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vol. title: Vol Four of The Theosophical Society of The Arya Samaj of Arya-wart vol. period: Sept 1878 – Sept 1879 pages in vol.: 350 |
< Important Notice (continued from page 8-268) >
may have to be made in the matter should be addressed to this gentleman. The notice given in the 5th No. constituting Pandit Umraosing the manager of the business, is cancelled. It is requested that with the same zeal that has been shown in subscribing for the publication, the subscribers will be good enough to pay in their subscriptions as they become due. The Attornies above named will employ all lawful means necessary to secure payments as they are due. The notice given in the 5th No. that the 6th No. would not be sent to those who are in arrears is cancelled. The publication will continue to be sent till the subscribers themselves write for its discontinuance. Those who send in their subscriptions in advance will be charged Rs. 4 per annum for “Veda,” the rest being charged Rs. 4½ per annum. Postage will be charged of those who do not send in their subscriptions regularly. The managers above named will also take the necessary steps against those who have or will behave falsely with us. To wit, Hurrichand Chintamon, who received several large sums on account of this as well as other publications of mine, but did not send them to me, nor gave me any proper account, and who, I hear, has gone away to England. He will be served with a proper notice, and if after that he does not remit all the sums due from him, it will be necessary to file a suit against him.
June, 1879.
Humbug in India.
India is essentially the land of “humbugs,” humbugs, the most preposterous, ridiculous, and many coloured. It may be safely said, that what obtains in India, is generally of a character, that would excite the risible sense of persons not over-inclined to gravity. It would be unwise to affirm that humbug prevails only in India, and to doubt its existence elsewhere. But the humbug of India is the humbug of no other country. A sensible philosopher once seriously said, that he believed in the immortality of humbug; and we believe so too from our experience of Indian affairs. When we see a Methodist gravely assuring his long-eared audience, that all but Methodists are doomed to eternal tortures, we laugh heartily at the poor fellow’s credulity or hypocrisy. But both credulity and hypocrisy can be classed under the general head of “humbug.” A woman was one night in despair, at the sudden death of her husband. Her despair did not rise so much from her love to her partner in life, as from her grief to find, that her other half had left this sinful world without making a will! She bethought her of an expedient, and immediately acted upon it, before her husband’s death became generally known. She persuaded a poor shoe-maker to lie in her husband’s bed, and sent for a lawyer. The man of law took down what the sick and dying-man gasped out—to the effect that one half of his money was to go to the disconsolate widow, and the other half to the poor shoe-maker, who had always proved a kind and obliging neighbour! In the anecdote we have given here, the ludicrous incidents are so mixed up, as to form one immortal humbug. The widow triumphed over the death of her husband, but was over-reached by the shoe-maker, who triumphed over both the dead and the living. We have spoken above of the Methodist and his opinions, his belief, but how many Protestants, who have laughed at the canting parson, have not gloated over their own future bliss, and believed from their hearts, that none but Christians would ever enter Heaven, and that the most virtuous heathens, Socrates and Plato, are damned eternally? Yet the best of the joke is, that this humbug gains credence, and is taken for Gospel? When you persuade yourself and those who will listen to you, that you can live upon love, or that you cannot live without it, do you not, dear friend, cheat yourself, and perpetrate one grand humbug? When you speak of your likes and dislikes, do you really believe all that you say? Do you not often suspect, that your neighbour’s tales are a little varnished with a romantic gloss, and can you wonder if your neighbour thinks the same of your own stories? The consolation is, that both are unwittingly humbugged.
We have spoken above of the nature of humbug in general; let us speak of humbug as it obtains in India. The most common type of Indian humbug is the school-boy, who takes to learning the language and literature of England with avidity, then turns his nose at all that is Indian, habits, dress, language, and men. A fine example of humbug is afforded by the lisping reformer, who does not see his own defects, but regularly lectures every fortnight against the British Government. Then, there is the sycophant of authority, the man who has risen to a high position by slandering his brother-natives, and pouring sweet poison in the ears of Englishmen. Yet another class of natives goes into ecstasies with the languages and literature and religion of ancient India, thinks the Sanscrit to be the best of all languages ancient and modern, and the Gujarati equal to any spoken in the habited<... continues on page 8-270 >
Editor's notes
- ↑ Humbug in India. by unknown author, Indian Spectator, The, Sunday, July 27, 1879