of 300 years each, the Treta, and 4,000 years with twilights of 400 years each, the Krita yuga. Four thousand of such yugas constitute a day of Brahma, whose night is as much. Fourteen Manvantaras pass in each day of Brahma. At the end of his day, the whole of creation merges into its primeval constituents, to emerge at the commencement of the next. Brahma's life consists of a hundred years, and at its termination, there comes a Mahákalpa. All forms and names assigned to objects in one Kalpa retain their potentiality when merging into Brahma, and, like seasons recurring in their order, recur in each successive Kalpa. The cycle of creation rolls on from Kalpa to Kalpa subject to the law of Karma, from which there is no escape except by knowledge. One Mapvantara of Hindu Chronology thus consists of 306,720,000 human years, and if we multiply this by 14, we get a day of Brahma. This is the Sástric idea of time, and the ordinary Hindu does not question the correctness of their statement. To those who look upon the world as only 6,000 years old, this attitude of his may appear to be very unhistorical, but if we take the various yugas as representing distinctive stages of progress in the history of society, there should not be much room for argument. The Krita-yuga may be regarded as the age of truth when dharma or virtue flourished in perfection, the Treta, marked the first advent of evil, the Dwâpara was the stage, when virtue and vice were nearly balanced, and the Kali, when the former had declined. In the Krita, asceticism, in the Treta, truth, in the Dwâpara, sacrifice, and in the Kali, charity, are mentioned by the sastras as means of saving mankind. The description of these yugas, as given in our books instead of being poetic imaginations, also seem to mark the progress of our society from simpler to more complex forms. There may be exaggeration in some of the descriptions, but the root ideas are apparently true. For instance, taking the present Kali age, its description in the Mahábhárata is applicable in many respects to Hindu society of the present day, and shows the clearness of the vision of those who had the India of the future present to their mind's eye. We are told, "that men shall practise morality and virtue deceitfully, and, with false reputation for learning, deceive their fellows. In consequence of the loss of truth they will be short-lived, covetous, subject to wrath and lust. Brahmans and Kshatriyas will descend to the level of the lowest orders, men will till low lands, employ even the banks of streams for cultivation, make very young cattle draw the plough, reb helpless persons and widows and orphans of

their possessions, as well as disregard all distinction of what ought to be eaten and what not. People will die young, as well as marry and beget children early. They will be filled with anxiety for means of livelihood. Their possessions will never be much. They will perform rites and ceremonies as listeth them and without a knowledge of the ordinances. Wealth will be the only source of honor. Every one will be in want. The clouds will not pour showers in season,'nor crops grow in abundance, and anxiety and discontent reign everywhere." (Mahábhárata Vana Parva, Chapter 190. In another place we read, "People will always be in fear O dearth and scarcity. Deprived of wealth, they will be subject to famine. Women will have many children and little means. Those who possess money will alone be respected. Wealth will alone secure supremacy. No one will part with the smallest fraction of wealth at the sacrifice, of personal interest. The grains of the earth will be poor and of little substance. Gifted with little sense people will be subject to infirmities of both mind and body, early decay and death." (Vishnu Purana VI, Chapter 1.) Accounts of the lives of persons, who are mentioned by the Rishis as having flourished in each of the other periods, also show that they were not altogether wrong in their descriptions of the yugas. In the Dwapara age, when virtue and vice were equal, heroes like Krishna, Bhishma and Yudhishthira, guided the destinies of the nation. In the Treta, Rama and Janaka, and in the Krita 'the Rishis of the Vedas and the Upanishads, furnished ideals of life for subsequent generations to follow." The Mahábhárata describes the Krita "to be the age of men of great strength and great power, great wisdom and handsome' features, possessed of the wealth of asceticism, capable of great exertion, possessed of high souls, and virtuous and truthful in speech," and the Kshatriyas of the period as ablebodied, of agreeable features, brave and well skilled in battle. In the Treta the Kshatriyas ruled from sea to sea. In the Dwapara also they were brave but desirous of conquering one another, while in Kali they became subject to jealousy, pride, anger, deceit} and covetousness " (Mahábhárata Bhishma Purva, Chapter 10.)

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The hymns of the Rig Veda and some of the older Upanishads show that the description of the first two yugas above given, applied in some measure at least to the Rishis who sang their hymns of praise to the gods on the banks of the five rivers, and to kings and

sages who ruled the India of those days. Sanat Kumara, Narada, Yagyavalkya and Vasishta among Rishis and Janaka, and Ajatsatru among kings may be said to belong to that age. The Rámáyana of Valmiki relates to Treta and the Mahábhárat describes the India of the close of the Dwapara age, and the lives of their chief characters show how far the Aryans of those periods adhered to truth and duty, and how both had gradually begun to decline among them. Mr. B. G. Tilak in his Arctic Home, in the Vedas (pp. 453, 454), comes to the conclusion, that the home of the primitive Aryans was about the North Pole, the Meru of the Puranas and that when that home was destroyed by glaciation, the Aryan people that survived the catastrophe carried as much of their religion and worship as was possible under the circumstances, and the relic thus saved from the general wreck was the basis of the Aryan religion in the post glacial period. In this way 10000 or 8000 B.C. marks the destruction of the Arctic home of the Aryans, 8000 to 5000 B.C. their migration from their original home and roaming over parts of northern Europe and Asia in search of lands, 5000 to 3000 B.C. the Orion period when some of the Vedic hymns were composed, 3000 to 1400 B.C. the period when the Taittiriy a Sanhita and the Brahmans were composed, and 1400 B. C. to 500 B.C the pre-Buddhistic period when the Sutras and the philosophical systems made their appearance. How far this is likely to be accepted by other scholars both in India and in Europe remains to be seen, but there ought to be no hesitation in accepting the position finally taken up by Vyasa "that the righteousness which is seen in the Krita age in Bráhmanas is now seen in those who are possessedof self-control, and are devoted to asceticism and learning. Those who follow dharma, observe vows and visit sacred places as enjoined in the duties relating to each yuga, from motives of acquiring heaven or obtaining worldly objects, or for the destruction of others, are said to represent the Treta, the Dwapara and the Kaliyugas." (Moksha Dharma, Chapter 233-37 and 38,)

