{"id":1043,"date":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1043"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","slug":"19-facts-and-opinions-31-7-1909-vol-02-karmayogin-volume-02","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/02-karmayogin-volume-02\/19-facts-and-opinions-31-7-1909-vol-02-karmayogin-volume-02","title":{"rendered":"-19_Facts and Opinions 31-7-1909.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n


\nFacts and Opinions<\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

\nVolume I – July 31, 1909 – Number 6<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n The Spirit in Asia<\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

                     <\/font>
\nA<\/font><\/b> spirit moves abroad in the world today upsetting kingdoms and
\nraising up new principalities and powers the workings of which are marked by a
\nswiftness and ubiquity new in history. In place of the slow developments and
\nuncertain results of the past we have a quickness and thoroughness which
\ndestroy in an hour and remould in a decade. It is noteworthy that these rapid
\nmotions are mostly discernible in Asiatic peoples.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n The
\n Persian Revolution<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Persian Revolution has
\nsettled, with a swiftness and decisiveness second only to the movement of
\nTurkey, the constitutional struggle in Iran between a reactionary Shah and a
\nrejuvenated, eager and ardent nation. The weak and unstable promise-breaker at
\nTeheran has fallen, mourned by a sympathetic Anglo-India but by no one else in
\nthe world. Since the late Shah under the pressure of passive resistance yielded
\na constitution to his people, the young Nationalism of Persia has been
\nattempting to force or persuade his son to keep the oaths with which he started
\nhis reign. Some deeds of blood on both sides, some sharp encounters have
\nattended the process but the price paid has been comparatively small. Like
\nother Asiatic States in a similar process of transformation Persia has rejected
\nthe theoretic charms of a republic; she has set up a prince who is young enough
\nto be trained to the habits of a constitutional monarch before he takes up the
\nauthority of kingship. In this we see the political wisdom, self-restraint and
\ninstinct for the right thing to be done which is natural to ancient nations
\nwho, though they have grown young again, are not raw and violent people new to
\npolitical thought and experiment.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 117<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n


\n
\n Persia’s
\n Difficulties<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A great and difficult task lies
\nbefore the newly-risen nation. No other people is so difficultly circumstanced
\nas the Persians. Weak in herself, long a stranger to good government, military
\nstrength and discipline, financial soundness and internal efficiency, Persia
\nhas to evolve all these under the instant menace from north and south of two of
\nthe greatest European empires. The threat of Russia to act herself if the new
\ngovernment does not instantly guarantee security on its borders, a threat made
\non the morrow of a violent coup d’\u00e9tat<\/i>
\nand before there has been time for the Regency to cope with any of the
\nimmediate difficulties surrounding it, is typical of the kind of peril which
\nthis proximity is likely to produce. Self-restraint and patience towards these
\ndoubtful friends and unbounded energy and decision within are the only
\nqualities by which the statesmen of Persia can surmount the difficulties in
\ntheir path and satisfy the claims posterity makes upon them. The internal
\nreorganisation of Persia and the swift development of military
\nstrength are the first needs. Till then
\nPersia must bear and forbear.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n The New
\n\tMen in Persia<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is worthy of notice that Sipahidar
\nand Sardar Assad,
\nthe Bakhtyari leader, who have effected this revolution, are men who in their youth
\nhave studied in Europe. They should know the springs of European politics and
\nthoroughly understand the way in which European Powers have to be dealt with as
\nwell as the necessities and conditions of internal reorganisation. The problem
\nfor all Asiatic peoples is the preservation of their national individuality and
\nexistence while equipping themselves with the weapons of the modern struggle
\nfor survival. A deep study of European politics, a strong feeling for Asiatic
\ninstitutions and ideals, a selfless
\npatriotism and immense faith, courage and self-restraint are the qualities
\nessential to their leaders in these critical times. It is reassuring to find
\nPersians high in praise of the self-denying and lofty character of the new
\nRegent. In the absence of<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 118<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n


\na patriotic King like the
\nMikado such a man alone can form the centre of national reconstruction.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

