Elements of South-Indian Palæography, from the Fourth to the Seventeenth Century A.D. c3.19

c3.19

I have thus briefly pointed out what we may hope to gain by a study of the South-Indian inscriptions, and, to all aware of the utter uncertainty attending all Indian researches, the prospect must be a very attractive one. But there are many difficulties, as I have also pointed out, and there is one obstacle that I must not omit to notice. From the beginning, Indian studies have been infected by a spirit of vague sentimentalism, the cause of which it is difficult to find, and which has reasonably caused prudent enquirers to doubt the value of much that has been done. To all students of Indian literature one can only repeat the words of advice addressed by M. Chabas to the Assyriologists: “Nous invitons les assyriologues sérieux à pousser de leur côté le cri d’alarme, et à maintenir leur science au-dessus de la portée des enthousiastes qui en abusent"¹). If an eminent Egyptologist finds it necessary to address his cautious fellow-labourers in this manner, how much more does the warning apply to Indianists? If Egypt and Assyria present merely ruins and broken fragments, these are at least real, whereas Indian literature is, mostly, but a fata-morgana of ruins that have disappeared ages ago.