Preface
There is a saying that 'the world knows little of its greatest men', and I am inclined to apply it to the case of Mr. Roy and India. Nay, I dare say that in this country too his books, printed as they are in India, are not often seen in the windows of our booksellers; though over here few of my anthropological brethren, to do them justice, would seem to be unfamiliar with his writ-ings. But, as regards India, I have a strong suspicion that there still prevails a general lack of interest among the cultured classes in respect to the diversified customs of their ancient land, teeming as it is with folk who have worked out the problem of life for themselves in a thousand different patterns, all alike worthy of inten-sive study on the part of one who would understand the laws of human life in order to improve it. Now I doubt if there is any part of the world that can compete with India in the sheer number of those who are anxious to frame a philosophy of life, and to do their best to live up to it. Quite rightly, however, they associate this philosophy as intimately as possible with their religion; for, since philosophy and religion are in com-mon concerned with ultimate questions, this is undoubt edly the attitude of mind most likely to unify and harmonize the sadly distracted energies and aspirations of the human spirit. But, if on the whole of inferior status, science, as the study of the actual conditions that have hitherto attended and in some sense determined the develop-ment of all life, and of our own life in particular, deserves its fair share of attention from the seeker after the highest and most comprehensive truth. Idealism makes sickly food unless a pinch of realism be added by way of salt. Just as a healthy soul involves a healthy body, so the quest of spiritual good entails a reason able acquaintance with the art of retaining our pre-carious hold on the surface of this planet. As earth-bound creatures we owe it to our higher selves not to neglect those lower things which happen to be essential to our continued existence. Nor is it simply a matter of keeping on good terms with matter. As members of society we condition one another from withe out no less than, so far as real sympathy is established, we can do so from within. Hence history and such historical disciplines as sociology and social psychology can well afford to aim at an objective treatment analo-gous to, if distinct from, the empiricism of the physical sciences. Before spiritual contact can be made between one people and another, they must have come to realize in a more or less disinterested manner the nature of the differences that keep them apart. An engineer would be a fool if he tried to throw a bridge across a river without having previously explored the further bank. Thus, though I believe that Kipling's jingle about East being East and West West involves no more than a alf-truth, the most well-meaning efforts of Europe to promote a mutual understanding of our several needs, so that we may the more usefully give and take, must have little result unless India is willing to take an equal hand in the game. And it must begin with acquiring an adequate self-knowledge. At present, I think, we at this end know our Europe for all the good and the bad that it contains far better than the educated Indian knows his India; nor indeed does he often know his own part of India as thoroughly as objective methods would help him very easily to do.
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