
body which God has given us, and therefore He is the author
of sin.
It is allowed that it is God who has given us a body, mind,
and all the faculties which we possess, but why has He given
them'? Certainly not that we should use them in sinning, but in
doing what is right. Suppose a master gives his servant some
rupees to buy articles needed for the family. He goes to the
bazaar and spends it in drinking and gambling. When the
master finds fault, the servant says, " Master, I am not to blame,
for it was you who gave me the money which I spent in bad
practices." Would this excuse be accepted'? would the servant
be considered as innocent ?
It may be objected why does God not prevent men from
sinning'?
God has created man a free agent, able to act as he pleases.
A man who was obliged by force to do certain acts would not be
responsible ; he would be like a machine that could neither do
right nor wrong.
Although God governs the world, He neither destroys nor
impairs man's free agency. Our own hearts bear witness that
we act with perfect freedom in doing many things every day of
our lives. No man has a right to say, " Since God orders all
things I need do nothing." God has ordained that men shall
have oil. But to obtain that oil man must himself gather
sesamum seed, and grind it in the oil-press, otherwise he gets no
oil. Hence it is plain that no one has a right to idly forbear
effort, saying, " Nothing can come of my actions." We are all
bound to trust in God and to submit cheerfully to His will, but
we are equally bound to make strenuous efforts on our own
behalf. And if we do our duty faithfully in both these respects,
we shall find that all has been working together for our good and
for God's glory.
10
74
the call of the twentieth century.
10. King out the belief that to some Virtue and Vice
are alike ; ring in the eternal distinction between
Bight and Wrong.
The Hindu Sacred Books describe Brahma, Vishnu, and
Siva as having guilty of acts which would disgrace for ever any
human being. The excuses made for them have been noticed.
(See pp. 55, 5G.)
The Imitation of Krishna,, a small volume by a Calcutta
M.A., says:
" To our mind virtue and vice being relative terms can never be
applied to one who is regarded as the Supreme Being. The being who
is equal in virtue as well as in vice is to us a far grander being than the
extremely virtuous man." p. ii.
The Jlvanmukta, "liberated but still living," is supposed to
be equally above the laws of morality: to him there is no such
thing as virtue and vice.
The Taittiriya Upanishad says :
" The thought afflicts him not, ' What good have I left undone,
what evil done ? ' " 11. 4.
The Kaushitaki Upanishad says :
" By no deed soever is his future bliss harmed, not by theft, not by
a Brahman's murder, nor by a mother's murder, nor bjr a father's
murder; nor, if he wishes to commit sin, departs the bloom from his
face." (iii. 1.)
The Bhagavad Glta says that actions performed without at¬
tachment (sanga) do not " defile."
Krishna says:
" Actions defile me not. I have no attachment to the fruit of
actions. He who knows me thus is not tied down by actions." IV. 14.
One object of this teaching is to persuade Arjuna that he
might kill all his relations without harm to himself.
Krishna says:
"He who has no feeling of egoism (that he is the doer of the
actions) and whose mind is not tainted, even though he kills (all)
those people, kills not, is not fettered (by the action). XVIII. 17.
The Bev. J. Lazarus, b.a. has the following remarks on this
doctrine of the Bhagavad Gita :
" To act without attachment is to act without motive or purpose,
to experience in the act itself neither pain nor pleasure, and to think
nothing whatever of its future fruit or result. Action, then, without the
three concomitants of motive, feeling, and effect, is action without
11. RING OUT THE BELIEF THAT FAITH IS SUFFICIENT. 75
attachment. Men are to be mere animals or living automata, acting
as they are moved by instinct. . . .
" Action without attachment is a convenient loop-hole for the
commission of any crime, however horrible or foul. The murderer
of Mr. Rand walked up to the gallows with the Gita in his hand.":;'
Ring out all such poisonous teaching ; ring in the eternal
distinction between right and wrong ; that all are bound by the
rules of morality.
11. Ring out the Belief that Faith is Sufficient ; Ring
IN THE DOCTRINE THAT FAITH MUST HAVE A PROPER OBJECT.
The moral texture of the Hindu is so flabby, that to him all
religions are mucbTthe same—one as good as "another. The ill ua-
trafion of Rainakrishna hak heeh'quoted :
" 11. As one can ascend to the top of a house by means of a ladder,
or a bamboo, or a staircase, or a rope, so divers are the ways and means
to approach God, and every religion in the world shows one of these
ways."
Atheism, Pantheism, Polytheism, Monotheism, lead in the
end to the same goal and are equally useful. A man who
urges the great importance of truth in religion is looked upon as
an intolerant bigot.
Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita :
" They also who worship other gods with devotion and faith, they
also worship me." IX. 23.
This justifies every form of idolatry and superstition. But
the Krishna of the Bhagavad Gita is an imaginary being, the
real speaker is a Vaishnava Brahman.
The doctrine that faith is sufficient saves all the trouble of
religious enquiry. Let it be examined.
