Satyam, as a neuter, is often used as an abstract, and is then rightly translated by truth. But it also means that which is, the true, the real; and there are several passages in the Rig-Veda where, instead of truth, I think we ought simply to translate satyam by the true, that is, the real, τὸ ὄντως ὄν.[66] It sounds, no doubt, very well to translate Satyena uttabhitâ bhûmih by "the earth is founded on truth;" and I believe every translator has taken satya in that sense here. Ludwig translates, "Von der Wahrheit ist die Erde gestützt." But such an idea, if it conveys any tangible meaning at all, is far too abstract for those early poets and philosophers. They meant to say "the earth, such as we see it, is held up, that is, rests on something real, though we may not see it, on something which they called the Real,[67] and to which, in course of time, they gave many more names, such as Rita, the right, Brahman," etc.

Of course where there is that strong reverence for truth, there must also be the sense of guilt arising from untruth. And thus we hear one poet pray that the waters may wash him clean, and carry off all his sins and all untruth:

"Carry away, ye waters,[68] whatever evil there is in me, wherever I may have deceived, or may have cursed, and also all untruth (anritam)."[69]

Or again, in the Atharva-Veda IV. 16:

"May all thy fatal snares, which stand spread out seven by seven and threefold, catch the man who tells a lie, may they pass by him who tells the truth!"

From the Brâhmanas, or theological treatises of the Brahmans, I shall quote a few passages only:

"Whosoever[70] speaks the truth, makes the fire on his own altar blaze up, as if he poured butter into the lighted fire. His own light grows larger, and from to-morrow to to-morrow he becomes better. But whosoever speaks untruth, he quenches the fire on his altar, as if he poured water into the lighted fire; his own light grows smaller and smaller, and from to-morrow to to-morrow he becomes more wicked. Let man therefore speak truth only."[71]

And again:[72] "A man becomes impure by uttering falsehood."

And again:[73] "As a man who steps on the edge of a sword placed over a pit cries out, I shall slip, I shall slip into the pit, so let a man guard himself from falsehood (or sin)."

In later times we see the respect for truth carried to such an extreme, that even a promise, unwittingly made, is considered to be binding.

In the Katha-Upanishad, for instance, a father is introduced offering what is called an All-sacrifice, where everything is supposed to be given up. His son, who is standing by, taunts his father with not having altogether fulfilled his vow, because he has not sacrificed his son. Upon this, the father, though angry and against his will, is obliged to sacrifice his son. Again, when the son arrives in the lower world, he is allowed by the Judge of the Dead to ask for three favors. He then asks to be restored to life, to be taught some sacrificial mysteries, and, as the third boon, he asks to know what becomes of man after he is dead. Yama, the lord of the Departed, tries in vain to be let off from answering this last question. But he, too, is bound by his promise, and then follows a discourse on life after death, or immortal life, which forms one of the most beautiful chapters in the ancient literature of India.

The whole plot of one of the great epic poems, the Râmâyana, rests on a rash promise given by Dasaratha, king of Ayodhyâ, to his second wife, Kaikeyî, that he would grant her two boons. In order to secure the succession to her own son, she asks that Râma, the eldest son by the king's other wife, should be banished for fourteen years. Much as the king repents his promise, Râma, his eldest son, would on no account let his father break his word, and he leaves his kingdom to wander in the forest with his wife Sitâ and his brother Lakshmana. After the father's death, the son of the second wife declines the throne, and comes to Râma to persuade him to accept the kingdom of his father. But all in vain. Râma will keep his exile for fourteen years, and never disown his father's promise. Here follows a curious dialogue between a Brâhman Gâbâli and Prince Râma, of which I shall give some extracts:[74]

