authority of Aristotle (_Rhet._ i. 7. 34). Herodotus (vii. 162) ascribes
almost the identical words to Gelo, and a similar idea is given by
Euripides in _Supp._ 447-49.]
[Footnote 29: _Memoirs_, vol. i. p. 328.]
[Footnote 30: _On the Sublime_, xxx.]
[Footnote 31: _Literature of the Victorian Era_, p. 382.]
[Footnote 32: _On the Sublime_, c. v.]
[Footnote 33: Aristotle's _Theory of Poetry and Fine Art_, p. 398.]
[Footnote 34: _Miscellaneous Writings_, Conington, vol. i. p. 162.]
[Footnote 35: iii. 1045 ff.]
[Footnote 36: Mr. Gladstone's merits as a translator were great. His
Latin translation of Toplady's hymn "Rock of Ages," beginning "Jesus,
pro me perforatus," is altogether admirable.]
[Footnote 37: _Od._ iii. 78-82.]
[Footnote 38: "As a mortal, thou must nourish each of two
forebodings--that to-morrow's sunlight will be the last that thou shalt
see: and that for fifty years thou wilt live out thy life in ample
wealth."]
[Footnote 39: _History of English Poetry_, iii., 394.]
[Footnote 40: _Hipp._ 331.]
[Footnote 41: "Great Zeus, why didst thou, to man's sorrow, put woman,
evil counterfeit, to dwell where shines the sun? If thou wert minded
that the human race should multiply, it was not from women they should
have drawn their stock."--_Hipp._ 616-19.]
[Footnote 42: _Decline and Fall_, v. 185.]
[Footnote 43: Book ii. c. 11.]
[Footnote 44: _Eighteenth Century Literature_, vol. vi. p. 331.]
[Footnote 45: "By us he fell, he died, and we will bury him."]
[Footnote 46: _Il._ xxiii. 116.]
[Footnote 47: _Od._ xi. 733.]
"THE QUARTERLY REVIEW"
III
SIR ALFRED LYALL
_"Quarterly Review," July 1913_
After reading and admiring Sir Mortimer Durand's life of Alfred Lyall, I
am tempted to exclaim in the words of Shenstone's exquisite inscription,
which has always seemed to me about the best thing that Shenstone ever
wrote, "Heu quanto minus est cum reliquis versari quam tui meminisse!"
He was one of my oldest and best of friends. More than this, although
our characters differed widely, and although I should never for a moment
think of rating my intellectual attainments on a par with his, at the
same time I may say that in the course of a long life I do not think
that I have ever been brought in contact with any one with whom I found
myself in more thorough community of opinion and sentiment upon the
sundry and manifold questions which excited our common interest. He was
a strong Unionist, a strong Free Trader, and a strong anti-suffragist.
I am, for good or evil, all these things. He was a sincere Liberal in
the non-party sense of that very elastic word. So was I. That is to say,
there was a time when we both thought ourselves good mid-Victorian
Liberals--a school of politicians whose ideas have now been swept into
the limbo of forgotten things, the only surviving principles of that age
being apparently those associated with a faint and somewhat fantastic
cult of the primrose. In 1866 he wrote to his sister--and I cannot but
smile on reading the letter--"I am more and more Radical every year";
and he expressed regret that circumstances did not permit of his setting
up as "a fierce demagogue" in England. I could have conscientiously
written in much the same spirit at the same period, but it has not taken
me nearly half a century to discover that two persons more unfitted by
nature and temperament to be "fierce demagogues" than Alfred Lyall and
myself were probably never born. In respect to the Indian political
questions which were current during his day--such as the controversy
between the Lawrentian and "Forward" schools of frontier policy, the
Curzon-Kitchener episode, and the adaptation of Western reforms to meet
the growing requirements to which education has given birth--his views,
although perhaps rather in my opinion unduly pessimistic and
desponding, were generally identical with my own.
