Do you not see -- taking up this plea of Sattva, the country has been slowly and slowly drowned in the ocean of Tamas or dark ignorance?
Where the most dull want to hide their stupidity by covering it with a false desire for the highest knowledge which is beyond all activities, either physical or mental;
where one, born and bred in lifelong laziness, wants to throw the veil of renunciation over his own unfitness for work;
where the most diabolical try to make their cruelty appear, under the cloak of austerity, as a part of religion;
where no one has an eye upon his own incapacity, but everyone is ready to lay the whole blame on others;
where knowledge consists only in getting some books by heart, genius consists in chewing the cud of others' thoughts, and the highest glory consists in taking the name of ancestors: do we require any other proof to show that that country is being day by day drowned in utter Tamas?
- Swami Vivekananda,
Introductory article in Bengali
written for Udbodhan (Jan 1899)
Where the most dull want to hide their stupidity by covering it with a false desire for the highest knowledge which is beyond all activities, either physical or mental;
where one, born and bred in lifelong laziness, wants to throw the veil of renunciation over his own unfitness for work;
where the most diabolical try to make their cruelty appear, under the cloak of austerity, as a part of religion;
where no one has an eye upon his own incapacity, but everyone is ready to lay the whole blame on others;
where knowledge consists only in getting some books by heart, genius consists in chewing the cud of others' thoughts, and the highest glory consists in taking the name of ancestors: do we require any other proof to show that that country is being day by day drowned in utter Tamas?
- Swami Vivekananda,
Introductory article in Bengali
written for Udbodhan (Jan 1899)
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