Twelve Men of Bengal in the Nineteenth Century/Keshub Chandra Sen
Keshub Chandra Sen
KESHUB CHANDRA SEN
1838—1884
No name in the annals of Bengal in the nineteenth century is more widely known than that of Keshub Chandra Sen. Spoken of as 'Indian's greatest son' by so eminent an Orientalist as Professor Max Müller, no Hindu before him ever achieved so widespread a reputation or drew so closely the attention of both East and West towards his life and teaching. His was one of the few names that was familiar during his lifetime not only among the vast millions who inhabit the Indian Empire but among European nations whose knowledge of India and all things Indian was then far slighter than it is to-day. Born at a time when Western education, half understood and imperfectly applied, had yet caught the imagination of the East, Keshub Chandra Sen's lfe coincided with one of the most important and interesting intellectual revolutions that India has ever seen. After long centuries of isolation East and West had met, and fusion of thought and speech had begun. On the one hand stood western civilization, with its latest scientific inventions, its latest literary achievements and its latest artistic triumphs on the other stood eastern culture, effete and decaying, strangled in the grip of custom and tradition. The full force of modern thought had been let loose about the old ideals and the old beliefs, threatening to overwhelm them in its first impetuous rush. There was imminent danger that the new system of life and thought, while sweeping away the old beliefs, might raise no new ones to supply their place. The restraints that the old caste system had enforced upon life generally, socially, morally and mentally had been roughly cast aside, and the new civilisation had as yet failed to impose other restraints that had the same binding force. The work that Keshub Chandra Sen was called upon to do was to combine all that was best in the old with all that was best in the new and to prevent a break with the old before a new religion and a new philosophy of life were found to which men might adhere. It was the old problem which so many have sought to solve without success, the reconciliation of the old and the new, of the East and the West. At a time when chaos threatened, Keshub Chandra Sen had the ability and the courage to formulate a new belief, purified and refined, out of the old, and at the same time the power to lead men after him along the lines which he laid down. The great and widespread influence that his life and conduct had even upon those who did not follow him in his new belief, set him apart as one of the moving spirits of the day.
Claiming descent from the ancient Sen Kings of Bengal, the family from which Keshub sprang had been resident for some generations at Garifa, now known as Gouripur, some twenty-four miles above Calcutta. His great grandfather, Gokul Chandra Sen of the Vaidiya caste was a poor, honest, hard-working villager, respected by his fellows but of no particular distinction. It was his son Ram Kamal Sen, Keshub's grandfather, who first raised the family to a position of dignity and affluence. He was one of that first little company of Hindus in Bengal who were quick to take advantage of all that western civilisation offered by adapting themselves to western culture and western modes of thought. Yet there was little in his earliest years to give promise of the brilliant career that was later to be his. With little education, learning English at a small Hindu school up the river where there were no dictionaries and no text books, he was forced from an early age to earn his own living. He began at the very lowest rung of the literary ladder, obtaining a post as assistant type-setter at the Asiatic Society's press on a monthly salary of only eight rupees. For eight years he plodded on in this humble post, throwing all his energies into the work and doing meanwhile all that lay in his power to improve his education and prepare himself for a more important post. His knowledge and industry attracting the attention of the officials of the Society, he was appointed a clerk in the office. Later he became native secretary, and continued to rise step by step, his capability and activity keeping pace with each new advance, until he eventually rose to be a member of the Council of the Asiatic Society whose service he had first entered as a type-setter on eight rupees a month. His abilities becoming widely recognised, he was offered the responsible and distinguished post of Treasurer of the Calcutta Mint. His success in this post led to the Dewanship of the Bank of Bengal with an income, of 2,000 Rs. a month and an assured and influential position in public life. Unspoilt by his marvellous success, his strenuous efforts for the welfare of his fellow-countrymen kept pace with his own advancement. In the establishment of the Hindu College in 1817, and the Sanskrit College in 1824, he took a keen interest, while to promote the acquisition of English by his countrymen he entered upon and carried through the great labour of producing a dictionary in English and Bengali, which Dr. Marshman, the celebrated Serampore Missionary, spoke of as 'the fullest, most valuable work of its kind which we possess and which will be the most lasting monument of Ram Kamal Sen's industry, zeal and erudition.' His work on behalf of education was supplemented by exertions in the cause of sanitation on which he held views far in advance of his day, and by generous gifts to Hospitals and to the District Charitable Society.
