Page:Essays On The Gita - Ghose - 1922.djvu/71

Rh disastrous absurdities. This is evident enough in the character of modern war. From the ide of a common military obligation binding on every individual to defend and fight for the community by which he lives and profits, has arisen the system by which the whole manhood of the naticn is hurled into the bloody trench to slay and be slain, thinkers, artists, philosophers,priests, merchants, artisans all torn from their natural functions, the whole life of the community disorganised, reason and conscience over-ridden, even the minister of religion whe is salaried by the State or called by his function to preach the gospel of peace and love forced to deny his creed and become a butcher of his fellow-men! Not only are conscience and nature violated by the arbitrary fiat of the military State, but national defence carried to an insane extreme makes its best attempt to become a national suicide.

Indian civilisation on the contrary made it its chief aim to minimise the incidence and disaster of war. For this purpose it limited the military obligation to the small class who by theri brith, nature and traditions were marked out for this function and found in it their natural means of self-development through the flowering of the soul in the qualities of courage, disciplinedforce, strong helpfulness and chivalrous nobility for which thewarrior’s life pursued under the stress of a high ideal gives a field and opportunities. The rest of the community was in every way guarded from slaughter and outrage; their life and occupations were as little interfered with as possible and the combative and destructive tendencies of human nature were given a restricted field, confined in a sort of lists so as to do the minimum amount of harm to the