Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay

“ Now, the plain facts regarding the phenomenon of the solstice are that the sun, in its apparent annual motion, approaches a certain point in the heaven, seems stationary there for a short time, and then recedes again towards the equator. In Hindu mythology, the sun is represented as moving in the heaven in a car, or rath. And so his car, or rath, is represented on earth, and made to conform to his motions in the heavens. ”

“ When Madana came to give place to Krishna, and the Madanotsaba came to be transformed into the Dol Jatra in Bengal, I am unable to say; but it was naturally to be expected that the god whose worship came to be the most popular in the country, and the memory of whose amorous achievements better fitted him to represent love and loose morals than Madana himself, should supplant the latter in popular festivals.
Take, again, the festivals in honour of Lakshmi. Lakshmi is the goddess of prosperity ”

“ So there is a summer festival, the Phul-dol, celebrated on a full-moon night in summer; and there is a rainy season festival, the Jhulan, falling on a full-moon night in the rainy season. All these four festivals were probably in their origin festivals merely in honour of the respective seasons, and had no necessary connexion with religion. They are now all religious festivals in honour of Krishna. It is to be observed, also, that there are these Mi-moon festivals for only four of the six seasons into which Hindus divide the year. There are none for the two divisions of the cold season. ”

“ On the Makar Sankranti the sun's car is not represented on the earth, as in the festival of the summer solstice; but one of the names given to the day succeeding the festival leaves no doubt that it is a solstitial festival. It is called the Uttarayana Dina, or the day on which the sun starts on his northern course. And in some places, though not in all, the sun is the only deity worshipped on the Makar Sankranti. ”

“ Even in the finest passage in all the poetical literature of India, perhaps of the East, the third canto of the Kumar Sambhava, where the poetry often rises into strains of loftiness and grandeur rarely attained, it sinks into the earth when the poet comes to describe spring. ”

“ It is impossible to venture on any general theory regarding their origin. Parti­cular festivals appear to have had each a particular origin quite different in its principle from the origin of others. Again, it is by no means clear that every festival has had its origin in the earlier stages of Hindu society. Some are doubtless, very old, but others are extremely modern. ”

“ A spring night, or a summer night, or an autumnal night, with a splendid full moon lighting up the earth and heavens, is a very proper season for festivity, and such a night, even during the rainy season, may be so if the sky happens to be clear on the particular day. ”

“ Season festivals, as the Dol Jatra and the three other full-moon festivals. Agricultural festivals, which are in honour of Lakshmi, the Hindu Ceres. Mythological festivals, like the Kali Puja and the Jugaddhatri, which appear to be the most modern of all. Lastly, festivals which apparently owe their origin to the popular dread of some physical agent of mischief, as the Manasa festival, celebrated to propitiate snakes. In the whole range of Hindu festivals, I have been unable to trace any to a historical origin. ”

“ In early times, when agriculture was the only and the direct source of wealth, wealth differed little in popular idea from the produce of a good harvest. Now, we find that there are four festivals in honour of Lakshmi ”