Although Keshub was only five years old when his grandfather died, his early association with him and the deep veneration in which he was held by all in any way associated with him cannot fail to have impressed him at the most impressionable period of his life. During those first five years the child and the old man had become firm friends, and so highly did his grandfather think of his early precocity that he is reported to have said, 'Keshub alone will be able to sustain the family reputation.' Keshub's father, Peary Mohan Sen was the second son of Ram Kamal whom he only survived four years, dying at the early age of thirty four. He was a young man of exemplary life and character and his early death was a great loss to Keshub. His mother, however, proved not only an adequate guardian but a source of inspiration to her son, who always gratefully acknowledged how much he owed to her early training. His youth was spent amidst the pleasantest surroundings. His grandfather, proud of the position he had won by his own exertions and ability took a delight in providing his family with every comfort and luxury. 'I was reared' said Keshub at a later date 'by a wealthy father and grandfather. Opulence and luxury surrounded my childhood, but as I grew up my mind began to show the spirit of natural poverty.'
At the age of seven he was entered at the Hindu College, in the foundation of which his grandfather had taken so great an interest twenty eight years before. From the first he distinguished himself, carrying off prizes for English and Mathematics several years in succession. Among his school fellows he proved himself a born leader. In the playground he was continually inventing new games, which he taught the other boys who entered with enthusiasm into the parts that Keshub assigned to them. Magic and juggling were his especial boyish delights and he himself acquired considerable dexterity in the juggler's art. Quiet and reserved, he hid even in his young days great force of character beneath a retiring manner, and amongst young companions, whose morals were far from beyond reproach, he kept himself pure and straight. For immorality and falsehood he always had the greatest aversion and contempt. A keen student, he devoted by far the greater portion of his time to his studies and to such effect did he apply himself that at the age of fourteen he was in the first senior class of the School Department of the Hindu College. Unfortunately his studies were interrupted by his transference to the Metropolitan College on its inception in 1853, but though started under such promising auspices that college did not fulfil its expectations, and in the following year those boys who had left the Hindu College in order to join it found themselves seeking readmission into the institution they had deserted. During his last years at College Keshub devoted himself chiefly to the study of mental and moral philosophy, into the wide range of which he plunged with youthful ardour and enthusiasm.
Leaving college Keshub found time to enter upon various projects which had long been forming in his mind. Education, he conceived, to be the first need of his fellow countrymen and so far as he was able, by his own individual efforts, he set himself to further the great cause. From the wider diffusion of knowledge and culture would, he hoped, spring in due course all the moral and social advancement that he so ardently desired, and his first attempts, though modestly begun, had this great end in view. Soon after leaving college he started a Literary Society, known as the British Indian Society, for the promotion of literature and science, and shortly afterwards he opened the Coltolla Evening School to which he gathered numbers of young men from the neighbourhood of his own house, he and his friends instructing them in English literature and philosophy. Shakespeare, first prominently introduced to Indian students by Captain Richardson, was one of the favourite studies of the day and Keshub was an enthusiast. Hamlet was his favourite play and he himself took the main part in a performance given by members of his Evening school. His acquaintance not only with Shakespeare but with English literature generally was surprising, and he soon inspired the members of his Society and Evening school with his own love of it.
