HINDUISM AND ISLAMISM.

Otago Witness, Issue 2170, 26 September 1895, Page 46

HINDUISM AND ISLAMISM.

That tho 280,000,000 inhabitants of the continent of India should ever become one nation ia so wild an improbability, and, even 5f possible, a matter of so many centuries, that its assumed realisation cannot bo made the basis of practical politics. England and Ireland aro an example of the slowness of growth of a national sentiment in cloßely-allied peoples forming one State, and the national unification of 'medfrcval Europe would have bsen a problem analogous to that of India to-day. For Latin then, as English now In India, was a common tongue for the educated classes, yet the former did Dot supplant, 9.8 the latter is not now destroying, the popnlar languages. And the ideal of a temporal head of Christendom in the Holy Roman Emperor, with its attendant aspirations, was a sentiment counteracting local or I tribal feeling stronger than any that has yet | arisen in India from the superimposed authority of the Queen's Government, while there is nothing in India to correspond with the religious unity of Europe under the Popes. For Hinduism and Islam show no j signs of decay, and the antagonism between their followers is on the increase. In the ttadltious of history, one of the most poweiful elements of national sentiment, the pride of the one 1b the shame of the other. The Mussulman glories in Auran&zeb ; the followers of Gobind Singh and Sivajl detest fail memory. Intermarriage is impossible and is a sin even among the myriad castes of Hindus. There is no historical example of feuch a miracle as the amalgamation Into one nation of snob, a multitude of diverse elements, and if it is to be effected the firdt steps have yet to be taken.— Tbe National Review.