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The Main feeder of Patriotism
THERE are many people who admit the superiority of Eastern civilisation, who recognise its humanitarian and socialistic aspect, who are not blind to its predominating feature of spirituality, who admire the absence of a militant Materialism in it, who praise the way in which it has balanced the interests of the different classes in the society, who are conscious how much attention it gives to the higher needs of humanity. But still patriotism is not a living and moving impulse with them. Apart from the natural attachment which every man has to his country, its literature, its traditions, its customs and usages, patriotism has an additional stimulus in the acknowledged excellence of a national civilisation. If Britons love England with all her faults, why should we fail to love India whose faults were whittled down to an irreducible minimum till foreign conquests threw the whole society out of gear? But instead of being dominated by the natural ambition of carrying the banner of such a civilisation all over the world, we are unable to maintain its integrity in its own native home. This is betraying a trust. This is unworthiness of the worst type. We have not been able to add anything to this precious bequest; on the contrary we have been keeping ourselves and generations yet unborn from a full enjoyment of their lawful heritage. For Eastern civilisation though it is not dead, though it is a living force, is yet a submerged force, and that not because it has no intrinsic merit but because it has been transmitted to a class of people devoid of a love for things their own. It seems as if they have no past to guide, instruct or inspire them. They are beginning, as it were, with a clean slate and what is worse, a foreign poetaster is calling upon his countrymen to take charge of them as "half devil, half child". Is not the humiliation sufficient to disturb our self-complacency? We make no appeal in the name of any material benefit. No desire for earthly gain can nerve a people to such superhuman activity as the eager hope of maintaining their greatness and
Page-426 glory. We must first realise that we are great and glorious, that we are proud and noble, and it is through voluntary prostration that we are being stamped into the dust. No material ideal of riches and prosperity has ever made a nation. But when the sense of honour has been touched, when the consciousness of greatness has been re-awakened, then and then only have the scattered units of a fallen nation clustered round one mighty moral force.
What is now considered by
political thinkers to be the chief incentive to conquest? What is the meaning of
the imperial sentiment which is "now dominating every English breast"?
"If we ask ourselves," says one writer, "seriously the question
why we glory in the magnitude of our empire, it may be answered: partly because
we think it adds to our riches, partly because we enjoy the sense of power and
dominion, partly because we cling to old traditions and remember the great deeds
of history; but beyond and above all these elements of satisfaction we feel that
throughout the whole British empire we enforce those ideas of justice, personal
freedom and religious toleration which are the results of the constitutional
struggles of centuries." We are not concerned here with the discussion
whether the Britisher’s boast is well or ill-founded; but rightly or wrongly
this sentiment has taken possession of him and he is invincible under its
influence. For we find the same explanation in Mill. Sidgwick also in his Elements
of Politics harps on the same strain. "Besides the material
advantages," he says, "there are legitimate sentimental satisfactions
derived from justifiable conquest which must be taken into account. Such are the
justifiable pride which the cultivated members of a civilised community feel in
the beneficent exercise of dominion and in the performance by their nation of
the noble task of spreading the highest kind of civilisation, and a more intense
though less elevated satisfaction —
inseparable from patriotic sentiment —
in the spread of the special type of civilisation distinctive of their nation,
communicated through its language and literature, and through the tendency to
catch its tastes and imitate its customs which its prolonged rule, specially if,
on the whole, beneficent, is likely to cause in a continually increasing
degree."
Page-427 from a desire for spiritual expansion and history also supports the assertion. But why should not India then be the first power in the world? Who else has the undisputed right to extend spiritual sway over the world? This was Swami Vivekananda’s plan of campaign. India can once more be made conscious of her greatness by an overmastering sense of the greatness of her spirituality. This sense of greatness is the main feeder of all patriotism. This only can put an end to all self-depreciation and generate a burning desire to recover the lost ground. Bande Mataram, June 19, 1907
We publish in another column a letter from a correspondent signing himself "Organised Cooperation", in which a very elaborate plan is sketched out for ascertaining the opinion of the nation and following out in unison the programme arrived at. The scheme is, we fear, more elaborate than practicable. If the suggestion originally put forward by the Nationalists of the creation of Congress electorates had been adopted, such a plebiscite might have been possible; as it is, the necessary machinery does not exist. Moreover, such an all-India plebiscite covering the whole field of politics, even if it were possible, would neither be useful nor necessary. The national programme has already been fixed by the Calcutta Congress and there is no need of a further plebiscite to decide it; in Bengal at least it has been universally accepted, with additions and reaffirmed by the District Conferences and District Committees appointed to carry it out. Our correspondent seems to have misapprehended the nature and object of a plebiscite. A plebiscite can only be on a single definite and supreme issue, the decision of which is so important that the ordinary representative assembles cannot undertake the responsibility of a final decision. A plebiscite on a whole programme is an impossibility. Neither would it be binding. Bengal, for instance, is practically unanimous for Boycott. If the majority of votes went against Boycott, would Bengal accept the decision and tamely submit to repression?
