MR BEGBIE’S BOOK ON INDIA.

Otago Witness, Issue 3016, 3 January 1912, Page 84

MR BEGBIE’S BOOK ON INDIA.

HOVv CHRISTIANITY IS INFLUENCING ITS PKGrLE—DIFFICULTIES OF THE TASK. Mr Harold Begbie’s mw book, “Other Sheep’’ (Hodder and Stoughton; 6s), is a companion volume to “Broken Earthenware,’’ of which 175,000 have been sold. It is the fruit of a visit to India, and the thought constantly in Mr Begbie’s mind w'as this : Awakening Asia is the new planet in the political skies. And the supreme question for civilisation is whether she wake to the moral restraints and sanctifying respects of the Christian religion or to the logical nihilism of an honest materialism. . . . Awakening Asia will either rise tip in the faith of Christianity or in the no-faith of a truculent materialism. ■—Fakir Singh.— This book is the outcome of what Mr Begbie saw and heard. lie travelled through India with Fakir Singh. “No one,’’ says Mr Begbie, “is better acquainted with the mind and soul of India; no one has ever penetrated further into the holy of holies of her immemorial solitude and seclusion; no one can pretend to a knowledge anything like so intimate and sympathetic of her inner life, her human heart, her troubled soul.’’ Fakir Singh is an Anglo-Indian official, who, leaving his desk, went “wandering into the villages and homes of the people, sitting under their trees with them, sharing their simple food, speaking their languages like one of themselves.” Mr Begbie had also long talks with such men as Sir George Clarke, Sir John Hewitt, and Sir Louis Dane. And all the while his observant eyes were taking in the rich colour of India, and were fascinated by the endless interest in each face he met. So throughout the book we get fine pen-pictures which bring to our minds the men and women and places which make up India, and which make Mr Begbie’s hook so readable. —A Laundry of Souls.— Benares is described as “The Laundry of Souls.” It stands on “a sweeping curve of the River Ganges.’’ “The wide and splendid stairs leading down to the river’s edge are thronged with thousands of pilgrims dressed in all the gorgeous colours of the sun. The carved and glittering balconies shine with a raiment so resplendent that one imagines a king fo be lodged in every house. . . . old white-haired men, middle-aged men, mere striplings, and little boys—there they are waist-deep in Mother Ganges, seeking communion with the powers of the universe and a lifting of the burden of their conscious wrong.”

—The Position in India.— We now turn to Mr Begbie’s analysis of what Christianity has achieved in India—the issue of the book which will be most discussed. Here i§ Mr Begbie’s summary of the religious outlook in India : “Leave out of count for the present the wonderful and moving conversions of Christianity among the humble and meek, the poor and the lowly, the unhappy and the outcast—the conversions which should inspire the courage of Christendom and lead to a fresh enthusiasm for the religion of Jesus’; leave these conversions out of count for the present, and the position is a revivified Hinduism, a new activity in religious thought, ana a Brahminism roused and oppugnant.” —Why Asia Rejects Christianity.— “ Why is it the Darkness of Asia withstands and repels the Light of the World?” asks Mr Begbie. “Christianity is rejected by Brahminism not as the noblest thesis of Optimism, but as an inferior thesis of Pessimism,” he replies. “Brahminism considers, and justly, that its own ancient philosophy of Pessimism is superior to clericalism’s modern philosophy of Pessimism. It lias no knowledge of Christianity as the gospel of Optimism. It rejects not the HeavenFather of Jesus, but the hostile God of the priest who must be propitiated and conciliated. It refects not the love of .God, Who asks only for the love of His children, but the capricious arbitrariness of a God Who has made the immense hazards of heaven and hell to turn upon intellectual assent to a set of theological dogmas. '' L'he answer to our question, Why does the Darkness of Asia withstand and repel the Light of the World? is another question. Does Christianity, in Europe or in Asia, represent Jesus as the Light of the World? Is it a religion of joy or a religion of sorrow?” —Christianity of Optimism.— Christianity, had it come with good news of Optimism, had it been a united and happy Christianity, not a discordant, quarrelling, and melancholy Christianity, might now be able to declare an extraordinary triumph; for it came, remember, to a people weary with pessimism, restless with ignorance, and degraded by oppression. It came, too, under the protection of a Government, almost wearing the uniform of that Government, which bad opened the barred doors of Asian isolation to the stirring music of European liberty and the vigorous light of European knowledge. The untouchable classes found themselves protected from tyranny, the peasant found his surly fields mysteriously watered and abundantly fertilised by the science of the Sahib, the pilgrim found himself borne swiftly and wonderfully to Benares by the magic of the white man’s steamengine, the poorest and the humblest slave of all those wondering millions knew that if any robbed or injured him the Sahib would execute justice; and, above all, the young man found a new world opening to his eyes in the book in which the great White Mother taught him how to read. With its message of liberation, to a people seeking Liberation as the one object of existence; with its gift of joy to a people all but dehumanised by melancholy ; with its assurance of life, and life more abundantly, to a people wearing out existence in a quest after death—what might not Christianity have done for the soul of India awakening from its sleep of the ages? But Christianity came as a Priest, and encountered a priest. It came as pessimism and encountered a pessimism. It stood at an altar, and an altar withstood it. “England’s greatest obstacle to an understanding with Mohammedan people thromrhout the entire East is the ceremonialism of Christianity, regarded by all Mussulmans as blasphemous idolatry.” Mr Begbie says of the victories which Christianity has won : —Revolution in Indian Thought.— “I find that every man in a high and responsible position—in a position which enables him to survey the whole various field of Indian life as it is manifesting itself over his own province, holds the opinion that a revolution of a most significant character is now taking place in Indian thought, and that this revolution is the work of Christianity. There are those who think that this revolution is all for the good of India, others who regard it with misgiving.” —Christianity and Social Ethics.— Christianity, helped by education and the presence of a Government more democratic and more socialistic than any Government in Europe, has succeeded in that very direction where Bhuddism failed, and where modern Hinduism seemed to be least vulnerable. Christianity has given India the sense of human brotherhood and the idea of social ethics. The immemorial theory of Caste is definitely challenged, the Brahmin’s contempt lor the poor is now regarded with new eyes, and genuine shame is felt for Hinduism’s neglect of ignorance and its indifference to suffering. The collision of Christianity and Brahminism has resulted thus far in a new birth for Hinduism, but not a new birth unto Christ. Mr Begbie pavs high tribute to the work of the Salvation Army in India under Fakir Singh, with whom he travelled throughout India. “Such a man as Fakir Singh, and xnanv more humble Salvationists gathered to India from all parts of Europe, while they make no criticism whatever on the missionaries and level no attack at all against Hinduism, force upon the native mind by the simplicity of their lives and the beauty of their teaching a notion of Christianity which sets it high above the tragedy of Hinduism. ‘■j t >• says Mr Begbie, “I have formed a correct opinion, the secret of the success of the Salvation Army in India is the same in America, England, and most of the other countries where it has organised itself —to wit, tremendous earnestness carried forward on a tide of sweeping

enthusiasm inspired by unquestioning faith in the Bible and unfailing love for humanity.”