DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.6523#0234
222
of the religion of the Indian ladies to-day is devotion
without knowledge, zeal without understanding. I
do not want in a public lecture to go into details on a
subject so sacred. I will only ask the men at once
whether it be not true that when they go back into
the home they go into an entirely different atmo-
sphere in matters of religious thought from their own,
and whether they do not find there observances which
are childish rather than elevating ; whether it would
not be well to add to the women's devotion a know-
ledge of religious topics, which will make her worship
intelligent as well as loving ; for remember that your
young boys are brought up at their mothers' knees;
if the boy worships as the mother now worships, he will
later think all religion is childish, and only fit for
women and children. How many young men of
sixteen, seventeen and eighteen reject their mothers'
faith because it is unintelligent, and her observances
because they are regarded as superstitious; so I say
educate your women in religion, not to diminish their
devotion but to render it more intelligent, so that they
may prevent the boy from growing into a sceptic, and
that he may learn at his mother's knee a religion of
which he need never be ashamed.
Outside religion and morals, literary education.
What should that be ? I submit it should include
first a thorough literary knowledge of the vernacular,
the vernacular of the'family to which the girl belongs.
That is fundamental, so that the great vernacular
of the religion of the Indian ladies to-day is devotion
without knowledge, zeal without understanding. I
do not want in a public lecture to go into details on a
subject so sacred. I will only ask the men at once
whether it be not true that when they go back into
the home they go into an entirely different atmo-
sphere in matters of religious thought from their own,
and whether they do not find there observances which
are childish rather than elevating ; whether it would
not be well to add to the women's devotion a know-
ledge of religious topics, which will make her worship
intelligent as well as loving ; for remember that your
young boys are brought up at their mothers' knees;
if the boy worships as the mother now worships, he will
later think all religion is childish, and only fit for
women and children. How many young men of
sixteen, seventeen and eighteen reject their mothers'
faith because it is unintelligent, and her observances
because they are regarded as superstitious; so I say
educate your women in religion, not to diminish their
devotion but to render it more intelligent, so that they
may prevent the boy from growing into a sceptic, and
that he may learn at his mother's knee a religion of
which he need never be ashamed.
Outside religion and morals, literary education.
What should that be ? I submit it should include
first a thorough literary knowledge of the vernacular,
the vernacular of the'family to which the girl belongs.
That is fundamental, so that the great vernacular