[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [General history and culture](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general) › [The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924) › c18.152 # The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c18.152 The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c18.152 - **Language:** English ### [c18.152](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924.c18.152) Many matters of interest and curiosity have been necessarily passed over, but the foregoing summary will, it is hoped, be sufficient to give the reader a fairly accurate notion of the principles on which the small kingdoms of Northern India were administered in the days of Alexander the Great. Although many of the rules in Chānakya's treatise are puerile, and some merely theoretical, the book on the whole was intended to be a practical manual of statecraft and administration, and as such it is well worth reading. Books like the so-called \*Laws of Manu\* and \*Dharmaśāstras\* set forth the Brahman ideal—the treatise of Chandragupta's minister openly discards ideals and presents a plain unvarnished statement of the immoral practice of kings and Brahman ministers in the fourth century before Christ, prior to the realization of the novel idea of a great empire extending over nearly all India.² - [Previous: c18.151](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924.c18.151) - [Next: c18.153](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924.c18.153) - [Up: c18](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924.c18) ## Cites (2) - [Mānava Dharmaśāstra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.niti.dharma.manu) — Manu & Bhṛgu, Sanskrit - [Dharmaśāstra](https://indike.org/pramana/in.niti.dharma) --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924.c18.152](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.general.smith-1924.c18.152) · Pramāṇa