\n Madanlal
\n Dhingra<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Madanlal Dhingra pays
\nthe inevitable and foreseen penalty of his crime. We have no wish whatever to
\nload the memory of this unfortunate young man with curses and denunciations.
\nRather we hope that in his last moments he will be able to look back in a calm
\nspirit on his act and with a mind enlightened by the near approach of death
\nprepare his soul for the great transit. No man but he can say what were the
\nreal motives for his deed. If personal resentment and exaggerated emotions
\nwere the cause of his crime, a realisation of the true nature of the offence
\nmay yet help the soul in its future career. If on the other hand a random
\npatriotism was at its back, we have little hope that reflection will induce him
\nto change his views. Minds imbued with these ideas are the despair of the
\nstatesman and the political thinker. They follow their bent with a remorseless
\nfirmness which defies alike the arrows of the reasoner
\nand the terrors of a violent death. He must in that case go forth to reap the
\nfruits in other bodies and new circumstances. Here his country remains behind
\nto bear the consequences of his act.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

\n Press
\n Garbage in England<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is at least gratifying to find that the theory of conspiracy is
\nexploded except in the minds of Anglo-Indian papers and perhaps of a few
\nAnglo-Indian statesmen and officials. Not a single circumstance has justified
\nthe wild suspicions and wilder inventions which journals like the Daily
\nMail<\/i> and Daily Express <\/i>poured thick upon the world in the first few
\ndays that followed the occurrence. These strange fictions are still travelling
\nto us by mail. The most extraordinary of them is perhaps that launched, by a
\ncertain gentleman who is bold enough to give his name, upon the World<\/i>.
\nIt seems that long ago the redoubtable Krishnavarma<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 119<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n

in a moment of benign and expansive frankness selected this
\ngentleman and revealed to him the details of a gigantic plot he has been
\nelaborating for the last eight years with a view to the murder wholesale and
\nretail of Anglo-Indian officials. If the story were true, Krishnavarma’s confidant ought certainly to have been put
\nin the dock as an accessory before the crime on the ground of criminal
\nconcealment. These romances sound ridiculous enough now that we read them three
\nweeks afterwards when the excitement of the hour has passed, but the harm this
\nkind of journalism can do was sufficiently proved at the time of the Chinese
\ndisturbances and the trouble which preceded the Boer War. That these daily voidings of impudent falsehood and fabrication
\nshould be eagerly swallowed by thousands shows the rapid deterioration of
\nBritish dignity and sobriety.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

\n Shyamji
\n Krishnavarma<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The exaggerated view of Mr. Shyamji Krishnavarma as an arch
\nconspirator of malign subtlety and power who has long been inculcating
\nterrorist opinions among young men and building up a secret society, is one
\nwhich none can accept who has any knowledge of this gentleman’s past career.
\nMr. Shyamji Krishnavarma is an earnest, vehement and outspoken idealist
\npassionately attached to his own views and intolerant of all who oppose them.
\nHe first went to England to breathe the atmosphere of a free country where he
\ncould speak as well as think as he chose. He was then a strong
\nconstitutionalist and his chief intellectual preoccupations were Herbert
\nSpencer, Home Rule and the position of the Native States. When the new
\nmovement flooded India it carried Mr. Krishnavarma forward with it. He became
\nan ardent Nationalist, a confirmed passive resister
\nwith an idealistic aversion to violent methods and a strong conviction that,
\nwhatever might be the case with other countries, India would neither need nor
\nresort to them. His conversion to Terrorism is quite recent and has astonished
\nmost those who knew him best. We know that Sj. Bepin Pal went to England with the confident
\nexpectation of finding full sympathy and co-operation from the<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 120<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n

editor of the Indian Sociologist<\/i>. The quarrel between the two
\nresulting from the change in Mr. Krishnavarma’s
\nviews is a matter of public knowledge. We refuse therefore to believe that Mr.
\nKrishnavarma has been a plotter of assassination and secret disseminator of Terrorism or that the India House
\nis a centre for the propagation and fulfilment of the ideas he has himself
\nventilated in the <\/font> Times<\/i>.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

\n Nervous
\n Anglo-India<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Time was when Srijut Surendranath Banerjee
\nwas held by nervous Anglo-India to be the crowned King of an insurgent Bengal,
\na very pestilent fellow flooding the country with sedition and rebellion. The
\nwhirligig of Time brings round with it strange revenges and at this moment
\nSrijut Surendranath is returning to India acclaimed by English Conservatives as
\na pillar of the British Empire, India’s representative with a mighty
\norganisation behind him pledged to loyalty, co-operation and the support of Morleyan reform. After Surendranath, Srijut Bepin Chandra Pal,
\nreputed editor of Bande Mataram<\/i> and author of the great Madras
\nspeeches, loomed as the arch-plotter of revolution and the chief danger to the
\nEmpire. The same Bepin Chandra is now a peaceful and unsuspected journalist and
\nlecturer in London acquitted, we hope, of all wish to be the Ravana destined to shake the British Kailas. But Anglo-India needs a bogeyman and by a
\nfew letters to the Times<\/i> Mr. Krishnavarma has leaped into that eminent
\nbut unenviable position. Who knows ? In
\nanother year or two even he may be considered a harmless if inconvenient
\nidealist. What is it, one wonders, that has turned the firm, phlegmatic Briton
\ninto a nervous quaking old woman in love with imaginative terrors ? Is it
\ndemocracy ? Is it the new sensationalist Press run by Harmsworth
\nand Company ? The phenomenon is inexplicable, but it is to be feared it is going
\nto be permanent.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

