jB SUPPOSED ORIGIN; ITS HISTORY; ITS EFFECTS; THE 
 DUT KRNMENT, HINDUS, AND CHRISTIANS 
 
 WITH RESPECT TO IT: AND ITS PROSPECTS 
 
 OMPILKD FROM MUIR. MAX MULLFR, SlTKXRIXO, 
 WILSOX, MOXIKR WILLIAMS, CORXISH, AND OTHKRS. 
 
 Papers on Indian Reform. 
 
 THE CUBIST I A?,' LITERATURE SOCIETY FOR INDIA. 
 
 LONDON AND MADRAS. 
 
 1896. 
 
 Tn< ;;;?'!*.
 
 PAPERS ON INDIAN REFORM. 
 
 CASTE: 
 
 ITS SUPPOSED ORIGIN; ITS HISTORY; ITS EFFECTS; THE DUTY OF GOVERNMENT, 
 HINDUS, AND CHRISTIANS WITH RESPECT TO IT; AND ITS PROSPECTS. 
 
 THIRD EDITION, 3,000 TOTAL COPIES, 9,000. 
 
 "The longer one lives, observes, and tbinks, tbe more deeply does be 
 feel tbere is no community on tbe face of tbe earth which suffers less from 
 political evils and more from self-inflicted, or self-accepted, or self-created, 
 and, therefore, avoidable evils, tban tbe Hindu community I ! " 
 
 Baja Sir T. Madhava Eov>, K.C.8.I. 
 
 Cart*." The most disastrous and blighting- of human institutions." 
 
 " Ancient Law " by Sir H. 8. Maine. 
 
 "One of the constant duties of a loyal citizen will be to help to bring 
 back the golden day of the Xrita-Yuga, by breaking down the walls of 
 partition that sever brothers from brothers." 
 
 Rev. E. P. Kice, B.A. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE SOCIETY FOR INDIA. 
 
 LONDON AND MADRAS. 
 
 1896.
 
 PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 Caste has been well described as " the most intolerant and exact- 
 ing taskmaster that ever placed a yoke on the neck of man." It is 
 a pleasing sign of progress that its evils are beginning to be felt, 
 and that some intelligent Indians are seeking to deliver their 
 country from its bondage. The present pamphlet is intended to 
 aid these reformers in their noble design. Many have not access 
 to Public Libraries, and it is expensive to purchase all the books 
 that require to be examined. The compiler has sought to bring 
 together, within moderate compass, the opinions of some of the 
 best Oriental scholars, Indian and European, bearing on the 
 subject. The following are the works which have chiefly been 
 consulted : 
 
 Asiatic Quarterly Review. 
 
 Banerjea, Rev. Dr. Krishna Mohun, Essay on Caste. 
 
 Barth, Religions of India. 
 
 Bhattacharyya, K. K., Tagore Law Lectures. 
 
 Bower, Rev. Dr. H. Prize Essay on Hindu Caste. 
 
 Cotton, H. J. S., New India. 
 
 Dubois, Manners and Customs of the People of India. 
 
 Duff, Rev. Dr., The Indian Rebellion. 
 
 Hunter, Sir W. W., India. 
 
 Madras Census Reports for 1871 and 1881. 
 
 Mamt's Ordinances, translated by Burnell. 
 
 Mitchell, Rev. Dr. Murray, Hinduism Past and Present. 
 
 Muir, Dr. John, Sanskrit Texts. 
 
 Miiller, Professor Max, Works. 
 
 Sherringr, Rev. M. A., Hindu Tribes and Castes. 
 
 Siromani, J. S.> Commentary on Hindu Law. 
 
 Wilkins, W. J., Modern Hinduism. 
 
 Williams, Sir Monier, Religious Thought and Life in India. 
 
 Wilson, Rev. Dr., Indian Caste. 
 
 Some of the leading Native newspapers have also furnished 
 materials. 
 
 National vanity and false patriotism may be unwilling to listen 
 to anything from a foreigner. Some Indian critics, instead of 
 directing attention to the subject, may simply follow the well- 
 known legal advice, " Abuse plaintiff's attorney." On the other 
 hand, the Romans, the greatest conquerors of antiquity, held tbe 
 maxim, Fas est db hoste doceri, It is allowable to learn even from 
 an enemy. But the compiler expects more generous treatment 
 from others. 
 
 If a darker view has been taken of caste than is usually enter- 
 tained, it is substantially that expressed by some of the ablest men 
 who have studied the subject. Readers, however, should use their 
 own judgment, and draw their own conclusions. 
 
 MADRAS, September, 1887. J. MURDOCH. 
 
 2097900
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Page 
 
 INTRODUCTION ... ... .,. ... ... ... ... 1 
 
 HINDU ACCOUNTS OP THE ORIGIN OP THE CASTES 4 
 
 TRUE ORIGIN OP CASTE ... ... ... ... ... 7 
 
 THE LAWS OP CASTE ACCORDING TO MANU 15 
 
 BUDDHIST OPPOSITION TO CASTE ... ... ... ... 18 
 
 CASTE REVIVAL ... ... ... ... 19 
 
 EFFECTS OP CASTE ... ... ... ... ... ... 20 
 
 OPINIONS OF CASTE ... ... ... 34 
 
 DUTY WITH REGARD TO CASTE : 
 
 I. DUTY OF GOVERNMENT ... ... 38 
 
 II. DUTY OF HINDUS ... ... ... ... ... ... 44 
 
 III. DUTY OP CHRISTIANS ... ... ... 50 
 
 PROSPECTS OF CASTE ... ... 50
 
 CASTE. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The English word Caste is probably derived from the Portuguese 
 Costa, race. It is especially used by Europeans to denote the 
 different classes into which the Hindus are divided. Varna, colour, 
 and Jdti, race, are Indian names. Chaturvarnya, the country of 
 the four colours, is an ancient distinguishing epithet of India. To 
 the present day, caste is regarded by other nations of the earth 
 as the characteristic feature of the Hindus. In the earlier ages of 
 society the system prevailed extensively throughout the world ; but 
 in course of time it was abandoned in all countries except India 
 and Ceylon. 
 
 Among no other nation was it ever observed with such strictness 
 or enforced by such severe penalties as among the Hindus. From 
 birth to the funeral pile, it directs every movement. The Hindu, 
 by day and night, at home or abroad, in waking, sleeping, eating, 
 drinking, in all the customs of the society in which he moves and 
 in the events determining his entire life, is always under its pervad- 
 ing and overmastering influence.* 
 
 Mr. Wilkins, in his Modern Hinduism, makes the following quota- 
 tion from Dr. Wilson : 
 
 " To give some idea of the minute regulations of this system of caste, 
 and how its laws are framed to regulate the life of its slaves, it may 
 be mentioned that it has for infancy, pupilage, and manhood its ordained 
 methods of sucking, sipping, drinking, and eating ; of washing, anoint- 
 ing ; of clothing and ornamenting the body ; of sitting, rising, reclining ; 
 of moving, visiting, travelling ; of speaking, reading, listening and 
 reciting ; and of meditating, singing, working and fighting. It has its 
 laws for social and religious rites, privileges and occupations ; for educa- 
 tion, duty, religious service ; for errors, sins, transgressions ; for inter- 
 communion, avoidance and excommunication ; for defilement and puri- 
 fication ; for fines and other punishments. It unfolds the ways of commit- 
 ting what ib calls sins, accumulating sin, and putting away sin ; of 
 acquiring, dispensing and losing merit. It treats of inheritance, convey- 
 ance, possession, dispossession of property ; and of bargains, gains, loss, 
 and ruin. It deals with death, burial and burning ; and with commemo- 
 ration, assistance and injury after death. It interferes, in short, with all 
 the relations and events of life, and with what precedes and follows, 
 or what is supposed to precede and follow life. It reigns supreme in 
 
 * Shemng's Hindu Tribes and Castes.
 
 2 CASTE. 
 
 the innumerable classes and divisions of the Hindus, whether they 
 originate in family descent, in religious opinions, in civil or sacred 
 occupations, or in local residence ; and it professes to regulate all their 
 interests, affairs and relationships. Caste is the guiding principle of 
 each of the classes and divisions of the Hindus viewed in their distinct 
 and associated capacity." pp. 125, 6. 
 
 " That the thoughtful and educated of men of India," says 
 Mr. Sherring, " should patiently endure its tyranny a tyranny the 
 most relentless, and at the same time the most senile and unreason- 
 able ever exercised by the human mind in its greatest corruption 
 is a phenomenon unparalleled in the history of our race." Even 
 the lowest and most degraded of the people, who are spurned from 
 the temples, are some of them as great sticklers for caste as the 
 highest. 
 
 Among the Hindu population in Ceylon, caste is much the same 
 as in India. In a modified form it exists, more or less, among the 
 Sinhalese. Most of the Sinhalese have a very mongrel religion. 
 Demon worship was at first the only superstition, and it still exerts 
 the strongest hold upon them. Buddhism was afterwards intro- 
 duced ; but, though condemned by it, demon worship retained its 
 power. The worship of the Hindu gods and the caste system were 
 introduced from India. The Sinhalese mingle the three. Some of 
 them seek to add a little from Christianity. Only a comparatively 
 small number are sufficiently enlightened to adhere to one religion. 
 
 Hindu Caste Peculiar. It is often alleged that caste distinctions 
 are similar to the civil and social distinctions of European and 
 other nations; but there is an essential difference. Recently it 
 was thus explained by Mr. (I. N. Chandavarkar, the Bombay 
 delegate to England : 
 
 " I have heard the question asked by the apologists of caste ' Does not 
 caste exist in England too ? Will a lord, generally speaking, not think it 
 degrading to marry a farmer's daughter ?' I reply that casre in the form 
 and under the circumstance in which it exists in India does not exist 
 anywhere else. An English lord may, generally speaking, think it 
 degrading to marry^a farmer's daughter, bat a farmer in England can 
 hope to be a lord himself. What Cardinal Newman says of Christians is 
 true of the English : ' They never pronounce of any one, now external 
 to them, that he will not some day be among them.' In India, on the 
 other hand, a Brahman is a Brahman and a Sudra is a Sudra ; the latter 
 can never hope to rise to the level of the former. There is consequently 
 not that bond of ' good fellowship ' between the two, and caste has 
 encouraged in India the growth of the principle of what Cardinal 
 Newman calls ' repulsion between man and man.' " 
 
 Indian caste is derived from birth alone. It cannot be trans- 
 ferred from one class to another ; it cannot be gained as a reward 
 for the highest merit or bestowed as an honorary title by the most
 
 INTRODUCTION. 6 
 
 powerful monarch.* As well might an ass be changed into a 
 horse. The Queen of England can raise any of her subjects to the 
 peerage, but she cannot alter the caste of a Hindu. The highest 
 nobleman in England may enter the cottage of the humblest person 
 in England, and sit with him at table; not so in India. 
 
 At the same time, it must be allowed that in England there is 
 far too much pride of rank and wealth. Mr. Justice Talfourd, in 
 some of his last words, lamented " that separation between class 
 and class which is the great curse of British society, and for which 
 we are all, more or less, in our respective spheres, in some degree 
 responsible." 
 
 Investigation of Caste. In former times it was considered 
 sufficient to follow the custom. This led to a stationary condition 
 of society. The present is an age of inquiry. The question re- 
 garding every institution is, not whether it is old, but whether it 
 is good ? 
 
 Most Indians have very erroneous ideas of the " ancients." 
 They look upon those who lived thousands of years ago as very old 
 and very wise ; while the present generation are compared to 
 childi-en. The very contrary is the case- We are the ancients. The 
 world is now older by thousands of years; those who lived long 
 ago are like the children. We ought also to be the wiser. 
 
 It is granted that institutions and customs, especially those of 
 long standing, should not be condemned or changed without careful 
 consideration and sufficient reasons. The object of the present 
 Paper is to seek to lead Hindus to make this inquiry. When 
 books were comparatively few, existing only in manuscript or 
 shrouded in Sanskrit, any examination of the question was very 
 difficult. Now the principal works bearing on the subject have 
 been printed, and several of them translated into English. Any 
 intelligent person having access to them is able to form his own 
 opinion. 
 
 An all-devouring credulity is an attribute of the uneducated 
 Hindu or even one of the Pundit class. The greatest self-contra- 
 dictions, the wildest tales, do not awaken his common sense. The 
 following remarks are intended only for men trained to weigh 
 evidence and to reason logically. As a rule, authorities are quoted, 
 and, where practicable, the opinions of eminent scholars are given 
 on each point. 
 
 * The Brahmans have devised a way for the Maharaja of Travancore. He is 
 made a twice-born by passing through a golden cow or lotas. The cow is of the 
 same weight as himself, and is afterwards cut into pieces and distributed among the 
 Brahmans. Probably the same plan would be efficacious in other cases, if people 
 were willing to bear the expense. The Maharaja afterwards cannot eat with the 
 members of his own family ; but he is admitted to the high privilege of seeing the 
 Brahmans enjoying their meals, and of eating in their presence.
 
 4 CASTE. 
 
 HINDU ACCOUNTS OF THE ORIGIN OF THE CASTES. 
 
 The common belief among the Hindus is that the Brahmaus pro- 
 ceeded from the mouth of Brahma ; the Kshatriyas from his arms ; 
 the Vaishyas from his thighs; and the Sudras from his feet. 
 
 Dr. John Muir, a distinguished Sanskrit scholar, devoted great 
 attention to an examination of the Hindu books with regard to the 
 origin of caste. The results are contained in a volume of 532 octavo 
 pages.* Numerous extracts are given in the original Sanskrit, 
 with English translations, of passages bearing on the subject. Only 
 a very few of the principal can be quoted ; but the general conclu- 
 sions at which Dr. Muir arrived will be given. 
 
 The learned Dr. Wilson of Bombay published a work on Caste in 
 two volumes. Mr. Sherring, of Benares, gave, in three quarto 
 volumes, detailed accounts of the Indian castes. The Census 
 Reports also contain more or less information on the subject. 
 
 Rig-Veda. The oldest known passage which makes mention of 
 the fourfold origin of the Hindu race is the 90th hymn of the 10th 
 Book, called Purusha Sukta, or the hymn to Purusha. 
 
 " 1. Purusha has a thousand heads, a thousand eyes, a thousand feet. 6. 
 When the gods performed a sacrifice with Purusha as the oblation, the 
 spring was its bntter, the summer its fuel, and the autumn its offering. 
 7. This victim, Parusha, born in the beginning, they immolated on the 
 sacrificial grass, with him the gods, the Sadhyas, and the rishis sacrificed. 
 11. When (the gods) divided Purusha, into how many parts did they 
 cut him up ? What was his mouth ? What arms (had he) ? What (two 
 objects) are said (to have been) his thighs and feet ? 12. The Brahman 
 was his mouth ; the Bajanya was made his arms ; the being (called) the 
 Vaisya, he was his thighs ; the Sudra sprang from his feet. 13. The 
 moon sprang from his soul, the sun from his eye, Indra and Agni from 
 his mouth, and Vayu from his breath. From his navel arose the air, from 
 his head the sky, from his feet the earth, from his ear the (four) 
 quarters ; in this manner (the gods) formed the worlds." 
 
 Oriental scholars are agreed that the Vedic hymns were composed 
 at dates widely apart from each other. The general opinion is that 
 the Purusha Sukta is one of the latest, belonging to the Brahmana 
 period. 
 
 Satapatha Brahmana Works of this class, though later, are 
 considered of equal authority with the Vedas. The Satapatha 
 Brahmana gives the following account of the origin of the castes : 
 
 " (Uttering) ' bhuh,' Prajapati generated this earth, (uttering) 
 ' bhuvah,' he generated the air, and (uttering) 'svah,' he generated the 
 sky. Saying ' bhuh,' Prajapati generated the Brahman ; (saying) 
 ' bhuvah' he generated the Kshattra; (and saying) ' svah,' he generated 
 the Vis." II. 1, 4. 
 
 * Original Sanskrit Texts, Volume I. Mythical and Legendary Accounts of the 
 Origin of Caste, with an Enquiry into its Existence in the Vedic Age. Trtibner.
 
 HINDU ACCOUNTS OP THE ORIGIN OF THE CASTES. 5 
 
 Taittiriya Brahmana. This treatise gives another account : 
 
 " This entire (universe) has been created by Brahma. Men say that 
 the Vaisya class was produced from the Rig Veda. They say that the 
 Yajur Veda is the womb from which the Kshattriya was born. The 
 Sania Veda is the source from which the Brahmans sprang." Ill, 12, 9. 
 
 The same Brahmana states elsewhere : 
 
 " The Brahman caste is sprung from the god.s ; the sudra from the 
 Asuras." I. 2, 6, 7. 
 
 Mann. After describing how Brahma, the parent of all worlds, 
 was born' in a golden egg, he says : 
 
 "31. That the world might be peopled, he caused the Brahman, the 
 Kshatriya, the Vaisya and the Sudra to issue from his mouth, his arms, 
 his thighs, and his feet." Book I. 
 
 In the next verse Manu gives a different account : 
 
 " 32. Having divided his own body into two, he became a male by 
 half, by half a female : on her that Lord begat Viraj." 
 
 " 33. But O best of twice-born men ! know that I am he, the 
 creator of all this world, whom that male Viraj, having practised 
 austerity, spontaneously produced." Book. I. 
 
 Mahabharata. In this voluminous work different accounts of 
 the origin of caste may be expected. In the Santi-parva, Bhrigu 
 makes the following statement : 
 
 " There is no difference of castes : this world, having been at first 
 created by Brahma entirely Brahmanic, became (afterwards) separated 
 into castes in consequence of works. Those twice-born men who were 
 fond of sensual pleasure, fiery, irascible, prone to violence, who had 
 forsaken their duty and were red-limbed, fell into the condition of 
 Kshatriyas. Those twice-born who derived their livelihood from kine, 
 who were yellow, who subsisted by agriculture and who neglected to 
 practise their duties, entered into the state of Vaisyas. Those twice-born 
 who were addicted to mischief and falsehood, who were covetous, who 
 lived by all kinds of work, who were black arid had fallen from purity, 
 sank into the condition of Sudras. Being separated from each other 
 by these works, the Brahmans became divided into different castes." 
 
 In the same Santi-parva the creation of the four castes is ascribed 
 to Krishna. 
 
 " Then, again, the great Krishna created a hundred Brahmans, the 
 most excellent, from his mouth, a hundred Kshatriyas from his arms, a 
 hundred Vaisyas from his thighs, and a hundred Sudras from his feet." 
 
 Bhagavad Gita. Chapter IV. contains the following : 
 
 " The Deity said, ' The fourfold division of castes was created by 
 me according to the apportionment of qualities and duties.' " 
 
 These duties are described in Chapter XVIII.
 
 D CASTS. 
 
 Vishnu Parana In the o'th Section of Book I, Parasara pro- 
 fesses to tell how Brahma formed the human race : 
 
 " 3. When true to his design, Brahma became desirous to create the 
 world, creatures in whom goodness (sattva) prevailed sprang from his 
 mouth ; (4) others in whom passion (rajas) predominated came from his 
 breast ; others in whom both passion and darkness (taw as) were strong, 
 proceeded from his thighs ; (5) others he created from his feet, whose 
 chief characteristic was darkness. Of these was composed the system 
 of four castes, Brahmans, Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, and Sudras, who had 
 respectively issued from his mouth, breast, thighs, and feet." 
 
 Vayu Purana. The 8th Chapter states that in the Krita Age 
 there was only one caste : 
 
 " 62. There were then no distinctions of castes or orders and no 
 mixture of castes. Men acted towards each other without any feeling 
 of love or hatred. 63. In the Krita age they were born alike in form 
 and duration of life, without any distinction of lower and higher." 
 
 Bliagavata Purana. The Second Book accepts the usual account 
 of the origin of the castes. The Ninth Book declares that in the 
 Krita Age there was only one caste : 
 
 " There was formerly only one Veda, only one god, Narayana, one 
 Agni and one Caste. From Purnravas came the triple Veda in the 
 beginning of the Treta." 
 
 Dr. Muir's Conclusions. After examining many other passages, 
 the results arrived at are briefly the following : 
 
 It is abundantly evident that the sacred books of the Hindus 
 contain no uniform or consistent account of the origin of castes ; 
 but, on the contrary, present the greatest varieties of speculation 
 on this subject. Explanations mystical, mythical, and rationalistic, 
 are all offered in turn ; and the freest scope is given by the individ- 
 ual writers to fanciful and arbitrary conjecture. 
 
