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certain matters for the British Cabinet. It is impossible for an English statesman to go further in the direction of Irish autonomy, and the Irish party will be welladvised to hecept even this qualified autonomy and make it an instrument for so developing the strength of the Irish nation as to make farther coneession in the future inevitable. The lifework of Parnell has not gone in vain; the two great questions he brought to a head by his masterly policy, the liberation of the Irish peasant from rackrenting landlords and the liberation of the Irish race from an unsympathetic domination, are both in process of solution within quarter of a centary of his untimely end. Liberty is a goddess who is exacting in her demands on her votaries,but, if they are faithful, she never disappoints
them of their reward,
For India, the elections are as favourable as an English election can be. We do not regard the defeat of pro-Indian Liberal candidates as a calamity. There is always a limit to the efforts of members of Parliament, however sincere, who are bound by ties of party loyalty and discipline not to embarrass their official chiefs beyond a certain point. The Labour mombers and the Nationalists are bound by no such scruples and both of these parties have sympathy with India. The one problem before us is how to turn that sentiment of sympathy into an effective impetus towards action; for in European politics sentiment is not a sufficiently strong motive unless it is sup. ported by some practical community of interests. The Irish Parliamentary party were able to bring Home Rule into the category of realisable ideals because they made it to the interest of the British parties to get rid of the Irish difficulty; it that ideal is realised now, it will be because the iranosta of the English Liberals and the Irish Nationalists have become one and, therefore, they must accommodate each other. It is furces that effect great political changes, not meral sentiments or wague generosities. Even a great
KARMATOGIE
idea can only become operative when it is manifested as a working force with a definite aim and a distinct pressure on its environments.
5
were also practically unknown to hini. And it is these that have developed the new 'philosophy of Nationalism, as we know it today. Lastly, the world also was practically inach smaller in Maxzini's day than it is now, The East had no doubt been rediscovered long before his time, but the tratht that the Eastern peoples also form an organic part of Universal Humanity, representing especial types of human civilisation and possessing eapitalised wealth of human culture, scarcely realised even today, was almost absolutely unknown in Europe in Mazzini's time. His profound spiritual insight and his breadth of sympathies notwithstanding, Mazzini's vision of Humanity. therefore, hardly went beyond what may very aptly be called, WhiteManity.
A
And it is a true conception of Humanity which must always find the real basis and significance of Nationalism. Nationality, is a part, Humanity is the whole, Nationality is the limb, Humanity, is the body, Nationality is the organ Humanity is the organism. The whole is the only interpretation of the parts; the body of the limbs; the organism of the organs. true philosophy of Nationalism can only be built up on a true philo sophy of Humanity. Mazzini's ideal of Humanity was perfect and his conception of Nationality was also equally sound. No more perfect or sound conception of either exists in our mind even to day. But the ideal is a mere form; it waits always to be filled up with the nctual content of our experience. The form and the contents are organically related to one another. And the narrowness of the contents must narrow down the notual application of an ideal, even if it does not destroy its intrinsic bromith and universality. This is what actually happened in Mazzini's case. His ideal of Humanity was a universal ideal. It was, as hu distinctly put it, the necessary corollary of his faith in God,-One God, One Law. His conception of God is essentially monistic. God in "the absolute, living Thought, of whom our world ia ray, the universe an
THOUGHTS AND COMMENTS.
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(BY BIPIN CHANDRA PAL) V Nationalism and Nationalists.
Mazzini was the first apostle and prophet of Nationalism in modern Europe. His message of Nationalisin was, therefore, necessarily more a matter of faith and intuition, than the fruit of any systematised philosophy. There is, no doubt, an unconscious philosophy behind every prophetic intuition, and it was also behind Mazzini's message. But Mazzini did not fully work it out. Indeed, the materials for working out a complete philosophy of Nationalisin were hardly present before him. Both Psychology and Sociology are comparatively new sciences; they are even now almost in their infancy. They were practically unknown in Mazzini's time. And it is to theso that we mainly owe, what may be called, the scientific basis of Nationalis:n. The study of social phenomena in the light of evolution, to which we are indebted for the highest generalisations of Sociology, is a very recent attempt. It was hardly known in Mazzini's time. Besides, the East which is but very crudely understood even to-day, was but barely known in those days. And the fundamental basis of Nationalism, as a universal generalisation in Sociology, is that, Absolute Idealism which is 4he especial heritage of the Hindu. Our highest philosophy furnishes a basis for Nationalism which is as yet unknown and unappreciated, to a large extent, in other known cultures and civilisations. Hindu Monism is the philosophical implication of that organic conception of the social life, which is the special contribution of modern Psychology and Sociology. Mazzini waspardlynequainted with this philosophy. The comparative, the historical, and the evolutional methods, the special methods discovered by the calture of the nineteenth century,
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