Ramanuja

“ Although the system of Ramanuja admits the unity of the total, within that totality of existence there are, according to him, eternal differences. Therefore, for all practical purposes, this system also being dualistic, it was easy for Ramanuja to keep the distinction between the personal soul and the Personal God very clear. ”

“ Purity is absolutely the basic work, the bed-rock upon which the whole Bhakti-building rests. Cleansing the external body and discriminating the food are both easy, but without internal cleanliness and purity, these external observances are of no value whatsoever. In the list of qualities conducive to purity, as given by Ramanuja, there are enumerated, Satya, truthfulness; Ârjava, sincerity; Dayâ, doing good to others without any gain to one's self; Ahimsâ, not injuring others by thought, word, or deed ”

“ After the poet-saints came the doctors and theologians. Accounts of them, which seem historical in the main though full of miraculous details, are found in the Tamil biographies [578] illustrating the apostolic succession of teachers. It appears fairly certain that Râmânuja, the fourth in succession, was alive in 1118: the first, known as Nâthamuni, may therefore have lived 100-150 years earlier. None of his works are extant but he is said to have arranged the poems of the Âr̤vârs for recitation in temple services. ”

“ He apparently wished to prove that the doctrine of salvation by devotion to a personal god is compatible with a system as strictly orthodox as Śaṅkara's own.
I shall treat elsewhere of his philosophy, known as the Viśishṭâdvaita or non-duality, which yet recognizes a distinction between God and individual souls. The line of thought is old and at all periods is clearly a compromise, unwilling to deny that God is everything and yet dissatisfied with the idea that a personal deity and our individual transmigrating souls are all merely illusion. Devotional theism was growing in Râmânuja's time. ”

“ Now this seems, therefore, to be the great point of difference between the dualist and the Advaitist. You find even great commentators like Shankaracharya making meanings of texts, which, to my mind, sometimes do not seem to be justified. Sometimes you find Ramanuja dealing with texts in a way that is not very clear. The idea has been even among our Pandits that only one of these sects can be true and the rest must be false, although they have the idea in the Shrutis, the most wonderful idea that India has yet to give to the world: एकं सव्दिप्रा बहुधा वदन्ति। — "That which exists is One ”

“ At the age of fifty he entirely renounced all secular concerns, and became a Synassi, devoting the whole of his time to the contemplation of the divinity, and reading books of philosophy and theology. Ramanujachari died at Sriparumutture, his native town. Many individuals of the Vystnava faith believed him to have been an incaroatiou of Sesha the Serpent, on which Vishnu reclines, and they raised a metallic image as a representation of Ramanujachari, and denominated him one of the twelve chief Alwers. ”

“ Since she knew that the Señorita was half Indian, why should she think it so dreadful a thing for her to marry an Indian man? It did not once enter into Alessandro's mind, that the Señora could have had any other thought, seeing them as she did, in each other's arms. And again what had he to give to Ramona? Could she live in a house such as he must live in,—live as the Temecula women lived? No! for her sake he must leave his people; must go to some town, must do—he knew not what—something to earn more money. Anguish seized him as he pictured to himself Ramona suffering deprivations. ”

“ He is the cursed one! He would bring a widow to a Brahmin hearth. Jai Kâli ma! Jai Kâli ma!"
"Mother! mother! for God's sake," pleaded Ramanund, aghast at the prospect of having the secret of his heart made bazaar property. "Think; give me time."
"Time!" she echoed wildly. "What time is there when folks die every minute for thy sin? Oh, Raino, son of my prayer, repent--do atonement. Lo! come with me even now and humble thyself before Her feet. I will ask no more but that to-day--no more." She thrust her hands feverishly into his as if to drag him to the shrine. ”

“ The allusion to the death of Ramanund's wife roused an instant murmur of assent from those who were of the city, and they passing the tale on to others, the murmur swelled to a roar which effectively drowned the rest of Ramanund's advice.
But Father Ninian, still at the door, still uncertain, could hear a man who had been buckling on his pilgrim's sandals as if for a start, say, as he stood up and thrust them back to his waistcloth:--
"Well! I, for one, go no further without remission, or the blood which brings it. As jogi-jee saith, no man should risk the woman's cursing. ”