 The most common story is that the castes issued from the mouth, 
 arms, thighs and feet of Purusha, or Brahma. The oldest extant 
 passage in which this idea occurs is found in the Purusha Sukta ; 
 but it is doubtful whether, in the form in which it is there presented, 
 this representation is anything more than an allegory. In Mann 
 and the Puranas, the mystical import of the Vedic text disappears, 
 and the figurative narration is hardened into a literal statement of 
 fact. 
 
 In other passages when a separate origin is assigned to the 
 castes, they are variously said to have sprung from the words bhuh, 
 bhuvah, svah ; from different Vedas ; from different sets of prayers ; 
 from the gods and the Asuras ; from nonentity, from the imperish- 
 able, the perishable, and other principles. 
 
 In the Vishnu, Vayu and Markandeya Puranas, where castes are 
 described as coeval with the creation, we are allowed to infer that
 
 HINDU ACCOUNTS OF THE ORIGIN OP THE CASTES. 7 
 
 during the Krita age the condition of the whole race was one of 
 uniform happiness ; while the actual separation into castes did not 
 take place, according to the \ 7 ayu Purana, until men had become 
 deteriorated in the Treta age. 
 
 In one passage men are said to be the offspring of Vivasvat ; in 
 another his son Manu is said to be their progenitor ; whilst in a 
 third they are said to be descended from a female of the same 
 name. The passage which declares Manu to have been father of 
 the human race, explicitly affirms that men of all the four castes 
 were descended from him. In another remarkable text the Maha- 
 bharata asserts that originally there was no distinction of classes, 
 the existing distribution having arisen out of difference of character 
 and occupation. Similarly, the Bhagavata Purana in one place 
 informs us that in the Krita age there was but one caste. 
 
 The very different opinions with regard to the origin of caste are 
 an illustration of the remark in the Mahabharata : 
 
 " Contradictory are the Vedas ; contradictory are the Shastras ; 
 contradictory all the doctrines of the holy sages." 
 
 When witnesses in a court of justice give conflicting evidence, 
 discredit is thrown upon all their testimony. Writings cannot be 
 infallible which involve self-contradictions. One would think that 
 no man in his senses would accept the account of creation in the 
 Purusha Sukta as literally true. The old Hindu writers framed 
 their geography and astronomy out of their own heads, and it was 
 much the same with their accounts of the origin of caste. Each 
 one followed his own fancy. However monstrous the fiction, it did 
 not matter. There is a nursery rhyme in England about the cow 
 jumping over the moon. Very young children accept this as true, 
 and most Hindus are just as credulous. 
 
 TRUE ORIGIN OF CASTE. 
 
 The second volume of Dr. Muir's Origin/hi Sanskrit Texts shows, 
 by numerous quotations, that the Aryan Hindus are of " Trans- 
 Himalayan Origin and akin to the Western Branches of the Indo- 
 European Race" This is fully admitted by Indian scholars. 
 Professor Bhandarkar said at Bombay : 
 
 " Europeans have successfully traced the affinity of the Sanskrit with 
 the ancient languages of Europe, and shown that the Aryans of India, 
 composed of the three castes, Brahman, Kshatriya and Vais'ya, belong 
 to the same race as the ancient Greeks and Romans and the nations of 
 modern Europe except the Turks, the Hungarians and the Fins." 
 
 Professor Max Miiller, in his Chips from a German Workshop, has
 
 8 CASTE. 
 
 an admirable review of Dr. Muir's work. The following remarks are 
 chiefly abridged from these two writers. 
 
 Caste arose from two chief causes : 1. Difference of Race. 
 2. Difference of employment. Locality is a third element of minor 
 importance, which will be noticed under the second head. 
 
 1. DIFFERENCE OF RACE. 
 
 The ordinary names for caste prove this. Jdti means race ; varna, 
 colour, arising from difference of race. 
 
 In the Vedas there are only two castes, the Aryas and the Dasyus. 
 A short account will be given of each. 
 
 Aryas. This word, meaning noble, probably comes from or, to 
 plough, the nations following agriculture being more civilised than 
 the wandering races. 
 
 At very early period a tribe speaking a language not yet Sans- 
 krit or Greek, or German, settled in the highlands of Central Asia. 
 As they multiplied, more land was needed for cultivation, fresh 
 pastures for their cattle. In search of these, bands went off at 
 different times. The main stream flowed towards the north-west. 
 The earliest to migrate were the ancestors of the Celts, who 
 probably found Europe a jungle, traversed by wandering tribes. 
 They were followed by the ancestors of the Italians, Greeks, Ger- 
 mans, and Slavonians. 
 
 " The Hindu," says Max Miiller, " though perhaps the eldest, 
 was the last to leave the central home of the Aryan family. He saw 
 his brothers all depart towards the setting sun, and then turning 
 towards the south and east, he started alone in search of a new 
 world." 
 
 Language proves that, without doubt, the ancestors of the prin- 
 cipal nations of Europe and the Hindus once dwelt together. 
 
 " The terms for God, for house, for father, mother, son and 
 daughter, for dog and cow, for heart and tears, for axe and tree, 
 identical in all the Indo-European idioms, are like the watchwords 
 of soldiers. We challenge the seeming stranger; and whether he 
 answer with the lips of a Greek, a German, or an Indian, we 
 recognise him as one of oui*selves. There was a time when the 
 ancestors of the Celts, the Germans, the Slavonians, the Greeks and 
 Italians, the Persians and Hindus, were living together within the 
 same fences, separate from the ancestors of the Semitic and Tura- 
 nian races."* 
 
 The Aryans were then no longer dwellers in tents, but builders of 
 permanent houses. As the name for king is the same in Sanskrit, 
 Latin, Teutonic, and Celtic, we know that kingly government was 
 established and recognised by the Aryans at the prehistoric period. 
 
 * Max Miiller.
 
 TRUE ORIGIN OP CASTE. 9 
 
 They also worshipped an unseen Being, under the self-same name. 
 We have in the Veda the invocation Dyaux pitar, the Greek Zeu 
 pi tier, the Latin Jupiter ; and that means iu all the three languages 
 what it meant before these three languages were torn asunder it 
 means Heaven-Father ! 
 
 Hence the European, whom the Hindu regards as an unclean 
 Mlechcha, is a long separated brother, who once dwelt with him in 
 the same mountain home, speaking the same language, and worship- 
 ping the same God. 
 
 The Aryas, descending the passes of the Hindu Kush, slowly 
 migrated towards India by Kabul. Like many succeeding invaders, 
 they probably crossed the Indus at Attock. The tribes which they 
 found occupying the country will next be described. 
 
 Dasyus. This name was applied by the Aryas to the aborigines 
 of India whom they sought to dispossess of their lands. The word 
 is supposed to mean enemies. So many of them were enslaved that 
 the word dasa was applied to a servant. They also so frequently 
 plundered their conquerors, that long afterwards their name was 
 employed as the common term to describe a prowling robber. 
 
 The Dasyus were non-Aryan tribes. Remains of them are still 
 found all over India. The main body was driven to the south, and 
 to the present day all the languages spoken there, Tamil, Telugu, 
 Canarese, &c., are distinct from the Sanskrit. 
 
 The Aryas, coming from a cool climate, were fairer in complex- 
 ion than the Dasyus. The Aryas prided themselves on their colour, 
 and called the Dasyus " the black skin," just as some ignorant, 
 vulgar Europeans of the present day call Hindus " niggers." The 
 noses of the Dasyus were not so prominent as those of the Aryas. 
 Hence the Dasyus were described as " goat-nosed" and " noseless," 
 whereas the Aryan gods are frequently praised for their beautiful 
 noses. 
 
 In other passages of the Vedas, the Dasyus are represented as 
 keeping no sacred fires, and as worshipping mad gods. Nay, they 
 are even taunted with eating raw flesh, and with feeding on 
 human flesh. The following are Vedic invocations with regard to 
 the Dasyus : 
 
 " Indra and Soma, burn the devils, destroy them, throw them down, ye 
 two Bulls, the people that grow in darkness ! Hew down the madmen, 
 suffocate them, kill them ; hurl them away, and slay the voracious. 
 
 " Indra and Soma, up together against the cursing demon ! May he 
 burn and hiss like an oblation in the fire ! Put your everlasting hatred 
 upon the villain who hates the Brahman, who eats flesh, and whose look 
 is abominable." 
 
 Some, at least, of the Dasyus, were not so barbarous as they are 
 represented by the Aryas. The wealth of the Dasyus is spoken of
 
 10 CASTK. 
 
 in several places ; e.g. : " Subdue the might of the Dasa ; may we 
 through Indra divide his collected wealth." They had forts ami 
 cities. " Indra and Agni, by one effort together ye have shattered 
 90 forts belonging to the Dasyus." " O Indra, impetuous, thou 
 didst shatter by thy bolt 99 cities for Puru." 
 
 The following is abridged from Dr. Muir : 
 
 We may conceive the Aryas proceeding from the Indus in a 
 south-easterly direction into a country probably covered with forest, 
 and occupied by tribes of a dark complexion, speaking a strange 
 language. The Aryas, meanwhile, as they advanced, and gradually 
 established themselves in the forests, fields and villages of the abori- 
 gines, would not be able at once to secure their position, but would 
 be exposed to constant reprisals on the part of their enemies, who 
 would avail themselves of every opportunity to assail them, to carry 
 off their cattle, disturb their rites, and impede their progress. The 
 black complexion, barbarous habits, rude speech, and savage yells 
 of the Dasyus, and the sudden attacks under cover of the im- 
 penetrable forests and the darkness of night, they would make on 
 the encampments of the Aryas, might naturally lead the latter to 
 speak of them as demons. 
 
 The Aryas, after advancing some way, would halt to occupy, to 
 clear and cultivate the territory they had acquired; and the 
 aborigines would continue in possession of the adjacent tracts, 
 sometimes at peace, and sometimes at war with their invaders. At 
 length the further advance of the Aryas would either drive the 
 Dasyus into the remotest corners of the country or would lead to 
 their partial incorporation with the conquerors as the lowest grade 
 in their community. 
 
 The first great distinction was between the white and dark races, 
 the conquerors and the conquered, the freeman and the slave. The 
 Sudras undoubtedly were the aboriginal races of India subdued by 
 the Aryan invaders. One of the earliest tribes brought under sub- 
 jection was called Sudraft, and this name was extended to the whole 
 race. 
 
 " This ancient division between Aryan and non-Aryan races, 
 based on an original difference of blood, was preserved in later 
 times as the primary distinction between the three twice-born 
 castes and the Sudras. The word ftrya (noble) is derived from arya, 
 which means householder, and was originally used as the name of 
 the third caste, or the Vaisyas. These Aryas, or Vaisyas, formed the 
 great bulk of the Brahmanic society, and it is but natural that their 
 name, in a derivative form, should have been used as a common 
 name of the three classes into which these Aryans became afterwards 
 divided."* 
 
 * Chipr! from a German Workshop, Vol. II. The other quotations are from the same 
 work.
 
 TRUE ORIGIN OF CASTE. 11 
 
 II. DIFFERENCE OF EMPLOYMENT AND LOCALITY. 
 
 "The three occupations of the Aryans in India were fighting, culti- 
 vating the soil, and worshipping the gods. Those who fought the 
 battles of the people would naturally acquire influence and rank, and 
 their leaders appear in the Veda as Rajas or kings. Those who 
 did not share in the fighting would occupy a more humble position ; 
 they were called Vis, Vaisyas, or householders, and would no doubt 
 have to contribute towards the maintenance of the armies. But a 
 third occupation, that of worshipping the gods, was evidently con- 
 sidered by the whole nation to be as important and as truly essen- 
 tial to the well-being of the country, as fighting against enemies or 
 cultivating the soil." 
 
 "No nation was ever so anxious to perform the service of their 
 gods as the early Hindus. It is the gods who conquer the enemy, 
 it is the gods who vouchsafe a rich harvest. Health and wealth, 
 children, friends, flocks and gold areall the gifts of the gods. Among 
 a nation of this peculiar stamp the priests were certain to acquire 
 great influence at a very early period, and like most priests, they 
 were as certain to use it for their own advantage." 
 
 At first any one might preside at a sacrifice. Great importance 
 was attached to the hymns which were sung. " A hymn by which 
 the gods had been invoked at the beginning of a battle, and which 
 had secured to the king a victory over his enemies, was considered 
 an unfailing spell, and it became the sacred war-song of a whole 
 tribe." These hymns were handed down from father to son as the 
 most valuable heir-loom. Writing was then unknown. A know- 
 ledge of the hymns was confined to a certain class who " impressed 
 the people with the belief that the slightest mistake in the words or 
 in the pronunciation of the words, * would rouse the anger of the 
 gods. Thus they became masters of all peligious ceremonies, the 
 teachers of the people, the ministers of kings. Their favour was 
 courted, their anger dreaded, by a pious but credulous race." 
 
 The Brahman was at first simply an assistant at sacrifices, by 
 whom or for whom conducted. Afterwards he became a purohita 
 (one set in front) or family priest. This office became hereditary, 
 and those who held at courts became the advisers and counsellors of 
 kings. Such a post was peculiarly favourable to the designs of 
 a crafty and ambitious priest, and must have offered him exceptional 
 opportunities for promoting the hierarchical aspirations of his order. 
 
 The Aitarey a Brahmana says, " Verily the gods do not eat the food 
 offered by the king who is without a purohita; wherefore let the 
 
 * The priests, among the old Romans, to acquire greater power for themselves, 
 taught the same. Hence a sacrifice had sometimes to be repeated thirty times on 
 account of mistakes made. Even pause in the music at a wrong time, required the 
 whole to be begun afresh.
 
 12 CASTE. 
 
 king, who wishes to sacrifice, place a Brahman at the head." 
 VIII. 24, 25. 
 
 In the Veda we still find kings composing their own hymns 
 to the gods, royal bards, Rajarishis, who united in their person the 
 powers both of king and priest. The family of Visvamitra has con- 
 tributed its own collection of hymns to the Rig-Veda ; but Visva- 
 mitra himself was a Kshatriya. If in later times he is repre- 
 sented as admitted into the Brahraanic family of the Brigus, this is 
 but an excuse invented by the Brahmans, in order to explain what 
 would otherwise have upset their own system. Visvamitra was the 
 author of the Gayatri. Professor Bhattacharjya says, "What more 
 convincing evidence could there be of the exceedingly small impor- 
 tance attached to caste in the Rig- Veda time, than that the holiest 
 text in the whole body of the Veda should have been attributed to 
 a member of the Kshatriya tribe ?"* 
 
 King Janaka is represented in some of the Brahmanas as more 
 learned than any of the Brahmans at his court. He also asserted 
 his right of performing sacrifices without the intervention of priests. 
 Maim, the most famous legislator, too, was by birth a Kshatriya. 
 
 As the influence of the Brahmans extended, they became more 
 and more jealous of their privileges, and, while fixing their own 
 claims, they endeavoured at the same time to circumscribe the 
 duties of the warriors and householders. Those of the Aryas who 
 would not submit to the laws of the three estates were treated as 
 outcasts, and they were chiefly known by the name of Vratyas, or 
 tribes. The aboriginal inhabitants, again, who conformed to the 
 Brahmanic law, received certain privileges, and were constituted a 
 fourth caste, under the name of Sudras, whereas all the rest who 
 kept aloof were called Dasyus (Manu x. 45.) 
 
 This Brahmanic constitution, however, was not settled in a day, 
 and we find everywhere in the hymns, in the Brahmanas, and in 
 the epic poems, the traces of a long-continued warfare between the 
 Aryas and the aboriginal inhabitants, and violent contests between 
 the two highest classes of the Aryans striving for political suprem- 
 acy. For a long time the three upper classes continued to con- 
 sider themselves as one race, all claiming the title of Arya, in 
 contradistinction from the fourth caste, or the Sudras. 
 
 After long and violent struggles between the Brahmans and the 
 Kshatriyas, the Brahmans carried the day, and, if we may judge 
 from the legends which they themselves have preserved of those 
 struggles, they ended with the total destruction of most of the old 
 Kshatriya families, and the admission of a few of them to the 
 privileges of the first caste. Parusu-rama is th a great hero of the 
 Brahmans. 
 
 
 
 * Tagore Law Lectures, p. 110.
 
 TRUE ORIGIN OP CASTE. 13 
 
 " He cleaved the earth thrice seven times of the Kshatriya caste, and 
 filled with their blood the five large lakes of Samanta, from which he 
 offered libations to the race of Bhrigu. Offering a solemn sacrifice to 
 the king of the gods, Parasu-rama presented the earth to the ministering 
 priests. Having given the earth to Kasyapa, the hero of immeasurable 
 prowess, retired to the Mohendra mountain, where he still resides ; and in 
 this manner was there enmity between him and the race of the Ksha- 
 triyas, and thus was the whole earth conquered by Parasu-rama."* 
 
 This account of the struggle is grossly exaggerated, and it.is 
 difficult to say how much truth there is in it. 
 
 By the time of Manu, however, the Brahmans were high above 
 the Kshatriyas before whom, but a few centuries earlier, they had 
 cringed and fawned. 
 
 Manu's explanation of the Mixed Castes. Manu represents the 
 various castes as the result of mixed marriages between the four 
 original castes. According to him, the four primitive castes, by 
 intermarrying in every possible way, gave rise to 16 mixed castes, 
 which by continuing their intermarriages produced the long list of 
 the mixed castes. 
 
 If we look more carefully, says Max Miiller, we shall find that 
 most of these mixed castes are in reality the professions, trades, and 
 guilds of a half-civilised society. They did not wait for mixed 
 marriages before they came into existence. Professions, trades and 
 handicrafts had grown up without any reference to caste. Some of 
 their names were derived from towns and countries where certain 
 professions were held in particular estimation. Servants who waited 
 on ladies were called Vaidehas, because they came from Videha. 
 In other cases the names of Manu's castes were derived from their 
 occupations. The caste of musicians, for instance, were called Venas 
 from vina, the lyre. Now it was evidently Manu's object to bring 
 these professional corporations in connection with the old system of 
 castes, assigning to each, according to its higher or lower position, 
 a more or less pure descent from the original castes. The Vaidyas, 
 for instance, or the physicians, evidently a respectable corporation, 
 were represented as the offspring of a Brahman father and a Vaisya 
 mother, while the guild of the fishermen, or Nishadas, were put 
 down as the descendants of a Brahman father and a Sudra mother. 
 
 Thus a new system of caste came in of a purely pi-ofessional 
 character, though artificially grafted on the rotten trunk of the 
 ancient castes. This is the system which is still in force in India, 
 and which has exercised its influence on the state of Indian society 
 for good and evil. 
 
 Dr. Cornish takes the same view as professor Max Miiller, and 
 gives the explanation of Manu's system : 
 
 " No dependence can be placed on Manu's authority for the origin of 
 
 * Chips, Vol. II.
 
 14 CASTE. 
 
 these mixed castes. Such people existed in his time, and their existence 
 had to be accounted for, and it is always an easier thing for a Hindu 
 author to make fanciful assertions than to adhere to the sober domain 
 of fact, and hence probably the wonderful legends of their origin from 
 certain mixtures of castes." 
 
 " It is characteristic of the Brahmanical intolerance of the compilers 
 of the code that the origin of the lowest of all (the Chanditla) should be 
 ascribed to the intercourse of a Sudra man and Brahman woman, while 
 the uuion of a Brahman male with a Sudra woman is said to have 
 resulted in one of the highest of the mixed classes. Indeed it was quite 
 lawful in ancient times for a Brahman to take a succession of wives from 
 the inferior castes. 
 
 " The object of the regulations regarding admixture of castes seems to 
 have been to visit with the heaviest pains and penalties any irregulari- 
 ties of the females of the twice-born castes, and their degradation, and 
 that of their offspring, for unions with inferior or impure castes; and 
 consequently in the origin of mixed castes, Manu assigns to the 
 offspring of the Brahman woman the lowest degradation of all. 
 
 " Again, the Chunchu or Chentsn, a race of hunters and forest men, are 
 spoken of by Manu as ' sons of Brahmans by women of the Vaideha 
 class,' whereas these identical people exist to this day, as they had 
 existed probably thousands of years before the caste s} r etcm was known, 
 as an aboriginal people living in forests, subsisting on the products of 
 the chase, and such roots and vegetable substances as require no culti- 
 vation. The whole of the chapter relating to mixed castes is so puerile 
 in tone, and shows so much of class hatred and intolerance, it gives such 
 freedom of intercourse to Brahmans without disqualification, and heaps 
 such dreadful penalties on the incontinence of Brahman women, that 
 the object of the compilers is at once apparent. It is plain that the ac- 
 count of the origin of mixed castes is entirely fanciful, and that not the 
 smallest reliance can be placed on the authority. 
 