"The Brâhman, who is a priest and courtier, says, 'Well, descendant of Raghu, do not thou, so noble in sentiments, and austere in character, entertain, like a common man, this useless thought. What man is a kinsman of any other? What relationship has any one with another? A man is born alone and dies alone. Hence he who is attached to any one as his father or his mother, is to be regarded as if he were insane, for no one belongs to another. Thou oughtest not to abandon thy father's kingdom and stay here in a sad and miserable abode, attended with many trials. Let thyself be inaugurated king in the wealthy Ayodhyâ. Dasaratha, thy father is nothing to thee, or thou to him; the king is one, and thou another, do therefore what is said.... Then offer oblations to the departed spirits (of thy forefathers) on prescribed days; but see what a waste of food! For what can a dead man eat? If what is eaten by one here enters into the body of another (viz., of the departed), let Srâddhas be offered to those who are travelling; they need not then get food to eat on their journey. These books (the Vedas), (which enjoin men to) sacrifice, give, consecrate themselves, practise austerities, and forsake the world, are composed by clever men to induce others to bestow gifts. Authoritative words do not fall from heaven. Let me, and others like yourselves, embrace whatever assertion is supported by reason. Adhere to what is apparent to the senses, and reject what is invisible.... This world is the next world; do thou therefore enjoy pleasure, for every virtuous man does not gain it. Virtuous men are greatly distressed, while the unrighteous are seen to be happy.'"

These positivist sentiments sound strange, particularly from the mouth of a Brâhman. But the poet evidently wishes to represent a Brâhman living at court, who has an argument ready for anything and everything that is likely to please his king.

But what does Râma answer? "The words," he says, "which you have addressed to me, though they recommend what seems to be right and salutary, advise, in fact, the contrary. The sinful transgressor, who lives according to the rules of heretical systems, obtains no esteem from good men. It is good conduct that marks a man to be noble or ignoble, heroic or a pretender to manliness, pure or impure. Truth and mercy are immemorial characteristics of a king's conduct. Hence royal rule is in its essence truth. On truth the word is based. Both sages and gods have esteemed truth. The man who speaks truth in this world attains the highest imperishable state. Men shrink with fear and horror from a liar as from a serpent. In this world the chief element in virtue is truth; it is called the basis of everything. Truth is lord in the world; virtue always rests on truth. All things are founded on truth; nothing is higher than it. Why, then, should I not be true to my promise, and faithfully observe the truthful injunction given by my father? Neither through covetousness, nor delusion, nor ignorance, will I, overpowered by darkness, break through the barrier of truth, but remain true to my promise to my father. How shall I, having promised to him that I would thus reside in the forests, transgress his injunction, and do what Bharata recommends?"

The other epic poem too, the Mahâbhârata, is full of episodes showing a profound regard for truth and an almost slavish submission to a pledge once given. The death of Bhîshma, one of the most important events in the story of the Mahâbhârata, is due to his vow never to hurt a woman. He is thus killed by Sikhandin, whom he takes to be a woman.[75]

Were I to quote from all the law-books, and from still later works, everywhere you would hear the same key-note of truthfulness vibrating through them all.

We must not, however, suppress the fact that, under certain circumstances, a lie was allowed, or, at all events, excused by Indian lawgivers. Thus Gautama says:[76] "An untruth spoken by people under the influence of anger, excessive joy, fear, pain, or grief, by infants, by very old men, by persons laboring under a delusion, being under the influence of drink, or by madmen, does not cause the speaker to fall, or, as we should say, is a venial, not a mortal sin."[77]

This is a large admission, yet even in that open admission there is a certain amount of honesty. Again and again in the Mahâbhârata is this excuse pleaded.[78] Nay, there is in the Mahâbhârata[79] the well-known story of Kausika, called Satyavâdin, the Truth-speaker, who goes to hell for having spoken the truth. He once saw men flying into the forest before robbers (dasyu). The robbers came up soon after them, and asked Kausika, which way the fugitives had taken. He told them the truth, and the men were caught by the robbers and killed. But Kausika, we are told, went to hell for having spoken the truth.

The Hindus may seem to have been a priest-ridden race, and their devotion to sacrifice and ceremonial is well known. Yet this is what the poet of the Mahâbhârata dares to say:

"Let a thousand sacrifices (of a horse) and truth be weighed in the balance—truth will exceed the thousand sacrifices."[80]

These are words addressed by Sakuntalâ, the deserted wife, to King Dushyanta, when he declined to recognize her and his son. And when he refuses to listen to her appeal, what does she appeal to as the highest authority?—The voice of conscience.

