Friedrich Max Müller Quotes

The worship of Shiva, Vishnu, and other popular deities was of the same and in many cases of a more degraded and savage character than the worship of Jupiter, Apollo or Minerva. ... A religion may linger on for a long time, it may be accepted by large masses of the people, because it is there, and there is nothing better. But when a religion has ceased to produce defenders of the faith, prophets, champions, martyrs, it has ceased to live, in the true sense of the word; and in that sense the old orthodox Brahmanism has ceased to live for more than a thousand years.

As for more than twenty years my principal work has been devoted to the ancient literature of India, I cannot but feel a deep and real sympathy for all that concerns the higher interests of the people of that country. Though I have never been in India, I have many friends there, both among the civilians and among the natives, and I believe I am not mistaken in supposing that the publication in England of the ancient sacred writings of the Brahmans, which had never been published in India, and other contributions from different European scholars towards a better knowledge of the ancient literature and religion of India, have not been without some effect on the intellectual and religious movement that is going on among the more thoughtful members of Indian society. I have sometimes regretted that I am not an Englishman, and able to help more actively in the great work of educating and improving the natives. But I do rejoice that this great task of governing and benefiting India should have fallen to one who knows the greatness of that task and all its opportunities and responsibilities, who thinks not only of its political and financial bearings, but has a heart to feel for the moral welfare of those millions of human beings that are, more or less directly, committed to his charge. India has been conquered once, but India must be conquered again, and that second conquest should be a conquest by education. Much has been done for education of late, but if the funds were tripled and quadrupled, that would hardly be enough. The results of the educational work carried on during the last twenty years are palpable everywhere. They are good and bad, as was to be expected. It is easy to find fault with what is called Young Bengal, the product of English ideas grafted on the native mind. But Young Bengal, with all its faults, is full of promise. Its bad features are apparent everywhere, its good qualities are naturally hidden from the eyes of careless observers. . . . India can never be anglicized, but it can be reinvigorated. By encouraging a study of their own ancient literature, as part of their education, a national feeling of pride and self-respect will be reawakened among those who influence the large masses of the people. A new national literature may spring up, impregnated with Western ideas, yet retaining its native spirit and character. The two things hang together. In order to raise the character of the vernaculars, a study of the ancient classical language is absolutely necessary: for from it these modern dialects have branched off, and from it alone can they draw their vital strength and beauty. A new national literature will bring with it a new national life and new moral vigour. As to religion, that will take care of itself. The missionaries have done far more than they themselves seem to be aware of, nay, much of the work which is theirs they would probably disclaim. The Christianity of our nineteenth century will hardly be the Christianity of India. But the ancient religion of India is doomed — and if Christianity does not step in, whose fault will it be?

वे गटकमाला को भी कंठस्थ करते हैं जिसमें बुद्ध के पिछले जीवनों का विवरण दिया गया है।

There will be and can be no rest till we admit, what cannot be denied, that there is in man a third faculty, which I call simply the faculty of apprehending the Infinite, not only in religion, but in all things; a power independent of sense and reason, a power in a certain sense contradicted by sense and reason; but yet, I suppose, a very real power, if we see how it has held its own from the beginning of the world — how neither sense nor reason has been able to overcome it, while it alone is able to overcome both reason and sense.

संस्कृत में काफी कुछ अभी भी लिखा जा रहा है तो हमारे पास साहित्यिक गतिविधि की एक धारा है जो 3400 साल से प्रवाहित हो रही है। चीन को छोड़कर सारे संसार में ऐसा कहीं नहीं है।

Thus we may infer that the only characteristic difference between modern Christianity and the old heathen faiths is the belief of the former in a personal devil and in hell. "The Aryan nations had no devil," says Max Muller. "Pluto, though of a sombre character, was a very respectable personage; and Loki (the Scandinavian), though a mischievous person, was not a fiend. The German Goddess, Hell, too, like Proserpine, had once seen better days. Thus, when the Germans were indoctrinated with the idea of a real devil, the Semitic Seth, Satan or Diabolus, they treated him in the most good-humored way."