“ The Indians did not all want to come to the Missions; some of them preferred to stay in the woods, and live as they always had lived; and I think they had a right to do that if they preferred, Majella. It was stupid of them to stay and be like beasts, and not know anything; but do you not think they had the right?”
“It is the command to preach the gospel to every creature,” replied the pious Ramona. “That is what Father Salvierderra said was the reason the Franciscans came here. I think they ought to have made the Indians listen. But that was dreadful about the ears, Alessandro. ”

“ Before Kâli, my lord need have no fears for that, and I have found favour in my lord's eyes. What, then, are the others to my lord? Let the wicked ones go."
"But if people do such things they should be punished by the law," fumed Ramanund, who, even with her arms round him, and a chaplet of chumpak blossom encircling his neck, could not quite forget that he was a schoolmaster. "You forget that we live in a new age, or perhaps you do not know it. ”

“ Father Salvierderra was past eighty, but his blood was not too old to move quicker at the sight of this picture. A man must be dead not to thrill at it. Ramona's beauty was of the sort to be best enhanced by the waving gold which now framed her face. She had just enough of olive tint in her complexion to underlie and enrich her skin without making it swarthy. Her hair was like her Indian mother's, heavy and black, but her eyes were like her father's, steel-blue. ”

“ Breathless, panting, Alessandro burst into Ramona's presence. “Majella! my Majella! There are cattle—and sheep,” he cried. “The saints be praised! We are not like the beggars, as I said.”
“I told you that God would give us food, dear Alessandro,” replied Ramona, gently.
“You do not wonder! You do not ask!” he cried, astonished at her calm. “Does Majella think that a sheep or a steer can come down from the skies?”
“Nay, not as our eyes would see,” she answered; “but the holy ones who live in the skies can do anything they like on the earth. Whence came these cattle, and how are they ours?” ”

“ The Señora wondered if Ramona would now ask again for a messenger to go to Temecula. Almost even the Señora relented, as she looked into the girl's white and wasted face, as she sat silent, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes fixed on the willows. The altar-cloth was done, folded and laid away. It would never hang in the Moreno chapel. It was promised, in Ramona's mind, to Father Salvierderra. She had resolved to go to him; if he, a feeble old man, could walk all the way between Santa Barbara and their home, she could surely do the same. She would not lose the way. ”

“ By the time she had grown to be a woman, if she had lived, there would be no place in all the country where an Indian could find refuge. Brooding over such thoughts as these, Alessandro went up into the cañon one morning. It must be done. Everything was ready for their move; it would take many days to carry even their few possessions up the steep mountain trail to their new home; the pony which had replaced Benito and Baba could not carry a heavy load. While this was being done, Ramona would dry the beef which would be their supply of meat for many months. ”

“ Ramona, her own heart wrung with fear, soothed him as best she could. “Dear Alessandro,” she said, “let us go to Los Angeles, and not live with the Indians any more. You could get work there. You could play at dances sometimes; there must be plenty of work. I could get more sewing to do, too. It would be better, I think.”
He looked horror-stricken at the thought. “Go live among the white people!” he cried. “What does Majella think would become of one Indian, or two, alone among whites? If they will come to our villages and drive us out a hundred at a time, what would they do to one man alone? ”

“ The Señorita Ramona is alone. The Señora loves her not. Indian blood! Indian blood!” These, or something like them, would have been the words; but Alessandro did not put them in words. He only worked away on the rough posts for Señor Felipe's bedstead, hammered, fitted, stretched the raw-hide and made it tight and firm, driving every nail, striking every blow, with a bounding sense of exultant strength, as if there were suddenly all around him a new heaven and a new earth. ”

“ If the whites took away this water, Saboba would be ruined. However, as the spring began in the very heart of the village, they could not take it without destroying the village. “And the Ravallos would surely never let that be done,” thought Ramona. “While they live, it will not happen.”
It was a sad day for Ramona and Alessandro when the kindly Hyers pulled up their tent-stakes and left the valley. Their intended three months had stretched into six, they had so enjoyed the climate, and the waters had seemed to do such good to Jos. ”

