Page:Agastya in the Tamil land.djvu/23

8 As at present, even at that early time, secular movements, of which colonisation of countries may be taken as a type, went in the wake of missionary enterprise and Agastya's trying to plant the Aryan religious rites, amongst the alien tribes of the South, only furnished the opportunity for the later expansion of the Aryans into the Southern region. It would not be true to say that Agastya himself was conscious, at the time, of the far-reaching consequences of his acts pursued for other purposes than land occupation. Nevertheless, being the first man who had pioneered the race into a new country of unmeasured potentiality, he should naturally come to be looked upon as a benefactor of his race, deserving their highest homage and worship. There is absolutely little or no difficulty from the Aryan point of view in explaining away the high veneration in which Agastya's name is still held. But the real problem begins only when we try to approach the subject from the Dravidian side. It is inconceivable how a whole race could be brought round to extol a foreign leader of men as the type of perfection in learning, wisdom, and saintliness and accept him as their own spiritual overlord and guide. Here, at any rate, we find the extraordinary phenomenon of almost the entire Tamil race of the present day enthroning Agastya, an Aryan Ṛṣi, in a rank little removed from that of divinity and paying him homage as to one of their own kith and kin. Is it possible, one may ask, for a race to exhibit such utter lack of race-consciousness as is here displayed? It may be doubted whether the attempt to make a Dravidian out of the Aryan sage has not been done with a view to cut the Gordian knot, here presented. Howevermuch race-consciousness may feel flattered by this daring feat, it is a foregone conclusion that no scholar of any standing will be found to stake his reputation on the acceptance of this new-fangled theory.