A man's faith may arise from ignorance as well as from
knowledge. If a man believes that his jewels are gold while they
are only brass, will his faith have any effect ? If a man intrust his
property to a thief believing him to be an honest man, will his
faith save his money V If a man take a cooly to be the king, will
he be really such ? If a man, wishing to cross a deep and rapid
river, goes into a leaky boat saying that faith is the chief thing,
will this save him from being drowned ?
In like manner, if a man worship an idol believing it to be
God, will his faith makfe it God V n a man believes that bath¬
ing in the Ganges will wasn away his sins, he believes what is
untrue and his sin remains.
* Lecture on the Bhagavacl GIti, pp. 11, 12.
the call oe the twentieth century.
In worldly matters men are not such fools as to believe that
faith is sufficient. A banker does not say this when asked for
the loan of money, nor a father when the marriage of his daughter
is proposed. Faith placed on a false object is worthless, and
simply ruins the man who trusts to it. Our first inquiry should
therefore be, Is our faith placed on a proper object?
12. King out Religious Intolerance ; Ring in
^^ Religious Liberty.
Religious liberty is often called toleration. Toleration means
allowing by not hindering. Religious toleration is allowing a
person to profess any religion which he believes to be true.
It must be confessed that religious intolerance has rather
been the rule in the world's history. About 2,500 years ago a
king of Babylon set up a golden image which he commanded all
his subjects to worship. If they did not do so, they were to be
cast the same hour into a burning fiery furnace. About 18 centu¬
ries ago the Roman empire was the greatest in the world. The
emperors were worshipped as gods. Many thousands of Chris¬
tians were put to death, because they would not bow down to the
images of the emperors.
Jesus Christ, the founder of Christianity, taught perfect tolera¬
tion. His teaching was not followed by many of His professed
followers. There have been religious persecutions by nominal
Christians.
\ Hinduism is, at once, most tolerant and intolerant. It will
'allow a man to be an atheist, theist, polytheist, pantheist; he
/may worship anything in the heaven above or in the earth
/beneath, or nothing. He may charge God with the greatest
crimes or he may deny His existence. He may be guilty of lying,
theft, adultery, murder ; but so long as he observes the rules of
his caste, he may live in his own home unmolested, and have
free admission to Hindu temples. But let him visit England to
study, let him marry a widow, dine with a person of another
caste, or even take a glass of water from his hand, and, accord¬
ing to Hinduism, he is excommunicated.
Hinduism, however, reserves its greatest intolerance for the
man who becomes a Christian. ~ Hindus are tnen up in arms and
make the most intolerant speeches, and do the most intolerant
deeds.
Hindus urge that to embrace Christianity breaks up their
families. Whose fault is this? It belongs to Hinduism and to
Hinduism alone. The Christian would gladly stay if Hindus
would let him stay and be true to his convictions and loyal to
his God.
12. ring out religious intolerance.
77
Eeligious toleration is the law of India. According to the
Queen's Proclamation, " None are to he in any wise favoured,
none molested or disquieted by reason of their religious faith or
observances." Although such is the law so far as Government is
concerned, Hindus seek to expel as outcastes any of their number
who avail themselves of the liberty.
Eeligious intolerance is attended by many evils. Among
the Hindus it has been a great obstacle to progress, and perpe¬
tuated a stationary condition of semi-civilisation. The people
are like a flock of sheep all moving together.
Babu Hiralal Haldar, m.a., has the following remarks on
Indian civilization :
" The chief characteristics of an infant are its utter helplessness
and dependence on others for support. The infant has no idea of per¬
sonality. It cannot depend for anything on itself, and has no sense of
responsibility. A careful inquiry into Indian civilization will reveal
these characteristics,
" In the Hindu social system, want of regard to pei-sonality is
most conspicuous. The head of the family is the sole authority in all
domestic affairs. Nay, he is more. He is the keeper of the consciences
of the members of the family. It is he who decides what is right or
wrong for them. All the members of the family must slavishly sub¬
mit to the dictates of the autocratic patriarch of the family."*
Eeligious Intolerance has induced hypocrisy among the
educated who have some glimmering of the truth, but who are
unwilling to act up to their convictions of what is right. This
is destructive of all nobleness of character.
It has promoted blind bigotry among the masses who will
not think for themselves, and seek to crush any who differ from
them.
When Christianity began to spread in Palestine, the rulers
of the Jews wished to put to death its missionaries. A wise man
among them, " a doctor of the law, held in honour of all the
people," gave this excellent advice: " Eefrain from these men
and let them alone ; for if this counsel or this work be of man,
it will come to nought : but if it be of God ye cannot over¬
throw it, lest haply ye be found even to fight against God." Let
this be pondered in India. Macaulay said in one of his speeches
that the man who opposes the spread of Christianity in India is
a " traitor to the cause of civilization."
God, our Creator and Preserver, has the first claim upon us.
Let liberty to think and act according to one's convictions be
granted to all.
* Indian Messenger.
78
the call of the twentieth century.
