But before we proceed to state what further developments the history of this epithet had to undergo we feel it incumbent to render an apology to ourselves. We have while writing this section wounded our own feelings. So we hasten to add that the few harsh words we had to say in explaining the political necessity that led to the rejection of Buddhism in India should not be understood to mean that we have not a very high opinion of that Church as a whole ! No, no ! I am as humble an admirer and an adorer of that great and holy Sangha the holiest the world has ever seen, as any of its initiated worshipper. We are not initiated not because the Sangha is not worthy of us, but because we are not worthy of stepping on the footsteps of the Temple that has lasted longer because it rested on ideas than many a great palace that rested on rocks. The consciousness that the first great and the most successful attempt to wean man from the brute inherent in him was conceived, launched and carried on from century to century by a galaxy of great teachers, Arhats and Bhikkus who were born in India, who were bred in India and who owned India as the land of their worship, fills us with feelings too deep for words. And if these be our feelings for the Sangha then what shall we say about its great Founder, the Buddha, the Enlightened ? I, the humblest of the humble of mankind can dare to approach Thee, O Tathagat, with no other offering but my utter humility and my utter emptiness! Although I feel that I fail to catch the purport of thy words yet I know that it must be so. Because while thy words are gathered from the lips of Gods, my ears and my understanding are trained to the accents and the din of this matter-of-fact world. Perhaps it was too soon for thee to sound thy march and unfurl thy banner while the world was too young and the day but just risen! It fails to keep pace with thee and its sight gets dazzled and dimmed to keep the radiance of the banner in full view. As long as the law of evolution that lays down the iron command [ Immobile forces are the easy prey of the mobile ones those with no teeth fall a prey to those with deadly fangs ; those without hands succumb to those with hands, and the cowards to the brave. ] is too persistent and dangerously imminent to be catagorically denied by the law of righteousness whose mottos shine brilliantly and beautifully, but as the stars in the heavens do, so long the banner of nationality will refuse to be replaced by that of Universality and yet, that very national banner hallowed as it is by the worship of gods and goddesses of our race, would have been the poorer if it could not have counted the Shakyasinha under its fold. But as it is, thou art ours as truly as Shri Ram or Shri Krishna or Shri Mahavir had been and as the words were but the echoes of yearnings of our national soul, thy visions, the dreams of our race, even so, if ever the law of Righteousness rules triumphant on this our human plane, then thou wilt find that the land that cradled thee, and the people that nursed thee, will have contributed most to bring about that consummation if indeed the fact of having contributed thee has not proved that much already !!