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Thus he paved the way for Sdkya, who added devotion to speculation, and extended to masses of men that freedom which Capila had given only to the few. Since how- ever the faith of Sdkya must have been to many a painful revolution, there would arise men desirous of a scientific freedom, 280 EARLIER AND LATER VEDA'NTA. yet anxious to reconcile it with the orthodox religion. This seems to have been attempted by Patanjali the grammarian, who lived some time after Pjlnini, and therefore later than S^kya. The interval then between the two stages of the S&nkhya philosophy comprises the rise of Buddhism. Later than these, though I dare not fix a precise date for it, must have been that orthodox wisdom, which the venerable Ach^rya represents. For though attempts to explain the purpose of the Vedas may have begun early, and some of them may have been called the earlier Mimansa, yet they evidently received an impulse from the opposition of less approved systems. The very phrase A-dwaita (non-duality) implies that the distinction between spirit and matter had been taught by others ; and some elements in the A'ch&tya's system are traced by himself to Sancara. Nor should I wonder if some of them are even later. But Sancara lived not earlier than 800 or 900 A. D. How different this newer Veddntine system is from the older Vedic worship, we have partly seen, and shall see farther. But all this stage of philosophical de- velopment occupies a middle ground of vast extent between the old poetical faith, and the new burst which gives the religion of India another form, as evident in the Pur&nas. It is in nearly the same middle region that we are to place the rise and fall of the Bauddha faith in India. Only there is this difference ; a reli- gious creed is so antagonistic to its rival creed, that we can fix defi- nitely its date ; whereas tendencies of thought may be at work when unacknowledged, and stretch over into their opposites, so as to be hardly disentangled. Thus the philosophical spirit may have anticipated its ftiUer consciousness by certain portions of the Epic poems, as well as interpolated episodes in the later of the two ; and again it reaches on into the Pauranic stage, both giving a meaning to the legends, and suffering itself to be fancifully trans- formed in them. Again, as the philosophical sects supply the middle ground in speculation, so do the Epic Poems in both heroic legend and physical parable, between the hymns of the old Vedic ritual, and the modem mythology of the Pur&ias. AGE OP THE VEDAS. 281 " But we must not let our collateral inquiry overshadow our great object, which is now beginning to clear before me. I have been trying to familiarize j^ou with the notion that Hindd literature has great epochs. If any portion of it is Divine, its Divinity does not depend upon its having come bodily from the mouth of Brahmd, nor upon its having been given to Manu by Brahmd; nor must you fancy that books, removed from each other by diverse customs and generations, were all arranged by one Vy&sa. This vast tree of Indian thought has put out a succession of branches in many ages. Nor would I venture to fix all the steps of its growth. But even in the sacred Vedas we saw signs, that whatever power inspired them must have extended its influence over no little time. And if some of the hymns attest occupation of the valley of the Ganges, while Others go back to that of the Punjaub, and if Bdma be the great A'ryan overrunner of India, then the age of B^ma will be a probable centre for the period over which we may suppose the growth of the hymns to have ranged. As, then, we have already placed Bima about 2000 years B.C., we may imagine the devo- tional feelings of the A'ryas to have been taking shape in the Vedic songs from about 2500 B. c. to about 1500. Some such theory is also confirmed by the astronomical notices in the collected books. For the Vedas contain a calendar, with the old Indian circle of five years. In this the ratio of solar and lunar time is given. The zodiac is divided into twenty-seven asterisms, beginning with the Pleiades. The solstitial points are reckoned to be at the beginning of the constellation Dhanisht'h&, and in the middle of AsleshA,; and this, according to astronomers, was the case in the fourteenth century before Christ*. The three earlier Vedas therefore were arranged by some Vy&a about 1400 B.C., and although this date may be more recent * Colebrooke, Vol. I. p. io6, states this argumeDt on astronomical grounds : and Lassen, B. n. Vol. I. pp. 739, 747, seems not altogether to reject it ; but Weber (to whom the Indian astronomy appears borrowed from the Greeks) gives it up, as based on calculations backward. I cannot judge of its value, but think its comespondenoe with general data justifies its retention. 282 CHANGES OF INDIAN SOCIETY. than you are prepared for, yet it falls in with the results of fair criticism, whether you look at the probabilities of our historical conjectures, or at tlie positive evidence of the stars, as implied in the books themselves. There is an interval of perhaps 2800 years from the Vy4sa of the Vedas to him of the Fur4nas. For the latter can hardly, after what we have said of the Brahmd Purdna, and of the Sri Bh^gavat, be placed before 1400 A. d. " If you are now prepared to entertain the idea of growth in your literature, we may here consider two great results which come out with a review of the whole subject. The first result is, that Indian life has not, as is often thought, been fixed in immutable form from the beginning. See, how this comes out in a general review. The earliest hymns of the Rig- Veda shew us the Hindd not yet having earned his name by long dwelling on the Indus, but in the country of the Five Rivers, worshipping all the skyey influences, hailing the dawn in song, and per- sonifying the dark cloud which withholds, as well as the blue heaven which liberates, the rain. His deities are BevaSy the bright elements, which seem to bless him. He has not yet built temples, nor bowed down to idols, nor become the instru- ment of priests, nor does he fancy anything of the transmigration of souls, nor probably of the incarnation of deities, nor has he yet suffered the brotherhood of mankind to be outraged by division into castes. Nor again does he make the pitiless demand for widows to be burned. It is very remarkable tliat none of these things are originally Vedic. Whether the horse- sacrifice (astoamidha) was merely symbolical, as your commen- tators say, or whether the later symbol represents an earlier usage, of perhaps Persian or even Tartar origin, I will not determine. But at least sacrifices were common enough, and the flesh of them* might be eaten ; so that the modem horror of eating flesh can hardly have existed. So far the earliest Hindii we read of had rather the advantage of his descendants. On the other hand, his hymns shew no deep feeling of the moral evil of * Bo, even in Manu, sacrifices may be eaten, but meat otherwise not. v. 13 — 34. DEVELOPMENTS OF SPECULATION, 283 sin, nor reverence for the deities as moral governors. Some liave fancied that thej can trace in the Vedas vestiges of an earlier belief in one supreme Grod*. But no texts have yet been shewn me, belonging to the earliest stage, which bear clearly such meaning. On the contrary, physical nature seems to present the objects of worship, and animal nature to suggest the prayers. Man seems as yet the first among animals wor- shipping the elements. By degrees, however, the shaping mind modifies its impressions into an unity; and a deeper sense appears of the mystery which underlies the agencies of nature, with a feeling after some spirit which formed them. It is chiefly in the Upanishads^ so far as I have observed, that this tendency develops itself; therefore not in the earliest time. Thoughts, however, of Atman the great Soul, or Self, or Person, without whom it is as unnatural to conceive the world, as a human body without a mind, may have had many indistinct utterances before they grew into such reasoned poems, as that about Vach which you quoted to me. There seems also to have broken off firom the A'ryas, while yet in the country of the Five Rivers, a section which carried westward some Vedic traditions, and ripened them in Bactria, or Persia, into the Zoroastrian lore.