18. King out Moral Weakness ; Ring in Moral Courage.
Moral Weakness is perhaps the most besetting fault, of
]'EducatedHindusi Hike tTTeWlftttoIIIan poet theynay make the
confession.
" I see the right, and I approve it too,
Condemn the wrong, and yet the wrong pursue."
The remarks of Bishop Caldwell have been quoted (pages 27,
28) to the effect that, whatever an educated Hindu may believe, his
conduct, save in a few unimportant particulars, does not differ
from that of the educated. Mr. Cotton says in New India,
" Collegiate impressions are at present like a tinselled out-door
decoration discarded by their possessor as a superfluity in private."
(p. 147).
At home, there is unquestioning submission to superstitious
customs, which in their hearts they despise.
A sense of individual responsibility, of the supremacy of
conscience, is one of the most important lessons a Hindu has
to learn.
By Moral Courage is meant acting up to one's convictions of
what is right in spite of every opposition. The great question is,
How is it to be obtained V
A few hints may be given.
1. Seek Divine Help.—What is the cause of the moral
cowardice almost universal among educated Hindus? They think
of their relatives and friends, of their own ease, of the praise of
men ; but they do not think of God.
Dr. Miller of Madras says : " If you would have strength and
courage to be decided—to take your part and play the man—to be
no longer halting between two opinions, no longer yielding to
influences and practices which you despise and hate, then seek to
know God—to have Him as your helper and your friend
Think of how it would give courage in every difficulty, and revive
under every disappointment, if you only knew that God was
working with and in you, and that whatever your struggles and
your failures here, still that the victory was sure—victory for all
that is true and pure at last on earth, and an eternity of restful
satisfaction with Himself on high."
Perhaps in the whole range of Hindu literature there is
nothing more touching than the following prayer from the Brihad
Aranya Upanishad :
" From the unreal lead me to the real.
From darkness lead me to light,
From death lead me to immortality."
13. ring out moral weakness.
79
The above words, in their true sense, should express the most
earnest desire of our hearts. They contain petitions which
should be offered by every human being.
From the Unreal to the Real means—from the False to the
True.
Let this prayer be daily addressed to our Father in heaven.
2. Select an inspiring Example for Imitation.—Lecky, in his
History of European Morals, bears the following testimony to the
Effects of Christ's example :
" It was reserved for Christianity to present to the world a charac¬
ter, which, through all the changes of eighteen centuries, has inspired
the hearts of men with an impassioned love ; has shown itself capable
of acting on all ages, temperaments, and conditions ; has been not only
the highest pattern of virtue, but the strongest incentive to its practice ;
and has exercised so deep an influence, that the simple record of three
years of active life has done more to regenerate and soften mankind
than all the discussions of philosophers and all the exhortations of
moralists."
Let the reader study His wonderful life as given in the New
Testament. Jesus Christ: His Life and Times (3 As.) will afford
some useful explanations.
3. Have a noble Object in view-—-The following remarks,
originally addressed by J. S. Mill to University students in Scot¬
land, are equally applicable to India :
" One of the commonest types of character among us is that of a
man all whose ambition is self-regarding ; who has no higher purpose in
life than to enrich or raise in the world himself and his family.; who
never dreams of making the good of his fellow-creatures or of his
country an habitual object."
" It is worth training them to feel, not only actual wrong or actual
meanness, but the absence of noble aims and endeavours, as not
merely blamable, but also degrading ;—the poorness and insignificance
of human life if it is to be all spent in making things comfortable for
ourselves and our kin, and raising ourselves and them a step or two
on the social ladder."
" Fix your eyes upon the ultimate end from which those studies
take their chief value—that of making you more effective combatants
in the great fight which never ceases to rage between Good and Evil,
and more equal to coping with the ever new problems which the
changing course of human nature and human society present to be
resolved."
" There is not one of us who may not so qualify himself so to
improve the average amount of opportunities, as to leave his fellow-
creatures some little the better for the use he has known how to make
of his intellect."
Foster mentions a "noble motive" as one of the means
of attaining moral courage. India, your " Fatherland,' presents
HO THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
one of the loftiest order. It contains about one-fifth of the
human race. Its inhabitants are bone of your bone, flesh of
your flesh, toiling, struggling, fainting like yourself in the battle
of life. What a glorious work it is to take part in their emanci¬
pation from the bondage of ignorance, idolatry, and every form
of evil under which they suffer ! How degrading it is for a man
to have no higher aim in life than to enrich or raise in the world
himself and his family !
4- Look to the End-—If you have no regard for others, think
of the eternity into which you are speeding, and into which you
may be launched at any moment. You may " shine at the stars
for ever and ever," or your portion may be " shame and ever¬
lasting contempt." One or other must be your lot. Which will
you choose ? Follow the counsel given in the spirited verses
below:—
Courage, brother, do not stumble,
Though thy path be dark as night ;
There's a star to guide the humble :—
" Trust in God, and do the right!"
Let the road be rough and dreary,
And its end far out of sight,
Foot it bravely ! strong or weary,
" Trust in God, and do the right!"
