New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century

New Ideas in India During the
Nineteenth Century

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Title: New Ideas in India During the Nineteenth Century A Study of
Social, Political, and Religious Developments
Author: John Morrison
Release Date: December 7, 2004 [EBook #14294]
Language: English
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IDEAS IN INDIA ***

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NEW IDEAS IN INDIA DURING THE NINETEENTH CENTURY
A Study of Social, Political, and Religious Developments
BY THE REV. JOHN MORRISON, M.A., D.D. LATE PRINCIPAL,
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY'S INSTITUTION, CHURCH OF
SCOTLAND MISSION, CALCUTTA, AND MEMBER OF SENATE
OF CALCUTTA UNIVERSITY
LONDON MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED NEW YORK: THE
MACMILLAN COMPANY 1907

PREFACE
The substance of the following volume was delivered in the form of
lectures in the Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh during Session
1904-5. As "Alexander Robertson" lecturer in the University of
Glasgow, the writer dealt with the new religious ideas that have been
impressing themselves upon India during the British period of her
history. As "Gunning" lecturer in the University of Edinburgh, the
writer dwelt more upon the new social and political ideas. The popular
belief of Hindu India is, that there are no new ideas in India, that
nought in India suffers change, and that as things are, so they have
always been. Even educated Indians are reluctant to admit that things
have changed and that their community has had to submit to education
and improvement--that suttee, for example, was ever an honoured
institution in the province now most advanced. But to the observant
student of the Indian people, the evolution of India is almost as
noteworthy as the more apparent rigidity. There is a flowering plant
common in Northern India, and chiefly notable for the marvel of
bearing flowers of different colours upon the same root. The Hindus
call it "the sport of Krishna"; Mahomedans, "the flower of Abbas"; for
the plant is now incorporate with both the great religions of India, and
even with their far-back beginnings. Yet it is a comparatively recent
importation into India; it is only the flower known in Britain as "the
marvel of Peru," and cannot have been introduced into India more than

three hundred years ago. It was then that the Portuguese of India and
the Spaniards of Peru were first in touch within the home lands in
Europe. In our own day may be seen the potato and the cauliflower
from Europe establishing themselves upon the dietary of Hindus in
defiance of the punctiliously orthodox. À fortiori--strange that we
should reason thus from the trifling to the fundamental, yet not strange
to the Anglo-Indian and the Indian,--à fortiori, we shall not be
surprised to find novel and alien ideas taking root in Indian soil.
Seeds, we are told, may be transported to a new soil, either wind-borne
or water-borne, carried in the stomachs of birds, or clinging by their
burs to the fur of animals. In the cocoa-nut, botanists point out, the
cocoa-nut palms possess a most serviceable ark wherein the seed may
be floated in safety over the sea to other shores. It is thus that the
cocoa-nut palm is one of the first of the larger plants to show
themselves upon a new coral reef or a bare volcano-born island. Into
India itself, it is declared, the cocoa-nut tree has thus come over-sea,
nor is yet found growing freely much farther than seventy miles from
the shore. One of the chief interests of the subject before us is that the
seeds of the new ideas in India during the past century are so clearly
water-borne. They are the outcome of British influence, direct or
indirect.
Here are true test and evidence of the character of British influence and
effort, if we can distil from modern India some of the new ideas
prevailing, particularly in the new middle class. Where shall we find
evidence reliable of what British influence has been? Government
Reports, largely statistical, of "The Moral and Material Progress of
India," are so far serviceable, but only as crude material from which the
answer is to be distilled. Members of the Indian Civil Service, and
others belonging to the British Government of India, may volunteer as
expert witnesses regarding British influence, but they are interested
parties; they really stand with others at the bar. The testimony of the
missionary is not infrequently heard, less exactly informed, perhaps,