Page:Calcutta Review (1925) Vol. 16.djvu/300

1925] silenced lesser beings into atrophy or compelled them into homage.

And yet who can ever forget the innate sweetness of this fighting Brahmin, the purity of his domestic life, the stern simplicity and swadeshism of living and dressing in which he revelled, the silent charities of his household? In ancient India this man among men would have carved out a bigger Nalanda—in modern Europe he would have carved out a free republic like another Hindenburg. But in modern Bengal he could only fashion a semi-democratic oasis in the Desert of Autocracy.

And Chittaranjan! The tears for the Deshabandhu, the country’s devoted friend and the refuge of the poor, the depressed and oppressed are not yet dry in an admiring and mourning people’s eyes and to write about him without passion or prejudice, understatement or overstatement is hard indeed. And yet as one who suffered and fought alongside of that Big Soul, fought for his innermost ideas and idealisms even when outwardly seeming to fight against certain modes and passing phases of his life, I make bold to say that there was hardly a greater born in Bengal—in the plane of activity after Sree Chaitanya. For Chittaranjan had in him the makings of a modern Chaitanya from the start : and while the secret of Asutosh’s being was Sakti, a lava-flow of Power and Energising, the secret of Chittaranjan’s life was that higher attribute which we call Prema, the liquid fire of Love—selfless, disinterested and pure—the prime mover of social forces. It was given to him to love greatly and those who love greatly suffer greatly also. This was the kingly dower, the royal largesse with which the Divine Lover had blest him ; this is the heritage he has left us. Chittaranjan was a lover and a poet—a princely Bhogi (enjoyer) and a still more princely Tyagi (sacrificer). This prodigality, of bounty was Chittaranjan’s master-bias. He lived and loved, enjoyed and sacrificed, suffered and fought—with a sheer abandon that recked of no