IsiXhosa Intellectual Traditions (IsiXIT) Digital Archive

LORD RIPON THE growth of the natives of this country in civilization is so often likened to the growth of the aboriginal subjects of the QUEEN in India that we, as an organ of the native community in this country, naturally pause at times to compare notes with our friends of the Indian race. Our countrymen may not know that within the last five years their prototypes in India have entered upon a new epoch—and one which, for them, is full of hope and' promise. The nobleman, Lord RIPON, who heads these remarks, has recently retired from the high position of Viceroy of the important Empire of India, and his departure for England has been seized by the millions of the Indian races for a demonstration of loyal affection towards him. It is, on the other hand, notorious, that not only with dead silence but with positive snarls has Lord RIPON been allowed to retire from the viceroyalty by Anglo-Indians. The attitude of the two races towards his Lordship is by itself sufficient to indicate that his term of five years' administration must have been an eventful one for India. And so it has been. When, in 1881, Lord RIPON set foot on Indian soil he found that the Government had taken up an anomalous position towards the thousands of capable Indians. Under the immediate direction of the Government the natives had been enabled to obtain the best of University and College education, and for this blessing the Indians were grateful to the Government. Beyond this the Government was not prepared to proceed, and we think with Lord RIPON that this unwilling- ness to proceed was ' the height of political folly.' It is absurd folly to think of giving men—be their colour black, or white, or brown, or yellow—the best of education, and thus to throw open to them English ideas and English thoughts, awaken in their minds many aspirations, and raise in their hearts legitimate ambition, and then turn round upon them and say; ' We will not give you any opening for those aspirations with which we have inspired you; we will not afford you any means for the satisfaction of that ambition we have created in you!' And yet this was the stand that the Indian Government had taken towards their proteges. The result was exactly what might have been expected. Discontent and a general distrust of British rule had leavened the hundreds of millions who form India. Some may, as they have done so in this country, regard it as folly on the part of the governing race to educate these Natives to such a pitch that aspirations and ambition are aroused. History does not show us that to keep a people ignorant will ensure you peace and prosperity; and we cannot, in this connection, do better than express this in the words of that eminent stateman, Lord MACAU-LAY, who was quoted by Lord RIPON with much effect in his speech at Leeds. In the debate in 1833 Lord MACAULAY said—'Are we to keep the people of India ignorant in order that we may keep them submissive; or do we think that we can give them knowledge without awakening ambition; or do we mean to awaken ambition, and provide it with no legitimate vent? Who will answer any of these questions in the affirmative ? Yet one of them must be answered in the affirmative by every person who maintains that we ought permenantly to exclude the people of India from high office. I have no fears. The path of duty is plainly before us, and it is also the path of wisdom, of national prosperity and of national honour.' We would cordially recommend these questions to those who, like the leader-writer in the Queen's Town Free Press, would not, on any account, employ educated Natives in this country in positions of trust and responsibility. ' It is in considerations of this description,' Lord RIPON told those who welcomed him at Leeds, ' that you will find the key to much of the policy that I pursued in India. It was upon ground like this that I felt it one of my foremost duties to further as much as I could the appointment of Natives of India to important offices of trust in the government when I found men fit to fill them. It may be said, as has recently been observed, that these remarks are pointing towards place and influence for the educated few and leaving to the uneducated many only the pleasure of seeing other men's glory. But those who say so forget that these ' educated few ' are regarded by their countrymen as experiments to test the benefits of education, so that the nation may, on satisfying itself of its utility, take to it as a whole. We think we are not much mistaken when we say that the relative proportion of educated Natives to the uneducated masses of their race in India is, if not the same, at all events, almost the same as in this country. We have a right then to assume that the arguments that hold good in regard to the educated Indians must hold good in regard to the educated natives here, though we are not prepared to say that our education has advanced as far as that of our Indian friends. To return to Lord RIPON'S administration, however, we find that the practical recognition of the true necessities of the situation has made his name not only a household word on his retirement but he has had the pleasure of handing over to the QUEEN hundreds of millions of sable people more devoted Majesty's Throne—aportant consideration Russia is 'marching upon India —who have for the first time discovered, according to a native writer, that ' the evils, from which they are so terribly suffering under British rule, are not the natural consequences of the system, but the work of the agency by which that rule has so long been, and still is, administered.' When a people under the QUEEN are thoroughly impressed by this fact there may be a well-founded sense of security and repose. And the statesman who will work to demonstrate this to the thousands of natives in South Africa will lay our countrymen under as heavy a debt of gratitude as the MARQUESS of RIPON has just laid the almost countless Natives of the Empire of the QUEEN in India.