Greater, however, than his desire for intellectual improvement was his desire for moral and religious advancement. Pre-eminently of a religious turn of mind, he had from the first attempted to combine secular education with the maintenance of religious beliefs. Of the defficulties that beset him he was fully aware. To reconcile the old traditions and superstitions with modern education was impossible. Education, as he himself admitted had unsettled his mind. He had given up the old faith but he had gained no positive system of belief to replace it. Towards that end, however, he devoted the most anxious and searching enquiries. By continual study and contemplation he sought to acquire the truth. Stern and austere at this time, he lived the life almost of an ascetic. Eating neither flesh nor fish, he gave up card playing and novel reading and all the theatrical and conjuring performances that he had previously so much loved. Beyond the friends associated with him in the Literary Society and the Evening school that he had founded, he saw scarcely any one, his chief friends being the Rev. James Long, Norendra Nath Sen and Devendra Nath Tagore. Buried in his books or sunk in thought he spent long hours alone, turning his back completely on the lighter side of life. Serious, earnest and as yet unsatisfied, he bent all his energies on solving the great questions of life to which the old beliefs had given him so inadequate a reply.
In 1857 Keshub Chandra Sen founded the 'Goodwill Fraternity.' It was a purely religious and devotional association and here he was at his best, lecturing and discussing the various questions which he had so closely studied in his long hours of solitude and meditation. Full and free discussion on every religious topic was desired. 'I established in my earlier days' wrote Keshub in later life 'a small fraternity in my own house to which I gave the somewhat singular but significant name of the 'Goodwill Fraternity.' I did not allow myself to harbour sectarianism, but preached to my friends these two doctrines—'God our Father, Every Man our Brother.' It was in these gatherings that Keshub's oratorical powers, which were later to exercise so great an influence, first began to develop and expand. Already his eloquence was remarkable, exercising a strong fascination over all who heard him. Upon the minds of the young men and boys whom he addressed in the 'Goodwill Fraternity' gatherings, it had a powerful effect and many of those who met him here for 'the first time became in after life his most devoted followers. His intense earnestness and glowing enthusiasm inspired others with the same spirit and the fame of the 'Goodwill Fraternity' gatherings rapidly grew. Among the many attracted by the reports of Keshub's eloquence and spirituality one of the most distinguished was Devendra Nath Tagore, and it was at one of the meetings of the 'Fraternity' that they first met. Between them was destined to grow up a firm and lasting friendship that not even religious difference in later days was able to destroy. Devendra Nath Tagore, belonging to one of the wealthiest and most prominent families in Calcutta, was then the leader of the Brahmo Samaj, founded by Ram Mohan Roy thirty years before, and it was doubtless very largely owing to his influence that Keshub definitely joined that body in 1857. This decided step at once involved him in difficulties with his family and relatives, since he refused in consequence to undergo the ceremony of initiation at the hands of the family guru, which would at that time in the ordinary course have taken place. Every effort was made to induce him to give way but in the face of persuasion, threats, and entreaties he stood firm, believing that he had at last found in the new faith that he had adopted the way of life which he had so long sought.
The starting of the Brahmo school in 1859 was one of Keshub's first activities in the Brahmo Samaj. It was a development of the 'Goodwill Fraternity' and the Coltolla Evening School, and was destined to play an important part in the history of the movement. It not only placed the hitherto vague conception of Brahmoism on a sound and rational basis of philosophy but it bound together a growing company of young men eager for the advancement of truth and learning. The Brahmo School at first held weekly meetings every Sunday at which Keshub and Devendra Nath Tagore were the leading spirits, the enthusiastic metaphysical discourses of the one contrasting with the closely reasoned and classical Bengali discourses on the faith of Brahmoism of the other.
Not content with his earnest personal appeals in the cause of progress, Keshub was ambitious of a wider public and from this time onwards sought to spread his opinions through the press. His first tract was characteristically called 'Young Bengal, this is for you.' In it he drew attention to the fact that a period of scepticism and irreligion had succeeded the sudden intellectual revival in Bengal and urged that it was essential for true, progress that religious development should go hand in hand with intellectual advancement. Education, unfortified by religious principles, he argued, leads neither to the social, moral nor political welfare of a nation. This first tract was followed by a dozen more, all deeply religious, forming the first beginnings of Brahmo literature and setting forth with power and authority the principles of the new faith. About this time also he founded the Sangat Sava, another association for religious discussion, to which many of the foremost Brahmos of later days traced their first inspiration and enthusiasm.