Albeit he was an earnest reformer, he was a warm advocate of strong and
capable government, and, in writing to our common friend, Lord Morley,
in 1882, he anathematised what he considered the weakness shown by the
Gladstone Government in dealing with disorder in Ireland. Himself not
only the kindest, but also the most just and judicially-minded of men,
he feared that a maudlin and misplaced sentimentalism would destroy the
more virile elements in the national character. "I should like," he
said, in words which must not, of course, be taken too literally, "a
little more fierceness and honest brutality in the national
temperament." His heart went out, in a manner which is only possible to
those who have watched them closely at work, to those Englishmen,
whether soldiers or civilians, who, but little known and even at times
depreciated by their own countrymen, are carrying the fame, the glory,
the justice and humanity of England to the four quarters of the globe.
The roving Englishman (he said) is the salt of English land....
Only those who go out of this civilised country, to see the rough
work on the frontiers and in the far lands, properly understand
what our men are like and can do.... They cannot manage a
steam-engine, but they can drive restive and ill-trained horses
over rough roads.
He felt--and as one who has humbly dabbled in literature at the close of
an active political life, I can fully sympathise with him--that "when
one has once taken a hand in the world's affairs, literature is like
rowing in a picturesque reach of the Thames after a bout in the open
sea." Yet, in the case of Lyall, literature was not a matter of mere
academic interest. "His incessant study was history." He thought, with
Lord Acton, that an historical student should be "a politician with his
face turned backwards." His mind was eminently objective. He was for
ever seeking to know the causes of things; and though far too observant
to push to extreme lengths analogies between the past and the present,
he nevertheless sought, notably in the history of Imperial Rome, for any
facts or commentaries gleaned from ancient times which might be of
service to the modern empire of which he was so justly proud, and in the
foundation of which the splendid service of which he was an illustrious
member had played so conspicuous a part. "I wonder," he wrote in 1901,
"how far the Roman Empire profited by high education."
Lyall was by nature a poet. Sir Mortimer Durand says, truly enough, that
his volume of verses, "if not great poetry, as some hold, was yet true
poetry." Poetic expressions, in fact, bubbled up in his mind almost
unconsciously in dealing with every incident of his life. Lord Tennyson
tells us in his _Memoir_ that one evening, when his father and mother
were rowing across the Solent, they saw a heron. His father described
this incident in the following language: "One dark heron flew over the
sea, backed by a daffodil sky." Similarly, Lyall, writing with the
enthusiasm of a young father for his firstborn, said: "The child has
eyes like the fish-pools of Heshbon, with wondrous depth of intelligent
gaze." But, though a poet, it would be a great error to suppose that
Lyall was an idealist, if by that term is meant one who, after a
platonic fashion, indulges in ideas which are wholly visionary and
unpractical. He had, indeed, ideals. No man of his imagination and
mental calibre could be without them. But they were ideals based on a
solid foundation of facts. It was here that, in spite of some sympathy
based on common literary tastes, he altogether parted company from a
brother poet, Mr. Wilfrid Blunt, who has invariably left his facts to
take care of themselves. Though eminently meditative and reflective,
Lyall's mind, his biographer says, "seemed always hungry for facts."
"Though he had an unusual degree of imagination, he never allowed
himself to be tempted too far from the region of the known or the
knowable." The reason why he at times appeared to vacillate was that he
did not consider he sufficiently understood all the facts to justify his
forming an opinion capable of satisfying his somewhat hypercritical
judgment. He was, in fact, very difficult to convince of the truth of an
opinion, not because of his prejudices, for he had none, but by reason
of his constitutional scepticism. He acted throughout life on the
principle laid down by the Greek philosopher Epicharmus: "Be sober, and
remember to disbelieve. These are the sinews of the mind." I have been
informed on unimpeachable authority that when he was a member of the
Treasury Committee which sat on the question of providing facilities for
the study of Oriental languages in this country, he constantly asked the
witnesses whom he examined leading questions from which it might rather
be inferred that he held opinions diametrically opposed to those which
in reality he entertained. His sole object was to arrive at a sound
conclusion. He wished to elicit all possible objections to any views to
which he was personally inclined. It is very probable that his Oriental
experience led him to adopt this procedure; for, as any one who has
lived much in the East will recognise, it is the only possible safeguard
against the illusions which may arise from the common Oriental habit of
endeavouring to say what is pleasant to the interrogator, especially if
he occupies some position of authority.
