{"id":296,"date":"2013-07-13T01:27:10","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=296"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:27:10","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:10","slug":"110-about-unity-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\/110-about-unity-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","title":{"rendered":"-110_About Unity.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n

\nAbout Unity<\/b><\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\n               
\nO<\/font>UR<\/font><\/b>
\n<\/b> <\/span>
\nesteemed contemporary, the Bengalee<\/i>,
\n<\/i>has recently been reading us eloquent sermons on the uses and advantages of
\nunity. We confess we cannot follow our contemporary’s argument. We gave
\nutterance to the very obvious and we thought, undeniable sentiment that Unity is
\na means and not an end in itself. But the Bengalee <\/i>asserts, and it has
\nnow got the strong authority of Mr. Myron Phelps to back it, that unity is an
\nend in itself and not a means, but it seems to us that neither our contemporary
\nnor his authority have anything but their ipse dixit <\/i>to prove their
\nassertion. We have great respect for Mr. Myron Phelps who is evidently a sincere
\nwell-wisher of our nation, but it does seem to us that he is forgetting the
\nhistory of his own country when he asserts that unity is an end in itself. The
\nend his countrymen aimed at during their quarrel with England was certainly not
\nunity but independence, and to the attainment of that end there was a strong
\nloyalist minority opposed and unfriendly. Even among the American Liberals the
\ndemocratic Extremists were a minority while the greater number would have been
\nglad to combine submission to the English crown with American liberty. It was
\nthe fiery vehemence and energy of the Extremists aided by the intensity of
\npopular indignation which hurried the Moderate majority into the Boycott and the
\nsame force which plunged them half against their will into war with the suzerain
\nand into ultimate democracy. The same thing has happened in India, for there is
\nnot the slightest doubt that the Moderates have been carried at the fiery
\nchariot-wheels of Extremism into the perpetuation of the Boycott and the angry
\nstruggle between people and bureaucracy from which they would have gladly
\nwithdrawn and more than once made motions to withdraw, if left to themselves. We
\ninsist that the end of national action is the acquisition and maintenance of
\nnational independence and greatness, and unity is only a means to that end.
\nMoreover, political unity which is an essential condition of inde-<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-615<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\npendence differs from unity of ideas and
\nmethods which are not essential. Political unity can be prepared by men of all
\nparts of the country joining in a common struggle for the creation of a single
\nnational government, but the other unity is only possible if the whole nation is
\ninspired by one spirit and one idea. The Bengalee <\/i>thinks there is
\nsubstantially such a unity between, say, Sir Pherozshah Mehta, Srijut
\nSurendranath Banerji and Srijut Bepin Chandra Pal; but we have our doubts.
\nSurendranath wants Colonial Self-government, Pherozshah would be hugely pleased
\nwith something infinitely less; Bepin Chandra wants absolute autonomy. Where is
\nthe unity? If Colonial Self-government for India, that political monstrosity,
\nmeans anything, it means a hampered and provincial autonomy; the Nationalists
\nstrive for a complete and international autonomy, and if our contemporary thinks
\nthat is a small or merely academic difference, we cannot compliment him on his
\nknowledge either of history or politics. We will admit however for the sake of
\nargument that our aim is identical, though in one case frankly expressed and in
\nthe other hidden under a. veil, but that our methods are different. How then can
\nthere be that unity of action for which the Bengalee <\/i>so sonorously but
\nhazily pleads? Unity of action along with and unaffected by difference of
\nmethods is a kind of unity which we do not understand, and we rather suspect it
\nis a chimera from the land of confused ideas very much on a par with the
\n"Colonial Self-government for India" of our friends or Mr. Morley’s wonderful
\nreconciliation of a free Press and Platform with an autocratic government. If
\none party has petitioning for its method and another rejects it for passive
\nresistance, how can there be unity of action? Or if one party insists on
\nassociation with and opposition to the bureaucracy (another twynatured and
\nself-contradictory figment from dreamland) and the other repudiates the
\nassociation, how can there be united action? If united action is at all possible
\nin Bengal, it is because the Moderate Party in Bengal has ceased to be wagged by
\nits loyalist tail and is now following the lead of its small but advanced head
\nwhich is in sympathy with many of the Nationalist ideas though it is not
\nprepared to carry them to their complete and logical end with the thoroughness
\nand audacity which true Nationalism requires.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-616<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

