"The East and the West are not so sharply divided as the alarmists would make us believe. The products of spirit and intelligence, the positive sciences, the engineering techniques, the governmental forms, the legal regulations, the administrative arrangements, and the economic institutions are binding together peoples of varied cultures and bringing them into closer reciprocal contact. The world today is tending to function as one organism. The outer uniformity has not, however, resulted in an inner unity of mind and spirit. The new nearness into which we are drawn has not meant increasing happiness and diminishing friction, since we are not mentally and spiritually prepared for the meeting. Maxim Gorky relates how, after addressing a peasant audience on the subject of science and the marvels of technical inventions, he was criticized by a peasant spokesman in the following words : "Yes, we are taught to fly in the air like birds, and to swim in the water like the fishes, but how to live on the earth we do not know." Among the races, religions, and nations which live side by side on the small globe, there is not that sense of fellowship necessary for good life. They rather feel themselves to be antagonistic forces. Though humanity has assumed a uniform outer body, it is still without a single animating spirit. The world is not of one mind. … The provincial cultures of the past and the present have not always been loyal to the true interests of the human race. They stood for racial, religious, and political monopolies, for the supremacy of men over women and of the rich over the poor. Before we can build a stable civilization worthy of humanity as a whole, it is necessary that each historical civilization should become conscious of its limitations and it's unworthiness to become the ideal civilization of the world."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Imported from EN Wikiquote
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sarvepalli_Radhakrishnan
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
1952 – 1962
105 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan →
Related Quotes
"Hinduism has come to be a tapestry of the most variegated tissues and almost endless diversity of hues.""
""Hinduism is therefore not a definite dogmatic creed, but a vast, complex, but subtly unified mass of spirItual thoug…"
"Hinduism is not a sect but a fellowship of all who accept the law of right and earnestly seek for the truth."
"The Gita appeals to us not only by its force of thought and majesty of vision, but also by its fervor of devotion and…"
"In the mystic traditions of the different religions we have a remarkable unity of spirit. Whatever religion they may …"
"[Radhakrishnan describes the state of dejection he experienced as a student at Madras Christian College:] 'I was stro…"
"The Flag links up the past and the present. It is the legacy bequeathed to us by the architects of our liberty. Those…"
"The challenge of Christian critics impelled me to make a study of Hinduism and find out what is living and what is de…"
"Man is a paradoxical being-the constant glory and scandal of this world."
"In the history of the world, Hinduism is the only religion that exhibits a complete independence and freedom of the h…"