Only half-reconciled, in the first instance, to Indian exile, and, when
once he had taken the final step of departure, constantly brooding over
the intellectual attractions rather than the material comforts of
European life, Lyall speedily came to the conclusion that, if he was to
bear a hand in governing India, the first thing he had to do was to
understand Indians. He therefore brought his acutely analytical
intellect to the task of comprehending the Indian habit of thought. In
the course of his researches he displayed that thoroughness and
passionate love of truth which was the distinguishing feature of his
character throughout life. That he succeeded in a manner which has been
surpassed by none, and only faintly rivalled by a very few, is now
generally recognised both by his own countrymen and also--which is far
more remarkable--by the inhabitants of the country which formed the
subject of his study. So far as it is possible for any Western to
achieve that very difficult task, he may be said to have got to the back
of the Oriental mind. He embodied the results of his long experience at
times in sweeping and profound generalisations, which covered the whole
field of Oriental thought and action, and at others in pithy
epigrammatic sayings in which the racy humour, sometimes tinged with a
shade of cynical irony, never obscured the deep feeling of sympathy he
entertained for everything that was worthy of respect and admiration.
Lyall had read history to some purpose. He knew, in the words which
Gregorovius applied to the rule of Theodosius in Italy, that "not even
the wisest and most humane of princes, if he be an alien in race, in
customs and religion, can ever win the hearts of the people." He had
read De Tocqueville, and from the pages of an author whose habit of
thought must have been most congenial to him, he drew the conclusion
that "it was the increased prosperity and enlightenment of the French
people which produced the grand crash." He therefore thought that "the
wildest, as well as the shallowest notion of all is that universally
prevalent belief that education, civilisation and increased material
prosperity will reconcile the people of India eventually to our rule."
Hence he was prepared to accept--perhaps rather more entirely than it
deserved to be accepted--the statement of that very astute Brahmin, Sir
Dinkur Rao, himself the minister of an important native State, that "the
natives prefer a bad native Government to our best patent institutions."
These, and similar oracular statements, have now become the commonplaces
of all who deal with questions affecting India. That there is much
truth in them cannot be gainsaid, but they are still often too much
ignored by one section of the British public, who, carried away by
home-made sentiment, forget that of all national virtues gratitude for
favours received is the most rare, while by another section they are
applied to the advocacy of a degree of autonomous rule which would be
disastrous to the interests, not only of India itself, but also to the
cause of all real civilised progress.
The point, however, on which in conversation Lyall was wont to insist
most strongly was that the West was almost incomprehensible to the East,
and, _vice versa_, that the Western could never thoroughly understand
the Oriental. In point of fact, when we talk of progress, it is
necessary to fix some standard by which progress may be measured. We
know our Western standard; we endeavour to enforce it; and we are so
convinced that it gives an accurate measure of human moral and material
advancement that we experience a shock on hearing that there are large
numbers of even highly educated human beings who hold that the standard
is altogether false. Yet that, Lyall would argue, is generally the
Oriental frame of mind. Fatalism, natural conservatism and ignorance
lead the uneducated to reject our ideas, while the highly educated often
hold that our standard of progress is too material to be a true
measure, and that consequently, far from advancing, we are standing
still or even retrograding. Lyall, personifying a Brahmin, said,
"Politics I cannot help regarding as the superficial aspect of deeper
problems; and for progress, the latest incarnation of European
materialism, I have an incurable distrust." These subtle intellectuals,
in fact, as Surendranath Banerjee, one of the leaders of the Swadeshi
movement, told Dr. Wegener,[48] hold that the English are "stupid and
ignorant," and, therefore, wholly unfit to govern India.