The Moderates have given up for the present the policy of
\nmendicancy, they have given in their adherence to the programme of passive
\nresistance though only in part. So far therefore as the methods of the two
\nparties agree, united action is possible, though difference of fundamental ideas
\nand difference of spirit make it impossible for that concord to be real and
\nwhole-hearted, even if personal misunderstandings and dislikes did not stand in
\nthe way. But it is only in Bengal that even so much unity is possible, though
\nthere is a tendency in that direction in Madras. In the rest of India Moderatism
\nis in its public professions and actions frankly loyalist and is quite prepared
\nto eject the Nationalists from the Congress so far as it can be done with safety
\nto itself. The Nagpur affair and the action of the All-India Congress Committee
\nprove that beyond doubt. Where then is the basis of unity? For that matter, the
\nBengal Moderates while they sing dulcetly to us the praises of Unity, have
\ninvariably joined heartily in Loyalist attempts to suppress the voice of
\nNationalism in the Congress. They were, we are convinced, consenting parties to
\nthe unconstitutional political trickery by which Sir Pherozshah transferred the
\nmeeting place of the Congress to one of his own pocket boroughs. Again we ask,
\non what ground can we meet for heartily united action? We have our work to do
\nand cannot wait for ever on sweet words and professions used as a veil for
\nsecret \u2014 well, shall we say, diplomacy? We are ourselves anxious to carry the
\nsupport of our Moderate countrymen with us in our struggles, but their
\nfriendship must first become less of the "I love you and kick you downstairs"
\nkind than it is at present. Sincerity has great healing properties and without
\nit professions are a poor salve for old sores.<\/p>\n


