The "unrest" of which we hear so much finds no echo in Mr. Banerjea's
pages. It is, indeed, confined to a minute percentage of the
population, even including the callow schoolboys who have been
tempted to waste precious years on politics. The masses are too
ignorant and too absorbed by the struggle for existence to care
one jot for reforms. They may, however, be stirred to blind fury by
appealing to their prejudices. Therein lies a real danger. Divergence
of religious ideals, to which I have already alluded, accounts for
the tranquillity that prevails throughout Bihar as compared with the
spirit of revolution in Bengal proper. The microbe of anarchy finds
an excellent culture-ground in minds which grovel before the goddess
Kali. But the unrest cannot be isolated from other manifestations of
cosmic energy, which flash from mind to mind and keep the world in
turmoil. Every force of nature tends to be periodic. The heart's
systole and diastole; alternations of day and night, of season
and tide, are reflected in the history of our race. Progress
is secured by the swing of a giant pendulum from East to West,
the end of each beat ushering in drastic changes in religion,
economics and social polity. It is probable that one of these
cataclysmic epochs opened with the victories wrested from Russia by
Japan.
Pages:
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36