In the midst of these philanthropic activities, Keshub had endeavoured to follow the universal practice then in vogue in Bengal for a young man to adopt the family profession. In 1859 in accordance with family tradition he entered the Bank of Bengal, beginning as a clerk on the modest stipend of 25 Rs. a month. Though the work was utterly uncongenial to him, so well did he perform his duties that before a year was passed his salary was doubled and apart from his family influence it was certain that speedy promotion awaited him. But the conviction soon took deep root in him that he was called upon to give up his life entirely to his educational and religious work and two years after entering the Bank he astonished his friends by resigning his position. He was the first young man of his rank and class to give up his worldly prospects in order to devote himself entirely to the advancement of his fellow-countrymen, and his disinterestedness and unselfishness greatly enhanced his already growing reputation. In 1860 he visited Krishnagar, on one of his first famous missionary expeditions, and so far broke with family customs and tradition as to accompany Devendra Nath Tagore on a voyage to Ceylon by sea. Though the spell had been broken by the journey of Ram Mohan Roy to England thirty years before, it still needed considerable courage to break through the strong opposition of relatives and friends among whom the prejudice against crossing the sea was still deeply ingrained. But Keshub's voyage to Ceylon was only the prelude to the longer voyage to England which he was already contemplating and which was to take form ten years hence.
Still further convinced that it was to the press that he must look even more than to his personal exertions and his personal eloquence, if he would successfully advance the cause of education and religion, Keshub determined to start a periodical of his own. In August 1861 with the help of his friends, among whom Man Mohun Ghose was one of the leading spirits, he brought out the first number of the Indian Mirror as a fortnightly journal. There was at that time only one English newspaper in Calcutta conducted by an Indian Editor, and it is an interesting fact that both these papers, the Hindu Patriot and the Indian Mirror are still in existence to-day. Although the latter paper afterwards passed out of Keshub's control he owned various other newspapers at different times, many of which commanded a wide circulation. In all of them he attempted to make fair consideration and conciliation, the prevailing notes, and though they ardently supported the schemes which he had at heart he was careful to avoid the adoption of a violently partisan attitude, opening his columns freely to all shades of opinion and permitting full discussion in them.
Formally appointed a minister of the Brahmo Samaj in 1862 by Devendra Nath Tagore, he was installed with much ceremony in the latter's house, the title of Brahmananda, the Rejoicer in God, being conferred upon him. The occasion of the installation marks another step in the advance towards the emancipation of the women of Bengal. Desirous that his wife, whom he had married according to Hindu rites many years before, should be present at the ceremony, he brought her to Calcutta from the family residence at Bally where she had been living with his relatives. The latter strongly opposed this further departure from orthodox Hindu custom, and his persistence meant for the time practical excommunication. But Keshub was convinced that the time had come when Indian women should play a more prominent part in life, being given a better education and a greater freedom of action, and he held on his way undismayed. A truce between him and his family, patched up in the following year, was again broken by dissensions over the Jat Karma, the thanksgiving for the birth of Keshub's third child, his mother alone remaining by him. Gradually, however, as the years advanced Keshub's strong personality and winning disposition not only overcame the opposition of his relatives but succeeded in carrying them with him as some of his most enthusiastic supporters in the cause of progress.
In 1864 Keshub started on an extensive missionary tour with the object of awakening the whole of India to participate in the general progress which he had so strenuously advocated in Calcutta, Everywhere he was received with popular acclamation, his eloquence and enthusiasm earning for him in Madras the name of 'The Thunderbolt of Bengal.' In almost every place he visited he found the same spirit of enquiry and eagerness for knowledge, and he returned from the tour greatly encouraged and more firmly convinced than before of the great work that lay before him and his followers.