Simple rule and safest guiding,
Inward peace and inward might,
Star upon our path abiding—
" Trust in God, and do the right!''
Some will hate thee, some will love thee;
Some will flatter, some will slight;
Cease from man, and look above thee—
" Trust in God, and do the right 1"
CONCLUDING APPEAL TO EDUCATED
INDIANS.
SUPPOSED WISDOM OF THE ANCIENTS.
"We must follow the ancients" is a maxim current every¬
where in India. People who lived long ago are looked upon as
very old and very wise ; while the moderns are regarded as chil¬
dren. In some respects the very reverse is the case. We are the
ancients; the world is now three thousand years older than it
was in the Yedic age. Even suppose that they were men of
greater talent than the moderns, though we may be dwarfs com¬
pared with them, yet, to use Bacon's figure, standing on their
shoulders, we can see farther than they.
SUPPOSED WISDOM OF THE ANCIENTS.
81
" We must follow the ancients," is equivalent to the rule,
" We must follow our children " The ancients lived in the child¬
hood of the world.
It is no disgrace to a child to be ignorant of many things;
but it would be a great shame to the father if he knew no more
than his young son and had to he guided by his example.
Tennyson says,
" The past shall always wear
A glory from its being far."
The ignorant and half-educated in all ages and in all coun¬
tries have looked upon the past as the Golden, and the present as
the Iron, Age. Ten centuries before the Christian era, Solomon
gave the caution, " Say not the former days were better than
these; for thou dost not inquire wisely concerning this." The
poet Horace lived in the Augustan age of Home, yet there were
then " praisers of bygone times." Indians now entertain exactly
the same feelings with regard to the declension of their country as
Englishmen who talk of the " good old times." Macaulay, in his
History of England, combats the " delusion which leads men to
overrate the happiness of preceding generations." " Since child¬
hood I have been seeing nothing but progress, and hearing of
nothing but decay." The evils now complained of are, he says,
" with scarcely an exception old. That which is new, is the
intelligence which discerns, and the humanity which remedies
them."
Indian ideas of past times are drawn from poetry and im¬
agination. As already mentioned, Indian literature, before the
English period, does not contain a single work on history. The
books accepted as such are simply the fictions of poets,
full of the most incredible statements.
The Satya yuga of the poets, when food was obtained by a
mere wish, never existed.
The Hint arrow heads found everywhere buried in the earth
show that the human race has only slowly emerged from a state
of barbarism. This applies even to Egypt and Babylon, the
oldest seats of civilization. Many tribes remain in their original
savage state.
In Yedic times there were no books, and printing was
unknown. All the valuable knowledge which has been gained in
any quarter of the globe during the last twenty-five centuries is
now at command. During these many years, lakhs of learned
men have been adding to our stores. Every fresh discovery
is now dashed by the electric telegraph, and by means of
newspapers is at once made known to the whole civilised
world.
11
82
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
The late distinguished Indian statesman, Sir Madhava Row,
says in a Convocation Address:
" Avoid the mischievous error of supposing that our ancient fore¬
fathers were wiser than men of the present times. It cannot be true.
Every year of an individual's life he acquires additional knowledge.
Knowledge thus goes on accumulating year by year. Similarly every
generation adds to the knowledge of the previous generation. Under
such a process the accumulation of knowledge in a century is very
large. To assert therefore that men possessed more knowledge scores
of centuries ago than at the present day is manifestly absurd.
" Even assuming intellectual equality between the ancients and
moderns, men of modern times have had enormous advantages over
those of ancient times for the acquisition of knowledge. Our field of
observation, our facilities for observation, our instruments of observa¬
tion, our highly elaborated methods of calculation, our means of pub¬
lishing the results of observation, of getting the results scrutinized,
questioned, compared, discussed and variously verified, are infinitely
greater than those of remote generations. The explorations of the
ancients were fragmentary and superficial.
" The whole world is now one field of observation. An enormous
intellectual committee of the whole civilized human race is ceaselessly
sitting from generation to generation, and is ceaselessly working for the
collection and augmentation of human knowledge.
" Calmly and carefully reflect and you are certain to agree with
me. Hesitate not therefore to prefer modern knowledge to ancient
knowledge. A blind belief in the omniscience of our forefathers is
mischievous, because it perpetuates errors and tends to stagnation."
As already stated, the ancients and moderns are represented
by a pandit and a University graduate, respectively.
Sir H. S. Maine was one of the ablest lawyers that ever
came to India. Instead of Hindus being guided by the ancients,
he says that they have received from them " an inheritance
of nearly unmixed evil."
" On the educated Native of India the Past presses with too awful
and terrible a poxver for it to be safe for him to play or palter with it.
The clouds ichirh overshadow his household, the doubts which beset his
mind, the impotence of progressive advance which he struggles against,
are all part of an inheritance of nearly unmixed evil ichich he has received
from the Past."* .
" The real affinities of the people are with Europe and the future, not
with India and the Past."
