The other principle stated above justifies in their eyes the taking by force of the property or wealth of those who would not give it willingly or voluntarily for the safety of the state as conceived by them. Hence the “dacoities.”
A few Nihilists. The men engaged in those dacoities are of two kinds: There are those who have no moral or religious scruples. They are “nihilists.” But their number is exceedingly small. They are not immoral people. For their own self or for private persons, they would not do anything which in any way contravenes the prevailing code of morality; they would neither steal nor rob, nor kill nor injure any person. But for the purpose of their movement they would do anything. Their number however is, as we said above, exceedingly small. Then there are those who are extremely religious and spiritual. Some of them are the followers of the “Kali”[80] cult as it is understood in Bengal; others are Vedantists. There are some who are deists or theists.
Religious Extremists. In every case, however, they believe that the British are the enemies of their Motherland and also of their religion. They would not touch one hair of any one simply because that person belonged to a religion different from theirs; but they would not scruple to kill any one who interferes with their religion. They believe that they owe their lives to the Motherland, whom they worship as the means of enabling them to be worthy of the worship of the Supreme Mother of the Universe. We will once more quote Mr. Pal[81] to explain what we mean, or rather how he puts the idea:
The Mother Worshippers. “The so-called idolatry of Hinduism,” he says, “is also passing through a mighty transfiguration. The process started really with Bankim Chandra,[82] who interpreted the most popular of the Hindu goddesses as symbolic of the different stages of national evolution. Jagatdhatri—riding a lion which has the prostrate body of an elephant under its paw, represented the motherland in the early jungle-clearing stage. This is, says Bankim Chandra, the mother as she was. Kali, the grim goddess, dark and naked, bearing a garland of human heads around her neck,—heads from which blood is dripping,—and dancing on the prostrate form of Shiva, the God—this, says Bankim Chandra, is the mother as she is, dark, because ignorant of herself; the heads with dripping blood are those of her own children, destroyed by famine and pestilence; the jackals[83] licking these drippings are the symbol of desolation and decadence of social life, and the prostrate form of Shiva means that she is trampling her own God under her feet. Durga, the ten-headed goddess, armed with swords and spears in some hands, holding wheat-sheaves in some, offering courage and peace with others, riding a lion, fighting with demons; with Sarasvati, or the goddess of Knowledge and Arts, supported by Ganapati, the god of Wisdom, on her one side, and Lakshmi, the goddess of Wealth, protected by Kartikeya, the leader of the Heavenly army, on the other side—this, says Bankim Chandra, is the mother as she will be. This interpretation of the old images of gods and goddesses has imparted a new meaning to the current ceremonialism of the country, and multitudes, while worshipping either Jagatdhatri, or Kali, or Durga, accost them with devotion and enthusiasm, with the inspiring cry of Bande Mataram. All these are the popular objects of worship of the Indian Hindus, especially in Bengal. And the transfiguration of these symbols is at once the cause and the evidence of the depth and the strength of the present movement. This wonderful transfiguration of the old gods and goddesses is carrying the message of new nationalism to the women and the masses of the country.”
Vedantists. “Behind this mighty transfiguration of the old religious ideas and symbols of the country stands, however, a new philosophy of life. Strictly speaking, it is not a new philosophy either, but rather a somewhat new application of the dominant philosophical speculations of the race. Behind the new nationalism in India stands the old Vedantism of the Hindus. This ancient Indian philosophy, divided into many schools, has one general idea running through it from end to end. It is the idea of the essential unity of man and God. According to this philosophy, Substance is one though expressed through many forms. Reality is one though appearances are multitudinous. Matter, in the eye of this philosophy, is not material, but essentially spiritual, the thought of God concretised. Man is the spirit of God incarnated. The meaning of cosmic evolution is to be found, not in itself, but in the thought of the Absolute. It is, to adopt the Hegelian dictum, the movement of the Self away from itself, to return to itself, to be itself. The Absolute, or Brahman, is the beginning, the middle, and the end of this evolutionary process. He is the Regulative idea. He is cosmic evolution. He is progressively revealing himself through the world process. In man, the Divine idea, or the Logos, comes slowly to consciousness of itself. The end of human evolution is the fullest realisation of man’s unity with God. Long, especially in what may be called the middle ages in India, this essential unity between God and man was sought to be realised through metaphysical abstractions, by negation of the social and civic life. There was an undue emphasis on the Subjective and the Universal to the neglect of the realities (however relative they might be) of the Objective and the Particular. Protests had, however, been made from time to time against these monkish abstractions, but in spite of these abstractions the dominant note continued to be that of Abstract Monism. Neo-Vedantism, which forms the very soul and essence of what may be called Neo-Hinduism, has been seeking to realise the old spiritual ideals of the race, not through monkish negations or mediæval abstractions, but by the idealisation and the spiritualisation of the concrete contents and actual relations of life. It demands, consequently, a social, an economic, and a political reconstruction, such as will be helpful to the highest spiritual life of every individual member of the community. The spiritual note of the present Nationalist Movement in India is entirely derived from this Vedantic thought.
“Under the influence of this Neo-Vedantism, associated to a large extent with the name of the late Swami Vivekananda, there has been at work a slow and silent process of the liberalisation of the old social ideas. The old bigotry that anathematised the least deviation from the rules of caste, or the authority of custom, is openly giving way to a spirit of new tolerance. The imperious necessities of national struggle and national life are slowly breaking down, except in purely ceremonial affairs, the old restrictions of caste. In the new movement, old and orthodox Brahmins are rendering open obeisance to the heterodox and non-Brahmin teachers. There is an evident anxiety to discover spiritual and traditional authority for even the outrages that some of these have committed against the old social and sacerdotal order. And where no such authority could be found, their personal freedom of thought and action is being condoned on the principle that those who are to be the saviours of their nation stand, like the mendicant and the holy man, above all law. And all this is a proof of the strange hold that the new nationalist propaganda has got on the real mind and soul of the people.”
To these two classes, the Mother worshippers, and the Vedantists, belong the great bulk of the Bengal Nationalists. They are neither “nihilists” nor “anarchists.” They are patriots who have raised their patriotism to the pitch of a religion. Their religion remarkably fits in with their patriotism and makes the latter indescribably intense and alive. Their whole life is permeated with it. They realise their “duty” every moment of their life and they are prepared to do anything and take any and every risk in the performance of that duty. They live on little; their food is abstemious; they scrupulously avoid liquor; they clothe themselves scantily; luxury they do not know. They can fast for days and go without sleep for days. Generally they are men of their word, men of honour, imbued with a strong idea of self-respect, true to their vows; men who are not swayed by lust or passion.
To this class belonged most of the Maniktolah party, Barendra and his friends. But it is evident that there are some theists among them, i.e., theists in the Western sense of the term. The man who shot Gossain, the first approver[84] in Bengal, was a