 " The whole caste system, as it has come down to us, bears unmistake- 
 able evidence of Brahmanical origin."* 
 
 " Men who have the same interests, the same occupations, the same 
 principles, unite in self-defence, and after acquiring power and 
 influence they not only defend their rights, but claim important 
 privileges. They naturally impose upon their members certain rules 
 which are considered essential to the intei-est of their caste or 
 company. These rules, sometimes of apparently the most trifling 
 character, are observed by individual members with greater anxiety 
 than even the laws of religion, because an offence against the 
 latter may be pardoned, while a disregard of the former would lead 
 to an instant exclusion or loss of caste. The more lucrative the 
 trade, the more jealously it was guarded, and there was evidently 
 no trade in India so lucrative as that of the priests. The priests 
 were, therefore, the strongest advocates of the system of caste, and 
 
 * Madras Census Report for 1871, pp. 122, 123.
 
 TRUE ORIGIN OF CASTE. 15 
 
 after investing it with a sacred character in the eyes of the people, 
 they expanded it into an immense spider's web, which separated 
 class from class, family from family, man from man, and which, 
 while it rendered all united action impossible, enabled the watchful 
 priests to pounce upon all who dread to disturb the threads of their 
 social tissue and to wither them to death."* 
 
 Mami's account of the supposed multiplication of castes is just 
 as mythical as that of the supposed origin of the four castes from 
 Brahma. The longer quotation from the Mahabharata gives the 
 true explanation it arose from difference of employment. 
 
 When the Brahmans could not extirpate the worship of the 
 aboriginal demons, they adopted them, calling them incarnations of 
 some of their gods. In like manner, they have connected different 
 occupations with their caste system. 
 
 Mr. Sherriug thus explains how subdivisions of castes may have 
 taken place : 
 
 " The caste separated into clans, each of which managed its own affairs, 
 held panchayets or councils, and maintained a distinct and independent 
 existence. As these clans were not amenable to one another or to the 
 caste itself considered as a federal whole, gradually they became jealous 
 of each^other's rights, and at length, impelled by the national habit of 
 exclusiveness, abandoned one another reciprocally, and assumed to 
 themselves absolutely all the functions and prerogatives of castes. "f 
 
 The Amrita Bazar Patrika attributes many of the subdivisions to 
 jealousy between rival families : 
 
 " The principal cause of the multiplication of castes is continual quarrel 
 and misunderstanding among men holding a certain degree of social 
 
 rank." 
 
 / 
 
 To the foregoing, Sir A. C. Lyall would add, as a source of Indian 
 caste, Sectarian differences, " meaning the castes which are 
 produced by difference of religion, by new gods, new rites, new 
 views, and new dogmas. "J 
 
 THE LAWS OF CASTE ACCORDING TO MANU. 
 
 The Ordinances of Mann constitute the highest authority for the 
 laws of Hindu caste. It is not certain when this work was com- 
 posed. Mr. Siromani says: 
 
 " There is a tradition that Mauu has undergone three successive redac- 
 tions. The introduction to Narada states that the work of Manu origin- 
 
 * Nearly the whole of this section, except where otherwise.stated, is fiom pro- 
 fessor Max Miiller. 
 
 t Hindu Tribes and Castes, Introduction. Vol. II. xxii. 
 J Asiatic Studies, p. 5.
 
 16 CASTE. 
 
 ally consisted of 1,000 chapters and 100,000 slokas ; Narada abridged it 
 to 12,000 slokas, and Sutuati agaiu reduced it to 4,000. The treatise 
 which we possess must be a third abridgment, as it only extends to 
 2,685."* 
 
 Manu's regulations give the ideal of government and justice 
 according to the Brahmans. The work is so extensive that only 
 a few quotations can be made. 
 
 BRABMANS. 
 Their Claims, 
 
 92. Man is declared purer above the navel ; therefore the purest 
 (part) of him is said by the Self-Existent to be his mouth. 
 
 93. Since he sprang from the most excellent part, since he was the 
 first-born, and since he holds the Vedas, the Brahman is, by right, the 
 lord of all this creation. 
 
 94. Him the Self-Existent, after having performed penance, created in 
 the beginning from his own mouth, for presentation of oblations to the 
 gods and offerings to the manes, (and) for the preservation of all this 
 (world,) 
 
 95. What being is there superior to him, by whose mouth the gods 
 eat oblations and the manes offerings ? 
 
 98. The birth of a Brahman is a perpetual incarnation of dharma ; 
 for he exists for the sake of dharma, and is for the existence of the 
 Vedas. 
 
 99. When the Brahman is born, he is born above the world, the chief 
 of all creatures, to guai-d the treasury of dharma. 
 
 100. Thu? whatever exists in the universe is all the property of the 
 Brahman ; for the Brahman is entitled to all by his superiority and 
 eminence of birth. 
 
 101. The Brahman eats his own alone, wears his own, and gives 
 away his own ; through the benevolence of the Brahman, indeed, the 
 other people enjoy (all they have)." Book I. 
 
 Punishment of Brahmans 
 
 379. Shaving the head is ordained as (the equivalent of) capital 
 punishment in the case of a Brahman, but in the case of the other castes 
 capital punishment may be (inflicted). 
 
 380. Certainly (the king) should not slay a Brahman even if he be 
 occupied in crime of every sort ; but he should put him out of the realm 
 in possession of all his property, and uninjured (in bod}). 
 
 381. No greater wrong is found on earth than killing a Brahman ; 
 therefore the king should not even mentally consider his death." Bk. VIII. 
 
 The atonement for killing a Sudra is the same as for killing the 
 following animals : 
 
 132. On killing a cat, an ichneumon, a daw, or a frog, a dog, a lizard, 
 an owl, or a crow, he should practise the observance (ordained for) killing 
 a Sudra. Book XI. 
 
 * Commentary on the Hindu Law, p. 16.
 
 THE LAWS OP CASTE ACCORDING TO MANU. 17 
 
 SUDRAS. 
 
 Created for Servitude. 
 
 91. One duty the Lord assigned to a Sudra service to those (before 
 mentioned) classes, without grudging. Book I. 
 
 413. But a Sudra, whether bought or not bought, (the Brahman) 
 may compel to practise servitude ; for that (Sudra) was created by the 
 Self-existent merely for the service of the Brahman. 
 
 414. Even if freed by his master, the Sudra is not released from 
 servitude; for this (servitude) is innate in him : who then can take it 
 from him ? 
 
 410. The king should . . . make the Sudra (act) as the slave of those 
 who are twice-born. Book VIII. 
 
 123. Merely to serve the Brahmans is declared (to be) the most ex- 
 cellent occupation of a Sudra ; for if he does anything other than this, 
 it profits him nothing. 
 
 129. Indeed, an accumulation of wealth should not be made by a 
 Sudra even (if he is) able (to do so), for a Sudra getting possession of 
 wealth merely injures the Brahmans. Book X. 
 
 417. A Brahman may take possession of the goods of a Sudra with 
 perfect peace of mind, for, since nothing at all belongs to this (Sudra) 
 as his own, he is one whose property may be taken away by his 
 master." Book VIII. 
 
 Reward of Servitude. 
 
 125. The leavings of food should be given (him) and the old clothes ; 
 so too the blighted part of the grain ; so too the old furniture." Book X. 
 
 Punishment of Sudras. 
 
 270. If a (man) of one birth assault one of the twice-born castes 
 with virulent words, he ought to have his tongue cut out, for he is of 
 the lowest origin. 
 
 271. If he make mention in an insulting manner of their name and 
 caste, a red-hot iron rod, ten fingers long, should thrust into his mouth. 
 
 272. If this man through insolence gives instruction to the priests in 
 regard to their duty, the king should cause boiling hot oil to be poured 
 into his mouth and ear. 
 
 279. If a man of the lowest birth should with any member injure 
 one of the highest station, even that member of this man shall be cut 
 (off) : this is an ordinance of Manu. 
 
 280. If he lift up his hand or his staff (against him), he ought to 
 have his hand cut off ; and if he smites him with his foot in anger, he 
 ought to have his foot cut off. 
 
 281. If a low-born man endeavours to sit down by the side of a high- 
 born man, he should be banished after being branded on the hip, or 
 (the king) may cause his backside to be cut off. 
 
 282. If through insolence he spit upon him, the king should cause 
 his two lips to be cut off. 
 
 3
 
 18 CASTK. 
 
 283. If he seize him by the locks, let the king without hesitation 
 cause both his hands to be cut off. Book VIII. 
 
 Treatment of certain Castes. 
 
 51. The dwelling of Chandalas and Swapacas (should he) outside 
 the village ; they should be deprived of dishes ; their property (consists 
 of) dogs and asses. 
 
 52. Their clothes (should be) the garments of the dead, and their 
 food (should be) in broken dishes ; their ornaments (should be) of iron ; 
 and they must constantly wander about. 
 
 53. A man who practises the rule of right should not desire inter- 
 course with these (people) ; their business transactions must be among 
 each other ; their marriages (should be only) with their equals. 
 
 54. Their food (for which the}' are) dependent on others should be 
 given in a broken dish ; they should not wander by night among the 
 villages and towns." Book X. 
 
 Sudras not to receive Religious Instruction. 
 
 80. One may not give advice to a Sudra, nor (give him) the i-emains 
 (of food) or (of) butter that has been offered. And one may not teach 
 him the law or enjoin upon him (religious) observances. 
 
 81. For he who tells him the law and he who enjoins upon him (relig- 
 ious) observances, he indeed, together with that (Sudra), sinks into the 
 darkness of the hell called Asarnvrtta (unbounded.) Book IV. 
 
 The 2,685 verses in Manu's Ordinances contain some rules which 
 are good, many frivolous, and others bad. The foregoing extracts 
 give the spirit of the laws regulating caste. 
 
 BUDDHIST OPPOSITION TO CASTE. 
 
 Gautama, the founder of Buddhism, is supposed to have lived 
 about the sixth century B. C. He was a Kshatriya and freely ad- 
 mitted all castes into his priesthood. In the Dhamma Pada, " Foot- 
 steps of Religion," he thus describes the true Brahman : 
 
 " 391. Him I call indeed a Brahmana who does not offend by body, 
 word, or thought, and is controlled on these three points. 
 
 "393. A man does not become a Brahman by his platted hair, by 
 his family, or by birth : in whom there is truth and righteousness he is 
 blessed, he is a Brahmana. 
 
 " 407. Him I call indeed a Brahman from whom anger and hatred, 
 pride and envy have dropt like mustard seed from the point of a needle." 
 
 Pandit Ashwaghosha, a learned Buddhist of Nepal, wrote a Sans- 
 krit treatise, called Vajra Suchi, the Needle of Adamant, exposing 
 caste. Some of his arguments will be noticed hereafter.
 
 CASTE BE VIVA L. 19 
 
 " Throughout the whole of the Buddhist period in India/' says 
 Sherring, " of a thousand years and upwards, strong opposition was 
 cherished, by the Buddhists against caste. During the dominancy 
 of their religion, which lasted perhaps six or seven hundred years, 
 caste was necessarily in a very depressed state ; and people 
 generally enjoyed a condition of social freedom which they had not 
 enjoyed, since the earliest ages of Hinduism." 
 
 CASTE REVIVAL. 
 
 Jainism is closely allied to Buddhism, and the two prevailed 
 extensively throughout India for several centuries. The revival of 
 Hinduism was largely owing to Sankara Acharya, who is supposed 
 to have lived about the ninth century of the Christian era. He 
 was a native of Malabar on the West Coast, of the tribe of Namburi 
 Brahmans He travelled all over India, engaging in successful 
 controversy with Buddhists and Jains or with Hindu sects. In 
 Malabar he is said to have divided the four original tribes into 72, 
 or 18 subdivisions of each, and to have assigned to them their re- 
 spective rites and duties. 
 
 It is generally supposed that Buddhism and Jainism were extir- 
 pated by severe persecution. Madhava Acharya relates how his 
 royal follower Sudhawan, a prince in Southern India, "command- 
 ed his servants to put to death the old men and children of the 
 Buddhists from the bridge of Rama to the Snowy Mountains; let 
 him who slays not be slain/' In Hindu temples in South India 
 may be seen representations of Buddhists and Jains impaled, with 
 dogs licking the blood which trickles down. The Hindu account is 
 that they seated themselves on the stakes rather than renounce 
 their faith. 
 
 There were certainly local struggles ; but whether there was any 
 general persecution may be doubted. 
 
 The Brahmans, on regaining their supremacy, made the caste 
 rules more stringent than ever. Marriages which were freely per- 
 mitted by Manu were forbidden. The facility for intermarriage has 
 given place to rigid exclusiveness, so that it is now absolutely 
 impossible for the pure castes to intermarry with the mixed, or for 
 the mixed to intermarry with one another. 
 
 Not only is intermarriage between different castes forbidden, 
 but the same castes are split up into numerous subdivisions, which 
 keep nearly as much aloof from one another as if they were distinct 
 castes. Mr. Sherring, in his work on Hindu tribes and Castes, 
 enumerates nearly 2,000 subdivisions of Brahmans. Sir W. W. 
 Hunter says, " They follow every employment from the calm
 
 20 CASTE. 
 
 pandits of Behar in their stainless white robes or the haughty priests 
 of Benares, to the potato-growing Brahmans of Orissa, ' half-naked 
 peasants struggling along under their baskets of yams, with a filthy 
 little Brahmanical thread over their shoulder."* 
 
 Mr. Sherriug thus describes the divisions among the Brah- 
 mans : 
 
 " Hundreds of these tribes, if not at enmity with one another, cherish 
 mutual distrust and antipathy to such a degree that they are socially 
 separated from one another as far as it is possible for them to be, 
 neither eating nor drinking together, nor intermarrying, and only agreed 
 in matters of religion and in the determination to maintain the pride 
 and secular dominaucy of their order. The Brahmans display all the 
 vices of a family divided against itself witli more than ordinary intensity, 
 for each one presumes on his purity of caste and birth, and affects the 
 airs and ostentation of an eldest son and heir." 
 
 The five tribes of Brahmans in the north, known as Gour, would 
 be excommunicated if they partook of a meal sitting together on 
 the same carpet. 
 
 Sir W. W. Hunter says : " In 1864, I saw a Brahman felon try 
 to starve himself to death, and submit to a flogging rather than eat 
 his food on account of scruples as to whether the birthplace of 
 North-Western Brahman, who had cooked it, was equal in sanctity 
 to his own native district." 
 
 The Kshatriyas reckon 590 separate tribes. Even the very 
 lowest castes have their subdivisions. Mr. Sherring says : 
 
 " The curse of Brahmanism has fallen on all native society and 
 blighted it. Each caste, down to the lowest, is eaten up with self- 
 satisfaction and self-admiration. Indeed, it is a notorious fact that the 
 most debased castes yield to none in the punctilious strictness witli which 
 they observe caste prejudices and carry out caste regulations." 
 
 In some respects, however, caste has been relaxed under British 
 rule and Western civilization. It is elastic, and adapts itself to the 
 inevitable. 
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 
 
 Division of labour exists in all civilised countries. Priests, 
 soldiers, merchants, farmers, mechanics, and servants, are found in 
 every one of them. It is Hindu Caste, a peculiar system, which has 
 now to be considered. Its good and bad features, real or supposed, 
 will be noticed in turn. 
 
 * Hunter's Gazetteer of India.
 
 KKFKCTS OP CASTE. 21 
 
 ADVANTAGES OF CASTE. 
 
 The following seem to be the principal : 
 
 1 . Division of labour secures a certain degree of Excellence. 
 
 A savage who does everything for himself can never rise in civili- 
 zation. It marks a distinct advance when there are separate pro- 
 fessions. The knowledge and skill acquired by the father descend 
 to the son. 
 
 '2. Some measure of Protection. Caste, as it were, makes a 
 man a member of a larger family, having the same interests, and 
 bound to help one another. 
 
 3. Cleanliness. This is undoubtedly promoted to some extent, 
 by the care about utensrls, bathing, &c. Some Indian houses are 
 beautifully clean. 
 
 4. Respect for Authority. This was one characteristic of the 
 Hindus in former times. At present, not unfrequentjy, insolence is 
 mistaken for independence. 
 
 5. Moral Restraint. The moral code of Hindu caste greatly 
 differs from modern ideas, as will afterwards be mentioned; but it 
 acts as a check in certain directions and upon certain classes. 
 
 To the above, Sir Lepel Griffin would add its value in a political 
 point of view to the British Government : 
 
 "If England continue to rule with justice, moderation, and impartiality, 
 with clean hands and an honest and eager desire to work for the good of 
 the people, there is no fear that the Hindus will ever turn against her. 
 And tlie explanation of this security is chiefly to be found in caste, 
 which, by depriving the people of ambition, has left each man content 
 with his position in life. Last year, Mi-. Lowell, the late American 
 Minister, told us that one of the advantages of democracy was that it 
 enabled a man to 'climb from a coal-pit to the highest position for which 
 he was fitted.' But in India, fortunately for society and the govern- 
 ment, the collier would have no inclination to climb at all. Every 
 occupation, even thieving, is hereditary ; and the rules of caste ordi- 
 narily compel a man to follow the occupation of his forefather, except 
 where English influence and education have displaced the conservative 
 tradition in a favor of a more democratic view of the rights of humanity. 
 But the English embroidery is only upon the hem of the mysterious 
 garment of Indian life, and the great mass of the people are unaffected 
 by the struggles of the young men of our schools and colleges to obtain 
 a share in the offices at the disposal of Government. Even with these, 
 the spirit of caste is still strong, and a wise policy would encourage and 
 not stifle it."* 
 
 There is, however, another side of the picture which will now be 
 given. 
 
 * Asiatic Quarterly Revieiv, Vol. I. p. 407. 

 
 22 CASTE. 
 
 DISADVANTAGES OF CASTE. 
 
 The following may be mentioned: 
 
 1. Physical Degeneracy. West, an English physician, author 
 of one of the best treatises on the " Diseases of Children," says, 
 " First among the causes of sickly infancy and premature death 
 may be mentioned the intermarriage of near relatives." The Hindus 
 have been split up into probably about a lakh of subdivisions, each 
 holding itself aloof from all others. Professor Ranganatha Muda- 
 liyar gives the following illustration : 
 
 "lam sure I am not guilty of exaggeration when I say that the 
 Mudaliars residing in Madras are divided into as many as fifty sections, 
 no one of which can intermarry with any other. The same difficulty 
 of intermarriage exists among Nayudus, and Pillais, and Reddis. It is 
 needless to expatiate on the evil, in a physiological and social point of 
 view, of marriages being contracted between parties so closely related, 
 and of the choice of a husband or wife being confined within such 
 narrow limits." 
 
 Caste is also mainly responsible for another cause of physical 
 degeneracy early marriages. A Bengali defender of caste in the 
 Calcutta Review says, " One thing is quite clear, if girls be not 
 married early enough, there can b no certainty that they won't 
 marry outside the caste community." 
 
 2. National Poverty. Three causes of this may be mentioned : 
 1 . Restriction on foreign commerce by forbidding to leave India. 
 
 One of the wealthiest cities in ancient time was Tyre, on the 
 eastern coast of the Mediterranean. It was built on a small island, 
 connected with the mainland, and had only a few miles of territory. 
 The prophet Ezekiel says of it, " When thy wares went forth out 
 of the seas, thou filledst many people; thou didst enrich the kings 
 of the earth with the multitude of thy riches and of thy mer- 
 chandise." Isaiah characterises it as, " The crowning city, whose 
 merchants are princes, whose traffickers are the honourable of the 
 earth." 
 
 In modern times, England is, perhaps, the richest country in the 
 world. One great cause of this is her commerce. Every sea is 
 traversed by her ships ; her merchants are to be found in every 
 land where wealth can be gained. 
 
 The great Creator intended that there should be free inter- 
 course between the different nations of the earth. Nearly every 
 country is noted for some article of produce. By interchange each 
 is benefited. 
 
 Caste teaches the people of India to regard all beyond their own 
 country as impure Mlechchas, and threatens with expulsion any 
 who dare cross " the black water." As far as it has power, caste
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 23 
 
 seeks to prevent the people from gaining the wealth which 
 results from foreign commerce. The Parsis are wiser. Parsi 
 merchants are to be found in London and China, thus largely 
 increasing their business and their profits. 
 