"If you think I am alone," she says to the king, "you do not know that wise man within your heart. He knows of your evil deed—in his sight you commit sin. A man who has committed sin may think that no one knows it. The gods know it and the old man within."[81]

This must suffice. I say once more that I do not wish to represent the people of India as two hundred and fifty-three millions of angels, but I do wish it to be understood and to be accepted as a fact, that the damaging charge of untruthfulness brought against that people is utterly unfounded with regard to ancient times. It is not only not true, but the very opposite of the truth. As to modern times, and I date them from about 1000 after Christ, I can only say that, after reading the accounts of the terrors and horrors of Mohammedan rule, my wonder is that so much of native virtue and truthfulness should have survived. You might as well expect a mouse to speak the truth before a cat, as a Hindu before a Mohammedan judge.[82] If you frighten a child, that child will tell a lie; if you terrorize millions, you must not be surprised if they try to escape from your fangs. Truthfulness is a luxury, perhaps the greatest, and let me assure you, the most expensive luxury in our life—and happy the man who has been able to enjoy it from his very childhood. It may be easy enough in our days and in a free country, like England, never to tell a lie—but the older we grow, the harder we find it to be always true, to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The Hindus too had made that discovery. They too knew how hard, nay how impossible it is, always to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. There is a short story in the Satapatha Brâhmana, to my mind full of deep meaning, and pervaded by the real sense of truth, the real sense of the difficulty of truth. His kinsman said to Aruna Aupavesi, "Thou art advanced in years, establish thou the sacrificial fires." He replied: "Thereby you tell me henceforth to keep silence. For he who has established the fires must not speak an untruth, and only by not speaking at all, one speaks no untruth. To that extent the service of the sacrificial fires consists in truth."[83]

I doubt whether in any other of the ancient literatures of the world you will find traces of that extreme sensitiveness of conscience which despairs of our ever speaking the truth, and which declares silence gold, and speech silver, though, in a much higher sense than our proverb.

What I should wish to impress on those who will soon find themselves the rulers of millions of human beings in India, is the duty to shake off national prejudices, which are apt to degenerate into a kind of madness. I have known people with a brown skin whom I could look up to as my betters. Look for them in India, and you will find them, and if you meet with disappointments, as no doubt you will, think of the people with white skins whom you have trusted, and whom you can trust no more. We are all apt to be Pharisees in international judgments. I read only a few days ago in a pamphlet written by an enlightened politician, the following words:

"Experience only can teach that nothing is so truly astonishing to a morally depraved people as the phenomenon of a race of men in whose word perfect confidence may be placed[84].... The natives are conscious of their inferiority in nothing so much as in this. They require to be taught rectitude of conduct much more than literature and science."

If you approach the Hindus with such feelings, you will teach them neither rectitude, nor science, nor literature. Nay, they might appeal to their own literature, even to their law-books, to teach us at least one lesson of truthfulness, truthfulness to ourselves, or, in other words, humility.

What does Yâgñavalkya say?[85]

"It is not our hermitage," he says—our religion we might say—"still less the color of our skin, that produces virtue; virtue must be practiced. Therefore let no one do to others what he would not have done to himself."

And the laws of the Mânavas, which were so much abused by Mill, what do they teach?[86]

"Evil-doers think indeed that no one sees them; but the gods see them, and the old man within."

"Self is the witness of Self, Self is the refuge of Self. Do not despise thy own Self, the highest witness of men."[87]

"If, friend, thou thinkest thou art self-alone, remember there is the silent thinker (the Highest Self) always within thy heart, and he sees what is good and what is evil."[88]

"O friend, whatever good thou mayest have done from thy very birth, all will go to the dogs, if thou speak an untruth."

Or in Vasishtha, XXX. 1:

"Practice righteousness, not unrighteousness; speak truth, not untruth; look far, not near; look up toward the highest, not toward anything low."

No doubt there is moral depravity in India, and where is there no moral depravity in this world? But to appeal to international statistics would be, I believe, a dangerous game. Nor must we forget that our standards of morality differ, and, on some points, differ considerably from those recognized in India; and we must not wonder if sons do not at once condemn as criminal what their fathers and grandfathers considered right. Let us hold by all means to our sense of what is right and what is wrong; but in judging others, whether in public or in private life, whether as historians or politicians, let us not forget that a kindly spirit will never do any harm. Certainly I can imagine nothing more mischievous, more dangerous, more fatal to the permanence of English rule in India, than for the young civil servants to go to that country with the idea that it is a sink of moral depravity, an ants' nest of lies; for no one is so sure to go wrong, whether in public or in private life, as he who says in his haste: "All men are liars."

LECTURE III.

