The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1913-11-12
THE oCc1DENT IN INDIA.

at the purity congress in Minneapolis
by Il delegate from India who OK
pressed the belief i'll Il newspaper in
terview that the missionaries had
made no permanent impress on the
life of India, that they had not been
successful at all in reaching the up
per strata of life in that country, and
that among the lower orders their
work amounted. as he put it. to cx-
other words the INDECENT were willing
to accept donations of food and CLOTH
ms, and had no objections to going
through the form of conversion to
Christianity i'll order more favorably
TO impress their benefactors. Oh
viously, wherever this is true, the
Conversions cannot be more than
skin deep.
Naturally these statements were re-
ccived with vigorous protests. 1t is
possible, though, that the Hindoo gen.
tle1nan has a better knowledge of the
conditions in his own country than is
possible among those whose only
knowledge of the country has been
gained from a superficial reading of
books. many Of which are in them
selves superficial, and from lectures
by persons who. while they have had
experience have permitted their en-
thusiasm to cloud their judgment.
a North Dakota man has recently
had some comment on another phase
Of foreign influence in India from a
friend who for fifty years has lived in
India, who is the son of Il British
army officer who was stationed there
for many years, n who has had
ample opportunity to become ac-
1uainted with the country and its
people. This gentleman discusses. not
the religious, but the political status,
and he says that in spite Of all the la
Dor that has been put forth in spite
of all the money that has been spent,
in spite of the time that has elapsed
since the first British occupancy of
the country, Great Britain has not yet
been able to make a permanent inn
press on the life Of India and its pco-
pic. He admits that many changes
have taken place during the British
occupancy, and because of It, but he
says that no matter how great these
changes appear to, be, they are OH the
surface only, and that the tempera.
ment, the ideals and the fundamental
beliefs Of tho Hindoo remain unchanE.
cd. lie says that we're the hand OF
Great Britain to he Withdrawn or were
the people to be stirred to a poin,
where they would assert themselves
within ten years every vcstige of Eu.
ropcan civilization would disappear
from the land.
we of tho western world are ami
to loo upon the people Of India as a
primitive people, anxious. or at least
willing to earn from Europeans, and
recognizing in the white races people
superior to themselves. The gentle.
man just quoted says that this is al
n mistake and the acceptance of this
view leads to other dangerous mis-.
takes. Instead of regarding white
me as their superiors he says tina,
The Hindoos look upon the white
races with a contempt Of which We
can have no conception. They accep,
the rule of the white man, he a in
obedience to a blind fatalism
which teaches them to yield
to force, a fatalism which has beer
bred into their very bones for untold
generations. and in accord with an
equally ancient belief that this life
is but an insignificant moment in the
long series Of changes to which the
human oul is foreordained, that no.
thing which occurs in it matters, and
that the only thing worthy of seriou.
thought is the Nirvana. the final G
tinction Of the separate individuality,
and the absorption of the soul into
the Deity.
All of this is a little difficult TO,
people of European or America,
training to understand. But it is cas-,
to sec that a people whose belief.
and ideals have their roots far bacl
in the ages when the ancestors o.
the present white races were savages
and when India had a civilization
which was already old. arc not to b,
changed in their customs or theil
tendencies of thought, quickly or cas-
lily.
CUETIvATING THE FARMER.