{"id":317,"date":"2013-07-13T01:27:17","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=317"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:27:17","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:27:17","slug":"099-the-vanity-of-reaction-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\/099-the-vanity-of-reaction-vol-01-bande-mataram-volume-01","title":{"rendered":"-099_The Vanity of Reaction.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n


\nThe Vanity of Reaction<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\n               
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>T<\/font><\/span><\/b>HE<\/b>
\ndevices of reactionary absolutism have a curious family resemblance all the
\nworld over. Reaction is never intelligent and never imaginative. Limited to the
\nnarrow horizon of its own selfish interests, committed to the preservation of
\nthe impossible and the resuscitation of corrupt systems and dead forms it has
\nneither the vision to understand and measure the forces that have been new born
\nto replace it, nor the wisdom to treat and compromise with the strength of Demogorgon while yet unripe so as to prolong its hour of rule for a little, \u2014
\nthe only grace that Heaven allows to doomed institutions and forfeited powers.
\nLike Kamsa of old, it seeks to confirm its failing grip on the world by
\nmurderous guile and violence or like the Jupiter of Prometheus Unbound gropes
\nfor safety through vain diplomacies and the martyrdom of the champions of
\nsuffering humanity. Poor in invention except in the cunning variation of savage
\ntortures or petty brutalities, it reiterates the old wornout spells, the
\nonce-potent lies which had been powerful to prolong the death-sleep of the
\npeoples and sees not that the mumbling of its incantations only awakes the scorn
\nand rage of strong men indignant that such deceptive bonds should so long have
\navailed to bind their strength. Barren of resources, it blindly persists in the
\nold stupid violences that can hurt and enrage but cannot kill, the old menaces
\nand outbursts of barbarous rage that have lost their power to intimidate an
\nincensed and stubborn people, and will not realise that every blow evokes a
\nmightier reaction, that every missile of death it hurls is returning with
\nfearful rapidity upon the thrower, that the chains with which it binds the limbs
\nof the nation’s martyrs are so much iron which the nation will forge into
\nweapons against its oppressors, that the blood it sheds is so much water of life
\nto foster the young plant of liberty, that, when sentence has been passed upon
\nmen or class or institution, every device invented for safety becomes an
\ninstrument for destruction and the fiercer the attempts to escape, the swifter
\nthe<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-558<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nmotion
\nstraight towards doom. Through the clanking of the chains of its prisoners,
\nthrough the cries of its victims, through the red mist of blood and torture and
\nsuffering which it seeks to set between itself and God and blind His vengeance
\nand baffle His decrees, still there rings the ancient sentence of Fate. "In
\nGokul He groweth still from day to day. Who thee shall slay." The genius,
\nthe wisdom, the strength of the servants of Reaction turns naturally to their
\nopposites, and posterity wonders that such wise men should have been so blind,
\nthat such giants should have been slain by the throwing of a pebble, that so
\nmuch energy of strong action and cunning speech should have been of no more
\navail than the staggerings and babblings of a drunkard in his cups. For they
\nhave set their strength and wit against God’s will, and it is His ironic decree
\nthat their wisdom shall be baffled by children and the weak hand of a woman
\nshall be enough to shatter their might.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>Men had once deemed of England that she was not as other peoples and that
\nthe lessons of history would be reversed by the unselfish glories of her rule,
\nand the weakness of human nature would be belied by the splendour of her
\ngenerosity and the candour of her enthusiasm. For the English are a great and
\nwonderful people. It is true that her statesmen and soldiers slew and murdered
\nand ravished in Ireland so that the Celt might remain quiet under her iron heel,
\n\u2014<\/span> but
\nthey planned and fought for the freedom of nations subject to other domination
\nthan her own. It is true that they have taken the bread out of the Indian’s
\nmouth that her own children might be filled and seek to turn her dark-skinned
\nsubjects everywhere into helots of her commerce and trade,
\n\u2014<\/span> but they paid down hard cash that her West Indian
\nNegro might be free. It is true that her politicians deny the institutions of
\nliberty to her own subjects, but she has been the examplar of a bourgeois
\nliberty and a limited democracy to the whole world. Other nations turned, it was
\nthought, but one side of themselves to the gaze, the side of national
\nself-seeking and grasping land-hunger. England had two sides, and the one which
\ndazzled men was very bright. And now all the world is watching what England will
\ndo now that the same problem is once more set for her which every nation has
\nfailed to solve, whether she will<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-559<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\ntread
\nthe same path of futile bloodshed, violence and defiance of irresistible decrees
\nwhich other nations have trod before her or
\nbe
\nwise in her generation as she was wise when her own children<\/span>
\n<\/span>rose against
\nher in Canada, as she has once more been wise after <\/span>her
\nhour of bloodthirst and madness in the Transvaal. The selfish fury of
\nAnglo-India is answering for her, the greed of her merchants and capitalists is
\npushing her on into the abyss. Still her rulers have qualms, hesitations, fears,
\nstill they dare not utterly set their own law and the law of God at defiance. At
\nthe last moment a palsy overtakes their hands, a relenting works in their souls.
\nAfter their long torture the Rawalpindi prisoners are free; Nibaran has hardly
\nescaped from the gallows by a strange mercy of Fate; here and there the
\nmonotonous roll of repression is brightened by occasional acquittals, by stray
\nglimpses of Justice if not of forbearance. But the Anglo-Indian bureaucrats have
\nset out on the slippery path where futile ferocity and vain blood guiltiness
\nhurry down the car of empire to sink in the sea of shame and blood below. Seldom
\nand by a miracle can the wheels that have once gone some way down by that slope
\nbe retarded and stopped.<\/font><\/p>\n