To-day I shall have to grapple with a third prejudice, namely, that the literature of India, and more especially the classical Sanskrit literature, whatever may be its interest to the scholar and the antiquarian, has little to teach us which we cannot learn better from other sources, and that at all events it is of little practical use to young civilians. If only they learn to express themselves in Hindustani or Tamil, that is considered quite enough; nay, as they have to deal with men and with the ordinary affairs of life, and as, before everything else, they are to be men of the world and men of business, it is even supposed to be dangerous, if they allowed themselves to become absorbed in questions of abstruse scholarship or in researches on ancient religion, mythology, and philosophy.

I take the very opposite opinion, and I should advise every young man who wishes to enjoy his life in India, and to spend his years there with profit to himself and to others, to learn Sanskrit, and to learn it well.

I know it will be said, What can be the use of Sanskrit at the present day? Is not Sanskrit a dead language? And are not the Hindus themselves ashamed of their ancient literature? Do they not learn English, and do they not prefer Locke, and Hume, and Mill to their ancient poets and philosophers?

No doubt Sanskrit, in one sense, is a dead language. It was, I believe, a dead language more than two thousand years ago. Buddha, about 500 b.c., commanded his disciples to preach in the dialects of the people; and King Asoka, in the third century b.c., when he put up his Edicts, which were intended to be read, or at least to be understood by the people, had them engraved on rocks and pillars in the various local dialects from Cabul[89] in the north to Ballabhi in the south, from the sources of the Ganges and the Jumnah to Allahabad and Patna, nay even down to Orissa. These various dialects are as different from Sanskrit as Italian is from Latin, and we have therefore good reason to suppose that, in the third century b.c., if not earlier, Sanskrit had ceased to be the spoken language of the people at large.

There is an interesting passage in the Kullavagga, where we are told that, even during Buddha's lifetime, some of his pupils, who were Brâhmans by birth, complained that people spoiled the words of Buddha by every one repeating them in his own dialect (nirutti). They proposed to translate his words into Sanskrit; but he declined, and commanded that each man should learn his doctrine in his own language.[90]

And there is another passage, quoted by Hardy in his Manual of Buddhism, p. 186, where we read that at the time of Buddha's first preaching each of the countless listeners thought that the sage was looking toward him, and was speaking to him in his own tongue, though the language used was Mâgadhi.[91]

Sanskrit, therefore, as a language spoken by the people at large, had ceased to exist in the third century b.c.

Yet such is the marvellous continuity between the past and the present in India, that in spite of repeated social convulsions, religious reforms, and foreign invasions, Sanskrit may be said to be still the only language that is spoken over the whole extent of that vast country.

Though the Buddhist sovereigns published their edicts in the vernaculars, public inscriptions and private official documents continued to be composed in Sanskrit during the last two thousand years. And though the language of the sacred writings of Buddhists and Gainas was borrowed from the vulgar dialects, the literature of India never ceased to be written in Pâninean Sanskrit, while the few exceptions, as, for instance, the use of Prâkrit by women and inferior characters in the plays of Kâlidâsa and others, are themselves not without an important historical significance.

Even at the present moment, after a century of English rule and English teaching, I believe that Sanskrit is more widely understood in India than Latin was in Europe at the time of Dante.

Whenever I receive a letter from a learned man in India, it is written in Sanskrit. Whenever there is a controversy on questions of law and religion, the pamphlets published in India are written in Sanskrit. There are journals written in Sanskrit which must entirely depend for their support on readers who prefer that classical language to the vulgar dialects. There is The Pandit, published at Benares, containing not only editions of ancient texts, but treatises on modern subjects, reviews of books published in England, and controversial articles, all in Sanskrit.

Another paper of the same kind is the Pratna-Kamra-nandinî, "the Delight of lovers of old things," published likewise at Benares, and full of valuable materials.

There is also the Vidyodaya, "the Rise of Knowledge," a Sanskrit journal published at Calcutta, which sometimes contains important articles. There are probably others, which I do not know.

There is a monthly serial published at Bombay, by M. Moreshwar Kunte, called the Shad-darshana-Chintanikâ, or "Studies in Indian Philosophy," giving the text of the ancient systems of philosophy, with commentaries and treatises, written in Sanskrit, though in this case accompanied by a Marathi and an English translation.

