of the very movement of his thought, and disposed it to the languor of contemplation and the melting passivity of dreams. reactions and re Yet that Aryan vitality, which in the North turned to Teutonic sinew and in the West to Persian and Intellectual Hellenic nerve, even here wrought its special wonders. Its brain, self-centred, enclosed in sults. tropical forests and under all-mastering heats, and without the fine stimulation from climate and the intermingling of vigorous races which the Greek enjoyed, nevertheless became an immensely productive force. And the fact tends to show that, while climatic or other physical conditions modify original spiritual forces, they are not adequate to explain civilizations, nor to supply the inspiration which sustains and directs them. The elements which characterize the later development of Hindu mind were, as we shall see, present in its infancy. The solitude and heat of the Indian wilderness gave it no new forces, but subserved a certain original ethnic personality, its special essence; some of whose qualities indeed they forced into excessive action, thereby provoking the others to bring out their latent strength in energetic reactions. Such historical results as these have an important bearing on the philosophy of development, by which modern science seeks to interpret the growth of man. They illustrate the truth which all evolutionists affirm, that no historical changes require to be explained by creative interference with the natural order. But they also tell against the tendency which prevails, in many scientists of this class, to mistake the physical conditions of phenomena for their productive cause, and to ignore forces, inexplicable by such conditions, which work in every step of the process, involving the precedence and creativity of mind, and constituting spiritual substance; more or less enduring forms of which appear in race, in personality, and in the constancy and wisdom of natural law. As it is not incapacity, so it is by no means pure enervation that we note in the passive quality of Hindu temperament. It is rather, as one has well defined it, an "inclination towards repose;" a constant reference to coming rest, alike in things material and spiritual, as the consummation of endeavor and the end of strife; explicable in part by the recurrence of a sultry, relaxing season, as the predestined end of the climatic year, and the most salient fact of its monotonous round. This is of course compatible with a degree of active energy. The religion of Brahman and Buddhist alike was aspiration to repose; yet its disciplines were pursued with incomparable energy and zeal. "If the Hindus are not enterprising," says Lassen, "they are industrious, wherever they have real labors to perform. They show much power of endurance, and bear heavy burdens with patience. And they avoid toils and dangers more from a dislike to have their quiet disturbed, than from want of courage; a quality in which they are well known to be in no way deficient." 1 The freedom and force of self-conscious manhood could hardly be expected of a people who were migrating further and further into tropical lowlands and wildernesses. The keen goads of the mountain air were forgotten. Lassitude crept over the will and relaxed the practical understanding, till they seemed to lie buried in the helplessness of dreams, confounded with this overwhelming life of physical nature; and 1 Lassen, I. pp. 411, 412. their place came to be defined by the philosopher as that stage in human development where man as yet knows not that he is other than the world in which he dwells. But, if we look more closely, we shall find that the facts are not wholly as they have seemed, and that the severity of the Hegelian formula is far from fairly representing them; since man is not here as an embryo in the womb of nature, but as living force that reacts upon it, though with little help from the practical understanding. And, if we listen attentively, we become assured that even the somnambuļism of the soul may be inspired; hearing from these dreamers, also, who at least have faith in their dream, not a few of those accents "of the Holy Ghost The heedless world hath never lost." |