Page-428 Or if the majority were for Boycott, would Bombay City agree to carry out the decision? We sympathise with the hankering for united action, but united action is only possible in so much of the programme as all are agreed upon; it is not possible in those matters on which opinion is still widely divided.
The Bengal Government’s Letter
The Statesman has recently become a confirmed sensation-monger and treats the public continually to its thick-coming opium visions. It has recently brought out a sensational statement about Government proceedings against the Nationalist Press in which a Bengal Government letter to three Calcutta journals received almost a fortnight ago, the recent Police raid on the Keshab Press, the Bande Mataram‘s posters and some luxuriant imaginings of the Statesman‘s own riotous fancy have been mingled together in wild confusion. We were one of the recipients of the Bengal Government’s letter, and if we have not written on the subject, it is simply because the letter was marked confidential. Now, however, that the matter has got abroad, we may as well correct certain inaccuracies which have appeared not only in the Statesman‘s bit of romancing, but in the Amrita Bazar Patrika’s correction. It is entirely untrue that on Monday afternoon or any other afternoon, evening or morning "a notice was served upon the proprietors, editor, manager and printer of this paper to the effect that proceedings would be adopted against them under section 124A and the other sections dealing with seditious publications, unless they moderated their tone". On Saturday before last, if our memory serves us, we received a communication from the Bengal Government addressed to the Editor, Bande Mataram in which we were informed that the Lieutenant-Governor had had under consideration certain articles (not specified) recently published in our paper "the language of which was a direct incitement to violence and breach of the peace". This sort of language the Bengal Government was determined to put a stop to, but before taking action they were gracious enough to give us a warning to mend our ways. That is all.
Page-429 It is not true either that a conference was held with the directors or that the managers interviewed the legal advisers of the Company in connection with the notice. No such conference or interview was held for the simple reason that none was necessary. The Editorial Department is solely responsible for the policy of the paper and they have no need to consult lawyers about their duty to the public. The Amrita Bazar Patrika is therefore wrongly informed when it says that legal opinion has been taken and given in the matter. It is true that legal opinion is being taken by the Company, but it is on a point of law which arose previous to the receipt of the Bengal Government’s letter and is entirely unconnected with it. The Statesman has also absurdly distorted the "proceedings against the Yugantar and Nabasakti". No proceedings have been instituted. The police while searching the Keshab Press for manuscripts in connection with the pamphlet Sonar Bangla — which has, by the way, no connection with Hare Street mare’s nest — stumbled on the forms of the Yugantar then being printed. The Keshab Press is being proceeded against, but it is doubtful whether anything will be done to the Yugantar, as the printing of a paper in part or whole at another press in emergency is so common an occurrence that, even if it be a technical offence, which is not certain, to prosecute it would be purely vindictive. In any case the Yugantar business is not, as the Statesman represents, the first step in a campaign against the Nationalist Press. Our own position is very simple. The articles to which the Bengal Government refers are, we presume, those in which we called upon the Hindus to defend their temples and their women from insult and outrage. Every Hindu paper at the time did the same, even the Indian Mirror and the Indian Nation, and we do not think we did anything more than our plain duty to our countrymen. The Lieutenant-Governor, however, takes exception not to the purport of our articles but to their language — which was less violent than what English papers would have used if a similar campaign of outrage on European women had been in progress. Be that as it may, the occasion has passed and until it is repeated, the question of complying or not complying with the warning does not arise. We merely note it and pass on. Bande Mataram, June 20, 1907
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