१८५७ का स्वातन्त्र्य समर (वीर विनायक दामोदर सावरकर - अंग्रेजों द्वारा छपने से पूर्व प्रतिबन्धित महाग्रन्थ)

THE VOLCANO
would stop, seeing that the English, in the exercise of
their authority for the passing of these laws, had begun
the dangerous habit of interfering by force with the
religious customs of the people. These laws may be good
or bad ; nor may it be necessary to attach to them the
slightest importance ; but this much is clear that any
changes in the social habits based upon religious texts can
be brought about only by the authority of those religions
and through their adherents. When a foreign administra-
tion professing an alien religion, after making promises
never to interfere with the religious beliefs of the people,
endeavours to change by force the hereditary customs,
the established religious beliefs of the people, on the
strength of a majority composed of men professing the
foreign religion in the council and on the strength of
despotic authority, and that, when the public opinion
clearly and unmistakably expressed, of the adherents
of those religions was opposed to such change, while,
in the Council, the men who belonged to these
religions had no authority at all,—then, indeed, there was
not the least difference between the tyranny of Aurang-
zeb and the tyranny of the Company's Raj. To-day law
regarding only suttee has been passed ; who could say
that, when this injustice was swallowed by the people,
what other laws the Company would not pass ? The
English hated idolatry as much as they did suttee.
To-day the law for the abolition of suttee was forced on
the people against their will ; who knows that, to-morrow,
a law for the prevention of idol-worship would not be
thrust on the people under the pretext of reform ? One
injustice begets another. To allow the continuance of this
system of interfering with religion by means of laws made
by aliens was to follow the lifting of the sword of
Aurangzeb. And when the English had begun to take
up the rôle of Aurangzeb, there was no other remedy
than that India must produce a Shivaji or a Guru
Govind. And such was the usual impression all
over India.
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