“ Ramona wore on her head the usual black shawl of the Mexican women. There was nothing distinctive, to the Father's eye, in her figure or face. In the dim light of the one candle,—Father Gaspara allowed himself no luxuries,—the exquisite coloring of her skin and the deep blue of her eyes were not to be seen. Alessandro's tall figure and dignified bearing were not uncommon. The Father had seen many as fine-looking Indian men. But his voice was remarkable, and he spoke better Spanish than was wont to be heard from Indians. ”

“ An old Indian woman, the same whose house they had hired in Saboba, had come up to live with Ramona. She was friendless now, her daughter having died, and she thankfully came to be as a mother to Ramona. She was ignorant and feeble but Ramona saw in her always the picture of what her own mother might perchance be, wandering, suffering, she knew not what or where; and her yearning, filial instinct found sad pleasure in caring for this lonely, childless, aged one.
Ramona was alone with her on the mountain at the time of the baby's birth. Alessandro had gone to the valley, to be gone two days ”

“ If the Señora couldn't keep hers, with Señor Felipe to help her, and he knows all about the law, and can speak the American language, what chance is there for us? We can't take care of ourselves any better than the wild beasts can, my Majella. Oh, why, why did you come with me? Why did I let you?”
After such words as these, Alessandro would throw himself on the ground, and for a few moments not even Ramona's voice would make him look up. ”

“ He said the Indians were all crazy. It was no use. They would only be killed themselves. That is the worst thing, my Majella. The stupid Indians fight and kill, and then what can we do? The white men think we are all the same. Father Gaspara has never been to Pala, I heard, since that time. There goes there now the San Juan Capistrano priest. He is a bad man. He takes money from the starving poor.”
“A priest!” ejaculated Ramona, horror-stricken.
“Ay! a priest!” replied Alessandro. “They are not all good,—not like Father Salvierderra.” ”

“ And, beholding the army all busy, the emissary of the vicious-souled Rākshasa—Rāvana, entered the city of Lankā and, approaching his lord, said,—"The army of monkeys and bears hath approached Lankā. It is immeasurably deep as the ocean. And those two sons of the king Daçaratha—the brothers Rāma and Lakshmana, gifted with great beauty, coming to rescue Sitā, have stationed themselves on the shore of the ocean, O thou of great effulgence. The army of Rāma extends over the sky and ten yojanas. I have come, O great king, to acquaint thee with the real truth. ”

“ She is very strong of soul. It is she who makes me strong often, and not I who give strength to her.”
“My faith, but the man is right,” thought Father Gaspara, a half-hour later, when, with a calm face, Ramona summoned them to supper. He did not know, as Alessandro did, how that face had changed in the half-hour. It wore a look Alessandro had never seen upon it. Almost he dreaded to speak to her.
When he walked by her side, later in the evening, as she went across the valley to Fernando's house, he ventured to mention Father Salvierderra's name. Ramona laid her hand on his lips. ”

“ Instantaneously, on the first sense of relief that the disgrace had not been what she supposed, followed a new wrath, if possible hotter than the first; not so much scorn, but a bitterer anger. “Marry! Marry that Indian!” she cried, as soon as she found voice. “You marry an Indian? Never! Are you mad? I will never permit it.”
Ramona looked anxiously at her. “I have never disobeyed you, Señora,” she said, “but this is different from all other things; you are not my mother. I have promised to marry Alessandro.”
The girl's gentleness deceived the Señora. ”

“ Felipe by her side,—the dear Felipe,—his eyes wearing the same bright and loving look as of old,—what strange thing was it which had happened to her to make it all seem unreal? Even the little one in her arms,—she too, seemed unreal! Ramona did not know it, but her nerves were still partially paralyzed. Nature sends merciful anæsthetics in the shocks which almost kill us. In the very sharpness of the blow sometimes lies its own first healing. It would be long before Ramona would fully realize that Alessandro was dead. ”