We cannot therefore say that Hinduism has no history. It cannot give the exact dates of the siege of Lanka and the battle of Kurukshetra, and reigns of kings like Rama, Janaka, Yudhishthira, nor of the compilation of the Vedas, the Smritis, the Darshanas, the Puranas and the Tantras. But each stage of its civilization is well marked, and there is no difficulty in tracing the origin and

growth of its institutions from age to age. It would have perhaps been better if accurate records of dates were kept in India as in other countries, but the absence of the latter does not stand in the way of our inquiring into our chief institutions. The art of writing has long been known in India, but all instruction was up to a very late period verbal. Through it a vast mass of knowledge of every description has come down to us in a form which speaks highly of the retentive powers of the Brahmins. Indian history is not a history of wars and conquests, but of progress in literature and philosophy. It is, moreover, one-and a most brilliant one too-of a time when other nations of the earth had none. The Hindu idea of

history was not one of a mere record of dates of important events, but to preserve the teachings and the memories of those who made India what it was, and the Hindus have done so as successfully as any other nation of the world. Our epic poets undertook the work of modern Bhats and Charanas and preserved the record of the great events of our history and their information, even if not quite accurate in point of dates, is yet fairly reliable as regards the social and political condition of those times.

On the other hand, those who date Hindu civilization not more than 4000 years would have-(1) the Vedic period extend from 1500 to 200 B. C., and (2) the Sanskrit period from 200 B. C. to 1000 A.D. In the first half of the first period, the centre of Aryan culture, according to them, lay around the Indus and its

F tributaries. In the latter half it had spread in the whole of the valley of the Ganges. In the Sanskrit period Brahmanic The literature of culture spread throughout Southern India.

the first half of the Vedic period was creative and poetical, of the second half, theological and speculative, while in the Sanskrit period the Hindus achieved distinction in almost every branch of literature. This is the opinion of Professor Macdonnel of Oxford, whose History of Sanskrit literature is now the best work on the subject. Another class of writers divides the history of Ancient India into five periods-(1) the Vedic period which marked the settlement of the Aryans in the Punjab and the composition of the Rig-Veda and extended from 2000 B.C. to 1400 B.C.; (2) the epic period which marked the Aryan settlement into the valley of the Ganges, the compilation of the Vedas, the Kuru Panchala wars, the composition of the Brahmanas and the Upanishads, from 1400

to 900 B.C.; (3) the Philosophic period from 00 to 200 B.C. in which the Aryans conquered India, Panini composed his grammar, Yaska his Nirukta, the Grihya and Dharma Sutras were composed, Buddha flourished, Asoka promulgated his edicts, Patanjali wrote his great treatise on grammar and the Sankhya philosophy was promulgated by Kapila; (4) the Buddhist period which was marked by the prevalence of Buddhism and the Bactrian invasion of India and extended from 242 B C. to 400 or 500 A. D.; (5) the Pauranic period marked by the reigns of Vikramaditya, the advent of poets like Kalidass and Bharavi, of astronomers like Arya Bhatta, the author of Surya Sidhanta, and the Bhartrihari Sataka, lexicographers like Amarsingh and philosophers like Shankaracharya. This period extends down to the fourteenth century A.D. Hindu thinkers would very likely agree with both

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classes of writers with the exception that the compositions of the earlier Brahmanas, the Aranyakas and the Upanishads did not take place in the epic period, i.e., at or after the time of the Kuru Panchala war, but before that. The Mahábhárata distinctly recognizes the philosophy taught in the Upanishads as the basis of religion, while the rites and the ceremonies laid down in the Brahmanas, are also considered to be anterior to that epic. Hindu is prepared to admit that the Rámáyana was compiled after the Mahábhárata, or that Rama flourished after the battle of Kurukshetra. The same remarks apply to the periods of Panini, Yaska and Kapila. All these according to Hindus flourished before, and not after the Mahábhárata. Kapila is mentioned by name in that great epic and the doctrines of the others are also found there. As regards Sankara, the Pandits say he came before Vikrama, for in the latter's time his commentaries are said to have been extant. With these exceptions, the course of Indian history, as traced by modern writers, may be taken as correct. But whether we take the Hindu or the modern view of the history of our civilization, we find it to be fairly continuous and can easily trace the heights to which it rose in religion and philosophy, as well as mark the steps by which it went down the scale, through neglect of arts of life and advent of superstition and dogma. Sanskrit literature not only presents a true picture of both these periods, but also furnishes abundant lessons as to what the Hindus ought to do to rise to the heights of other nations of modern times. We shall therefore