Meanwhile unfortunate dissensions had been gradually arising in the Brahmo Samaj itself. Devoted to each other as Devendra Nath Tagore and Keshub were, it had been for some time evident to both that, firm as their friendship might be, their opinions must eventually to a very great extent separate them. Devendra Nath Tagore represented the older generation of the Rennaissance, fully imbued with the necessity of advancing with the times yet cautious and conservative, anxious to break with the past as little as might be. Keshub on the other hand represented the second generation of the reform movement, less bound to the old traditions and the old beliefs, eager to throw off all that retarded progress and to hold fast only to the truth. Devendra Nath Tagore had indeed discarded the Brahmanical thread and had appointed Keshub, who was not a Brahmin, to the ministry but he was at heart strongly conservative and there were many innovations advocated by Keshub and the younger generation to which he could not subscribe. Keshub had, for instance, taken up the cause of widow re-marriage with enthusiasm, but here Devendra Nath Tagore could not follow him. The still more difficult question of intermarriage had also arisen. The members of the Brahmo Samaj were of all castes and having abandoned all caste restrictions, the question of intermarriage among them was bound to arise. The first intermarriage according to the Brahmo ritual took place in August 1862 but serious doubts were expressed as to its legality, the essential Hindu rites having been omitted. It was a subject which Keshub was to take up later with good results but meanwhile it widened the breach that was gradually separating the old and the new element in the Brahmo Samaj.
Finally breaking with the old Samaj under Devendra Nath Tagore, Keshub Chandra Sen founded the new Brahmo Samaj of India on November the 11th, 1860. The new Samaj was to be on the broadest lines and open to any human being no matter what his creed or caste might be. One of its main objects was to include among its members men of all nationalities and races. It was to be a world-wide church, and its doctrines were to include all those that were highest and best in the Bible, the Koran, the Zendavesta and the Shastras, extracts from all of which met for the first time side by side as the creed of the new Brahmo Samaj. 'The wide universe is the Temple of God' ran the motto of the new Faith 'Wisdom is the pure land of pilgrimage: Truth is the everlasting Scripture: Faith is the root of all religion; Love is the true Scriptural Culture: the Destruction of Selfishness is the true asceticism.' It was to be a universal church founded on broad principles to which the whole world might subscribe if it would. Keshub and his little band of followers, having given up all their worldly prospects threw themselves with true missionary zeal into the work of spreading the tenets of their faith. To all parts of India Keshub carried his message of peace and good will, being everywhere welcomed by officials and non-officials alike and meeting much sympathy from Lord Lawrence, the Governor-General, whose guest he was on several occasions in Simla. On the 24th of January 1868, the thirty-eighth anniversary of the Brahmo Samaj as founded by Ram Mohan Roy, was laid the foundation stone of the Brahma Mandir, the new church of the new Faith. It was opened for service in August 1869.
Keshub's visit to England in 1870, like that of Ram Mohan Roy just forty years before, aroused much criticism and opposition. Nothing daunted however, by fierce denunciation or evil prognostications he set out in the spring of that year, reaching England in the month of March. Of his first European impressions he has left an amusing account. The luxury of hotel life astonished him while what surprised him still more at first sight was the hurry and bustle of the streets, which contrasted so strikingly with the slow movement and general leisureliness of the East. In England he met with a warm welcome. Lord Lawrence and many other retired officials who has known him proved themselves good friends and introduced him to all that was best in English society. Among the many whom he met were Dean Stanley, Professor Max Müller, Mr. Glodstone and John Stuart Mill. With the first two he formed a life long friendship. He was graciously received in private audience by Queen Victoria, who presented him with a large engraving of herself and copies of her two books, inscribed in her own hand "To Keshub Chandra Sen from Victoria, R. Sept. 1870.' He visited no fewer than fourteen of the chief towns of England and Scotland, the National Indian Association which has survived till the present day being founded by Miss Mary Carpenter to promote the cause that Keshub had so closely at heart. After six months in England, he left for India strengthened and encouraged by contact with some of the greatest minds of the day and with his loyalty to the British Government greatly intensified. So deeply was he touched by the universal kindness he met with from all classes, from Her Majesty the Queen to the poorest peasant that, as he himself said, his loyalty to the great nation which had done so much for India became a part henceforward of his religion.