Of the Rig-Veda, the most ancient of Sanskrit books, two editions are now coming out in monthly numbers, the one published at Bombay, by what may be called the liberal party, the other at Prayâga (Allahabad) by Dayânanda Sarasvatî, the representative of Indian orthodoxy. The former gives a paraphrase in Sanskrit, and a Marathi and an English translation; the latter a full explanation in Sanskrit, followed by a vernacular commentary. These books are published by subscription, and the list of subscribers among the natives of India is very considerable.

There are other journals, which are chiefly written in the spoken dialects, such as Bengali, Marathi, or Hindi; but they contain occasional articles in Sanskrit, as, for instance, the Hariskandrakandrikâ, published at Benares, the Tattvabodhinî, published at Calcutta, and several more.

It was only the other day that I saw in the Liberal, the journal of Keshub Chunder Sen's party,[92] an account of a meeting between Brahmavrata Samadhyayi, a Vedic scholar of Nuddea, and Kashinath Trimbak Telang, a M.A. of the University of Bombay. The one came from the east, the other from the west, yet both could converse fluently in Sanskrit.[93]

Still more extraordinary is the number of Sanskrit texts, issuing from native presses, for which there seems to be a large demand, for if we write for copies to be sent to England, we often find that, after a year or two, all the copies have been bought up in India itself. That would not be the case with Anglo-Saxon texts in England, or with Latin texts in Italy!

But more than this, we are told that the ancient epic poems of the Mahâbhârata and Râmâyana are still recited in the temples for the benefit of visitors, and that in the villages large crowds assemble around the Kâthaka, the reader of these ancient Sanskrit poems, often interrupting his recitations with tears and sighs, when the hero of the poem is sent into banishment, while when he returns to his kingdom, the houses of the village are adorned with lamps and garlands. Such a recitation of the whole of the Mahâbhârata is said to occupy ninety days, or sometimes half a year.[94] The people at large require, no doubt, that the Brahman narrator (Kâthaka) should interpret the old poem, but there must be some few people present who understand, or imagine they understand, the old poetry of Vyâsa and Vâlmîki.

There are thousands of Brahmans[95] even now, when so little inducement exists for Vedic studies, who know the whole of the Rig-Veda by heart and can repeat it; and what applies to the Rig-Veda applies to many other books.

But even if Sanskrit were more of a dead language than it really is, all the living languages of India, both Aryan and Dravidian, draw their very life and soul from Sanskrit.[96] On this point, and on the great help that even a limited knowledge of Sanskrit would render in the acquisition of the vernaculars, I, and others better qualified than I am, have spoken so often, though without any practical effect, that I need not speak again. Any candidate who knows but the elements of Sanskrit grammar will well understand what I mean, whether his special vernacular may be Bengali, Hindustani, or even Tamil. To a classical scholar I can only say that between a civil servant who knows Sanskrit and Hindustani, and another who knows Hindustani only, there is about the same difference in their power of forming an intelligent appreciation of India and its inhabitants, as there is between a traveller who visits Italy with a knowledge of Latin, and a party personally conducted to Rome by Messrs. Cook & Co.

Let us examine, however, the objection that Sanskrit literature is a dead or an artificial literature, a little more carefully, in order to see whether there is not some kind of truth in it. Some people hold that the literary works which we possess in Sanskrit never had any real life at all, that they were altogether scholastic productions, and that therefore they can teach us nothing of what we really care for, namely, the historical growth of the Hindu mind. Others maintain that at the present moment, at all events, and after a century of English rule, Sanskrit literature has ceased to be a motive power in India, and that it can teach us nothing of what is passing now through the Hindu mind and influencing it for good or for evil.

Let us look at the facts. Sanskrit literature is a wide and a vague term. If the Vedas, such as we now have them, were composed about 1500 b.c., and if it is a fact that considerable works continue to be written in Sanskrit even now, we have before us a stream of literary activity extending over three thousand four hundred years. With the exception of China there is nothing like this in the whole world.

