Chapter (অধ্যায়): THE EAST AND THE WEST PAGE-536Page: 536 of 537
was rather more and not less civilised than Ramachandra. The civilisation of Lanka was rather higher, and surely not lower, than that of Ayodhya. And then, when were these Vanaras (monkeys) and other Southern Indians conquered? They were all, on the other hand, Ramachandra's friends and allies. Say which kingdoms of Vali and Guhaka were annexed by Ramachandra?
It was quite possible, however, that in a few places there were occasional fights between the Aryans and the aborigines; quite possible, that one or two cunning Munis pretended to meditate with closed eyes before their sacrificial fires in the jungles of the Rakshasas, waiting, however, all the time to see when the Rakshasas would throw stones and pieces of bone at them. No sooner had this been done than they would go whining to the kings. The mail-clad kings armed with swords and weapons of steel would come on fiery steeds. But how long could the aborigines fight with their sticks and stones? So they were killed or chased away, and the kings returned to their capital. Well, all this may have been, but how does this prove that their lands were taken away by the Aryans? Where in the Ramayana do you find that?
The loom of the fabric of Aryan civilisation is a vast, warm, level country, interspersed with broad, navigable rivers. The cotton of this cloth is composed of highly civilised, semi-civilised, and barbarian tribes, mostly Aryan. Its warp is Varnashramachara,1 and its woof, the conquest of strife and competition in nature.
And may I ask you, Europeans, what country you have ever raised to better conditions? Wherever you
1 The old Aryan institution of the four castes and stages of life. The former comprise the Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, and Shudra, and the latter, Brahmacharya (student life), Garhasthya (householder's life), Vanaprastha (hermit life), and Sannyasa (life of renunciation).