I was therefore not surprised to read his
remark that he recognised, "frankly and publicly, that new aspirations
were stirring in the hearts of the people, that they were part of a
larger movement common to the whole East, and that it was necessary to
satisfy them to a reasonable extent by giving them a larger share in the
administration."
But the present movement in India will be very poorly understood if it
be regarded only in connexion with the movement in the East. The
awakening of Asia is part of a world-movement, which has been quickened
into marvellous rapidity by the world-war. The world-movement is towards
Democracy, and for the West dates from the breaking away of the American
Colonies from Great Britain, consummated in 1776, and its sequel in the
French Revolution of 1789. Needless to say that its root was in the
growth of modern science, undermining the fabric of intellectual
servitude, in the work of the Encyclopaedists, and in that of
Jean-Jacques Rousseau and of Thomas Paine. In the East, the swift
changes in Japan, the success of the Japanese Empire against Russia, the
downfall of the Manchu dynasty in China and the establishment of a
Chinese Republic, the efforts at improvement in Persia, hindered by the
interference of Russia and Great Britain with their growing ambitions,
and the creation of British and Russian "spheres of influence,"
depriving her of her just liberty, and now the Russian Revolution and
the probable rise of a Russian Republic in Europe and Asia, have all
entirely changed the conditions before existing in India.
Pages:
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46