 2. Caste tends to malte professions hereditary. The late Dr. 
 Krishna Mohan Banerjea says, " The Hindus improved their arts, 
 sciences, and social institutions up to a certaiii point ; they left 
 some of their neighbours behind them in the scale of civilization ; 
 and there they stopped. Their caste prevented the full deve- 
 lopment of their faculties." Professor Bhandarkar said in Bom- 
 bay, " Indian implements and arts are now in that condition in 
 which they were in the time of Manu." For three thousand years 
 the Indian plough has been little better than a crooked stick. 
 Caste leads to a stationary civilization. In England some of the 
 greatest improvements in the arts have been made by men who did 
 not belong to the trade, as cotton-spinning and the steam-engine. 
 
 3. Caste makes labour degrading. England owes her wealth 
 perhaps even more to her manufactures than her commerce, though 
 they are mutually helpful. The Rev. Dr. K. M. Banerjea may 
 again be quoted : "In civilized countries, every encouragement is 
 held out to the cultivators of the arts, especially the fine arts. Their 
 professions are esteemed honourable their labours are amply 
 
 rewarded by men of taste and refinement The pernicious system 
 
 of caste taught a different lesson to the Hindus. The civil architect 
 is branded as a bastard. The carpenter and the goldsmith are 
 accursed, because the Brahmans chose to take umbrage at them. 
 How could the arts flourish in such a society ? How could a 
 person of sensibility aspire to distinction in the cultivation of arts 
 which are considered so low ?" 
 
 Dr. Banerjea quotes from the Brahma Vaibartha Purana the 
 reasons why certain castes were degraded. 
 
 Carpenter. Born from Vishvakarma and a Sudra mother. 
 Degraded by the curse of the Brahmans, whom he did not readily 
 supply with wood necessary for a burnt offering. 
 
 Painter. Vishvakarma and Sudra mother. Degraded by the 
 curse of the Brahmans for his faults in painting. 
 
 Goldsmith. Degraded by the curse of the Brahman for stealing 
 gold belonging to Brahmans. 
 
 Civil Architect. Born of a painter and Sudra harlot. Degraded 
 because base-born. 
 
 Hlechcha. Born of a Khastriya father and Sudra mother. Be- 
 gotten on a forbidden day. Mlechchas are further described as 
 " People born without the precincts of the ' excellent land of India/ 
 whose ears are not bored, who are cruel, daring, invincible in
 
 24 CASTE. 
 
 battle, impure in practice, violent and without religion."* "In their 
 country the regenerate must not even temporarily dwell." 
 
 There is an Indian proverb to the effect, that by two things you 
 can distinguish a bullock from a ploughman, by its horns and its 
 tail. The country is being flooded with candidates for Govenment 
 office, who are mere consumers not producers. Improved agricul- 
 ture, developed manufactui-es, and foreign commerce, are the real 
 ways by which India may be enriched, but caste discourages or 
 forbids them all. 
 
 3. Intellectual Progress hindered. A Bengali writer on caste 
 thus shows how this result was produced : 
 
 "None but a Brahman, declared the Shastras, should read the Veds, 
 or impart religious instruction, and as the Veds and their Angas included 
 all the literature and sciences of the country grammar, versification, 
 arithmetic, and mathematics the law thus effectually enjoined ignorance 
 to the rest of mankind. The consequence has been a total prostra- 
 tion of intellect and of mental energy, not only in the general mass of the 
 community, but even among that favoured class itself. Learning has 
 dwindled down to childish frivolity, and religion to ceremonial purity. 
 Our Pandits of the present day are a set of lazy, superstitious weak- 
 minded men, living mostly on the community, without contributing at all 
 to its welfare; having, some of them a little dexterity in threading the 
 dreams of metaphysics, and the unenviable ability of framing specious 
 arguments for perplexing the plainest truths. The cause of so much 
 deterioration is easily explained. When literature and the sciences were 
 ensured in perpetuity to the Brahmans, it became no longer their interest 
 to acquire real knowledge, and the means of making themselves and their 
 brethren wiser and happier. The arts of imposition held out to them 
 more lucrative employment. To cheat and delude the mass, whom the 
 laws had consigned to ignorance and misery, promised them palpable 
 advantages; and they possessed by birthright the means of deceiving 
 with impunity. The temptation was too great for human nature to 
 resist, and it was riot resisted." 
 
 Brahmans who have not had the advantage of English education 
 are, as a rule, the foes of social progress. They are utterly narrow- 
 minded. They believe that the whole circle of human knowledge 
 is contained in Sanskrit writings, and the most bigoted of them 
 are fully persuaded that to learn anything beyond the Sastras is 
 quite useless. t 
 
 For every Brahman in India there are at least twenty members 
 of other castes. All these, according to caste, are doomed, more or 
 less, to ignorance. God has not limited intellectual gifts to one 
 small section of the community. Bunyan, author of the Pilgrim's 
 Progress, was a tinker; Burns, the Scottish poet, was a ploughman; 
 Jeremy Taylor, one of the greatest English divines, was the son 
 
 * Hindu Caste, pp. 25, 26. f Sir Monier Williams, Modern India, p. 287.
 
 EFFECTS OP CASTE. 25 
 
 of a barber, as was Lord Tenterden, a distinguished English lawyer ; 
 Shakespeare was the son of a butcher; the author of the Tamil 
 Kurraly probably the best ethical poem ever written in India, was 
 a Pariah. If learning is confined to the few, the rich talents 
 which may exist in the many are undeveloped. 
 
 4. Hostility to Social Reform. What are the leading social 
 evils under which India is suffering? The neglect of female 
 education, early marriages, the treatment of widows, and the 
 enormous expenses of caste feasts. Caste lies at the root of all, and 
 is the great obstacle to reform. The following extract is from the 
 Indu Prakash : 
 
 " Does a Brahman wish to marry his daughter at a mature and mar- 
 riageable age ? There conies the tyrant caste and says, ' You shall not 
 keep your daughter unmarried beyond the age of 8 or 10, unless you 
 choose to incur the penalty of excommunication.' Does a man wish to 
 countenance either by deed or word the marriage of little girls plunged 
 into life-long misery and degrading widowhood ? Caste says, ' No, you 
 will be excommunicated.' Does a man wish to dispense with any of the 
 unmeaning and idolatrous ceremonies with which Native society is ham- 
 pered ? Caste says, 'No, you will be excommunicated.'" 
 
 There are thousands of educated Hindus who feel these social 
 evils almost as acutely as Mr. M. Malabari, and make speeches 
 against them ; bnt, with a few noble exceptions, they submit to the 
 yoke of caste all the same. 
 
 Considering the tyranny of the system, it must be allowed that it 
 requires a considerable amount of moral courage to resist it. Sir 
 Monier Williams gives the following illustration of its working : 
 
 "When I was in Gujarat, in 1875, a man named Lallu-bhai, a cloth 
 merchant of Ahmedabad, was proved to have committed a heinous caste 
 crime. He had married a widow of his own caste, and to marry a widow 
 is, in the eyes of a Hindu, a most awful offence. A woman once married, 
 belongs to one husband for time and eternity. Forthwith, he was 
 sentenced to complete excommunication. No one, either of his own or 
 any other caste, was to be allowed to associate with him ; no one was to eat 
 with him ; no one was to have any trade dealings with him ; nox>ne was 
 to marry any of his children ; no temple was to receive him as a 
 worshipper; and if he died, no one was to carry his body to the burning 
 ground. On the morning after the sentence was passed, he went to the 
 bazaar as usual, but not a person would buy from him or sell to him ; he 
 could get no home to live in ; and none of his debtors would pay him 
 their debts. It was impossible to sue them, as no one would give 
 evidence. He was a ruined man, and had to leave the country, and 
 obtain Government employment in a distant city." * 
 
 5. Individual Liberty is crushed. " The caste of India," says 
 Sherring, " is indissolubly blended with the social life of the Hindu, 
 
 * Religious Thought and Life in India, pp. 472, 473.
 
 26 CASTE. 
 
 and is as much a necessity to him as food to eat, as raiment to wear, 
 and as a house to live in. Indeed, he can often dispense with 
 raiment, and during most of the year he prefers the court outside 
 his house to the hot rooms within ; but he can never free himself 
 from caste, can never escape from its influence." 
 
 Caste has its " thousand and one }> regulations, nearly all childish 
 and frivolous, and some of them leading to much suffering. " Does 
 a Brahman/' says the Indu Prakash, " wish to dine with a man of 
 another caste ? However thick friends they may be of one another, 
 caste says, 'No, you must not do that, or you will be excommuni- 
 cated.' If a Brahman feel thirsty and has no other water but such as 
 is brought by a Sudra near him, he cannot drink it ; for caste forbids 
 it at the pain of excommunication." During famines people, dying 
 of hunger, have refused food offered to them by Europeans. 
 
 "An individual Hindu, "says Dr. Duff, "follows the example of his 
 caste, just as a sheep or a wild pigeon follows the example of the 
 flock. There are local variations observable in the customs and 
 usages of the same caste. In one place a Hindu will consent to do 
 what in another he would peremptorily refuse to do, simply because 
 in the former he is countenanced by the example of his brethren 
 and not in the latter; just as a flock of sheep or pigeons may, from 
 accidental causes, somewhat vary its habits or movements in 
 different localities." There is no true liberty among the Hindus ; 
 they are the bondslaves of caste. 
 
 6. The Growth of Nationality is hindered. The Hindus love 
 their children, they are zealous for their caste; but except in the 
 case of the enlightened few, their sympathies do not extend beyond 
 these narrow limits. Hence Max Miiller says, " The Indian never 
 knew the feeling of nationality " he did not think of his country 
 as a whole. 
 
 The Romans had a maxim, " Divide and conquer." The Brah- 
 mans acted on the same principle. By splitting up the people into 
 numerous sections, they more easily retained their supremacy. "A 
 nation divided against itself, is the proper description of the Hindu 
 race." Hence they have become an easy prey to foreign invaders. 
 Sir Lepel Griffin, as quoted, thinks it politic on the part of the 
 British Government to encourage caste. 
 
 A new feeling of nationality is springing up among educated 
 Indians, but this is in direct opposition to caste. The " National 
 Congresses," regarded with enthusiasm, would be impossible under 
 Manu's caste regulations. Sudras compose the great majority of 
 the population ; but if they had presumed to attend and sit in the 
 presence of the " twice-born," banishment and mutilation would 
 have been the reward of their presumption." 
 
 7. Discord between classes This is especially the case in 
 South India, where the hold of caste is strongest. There an
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 27 
 
 additional division prevails of Right-hand and Left-hand castes. 
 Dubois thus describes the result : 
 
 " This particular distinction has turned out to be the most baneful that 
 could have been imagined for the tranquillity of the state, and the most 
 injurious to the peace of the citizens. It has proved the perpetual foun- 
 tain of disturbance and insurrections among the people, and a continued 
 principle of endless jealousy and animosity amongst all members of the 
 community. 
 
 " The opposition between the Right-hand and the Left-hand arises from 
 certain privileges to which they both lay claim ; and where any encroach- 
 ment is made by either, it is instantly followed by tumults. Gentlest of 
 all creatures, timid under all other circumstances, here only the Hindu 
 seems to change his nature. There is no danger that he fears to encoun- 
 ter in maintaining what he terms his right, and rather than yield it he 
 is ready to make any sacrifice and even to hazard his life. 
 
 " I may be permitted to relate one instance at which I myself was pre- 
 sent. The dispute was between the caste of Pariahs and shoemakers, 
 and produced such dreadful consequences through the whole district 
 where it happened that many of the peaceable inhabitants had begun to 
 leave their villages for a place of greater safety. Fortunately in this 
 instance, matters did not come to an extremity, as the principal inhabitants 
 of the district seasonably came forward to mediate between these vulgar 
 castes, and were just in time, by good management, to disband the armed 
 ranks on both sides that only waited the signal of battle. 
 
 " One would not easily guess the cause of this dreadful commotion. 
 It arose forsooth from a shoemaker, at a public festival, sticking red 
 flowers in his turban, which the Pariahs insisted that none of his caste 
 had a right to wear." 
 
 Dr. Cornish mentions another claim. " The right-hand castes 
 have the privilege of erecting twelve pillars to sustain their marriage 
 booths, while the left-hand castes may not have more than eleven 
 pillars ! 
 
 " The quarrels arising out of these small differences of opinion were so 
 frequent and serious in the seventeenth century that in the town of 
 Madras it was found necessary to mark the respective boundaries of the 
 right and left hand castes, and to forbid the right hand castes in their 
 processions from occupying the streets of the left hand, and vice versa."* 
 
 With a more efficient police, such open caste disputes are now 
 rare, but the spirit remains. A few years ago a great disturbance 
 was threatened in Masulipatam, because certain castes whitewash- 
 ed their houses. The magistrate refusing to prevent this, a telegram 
 was sent direct to the Governor. 
 
 The Madras Census Report for 1881 says, "Except the members 
 of the admittedly degraded and depressed castes, each Shudra 
 
 * Madras Census Report for 1871, p. 129.
 
 28 CASTE. 
 
 thinks, or professes to think, his caste better than his neighbour's. 
 The Shanar claims to be a Rajput. The Kamraala and the Pattnul 
 (weavers) growl that, if they had their rights, they would be recog- 
 nised as Brahmans." 
 
 There are constant quarrels about precedence, nor is it confined 
 to this. The Bengali writer on caste already quoted says : 
 
 " Each of these divisions (the lower orders) has a class of men called 
 paramaniks, members of which exercise the most unlimited inquisitional 
 powers, each within his own jurisdiction of one or more villages, prying 
 even into the minutest circumstances of life, and interfering with every 
 domestic incident, unless bought off with a bribe. Thus domestic happi- 
 ness, the dearest of all dear things on earth, is subjected to the vulgar 
 intrusion and despotic interference of men who make their inquisitive- 
 ness the source of their wealth." 
 
 "Instead/' says Principal Caird, "of breaking down artificial 
 barriers, waging war with false separations, softening divisions 
 and undermining class hatreds and antipathies, religion becomes 
 itself the very consecration of them." 
 
 8. The Heart is hardened against Suffering. A few illustrations 
 of this may be given. 
 
 As far as the rules of caste allow, the Hindus are as hospitable as 
 most other nations; but it is a sufficient excuse for not rendering 
 help that the sufferer belongs to a lower class or to a class unknown. 
 Bishop Heber writes : 
 
 "A traveller falls down sick in the streets of a village, (I am mention- 
 ing a fact which happened ten days ago,) nobody knows what caste he is 
 of, therefore nobody goes near him, lest they should become polluted. 
 He wastes to death before the eyes of the whole community, unless the 
 jackals take courage from his helpless state to finish him a little sooner, 
 and, perhaps, as happened in the case to which I alluded, the children 
 are allowed to pelt him with stones and mud." 
 
 The late Dr- Wilson, of Bombay, says, " I have seen a man lying 
 crushed with broken limbs beneath a cocoa-nut tree which had fall- 
 en upon him, while the spectators were making no effort to remove 
 the destructive load from his body." 
 
 The above are not solitary cases. The Rev. J. Vaughan says : 
 
 " Outside their own caste the weal or woe of their fellows affect them 
 in no degree whatever. We have again and again witnessed along the 
 great pilgrim routes of India harrowing illustrations of this sad truth. 
 We have seen poor creatures, smitten with disease, lying on the road- 
 side passed by hundreds of their co-religionists with no more concern 
 than if they were dying dogs ; we have seen the poor parched sufferers 
 with folded hands and pleading voice crave a drop of water to moisten 
 their lips, but all in vain. Hundreds thus perish, untended, unpitied, 
 unaided ; perhaps even before death does its . work, the vultures and
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 29 
 
 jackals begin theirs, and thus lines of whitened bones and blackened 
 skulls, border the roads leading to the sacred shrines ; and whence this 
 worse than brutal callousness? What has dried up the springs of 
 human sympathy ? It is Caste. This first of all taught the people to 
 look upon differing castes as different species ; it next taught the lesson 
 of defilement by contact; thus utter isolation and heartless selfishness 
 account for the whole of the sickening scenes described."* 
 
 More enlightened views are beginning to prevail among some, 
 and a large-hearted benevolence, embracing all, is not unfre- 
 quently exhibited. Still, such is not the caste spirit. 
 
 9. Caste seeks to degrade nearly the whole Human Race, and 
 ranks some beneath the brntes. The most refined Englishman is 
 an impure Mlechcha. When Sir Monier Williams, the Oxford 
 Professor of Sanskrit, first visited India, he was struck by the fact 
 that pandits always came to see him early in the morning. He 
 learned afterwards that it was to save an additional bathing from 
 the pollution they had contracted by meeting him. Even a Sudra 
 has been known to beg a European not to enter his house, to avoid 
 the expense of getting it purified. This would not be required in 
 the case of a dog. The very shadow of a European is defiling to a 
 felon in a jail, and will make him throw away his food. The same 
 thing happened when a little English girl, by chance, touched 
 the wooden platform on which two prisoners were preparing food : 
 the whole was thrown away. 
 
 According to caste, the great majority of the Hindus are born 
 slaves. Quotations have been given from Manu as to the way in 
 which they are to be treated and regarded. But the height of 
 injustice and cruelty is reached in the case of the Chandals and 
 some other castes (see p. 18.) 
 
 Mr. Sherring thus describes the condition of the low castes and 
 the feelings with which they are looked upon : 
 
 u For many long ages they have been a down-trodden and oppressed 
 race, have been treated by the higher castes almost as savages, have been 
 purposely kept ignorant and debased, have been compelled to labour 
 very hard for the scantiest fare, and have been led to regard themselves 
 in the same light in which they are regarded by other castes, namely, 
 as an unclean, vile, ungodly, and contemptible race, not worthy to enter 
 a temple or to come near a Brahman, or to perform any religious duty 
 except vicariously through the priests, or to receive the smallest amount 
 of useful knowledge, or to hold any position except that of serf and 
 clods of the ground." 
 
 " The repugnance to the outcaste is hereditary. The Hindus impart 
 it to their children ; they hand it down from one generation to another ; 
 they display it perpetually in their dealings with this unfortunate race, 
 whom they vilify by the use of every epithet of abuse which can possibly 
 
 * The Trident, the Crescent and the Cross, pp. 31, 32.
 
 30 CASTE. 
 
 pourtray the loathing- and disgust with which their minds are filled. 
 No amount of patient, faithful, and ill-rewarded service, performed by a 
 member of those despised tribes, can softeu the heart of the Brahman or 
 Rajput, and load him to think and act differently.* 
 
 Sir Lepel Griffin says, "Much of Central India is inhabited by 
 Bhils, an ancient people of singularly gentle and simple ways. 
 But it is exceedingly difficult to persuade the Rajput chiefs and their 
 Brahman ministers to treat their subject Bhils with common 
 humanity. They look down upon them as dogs, whom only the 
 eccentric philanthropy of the British Government can find excuse 
 for protection." 
 
 In Travancore certain castes ought not to come nearer to a 
 Brahman than 74 paces. They are required to make a grunting 
 noise as they pass along, that if necessary on the approach of their 
 superiors, they may retreat from the high road. 
 
 The so-called low castes have some of them very disagreeable 
 but necessary duties to perform. Without them, cities would soon 
 become uninhabitable. The feeling towards them should rather be 
 one of gratitude than repugnance. It is thus well described by 
 Carlyle : 
 
 ''Venerable to me is the hard hand, crooked, coarse, wherein not- 
 withstanding lies a cunning virtue indefeasibly royal as of the sceptre 
 of this planet. Venerable, too, is the rugged face, all weather-tanned, 
 besoiled, with its rude intelligence, for it is the face of a man living 
 man-like. Oh, but the more venerable for thy rudeness and even 
 because we must pity as well as love thee, hardly-entreated brother ! 
 For us was thy back so bent, for us were thy straight limbs and fingers 
 so deformed ; thou wert our conscript on whom the lot fell, and fighting 
 our battles, were so marred. For in thee, too, lay a God-created form, 
 but it was not to be unfolded ; encrusted must it stand with the thick 
 adhesions and defacements of labour, and thy body, like thy soul, was 
 not to know freedom. Yet, toil on, toil on ; thou art in thy duty> be out 
 of it who may." 
 
 10. Caste fills a few with pride and arrogance. There are proud 
 and haughty men in all countries ; but the pride of the Brahmans 
 is peculiar. Their pretensions are thus stated by Dr- Wilson : 
 
 " They only must read and interpret the Vedas. Their wrath 
 is as terrible as that of the gods. They claim to have kicked, 
 beaten, cursed, and frightened, and degraded the highest deities, 
 and distressed and destroyed their children. One of their number, 
 Brihaspati, the instructor of the gods, is said to have turned the 
 moon into a cinder ; and another, Vishvakarma, to have cut the 
 sun into twelve pieces ; Agastya swallowed up the ocean at three 
 sips, and gave it out salt !" 
 