There is now a movement in favour of teaching Sanskrit, but
as Sir H. S. Maine says, it means teaching " what is not true—
false morality, false history, false philosophy." The time devoted
to Sanskrit in schools might be much more usefully given to
other subjects.
* Convocation Address.
OBSTACLES TO REFORM.
83
OBSTACLES TO REFORM.
The masses, spell-bound by custom and authority, cannot be
expected to take the initiative of reform—rather to offer the
strongest opposition. The most discouraging feature is that
among the educated there are so few zealous and consistent re¬
formers.
The explanation of this was given at the Cocanada Social
Conference by the President, Rao Bahadur K. Viresalingam
Pantulu:
" The reason for the smallness of workers in the social reform cause
is obvious. Social reform always involves some sort of self-sacrifice,
whereas politics cost a man nothing more than words except in the case
of those who have devoted time and money to the cause. The louder a
man decries the Government, the more he passes for a patriot. There
he loses nothing but gains something—cheap patriotism. Workers in
politics are cheered and encouraged by those for whom they work. But
workers in the social reform cause are ridiculed and abused even by
those for whose well-being they labour."
The inconsistency of those who cry out for political reform
and are silent on social reform is thus pointed out:
" How can we clamour for Self-Government when we are not
willing to grant the blessings of higher education to our own women ?
How can we ask the Government to remove our disabilities when we
are not prepared to remove the disabilities of the oppressed classes of
our own society ? To show that we really deserve the political conces¬
sions we demand, let us show our earnest desire to improve our society
and to remove the disabilities from which the oppressed classes of our
society suffer. How can we, with consistency, be liberal in politics and
conservative in social matters'? What we demand for social reform is
nothing more than mere justice to our women and lower classes, fair-
play to all classes of persons, alleviation of suffering, removal of unne¬
cessary obstacles, sympathy for all and love of country—the very
demands which we constantly make in political matters. Unless we
cultivate feelings of justice, fair-play, compassion and love, we cannot
be disinterested workers either in political or in social concerns."
Some of the excuses for doing nothing, floating like dead fish
along the stream, are thus mentioned :
" There has arisen another class of critics who pose themselves as
friends of social reform, but disapprove of the methods adopted by the
present-day reformers. Numerous are the modes of work which these
friends propose. When a reform is in the preliminary stage of deliver¬
ing lectures and making agitation in favour of certain reforms which he
advocates, they call him a lip-reformer and fame-hunter. When he
reduces his profession to action and becomes a practical reformer, they
call him a revolutionary headlong firebrand, unlit to work in a quiet
84
THE CALL OE THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
manner. One crit ic advises us to leave everything to time as it time is
a living active agent to do or undo things. Mere time can do nothing,
but it is individuals that must do everything. Another critic advises
us to work on ' national lines.' Nobody can say what these national
lines exactly are. Man is a rational creature, and he must do things
only in a manly and rational way. Take for example some reform, say
widow marriage. What are the national lines by which that reform can
be brought about ? Any number of quotations from the Vedas and
Sustras does not in the least help the reformer to bring about
even a single widow marriage. If he wants to effect practical
reform, he must bring in reason to his help and appeal to the feelings
of reasonable men, enumerating the numerous evils and miseries to
which young widows are unjustly subjected. Reason can accomplish
in one week what the so-called national lines cannot effect in a year.
They may say this is a violent measure. Yes. Yholent maladies require
violent remedies. Let this pass. Take the case of sea voyage or
marriage after puberty. Do your national lines help the reformer in
these reforms ? A third critic proposes to us to work on the lines of
' least resistance,' calling the present mode of working rash and hasty,
and accusing us of doing more harm than good to the cause of social
reform by going ahead of, instead of moviug with the times. 'Working
on the lines of least resistance' ' and moving with the times' are no
doubt excellent and high-sounding phrases, but to my mind they con¬
vey no other meaning than this—Be idle and do nothing. To move
with society or the times means to move in the old superstitious ways.
Unless one goes ahead of society and sets a brilliant example to it,
there can be no progress—no onward march. If a daring man first
sets an example, others will follow him one by one. No reform is ever
achieved in this world by men who are afraid of going ahead and can
only move with society. There is a wrong impression prevalent among
most men that a man can do more useful work by staying in society
than by going out of it. Working by staying in society comes to saying
this,—' I cannot persuade you to adopt my ways of reform, and I will
therefore conform to your superstitious ways, giving up my ideals.' Do
not think that a man going out of society by acting up to his convic¬
tions loses his influence over it. It is only such daring men that achieve
any reform worth the name."
There can never be a reformation in any country if the leaders
follow the masses, instead of setting them an example.
The worst enemies of reform in India are those who, not
content with passive resistance, seek by esoteric explanations to
justify polytheism, idolatry, and other superstitions,
ENCOURAGEMENTS.
Awakening India—A Himalayan journal is entitled, Pra-
buddha, Bluirata, ' Awakened India.' Awakening India rather
describes the state of the case. India may be compared to Kum-
bhakarna, the brother of Havana, who required to be roused from
ENCOURAGEMENTS.
