A History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, so far as it illustrates the Primitive Religion of the Brahmans c11.2

c11.2

THE three periods of Vedic literature which we have examined, the Sûtra, Brâhmaṇa, and Mantra periods, all point to some earlier age which gave birth to the poetry of the early Rishis. There was a time, doubtless, when the songs which were collected with such careful zeal in the Mantra period, commented upon with such elaborate pedantry during the Brâhmaṇa period, and examined and analysed with such minute exactness during the Sûtra period, lived and were understood without any effort by a simple and pious race. There was a time when the sacrifices, which afterwards became so bewildering a system of ceremonies, were dictated by the free impulse of the human heart, by a yearning to render thanks to some Unknown Being, and to repay, in words or deeds, a debt of gratitude, accumulated from the first breath of life. There was a time when the poet was the leader, the king, and priest of his family or tribe, when his songs and sayings were listened to in anxious silence and with implicit faith, when his prayers were repeated by crowds who looked up to their kings and priests, their leaders and judges, as men better, nobler, wiser than the rest, as beings nearer to the gods in proportion as they were raised above the common level of mankind. These men themselves living a life of perfect freedom, speaking a language not yet broken by literary usage, and thinking thoughts unfettered as yet by traditional chains, were at once teachers, lawgivers, poets, and priests. There is no very deep wisdom in their teaching, their laws are simple, their poetry shows no very high flights of fancy, and their religion might be told in a few words. But what there is of their language, poetry, and religion has a charm which no other period of Indian literature possesses: it is spontaneous, original, and truthful.