{"id":275,"date":"2013-07-13T01:27:02","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=275"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:27:02","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:02","slug":"077-legitimate-patriotism-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/01-bande-mataram-volume-01\/077-legitimate-patriotism-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","title":{"rendered":"-077_Legitimate Patriotism.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n


\n\u201c<\/font><\/a>Legitimate
\nPatriotism<\/font>\u201d<\/font><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\n                       
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>L<\/font><\/span>ORD <\/font><\/b>Minto has given us the historic
\nexpression \u201chonest Swadeshi\u201d, and it was reserved for an Anglo-Indian
\npublicist to startle the English-knowing world by an equally significant
\nexpression, \u201clegitimate patriotism\u201d. Honesty, legitimacy and other kindred
\nwords of the English vocabulary are being newly interpreted by the Anglo-Indian
\nbureaucrats and publicists. The natural sentiments and aspirations of men are to
\nbe regulated according to their convenience and notions.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>If you give preference to the indigenous products of the country and ask
\nyour friends, relatives and countrymen to do the same, you are dishonest. This
\nis stretching the meaning of honesty to suit the moral sense of our alien and
\nbenevolent despots. Today we hear from another Anglo-Indian Sir Oracle, the Daily
\nNews <\/i>of Calcutta, that there is such a thing as legitimate patriotism. We
\nhave looked up the dictionaries to profit by the enlightenment so kindly
\nvouchsafed to us, but we have failed in our efforts. According to Webster,
\npatriotism covers all activities to zealously guard the authority <\/i>and
\ninterest of one’s country and we are at a loss to understand how what the
\nIndians have hitherto done or proposed to do to ensure the authority and
\ninterest of their country can be stigmatised as illegitimate. We on the contrary
\nbelieve, and that according to the best authority, that the patriotism which has
\nhitherto wrested from Mr. Morley only an expanded Council with an official
\nmajority and a comic advisory Board of Notables, falls far short of the standard
\nof lexicographers. Patriotism will never rest satisfied till it has recovered
\nthe authority of the country, however much the Anglo-Indians try to twist its
\nmeaning and implications.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>If it is patriotic for an Englishman to say, as their greatest poet has
\nsaid, that this England never did nor shall lie at the proud feet of a
\nconqueror, why should it be unpatriotic and seditious for an Indian to give
\nexpression to a similar sentiment? If it is highly patriotic for a Roman \u201cto
\ndie in defence of<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-455<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nhis
\nfather\u2019s ashes and the temples of his gods\u201d, why should it be madness and
\nsenseless folly for an Indian to be stirred by a similar impulse? If "self-defence
\nis the bulwark of all rights", as Lord Byron has said, why should an Indian
\njournalist be charged with an attempt to incite to violence when he asks his
\ncountrymen of East Bengal to defend the honour of their women at any cost? If
\nCampbell is right in saying that virtue is the spouse of liberty, why should an
\nIndian be exposed to the menace of siege-guns when entering on a legitimate and
\nlawful struggle for the recovery of his lost freedom? If each noble aim
\nrepressed by long control expires at last or feebly mans the soul, why should
\nnot our countrymen benefit by the advice of Goldsmith and begin to chafe at the
\nattempt to prolong this alien control? If Tennyson is justified in taking a
\npride in his country which freemen till, which sober-suited Freedom chose, where
\ngirt with friends or foes, a man may speak the thing he will, where freedom
\nslowly broadens down from precedent to precedent, why should it be criminal on
\nthe part of an Indian to imagine a similar future for the land of his birth? It
\nwill not do to fling in our face the mockery of glittering generalities or
\nblazing ubiquities of natural right with which they ridiculed the Declaration of
\nIndependence by the American colonists in 1776. Man cannot escape the influence
\nof these glittering generalities and blazing ubiquities; the literatures of
\npeoples who struggled for independence in former ages have always abounded with
\nthem and the awakened East must also talk in the same language. When some mighty
\nsentiments dominate the human breast, they give rise to language which runs the
\nrisk of being scouted as mere platitude, they give rise to activities and
\ndemonstrations which are in danger of being traced to illegitimate sources. The
\nstudents of Rajahmundry wore "Bande Mataram" badges, shouted "Bande
\nMataram" in the streets, gave a grand reception to a Nationalist speaker,
\nformed themselves into a Balabharat Samiti, and the Daily News <\/i>thinks all
\nthese to be the outcome of a patriotism hardly legitimate. What is then
\nlegitimate patriotism, pray? Our contemporary has given us no light on the
\npoint. We suppose it means a blind loyalty to the alien government, a helpless
\nacquiescence in its most despotic measures, bowing our knee to every Anglo-<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-456<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nIndian,
\nespecially to the dicta of the Editor of the Indian Daily News <\/i>and the
\nEnglishman<\/i>.
\n<\/i>If we do not accept the ethics of the British and Anglo-Indian Press which
\ncalls the present patriotic movement immoral and ascribes it to the want of
\nmoral training in our schools and colleges, we may be guilty according to
\nAnglo-Indian jurisprudence but the higher tribunal to whom alone all oppressed
\npeoples look up, knows their hearts and shapes their destinies accordingly.<\/font><\/p>\n


\nBande Mataram<\/i>,
\n<\/i> <\/font>June 27, 1907<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-457<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cLegitimate Patriotism\u201d                           LORD Minto has given us the historic expression \u201chonest Swadeshi\u201d, and it was reserved for an Anglo-Indian publicist to startle the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","wpcat-8-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275","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=275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}