Page:The Message and Ministrations of Dewan Bahadur R. Venkata Ratnam, volume 3.djvu/467

 IV

PUNDIT ISWARA CHANDRA VIDYASAGAR.

( 1914 )

Emerson has said, 'Every man is a quotation from all his ancestors.’ That is to say, every man has in him the spirit that lived in and animated his ancestors. Every man is a reproduction, so to speak, a reincarnation, of the immortal part of the life of his predecessors. That is particularly so in the case of those who leave behind rich legacies of precept and example — of informing thought, of noble sentiment, of an uncompromising sense of duty, of an unflinching resoluteness of purpose and of a fruitful life of faith and action. Vidyasagar, like every other great personality, must be reproduced in us. We must become, each one of us, in some real measure, a quotation, a reproduction, of his life.

It is impossible, however callous they may be, that the life of a remarkable person like