85
profound sleep. Trumpets, cymbals, and drums, mingled with
war cries, were tried in vain. He was beaten with clubs and
mace, but nothing availed him till he was trampled by elephants.
India is beginning to show signs of awakening. There are various
movements among Hindus; the Muhammadans are holding-
Conferences; even the Jains are bestirring themselves.
The motto of the Prabuddha BJiarata should be adopted :
u Awake ! Awake ! and stop not till the goal is reached "
Katlici, Upan. I. iii. 4.
Reforms the work of a Minority.—Mr. Rees, at a meeting,
in London, called the social reformers a " microscopic minority."
To this taunt the Hon. Mr. Justice Chandravarkar well replied :
" ' Microscopic minorities,' which Mr. Rees was fond of ridiculing
whenever he spoke, are, after all, not the light things that he thought.
All real good has come from ' microscopic minorities.' "
Mill says in his book on Liberty :
" 'The initiation of all wise or noble things, comes, and must come,
from individuals—generally at first from some one individual. The
honour and glory of the average man is that he is capable of following
that initiation ; that he can respond internally to wise and noble things,
and be led to them with his eyes open...In this age, the mere example
of nonconformity, the mere refusal to bend the knee to custom, is itself
a service."
Sankaracharyar in India and Luther in Europe show what
great results may follow from the labours of one zealous and able
man.
The following are other encouragements:
Progress of Education :—Sir W. W. Hunter says :
" In the last century,* education in India was a monopoly in the
hands of the priests,—a power which they employed to subjugate the
minds of the people. Under British rule, education in India has been
taken entirely out of the hands of the priests, and it has become the
great emancipator of the Indian races In ancient India a Brahman
was forbidden, on pain of death, to teach the sacred books to the
masses. Under British rule, the State schools offer instruction to every
one, and open the same careers to all. In the last century the Hindus
were taught, from their earliest childhood, that they must remain im¬
prisoned for life in the caste in which they were born. We have now
(four) millions of boys and girls receiving public instruction in India.
These four millions of native children are learning that every occupa¬
tion, and every profession in British India is open to every boy on the
benches of an Indian school." 1
i
* The Eighteenth.
f England's Work in India, pp. 43-45.
8(5 THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
Literary Progress-—Here also Sir W. W. Hunter-may be
quoted, and a considerable advance has been made since he
wrote :
" The result (of education) has been a revival of letters such as tie
world has never seen. On the 31st March, 1818, the Serampur mission¬
aries issued the first newspaper ever printed in a native language of
India. The Vernacular journals now exceed 230 in number, and are
devoured every week by half a million readers. In 1878, 5,000 books
were published in India., besides a vast importation of literature from
England. Of this mass of printed matter, only 500 were translations,
the remaining 1,500 being original works. The Indian intellect is
marching forth in many directions, rejoicing in its new strength. More
copies of books of poetry, philosophy, law, and religion issue every year
from the press of British India, than the whole manuscripts compiled
during any century of native rule."
In spite of pandits and their following, India has not always
been content to " walk according to custom," " to follow the
ancients already a hopeful beginning has been made in the
cause of reform. The following are some of the changes which
have been introduced :
Western Arts have been accepted.— Railways, the electric
telegraph, photography, weaving by steam power, Ac., have
been introduced, and are freely employed. The Indian would
be looked upon as an idiot who urged his countrymen to stick
to the "national" conveyances of palanquins and bullock carts,
and not travel by the " foreign" invention of railways.
Western Science has superseded that of the Pur anas.—No
educated Hindu now believes in Mount Meru, in seas of ghi,
wine, Ac., or that eclipses are caused by Asuras seeking to seize
the sun and moon.
If a man makes statements which we know to be false, dis¬
credit is thrown upon whatever else he may say. We know that
the geography and astronomy of the Hindu sacred books are
erroneous: the presumption is that their religious teaching is
equally incorrect, and should be rejected.
Western Ideas of Government have been adopted.—For
three thousand years the Hindu and Mulianmiadan governments
in India were pure despotisms. Bholanath Chunder says of the
Oriental mind :
" It has never known, nor attempted to know any other form of
Government but despotism."
This is not peculiar to India. Sir H. S. Maine says : " It is
indisputable that much the greatest part of mankind have never
shown a particle of desire that its civil institutions should be
improved."
ENCOURAGEMENTS.
87
India has now its National Congress, claiming a voice in the
administration of the country ; trial by jury has been introduced
with approval; a commencement has been made in representative
government ; the separation of the judicial and executive func¬
tions is asked, etc.
A beginning has been made in Social and Moral Reform-
Formerly education was monopoly in the hands of the priests,—■
a power which they employed to subjugate the minds of the people.
The women especially were kept in ignorance. There are now
millions of all classes at school, and a beginning has been made in
female education. Slavery has been abolished, and the oppression
of the lower classes has been lightened. Early marriage and the
cruel treatment of widows are receiving attention. Dancing
girls in temples and obscene sculptures are condemned. There is
now much greater purity of administration and a higher standard
of truthfulness. The gods are now held to be bound by the
ordinary rules of morality. The excuse, SamartJii ko dosh
naliin is not accepted.