 * Asiatic Quarterly Review, Vol. I. pp. 468, 469.
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 31 
 
 The following syllogism, translated from the Sanskrit, is Current 
 over India : 
 
 " The whole world is under the power of the gods ; 
 The gods are under the power of the mantras; 
 The mantras are under the power of the Brahman; 
 The Brahman is therefore our God." 
 
 According to Manu, the Brahman is not to be put to death for the 
 greatest crimes. Garuda, the bearer of Vishnu, used to eat every 
 creature except Brahmans, who, if swallowed, would have caused 
 an insufferable pain in his stomach. Manu says : 
 
 " 165. A twice-born man, having merely assaulted a Brahman out 
 of desire to slay him, abides a hundred years in the hell Tamisra. 
 
 " 166. Having 1 designedly struck him out of anger, even with a straw, 
 for 21 births he is born from sinful wombs." Book IV. 
 
 Life, however, must not only be preserved, but rendered comfort- 
 able. Land given to a Brahman secures heaven ; a red cow, a safe 
 passage across the boiling infernal river Vaitarani ; a house, a 
 heavenly palace ; an umbrella, freedom from scorching heat ; shoes, 
 freedom from pain in walking ; feasting of Brahmans, the highest 
 merit. A proper gift to a Brahman on a death-bed will secure 
 heaven to a malefactor. 
 
 On the other hand, property taken from a Brahman entails the 
 heaviest curse. The Sri Bhagavat says, " Whosoever taketh pro- 
 perty belonging to Brahmans, whether it was given to them by 
 himself or others, is born as a worm on a dunghill for sixty thou- 
 sand years." 
 
 The masses have thus been led to regard the Brahman's curse as 
 the most appalling calamity, and his blessing as the highest possible 
 good. 
 
 Through caste, says Dr. Banerjea, " some are puffed up ; others 
 are depressed. ALL ARE MORALLY DETERIORATED." 
 
 11. Caste concentrates religion on outward ceremony, and 
 perverts moral feeling. What offences are punishable by expul- 
 sion from caste ? Eating, drinking and marrying contrary to rule. 
 Take the case of the Ahmedabad merchant who suffered so much 
 for marrying a widow of his own caste. Suppose he had become a 
 drunkard, ruined his body by debauchery, been guilty of perjury, 
 theft and murder, all these would not have affected his caste. 
 During the Mutiny, Nana Sahib, at Cawnpore, sent butchers to 
 murder a large number of English women and children : all this 
 did not pollute him ; but had he spared a little English girl and 
 drunk a cup of pure water from her hand, he would at once have 
 been expelled. 
 
 It is true that caste rules with respect to eating and drinking 
 ai'e often violated. There are numbers of Hindus in Calcutta who
 
 32 CASTE. 
 
 eat the flesh of the cow and get drunk in English hotels, who still 
 retain their caste. But let one visit England to study, and he is 
 excluded. A pundit for 5 Rupees will write a tract ridiculing 
 the Hindu gods, but for 5,000 Rs. he would not take a glass of water 
 from a European. Caste is far more to a Hindu than religion. 
 
 The Stomach the seat of Hinduism. It has been well remarked : 
 " Other religions may be seated in the mind and soul but the 
 stronghold of Hinduism is the stomach. A Hindu may retain his 
 faith against all argument, and against all violence, but mix a bit 
 of beef in his food, and his religion is gone ! Not that he renounces 
 it, but that it repudiates him. Let half a dozen Hindus seize one 
 of their own caste, and forcibly thrust forbidden food down his 
 throat, and that man has ceased to have any rights in this world or 
 the next." 
 
 Thus the conscience of the Hindu is perverted, and the true 
 distinctions between right and wrong are so far destroyed. The 
 heaviest caste penalties are inflicted for actions which may even be 
 commendable, as going to England for study. " Under caste " says 
 Dr. Duff, " that is accounted sin which is no sin, and that is no sin 
 which is most heinous in the sight of a holy God." 
 
 To observe the rules of his caste is the Hindu ideal the " Whole 
 Duty of Man." 
 
 12. Caste is founded on a blasphemous Falsehood, and leads to 
 Falsehood. According to caste, the Deity is an enormous male, with 
 mouth, hands, thighs, and feet, giving rise to different orders of 
 men endowed with different qualities of good and evil, of sattva, 
 rajas, and tamas (truth, passion, darkness) as they come from God, 
 and with essentially different laws and institutions. These laws, 
 however frivolous, vexatious, and injurious, it ascribes to God, and 
 in his name demands on their behalf universal obedience. It is, 
 consequently, most impious in its very foundations. 
 
 Caste is also maintained by falsehood. The supremacy of the 
 Brahman involves constant lying, either implied or uttered. The 
 same remark applies to many of the other castes. There are com- 
 paratively few of the higher castes who really are what they claim 
 to be. Of Southern India the last Madras Census Report says : 
 
 " It may be safely accepted that the mass of the people are not Aryan ; 
 that indeed none of them are Aryan, except the Brahmans ; possibly 
 not all of these, for there are several classes or subdivisions of Brahmans 
 of more or less hazy origin. All the rest of the so-called Hindus may, 
 if they please, call themselves Shudras, but they are in fact a Dravidian 
 or Turanian or Scythian people who have adopted, in a very highly- 
 developed form, the Aryan caste system, whose germs are found in the 
 four-caste system of Manu. 
 
 "Of Kshatriyas and Vaishyas there are probably few, although there 
 are many who claim to belong to these Aryan castes. The soi disant (self-
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 33 
 
 called) Kshatriyas are principally the small Rajas and their followers 
 of swordsmen, the Bondilis or Muchias and a few more. Those claiming 
 to be Vaishyas are some of the merchant and trading castes. They are 
 very numerous, and the claim has never been admitted for many of them." 
 
 " The Shetti is no longer the only merchant or shopkeeper. On the 
 contrary, the potter and the fisherman turned traders merely add Shetti 
 to their names." pp. 103, 104. 
 
 Dr. Burnell says, " I know some families in Southern Canara 
 which now claim to be Brahmans, and are called so, but inscriptions 
 show that 500 years ago they were Jains. Much doubt is thrown 
 on the origin of the Gurukkal or Savia priests of the Tamil country, 
 and some wealthy traders in Madura have suddenly set up a claim 
 to be Brahmans."* 
 
 There are " manufactured Brahmans" also in the north. Hunter's 
 Orissa citis " well-known legends of large bodies of aliens being 
 from time to time incorporated even into the Brahman caste." 
 The same writer says, " In many outlying Provinces, we see non- 
 Aryan chiefs and warlike tribes turn into Aryan Rajputs before 
 our eyes." The Bengali defender of caste in the Calcutta Review, 
 says, " Just now there is a hot controversy going on in Hindu 
 society as to whether or not the Bunnya caste in Bengal are the 
 representatives of the ancient Vaisya caste." 
 
 It was the same even in early times. Yudishthira says in the 
 Vana-parva : " most sapient Serpent, birth is difficult to be dis- 
 criminated in the present condition of humanity, on account of 
 the confusion of all castes. All (sorts of) men are continually 
 begetting children on all (sorts of) women." 
 
 The foregoing evils of caste refer to the whole of India ; but its 
 worst type is to be found in the Kulinism of Bengal. A king, named 
 Ballala Sen, a son of the river Brahmaputra (!), gave the title of 
 Kul or honourable, to certain Brhmans. Brahmans of a lower order 
 are most anxious to get a Kulin son-in-law. Hence large sums are 
 paid to them to marry their daughters. There are Kulins with 
 twenty, fifty, or even a hundred wives. But the marriage of Kulin 
 females is cruelly stringent ; these must not on any account be given 
 to any unless they are of an equal or superior grade. The poor 
 Kuliu father is often in the greatest difficulty. He cannot allow 
 his daughter to marry any one of a lower grade ; he cannot afford 
 to purchase a husband in his own. It would be a great disgrace to 
 allow her to remain unmarried. His only resource is to appeal to 
 some decrepit old Kulin Brahman, who has already a multitude of 
 wives, to save the honour of his family by adding one more to his list. 
 
 Kulin polygamy carries with it a license to indulge, to an almost 
 * Translation of The Ordinances of Manu, p. 6.
 
 34 CASTE. 
 
 unlimited extent, the vilest passions of human nature, while it 
 occasions an untold amount of misery and crime.* 
 
 " The system of caste/' says Principal Caird, " involves the 
 worst of all wrongs to humanity that of hallowing evil by the 
 authority and sanction of religion." 
 
 The advantages and disadvantages of caste have now been 
 stated, and the latter are considered far to outweight the former. 
 " Taken in excess even nectar is poison." Sir Lepel Griffin brings 
 forward " contentment" as one of the good results of caste. But 
 " contentment" may be simply a proof of degradation. Bishop 
 Caldwell says of the women of India : " In their own opinion they 
 have nothing to lament as a class, but are as well treated as women 
 could wish to be, and are perfectly content." The Hindu says, 
 " The contentment of our people is the result of moral death dur- 
 ing centuries." 
 
 Granting that the advantages of caste have been greatly under- 
 rated, and its disadvantages exaggerated, the retention or abandon- 
 ment of the system should hinge upon the answer to the following 
 question : 
 
 Is caste consistent with strict justice between man and man ? 
 
 The burning words of Kingsley are true : 
 
 " Foremost among them stands a law which I must insist on, boldly 
 and perpetually, a law which man has been trying in all ages, as now, 
 to deny, or at least to ignore; though he might have seen it if he had 
 willed, working steadily in all times and nations. And that is that as 
 the fruit of righteousness is wealth and peace, strength and honour ; 
 the fruit of unrighteousness is poverty and anarchy, weakness and 
 shame. It is an ancient doctrine and yet one ever young. The Hebrew 
 prophets preached it long ago, in words which are fulfilling themselves 
 around us every day, and which no new discoveries of science will 
 abrogate, because they express the great root-law, which, disobeyed, 
 science itself cannot get a hearing."f 
 
 As well may men gather grapes from thorns and figs from 
 thistles, as expect good results, on the whole, from an iniquitous 
 system. 
 
 Caste is very much like slavery. Under good masters slavery 
 has its advantages ; but, taking it all in all, it is to be condemned 
 for its injustice. So with caste. The old Romans had a saying, 
 " Let justice be done though the heavens should fall." This, in 
 the end, is the wisest and best course. 
 
 OPINIONS OP CASTE. 
 
 The writer, in the estimation of the observers of caste and of 
 some of its European advocates, may seem to have painted the 
 
 * Abridged from Modern Hinduism, by Wilkins. 
 t Limits of Exact Science applied to History.
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 35 
 
 disadvantages of caste in too strong colours. Each feature ought 
 to be examined, and its consistency with truth considered. But 
 the view he has given is the same as that held by some of the ablest 
 and most intelligent men in India, deeply interested in the welfare 
 of the country. 
 
 A " member of the highest, wealthiest and most influential of 
 the strictest sect of Brahmans," in an Essay on Caste, for the fol- 
 lowing reasons, pronounces it a " HUGE SHAM" : 
 
 " How many of us, may I ask, satisfy the requirements of caste ? I do 
 not mean among our own heterodox selves, but among the bigoted 
 conservatives, who with our uneducated women form the stronghold of 
 the caste ethics ? Our motto seems to be, not that they should not be 
 violated, but that we should take care not to be found out in the breach. 
 Ninety-nine out of a hundred Brahmans do not perform the Sandhya in 
 proper time, never study the Vedas at all, seldom think of the sacrifices 
 required daily, and do not even wash as often as the rules enjoin. Yet 
 no one objects. We go through the ceremonies in a mechanical way, 
 either without understanding them, or without being edified if we do. 
 We are, without the slightest compunction, reciting the Vedas in the 
 hearing of those who, if Manu were the ruler, would have had molten lead 
 poured into their ears for their pains ! We are content even to study 
 our own Vedas from non-Brahmanical pandits like Max Miiller. We 
 talk glibly of widow marriages and sea voyages, and shock the orthodox 
 world beyond all forgiveness. We have renounced our ancestral and 
 Gita-prescribed pursuits of life and duties, and have adopted mammon 
 worship in hundreds of ways. We never even make a namaskdra to our 
 idols, and, like consumate cynics, sneer at the most serious observances 
 of our orthodox brethren. We educate our girls, and make them study 
 our sacred literature in the teeth of tenets which degrade our women to 
 the level of Sudras. What prevents our travelling in other lands and 
 acquiring practical wisdom ? What makes our practical religion so 
 ridiculous in the eyes of other religionists ? CASTE. It is demoralizing 
 in its effects, engenders self -sufficiency, narrows our sympathies, and is 
 alike oppose to reason and conscience. Its refrain is that the bulk of 
 the human race should for ever hopelessly continue to be the helots of a 
 narrow oligarchy irrespective of religious purity, wealth or intellectual 
 superiority. It in effect represents the Divine Father of mankind as a 
 partial Being, with human and earthly passions and leanings. I repeat 
 therefore that caste is a HUGE SHAM, and if we are true to ourselves, to 
 human nature, to God's eternal laws, and to our country's real good, 
 we ought to renounce it."* 
 
 Pandit Shiva Nath Sastri. The following are the heads of a 
 lecture on the effects of the caste : 
 
 (1) It has produced disunion and discord. (2) It has made honest 
 manual labour contemptible in this country. (3) It has checked internal 
 and external commerce. (4) It has brought on physical degeneracy by 
 
 * Quoted in the Indian Evangelical Review.
 
 36 CASTE. 
 
 confining marriage within narrow circles. (5) It has been a source 
 of conservatism in every thing. (6) It has suppressed the development 
 of individuality and independence of character. (7) It has helped in 
 developing other injurious customs, such as early marriage, the charging 
 of heavy matrimonial fees, &c. (8) It has successfully restrained the 
 growth and development of national worth ; whilst allowing opportunity 
 of mental and spiritual culture only to a limited number of privileged 
 people, it has denied these opportunities to the majority of the lower 
 classes, consequently it has made the country negatively a loser. (9) It 
 has made the country fit for foreign slavery by previously enslaving the 
 people by the most abject spiritual tyranny. 
 
 Balm Kesliab Chandra Sen. An appeal to " Young India/' 
 contains the following : 
 
 "Next to idolatry and vitally connected with its huge system is caste. 
 You should deal with it as manfully and unsparingly as with idolatry. 
 That Hindu castism is a frightful social scourge no one can deny. It 
 has completely and hopelessly wrecked social unity, harmony, and hap- 
 piness, and for centuries it has opposed all social progress. But few 
 seem to think that it is not so much as a social but as a religious institu- 
 tion that it has become the great scourge it really is. As a system of 
 absurd social distinctions, it is certainly pernicious. But when we view 
 it on moral grounds it appears as a scandal to conscience, and an insult 
 to humanity, and all our moral ideas and sentiments rise to execrate it, 
 and to demand its immediate extermination. Caste is the bulwark of 
 Hindu idolatry and the safeguard of Brahminical priesthood. It is an 
 audacious and sacrilegious violation of God's law of human brotherhood. 
 It makes civil distinctions inviolable divine institutions, and in the name 
 of the Holy God sows perpetual discord and enmity among His children ! 
 It exalts one section of the people above the rest, gives the former, 
 under the seal of divine sanction, the monopoly of education, religion 
 and all the advantages of social pre-eminence, and visits them with the 
 arbitrary authority of exercising a tyrannical sway over unfortunate and 
 helpless millions of human souls trampling them under their feet and 
 holding them in a state of miserable servitude. It sets up the Brahmin- 
 ical order as the very vicegerents of the Deity and stamps the mass of 
 the population as a degraded and unclean race, unworthy of manhood and 
 unfit for heaven. Who can tolerate this woeful despotism, this system 
 of abhorrent slavery, this robbery of divine authority ? Fellow-country- 
 men, if you abjure idolatry and rally under the heavenly standard of the 
 true God, you must establish and organize a new brotherhood on the 
 basis of enlightened thoughts and sentiments : in this reformed alliance 
 you must discard and discountenance all caste distinctions, that truth 
 maybe freely embraced by all, Brahmin and Sudra alike, and both by virtue 
 of birthright may secure access to the blessings of spiritual freedom, 
 progress and happiness, without let or hindrance. Abandon idolatry and 
 seek the worship of the true God ; kill the monster caste and form a 
 rational and religious brotherhood of all your reformed countrymen." 
 
 Rev. Dr. Duff. Educated Hindus, throughout India, owe a deep
 
 EFFECTS OF CASTE. 37 
 
 debt of gratitude to this distinguished missionary. It was largely 
 through his influence that the modern system of education was 
 introduced. What did he think of the effects of caste ? 
 
 " In point of fact, has not caste, even in the judgment of many of the 
 more candid of its favourers and palliators, tended, in all ages, under all 
 changes of dynasty, and amid circumstances the most diverse, to cramp 
 and paralyse the vigour of the mental faculties, to retard, if not wholly 
 obstruct, the progress of civilization, to arrest and freeze up the genial 
 current of benevolent feeling, and saturate the whole soul with an isolat- 
 ing, accursed selfishness, to extinguish every spark of true patriotism, 
 and quench all zeal in the promotion of joint enterprises of public utility, 
 to banish alike the conception and the reality of human duties and 
 virtues, or duties and virtues pertaining to man as man, to defeat the 
 ends of truth and righteousness between man and man, and aid and abet 
 the notorious national habits of cruelty and perjury, to form and con- 
 solidate, as by the spell of a freemasonry, those harpy-like fraternities of 
 religious mendicants, and other unproductive classes, that gorge them- 
 selves on the very life-blood of the industrious throughout the land, to 
 facilitate the associated aggregation of dacoits, thugs, and other desperate 
 confederacies for the commission of deadly crim es, to foster and encourage 
 secret cabals, plots, and conspiracies, that may burst forth in a tempest 
 of conflagration and rapine, massacre and blood, to externalise all 
 morality, converting it into a ceaseless round of forms, rites and ceremo- 
 nies, the most puerile, unmeaning, and degrading ; thus practically anni- 
 hilating all moral distinctions, leaving the people without a conscience, 
 and the universe without a God or Righteous Moral Governor ? ' * 
 
 Indn Frakash. Some extracts have already been made from this 
 influential Bombay journal. The remainder is given below : 
 
 " The question is not about going to England, but about an unmanly 
 submission to the vilest and most absurd prejudices of the caste system 
 and Hinduism, which nothing can check and uproot but a spirit of noble 
 independence, rigid moral firmness, and genuine patriotism. The prohi- 
 bition to go to England is the least of our complaints against the 
 tyranny of caste." 
 
 It " extends from the most trifling to the most important affairs of 
 Hindu life. It cripples the independent action of individuals, sows the 
 seed of bitter discord between the different sections of society, encourages 
 the most abominable practices, and dries up all the springs of that 
 social, moral, and intellectual freedom which alone can secure greatness, 
 whether to individuals or nations." 
 
 " Oh God, have mercy on our fallen-countrymen ! Give them true 
 knowledge of Thy Fatherhood, and their brotherhood ; that our countless 
 millions may be bound by one social tie, and joining hand with hand, and 
 heart with heart, move onward in the path of freedom and righteousness, 
 knowledge and glory, and national regeneration." 
 
 * The Indian Rebellion, pp. 344346.
 
 38 CASTE. 
 
 DUTY WITH REGARD TO CASTE. 
 
 This is a question of the greatest importance and of no small 
 difficulty. So long as it is confined to talk, its settlement is easy ; 
 but practical action is a very different thing. 
 
 Some writers dwell upon the evil that would result from the imme- 
 diate abolition of caste. This is the last thing to be dreaded. Caste 
 will " die hard." The fear is not lest it should give up the ghost 
 too quickly, but lest it should require to apologize, like Charles II. 
 for being such an "unconscionable time" in taking its departure. In 
 one form or another, it will exist on the earth as long as the human 
 race in its present condition. " The spirit of caste never dies." 
 
 Duty with regard to caste may be noticed, in turn, under three 
 heads the British Government, Hindus, and Christians. 
 
