Page:Vidyasagar, the Great Indian Educationist and Philanthropist.djvu/149

 him. Had he spent his days in quiet and taken no part in public matters, his educational services alone would have undoubtedly kept his name alive. But he was not born to lead a recluse life. The clash of Eastern and Western ideas and ideals had already begun. Society was in a state of transition. People there were who fascinated by a civilisation entirely new to them were for breaking away from the past and making a clean sweep of all ancient and time-honoured customs of the country. To these iconoclasts nothing was sacred but crass materialism. There were others who ran into the opposite extreme and hated to inaugurate a new order of things. Intensely fossil, they venerated all old and mouldy usages. Side by side with these ultra liberals and conservatives, there was another party which attempted to follow the golden mean and work gradual reforms by wise and well-considered means. Vidyasagar was doubtless one of these conservative reformers. He wanted to readjust old institutions just