A History of Ancient Sanskrit Literature, so far as it illustrates the Primitive Religion of the Brahmans c8.19

c8.19

स्वधर्मातिरेकेण च क्षत्रियेण सता प्रवृत्तप्रतिग्रहौ प्रतिपन्नौ। And again, बुद्धादेः पुनरयमेवातिक्रमो ऽलंकारबुद्धौ स्थितः। origin, and belonged to the nobility of the land. He was not the first of his caste who opposed the ambition of the Brahmans. Several centuries before Buddha, Viśvâmitra, who, like Buddha, was a member of the royal caste, had to struggle against the exclusiveness of the priests. At that early time, however, the position of the Brahmans was not yet impregnable; and Viśvâmitra, although a Kshatriya, succeeded in gaining for himself and his family the rights for which he struggled, and which the Brahmans had previously withheld from all but their own caste. King Janaka of Videha again, whose story is given in the Brâhmaṇas, refused to submit to the hierarchical pretensions of the Brahmans, and asserted his right of performing sacrifices without the intercession of priests. However great the difference may have been between the personal character of these two men and of Buddha,