 I. DUTY OF GOVERNMENT. 
 
 The British Government should no longer use its vast influence 
 to maintain caste distinctions. The Sepoy Rebellion was a terrible 
 result of petting and pampering caste. It is granted that something 
 has already been done. Means have been taken to prevent caste 
 combinations in the Native army. All castes may draw water from 
 public wells, be admitted into public schools, and sit together in 
 railway carriages. The fact that Brahmans have had practically a 
 monopoly of Government official service has also received some 
 attention. Dr. Cornish remarked : 
 
 " Politically it is not to the advantage of the Government that every 
 question connected with the progress of the country should be viewed 
 through the medium of Brahman spectacles. The contempt which the 
 Brahmans evince for the lower classes, is in itself a serious bar to their 
 usefulness in many phases of official life, and the true policy of the state 
 would be to limit their numbers in official positions, and to encourage 
 a larger proportion of non-Brahmanical Hindus and Mussulmans to enter 
 official service, so as to allow no special pre-eminence, or great preponder- 
 ance of any particular caste." Census Report for 1871, p. 197. 
 
 To the present time, however, the British Government, not inten- 
 tionally but indirectly, is one of the chief agencies for the perpetu- 
 ation of caste distinctions, and with them of caste feuds. This is 
 done in two ways : 
 
 1. By registering in the Census Returns the most minute caste 
 distinctions, and entering them in a scale graded according to caste 
 ideas. The Madras Census Returns for 1881 gave 19,044 Caste 
 names (Report, vol. I. p. 102). Dr. Cornish says, " The castes are 
 entered in the order in which native authorities are pretty generally 
 agreed as the order of their relative importance." (Report for 1871,
 
 DUTY WITH EEGAED TO CASTE. 
 
 p. 117). The arrangement and the number belonging to each in the 
 Madras Presidency in 1881 are given in the following table : 
 
 No. 
 
 Caste Name. 
 
 Occupation. 
 
 Total Number. 
 
 1 
 
 Brahmans 
 
 Priests 
 
 1,122,070 
 
 2 
 
 Kshatriyas 
 
 Warriors 
 
 193,550 
 
 3 
 
 Shetties 
 
 Traders 
 
 640,047 
 
 4 
 
 Vellalars 
 
 Cultivators 
 
 7,767,463 
 
 5 
 
 Idaiyars 
 
 Shepherds 
 
 1,586,000 
 
 6 
 
 Kammalars 
 
 Artizans 
 
 849,901 
 
 7 
 
 Kanakkan 
 
 Writers 
 
 102,472 
 
 8 
 
 Kaikalar 
 
 Weavers 
 
 979,062 
 
 9 
 
 Vanniyan 
 
 Labourers 
 
 3,751,093 
 
 10 
 
 Kushavan 
 
 Potters 
 
 263,975 
 
 11 
 
 Satani 
 
 Mixed Castes 
 
 625,455 
 
 12 
 
 Shembadavan 
 
 Fishermen 
 
 873,448 
 
 13 
 
 Shanan 
 
 Toddy-drawers 
 
 1,621,111 
 
 14 
 
 Ambattan 
 
 Barbers 
 
 348,390 
 
 15 
 
 Vannan 
 
 Washermen 
 
 528,535 
 
 16 
 
 Pariahs 
 
 Labourers 
 
 4,439,253 
 
 17 
 
 Others, includ- 
 
 
 
 
 ing " Not Stated." 
 
 
 
 2,811,841 
 
 
 
 
 28,497,666 
 
 Government, of course, repudiates all claim to settle precedence, 
 of placing shepherds above writers, fishermen above toddy-drawers, 
 &c., but the effect is all the same. Shepherds, in the Government 
 Tables, are of the fifth grade ; writers of the seventh, &c. Such a 
 classification may gratify the pride of a small section, but it tends 
 to perpetuate caste disputes among the great bulk of the population. 
 
 It should be stated that in the Census Returns Native Christians 
 are not required to give their original castes. 
 
 2. By entering Caste Distinctions in other public documents and 
 making inquiries in Court about Caste. 
 
 The Bombay Government Education Directory* may be given as 
 an example. It contains a column, "Caste or Religion." The 
 following are some of the entries. "Vania, Brahman, Hindu, 
 Kshatriya, Bania, Coppersmith, Kunbi, Lohar, Mali, &c." 
 
 With regard to the other point, the following illustrations maybe 
 given. In the Telugu country, to the north of Madras, number's 
 belonging to the shoemaker caste, considered one of the most 
 degraded, have become Christians. Brahman officials, when sum-- 
 moning them as witnesses, &c., have wished to add to their Christian 
 names the opprobrious caste designation. English Magistrates in 
 
 * See Bombay Educational Record for April, 1887.
 
 40 CASTE. 
 
 Court have tried to elicit it from the witnesses themselves. The 
 attempt) in some cases, has been successfully resisted. A witness, 
 when asked to give his caste, has simply said, " I am a Christian," 
 and the Magistrate has been obliged to give way. If a Hindu is 
 thrust out of his caste by becoming a Christian, there is no justice 
 in compelling him to answer to the caste name. 
 
 No part of the Proclamation of 1858 is more frequently quoted 
 than 
 
 " It is our further will, that, so far as may be, our subjects, of what- 
 ever race or creed, be freely and impartially admitted to offices in our 
 service, the duties of which they may be qualified by their education, 
 ability and integrity, duly to discharge." 
 
 Brahmans and other so-called high castes consider the employment 
 of a comparative handful of Europeans as a breach of this pledge; 
 but they think it quite proper to exclude the lower castes. 
 
 The following recommendations by the late Dr. Duff indicate the 
 right course on the part of Government : 
 
 " Let us henceforth proclaim it to all India and the world, that in 
 future, we are, as a Government, to have nothing whatever to do with 
 caste, as such, that we are to ask no questions concerning it that we 
 are to look to the highest qualifications for particular business in view, 
 and to these alone, as the determining elements in the selection of candi- 
 dates. Let us honestly act out the spirit and intent of such a proclama- 
 tion, by practically proving to India and the world, that whosoever 
 brings the most eminent qualifications into the labour-market throughout 
 every department military, judicial, fiscal, police, or educational must 
 thereby ensure a decided preference, and fetch the highest price. And 
 let it further be made to be felt, that mental attainments, original and 
 acquired, as well as official aptitude, actual or potential, being equal, he 
 will be the object of choice whose moral character, not in the Hindu 
 ceremonial sense, but in the true European or Christian sense, is best 
 established ; or whose openly avowed and consistently professed moral 
 and religious principles may furnish the surest guarantee for upright- 
 ness and conscientiousness in the discharge of duty. 
 
 " In actually carrying out such an ordinance, let it be decreed that in 
 registering the names of successful candidates, their proper names alone, 
 and not, most as frequently hitherto, their caste be officially recorded ; or 
 if, in addition to the bare name, there be columns for place of nativity, 
 seminary of education, or any other item of identification, let it still be 
 peremptorily forbidden to have any separate column for caste. 
 
 "In these several ways, let caste, without any violent or forcible inter- 
 ference, be simply and absolutely ignored by our Christian Government 
 in connexion with the hundreds of thousands of offices at its disposal 
 throughout every branch of the public service, and the effect will, in 
 time, be found vastly to exceed the apparent smallness and simplicity of 
 the means. The mere fact of such universal and continuous non-recog-
 
 DUTY WITH REGARD TO CASTE. 41 
 
 nition of caste by the paramount and sovereign power will silently operate 
 on the Asiatic mind as by a slow but a steady process of attrition ; and, 
 along with other and more potent influences, will eventually succeed in 
 reducing its once lofty and proud pretensions into something like a fluent, 
 or constantly diminishing and finally evanescent, quantity. 
 
 " Besides its simplicity and practicability, the grand advantage of 
 adopting such a course is, that it obviously involves no violence to reli- 
 gious scruples, no restraint on liberty of conscience."* 
 
 Mr. Sherring, in his elaborate work on Caste, makes similar 
 recommendations : 
 
 " In regard to not a few situations of importance under the Govern- 
 ment, the question is at once asked of candidates, ' To what caste do you 
 belong ?' Official notices commonly state the castes of Government 
 servants ; and thus those of low caste, although holding, it may be, as 
 good positions as those of higher castes, are held up to obloquy and 
 contempt. I believe this is altogether unintentional on the part of the 
 Government. Nevertheless, it is beyond dispute that caste is invigorated, 
 and honoured, by the public attention which is thus paid to it. Moreover, 
 Hindus of good caste, naturally feel that they stand in favour with the 
 Government, by virtue of their caste, and in proportion to its rank, to the 
 disadvantage of Hindus of lower castes, who, on the other hand, are 
 painfully conscious of the comparative dishonour with which they are 
 regarded, and treated, on account of caste inferiority. So inveterate 
 is the habit, in some Government departments, of stating in official 
 documents, the castes of Hindu employees, that even when a Hindu 
 becomes a Christian he is still compelled to state his caste, which, in hia 
 case, is the Christian caste. This recognition of caste by the British 
 Government in India is a custom which it most likely inherited when it 
 took possession of the country and which it has unwittingly observed 
 to the present time, for it would be unjust, as well as absurd, to imagine 
 that the Government, which has so determinately severed itself from all 
 connexion with the Hindu idolatry, would knowingly lend its influence 
 to the propping up of Hindu caste. Still it has done so. Henceforward, 
 however, its connexion with it should cease. It should not recognize the 
 institution in any way whatever. Its official documents, its monthly 
 forms, pay bills, and other papers containing descriptions of its servants, 
 should make no allusion to it. Specially, should the question never 
 be asked of a candidate for a post under Government what is your caste ? 
 The candidate's suitability for a post should be decided by his qualifi- 
 cations, altogether apart from the subject of caste. In short, the 
 Government should carefully abstain by fitting regulations from sanc- 
 tioning such an obnoxious and terrible social evil."f 
 
 Mr. Sherring urges the same course upon merchants and private 
 employers of labour that he does upon Government. 
 
 * The Indian Rebellion, pp. 350-352. 
 
 t Quoted in Indian Evangelical Review), Vol. VII. pp. 191, 192. 
 
 6
 
 42 CASTE. 
 
 To the foregoing may be added the opinion of Sir John Lawrence, 
 in a Punjab order during the Mutiny : 
 
 " The system of caste can no longer be permitted to rule our services. 
 Soldiers and Government servants of every class must be entertained 
 for their merits, irrespective of creed, caste or class. 
 
 The great argument for the retention of caste names is for 
 identification. It may be asked how is this secured in all other 
 countries of the world where caste does not exist ? The three 
 following entries are sufficient. 
 
 1. The name. If a person choose to retain in his name the 
 caste section to which he belongs, as Banerjea, Mudaliar, &c., to 
 this there is no objection. When a claim hinges upon belonging to 
 a particular caste, the question may be put. It is a separate general 
 heading for caste that is condemned. 
 
 2. Employment. 
 
 3. Place of Residence. 
 
 These are enough for postal purposes and they should suffice in 
 other cases. 
 
 It is granted that for statistical objects Caste Returns in the 
 Census Reports are interesting and useful. One great objection 
 might also be obviated by ranking them alphabetically. The last 
 Madras Census Report says : 
 
 " Of late years castes have been so infinitely multiplied that, even 
 if there were any recognised principle of precedence, the nuances of rank 
 would be so light, that the places of the several castes could not be 
 distinguished.... The test of social pre-eminence, as a guide to grading 
 the castes, is not only an impracticable one, but it will become more 
 so, every year." Report, p. 105. 
 
 Still, the disadvantages greatly preponderate even against an 
 alphabetical arrangement. Besides, the great divisions are now 
 sufficiently known. How long the British Government will continue 
 to countenance an unjust system, and help to perpetuate discord 
 among those under its rule, it is hard to say. Great bodies are 
 slow to move. Years of agitation were needed before British troops 
 in India were released from firing salutes in honour of idols. The 
 Bishop of Madras was even censured by the Madras Government 
 for proposing its discontinuance. The British Government long 
 employed Brahmans to pray for rain, while the Ceylon Government 
 paid for " devil dances" for " Her Majesty's Service." 
 
 Some members of Government, like Sir Lepel Griffin, think caste 
 useful in preventing rebellion. Even politically, however, it has 
 its disadvantages. It is sometimes used for combinations to con- 
 ceal injustice and crime. The terrorism and " boycotting" of the 
 National League, which the British Government is trying to sup-
 
 DOTY WITH REGARD TO CASTE. 43 
 
 press in Ireland, is simply a reproduction of the Indian caste ban. 
 The case of the Ahmedabad merchant has been noticed at page 25. 
 
 Not a few European officers become Brahmanised through the 
 influence of their caste subordinates. This has caused the most 
 public-spirited Native of Ceylon, who has made the largest contri- 
 butions for the benefit of the Island, to be passed over in the 
 distribution of Jubilee honours, to please a selfish class, who have 
 sought only their own advancement, and the degradation of large 
 bodies of their countrymen. 
 
 The words of Kingsly have already been quoted. The throne is 
 not to be established by iniquity. Justice between man and man 
 is the only secure basis of Government, and every other foun- 
 dation is rotten. 
 
 Dr. Burnell justly characterises the " Introduction on Caste>" in 
 the Madras Census Report of Dr. Cornish, as " invaluable." Few 
 Europeans had better opportunities for examining the working of 
 caste. His opinion is not that of a Missionary or an "irrespon- 
 sible pamphleteer," but of a public officer without bias, after 
 careful investigation. The Introduction concludes with the words 
 that caste " is now the greatest bar to the advance of the Indian 
 people in civilization and aptitude for self-government." Report, 
 p. 130. 
 
 The writer strongly disowns any desire to deal unfairly with 
 Brahmans. So long as they are the best qualified candidates for 
 office, let them be appointed. From their superior advantages for 
 unnumbered generations, they are long likely to retain their 
 superiority. On the other hand, they should not have any prefer- 
 ence simply on the ground of their caste. " A fair field and no 
 favour," should be the guiding principle. There is a Latin proverb, 
 detur digniori, " Let it be given to the more worthy." As Lord 
 Kenyon, a Chief Justice of England, remarked, " There is no rule 
 better established respecting the disposal of every office, in which 
 the public are concerned than this." 
 
 It may be urged that the object of Government is rather to dis- 
 courage caste by a column for it in the Returns it is intended to 
 guard against a preponderance of Brahmans. If so, it is not the 
 first case in which we have intensified an evil by our ill-considered 
 remedies. 
 
 All that Government is asked to do with regard to caste as 
 suggested by Dr. Duff is, " simply to ignore its existence altogether" 
 He adds : 
 
 " Let there be no direct or violent attack, by the arm of secular power, 
 on it or any of its usages. So long as our native fellow-subjects are in 
 darkness, and know and feel, and believe no better, let them retain and 
 freely practise what usages and customs they please, so far as these do 
 not interfere with the peace and order of society, or openly trench on the
 
 44 CASTE. 
 
 grand fundamental laws of general morality. But, while we would 
 studiously abstain from all forcible or sinister means of inducing or com- 
 pelling them to tear asunder and cast away the encumbering fetters 
 of caste, let us be scrupulously careful, both in word and deed, to refrain 
 from aught that would confound bare tolerance with favouring approba- 
 tion simple liberty of conscience with formal sanction of law."* 
 
 II. THE DUTY OF HINDUS. 
 
 1 . It should be made as widely known as possible that caste 
 is not recognised in the Vedas. 
 
 Professor Max Miiller first printed the whole of the Rig Veda 
 with the commentary of Sayana; and he has devoted nearly his 
 entire life to its study under the most favourable circumstances. 
 What does he say ? 
 
 " There is no authority whatever in the hymns of the Veda for the 
 complicated system of castes. There is no law to prohibit the different 
 classes of the people from living together, from eating and drinking 
 together ; no law to prohibit the marriage of people belonging to differ- 
 ent castes ; no law to brand the offspring of such marriages with an in- 
 delible stigma. There is no law to sanction the blasphemous pretensions 
 of a priesthood to divine honours, or the degradation of any human 
 being to a state below the animal." Chips. Vol. 11. 
 
 Mr. J. Siromani, M.A., B.L., and of the College of Pundits, Nadiya, 
 in his Commentary on Hindu Law, quotes the following from Gold- 
 stiicker, a distinguished Sanskrit scholar : 
 
 " The institution of caste, however, seems at the time (the Sanhita 
 period) to have been unknown, for there is no evidence to prove that the 
 names which at a later period were current for the distinction of caste, 
 were employed in the same sense by the poets of these hymns." p. 13. 
 
 Mr. Siromani says, "In former times a girl of the lower caste 
 could be taken in marriage. But intermarriage between the several 
 castes is forbidden in the present age. There is no express prohibi- 
 tion in the Shastras as to intermarriage between several classes of 
 the same caste." p. 68. 
 
 Mr. K. K. Bhattachar jy a, late Professor of Sanskrit in the 
 Presidency College, Calcutta, and Tagore Professor of Law, says, 
 " There is overwhelming evidence in ancient texts that in these 
 days intermarriage among the different castes was of very frequent 
 occurrence. "t 
 
 The present stringent rules are simply based on custom. 
 
 2. The effects of caste should be carefully considered, and it 
 
 * The Indian Rebellion, p. 439. f Tagore Law Lectures, p. 73.
 
 DUTY WITH REGARD TO CASTE. 45 
 
 should especially be inquired whether it is consistent with truth 
 and justice. 
 
 Not very long ago there were millions of Negro slaves in the 
 West Indies and the United States, owned by Englishmen and 
 Americans. It was most difficult to convince these slaveholders 
 that it was wrong to retain their fellowmen in bondage, to buy 
 and sell them like cattle. It will be as hard a task for those who 
 have all their lives been accustomed to caste to form a dispassion- 
 ate judgment with regard to its merits. As in the case of the 
 slaveholders also, there is the sacrifice involved if it is wrong. 
 We are easily convinced of what we wish to believe. Still, the 
 duty is plain. God has given us reason, and we are not to act 
 simply like sheep. Our responsibility is the same although we 
 seek to evade it. 
 
 3. If caste is founded on a blasphemous falsehood and is unjust, 
 it should be felt to be sinful to countenance it in any way. 
 
 The late Rev. Dr. Krishna Mohun Banerjea says : 
 
 " Such of our readers as have not absolutely surrendered their mental 
 freedom to the pretended authority of the "Vedas and Puranas, should 
 consider the guilt of conforming to a system which is falsely attributed 
 to a divine original. Of all forgeries the most flagitious and profane is 
 that, which connects the name of the Almighty with an untruth. If the 
 Brahman, the Kshatriya, the Vaishya, and the Sudra did not really 
 proceed from different parts of the Creator's person, the story is nothing 
 short of blasphemy. He who professes assent to such a story by his 
 conformity to the institution of caste is particeps criminis (a sharer in 
 the crime). Even if it were abstractedly right to classify a people, it 
 would still be a participation in the spiritual forgeries of the Shastras 
 to support the specific institution which they have originated." 
 
 It must be acknowledged that an enlightened conscience is 
 needed for this feeling. Hindus are familiar with stories of their 
 highest gods, charging them with the most heinous crimes. Brah- 
 ma, the fabled Creator, is said to have been cursed for his evil 
 deeds, and deprived of worship. Accustomed from infancy to the 
 observance of caste, it becomes a kind of second nature. But 
 though conscience has been deadened and perverted, it has not 
 been altogether destroyed. It is difficult to see how any educated 
 man can honestly say that the caste system, as laid down by Manu, 
 is just and righteous. If, on the other hand, it is unjust and 
 unrighteous, its support, in any way, is to be condemned. Sin sits 
 lightly upon the conscience of the Hindu, and to argue that 
 because a thing is wrong in itself he ought to give it up, he regards 
 as a non sequitur not a necessary deduction. It ought to be 
 shown that it is contrary to custom. In time, however, more cor- 
 rect views will prevail.
 
 46 CASTE. 
 
 4. The Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man should 
 be recognised and acted upon. An English poet says, 
 
 " Children we are all 
 Of one Great Father, in whatever clime 
 His providence hath cast the seed of life ; 
 All tongues, all colours." 
 
 The Mahabharata has the following : 
 
 " Small souls inquire ' Belongs this man 
 To our own race, or class, or clan ? ' 
 But larger- hearted men embrace 
 As brothers all the human race." 
 
 That there is no real distinction between men is admitted by all 
 who have any claim to intelligence. 
 
 In one of the Pitakas, the sacred books of the Buddhists, it is 
 said, that " Caste is a sound, and nothing but a sound." Ashwa- 
 gosha argues that different animals can be distinguished by differ- 
 ent structure. We can say "this is a bull's foot; that a deer's 
 foot," and so on. But there are no sitniliar differences between the 
 castes into which men are divided. 
 
 Yudhisthira says in the Vana-parva : 
 
 " The speech, the mode of propagation, the birth, the death of all 
 
 mankind are alike I have already declared that he is a Brahman in 
 
 whom purity of conduct is recognised." 
 