It is difficult to give an idea of the enormous extent and variety of that literature. We are only gradually becoming acquainted with the untold treasures which still exist in manuscripts, and with the titles of that still larger number of works which must have existed formerly, some of them being still quoted by writers of the last three or four centuries.[97]

The Indian Government has of late years ordered a kind of bibliographical survey of India to be made, and has sent some learned Sanskrit scholars, both European and native, to places where collections of Sanskrit mss. are known to exist, in order to examine and catalogue them. Some of these catalogues have been published, and we learn from them that the number of separate works in Sanskrit, of which mss. are still in existence, amounts to about 10,000.[98] This is more, I believe, than the whole classical literature of Greece and Italy put together. Much of it, no doubt, will be called mere rubbish; but then you know that even in our days the writings of a very eminent philosopher have been called "mere rubbish." What I wish you to see is this, that there runs through the whole history of India, through its three or four thousand years, a high road, or, it is perhaps more accurate to say, a high mountain-path of literature. It may be remote from the turmoil of the plain, hardly visible perhaps to the millions of human beings in their daily struggle of life. It may have been trodden by a few solitary wanderers only. But to the historian of the human race, to the student of the development of the human mind, those few solitary wanderers are after all the true representatives of India from age to age. Do not let us be deceived. The true history of the world must always be the history of the few; and as we measure the Himâlaya by the height of Mount Everest, we must take the true measure of India from the poets of the Veda, the sages of the Upanishads, the founders of the Vedânta and Sânkhya philosophies, and the authors of the oldest law-books, and not from the millions who are born and die in their villages, and who have never for one moment been roused out of their drowsy dream of life.

To large multitudes in India, no doubt, Sanskrit literature was not merely a dead literature, it was simply non-existent; but the same might be said of almost every literature, and more particularly of the literatures of the ancient world.

Still, even beyond this, I am quite prepared to acknowledge to a certain extent the truth of the statement, that a great portion of Sanskrit literature has never been living and national, in the same sense in which the Greek and Roman literatures reflected at times the life of a whole nation; and it is quite true besides, that the Sanskrit books which are best known to the public at large, belong to what might correctly be called the Renaissance period of Indian literature, when those who wrote Sanskrit had themselves to learn the language, as we learn Latin, and were conscious that they were writing for a learned and cultivated public only, and not for the people at large.

This will require a fuller explanation.

We may divide the whole of Sanskrit literature, beginning with the Rig-Veda and ending with Dayânanda's Introduction to his edition of the Rig-Veda, his by no means uninteresting Rig-Veda-bhûmikâ, into two great periods: that preceding the great Turanian invasion, and that following it.

The former comprises the Vedic literature and the ancient literature of Buddhism, the latter all the rest.

If I call the invasion which is generally called the invasion of the Sakas, or the Scythians, or Indo-Scythians, or Turushkas, the Turanian[99] invasion, it is simply because I do not as yet wish to commit myself more than I can help as to the nationality of the tribes who took possession of India, or, at least, of the government of India, from about the first century b.c. to the third century a.d.

They are best known by the name of Yueh-chi, this being the name by which they are called in Chinese chronicles. These Chinese chronicles form the principal source from which we derive our knowledge of these tribes, both before and after their invasion of India. Many theories have been started as to their relationship with other races. They are described as of pink and white complexion and as shooting from horseback; and as there was some similarity between their Chinese name Yueh-chi and the Gothi or Goths, they were identified by Remusat[100] with those German tribes, and by others with the Getae, the neighbors of the Goths. Tod went even a step farther, and traced the Gâts in India and the Rajputs back to the Yueh-chi and Getæ.[101] Some light may come in time out of all this darkness, but for the present we must be satisfied with the fact that, between the first century before and the third century after our era, the greatest political revolution took place in India owing to the repeated inroads of Turanian, or, to use a still less objectionable term, of Northern tribes. Their presence in India, recorded by Chinese historians, is fully confirmed by coins, by inscriptions, and by the traditional history of the country, such as it is; but to my mind nothing attests the presence of these foreign invaders more clearly than the break, or, I could almost say, the blank in the Brahmanical literature of India from the first century before to the third century after our era.[102]

If we consider the political and social state of that country, we can easily understand what would happen in a case of invasion and conquest by a warlike race. The invaders would take possession of the strongholds or castles, and either remove the old Rajahs, or make them their vassals and agents. Everything else would then go on exactly as before. The rents would be paid, the taxes collected, and the life of the villagers, that is, of the great majority of the people of India, would go on almost undisturbed by the change of government. The only people who might suffer would be, or, at all events, might be the priestly caste, unless they should come to terms with the new conquerors. The priestly caste, however, was also to a great extent the literary caste, and the absence of their old patrons, the native Rajahs, might well produce for a time a complete cessation of literary activity. The rise of Buddhism and its formal adoption by King Asoka had already considerably shaken the power and influence of the old Brahmanic hierarchy. The Northern conquerors, whatever their religion may have been, were certainly not believers in the Veda. They seem to have made a kind of compromise with Buddhism, and it is probably due to that compromise, or to an amalgamation of Saka legends with Buddhist doctrines, that we owe the so-called Mahâyâna form of Buddhism—and more particularly the Amitâbha worship—which was finally settled at the Council under Kanishka, one of the Turanian rulers of India in the first century a.d.

