have contemplated the possibility of future generations gradually adopting new usages, more or less opposed to those which he recommends. In any case he must have foreseen the probability of adherents of çākhās and caranas other than the Manava continuing to observe their own proper usages. In using Manu, therefore, we must recollect that any observance recommended therein is not necessarily one for all time, and certainly is for a particular limited class. Take for example the teaching about niyoga (levirat), which first shows how the thing is to be done according to rule, and then goes on to disapprove and condemn in the strongest terms the doing of it (IX. 59-68). Clearly we have here a concession to the usage of some, accompanied by the expression of a hope that the objectionable practice would some day be abandoned as 'a law fit only for cattle.' And compare with this the teaching about drinking, and eating, which seems to show that the author did not expect certain objectionable and sinful habits to be at once abandoned by Brahmans and Kṣatriyas.

That most of the usages recommended by Manu are for Brahmans alone, is perfectly plain, as I have already observed. And many of them are for a very small class indeed, namely, the select few, learned and virtuous persons who were ready and willing to devote their whole lives to the acquisition of true knowledge and true religious merit. And, lastly, the author's public, as regards the Brahmans at least, would necessarily be confined at first, for the most part, to those who, like his patron, were connected

with the Manara school. For, according to the commentary on Pāraskara's Grihiya Sutras: Vasishtha declares that it is wrong to follow the rules of another çûkhâ. . . . Whosoever leaves the law of his çûkha and adopts that of another, he sinks into blind. darkness, having degraded a sacred Rishi.' And other authorities for this proposition may be cited. Finally Max Müller says: Only in case no special rule is laid down for certain observances in some Grihiyas, it is lawful to adopt those of other families.' For a discussion of this matter see Chapter III. of my Prospectus.

Having considered the aim and scope of Manu, and its date, and the classes to which its teaching was addressed, a judge should next proceed to select for use the parts that promise good fruit. Mixed up with much that is useful, there is in Manu an immense amount of mere rubbish which must be carefully rejected. And beside rubbish there is much of obvious exaggeration and ornament, designed to emphasize doubtful truths. Great discretion must be exercised in winnowing the whole mass, and securing a valuable residuum, for application (subject to numerous restrictions) principally to Brahmans, and occasionally, but in a much less degree, to such nonBrahman tribes and castes as may appear to follow in the wake of the Brahmans.

So much for Manu, which for certain reasons is the most important, as unquestionably it is by far the most interesting, of the older Sanskrit 'law-books.' With reference to chronologic priority, I should have

spoken first of the dharmasutras that still exist, and which are said to belong distinctly to the Vedic period of Sanskrit literature. But my suggestions with regard to the use of Manu apply for the most part equally well to the dharmasūtras, and indeed to the Sanskrit 'law-books' generally.

The principal thing to be remembered about the dharmasūtras, for our present purpose, is that, whilst four of them belong to the 'old' or 'black Yajur Veda,' the other two do not.1

The four black Yajur Veda' sutras, called Baudhayana, Āpastamba, Hiraniya-Kesin and Kathaka, are thought (see Jolly, p. 38) to have been composed in South India. And (as I have shown in my Prospectus, p. 62) there are grounds for believing that the Apastambiya school prevails particularly in the Madras Province, excluding the Northern Cirkars and the Western Coast. Probably, therefore, in suits between Brahmans these four works, or at all events Apastamba, should be consulted in Madras more frequently than Manu, which appears to be connected with a school that has died out.

The oldest sutra of all, the Gautama, is thought by Bühler and Jolly certainly to belong to the Sama Veda, whilst Jolly says that the Vasistha sūtra seems to have originated in a school studying the Rigveda.

1 Burnell observes in his Introduction to Manu, p. xxiv: 'That the text has been universally received, though a black Yajur Veda treatise and not of universal significance, is to be attributed to the fact that this Veda is still the most commonly followed one: in South India about eighty-five per cent. of the Brahman population adheres to it.' We do not yet know what proportion of this population follows the Apastamba and other çākhās, without paying attention to the Manava-d.-ç.

The origin of the Vishnu Smṛti, also called a sutra, seems to be still involved in doubt.

Whilst it is extremely difficult to determine in what degree the 'black Yajur Veda' sūtras, and Manu, which must be closely connected with them, should be applied to the resolution of questions arising nowadays between Apastambiya and other Brahmans resident in the Madras Province, it is still more difficult to limit the application of the Yajnavalky a Smrti; which (see my Prospectus) is an exposition of Yoga doctrine designed for the people of Mithilâ, and is connected certainly with the 'white Yajur Veda,' and not improbably with Buddhism.

Its suspicious origin and connections' notwithstanding, this Smṛti (according to Jolly, p. 48), though less celebrated than the Code of Manu, has exercised an immense influence on the modern development of Indian law, through the medium of the Mitākṣarā and other Indian commentaries of the Yajnavalkya Smrti. And the learned Professor goes on to account for this by supposing that Manu had become somewhat obsolete when the commentators of the Y. Smrti wrote; and they found the Y. Smrti more accordant with the usages of their own time, and therefore selected it as the basis of their works. As to this, I would observe, in the first place, that the commentaries

1 In addition to what I have suggested in the Prospectus as circumstances of suspicion against Yajnavalkya, we may observe the mode in which the Seer is spoken of in the Sathapatha Bramhana, in several places, as holding opinions contrary to the opinions of others, upon such important matters as the eating of the flesh of cows, which he recommended, and as having been cursed by Karaka Adhvaryu.

of Vijñāneçvara and Apararka are referred by the Professor to the 11th and 12th centuries; whilst Medhātithi's date according to Burnell is 1000 A.D., and Manu may be of the 8th or 9th century. And, in the next place, whereas the Y. Smrti itself is a copious work, the author of the Mitākṣarā could get out of it only thirty-six verses as matter on which to comment at large, in the part on inheritance. I cannot think it probable, therefore, that Vijñāneśvara selected the Y. Smrti as the basis of his work because he found Manu obsolete. It is far more likely, it seems to me, that he may have done so because he had new and peculiar views of his own to propound, and preferred to take up entirely new ground, using the Y. Smrti as a convenient peg.

I have already, both in the View and in the Prospectus, protested for many reasons against the daily increasing importance that is attached to the Mitākṣarā. I will only add here a bit of testimony from the pen of Professor Jolly. He says (at p. 121): 'Before closing this subject, I must not omit to note that judging Mitākṣarā doctrine on its merits, it is hardly possible to take a favourable view of it. It is too much opposed to the old text law and to modern usage to be looked upon as more than a theoretical development.'

Perhaps it would not be unwise, in dealing with the digests and commentaries generally, to look upon all doctrines in them opposed to the old text law and to modern usage as no more than 'theoretical developments,' fit only for discussion by idealists.