THE MODERN REVIEW
JULY, 1917
No. I.
THE NATION
By Sir Rabindranath Tagore.
THE peoples are living beings having their distinct personalities. But nations are mere organizations of power. And therefore their inner aspects and outward expressions are monotonously the same everywhere. Their differences are merely the differences in degree of efficiency.
In the modern world the fight is going on between the living spirit of the people and the methods of nation-organising. It is like the struggle that began in Central Asia between man's cultivated area of habitation and the continual encroachment of desert sands, till the human region of life and beauty was choked out of existence. When the spread of higher ideals of humanity is not held to be important, the hardening method of national efficiency gains in strength, and at least for some limited period of time it proudly proves itself to be the fittest to survive.
But it is the survival of that part of man which is the least living. And this is the reason why dead monotony is the sign of the spread of the nation. The modern towns which present the ⟨physiognomy⟩ of this dominance of the nation are everywhere the same from San Francisco to London from London to Tokyo;-they show no faces but merely masks.
The peoples being living personalities ⟨must⟩ have their self-expresion and this ⟨leads⟩ to creations. These creations are ⟨literature⟩, art, social symbolism and ceremonials. They are like different dishes in the common feast adding richness to our enjoyment and understanding of truth. They are ⟨making the world of man fertile of life and variedly beautiful.⟩
But the nations do not create, they merely produce and destroy. Organisations for production are necessary. Even organisations for destruction may be so}} but when actuated by greed and ⟨hatred⟩, they crowd away into a corner ⟨the living man⟩ who creates, then the ⟨harmony⟩ is lost, and the people's history ⟨runs at a⟩ breakneck speed towards some fatal ⟨catastrophe⟩.
Humanity, where it is living, is guided by inner ideals, but where it is a ⟨dead⟩ organisation, it becomes impervious to them. Its building process is only an external process and its response to the inner moral guidance has to pass through obstacles that are gross and non-plastic.
Man as a person has his individuality which is the field where his spirit has the freedom to express itself and to grow. Man as the professional carries a right crust around him which has very little variation and hardly any elasticity. This professionalism is the region where men specialise their knowledge and organise their power, where they mercilessly elbow each other in their struggle to come in front. Professionalism is necessary without doubt, but it must not be allowed to exceed its healthy limits, to assume complete mastery over the personal man, making him narrow and hard, exclusively intent upon pursuit of success at the cost of his faith in ideals.
In ancient India professions were kept within limits by social regulation. They were considered primarily as social ⟨necessities⟩ and secondarily as the means of livelihood for the individuals,—thus man, being free from the constant urging of un-bounded competition could have ⟨leisure⟩ to cultivate the completeness of his nature.
The idea of the nation is the professionalism of the people, which is becoming their greatest danger, because it is bringing them ⟨enormous success, making them impatient of the claims of higher ideals. The greater the amount of success, the stronger are the conflicts of interest and⟩