If then we divide the whole of Sanskrit literature into these two periods, the one anterior to the great Turanian invasion, the other posterior to it, we may call the literature of the former period ancient and natural, that of the latter modern and artificial.

Of the former period we possess, first, what has been called the Veda, i.e., Knowledge, in the widest sense of the word—a considerable mass of literature, yet evidently a wreck only, saved out of a general deluge; secondly, the works collected in the Buddhist Tripitaka, now known to us chiefly in what is called the Pâli dialect, the Gâthâ dialects, and Sanskrit, and probably much added to in later times.

The second period of Sanskrit literature comprehends everything else. Both periods may be subdivided again, but this does not concern us at present.

Now I am quite willing to admit that the literature of the second period, the modern Sanskrit literature, never was a living or national literature. It here and there contains remnants of earlier times, adapted to the literary, religious, and moral tastes of a later period; and whenever we are able to disentangle those ancient elements, they may serve to throw light on the past, and, to a certain extent, supplement what has been lost in the literature of the Vedic times. The metrical Law-books, for instance, contain old materials which existed during the Vedic period, partly in prose, as Sûtras, partly in more ancient metres, as Gâthâs. The Epic poems, the Mahâbhârata and Râmâyana, have taken the place of the old Itihâsas and Âkhyânas. The Purânas, even, may contain materials, though much altered, of what was called in Vedic literature the Purâna.[103]

But the great mass of that later literature is artificial or scholastic, full of interesting compositions, and by no means devoid of originality and occasional beauty; yet with all that, curious only, and appealing to the interests of the Oriental scholar far more than the broad human sympathies of the historian and the philosopher.

It is different with the ancient literature of India, the literature dominated by the Vedic and the Buddhistic religions. That literature opens to us a chapter in what has been called the Education of the Human Race, to which we can find no parallel anywhere else. Whoever cares for the historical growth of our language, that is, of our thoughts; whoever cares for the first intelligible development of religion and mythology; whoever cares for the first foundation of what in later times we call the sciences of astronomy, metronomy, grammar, and etymology; whoever cares for the first intimations of philosophical thought, for the first attempts at regulating family life, village life, and state life, as founded on religion, ceremonial, tradition and contract (samaya)—must in future pay the same attention to the literature of the Vedic period as to the literatures of Greece and Rome and Germany.

As to the lessons which the early literature of Buddhism may teach us, I need not dwell on them at present. If I may judge from the numerous questions that are addressed to me with regard to that religion and its striking coincidences with Christianity, Buddhism has already become a subject of general interest, and will and ought to become so more and more.[104] On that whole class of literature, however, it is not my intention to dwell in this short course of Lectures, which can hardly suffice even for a general survey of Vedic literature, and for an elucidation of the principal lessons which, I think, we may learn from the Hymns, the Brâhmanas, the Upanishads, and the Sûtras.