 The Santi-parva is even more explicit. Bharadvaja says : 
 
 " Desire, anger, fear, cupidity, grief, apprehension, hunger, fatigue, 
 prevail over us all ; by what then is caste discriminated ? Sweat, urine, 
 excrement, phlegm, bile and blood (are common to all) ; the bodies of all 
 decay ; by what then is caste discriminated ? Brigu replies : There 
 is no difference of castes ; this world, having been at first created by 
 Brahma entirely Brahmanic, became (afterwards) separated into castes 
 in consequence of works." 
 
 " There is a monotheism/' says Max Miiller, " which precedes 
 the polytheism of the Veda." As already mentioned, the ances- 
 tors of the Hindus, Greeks, Romans, and English, once lived to- 
 gether worshipping the same God, under the same name a name 
 which meant Heaven-Father. The long separated Aryan nations 
 should use again, " the primeval prayer, in that form which will 
 endure for ever, ' Our Father which art in heaven.' ' ! 
 
 The Bible says that God " hath made of one blood all nations of 
 men to dwell on all the face of the earth." " Have we not all one 
 father ? hath not one God created us ?" Let us acknowledge 
 each other as brethren, and treat each other as brethren. 
 
 The golden rule should be followed : " All things whatsoever ye
 
 DUTY WITH REGARD TO CASTE. 47 
 
 would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." This 
 strikes at the root of caste. 
 
 5. No opprobrious caste names should be used, and all should be 
 addressed without indignity. It has been shown that there is no 
 such thing as caste distinctions, and that to maintain them is to 
 maintain a falsehood. It has also been pointed out that the so- 
 called low castes are very necessary members of the community, and 
 that they are entitled to gratitude rather than disdain on account 
 of the disagreeable duties they have to perform. A Chandal who 
 supports himself and his family by honest labour deserves far more 
 respect than a Brahman who spends his time in idleness and gains 
 his living by false claims. One of the Shastras contains the following : 
 " Caste is not regarded by the gods, but rather those virtues that 
 promote universal happiness : and even an outcaste, if he possesses 
 them, is owned by them as a Brahman." 
 
 The rudeness of some Europeans is a frequent and, in some cases, 
 a just complaint in Native papers. None regret it more than some 
 of their own countrymen. But there is a religious silence regard- 
 ing the degradation to which many millions are daily subjected. 
 The Indian Mirror justly remarks : 
 
 If ten Englishmen behave haughtily towards the Natives, they deserve 
 to be condemned, and they will be condemned throughout the civilised 
 world by every right- thinking man. What we contend for is that while 
 we are apt to animadvert on the overbearing conduct of a certain class of 
 Englishmen, we seem indifferent or perhaps blind to the same defect in 
 ourselves." 
 
 The Times of India says, ' ' No Englishman treats the Natives of 
 this country with the contempt and insolence which high caste 
 Hindoos habitually display towards their low-caste brethren." 
 
 The Sinhalese are said to have 16 forms of the second personal 
 pronoun, ranging from the highest respect to the utmost contempt. 
 The last is constantly used by many of the so-called high castes in 
 speaking to numbers of their fellow-countrymen, rendering to them 
 useful service. 
 
 Smiles says, " There are many tests by which a gentleman may 
 be known ; but there is one that never fails how does he exercise 
 power over those subordinate to him ? " There are men that cringe 
 to their superiors, who, in speaking to their inferiors, could not 
 assume harsher and more contemptuous language were they speak- 
 ing to a dog. 
 
 The last words uttered by the Duke of Wellington were, "Yes, 
 if you please," addressed to a servant who asked him if he would 
 take a cup of tea. The " Great Duke " had been accustomed to 
 command large armies, and to be waited on by some of the noblest 
 in the land ; but thus he spoke to one of his common servants.
 
 48 CASTE. 
 
 The Bible command is "Honour all men." Let every person be 
 addressed in terms which do not imply any disi'espect. 
 
 6. Subdivisions of the same caste should freely eat together 
 and intermarry. It is not desirable, as a rule, for persons widely 
 dissimilar in social position and tastes to marry. A Pariah girl, well 
 educated in a Mission Boarding School, may herself be a suitable 
 match for an educated Brahman, but in India when a man marries 
 a wife he is considered also to marry all her relations, who think they 
 have a right to come and quarter themselves upon him. The first and 
 easiest step is that proposed by Professor Ranganatha Mudaliyar: 
 
 " Can nothing be done to bring into intermarrying relations all the 
 members of a class like Mudaliars or Nayadus ? That the son of one 
 Nayadu should marry the daughter of another Nayadu does not seem to 
 involve any violation of the Vedic or Smrithic precepts. No religions 
 scruples need be set at rest, and I presume there will be no great opposi- 
 tion from the priest. Custom is the only foe to contend with. I would 
 fain think that if a small beginning were made in the way of uniting three 
 or four of the many sections of Mudaliyars, the advantageous character 
 of the union would be readily and fully appreciated, and the way be 
 prepared for a further blending together of the sections that now stand 
 apart. In a matter like this, the chief city should set the example, and 
 the towns in the mofussil will follow suit, sooner or later." 
 
 It has been shown that the Vedas do not contain any restriction 
 whatever about marriages, and that even in the time of Manu there 
 were intermarriages between the different castes. The present 
 system of forbidding marriages between numerous sections of the 
 same caste is modern, and rests wholly on custom. 
 
 7. Educated men of the same social standing should eat 
 together and their families should intermarry. This would be 
 the second step in advance. 
 
 The great caste rod of terror is the prohibition of marriage, 
 Hindus feel bound to marry their children, and if outcasted this is 
 impossible according to their ideas. There are now so many edu- 
 cated and intelligent Hindus in the great cities of India, that they 
 outnumber several of the subdivisions that confine intermarriage to 
 themselves. A greater choice of marriage would thus be permitted, 
 while there would also be a greater similarity of tastes and greater 
 happiness. Early marriage would not be necessary, and girls might 
 be properly educated. 
 
 It has been proposed that a union of this kind should be formed 
 among educated men, who would bind themselves to intermarry 
 their children. If this were done, it would give a great impulse 
 to the movement throughout India. 
 
 8. Educated men, on returning from Europe, should refuse to 
 make expiation. One of the most degrading features of Hinduism 
 is its animal worship. No doubt this has existed in all ages among
 
 DUTY WITH EEGARD TO CASTE. 49 
 
 savage or semi-civilized nations ; but perhaps its lowest depth is 
 reached in India. Not only is the cow worshipped, but her very 
 excrements are considered sacred. Her urine is the best of all holy 
 waters a sin-destroying liquid which purifies every thing it touches. 
 Among the Parsis, it is brought to the house every morning. Cow- 
 dung is supposed to be of equal efficacy. The ashes produced by 
 burning this substance are of such a holy nature that they have 
 only to be sprinkled over a sinner to convert him into a saint.* 'To 
 swallow a pill composed of the fivet products of the cow will even 
 purify a man from the deep pollution of a visit to England. 
 
 That the ignorant should cling to caste, is only what might be 
 expected ; but it is humiliating that some men who ought to be the 
 leaders of enlightened public opinion bend their necks to its yoke. 
 
 Mr. Sherring says of some : " With all their weight of learning 
 the possession of which enables them to carry off University degrees 
 and honours, they are perfectly content to mingle among the most 
 superstitious and ignorant Hindus, to do as they do, to obey their 
 foolish dictum as law, and to have no other aim in life than to 
 conform to the most rigid usages of their ancestors." 
 
 The Hindu Patriot) the leading Native paper, while under the 
 editorship of the late Hon. Kristo Das Pal, remarked : 
 
 " As Indians, we should feel humiliated to see any one of oar fellow- 
 Indians, with silly caste-notions in his head, travelling to Europe espe- 
 cially, when the traveller pretends to represent the rising and educated 
 classes of this great continent. We do not wish people in England, in 
 Europe, to believe that what we call 'education ' has not yet freed our 
 intellects from the trammels of superstition ; that we are afraid even to 
 drink a glass of pure water from the hands of an Englishman, lest the 
 recording angel should make a damning entry against us in his books ! 
 India can never be regenerated till she has outlived the oppressive insti- 
 tution of caste ; and she can never outlive the oppressive system of caste, 
 
 if we are to look to men like who begins like a daring rebel, 
 
 but ends into an imbecile swallower of penitential pills !" 
 
 Mr. N. Gr. Chandavarker, the Bombay delegate to England, said 
 with truth recently : " Above all, we are a caste-ridden people, and 
 where caste exists, there the political spirit can and will never 
 prosper/' Professor Bhandarkar says : " The caste system is at 
 the root of the political slavery of India." 
 
 But such disgraceful concessions to caste and animal worship 
 have a far more important bearing than even upon political advance- 
 ment. Referring to an instance in 1886, The Indian Messenger 
 justly remarks : 
 
 " We find in this only cause to mourn for we look upon it as one more 
 
 * Sir Monier Williams, Religious Thought in India, p. 318. 
 t Milk, curds, ghee, urine, and dung.
 
 50 CASTE. 
 
 act, tending to make the present Hindu society hollow and hypocritical. 
 Under the influence of Western education a young man may discard 
 many things, but let him not discard sincerity, the only thing that can 
 entitle a man to the respect of his fellowmen, and without which no 
 man or no nation was ever ennobled." 
 
 All Indians, however, on their return from England, have not 
 acted the part of the poltroon. One good result has been that it 
 is beginning to be admitted that expiation is not necessary. 
 
 III. THE DUTY OF CHRISTIANS. 
 
 Professing Christians are especially bound not to exhibit the 
 caste spirit in any degree. The Hindu thinks that caste has 
 religious authority, and that it is his duty to obsei've it. The 
 Christian, on the other hand, who keeps caste, is acting in direct 
 opposition to his professed Master. The second great commandment 
 is, " Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Christ also says, 
 "Ye are brethren." Another precept of the New Testament is, 
 "In honour preferring one another." All these are incompatible 
 with the caste spirit. 
 
 Just as the fiercest caste disputes are among Pariahs and shoe- 
 makers, so some of the Native Christians who are most tenacious 
 about caste were originally of what are called the lower castes. 
 Brahman converts to Christianity, in general, are more free from 
 the spirit. 
 
 The excuse is made that caste is observed among Christians 
 simply as a distinction of rank; but its features and results are the 
 same as in the Hindu system. It depends upon birth alone, and 
 is unchangeable. It is founded on pride and falsehood. Its father 
 is Satan, whose condemnation was pride,*and who was a liar from 
 the beginning. Those who manifest it show by their spirit to 
 whom they belong. 
 
 It is not proposed that all classes of Christians should eat together 
 or intermarry. Their tastes and circumstances differ greatly, and, 
 as it as already been remarked with reference to Hindus, dissimi- 
 larity in these respects is a bar to happiness in the married life. 
 But in church there should not be any distinction, nor should it 
 once be named among Christians in ordinary life. 
 
 Although the Ceylon Buddhists observe caste, it is also contrary 
 to their religion. 
 
 PROSPECTS OF CASTE. 
 
 The motto on the title page, from Sir Madhava Row, applies 
 especially to caste : 
 
 " The longer one lives, observes and thinks, the more deeply does 
 he feel there is no community on the face of the earth which suffers
 
 PROSPECTS OP CASTE. 51 
 
 less from political evils and more from self-inflicted or self -accepted, 
 or self-created, and, therefore, avoidable evils, than the Hindu 
 community ! ! " 
 
 There is a Persian proverb, " The proper devil of mankind is 
 man." People are their own worst enemies. God said, through 
 Jeremiah, of the Jews in ancient times, " The prophets prophesy 
 falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means ; and my people 
 love to have it so." The iron of slavery has entered into a soul 
 of the Hindus. They have become " hereditary bondsmen," nay, 
 they even hug their fetters. Like ignorant Hindu women, they are 
 quite content, or rather, like the ancient Jews, they "love to have 
 it so/' To be unconscious of their degradation is their deepest 
 degradation. 
 
 The discouragements and encouragements in the way of reform 
 will now be noticed. 
 
 Opposition to Reform from false Patriotism. It has been re- 
 marked that the " spirit of caste never dies." At present among a 
 section of educated Hindus it takes the shape of an exaggerated 
 idea of their ancient civilization, and in proof of this they maintain 
 the superiority of their social customs to the changes which certain 
 reformers seek to introduce. 
 
 Fifty years ago the words of Burns were hailed with enthusiasm 
 by a large meeting in Calcutta : 
 
 " For a' that, and a' that, 
 It's comin' yet for a' that, 
 That man to man, the world o'er. 
 Shall brothers be, for a' that." 
 
 The following quotation from the Indu Prakash shows a very 
 different spirit : 
 
 " The Indian Messenger is responsible for the following statement : 
 ' It was bat the other day that we heard of a student of a low caste, who 
 has passed the F. A. examination this year, being looked upon with 
 extreme dislike by his fellow-students, who wished that he should not be 
 allowed to sit on the same bench with them.' Bat for the fact that the 
 statement is made by a paper, which is scrupulously accurate in its 
 facts, we should have doubted it. But the fact is and no one that 
 reads the signs of the times can fail to notice it and be painfully im- 
 pressed by it well, we say the fact is that there seems to be a strong, 
 blind, unreasonable, and suicidal reaction in favour of customs which 
 have contributed to the downfall of the ancient Hindu race. Caste is 
 good ; infant marriage is good : enforced widowhood is good." 
 
 The Subodh Patrika contains the following account of a meeting 
 lately held in Calcutta : 
 
 " The anti-reform spirit which we find displayed in Bombay and Poona 
 among our young graduates and still younger undergraduates and other
 
 52 CASTE. 
 
 students has its exact counterpart in Calcutta. At a recent meeting of a 
 students' association in Calcutta, we learn from a Calcutta paper, the 
 subject of early marriages was brought up for discussion. One of the 
 speakers had the hardihood to denounce the custom in very strong 
 language. For this he was hissed and laughed at by the audience ; nay, 
 such was the feeling displayed at the meeting and such the noise and din 
 Avhich ensued, that the President of the meeting, no less a person than 
 Babu S. N. Banerji, had, we learn, to adjourn the debate to another day. 
 On this occasion, the audience patiently listened to a stout defence of 
 the time-honoured custom, but compelled another speaker who raised his 
 voice against it to resume his seat without completing his speech. 
 Thereupon Mr. Banerji called upon Pandit Shivnath Shastri to address 
 the meeting, but he very wisely declined the honour. In this way, did 
 the rising hope of Calcutta establish its patriotism on the occasion."* 
 
 Principal Wordsworth, acknowledged to be one of the warmest 
 friends of India, and from his position having the best means of 
 ascertaining the truth, makes the following severe remarks regard- 
 ing the action of some educated Hindus : 
 
 " I need hardly say, that I consider the existence of the Hindu child- 
 widow one of the darkest blots that ever defaced the civilisation of any 
 people, and it is the direct and necessary consequence of the system of 
 infant marriage. Some years ago I should have expected that these 
 sentiments would have found an echo in the bosom of every Hindu who 
 had received an English education, and particularly among those persons 
 who were attempting to appropriate the political methods and ideas 
 of Englishmen. I have no such delusion now. I find some of them 
 employing all the resources of theological sophistry and cant, not simply 
 to palliate, but to vindicate what is plainly one of the most cruel, 
 blighting, and selfish forms of human superstition and tyranny. I find 
 others manoeuvring to arrest every sincere effort at reform, sophisticating 
 between right and wrong, defaming the character and motives of refor- 
 mers, and labouring to establish by arguments as ridiculous as they are 
 insulting, that English domestic society offers a warniug rather than an 
 example to Hindus. I find them vindicating early marriage as the only 
 safeguard against universal sexual license, a confession of moral incom- 
 petence which I should have thought that any people with a grain of 
 self-respect would have shrunk from advaiicing."f 
 
 The Hindu complains of somewhat the same spirit being mani- 
 fested in Madras : 
 
 " We have observed of late a tendency on the part of some of our 
 educated countrymen to apply their mental powers for irrationally 
 reactionary purposes. Social customs and institutions which are evil 
 in their results, and are the product of past simpler and less civilized 
 conditions, have received elaborate defence ; and even certain merits 
 
 * Quoted in Bombay Guardian, 6th August, 1887. 
 t Letter to Mr. M. Malabari.
 
 PROSPECTS OP CASTE. 53 
 
 have been attached to them. The general community of educated natives 
 have rejected them, if not all of them in practice, but at least in their 
 beliefs, as injurious to social progress, and as being inconsistent with 
 modern civilization. Yet we have seen tolerably educated men setting 
 up elaborate defences of them and even going the length of denouncing 
 the majority, not agreeing with them as unpatriotic, denationalized and 
 so forth ... A sentiment of pride in our own annals is necessary for any 
 people to feel self-respect. It is reasonable and wholesome if we indulge 
 it as a stimulus to our attachment to the country and to patriotic reform. 
 But to take a past state of things which is separated from the present 
 by centuries of barbarous history, as the pattern of reform, is to aim 
 not at progression but at retrogression." 
 
 The Indian Messenger points out the injurious effects upon the 
 moral character, of those who take part in such movements, and 
 attributes them to a false patriotism : 
 
 " We sincerely regret the recent agitation iu favour of infant-marriage, 
 not because we are in any way afraid lest it should obstruct the cause 
 of social progress in this country, but because this retrograde movement 
 will tell seriously upon the intellectual honesty of the rising generation, 
 and give a premium to hypocrisy and false self-satisfaction. Infant- 
 marriage is doomed ; its utter banishment from society is simply a 
 question of time. We harbour no fear on that score. But the only 
 thing that we regret in connection with the recent agitation is its hollow, 
 insincere character. When people who would never think of giving their 
 own daughters in marriage before they were fully grown up, who have, 
 in their own family, given practical proofs of their partiality for adult- 
 marriages, when they now come forward as apologists for early 
 marriages, the value of their agitation may well be ascertained. Most 
 men feel infant-marriage to be a grave social evil but a false patriotism 
 and a false idea of nationality come in, and kick up a spurious, hollow, 
 and insincere agitation in support of it. That is the real evil. This 
 tendency to hide our own shortcomings, and parade the virtues of social 
 institutions which in our heart of hearts we detest, this hypocrisy and 
 insincerity is what we regret most." 
 
 Great indignation was expressed at Sir Lepel Griffin on account 
 of the following remarks : 
 
 " The real friends of India are not those who persuade the natives that 
 they are already the equals of their teachers, and that after a few years 
 of imperfect training they are ripe for institutions which, in England, are 
 the outcome of the constitutional struggles of centuries, and have been 
 bought by blood and tears, by much suffering and by long endurance. 
 Let the young Hindu students, who so loudly talk of their grievances, 
 remember that more personal and political freedom is enjoyed by natives 
 of India than is the lot of any modern people in Europe, and that the 
 English nation has no wish to arbitrarily withhold from them any of the 
 rights and privileges of a common citizenship. Let them prove their 
 civilization by emancipating their women from the curse of infant-mar-
 
 54 CASTE. 
 
 riage and virgin widowhood, and admit them to an honoured place, side 
 by side with men: let them demonstrate their intellectual power by 
 original research, and their fitness for political enfranchisement by 
 moderation, dignity, and self-restraint ; while they refrain from childish 
 abuse of those who tell them that they must learn to walk before they 
 can run. When they have accomplished this, Englishmen will listen 
 with patience to their demand for representative institutions, if by that 
 time they have not become too wise to hanker after so doubtful a 
 blessing." 
 
 Some Indian reformers now seem almost inclined to agree with 
 Sir Lepel Griffin. The Indian Spectator (10th July, 1887) has the 
 following : 
 
 " In the course of an excellent article, headed, The Cry for Representa- 
 tive Government, last week's Indu Prakash makes the following remarks. 
 We have given expression to similar views more than once and hold to 
 these views with greater tenacity the more we see of the work of our 
 ' national representatives ' in India. We are led to ask at such moment 
 tvho are our representatives and whom do they represent '? These are 
 the reflections of the Indu Prakash : 
 
 " We have begun to doubt whether the cause of social reform where 
 it requires legitimate legislative help will be promoted if the elective 
 principle be introduced into our Councils just at present. We need more 
 assurance on the point and we are afraid that assurance events that have 
 transpired so far and the spirit that seems to prevail have failed to give 
 us. What will be the gain to the country if men who are sent as its 
 representatives would abolish the Widow Marriage Act or insist, on 
 imprisoning women to enforce harsh customs, or if those who would 
 exhibit such a reactionary spirit ai-e returned to the Council ? The 
 present attitude towards social reform questions must change, or else it 
 may prove a leap in the dark. Let us not be misunderstood. We 
 fully believe that the life of the country depends on its social arrange- 
 ments and, therefore, social reform, to our mind, must proceed along, if 
 not precede, political progress. Yet we do not mean that changes should 
 be forced on an unwilling people by penal or coercive enactments. What, 
 however, is clearly essential to the success of the cry now so generally 
 raised is that there should be guarantee that the elective legislature 
 will not be actuated by a spirit of blind and caste-ridden conservatism, 
 and that the social problem will meet with a fair treatment, free from 
 the spirit of tyranny which Professor Wordsworth has justly charac- 
 terised as blighting and selfish." 
 
