But They Who Are Unconcerned About The Consequences Of
Their Actions Are Not Therefore Unconcerned About Their Actions.
Behold the difference between the Oriental and the Occidental.
The former has nothing to do in this world; the latter is full of
activity.
The one looks in the sun till his eyes are put out;
the other follows him prone in his westward course. There is
such a thing as caste, even in the West; but it is comparatively
faint; it is conservatism here. It says, forsake not your
calling, outrage no institution, use no violence, rend no bonds;
the State is thy parent. Its virtue or manhood is wholly filial.
There is a struggle between the Oriental and Occidental in every
nation; some who would be forever contemplating the sun, and some
who are hastening toward the sunset. The former class says to
the latter, When you have reached the sunset, you will be no
nearer to the sun. To which the latter replies, But we so
prolong the day. The former "walketh but in that night, when all
things go to rest the night of _time_. The contemplative Moonee
sleepeth but in the day of _time_, when all things wake."
To conclude these extracts, I can say, in the words of Sanjay,
"As, O mighty Prince! I recollect again and again this holy and
wonderful dialogue of Kreeshna and Arjoon, I continue more and
more to rejoice; and as I recall to my memory the more than
miraculous form of Haree, my astonishment is great, and I marvel
and rejoice again and again! Wherever Kreeshna the God of
devotion may be, wherever Arjoon the mighty bowman may be, there
too, without doubt, are fortune, riches, victory, and good
conduct. This is my firm belief."
I would say to the readers of Scriptures, if they wish for a good
book, read the Bhagvat-Geeta, an episode to the Mahabharat, said
to have been written by Kreeshna Dwypayen Veias, - known to have
been written by - - , more than four thousand years ago, - it
matters not whether three or four, or when, - translated by
Charles Wilkins. It deserves to be read with reverence even by
Yankees, as a part of the sacred writings of a devout people; and
the intelligent Hebrew will rejoice to find in it a moral
grandeur and sublimity akin to those of his own Scriptures.
To an American reader, who, by the advantage of his position, can
see over that strip of Atlantic coast to Asia and the Pacific,
who, as it were, sees the shore slope upward over the Alps to the
Himmaleh Mountains, the comparatively recent literature of Europe
often appears partial and clannish, and, notwithstanding the
limited range of his own sympathies and studies, the European
writer who presumes that he is speaking for the world, is
perceived by him to speak only for that corner of it which he
inhabits. One of the rarest of England's scholars and critics,
in his classification of the worthies of the world, betrays the
narrowness of his European culture and the exclusiveness of his
reading.
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