The History of Indian Literature c8.46.4

c8.46.4

and still greater progress in those Upanishads which stand by themselves, *i.e.*, those which, although perhaps originally annexed to a Bráhmaṇa or an Áraṇyaka of one of the three older Vedas, have come down to us at the same time—or, it may be, have come down to us only—in an Atharvan recension. Finally, those Upanishads which are directly attached to the Atharva-Veda are complete vehicles of developed philosophical systems; they are to some extent sectarian in their contents, in which respect they reach down to the time of the Puráṇas. That, however, the fundamental works now extant of the philosophical systems, viz., their Sútras, were composed much later than has hitherto been supposed, is conclusively proved by the following considerations. In the first place, the names of their authors are either not mentioned at all in the most modern Bráhmaṇas and Áraṇyakas, or, if they are, it is under a different form and in other relations—in such a way, however, that their later acceptation is already foreshadowed and exhibited in the germ. Secondly, the names of the sages mentioned in the more ancient of them are only in part identical with those mentioned in the latest liturgical Sútras. And, thirdly, in all of them the Veda is expressly presupposed as a whole, and direct reference is also made to those Upanishads which we are warranted in recognising as the latest real Upanishads; nay, even to such as are only found attached to the Atharvan.