Page:The Rámáyana of Tulsi Dás.djvu/35

Rh understanding is not, strictly speaking, a religion at all. A just discrimination of good and evil and a sound code of morality are not beyond the compass of natural intelligence: but the rites and mysteries of religion can only be learnt by a direct revelation from God and through the action of His grace. Their acceptance by faith, even when they seem to conflict with reason, is a part of our earthly probation and a meritorious confession of our dependence on the Supreme. The final purpose of the Incarnation, like the idea of any revelation whatever from God to man, is above comprehension. The fact of the divine message having been sent may be reasonably established by historical evidence; but the tenor of the message transcends argumentative discussion, and demands nothing short of implicit and absolutely unquestioning submission. For the dogmas of revealed religion must ex hypothesi be incomprehensible mysteries. If they were ascertainable by the ordinary processes of reason, it would not be consistent with the economy of the universe to communicate them by the special vehicle of revelation. A professedly revealed religion, which is demonstrable and intelligible throughout, stands self-convicted as a human invention.

The introductory portion of the first book of the Rámáyana is curious as containing the author's vindication of his literary style as against his critics, the pedants. They attacked him for lowering the dignity of his subject by clothing it in the vulgar vernacular. However just his defence may be, it has not succeeded in converting the opposite faction and the professional Sanskrit pandits, who are its modern representatives, still affect to despise his work as an unworthy concession to the illiterate masses. With this small and solitary exception the book is in every one's hands, from the court to the cottage, and is read, or heard, and appreciated alike by every class of the Hindú community, whether high or low, rich or poor, young or old. The purity of its moral sentiments and the absolute avoidance of the slighest approach to any pruriency of idea—which the author justly advances among his distinctive merits—render it a singularly unexceptionable text-book for the native boys. For several years I persistently urged its adoption upon the Education Department, and—thanks to Rája Siva Prasád—extracts from it have now been introduced into our primary schools; while it has always been prescribed as the principal test in the civil examinations for high proficiency and a degree of honour. It is equally well adapted for both these apparently incongruous purposes: for a Hindu child generally grasps at once the familiar idiom, and finds no great difficulty in even the most crabbed