 Some years ago Mr. Manomohun Ghose said : 
 
 " He felt a legitimate pride in the ancient civilization of India, but he 
 was bound to say that an undue and exaggerated veneration for the past 
 was doing a great deal of mischief. It was quite sickening to hear the 
 remark made at almost every public meeting that the ancient civilization 
 of India was superior far to that which Europe ever had." 
 
 National conceit, instead of being a proof of enlightenment, is
 
 PKOSPECTS OF CASTE. 55 
 
 exactly the reverse. In vanity the negroes of the Hayti Republic 
 exceed even " Young Bengal." The following illustration is from 
 Chambers' s Journal : 
 
 " The Haytians are an intensely vain people, and the thing they most 
 pride themselves on is their army. Nothing will convince them that as 
 a military power they are not vastly superior to any nation either in the 
 Old or New World. Even those who have lived in European capitals are 
 addicted to this extremely ridiculous ' balderdash ;' but when the real 
 facts are presented, the state of affairs disclosed is simply sublime in 
 its absurdity. The Haytian army must present to European beholders 
 a spectacle of grotesqueness, the equal of which it would be difficult to 
 find anywhere either in fact or fiction. Imagine a battalion on parade 
 consisting of thirteen privates, ten officers, and six drummers ! the rest 
 of the men as the author quaintly pats it thinking it unnecessary to 
 present themselves except on pay-day. The staff-officers are clad in the 
 most gorgeous uniforms procurable; while the men are habited in a motley 
 array of tatters. Some have coats wanting one arm, the collar, or the 
 tail, the headgear may consist of a dilapidated shako, a straw-hat, wide- 
 awake, or in many cases merely a handkerchief tied round the head. 
 The officers hold their swords in either hand as suits them ; and the men 
 march past in admirable confusion, each one carrying his musket in the 
 position he finds most convenient. The populace look on with admiring 
 looks, and gravely ask if finer troops can anywhere be found." May, 1887. 
 
 The meeting in Calcutta in favour of early marriages that would 
 not allow the opposite side even to be heard, was composed largely 
 of school-boys; but it must be admitted that even many graduates 
 have only a thin whitewash of Western enlightenment the pure 
 Hindu is immediately below the surface ; or, as Mr. Cotton expresses 
 it in New India, " Collegiate impressions are at present like a 
 tinselled outdoor decoration, discarded by their possessor as a 
 superfluity in private." (p. 147). 
 
 While the English occupy a high place, in several respects, 
 among the nations of the earth, it is readily admitted that wide- 
 spread evils exist among them, calling loudly for reform. Some of 
 them, like the Poet Laureate, are inclined almost to take a pessi- 
 mistic view of the stafe of things. 
 
 Tennyson, when a young man, wrote in Locks-ley Hall : 
 
 " Yet I doubt not through the ages an increasing purpose runs, 
 And the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns." 
 
 Recent cases of Irish savagery and other things made Locksley 
 Hall Sixty Years After adopt a different tone : 
 
 " Gone the cry of ' Forward, Forward," lost within a growing gloom : 
 Lost, or only heard in silence from the silence of a tomb. 
 Half the marvels of my morning, triumphs over time and space, 
 Staled by frequence, shrunk by usage into commonest commonplace. 
 ' Forward ' rang the voices then, and of the many mine was one, 
 Let us hush this cry of ' Forward ' till ten thousand years have gone."
 
 56 CASTE. 
 
 When Englishmen seek to strengthen the hands of Hindu 
 reformers, it is no answer for the orthodox or their allies among 
 "Young India/' to point to evils in Britain. Neither are Hindus 
 urged to copy any example because it is English. Some of their 
 customs are neither right nor wrong in themselves ; in some they 
 excel the English ; only those which are injurious and unjust 
 ought to be abandoned. 
 
 Encouragements. The earlier utterances of Tennyson more 
 nearly express the truth than his later. The cry of " Forward " is 
 not yet '' gone," though the progress may be slow. When Rammo- 
 hun Roy, seventy years ago, began his crusade against widowburn- 
 ing, it found as enthusiastic defenders in Calcutta as early marriages 
 at present. The Dharma Sabha was founded to pi-eserve this 
 Hindu "institution." The Bengali Chandrika was its warm sup- 
 porter. It was not till 1831, when Rammohun Roy was in England, 
 that the "last appeal of the members of the Dharma Sabha against 
 the abolition of the burning of widows was heard in the Privy 
 Council and rejected."* 
 
 As a reformer, Rammohun Roy had to endure much personal 
 obloquy. He writes : " I was at last deserted by every person 
 except two or three Scotch friends, to whom and the nation to which 
 they belong, I always feel grateful." t 
 
 It must be confessed that the roasting alive of widows would 
 probably still find some defenders in Bengal. Sir Lepel Griffin 
 says, " I was yesterday reading a Bengali newspaper which observed 
 that if the native press had been as strong formerly as at present, 
 the Government would have been unable to abolish suttee." J 
 
 Still, the honour lately done to the memory of Rammohun Roy 
 in Calcutta is a proof of progress. 
 
 Another encouraging sign is that the reformers represent the 
 real intellect and knowledge of the country. Mr. Manomohun 
 Ghose expressed the following opinion of " the much-vaunted 
 civilization of India" : 
 
 " It must be admitted by all who had carefu'lly studied the ancient 
 literature of India, that the much-vaunted civilization of India was of a 
 peculiar type, and that it never could bear any comparison to what we 
 call modern European civilization. Whatever might have been the case 
 in ancient times, he thought that this frequent appeal to our ancient 
 civilization could serve no good purpose at the present day, while it was 
 simply calculated to make the Bengalis more conceited than they were." 
 
 Dr. Bhandarkar, of the Deccan College, a distinguished orienta- 
 list, lately expressed the same sentiments in Bombay. 
 
 * Max Miiller's Biographical Essays, pp. 25, 26. 
 
 t Ibid, p. 48. 
 
 J Asiatic Quarterly Review^ Vol. I. p. 475.
 
 PROSPECTS OP CASTE. 57 
 
 Really intelligent men among the Hindus, admit the need of 
 reform. The Hon. K. T. Telang said in Bombay : 
 
 "He thought it well that they should be reminded of their individual 
 or national defects, either by outsiders or by men of their own community, 
 and he was sorry to see the impatience manifested in some quarters at 
 such defects being pointed out. The consciousness of defects was a 
 healthy sign of the first condition of progress, and was not at all incom- 
 patible with a proper amount of self-respect." 
 
 It is a maxim of national self-conceit and false history that 
 "Reform must come from within." On the contrary, as a rule, 
 " Reform must begin from without." So much is this the case that 
 Sir H. S. Maine, in a Calcutta Convocation Address, traced the root 
 of all progress to the Greeks : 
 
 " With one single exception, no race or nationality, left entirely to 
 itself, has developed any intellectual result which is valuable or durable, 
 except perhaps poetry. Not one of all those intellectual achievements 
 which we regard as characteristic of the great progressive races of the 
 world, not the law of the Romans, not the philosophy and sagacity of the 
 Germans, not the luminous order of the French, not the political aptitude 
 of the English would ever have come into existence, if those races had 
 been left to themselves. To one small people, covering, in its original 
 seat, no more than a hand's breadth of territory, it was given to create 
 the principle of progress, of movement onwards and not backwards or 
 downwards, of destruction tending to construction. That people was the 
 Greek. Except the blind forces of Nature, nothing moves in this world 
 which is not Greek in its origin. A ferment spreading from that source 
 has vitalized all the great progressive races of mankind, penetrating from 
 one to another, and producing, in each, results accordant with its hidden 
 and latent genius, and results of course often far greater than any 
 exhibited in Greece itself. It is this principle of progress which we 
 English are communicating to India. We did not create it. We deserve 
 no special credit for it. It came to us filtered through many different 
 media. But we have received it, and, as we have received it, so we pass 
 it on." 
 
 While Greek influence is exaggerated, the general principle is 
 true. Any reform movement, to be thorough, must be taken up in the 
 country, but the original impulse generally comes from without. 
 
 Notwithstanding temporary discouragements, the conclusion of 
 the Hon. Mr. Telang may be adopted : 
 
 " He asked them to take a cheerful view of things. Clouds would, of 
 course, sometimes darken the horizon, but they might be sure that these 
 clouds would pass away, and the sun of glory come out again in all its 
 brightness. 
 
 Need of Leaders. The ultimate downfall of the caste system is 
 certain in the end. " Truth conquers." Still, it may be much 
 hastened by the efforts of a few zealous, consistent reformers among 
 
 8
 
 58 CASTE. 
 
 the higher castes. Mr. Sherring says, " If the superior castes 
 are wise as well as politic, they will lose no time in holding out the 
 right hand of fellowship to the lower. Such a step would, by its 
 magnanimity, secure to them much of the respect and honour which 
 they at present enjoy." 
 
 But deeds are wanted not mere words. 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Miller, of Madras, gave an excellent address on 
 "Nothing for Nothing." Good of any kind is not to be obtained 
 unless men are willing to pay the price for it. Among other 
 things he said that " educated Hindus should not forget that fine 
 discussions and elegant speeches, and long orating would not help 
 them a bit towards removing the great evils of enforced widowhood, 
 and infant marriage. There must be action and self-denial." The 
 same remark applies to caste. 
 
 It has been suggested that the first step in practical reform 
 would be for different sections of the same caste to eat together and 
 intermarry. Mr. Sherring thinks that such is the case, even at 
 present, to a large extent, among the Rajputs. The second advance 
 would be similar intercourse between families of different castes, 
 but of about the same social standing. 
 
 A lecture by the Rev. E. P. Rice, B.A., on the " Duties of Citi- 
 zens," points out an easier way of helping to free one's country 
 from the tyranny of social custom. He says : 
 
 " I am not satisfied with it, but I offer it simply on the principle 
 that half a loaf is better than no bread. If all have not the active 
 aggressive courage required for such a coui'se as I have already named, 
 all may at least muster the passive courage of what is called ' masterly 
 inactivity.' If one is not willing to be made a martyr of, much may be 
 done by standing aloof from the martyrdom of others. Refuse to join in 
 the social ostracism by which a heterodox brother is being forced against 
 his conscience, and decline to make any difference in your relations 
 towards him. Probably even this will entail some trouble, but it will 
 be of a minor degree, which ought not to be grudged or to be difficult 
 to bear. It is not necessary that you should agree with the obnoxious 
 member in his opinions or sympathize with his personal character. Of 
 greater importance, it is to side with him in his affirmation of the right 
 of individual liberty. God has made us our brother's helpers, but not 
 our brother's judges. Our own need of forbearance from others should 
 make us very forbearing to them. If others choose to persecute, that is 
 their business, but at least we may refuse to have any thing to do with 
 it, and we shall find many of our fellow-countrymen strengthened by 
 our example."* 
 
 Duty of the so-called " Lower Castes." The prospects of caste 
 also depend a good deal upon the course taken by this large section 
 of the community. Education is levelling up, and it will have this 
 
 * The Hindu, 5th Aiignst, 1887.
 
 PROSPECTS OF CASTE. 59 
 
 effect more and more. Already in Bengal the Vaidyas and the 
 Kayasths occupy a position little inferior to the Brahmans. There 
 are thousands of youths considered to belong to degraded classes 
 now in Colleges and Schools. " The heavy gloom of conscious 
 inferiority," says Sherring, " is passing from their faces, which are 
 becoming bright and cheerful like those of youths of the higher 
 castes." 
 
 The lower castes should avail themselves of every opportunity of 
 acquiring knowledge and improving their position. With regard 
 to cleanliness and good manners, they should seek to be on an 
 equality with the highest to be perfect gentlemen in the truest 
 sense of the world. They should also remember that the less airs 
 they give themselves, the more honour they will receive. There is 
 a South Indian proverb that " When the low caste is exalted, the 
 umbrella must borne even at midnight." Let the truth of this be 
 disproved. 
 
 Some of the attempts of the lower castes to raise themselves 
 only damage their cause. Dr. Cornish remarks it as a curious phase, 
 "That the lower the caste, the more it now claims pre-eminence 
 for itself." He adds : 
 
 " As the lower castes, in those days, frequently send out into the 
 world men who accumulate wealth, so it happens that the surplus funds 
 of such men are often employed in the feeding of pundits to prove the 
 ancient glories of their particular caste. A whole literature of ponder- 
 ous tomes is springing up in Southern India with no other object than 
 the exaltation of caste." 
 
 " The uneasiness of the lower castes in regard to the social position 
 assigned them by Brahmanical authority is simply an indication that, 
 under British rule, they have increased in wealth and intelligence, and 
 naturally desire to prove that the yoke imposed upon them by the caste 
 system was tyrannical and unjust. They seek to accomplish the latter, 
 not by boldly denying the authorities on which the institution of caste 
 was built up, but by claiming a position under the Hindu system which 
 they have no pretensions to." 
 
 Referring to the publications on caste, Dr. Cornish says : 
 
 " The majority of the works of this kind are simply mischievous, 
 inasmuch as they encourage, by fanciful theories, the pretensions of 
 humble communities to seek high places in the Hindu social economy, 
 instead of boldly endeavoring to prove historically that the caste system 
 was of foreign growth, imposed upon them by their northern neighbours 
 as a mark of bondage, and consequently no longer applicable to the 
 existing conditions of a free people under an impartial and just Govern- 
 ment."* 
 
 Fictitious claims only degrade those who make them. The pre- 
 * Madras Census Report, for 1871, pp. 118, 119.
 
 60 CASTE. 
 
 tensions of certain castes to be Rajputs are just as false as those 
 of certain Rajputs to be descended from the sun and moon. 
 
 A stand should be made on the great principles of truth and 
 justice. Honest useful labour, of whatever kind, as a means of 
 living, is far more honourable than one gained by fraud. The son 
 of a barber who raised himself to be Lord Chancellor of England 
 was only the more deserving of respect on that account. 
 
 Religious Reformation the greater Agency. While the measures 
 already mentioned will have some influence, it must be confessed 
 that a religious change is the only effectual remedy. Much was, at 
 one time, expected from education. Mr. Sherring goes so far as 
 to say that, with some noble exceptions, those who have had its 
 advantages are " of all classes the most disappointing." " With all 
 their weight of learning the possession of which enables them to 
 carry of University degrees and honors, they are perfectly content 
 to mingle among the most superstitious and ignorant Hindus, to do 
 as they do, to obey their foolish dictum as law, and to have no 
 other aim in life than to conform to the most rigid usages of their 
 ancestors." The testimony of Mr. H. J. S. Cotton, an unexcep- 
 tionable witness, is much in the same terms : 
 
 " Caste still exercises a predominant influence among all classes of the 
 community. Educated Hindus are puzzled to make out what they owe to 
 their society, and why they render to caste their tribute of submission 
 when there is nothing to compel their obedience. Nevertheless, the 
 institution is as powerful among those who disregard many of its rules 
 as it was with their fathers who rigidly observed them all. They find 
 it as hard to bear excommunication themselves, and are as disposed 
 to inflict that punishment upon wrong-doers of their community, as was 
 the case with their ancestors in the past. They find it as desirable 
 to cling to their caste-fellows, despite many disagreeable features in 
 their life and character, as their predecessors may have done."* 
 
 Some of them, it is true, make fine speeches. A native news- 
 paper thus compares their public and private life : " A Demosthenes 
 at Debating Societies, whose words tell as peals of thunder, a 
 Luther in his public protestations against prevailing corruption, a 
 thorough-going Cockney in ideas and tastes, he is but a timid 
 crouching Hindu in his home, yielding unquestioning submission 
 to the requisitions of a superstitious family." 
 
 Mr. Sherring says of some of the educated classes : " To be satis- 
 fied with calmly looking on and watching the current of events, 
 implies a condition of meanness on the one hand, and incapacity, 
 on the other, and therefore of total unfitness to be ranked a whit 
 higher in the scale of civilization than their uneducated, supersti- 
 tious, and caste-loving neighbours." Even stronger language 
 
 * New India, p. 142.
 
 PROSPECTS OP CASTE. 61 
 
 may be used, for the ignorant have not had their advantages, and 
 are not guilty of insincerity. Still worse is the conduct of those 
 described by Principal Wordsworth, whose learning is employed 
 to "vindicate superstition and tyranny." 
 
 It is gladly admitted that some of the noblest men in India 
 are also to be found among the educated classes, but they are 
 such a very small minority, that Principal Wordsworth singled out 
 " the learned and venerable Dewan of Indore" as " fighting almost 
 single-handed." 
 
 The late Professor of Sanskrit in the Presidency College, Calcutta, 
 in his Tagore Law Lectures, describes caste as " the chief charac- 
 teristic of Hinduism/' (p. 44). Caste and Hinduism must fall 
 together. Whatever may be the evils of caste, the masses believe 
 that it has religious sanction, and must be observed at all cost. 
 The Hon. M. G- Ranade said in a letter to Mr. M. Malabari, 
 " Only a religious revival can furnish sufficient moral strength to 
 work out to the complex social problems which demand our atten- 
 tion." The late KeshabChunder Sen said at Bombay in 1868 : " Were 
 I engaged in the work of reforming this country, I would not be 
 busy in lopping off the branches, but I would strike at the fatal 
 root of the ti-ee of corruption, namely Idolatry. Ninety-nine evils 
 out of every hundred in Hindu society, are, in my opinion, attribu- 
 table to idolatry and superstition." To these testimonies may be 
 added that of Dr. Duff : 
 
 " What, then, can exorcise this Demon Spirit of caste ? Nothing 
 nothing but the mighty power of the Spirit of God, quicken- 
 ing, renewing and sanctifying the whole Hindu soul ! It is grace, 
 and not argument regeneration of nature, and not any im- 
 proved policy of Government in a word, the gospel, the ever- 
 lasting gospel, and that alone, savingly brought home by the 
 energy of Jehovah's Spirit, that can effectually root out and 
 destroy the gigantic evil. And it is the same energy, inworking 
 through the same gospel of grace and salvation, that can and will 
 root out and destroy the other monster evil under which India still 
 groans IDOLATRY, with its grim satellite Superstition. 
 
 " As caste and idolatry sprang up together from the same rank 
 soil of old nature growing with each other's growth, and strength- 
 ening with each other's strength luxuriating in mutual embrace 
 and mysterious wedlock for untold ages flinging abroad their 
 arms, 'branching so broad and long' as to smite the whole land 
 with the blight of their portentous shadow both are destined to 
 fall together. The same cause will inevitably prove the ruin of 
 both. The same light of sound knowledge, human and divine, ac- 
 companied by the grace of God's Spirit, will expose the utter folly 
 and irrationality of idolatry and superstition, and, at one and the
 
 62 CASTE. 
 
 same time, lay bare the cruelty and injustice of that strange, half- 
 natural, half-artificial caste system which has done so much to 
 uphold them. Then will the stupendous fabric of idolatry be seen 
 falling down like Dagon before the Ark of the living God; while 
 the antisocial tyrannous dominion of caste will be resented, abhor- 
 red, and trampled under foot with an indigaation not lessened by 
 the reflection that, over ages and generations without number, it 
 hath already swayed undisturbed the sceptre of a ruthless despot- 
 ism, which ground men down to the condition of irrationals, and 
 strove to keep them there with the rigour of a merciless necessity."'* 
 
 A religion whose "chief characteristic" is based on a blasphemous 
 falsehood, will not always retain its hold. It will be seen to be the 
 invention of priestcraft, and its books will no longer be considered 
 as divine. The true Kalki Avatar will yet come, bringing in a 
 reign of righteousness. He will loose the bands of wickedness, undo 
 the heavy burdens, let the oppressed go free, and break every yoke. 
 
 The writer would conclude his remarks with Milton's noble 
 prayer : 
 
 " Come forth, from Thy royal chambers, Prince of all the 
 kings of the earth ; put on the visible robes of Thy imperial 
 majesty ; take up that unlimited sceptre which Thy Almighty 
 Father hath bequeathed Thee ; for now the voice of Thy bride calls 
 Thee, and all creatures sigh to be renewed !" 
 
 * The Indian Rebellion, pp. 357, 358.
 
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