Testament type; he tried to get back and to lead others back to the simple lives and me simple ideals of the old Fathers. The Vedas, the oldest sacred book of the Hindus, were infallible, and by them and by no other book must conduct be guided. He has recently died, but the movement has great vitality, and finds favour both with English educated clerks and old-fashioned chiefs.
These are some of the religious movements among the Hindus which have been in part aroused by their contact with the English, and facilitated by the peace and order which we have preserved in India during the last century. The reformers I have mentioned, and others besides, have infused new vitality into a religion which had long lain torpid; and if such men have arisen in the just immediate past, we may well expect that as great and greater will appear in the future to purify the religious life of the people.
By preserving order, by giving the people of India full opportunity to develop along the line most natural to them, and by ourselves affording them practical examples of well-worked-out lives, we shall best help the spiritually-minded Hindus. What, then, is to be our relationship with them? It is most important that we should have a clear view on this point, for this is the governing idea by which all our actions should be guided and tested. It is what we should have at the back of our minds whenever Indian questions are under consideration, and upon the clearness, accuracy, and intensity of it will depend our success in the management of India. For years we had the idea in regard to our relationship with the Colonies that they were like the fruit of a tree which must soon ripen and then drop off, and having this idea rooted in our minds, we thought it useless to make any effort to attach the Colonies to us. We can realize, then, how important it is in the case of India to avoid falling into a similar error through having in our minds a false conception of our true relationship with the people. What, then, is it to be?