Monotheistic ideas are spreading.—The grand truths taught
by .Tesus Christ—the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of
Man—-are now beginning to be acknowledged by intelligent
Hindus. Some even claim that they are found in their sacred
books. In spite of every obstacle, the time is coming when
men all the world over will acknowledge each other as brothers.
It is true that such enlightened opinions are yet held only by a
few, like the sun illuminating the highest peaks of the Himalayas
while below there is darkness. Still, they wilt spread.
Past history makes it certain that the demonism and poly¬
theism of India will give place to monotheism. About two thou¬
sand years ago belief in monotheism was confined, with individual
exceptions, to one small nation—the Jews. It is now accepted
by the whole civilised world. The gods of many lands have
passed away in succession. Principal Cairns says :
" The classic Paganism, Greek and Eoman, the Syrian, Egyptian,
and North African, the Druidic, and ultimately the Teutonic have all
fallen to rise no more ; and at this moment there is not on the face of
the earth a single worshipper of ' the great goddess Diana' or ' the
image that fell down from Jupiter,' of Baal or Dagon, of Isis or Serapis,
of Thor and Woden "
" The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, even
they shall perish from the earth and from under these heavens."
The change of religion which took place in Europe, in spite
of the strongest opposition of the Eoman Government, will also
happen in India. The temples of \ ishnu and Siva will yet be as
deserted as those of Jupiter and Minerva in Europe. The Eastern
and Western Aryans will kneel at the same footstool, and address
the same Heaven Father.
88
THE CALL OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
A distinguished French Orientalist says that " As India has
already adopted the science and arts of Christian nations, so she
will one day spontaneously embrace their faith."
In spite of the efforts to prevent " the old gods of Hinduism
dying in the new elements of intellectual light and air," Sir
Alfred Lyall anticipates a rapid change in the religion of India :
" Thus there may be grounds for anticipating that a solid universal
peace and the impetus given by Europe, must together cause such rapid
intellectual expansion that India will now he carried swiftly through
phases which have occupied long stages in the lifetime of other
nations."''
How to Promote Religious Reform.
A few hints may lie offered under this head regarding the
means to be employed.
1. Example-—If the reader acknowledges the Fatherhood of
God and wishes to benefit his countrymen, let him act up to his
belief. A dutiful child loves an earthly father; he goes to him
with all his wants and difficulties ; he follows his guidance ; he
avoids whatever would he displeasing to him. Act in this way
towards your heavenly Father.
In the morning thank your heavenly Father for His protect¬
ing care during the night; ask Him to give you strength to act as
His child during the day ; at night review your conduct, confess,
with sorrow, any faults through temptation, seek forgiveness, and
God's loving care during the night.
•2. Discountenancing idolatry in others-—One great tempta¬
tion of educated Hindus is to do what their conscience condemns to
please ignorant women. The excuse has been made that they
do so "good naturedly." The commands of the great Creator
and Ruler of the Universe are not to he set aside to please
ignorant women. Besides being a violation of his own con¬
science, for an educated Hindu to take part in ceremonies
which he knows to be wrong, is an act of the greatest cruelty to
his ignorant relations, confirming them in error, and prolonging
the reign of superstition in the country. If educated Hindus took
a vigorous stand against idolatry, it would soon disappear.
3. Teaching.—If the reader is married and has children, his
family should receive his earliest and most earnest attention.
Plindu wives have some excellent qualities ; but they are full of
superstitious fears which they impart to their children. They
believe themselves to be surrounded by evil spirits against whom
they must seek protection by charms and ceremonies. Instead of
conforming to superstitious ceremonies to please them, they should
* Asiatic Studies, Vol, I. p. 300.
HOW TO PROMOTE RELIGIOUS REFORM.
89
be taught the groundlessness of their fears, and that we have a
great Father in heaven, Who watches over us, Who can guard
us from every danger, and give us every blessing that we
need.
Children should he taught that they have a Heavenly as well
as an earthly Father, who never sleeps, who watches over them
night and day. It would be a great blessing to them to be saved
from the dread of evil spirits by which so many are haunted ail
their lives. Children should be taught to pray morning and even¬
ing to their Father in heaven, and to seek to please Him in all
things.
The circle of teaching should be gradually widened to other
relations, friends, and acquaintances.
Some who are qualified might deliver addresses on religious
reform. Those who cannot speak might invite people to
attend.
Much good, on a wide scale, may be done by the circulation of
suitable literature. There is now a great variety of publications
of all sorts and sizes, some given gratuitously, others sold.
While the reader should teach others, he should himself be a
student. He is specially invited to study the life and work of
Jesus Christ. Liddon says :
" Not to be interested in the life of Jesus Christ, is to be, I do not
say irreligious, but unintelligent. It is to be insensible to the nature
and claims of the most powerful force that has ever moulded the thought
and swayed the destinies of civilized man.""
