There are two great obstacles on our path in India,
the Scylla of old orthodoxy and the Charybdis of modern European civilisation.
Of these two, I vote for the old orthodoxy, and not for the Europeanised system; for the old orthodox man may be ignorant, he may be crude, but he is a man, he has a faith, he has strength, he stands on his own feet; while the Europeanised man has no backbone, he is a mass of heterogeneous ideas picked up at random from every source -- and these ideas are unassimilated, undigested, unharmonised. He does not stand on his own feet, and his head is turning round and round.
Where is the motive power of his work?-- in a few patronising pats from the English people.
His schemes of reforms, his vehement vituperations against the evils of certain social customs, have, as the mainspring, some European patronage.
Why are some of our customs called evils?
Because the Europeans say so. That is about the reason he gives.
I would not submit to that.
Stand and die in your own strength; if there is any sin in the world, it is weakness; avoid all weakness, for weakness is sin, weakness is death.
- Swami Vivekananda,
Address at Ramnad,
Lectures From Colombo to Almora
the Scylla of old orthodoxy and the Charybdis of modern European civilisation.
Of these two, I vote for the old orthodoxy, and not for the Europeanised system; for the old orthodox man may be ignorant, he may be crude, but he is a man, he has a faith, he has strength, he stands on his own feet; while the Europeanised man has no backbone, he is a mass of heterogeneous ideas picked up at random from every source -- and these ideas are unassimilated, undigested, unharmonised. He does not stand on his own feet, and his head is turning round and round.
Where is the motive power of his work?-- in a few patronising pats from the English people.
His schemes of reforms, his vehement vituperations against the evils of certain social customs, have, as the mainspring, some European patronage.
Why are some of our customs called evils?
Because the Europeans say so. That is about the reason he gives.
I would not submit to that.
Stand and die in your own strength; if there is any sin in the world, it is weakness; avoid all weakness, for weakness is sin, weakness is death.
- Swami Vivekananda,
Address at Ramnad,
Lectures From Colombo to Almora
No comments:
Post a Comment