Page:Myths of the Hindus & Buddhists.djvu/33

The Story and by austerity and penance win great gifts of them: in a word, they flourish like the bay-tree, and if they are evil, at least they are not ignoble. Amongst them are found some, like Vibhishana, not evil at all. After all, then, these rākshasas are not inhuman at all, but their estate is an image of the a-dharmic, unrighteous, aspect of human society—an allegory which we should all understand were it presented to us to-day for the first time, like the Penguins of Anatole France.

The Story

The siege of Lankā is told in the original at great length and with grotesque humour. But its violence is redeemed by many incidents of chivalric tenderness and loyalty. Rāvana, once slain, is thought of by Rāma as a friend; Mandodarī grieves for him as Sītā herself might grieve for Rāma. The story is full of marvels, but the magic element has often a profound significance and is no merely fanciful embroidery. All the great powers possessed by the protagonists of one side or the other are represented as won by self-restraint and mental concentration, not as the fruit of any talisman fortuitously acquired. Thus the conflict becomes, in the last resort, essentially a conflict of character with character. Take again the case of the magic weapons, informed with the power of irresistible spells. Hanuman is struck down and paralysed with one of these, but no sooner are physical bonds added to the mental force than he is free. Here, surely, is clear evidence of an apprehension of the principle that to fortify with violence the power of wisdom is inevitably an unsuccessful policy.

In such ways the significance of Vālmīki's Rāmāyana becomes apparent to those who read or re-read it attentively, 13