54 



The Review of Reviews. 



INDIA'S GAINS AND LOSSES UNDER OUR RULE. 



By an Indian 



In the Indian World for December, the editor, 

 Prithwis Chandra Ray, sums up the gains and losses 

 of the British connection. Among the gains he 

 reckons the Fax Britannica, a sense of security of 

 Hfe and property unknown in India previously ; (2) a 

 common system of education, government, administra- 

 tion, and a common spoken tongue, a new India, a 

 common nationality ; (3) world-wide trade and indus- 

 try ; (4) suppression of thuggee, Sati and infanticide, 

 and steady disappearance of polygamy, polyandry, etc. ; 

 (5) bitterness assuaged of mutual prejudice between 

 members of different religions. 



LOSSES. 



" We have lost a good deal under British rule — 

 more than a foreigner can gauge," says the editor : — 



The most significant item under this head is the loss of our 

 ancient ideals of lite and the bad bargain we have made in 

 bartering a spiritual for a material life. Our old moorings have 

 been cast adrift, and socially we are now a people without any 

 definite ideals, without knowing whither we are drifting. 

 Hindu society, or, for the matter ol that, Indian society of to- 

 day is now like a ship without a pilot and with no one to steer 

 it clear of rocks. The want of ideals and the absence of guid- 

 ance are the creation of British rule The old order of plain 

 living and high thinking has been replaced by luxurious living 

 and no thinking ; the old neighbourly feeling has given way to 

 a life of rigid selfishness ; the old code of doing good to others 

 when you can has made room for a spirit of indift'erentism new 

 under an eastern sky. There has been a general disintegration 

 of social order all along the line. 



It is difficult to say if we h.ive lost much in morals or ideas of 

 social purity. But the fact must go without challenge that in- 

 temperance, fraud, deceit, mistrust are gaining currency to an 

 extent which could find no parallel in the history of India 

 except in the intriguing courts of Agra and Delhi. 



Replacement by organised charity of the old 

 individual charities , the breakdown ot the joint 

 family system without a poor-house system in its 

 place ; deepening poverty among the articulate 

 classes in India, upon whom British rule has abso- 

 lutely conferred no benefits. " One of the worst 

 lessons that England has taught India, both morally 

 and politically, is that colour is a crime. Before the 

 advent of the British, the colour question never 

 entered into any administrative or political dis- 

 cussion," 



meet their friends and acquaintances. " Religion " is put 011 

 an<l discarded with Sunday clothes. 



No, answers Mr. Phelps; Westerners are not the men to 

 consult about religion. They are excellent authorities on stocks 

 and bonds and railways and motor-cars and flying machines. 

 But don't ask them about religion or take their advice. On 

 that subject they know little. 



THE WEST NO AUTHORITY ON RELIGION. 



In the Indian World for Deceinber Mr. Myron 

 H. rhelps, an American friend of India, has 

 declared : — 



I do not mean to say that one will not find in the West good 

 men — spiritual men. There are many of them— some in the 

 Churches, but more out^illc the Churches — the social, civic 

 public life — the life of the masses of men^goes on just as it 

 would go on, if men h.ad aciu.d knowlcilge that there was no 

 God. Probably at least three-fourths of the men of .-Vmerica 

 go through the business and pleasures of the day, from the time 

 they rise in the morning until they retire at night, without a 

 single thought of God or spiritual things. The Churches have 

 become for the most part mere social clubs, where men go to 



THE NEW DEPARTURE IN INDIA, 



With Further Suggestions. 



Dr. J. Beattie Crozier, in the Fortnightly Rei'ieu<, 

 lays down a few rough general principles for the 

 government of India, suggested' by his own special 

 studies on the Constitution-building side of Sociology. 

 Tl-.e first part of the article is devoted to an exposition 

 of the reasons which have rendered it very easy for 

 us to establish our authoiity in India. The latter 

 part of it deals with our prospect in the future. 

 Dr. Crozier thinks the one shadow, which is as wide 

 as the sky, is the modern political spirit which cannot 

 be exorcised or fought with carnal weapons. The 

 most that we can do is to give it as f;ee a vent, 

 as wide an outlook, and as fair an arena as 

 possible. 



With regard to the Indian Princes, he would make 

 up to them in honours for any ultimate political 

 powers which the necessities of our supremacy must 

 deny them. He would leave them to enjoy their 

 own independent sovereignty as protected by their 

 treaty rights, as much so, indeed, as if they were 

 Afghans or Thibetans. 



As to the young Europeanised Brahmins, he would 

 grant them an equality of opportunity to all those 

 positions and honours in their own country to which 

 their abilities can carry them, even up to the Imperial 

 Legislative Council. He would reform the methods 

 of examination and education and give them the 

 widest extension of authority in all the civil aftairs 

 of their own country, while reserving the supremacy 

 of ultimate power for ourselves. He would not give 

 any popular franchise. 



As for Caste, he would try to dissolve it by indirect 

 action from within, while he would hand over the 

 fifty millions of " Outcasts " to Christian missionaries. 

 As for the people in general, he would offer them all 

 alike a free and open primary education. 



In the Contemporary Rei'iew Major-General H. B. 

 Jeffreys pleads very strongly in favour of admitting 

 the Princes of India and other competent Indians to 

 commissions in the Indian army. He laments that 

 the King lost a great opportunity by not 



opening to the descendants of those who in the past gallantly 

 led Sikiis, R.ijputs, Pathans, or Baluchis against us, an honour- 

 able career in our army. \Ve venture 10 say that had the King- 

 Emperor at the recent Ourliar seen fit to grant this concession 

 to Indian sentiment and aspirations, the boon would have been 

 received with ftithusiasiic gratitude. The native army welcomes 

 the extension to it of the possibility of winning the Victoria 

 Cross, but no step would arouse such passionate loyalty among 

 the natural leaders of India's fighting men .as the removal of the 

 race disqualification, in the matter of rising to real military 

 command, under which they now suffer. 



