The condition on which the aid was given is something like this. The proprietor of a school, desiring aid of a certain sum, must raise a like amount by fees from the pupils and other private donations, and spend the whole for support of his school. Among others, a philanthropic Brahmun, Baboo J. K. M. (the landholder) of Ottor Parah, near Calcutta, established more than twenty-four primary schools in different parts of his estate, defraying one half of the expense from his own treasury, and drawing the other from that of the government. These schools prepare the boys for the college, where they go after passing the junior scholarship examination, which entitles them to prosecute their studies free in the higher branches for one year, and draw a monthly stipend of five dollars. Those who fail to go successfully through the examination have to pay for their instruction of course. The standard for the junior and senior examinations is not the same every year, but varies according to the general progress of the schools, and the discretion of the Directors.
The year before I left Calcutta, the “standard for the junior scholarship examination comprised the following books: Cowper’s Task, Tytler’s Universal History, Paterson’s Zoölogy, Stewart’s Geography, Grammar, Mechanics, first four books of Euclid’s Geometry, Algebra quadratic equation, Arithmetic whole, and other Bengalee studies.” The candidates who pass this examination are from sixteen to twenty years old. The sphere to move about for the successful students is broad and honorable; they may continue their scholastic course in the Presidency College, study medicine, or teach schools where the branches of study are low. Let it be said, to the credit of the Bengalee boys, that hardly a primary school fails to send out annually three or four students to the higher colleges, from its first class, which scarcely makes room for fifteen.
I do not know exactly the studies in the senior classes in colleges, nor feel able to fathom the depth of the acquirements there. I would use another’s tongue to show how much the Hindoo young men could do in their scholastic career. A writer in the Christian Examiner quotes from an able article on British India, in the London Quarterly Review, the following, which fitly answers my purpose:—“Young men (Indians) who have received an education, and have passed an examination, scarcely inferior in the variety and difficulty of its subjects to those of our English universities,” &c. I do not exaggerate the intellectual powers of my countrymen, when I affirm that their aptness to learn anything set before them, their capacity to improve, are remarkable. These are not however their borrowed faculties, but their native, a part of their being. The same article I quoted above says:—“No race, perhaps, shows a higher intellectual development than the Brahmins of Western India or the higher castes in Bengal. Their thirst after knowledge—whether for its own sake or for the object of obtaining employment—is unbounded.” India of to-day can show her pearls and jewels in her children, beside the celebrated R. M. Roy.
To speak nothing of her other cities, Calcutta alone has her numerous highly-educated sons;—the Reverend Messrs. K. M. Banerjea, G. C. Mitter, converts to the Episcopal faith; L. B. Day, of Free-church Institution; Baboos R. N. Sickdar, V. D. Banerjea, C. C. Singha, R. M. Mitter, P. C. Mitter, P. C. Sen, K. C. Mitter, R. G. Ghose, and others too numerous to mention. There was a short notice of the last-named gentleman in the Boston Journal:—“Baboo R. G. M., a native merchant of Calcutta, delivered, at the receipt of the Queen’s proclamation, an address that causes him to be called the Bengalee Demosthenes.”
Though the English schools are open to every class, high and low, yet the lowest classes do not send their children to them, under a mistaken idea that they have nothing to do with book-knowledge. Living in a degraded condition for a long time, they have lost entirely the right and claims of human beings, as it were. The miserable, pitiable state in which they live and die, and which is the effect of the despotic caste system, is regarded by them as the will and decree of God; consequently they dare not try to get rid of this yoke.
Most of the Brahmun young men study English as the money-making language, while others devote themselves to their professional studies. All the ancient Sanscrith books are written manuscripts; the pages are long, narrow, and colored. Some are written on palm-leaves, and “roogee pathroo,” bark of a tree. Every student under the tuition of the superstitious priests, is obliged to transcribe a book as he makes progress in his studies. But in the Calcutta Government Sanscrith College, printed books, beautifully bound and gilded, are used.
The Hindoos are averse to female education, and suffer their daughters to live in entire ignorance. The popular belief among Hindoo women is, that, if a girl should learn to read and write, she would be a widow. The widowhood in Bengal is the saddest part of female life, and its consequent sufferings are such as have caused millions to prefer death, by being burnt alive on the funeral pile of the husband. But experience has falsified the idea in a measure. Here and there one out of ten thousand of women knows how to read a little, and enjoys connubial life. There are other difficulties to be considered and removed which prove strong obstacles to the education of the females in Bengal. The Hindoo women have no free intercourse in speech with other men beside their husbands, father, and brothers; their faces are covered with thick veils immediately after the marriage, and from that time they are not allowed to walk out of the house. Unless these customs are rooted up, there is no hope at all for the regeneration of the female in Bengal. As I compare a woman in Bengal with one in America or England, I see plainly the difference between Christianity and Hindooism. Nothing but the divine influence of Christianity has ennobled the female condition in Christendom. May the Christian women be ever grateful to God for his peculiar blessings unto them, and pray for the rescue of their sisters in the bondage of ignorance in heathen lands!
CHAPTER IV.
The Second Birth.—Brahmun Consecrated Thread.—Discipline and Privileges of the Brahmun’s Life.
In the interesting conversation of Christ with Nicodemus, St. John iii. 3–7, we hear him say, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Again, “Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.” This doctrine or command, whatever name may be given it, has been known to the Brahmuns from time immemorial, and even unto this day it is considered as the vital part of this dispensation. How little does a Brahmun differ from our Lord in the importance of a second birth! Christ says, “born again,” the Brahmun says, “thejo,” second birth. There is a difference between Christ’s views and the Brahmun’s on this point, which shows the superiority of the former over the latter. Christ did not prescribe different modes of spiritual birth for different nations. “Man,” he says, “must be born of water and of the Spirit,” assume a new life of holy actions, of purity, of devout trust, of practical brotherhood, of disinterestedness, and of unsullied love, so as to make himself worthy to tread in the steps of the Saviour, and breathe the balmy odor that comes from the celestial groves; taste the fruits of the removed tree of life, drink the water that issues from the great Fount of all bliss, dress in the robes of immortality, join his voice with the sweet, swelling chorus of angels, and enter into the promised mansions, to rest at the feet of the God of all. But the Brahmun does not include the whole human race, as being under the necessity of a spiritual birth. He cares for one people, and even among them he prescribes different rites. As the ceremony for the second birth of the low castes is not very important, I will omit a description of it, and direct the attention to that of the three privileged classes, namely, Brahmun, Aucherjea, and Boitho, physician.