I remember Lyall, who, as Sir Mortimer Durand says, had a very keen
sense of humour, telling me an anecdote which is what Bacon would have
called "luciferous," as an illustration of the views held by the
uneducated classes in India on the subject of Western reforms. The
officer in charge of a district either in Bengal or the North-West
Provinces got up a cattle-show, with a view to improving the breed of
cattle. Shortly afterwards, an Englishman, whilst out shooting, entered
into conversation with a peasant who happened to be passing by. He asked
the man what he thought of the cattle-show, and added that he supposed
it had done a great deal of good. "Yes," the native, who was probably a
Moslem, replied after some reflection, "last year there was cholera.
This year there was Cattle Show. We have to bear these afflictions with
what patience we may. Are they not all sent by God?"
But it was naturally the opinions entertained by the intellectual
classes which most interested Lyall, and which he endeavoured to
interpret to his countrymen. The East is asymmetrical in all things. I
remember Lyall saying to me, "Accuracy is abhorrent to the Oriental
mind." The West, on the other hand, delights beyond all things in
symmetry and accuracy. Moreover, it would almost seem as if in the most
trivial incidents in life some unseen influence generally impels the
Eastern to do the exact opposite to the Western--a point, I may observe,
which Lyall was never tired of illustrating by all kinds of quaint
examples. A shepherd in Perthshire will walk behind his sheep and drive
them. In the Deccan he will walk in front of his flock. A European will
generally place his umbrella point downwards against the wall. An
Oriental will, with far greater reason, do exactly the reverse.
But, in respect to the main question of mutual comprehension, there are,
at all events in so far as the European is concerned, degrees of
difficulty--degrees which depend very largely on religious differences,
for in the theocratic East religion covers the whole social and
political field to a far greater extent than in the West. Now, the
religion of the Moslem is, comparatively speaking, very easy to
understand. There are, indeed, a few ritualistic and other minor points
as to which a Western may at times have some difficulty in grasping the
Oriental point of view. But the foundations of monotheistic Islam are
simplicity itself; indeed, it may be said that they are far more simple
than those of Christianity. The case of the Hindu religion is very
different. Dr. Barth in his _Religions of India_ says:
Already in the Veda, Hindu thought is profoundly tainted with the
malady, of which it will never be able to get rid, of affecting a
greater air of mystery the less there is to conceal, of making a
parade of symbols which at bottom signify nothing, and of playing
with enigmas which are not worth the trouble of trying to
unriddle.... At the present time it is next to impossible to say
exactly what Hinduism is, where it begins, and where it ends.
I cannot profess to express any valuable opinion on a subject on which I
am very imperfectly informed, and which, save as a matter of political
necessity, fails to interest me--for, personally, I think that a book of
the _Iliad_ or a play of Aristophanes is far more valuable than all the
lucubrations that have ever been spun by the subtle minds of learned
Hindu Pundits--but, so far as I am able to judge, Dr. Barth's
description is quite accurate. None the less, the importance to the
Indian politician of gaining some insight into the inner recesses of the
Hindu mind cannot for a moment be doubted. Lyall said, "I fancy that the
Hindu philosophy, which teaches that everything we see or feel is a vast
cosmic illusion, projected into space by that which is the manifestation
of the infinite and unconscious spirit, has an unsettling effect on
their political beliefs." Lyall, therefore, rendered a very great
political service to his countrymen when he took in hand the duty of
expounding to them the true nature of Hindu religious belief. He did the
work very thoroughly. Passing lightly by the "windy moralities" of
Brahmo Somaj teachers of the type of Keshub Chunder Sen, whom he left to
"drifting Deans such as Stanley and Alford," he grasped the full
significance of true orthodox Brahmanism, and under the pseudonym of
Vamadeo Shastri wrote an essay which has "become a classic for the
student of comparative religion, and for all who desire to know, in
particular, the religious mind of the Hindu." In the course of his
enquiries Lyall incidentally performed the useful historical service of
showing that Euhemerism is, or very recently was, a living force in
India,[49] and that the solar myth theory supported by Max Müller and
others had, to say the least, been pushed much too far.