One of the first acts of Keshub on his return to India was the establishment of the Indian Reform Association on the lines of the most modern associations with which he had become acquainted in England. Its object was 'the social and moral reformation of the natives of India,' and it was divided into five branches, each with its special work. One branch occupied itself with the supply of cheap and good literature which was to be made easily accessible to all: a second was entrusted with charitable relief: a third with all matters concerning education: a fourth with the improvement of the position of Indian women, and a fifth with temperance work. Impressed with the immense power wielded by the press in England, especially by the daily papers headed by 'The Times,' Keshub endeavoured to improve upon the newspapers he had formerly published, bringing out a weekly pice paper, under the management of the new association, called the Sulav Samachar. Being the first paper of its kind published in India it achieved immediate popularity. Its influence in its first days of prosperity was far-reaching, and it did much not only to bring home to a very wide public the lessons which Keshub sought to teach but succeeded further in advancing the cause of cheap and popular journalism.
Nothing had impressed Keshub as more sharply in contrast with conditions in his own country than the high position occupied by women in English life. Coming from the midst of his own community, in whose public life women played no part, he was greatly struck by the fact that in England not only had women taken their place on an equality with men in social life but that they were everywhere actively participating in all public and philanthropic movements of the day. In spite of their unrestricted social intercourse, the deference and respect with which they met was particularly striking. His English experiences urged Keshub to take up again more enthusiastically than before the cause of the women of India and one of the most successful branches of the Indian Reform Association was the Normal School for Indian ladies. Soon after its commencement there were no fewer than fifty Hindu ladies of the highest castes regularly attending the school, receiving instruction on modern lines such as had never before been obtainable by Indian women. So cordially did Government approve of the object and work of the Normal School that is offered a grant of Rs. 2,000 annually towards its maintenance.
Of temperance work Keshub had seen much in England and this also he took up with renewed energy on his return. He had long been aware how firm a hold intemperance threatened to gain upon a certain section of his fellow-countrymen and he set himself to combat the evil by every means in his power. Here as elsewhere in the cause of progress he set his hopes chiefly upon the rising generation and realising that the young men of his day were growing up largely without the restraints, which the old caste system had exercised over its members, he endeavoured to instill into them a horror of intemperance and the degradation that it brought inevitably in its train.
One of the greatest permanent measures that Keshub was able to accomplish was the passing of the Brahmo Marriage Act of 1872. The difficult question of intermarriage among members of the Brahmo community had for years awaited a definite solution. The Advocate-General when referred to had pronounced against the legality of such marriages on the ground that they complied with no recognised form of marriage ceremony. It was apparent that only legislation could set such marriages on a safe and legal footing. But many difficulties had to be overcome before the Bill became law. The Adi-Brahmo Samaj, the old section of the Brahmo community under Devendra Nath Tagore, considered its own marriage ceremonies amply sufficient and it was difficult so to frame the bill as to prevent it doing injustice to those who declined to take advantage of its provisions. The original intention of the Act was to render legal all marriages not performed according to any recognised form of religion, but this practical institution of civil marriage met with a strong protest on the ground that it would totally destroy the ancient social organization of the country, allowing any man to marry whomsoever he pleased irrespective of caste. The Bill was therefore altered to apply only to members of the Brahmo Samaj and it was expressly stipulated that the contracting parties should state that they did not profess the Hindu, Muhammadan, Christian, Parsi, Buddhist, Sikh or Jain religion. To avoid any possible hardships, the act expressly stated that 'nothing in this act contained shall affect the validity of any marriage not solemnised under its provisions; nor shall this act be deemed directly or indirectly to affect the validity of any mode of contracting marriage; but if the validity of any such mode shall hereafter come into question before any Court, such question shall be decided as if this act had not been passed.' The Act finally became law on the 19th March 1872 and Keshub rightly regarded it as one of his greatest triumphs. It was an official recognition of the Brahmo Samaj, providing for its convenience a special law. Henceforward the Brahmo Samaj had its own form of marriage service which was as legal as that of any other religion in India.