Let the earnest efforts of the reader be directed to
" Ring out the false and ring in the true."
Let him seek to change every injurious custom, to diffuse
religious truth. Thus will he aid in transforming the present Kali
Yuga into the Satya Yruga, and benefit his native land to untold
generations.
And let there be no delay. Join at once the noble band
already in the field.
Arise ! for the day is passing,
And you lie dreaming on ;
Your brothers are cased in armour,
And forth to the fight are gone !
A place in the ranks awaits you ;
Each man has some part to play,
The Past and the Future are nothing
In the face of stern To-day.
* Some Elements of Religion.
12
90
THE CALL OP THE TWENTIETH CENTURY.
Arise from the dreams of the Future
Of gaining some hard-fought field,
Of storming some airy fortress,
Or bidding some giant yield ;
Your future has deeds of glory,
Of honour, (God grant it may !)
But your arm will be never stronger,
Or needed as now—To-day.
Arise ! if the Past detain you,
Her sunshines and storms forget;
No chains so unworthy to hold you,
As those of a vain regret;
Sad or bright, she is lifeless ever;
Cast her phantom arms away,
Nor look back, save to learn the lesson
Of a nobler strife To-day.
Arise ! for the day is passing !
The sound that you scarcely hear,
Is the enemy marching to battle!
Rise ! Rise ! for the foe is near !
Stay not to sharpen your weapons,
Or the hour will strike at last,
When, from dreams of coming battle,
You may wake to find it past.
A A. Prortev.
APPENDIX.
Publications
ian Readers.
The Religions of the World. An Illustrated Sketch of their History.
8vo. 208 pp. 6 As.
The Great Religions of the World are described and contrasted. India is urged
to prosecute vigorously the course of reform on which she has entered. Illustrative
woodcuts.
The Hindu Sacred Books Described and Examined.
VOLUME I.
VEDAS AND BRAHMANAS.
An Account of the Vedas, with Illustrative Extracts from the
Rig-Veda. 8vo. 166 pp. 4£ As. Post-free, 6 As.
The principal divisions of the Vedas are described ; with life in Yedic times, the
gods of the Vedas, the offerings and sacrifices. Translations of some of the most
important hymns in the Rig-Veda are quoted in full.
The Atharva-Veda. 8vo. 76 pp. 2i As. Post-free, 3 As.
This is the Veda of Prayers, Charms, and Spells. A classified selection of the
Hymns is given, including charms to cure diseases, expel demons, secure success in
life, destroy enemies, &c.; with a review of the whole.
The Brahmanas of the Vedas. 8vo. 232 pp. By the Rev. K. S.
Macdonald, M.A., D.D., Author of The Vedic Religion. 8 As.
Post-free, 10 As.
Accounts are given of the Brahmanas of the Rig-Veda, Sima-Veda, Black and
White Yajur-Vedas, and the Atharva-Veda, showing the development of Hinduism.
The state of society, the human, horse, and other sacrifices, the gods and religion of
the Brihmanas are described ; with many interesting details.
VOLUME II.
PHILOSOPHICAL WORKS AND LAW BOOKS.
Selections from the Upanishads. 8vo. 120 pp. 4 As. Post-free, 5 As.
The Katha, Isa, and Svet&svatara, as translated into English by Dr. Roer, are
quoted in full, with the notes of Sankara Acharya and others ; and there are copious
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The Bhagavad Gita. 8vo. 108 pp. 3 As. Post-free, 5 As.
This work, supposed to represent the loftiest flight of Hindu Philosophy, consists
of a supposed dialogue between Arjuna and Krishna. It seeks to harmonise the
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This celebrated treatise, by Sadananda, is considered the best popular exposition
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Yoga Sastra. 8vo. 78 pp. 2| As. Post-free, 3 As.
The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali examined, and the supposed Yoga powers shown
to be a delusion. The true Yoga Sastra is explained ; with a notice of Swami
Vivekananda's Yoga Philosophy.
for Ind
92
PUBLICATIONS FOR INDIAN READERS.
The Laws of Manu. Bvo. 100 pp. 4 As. Post-free, 4£ As.
Manuvfi DhetVma-Sastra, the Laws of Manu, is not only the most important
of all the legal Codes, but it is regarded as almost equal in holiness to the \ edas.
An English translation is given of the principal passages, with brief notices ot
other Dharma-Sastras, and a review of the whole.
VOLUME III.
EPIC POEMS AND PUKANAS.
The Ramayana. Bvo. 180 pp. 7 As. Post-free, 84 As.
A full abridgment of this celebrated poem is given in English, with explanatory
notes, where necessary.
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Five Lectures by the Rev. T. E. Slater. An interesting account is given of the
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Review of the Hinduism of the Epic Poems and Turanas, &e. ; Rites and
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PUBLICATIONS PGR INDIAN READERS-, 08
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The history of Vishnu is traced through the Sacred Books of the Hindus.
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94
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PUBLICATIONS FOR INDIAN READERS.
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