I turn to another point. All who were brought in contact with Lyall
speedily recognised his social charm and high intellectual gifts, but
was he a man of action? Did he possess the qualifications necessary to
those who take part in the government of the outlying dominions of the
Empire? I have often been asked that question. It is one to which Sir
Mortimer Durand frequently reverts, his general conclusion being that
Lyall was "a man of action with literary tastes." I will endeavour
briefly to express my own opinion on this subject.
There have been many cases of notable men of action who were also
students. Napier said that no example can be shown in history of a great
general who was not also a well-read man. But Lyall was more than a mere
student. He was a thinker, and a very deep thinker, not merely on
political but also on social and religious subjects. There may be some
parallel in the history of our own or of other countries to the peculiar
combination of thought and action which characterised Lyall's career,
but for the moment none which meets all the necessary requirements
occurs to me. The case is, I think, almost if not quite unique. That
Lyall had a warm admiration for men of action is abundantly clear. His
enthusiasm on their behalf comes out in every stanza of his poetry, and,
when any suitable occasion offered, in every line of his prose. He
eulogised the strong man who ruled and acted, and he reserved a very
special note of sympathy for those who sacrificed their lives for their
country. Shortly before his own death he spoke in terms of warm
admiration of Mr. Newbolt's fine lines:
Qui procul hinc--the legend's writ,
The frontier grave is far away--
Qui ante diem periit
Sed miles, sed pro patriâ.
But he shared these views with many thinkers who, like Carlyle, have
formed their opinions in their studies. The fact that he entertained
them does not help us to answer the question whether he can or cannot be
himself classed in the category of men of action.
As a young man he took a distinguished part in the suppression of the
Mutiny, and showed courage and decision of character in all his acts. He
was a good, though not perhaps an exceptionally good administrator. His
horror of disorder in any form led him to approve without hesitation the
adoption of strong measures for its suppression. On the occasion of the
punishment administered to those guilty of the Manipur massacres in
1891, he wrote to Sir Mortimer Durand, "I do most heartily admire the
justice and firmness of purpose displayed in executing the Senapati. I
hope there will be no interference, in my absence, from the India
Office." On the whole, the verdict passed by Lord George Hamilton is, I
believe, eminently correct, and is entirely in accordance with my own
experience. Lord George, who had excellent opportunities for forming a
sound opinion on the subject, wrote:
Great as were Lyall's literary attributes and powers of initiation
and construction, his critical faculties were even more fully
developed. This made him at times somewhat difficult to deal with,
for he was very critical and cautious in the tendering of advice as
regards any new policy or any suggested change. When once he could
see his way through difficulties, or came to the conclusion that
those difficulties must be faced, then his caution and critical
instincts disappeared, and he was prepared to be as bold in the
prosecution of what he advocated as he had previously been
reluctant to start.
The mental attitude which Lord George Hamilton thus describes is by no
means uncommon in the case of very conscientious and brilliantly
intellectual men, such, for instance, as the late Lord Goschen, who
possessed many characteristics in common with Lyall. They can cite, in
justification of their procedure, the authority of one who was probably
the greatest man of action that the world has ever produced. Roederer
relates in his journal that on one occasion Napoleon said to him:
Il n'y a pas un homme plus pusillanime que moi quand je fais un
plan militaire; je me grossis tous les dangers et tous les maux
possibles dans les circonstances; je suis dans une agitation tout à
fait pénible; je suis comme une fille qui accouche. Et quand ma
résolution est prise, tout est oublié, hors ce qui peut la faire
réussir.