\nBande Mataram<\/i>,
\n<\/i>
\n<\/font>December 2, 1907<\/font><\/p>\n

 \n<\/p>\n

\nPersonality
\nor Principle<\/font><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nOur contemporary, the Punjabee<\/i>, <\/i>has
\nin its last issue a balanced and carefully impartial comment on the Congress
\ntrouble and the action of the All-India Congress Committee, or rather of Sir
\nPherozshah Mehta in the exercise of his role of Congress Lion<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-617<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nand Dictator. There is one remark of our
\ncontemporary’s, however, which seems to us unfair to the Nationalist Party and
\nwith which therefore we feel bound to join issue. He censures the Nagpur
\nNationalists for forcing on a division in the camp over a personal question like
\nthe election of Mr. Tilak as President. The question of the Presidentship is, in
\nhis opinion, not only a purely personal issue but also extremely trivial, as the
\nPresident has no function of importance and a democratic body like the Congress
\nought not to make a vital issue out of a nomination to a purely honorific post.
\nWe have already given our reasons for originally raising and still persisting in
\nthis question and we again assert that we are not swayed in the slightest degree
\nby personal questions. It will not raise Mr. Tilak in our eyes if he becomes
\nPresident, it will not lower him in our eyes if he is never nominated. To a
\ncertain extent the Presidentship is a position of honour, and so far as it is
\nso, a man of ability and reputation, an acknowledged leader and moulder of
\nopinion, who has suffered courageously for the country is entitled to that
\nhonour. But that is not the position we take. The Presidentship is in our view
\nmuch more a position of responsibility and service. We cannot agree that it is
\nof no importance who is chosen to fill the chair, even if the Congress be a
\ndemocratic body, which, as at present constituted and conducted, it is not. In
\nno democratic assembly is the choice of the President, whether he be a virtual
\nruler, as in America, or only a Moderator, as in France, a question of no
\nimportance. Our Congress is not as yet either a deliberative or a legislative
\nbody, but even so the Presidentship is a function of considerable importance.
\nThe President is the embodiment to all observers of the dignity and personality
\nof that year’s session and as such his address, though it may not be binding on
\nthe whole body, is an utterance of great weight and is or ought to be largely
\nindicative of the national temper and policy. The Congress shows the importance
\nit attaches to his address by devoting the first day to it, an arrangement
\nwhich, if the address has no weight or value as a manifesto of Congress views
\nand policy, is an absurd and reprehensible waste of time. Besides, the President
\nis a moderator of debate in the Subjects Committee, and of rule and decorum in
\nthe public sitting. When divided views are<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-618<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nbefore the national gathering it depends
\non him whether all sides shall get a fair hearing and a chance of impressing
\ntheir views on the Congress. We raised the question of Mr. Tilak’s Presidentship
\nat a time when Swadeshi was the question before the country partly in order that
\nthe most powerful Swadeshi worker in the country might pronounce for Swadeshi
\nfrom the President’s chair, and the Congress by electing him might show its
\nsympathy with the movement. We made no secret of our object at the time and it
\nwas certainly not of a personal nature. But there was a second point at issue
\nwhich was in the minds of all though it was never formulated, and this too was a
\npoint of principle, viz. that the Congress should not in any of its actions be
\ninfluenced by the desire of bureaucratic favour or the fear of bureaucratic
\ndispleasure, that it should declare its complete independence as a body which
\nlooked to the people alone and not to the bureaucracy. This could not be better
\ndone than by the election of a great man and leader who was not a persona
\ngrata <\/i>with the bureaucrats and had undergone sentence of imprisonment for
\nthe crime of patriotism. That is the real difficulty in the way of the
\nModerates’ accepting Mr. Tilak and it is equally the reason why the Nationalists
\nrefuse to give up their point. An apparently personal question often conceals
\none of essential principle, even when the person is not as in this case a great
\npatriot and leader. It was not for profligate John Wilkes that the people of
\nMiddlesex fought in the eighteenth century but for the liberty of the Press
\nwhich was attacked in his person. We too fight not for honour to be done to a
\nman however great and noble, but for the liberty of the Congress from all shadow
\nof bureaucratic influence and its new creation as an independent, popular and
\ndemocratic assembly.<\/font><\/p>\n

 \n<\/p>\n


\nPersian Democracy<\/font><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nThe progress of democracy in the East
\nwill, if signs can be trusted, receive a powerful impetus from the creation of
\nthe Persian Parliament. In Persia the people are proving themselves too powerful
\nfor both the Crown and the Church and rapidly taking<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-619<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nall power into their hands. When the
\nsecond of Asia’s Parliaments came into being, the European critics wrote,
\npatronisingly or scornfully as the mood took them, about this new departure of
\nthese funny Asiatics who will not understand that it is only Europeans who are
\ncapable of self-government or fit for democracy and that God made Asia only to
\nbe civilised, exploited and ruled by white men, and they were liberal of
\nprophecies that the Shah would re-establish absolutism by the sword before the
\nworld was many months older, or that Persia would be mis-governed by fanatical
\nMullahs. The prophets were evidently very much out of it, for the reverse has
\nhappened. The Shah is evidently being overwhelmed in the tide of democracy and
\nthe clergy who took the first step towards revolution find themselves, like the French noblesse after a similar step, already in
\nthe position of <\/span>reactionaries threatened by the flood they set going.
\nDemocracy is not only the natural bent of Mahomedanism, but it is obviously the
\nonly hope of Persia where there is no wise and powerful aristocracy to lead and
\norganise the people as in Japan. Only the fire of the democratic idea and the
\nresurgence of the whole people, can save Persia from the European menace.
\nDemocracy is not merely the dream of "the young and ignorant" in Bengal, it is a
\nrising force throughout Asia. Sir Harvey Adamson will have it that democracy is
\nneither conceivable nor desired in India. Well, well, the proof of the pudding
\nis in the eating and we will see by practical experiment whether you are right
\nor we.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\nBande Mataram<\/i>,
\n<\/i>
\n<\/font>December 3, 1907<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-620<\/font><\/p>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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