History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c86.s4: § 12. The significance of Aurangzib's reign : how an Indian nationality can be formed.
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c86.s4
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§ 12. The significance of Aurangzib's reign : how an Indian nationality can be formed.
v5.c86.s4.1
The detailed study of this long and strenuous reign of fifty years that we have pursued through five volumes, therefore, drives one truth home into our minds. If India is ever to be the home of a nation able to keep peace within and guard the frontiers, develop the economic resources of the country and promote art and science, then both Hinduism and Islam must die and be born again. Each of these creeds must pass through a rigorous vigil and penance, each must be purified and rejuvenated under the sway of reason and science. That such a rebirth of Islam is not impossible, has been demonstrated in our own days by the conqueror of Smyrna. Ghazi Mustafa Kamal Pasha has proved that the greatest Muslim State of the age can secularise its constitution, abolish polygamy and the servile seclusion of women, grant political equality to all creeds, and yet not cease to be a land of Islam.
v5.c86.s4.2
But Aurangzib did not attempt such an ideal, even though his subjects formed a very composite population, even though the Indian world lay at his feet and he had no European rivals hungrily watching to destroy his kingdom. On the contrary, he deliberately undid the beginnings of such a national and rational policy which Akbar has set on foot.
v5.c86.s4.3
History when rightly read is a justification of Providence, a revelation of a great purpose fulfilled in time. The failure of an ideal Muslim king like Aurangzib with all the advantages he possessed at his accession and his high moral character and training,—is, therefore, the clearest proof the world can afford of the eternal truth that there cannot be a great or lasting empire without a great people, that no people can be great unless it learns to form a compact nation with equal rights and opportunities for all,—a nation the component parts of which are homogeneous, agreeing in all essential points of life and thought, but freely tolerating individual differences in minor points and private life, recognising individual liberty as the basis of communal liberty,—a nation whose administration is solely bent upon promoting national, as opposed to provincial or sectarian interests,—and a society which pursues knowledge without fear, without cessation, without bounds. It is only in that full light of goodness and truth that an Indian nationality can grow to the full height of its being.
v5.c86.s4.4
The history of Aurangzib which I began twenty years ago, is now complete. The task has been ceaselessly pursued in the midst of exacting professional duties and private cares that have only grown with age.
v5.c86.s4.5
That it has been possible to use in this book all the known original sources is due solely to the generous rule of the India Office, London, and the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain for lending their MSS. to students outside,—the enlightened liberality of the Nawab of Rampur (U. P.) and the Jaipur State (Rajputana) in permitting me to take copies of their Persian documents,—the unfailing kindness of Sir Edward Gait, who secured for me a loan of the Assam Buranjis and access to the Jaipur archives,—and the constant help of many friends in India, notably Thakur Narendra Singh of Jobner (State Councillor) and the officers of the Mahakuma Khas of Jaipur, and Govind Sakharam Sardesai, the greatest living historian of Maharashtra.
v5.c86.s4.6
For proof-reading from the 3rd volume onwards I am indebted to the tireless industry and minute accuracy of Brojendra Nath Banerji, a very promising and devoted investigator of history at Calcutta.
v5.c86.s4.7
PATNA, 14th December, 1924. } JADUNATH SARKAR the *Gesta Romanorum*, the *Legenda Aurea* of Jacobus de Voragine, and the *Speculum Historiale* of Vincent of Beauvais. These were the books that fed the imagination of the Middle Ages, and they were the books that the Church, in its wisdom, provided for the instruction and edification of the faithful.
v5.c86.s4.8
But the Church did not merely provide books; it also provided the means of their dissemination. The monastic scriptoria, where monks labored in silence to copy the sacred texts, were the precursors of the printing press. And when the press finally arrived, it was the Church that first harnessed its power, using it to spread the word of God to the corners of the earth. The Gutenberg Bible, the first major book printed in Europe, was a testament to the Church's commitment to the written word.
v5.c86.s4.9
Yet, even as the Church championed the spread of knowledge, it also sought to control it. The *Index Librorum Prohibitorum*, or List of Prohibited Books, was a tool used by the Church to suppress ideas it deemed dangerous or heretical. This tension between the desire to educate and the need to control would define the Church's relationship with literature for centuries to come.
v5.c86.s4.10
It is a complex history, one that is marked by both enlightenment and suppression. But it is a history that cannot be ignored, for it is the history of the very foundation of Western civilization. The Church, in its role as the guardian of knowledge, has shaped the way we think, the way we write, and the way we understand the world around us.
v5.c86.s4.11
the *Gesta Romanorum*, the *Legenda Aurea* of Jacobus de Voragine, and the *Speculum Historiale* of Vincent of Beauvais. These were the books that fed the imagination of the Middle Ages, and they were the books that the Church, in its wisdom, provided for the instruction and edification of the faithful.