Long is the night to him who is awake; long is a mile to him who is tired; long is life to the foolish who do not know the true law. 61. If a traveller does not meet with one who is his better, or his equal, let him firmly keep to his solitary journey; there is no companionship with a fool.

आप सब वीरों में समृद्ध एवं सशक्त वीरवत्तम हैं। यत्र-तत्र सर्वत्र आपका स्तवगान होता रहता है। आप सभी अदितिसुत आदित्यों या देवताओं में अविजेय हैं। हे देव! आप हमें अपना मित्र बनाने की कृपा कीजिए।’ ‘शासक आदित्य ने इन नदियों को धरती पर प्रवाहित किया है। हे वरुण! वे आपकी आज्ञाकारी हैं। वे आपकी आज्ञा में रहती हुई निरन्तर प्रवाहित होती रहती हैं, वे कभी थकती नहीं और न अपने प्रवाह को ही कभी रोकती हैं। मानो उड़ती जा रही हों।

Whatever sphere of the human mind you may select for your special study, whether it be language, or religion, or mythology, or philosophy, whether it be laws or customs, primitive art or primitive science, everywhere, you have to go to India, whether you like it or not, because some of the most valuable and most instructive materials in the history of man are treasured up in India, and in India only.

Whatever may be the date of the Vedic hymns , whether 1500 or 15,000 B.C. , they have their own unique place and stand by themselves in the literature of the world " .

शास्त्रीय प्रज्ञा के विद्वानों ने विचार पर पहरा दिया। खुद मुझे अभी तक वह समय याद है जब मैं लीपजिग में छात्र था और संस्कृत पढ़ना शुरू किया था और किस प्रकार उस समय मेरे शिक्षकों, गोटफ्रीड हरमेन, हाप्ट, वेस्टरमैन, स्टालबाम और अन्य ने संस्कृत और तुलनात्मक व्याकरण की घृणा से टीका की थी।

1783 में मैं भारत की, जिसका मैं बहुत समय से भ्रमण करने की तीव्र इच्छा रख रहा था, यात्रा पर समुद्र में था, तब दिन भर के अवलोकनों की पड़ताल करने पर एक शाम मैंने पाया, कि भारत तो हमारे सामने है, फारस हमारे बाएँ है, जबकि अरब से आ रहा हवा का झोंका हमारे पीछे आ रहा था। यह स्थिति खुद में इतनी सुखद और मेरे लिए इतनी नई थी कि इसने मेरे मस्तिष्क में यादों की एक ऐसी शृंखला जगा दी,

If I were to look over the whole world to find out the country most richly endowed with all the wealth, power, and beauty that nature can bestow — in some parts a very paradise on earth — I should point to India. If I were asked under what sky the human mind has most full developed some of its choicest gifts, has most deeply pondered on the greatest problems of life, and has found solutions of some of them which well deserve the attention even of those who have studied Plato and Kant — I should point to India. And if I were to ask myself from what literature we, here in Europe, we who have been nurtured almost exclusively on the thoughts of Greeks and Romans, and of one Semitic race, the Jewish, may draw that corrective which is most wanted in order to make our inner life more perfect, more comprehensive, more universal, in fact more truly human, a life, not for this life only, but a transfigured and eternal life — again I should point to India.

These two sciences. the Science of Language and the Science of Man, cannot. at least for the present, be kept too much asunder; and many misunderstandings, many controversies, would have been avoided. if scholars had not attempted to draw conclusions from language to blood, or from blood to language. When each of these sciences shall have carried out independently its own classification of men and languages, then, and then only, will it be time to compare their results; but even then, I must repeat, what I have said many times before, it would be as wrong to speak of Aryan blood as of dolichocephalic grammar.(61)

Whatever may be the date of the Vedic hymns, whether 1500 B.C.E. or 15,000 B.C.E., they have their own unique place and stand by themselves in the literature of the world. They tell us something of the early growth of the human mind of which we find no trace anywhere else.