\n           
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>What is it that you seek, rulers who are eager to confuse the interests
\nof a handful of white administrators with the welfare of humanity, or what is it
\nthat you dream, traders who think that God made this India of ours only as a
\nmarket for your merchandise? This great and ancient nation was once the fountain
\nof human light, the apex of human civilisation, the examplar of courage and
\nhumanity, the perfection of good Government and settled society, the mother of
\nall religions, the teacher of all wisdom and philosophy. It has suffered much at
\nthe hands of inferior civilisations and more savage peoples; it has gone down
\ninto
\nthe shadow of night and tasted often of the bitterness of <\/span>death.
\nIts pride has been trampled into the dust and its glory has departed. Hunger and
\nmisery and despair have become the masters of this fair soil, these noble hills,
\nthese ancient rivers, these cities whose life story goes back into prehistoric
\nnight. But do you think that therefore God has utterly abandoned us and given us
\nup for ever to be a mere convenience for the West, the helots of its commerce,
\nand the feeders of its luxury and<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-560<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\npride? We are still God’s chosen people and all our calamities have been but a discipline of suffering, because for the great mission before us prosperity was not sufficient, adversity had also its training; to taste the glory of power and beneficence and joy was not sufficient, the knowledge of weakness and torture and humiliation was also needed; it was not enough that we should be able to fill the role of the merciful sage and the beneficent king, we had also to experience in our own persons the feelings of the outcaste and the slave. But now that lesson is learned, and the time for our resurgence is come. And no power shall stay that uprising and no opposing interest shall deny us the right to live, to be ourselves, to set our seal once more upon the world. Every race and people that oppressed us even in our evening and our midnight has been broken into pieces and their glory turned into a legend of the past. Yet you venture to hope that in the hour of our morning you will be able to draw back the veil of night once more over our land as if to read you a lesson. God has lighted the fire in a quarter where you least feared it and it is beginning to eat up your commerce and threaten your ease. He has raised up the people you despised as weaklings and cowards, a people of clerks and babblers and slaves and set you to break their insurgent spirit and trample them into the dust if you can. And you cannot. You have tried every means except absolute massacre and you have failed. And now what will you do? Will you learn the lesson before it is too late or will you sink your Empire in the mire of shame where other nations have gone who had not the excuse of the knowledge of liberty
\nand the teachings of the past? For us, for you, today everything is trembling in the balance, and it is not for us who have but reacted passively to your action, it is for you to decide.

