olden times, like those of the Vasishthas, the Visvâmitras, the Angirases and the Kanvas,-furnished renowned warriors and eminent priests at the same time. A Percy or a Douglas might be an ambitious priest or a fiery warrior, and so might a Kanva or an Angiras. To be sure, the Hindu houses were pre-eminently priestly as the European houses were military, but caste was as unknown to the one as to the other. Many a baron of medieval Europe whose names are still preserved in the history of the crusades, had their fathers or uncles, sons or nephews, immured in the solitude of holy monasteries; and many a Vasishtha or Visvâmitra, whose religious hymns we still cherish and revere, had their sons or nephews, engaged in the wars of the Vedic Period, in the unending contests against the aborigines of the soil. These facts are proved by the texts of the Rig Veda itself which we have quoted in a previous chapter; and they are confirmed by the legends and traditions which we have quoted in this chapter from later Sanscrit literature. The Vedic Rishis composed their hymns, fought their wars, and ploughed their fields; but were neither Brâhmans, nor Kshatriyas, nor Vaisyas. The great Rishi houses of the Vedic Age furnished priests and soldiers, but were no more Brâhmans or Kshatriyas than the Percies or Douglases of midieval Europe were Brâhmans or Kshatriyas.

BOOK II.

EPIC PERIOD B. C. 1400 TO 1000.

CHAPTER I.

LITERATURE OF THE PERIOD.

WE have closed our account of the Vedic Age, wher the Hindu Aryans crossed the Indus and gradually conquered and occupied the whole tract of country watered by the Indus and its five tributaries. We have seen that the sole work of this period which remains to us is the collection of hymns known as the Rig Veda Sanhitâ, and we have also seen how these hymns illustrate the civilization of the Vedic Period. We now proceed to describe the civilization of the Epic Period, when the Hindus crossed the Sutlej, moved down the basin of the Ganges and the Jumna, and founded powerful kingdoms along the entire valley as far down as modern Benares and North Behar. And as in the case of the Vedic Age, so in the case of the Epic Age, we will base our account on contemporaneous literature.

What is the contemporaneous literature of the Epic Age? And what is the contemporaneous literature of the Philosophical or Rationalistic Age that followed ? R. C. D., A. I.

The Brâhmanas, the Âranyakas, and the Upanishads which constantly refer to the actions of the Kurus, the Panchâlas, the Kosalas, and the Videhas living in the valley of the Ganges, form the literature of the Epic Age. The Sûtras which presuppose the rise of rationalism in India, and which were composed when the Aryans had expanded all over Eastern and Southern India, form the literature of the Rationalistic Age.

About thirty years ago Professor Max Müller published his great work on Sanskrit literature and gave reasons, which have since generally been accepted, for considering the mass of Sûtra literature as subsequent to the Brahmana literature. He shewed that the Sûtra literature presupposed and quoted the Brâhmana literature, and the converse was never the case. He shewed that the Brahmana literature reflected an age of priestly supremacy and unquestioning obedience on the part of the people, which was anterior to the practical and philosophical and sceptical age of the Sûtras. He shewed that the Brâhmana literature down to the Upanishads was considered revealed in India, while all Sûtra works were ascribed to human authors. And he enforced these and similar arguments by a wealth of illustrations and a degree of erudition which left nothing to be desired.*

Later researches have confirmed the view that not only are the Sûtras of a particular school subsequent to the Brâhmanas of the same school, but that the body of the Sûtra literature as a whole is subsequent to the

It is needless to say that we cannot enter into the details of these learned discussions. True to the plan of the present work, we will make only a few remarks not on the literary, but on the historical beatings of the facts stated above. What is the historical import of this sequence in the different classes of Ancient Sanskrit literature? What is the historical reason of this sequence? Why did the Ancient Hindus compose their works in one particular form, the Vedic hymns, for a number of centuries? Why did they gradually abandon that style of composition, and write the prolix and dogmatic prose

body of the Brahmana literature. Thus to quote one instance only, Dr. Bulher, who does not altogether agree with Max Müller on this point, nevertheless points out in his introductions of the Dharma Sûtras that those Sûtras repeatedly quote from Brâhmanas of different schools. He shews that the oldest Dharma Sûtra extant presupposes an Aranyaka of the Black Yajur Veda, a Brâhmana of the Sâma Veda, and even an Upanishad of the Atharva Veda! He points out that Vasishtha's Dharma Sûtra quotes from a Brâhmana of the Rig Veda, an Aranyaka of the Black Yajur Veda and a Brâhmana of the White Yajur Veda, and also mentions an Upanishad of the Atharva Veda. So also Baudhâyana's Dharma Sûtra quotes from the Brâhmanas both of the Black and the White Yajur Veda. On the other hand, no Brâhmana ever quotes from any Sûtra work.

No scholar maintains that the last Brâhmana work was composed before the first Sûtra work was written. But there can be little doubt on the evidence now before us, that there was a period when the prevailing style of writing was the prose style of the Brâhmanas, and that this period was followed by a period when the prevailing style was aphorisms or Sûtras.

Brâhmanas, for some succeeding centuries? And why again did they gradually change this for the concise aphorisms of the Sûtras during the next few centuries? What is there in the nature of things that would induce the Ancient Hindus to take up different styles of composition at different periods of their history,—as if to afford the future historian a clue to the dates of their writings?

The question is more easily asked than answered. It may be answered however by a counter question. What is there in the nature of things which prevented the Chronicles and Romances of Medieval Europe being composed after the 14th and 15th centuries? Why did not Hume and Froude compose Chronicles? Why did not Fielding and Scott compose Mediæval Romances? The subjects were still the same;—why was the composition so different that it would be possible to demarcate the feudal ages from the modern period on the testimony of European literature, even if every vestige of European history was destroyed?

An Englishman would answer: It was impossible that Chronicles and feudal Romances should be continued after Elizabeth had reigned and Shakespeare and Bacon. had written. A new light had dawned on Europe. The human mind had expanded. Religion was purified. A new world had been discovered. Modern philosophy had taken its rise. Commerce and maritime enterprise had received a wonderful development.