\n The
\n Recoil of Karma<\/a><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThere is a general law that Karma rebounds
\nupon the doer.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 121<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n

Associated in Hindu philosophy mainly with the individual and the
\ntheory of rebirth, this truth has also been recognised as equally applicable on
\nother lines to the present life and to the destiny of nations. The Karma of the
\nBritish people in India has been of a mixed quality. So far as it has opened
\nthe gates of Western knowledge to the people of this country it has been good
\nand in return the thought and knowledge of India has poured back upon Europe to
\nreturn the gift with overmeasure. Had they
\nin addition consciously raised up and educated the whole people, all the fruits
\nof that good Karma would have gone to England. But the education they have
\ngiven is bad, meagre and restricted to the few, and their sympathy for the
\npeople has been formal and deficient. In consequence the main flood of the new
\nthought and knowledge has been diverted to America, the giant of the future,
\nwhich alone of the nations has shown an active and practical sympathy and
\nunderstanding of our nation. British Karma in India has been bad in so far as
\nit has destroyed our industries and arrested our national development. This
\nKarma is also beginning to recoil, patently in Boycott and unrest, much more
\nsubtly in the growing demoralisation of British politics. Already the jealous
\nlove of liberty is beginning to wane in the upper classes in England, political
\nthinkers are emerging who announce the failure of democracy, the doctrine of
\nthe rule of the strong man is gaining ground and the temptation to strengthen
\nthe executive at the expense of the liberty of the citizen is proving too powerful
\neven for a Radical Government. It seems impossible that even a veiled despotism
\nor a virtual oligarchy should ever again rule in England, yet stranger things
\nhave happened in history. The change may come by the growth of Socialism and
\nthe seizure of the doctrine of State despotism by masterful and ambitious
\nminds to cloak an usurpation the ancient and known forms of which would not be
\ntolerated, just as the Caesars, while avoiding the detested name and form of
\nkingship, yet ruled Rome under the harmless titles of Princeps
\nand Imperator, first man of the state and
\ngeneral, far more despotically than Tarquin could have done. Under whatever disguises
\nthe change may steal upon the people, one thing is certain that if Lord Morley and the Anglo-Indian proconsuls succeed in
\nperpetuating absolutism in<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 122<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\n

India, it will recoil from India to reconquer England. The
\nNationalists of this country are fighting not only for the liberties of India
\nbut for the liberties of England.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n  <\/p>\n

\n Liberty
\n or Empire<\/a><\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It is an ancient and perpetually recurring choice which is now being
\noffered to the British people, the choice between liberty and empire. The two
\nare incompatible except by the substitution of a free federation for a
\ndominion. Rome was offered the choice. She won an empire and lost her liberty.
\nExternal expansion has always been accompanied by a concentration of internal
\npower in King or oligarchy. Athens, the only people who attempted to be imperial
\nand despotic abroad and democratic at home, broke down in the attempt. In
\nEnglish history also we find that the great expansion in the eighteenth century
\nled to the reactionary rule of the third George and it was not till England
\nafter the severe lesson in America adopted her present
\ncolonial system that expansion and democracy went hand in hand. That system
\nwas not an imperial system but a loose collection of free states only nominally
\nunited by the British Crown. The Indian problem is the test of British
\nLiberalism. The colonial system as it stands cannot obtain between two States
\nwhich are not mother and daughter. The one would not tolerate it, the other
\nwould not be content with it. But if England can bring herself to extend in a
\ndifferent form the principle of a collection of free States to India, she may
\nkeep her position in the world and her liberty together. Despotic Empire and
\nliberty she cannot keep; she must either yield up absolutism abroad or renounce
\nliberty at home.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 123<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Facts and Opinions Volume I – July 31, 1909 – Number 6 The Spirit in Asia                        A spirit moves abroad in the world…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-02-karmayogin-volume-02","wpcat-23-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}