Page:Isvar Chandra Vidyasagar, a story of his life and work.djvu/324

Rh persons, ought to break down for the thousands of persons of the society. How can he, that cannot bear to see the piercing of a needle into the body of a single individual, suffer himself to see the sacrifice of hundreds of individuals. If it is a cruelty not to relieve the miseries of a handful of widows, then it must be a barbarous inhumanity to cause mischief to thousands of individuals of the society by inaugurating widow-marriage; it would be no piety to make a gift of a pair of shoes after killing a cow. If there are apprehensions of widows turning immoral, those apprehensions cannot be wholly eradicated by giving them away in marriage, for many married women are as well seen to lose their character. We are of gentle temperament, and have therefore learned to be kind only, we cannot bear to see the severe form of justice. As a matter of consequence, we cannot keep justice in view; we keep in view our emotions only, and express our opinions accordingly. This is exactly what Spencer calls "Emotional bias."

After the publication of his second paper, Vidyasagar no more entered into controversies with his opponents. He now published an English translation of the two papers with the title, "Marriage of Hindu Widows." In this work he was greatly assisted by his friends, Ananda Krishna and Srinath. Prasanna Kumar Sarvvadhikari corrected the proof-sheets. It is said that Vidyasagar gave a copy of this English pamphlet to the British Indian Association for forwarding