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vol. title: vol. period: 1882 pages in vol.: 229 |
<Untitled> (Our illustrious member M. R. Ry. C. V. Cunniah Chetty Garu...)
Our illustrious member m. r. ry. C. V. Cunniah Chetty Garu with his usual munificence undertook on behalf of ‘The Hindu Sabha’ to print the 1st lecture of Col Olcott, gratis. The thanks of the Hindu Sabha members are herein conveyed for his liberality.
Native Social Life.
“The division of labour is the most remarkable feature in native social life. The artificial division of the Hindoos into four classes is in no part of the country to be found, as is shown recently by most competent authorities, but there are two distinct classes—the Brahmins and those that are not Brahmins. With the exception of the Mussalmans the people of the villages are—some of them—Brahmins, and the others are those that are not Brahmins; and in the second class we may include, for the sake of simplicity, the pure and the mixed aboriginal races, of which a great many preserve up to this day in hilly regions their languages and their customs, which have suffered little or no change from any external influences whatever, and which remain nearly as intact as they were probably in remote antiquity. The non-Brahmins of the villages are not all of them like aborigines, but the difference between the pure aboriginal races and the other non-Brahmins is that the latter have had much influence exerted over them by contact with the Brahmins, who in their turn have also been much influenced by contact with the primitive races. Nor are Brahmins in all the villages of one kind. A pious Brahmin of superior rank, repeating his prayers on the banks of the sacred Ganges, hardly recognises another of the south or of a different part of the country as a member of the same class, or of the same religious persuasion. Of the Brahmins there are fifty or more classes, and the non-Brahmins are divided into many more than fifty classes, and the name of the class represents the occupation of its members, although in many cases that occupation is forsaken in favour of another and a more lucrative one, as it is inevitable under a government where strict justice and impartiality prevail, and where perfect protection is extended equally to the superior and the inferior races.
Editor's notes