Page:Letters of Tagore.djvu/5

 LETTERS OF TAGORE

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ILL we can achieve something, let us live incognito, say I. So long as we are only fit to be looked down upon, on what shall we base our claim to their respect? When we shall have acquired a foothold of our own in the world, when we shall have had some share in shaping its course, then we can meet them smilingly. Till then let us keep in the background, attending to our own affairs.

But our countrymen seem to hold the opposite opinion. They set no store by our more modest, intimate wants which have to be met from behind the scenes, the whole of their attention being directed to that which is but momentary attitudinising and display.

Ours is truly a God-forsaken country. Difficult, indeed, is it for us to keep up the strength of our will to do. We get no help in any real sense. We have none within miles of us, in converse with whom we may gain an access of vitality. No one seems to be thinking or feeling or working. Not