Volume 5 - Philosophy and Religion

National Integration in a Multireligious Society.... 163 subsisting in all beings which undoubtedly is pre-requisite of all
types of integration, national or international.
Culture of a country is determined by its history, geography
and the complexion of its population. This holds good in the case
of India as well which is populated by many races. Four of these
were identified in the pre-historic age itself: the Aryans, the
Dravidians, the Astroloids and the Mongoloids. To these were
added quite a large number through immigration princ.pally
through the North-West. Foreigners flocked to India in successive
waves in search of pastures anew. As for languages, there are
twenty two major ones which are spoken in India at present with
countless off-shoots. All this has resulted in the evolution in India
of a psychology which is of the accepting type. Since India did
not go in for exclusivism throughout its long march through
history, it did not go in for intolerance and fanati::sm either. It
developed instead breadth of outlook, catholicity of approach and
width of perspective. That is the typical Indian ethos which got
its full articulation through a long line of Indian seers and sages,
thinkers and philosophers. They could see through unity in the
midst of all this diversity. There is only one reality which is given
different names, said they: ekam sad viprā bahudhā vadanti."
Each living being has the same soul residing in him and therefore
there is no question of any dissension among creatures in the
ultimate analysis. Declares the Gītā:
vidyāvinayasampanne brāhmaṇe gavi hastinit
śuni caiva śvapake ca paṇḍitāḥ samadarsinahif
"The wise look upon a learned and modest Brahmin, a cow,
an elephant, a dog and an outcast as they are one and the same.
"
This outlook did not make the Indians limit themselves to
their tiny village, their town, their city and even their vast country.
They could go beyond them and look upon the whole earth as
their mother. The Atharvaveda seer calls himself the son of the
earth: mātā bhūmiḥ putro 'ham pṛthivyaḥ," "I am the son of the
earth. The earth is my mother." That is the true international spirit,
manifest not in a work of today when there is so much of talk of
fostering of international outlook but in a work thousands of years
old! To the Indians the whole universe is a nest which they
CC-0. Prof. Satya Vrat Shastri Collection, New Delhi. Digitized by S3 Foundation USA