102 ESSAYS IN NATIONAL IDEALISM.

All departments of education in India—primary,,
secondary and university—are directly or indirectly
controlled by Government. A few indigenous insti-
tutions for imparting a knowledge of Sanskrit and Arabic-
carry on a forlorn struggle for existence. A few
modern institutions, such as the Central Hindu
College in Benares, and the Hardwar Gurukula, are carried
on entirely without Government aid; but most of these-
are bound to the University curriculum, as otherwise their
students would be unable to obtain degrees. Two-thirds*
of Indian Arts Colleges are Missionary institutions,—
equally bound to the Government codes and selected text-
books. The net result is that Indian culture is practically
ignored in modern education ; for this culture, whether
Hindu or Muharnrnadan, is essentially religious, and -so,,
regardless of the example of almost every Indian ruler
since history began, the Government practises toleration,
-—by ignoring it,—and the Missionary practises intolerance-
•—by endeavouring to destroy it, in schools where edxxca-
tion is offered as a bribe, and where the religion of the-
people is of set purpose undermined. The great tragedy
of the present situation lies in this, that the schools are-
not part of Indian life (as were the tols and maJctabs of
the past), but antagonistic to it. Of the two type»s of
English schools in India, Government and Missionary, the
one ignores, the other endeavours to break down the ideals
of the home. Sir George Bird wood truly , says : " Our
education has destroyed their love of their own literature^
the quickening soul of a people, and their delight
in their own arts and, worst of all, their repose in
their own traditional and national religion. It has dis-
gusted them with their own homes—their parents, their
.sisters, their very wives. It has brought discontent into*