It was a real misfortune that Sanskrit literature became first known to the learned public in Europe through specimens belonging to the second, or, what I called, the Renaissance period. The Bhagavadgîtâ, the plays of Kâlidâsa, such as Sakuntalâ or Urvasî, a few episodes from the Mahâbhârata and Râmâyana, such as those of Nala and the Yagñadattabadha, the fables of the Hitopadesa, and the sentences of Bhartrihari are, no doubt, extremely curious; and as, at the time when they first became known in Europe, they were represented to be of extreme antiquity, and the work of a people formerly supposed to be quite incapable of high literary efforts, they naturally attracted the attention of men such as Sir William Jones in England, Herder and Goethe in Germany, who were pleased to speak of them in terms of highest admiration. It was the fashion at that time to speak of Kâlidâsa, as, for instance, Alexander von Humboldt did even in so recent a work as his Kosmos, as "the great contemporary of Virgil and Horace, who lived at the splendid court of Vikramâditya," this Vikramâditya being supposed to be the founder of the Samvat era, 56 b.c. But all this is now changed. Whoever the Vikramâditya was who is supposed to have defeated the Sakas, and to have founded another era, the Samvat era, 56 b.c., he certainly did not live in the first century b.c. Nor are the Indians looked upon any longer as an illiterate race, and their poetry as popular and artless. On the contrary, they are judged now by the same standards as Persians and Arabs, Italians or French; and, measured by that standard, such works as Kâlidâsa's plays are not superior to many plays that have long been allowed to rest in dust and peace on the shelves of our libraries. Their antiquity is no longer believed in by any critical Sanskrit scholar. Kâlidâsa is mentioned with Bhâravi as a famous poet in an inscription[105] dated a.d. 585-6 (507 Saka era), and for the present I see no reason to place him much earlier. As to the Laws of Manu, which used to be assigned to a fabulous antiquity,[106] and are so still sometimes by those who write at random or at second-hand, I doubt whether, in their present form, they can be older than the fourth century of our era, nay I am quite prepared to see an even later date assigned to them. I know this will seem heresy to many Sanskrit scholars, but we must try to be honest to ourselves. Is there any evidence to constrain us to assign the Mânava-dharma-sâstra, such as we now possess it, written in continuous Slokas, to any date anterior to 300 a.d.? And if there is not, why should we not openly state it, challenge opposition, and feel grateful if our doubts can be removed?

That Manu was a name of high legal authority before that time, and that Manu and the Mânavam are frequently quoted in the ancient legal Sûtras, is quite true; but this serves only to confirm the conviction that the literature which succeeded the Turanian invasion is full of wrecks saved from the intervening deluge. If what we call the Laws of Manu had really existed as a code of laws, like the Code of Justinian, during previous centuries, is it likely that it should nowhere have been quoted and appealed to?

Varâhamihira (who died 587 a.d.) refers to Manu several times, but not to a Mânava-dharma-sâstra; and the only time where he seems actually to quote a number of verses from Manu, these verses are not to be met with in our text.[107]

I believe it will be found that the century in which Varâhamihara lived and wrote was the age of the literary Renaissance in India.[108] That Kâlidâsa and Bhâravi were famous at that time, we know from the evidence of inscriptions. We also know that during that century the fame of Indian literature had reached Persia, and that the King of Persia, Khosru Nushirvan, sent his physician, Barzôî, to India, in order to translate the fables of the Pañkatantra, or rather their original, from Sanskrit into Pahlavi. The famous "Nine Gems," or "the nine classics," as we should say, have been referred, at least in part, to the same age,[109] and I doubt whether we shall be able to assign a much earlier date to anything we possess of Sanskrit literature, excepting always the Vedic and Buddhistic writings.

Although the specimens of this modern Sanskrit literature, when they first became known, served to arouse a general interest, and serve even now to keep alive a certain superficial sympathy for Indian literature, more serious students had soon disposed of these compositions, and while gladly admitting their claim to be called pretty and attractive, could not think of allowing to Sanskrit literature a place among the world-literatures, a place by the side of Greek and Latin, Italian, French, English, or German.

There was indeed a time when people began to imagine that all that was worth knowing about Indian literature was known, and that the only ground on which Sanskrit could claim a place among the recognized branches of learning in a university was its usefulness for the study of the Science of Language.

At that very time, however, now about forty years ago, a new start was made, which has given to Sanskrit scholarship an entirely new character. The chief author of that movement was Burnouf, then professor at the Collège de France in Paris, an excellent scholar, but at the same time a man of wide views and true historical instincts, and the last man to waste his life on mere Nalas and Sakuntalâs. Being brought up in the old traditions of the classical school in France (his father was the author of the well-known Greek Grammar), then for a time a promising young barrister, with influential friends such as Guizot, Thiers, Mignet, Villemain, at his side, and with a brilliant future before him, he was not likely to spend his life on pretty Sanskrit ditties. What he wanted when he threw himself on Sanskrit was history, human history, world-history, and with an unerring grasp he laid hold of Vedic literature and Buddhist literature, as the two stepping-stones in the slough of Indian literature. He died young, and has left a few arches only of the building he wished to rear. But his spirit lived on in his pupils and his friends, and few would deny that the first impulse, directly or indirectly, to all that has been accomplished since by the students of Vedic and Buddhist literature, was given by Burnouf and his lectures at the Collège de France.