XXII
EDITOR ' S INTRODUCTION
< han any other with the material and social conditions of the people themselves , but he is himself the author of a most authoritative work on the moral and material progress of Southern India under British rule . At the meeting referred to he observed
:
'
The Abbe was a most remarkable character , and a study of his life cannot fail to be of profit to us all . It has been
said , and said truly , that one half of the nation does not know how the other half lives . The difficulties which a
foreigner has of understanding the inner life and modes of thought of a people to which he does not belong may indeed be said to be immense . The Abbe surmounted these difficulties by devoting thirty years of his life to his
subject . To effect his purpose he adopted the garb , the manners , and , as he says , even the prejudices of the won their respect
people among whom his lot was cast ; and confidence ; and was held by them in quite as much reverence as one of their yogis or gurus . The quotations from his work show his shrewd common sense , clear-sightedness , and perfect candour . Any account given by such a man of the manners and customs of the people amongst whom he lived must in any case be instructive , and I for one look forward with great interest to the forthcoming revised edition of the Abbe ' s work .'
In many respects the Abbe displays a truly wonderful insight into things . For instance , in his finally corrected work
there is a passage ( evidently a late interpolation ) in which he sums up in a few brief sentences his opinion of British
dominion in India , and which is all the more remarkable as coming from a Frenchman . In that passage he remarks :
'
The European Power which is now established in India
is , properly speaking , supported neither by physical force nor by moral influence . It is a piece of huge , complicated machinery , moved by springs which have been arbitrarily adapted to it . Under the supremacy of the Brahmins the people of India hated their government , while they cherished and respected their rulers ; under the supremacy of Europeans they hate and despise their rulers from the bottom of