It was inevitable that Keshub's many activities should stir up enmity in certain quarters and he had like all reformers to submit to a storm of abuse from those who were strongly opposed to his views. Though he numbered his friends among all ranks and all classes there were many who were not generous enough to agree to differ from him on certain points and to acknowledge the good work he was undoubtedly doing. From Government he met with great encouragement. Lord Northbrook, the Viceroy accompanied by his daughter paid him the almost unprecedented honour of a visit at his private house after having visited the Normal School in 1874. With many other officials from the highest to the lowest he was on cordial terms of friendship. All those who came in contact with him were impressed not only with his sincerity but with his moderation. He was anxious only to avoid on the one hand social and political stagnation, and on the other a too sweeping and radical programme of reform. He was convinced that progress must be worked out slowly and with infinite precaution and that the cause of true reform could never be advanced by sudden upheavals but only gradually evolved step by step, by retaining the good and sedulously eliminating the evil.
In 1878 Keshub's daughter was married to the Maharaja of Cooch Behar. Considerable opposition to the marriage was manifested by a certain section of his followers and difficulties arose over the marriage ceremonies, which the relatives of the Maharaja naturally wished to invest with Hindu rites. The controversy unfortunately led to a further split in the Brahmo Samaj, but opposition served only to stir Keshub to greater exertions and the wonderful revival of that year led to his proclamation of the New Dispensation. To him the harmony of religions was the first mission of the Brahmo Samaj. The best that was in Hinduism, Christianity, Muhammadanism and Buddhism should be welded together in the Church of the New Dispensation. To spread abroad his views, in addition to his own personal eloquence, he turned again to the press and himself started The Sunday Mission and later, The Liberal and The New Dispensation. All his publications were studiously moderate and though by no means lacking in courage and independence, were always courteous to the opinions and beliefs of others. He never denied access to his columns to fair and honest criticism of his work, and throughout he was consistent in following the motto that he had adopted, 'Try all things; hold fast to that which is good.' His Catholicism was proved by the number of his friends who were drawn from all walks of life. He was respected and esteemed by so orthodox a Hindu as Maharaja Sir Jotindra Mohan Tagore, by so good a Muhammadan as Nawab Abdul Latif and by such men of western light and learning of another faith as Professor Max Müller and Dean Stanley.
Loyalty was one of the watch-words of the Brahmo Samaj. None realised more fully than Keshub Chandra Sen how essential it was to the peace and welfare of his country that the British Government should receive the loyal and hearty cooperation of his fellow countrymen. "You are bound to be loyal to your divinely-appointed sovereign" he wrote to his people. "Not to be loyal" he argues base ingratitude and absence of faith in Providence. You are bound to be loyal to the British Government, that came to your rescue as God's ambassador when your country was sunk in ignorance and superstition and hopeless jejuneness, and has since lifted you to your present high position. Honour your Sovereign and the entire ruling body with fervent loyalty. The more loyal we are, the more we shall advance with the aid of our rulers in the poth of moral, social and political reformation.'
Worn by his ceaseless activities and worried by dissensions among his followers, Keshub's health now began to give serious cause for alarm. Visits to Darjeeling and Simla effected only temporary relief and he himself was the first to realise the fatal nature of the malady from which he was suffering. The knowledge that his end was near served to urge him to one final spell of activity. His last public lecture was perhaps his finest effort. 'Asia's message to Europe' was one of love, unity and concord. It was the offer of a purely unsectarian and universal religion that should embrace all creeds and all nations in one great brotherhood of perfect harmony. Such being the message that he had tried to preach, the dissensions among his own followers were a great grief to him. He was forced to recognise that men who had thrown off the time-honoured religious restraints under which they had been born were especially prone to dissensions among themselves. The old unquestioned authority having been set aside, it was difficult to find a common meeting ground where all might join. It seemed to him that what was needed was some broad rule of life by which, however much they might differ in details, they might strive to live. With this object he drew up the Nava Samhita, the New Way of Life which enunciated an ideal course of conduct, personal, social, domestic and moral to which every man should strive to attain. These are briefly the twelve rules of life whereby the ideal man should endeavour to live—
1. To look upon woman as the daughter of God and regard her with honour and affection and to cherish no impure thought or wish in regard to her.
