Ranade as his guru and both were of opinion that there was too little of activity and too little of work done or attempted by the people of this country in the midst of the prevailing langour and lassitude. These two strenuous workers have left behind them enduring examples to the rising generations. Latterly Mr. Gokhale had acquired an international reputation. Indians in every country were proud to point to him as an example of their countrymen who could rise to the level of the best in any country.
Gokhale was one of the rarest beings produced by any country or time, one who went through life with unsurpassed simplicity and modesty, whose presence inspired love and and trust, whose life was so pure, whose character was so unselfish that no one can refer to him except with respectful admiration, whose intellect was so clear that those who disagreed with him had the utmost difficulty in justifying their opinion, and sometimes failed perhaps in convincing even themselves, who when he stood forth as the representative of the vast country, whether at the foot of the throne of the Emperor, or in the midst of men in power, or in an unsympathetic self-governing colony, in the midst of men sanguine in the correctnes of views, whose error he was sent to demonstrate, commanded by his personality, unadorned by external symbols of authority, a deference not unlike that which may be claimed by kings, and inspired in minds of his expectant countrymen a serene confidence that he would be accorded a place worthy of this country where-ever he went-even in that assemblage of which it is said:
"There is
One great Society above on earth
The noble living and the noble dead".