\n

\nThe Price of a Friend<\/a>

\n<\/b>
\n

\nRecent events are daily putting a greater and greater strain on the sweet and cordial relation of the Friend of India with her people. It is no doubt hard to part when friends are dear, perhaps it will cost a sigh, a tear. Under the circumstances the poet’s<\/font><\/SPAN><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n
\nPage-561<\/SPAN><\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nadvice is to steal away and choose
\none’s own time. But the Friend of India is giving us warning after warning that
\nit will cease to be our friend unless we consent to do its bidding. When the
\npeople do not much mind the sundering of this tie the Friend should be prepared
\nfor the inevitable and devise some means for avoiding the heart-wrench which the
\nsudden severance of such a long-standing connection must necessarily cause. The
\nFriend so fondly hoped that the Moderates compared with whom the Extremists are
\n"a mere drop in the ocean" would ever remain docile and teachable, sit at its
\nfeet for all time and hang on its lips with the attention and reverence they
\nshow to their spiritual preceptors. But this sudden change in their attitude has
\ncome to our friend as a surprise. The Moderates are now most indecently and
\nopenly hobnobbing with the Extremists. When a prominent.<\/font><\/span> <\/font>
\nExtremist goes to jail the Moderates stand by him, nay shed
\ntears over his unjust incarceration. When an Extremist newspaper is prosecuted and the bureaucracy fails to spot the real offender on account of its having been conducted under an arrangement which whatever its merit, lacks the fairness and candour of delivering the management at once into the hands of the enemy whenever so required, the Moderates do not realise the enormity of the latter’s offence and what is more, resent the Friend of India’s pious demand that the conductors of the paper should have thrust their neck, down the wolf’s throat. This ill-advised obstinacy the friend can hardly excuse and we quite understand its righteous indignation. There is time yet for the Moderates to come round, go on their knees before their justly offended friend and sign a pledge to go back to his guidance. This the friend demands and hopes that the Moderates will accede to it. The friend also reaffirms his claim to their allegiance and that is his persistent support of their “just aspirations”. It is by their unjust aspirations that they have forfeited the sympathy of this precious friend. There
\ncannot be a greater iniquity than the attempt at self-realisation; justice and
\nequity demand that one nation should for ever be in the leading strings of
\nanother. Whoever wants to alter this most reasonable and fair arrangement must
\nbe shunned and expelled from the Congress and all other institutions which desire the countenance of<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n
\n Page-562<\/font><\/SPAN><\/p>\n

\n

\nthe
\nStatesman<\/i>. <\/i>The friend also contends that though the constitutional method
\nhas not hitherto paid, that does not mean that it will never pay. Even if it
\ndoes not pay at all, the Moderates have no business to rub the shoulders with
\nthe Extremists; for in that case they stand to lose the most valuable thing they
\npossess, the friendship of the Friend of India.<\/font><\/p>\n


\nA New Literary Departure<\/a><\/span><\/font><\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

\nWe
\nhave received from the publisher Srijut Abinash Chandra Bhattacharya, a small
\nvolume in Bengali, entitled Bartaman Rananiti <\/i>or the Modern Science of
\nWar. The book is a small manual which seeks to describe for the benefit of those
\nwho, like the people of Bengal under the beneficent Pax Britannica, are entirely
\nunacquainted with the subject, the nature and use of modern weapons, the meaning
\nof military terms, the uses and distribution of the various limbs of a modern
\narmy, the broad principles of strategy and tactics, and the nature and
\nprinciples of guerilla warfare. These are freely illustrated by detailed
\nreferences to the latest modern wars, the Boer and the Russo-Japanese, in the
\nfirst of which many new developments were brought to light or tested and in the
\nsecond corrected by the experience of a greater field of wafare and more normal
\nconditions. The book is a new departure in Bengali literature and one which
\nshows the new trend of the national mind. In the old days of a narrow life and
\nconfined aspirations, we were satisfied with the production of romantic poetry
\nand novels varied by occasional excursions into academic philosophy and
\ncriticism. Nowadays the heart of the nation is rising to higher things; history,
\nthe patriotic drama, political writings, songs of national aspiration, draughts
\nfrom the fountain of our ancient living religion and thought are almost the sole
\nliterature which command a hearing. There are signs also that books recording
\nthe results of modern science and the organisation of modern life in war and
\npeace will ensure a ready sale if there are writers who can give the public
\nexactly what they want. The new born nation is eagerly seeking after its
\ndevelopment and organisation and anything<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-563<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nwhich
\nwill help it and widen its sphere of useful knowledge, will deserve and gain its
\nattention. Two years ago this small volume would have fallen still-born from the
\nPress, today we have no doubt it will be eagerly sought after. It is perfectly
\ntrue that no practical use can be made of its contents at the moment; but the
\nwill and desire of thousands creates its own field and when the spirit of a
\nnation demands any sphere of activity material events are shaped by that demand
\nin ways that at the time seem to be the wild dreams of an unbridled imagination.
\nOur business is to prepare ourselves by all kinds of knowledge and action for
\nthe life of a nation, by knowledge and action when both are immediately
\npermitted us, by knowledge alone for action which, though not permitted now, is
\na necessary part of the future nation’s perfect development. When the earnest
\nsoul prepares itself by what Sadhana is possible to it, however imperfect, God
\nin his own good time prepares the field and the opportunity for perfect Sadhana
\nand complete attainment.<\/font><\/p>\n