2. To forgive and love one's enemies and not to indulge in anger when provoked by them.
3. To rejoice in other man's happiness and not to harbour envy or jealousy.
4. To be humble in disposition and to harbour no pride of position, wealth, learning, power or religion.
5. To live the life of an ascetic and to take no undue thought for the morrow. To seek not the riches of the world.
6. To give religious instruction to one's household.
7. To love justice, and give every man his due.
8. To speak the truth and nothing but the truth, and to hate all manner of falsehood.
9. To be charitable to the poor and to relieve all sickness and suffering.
10. To love all men and endeavour to promote the welfare of one's fellowmen.
11. To fix one's heart on divine and heavenly things and be not given to worldliness.
12. To be active in maintaining unity and harmony in the community.
There could be no higher ideals than those set forth in the Nava Samhita. Throughout the lesson of it is that true labour in any field of life is the one and only true worship. Yet even in drawing up these broad rules of life and conduct Keshub was anxious that they themselves should not become a cause of contension, leading to fresh dissensions over their interpretation. 'Let not the Samhita be a new fetish' he wrote. 'It is no infallible Gospel. It is only the national law of the Aryans of the new Faith in its application to social life. It contains the essence of God's moral law adapted to the peculiar needs and character of reformed Hinduism and based upon their national instinct and traditions. We should not therefore bow to its letter but accept its spirit and its essence for our guidance.'
Adjoining his house in Upper Circular Road he built the new Sanctuary, the Nava Devalaya, and the consecration ceremony on January the 1st 1884 to which he was carried from his sickbed, was his final effort. He died seven days later in the midst of his sorrowing family and friends, sustained during the great physical agony of his last days by their love and veneration. The funeral procession that followed his body to the grave was one of the most imposing that Calcutta had ever seen, and it was especially remarkable for the presence of all classes and all creeds, Europeans, Hindus and Muhammadans mingling with his followers of the new faith. Condolences poured in from all quarters, from Her Majesty the Queen-Empress and a host of English friends down to the humblest who had known and appreciated the great man's worth. However much men might differ from him on many points, there were few who did not recognise his earnestness and sincerity. His all-absorbing desire to benefit his fellow-countrymen, and his constant efforts to make his new faith unsectarian and such that it might include the whole brotherhood of man, won universal admiration and respect. In an age of self seeking, he set a striking example of unselfishness. He voluntarily gave up all to follow the way of life that seemed to him to lead to the highest and the best. Worldly rewards he never sought and worldly honours he refused. His way of life, it is true, though an ideal to which every Faith might well strive to attain, was an ideal which men in the nineteenth century found it hard to follow. It needed the enthusiasm and devotion of the earlier ages when the world was young and life less complex. It was in direct contrast to the growing worldliness and the keen competitive spirit of the day against which it was a protest. The whole tendency of the time was in the opposite direction. The decay of the old faiths had coincided with the great renaissance of thought and education and but for the little company of enthusiasts whom that renaissance produced, it might have ended in a cataclysm of irreligion. How great was the influence of Keshub Chandra Sen and how effectual were his efforts towards checking the prevailing tendency towards unbelief and immortality must not be judged merely by the numerical strength of the Samaj that he founded. His influence went for deeper and his noble life and character left an abiding impression on the thought and spirit of the day. Among the many distinguished Indians of the century there was none whose name was more widely known in Europe and throughout the East, and none who exercised a greater influence in stemming the tide of irreligion and immorality, and awakening his fellow-countrymen to a sense of their moral, social, and intellectual responsibilities.