v5.c86.s4.12
But the Church did not merely provide books; it also provided the means of their dissemination. The monastic scriptoria, where monks labored in silence to copy the sacred texts, were the precursors of the printing press. And when the press finally arrived, it was the Church that first harnessed its power, using it to spread the word of God to the corners of the earth. The Gutenberg Bible, the first major book printed in Europe, was a testament to the Church's commitment to the written word.
v5.c86.s4.13
Yet, even as the Church championed the spread of knowledge, it also sought to control it. The *Index Librorum Prohibitorum*, or List of Prohibited Books, was a tool used by the Church to suppress ideas it deemed dangerous or heretical. This tension between the desire to educate and the need to control would define the Church's relationship with literature for centuries to come.
v5.c86.s4.14
It is a complex history, one that is marked by both enlightenment and suppression. But it is a history that cannot be ignored, for it is the history of the very foundation of Western civilization. The Church, in its role as the guardian of knowledge, has shaped the way we think, the way we write, and the way we understand the world around us.
v5.c86.s4.15
the *Gesta Romanorum*, the *Legenda Aurea* of Jacobus de Voragine, and the *Speculum Historiale* of Vincent of Beauvais. These were the books that fed the imagination of the Middle Ages, and they were the books that the Church, in its wisdom, provided for the instruction and edification of the faithful.
v5.c86.s4.16
But the Church did not merely provide books; it also provided the means of their dissemination. The monastic scriptoria, where monks labored in silence to copy the sacred texts, were the precursors of the printing press. And when the press finally arrived, it was the Church that first harnessed its power, using it to spread the word of God to the corners of the earth. The Gutenberg Bible, the first major book printed in Europe, was a testament to the Church's commitment to the written word.
v5.c86.s4.17
Yet, even as the Church championed the spread of knowledge, it also sought to control it. The *Index Librorum Prohibitorum*, or List of Prohibited Books, was a tool used by the Church to suppress ideas it deemed dangerous or heretical. This tension between the desire to educate and the need to control would define the Church's relationship with literature for centuries to come.
v5.c86.s4.18
It is a complex history, one that is marked by both enlightenment and suppression. But it is a history that cannot be ignored, for it is the history of the very foundation of Western civilization. The Church, in its role as the guardian of knowledge, has shaped the way we think, the way we write, and the way we understand the world around us.
v5.c86.s4.19
the *Gesta Romanorum*, the *Legenda Aurea* of Jacobus de Voragine, and the *Speculum Historiale* of Vincent of Beauvais. These were the books that fed the imagination of the Middle Ages, and they were the books that the Church, in its wisdom, provided for the instruction and edification of the faithful.
v5.c86.s4.20
But the Church did not merely provide books; it also provided the means of their dissemination. The monastic scriptoria, where monks labored in silence to copy the sacred texts, were the precursors of the printing press. And when the press finally arrived, it was the Church that first harnessed its power, using it to spread the word of God to the corners of the earth. The Gutenberg Bible, the first major book printed in Europe, was a testament to the Church's commitment to the written word.
v5.c86.s4.21
Yet, even as the Church championed the spread of knowledge, it also sought to control it. The *Index Librorum Prohibitorum*, or List of Prohibited Books, was a tool used by the Church to suppress ideas it deemed dangerous or heretical. This tension between the desire to educate and the need to control would define the Church's relationship with literature for centuries to come.
v5.c86.s4.22
It is a complex history, one that is marked by both enlightenment and suppression. But it is a history that cannot be ignored, for it is the history of the very foundation of Western civilization. The Church, in its role as the guardian of knowledge, has shaped the way we think, the way we write, and the way we understand the world around us.
v5.c86.s4.23
the *Gesta Romanorum*, the *Legenda Aurea* of Jacobus de Voragine, and the *Speculum Historiale* of Vincent of Beauvais. These were the books that fed the imagination of the Middle Ages, and they were the books that the Church, in its wisdom, provided for the instruction and edification of the faithful.
v5.c86.s4.24
But the Church did not merely provide books; it also provided the means of their dissemination. The monastic scriptoria, where monks labored in silence to copy the sacred texts, were the precursors of the printing press. And when the press finally arrived, it was the Church that first harnessed its power, using it to spread the word of God to the corners of the earth. The Gutenberg Bible, the first major book printed in Europe, was a testament to the Church's commitment to the written word.
v5.c86.s4.25
Yet, even as the Church championed the spread of knowledge, it also sought to control it. The *Index Librorum Prohibitorum*, or List of Prohibited Books, was a tool used by the Church to suppress ideas it deemed dangerous or heretical. This tension between the desire to educate and the need to control would define the Church's relationship with literature for centuries to come.
v5.c86.s4.26
It is a complex history, one that is marked by both enlightenment and suppression. But it is a history that cannot be ignored, for it is the history of the very foundation of Western civilization. The Church, in its role as the guardian of knowledge, has shaped the way we think, the way we write, and the way we understand the world around us.