\nBande
\nMataram<\/i>,
\n<\/i> <\/font> October 7, 1907<\/font><\/p>\n


\n <\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/b>
\nMr.
\nKeir Hardie and India<\/a><\/b><\/font><\/p>\n


\n <\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

<\/b><\/p>\n

\nThe
\nvisit of Mr. Keir Hardie to Bengal, so much feared by the English papers, has
\ncome and gone and the reactionist Press have taken care that it should create
\nthe right sort of sensation in England, so that whatever he may tell of the
\ncarefully-hidden truth about the "unrest" in India may be discredited
\nbeforehand. We have been watching these manoeuvres with some amusement, mingled
\nwith a kind of admiration for the sheer bare-faced impudence of the lies which
\nthese amiable gentry are administering so liberally to a willing British public.
\nAnything is good enough for British consumption, and accordingly Anglo-India sets
\nitself no limits in the grossness and incredibility of the inventions it
\ncirculates. Mr. Hardie’s presence is responsible for the riots, for the Union
\nJute Mills strike, for every development of the political struggle which has
\noccurred since the formidable Labourite set foot on Indian soil. We shall hardly
\nbe surprised if we see it next asserted in the Englishman <\/i>and then
\ntelegraphed<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-564<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\nby
\nthe Englishman<\/i>‘s <\/i>faithful Reuter that the boldness of Brahmobandhab
\nUpadhyay’s statement in the dock was caused by the expectation of Keir Hardie’s
\nvisit or that some dim prophetic anticipation of it moved Basanta Bhattacharjee
\nwhen he faced the terrors of British law. We are ready to give Anglo-India
\ncredit for very great lengths of denseness, ignorance and folly, but it is hard
\nto believe that they cannot realise the change which has come over Indian
\npolitical life and still think that the words or presence of an Englishman can
\never again influence the minds of the people even in an ordinary way much less
\nin the fabulous fashions which Newmania concocts. Anglo-India feared that if the
\ntruth travelled to England, the campaign of repression might be stopped and
\nmeasures of conciliation adopted. For ourselves we never entertained any such
\nfear. It is not ignorance of the truth, but their own self-interest as a nation
\nwhich determines the attitude of all English parties, not excluding the
\nLabourites. The interest of the monied classes is bound up with the continuance
\nof arbitrary British domination, and for that domination Liberal as well as Tory
\nwill fight tooth and nail. As for the Labour Party, it will support that
\ndomination if they think it is to the interest of the working classes, otherwise
\nthey will oppose it. We have met and talked with Mr. Keir Hardie and we found
\nhim a strong, shrewd-witted man possessed of a great deal of clear common sense.
\nHe is a Labourite and a Socialist. As a Labourite he will do whatever he thinks
\nbest in the interests of Labour; as a Socialist, the interests of whose creed
\nare bound up with the progress of internationalism, he may take Indian questions
\nwith a greater sincerity than the Cottons and Wedderburns. But as we said before
\nin our article on Mr. Keir Hardie, to suppose that he can do anything for us is
\na delusion. India like other countries, must work out her salvation for herself,
\nand the less she trusts to foreign help, the swifter will be her deliverance.<\/font><\/p>\n


\nBande Mataram<\/i>,
\n<\/i> <\/font> October 8, 1907<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage-565<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Vanity of Reaction                   THE devices of reactionary absolutism have a curious family resemblance all the world over. Reaction is never intelligent and…<\/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-317","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\/317","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=317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}