A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c10.s1.1

c10.s1.1

It has been our endeavour in the early part of this chapter to show how the canonical authors of the present period incorporated a more or less considerable branch of the Arthaśāstra thought with the teaching of the older canon. We have now to mention another author belonging apparently to the close of this period who represented, although in an incidental fashion and within closely restricted limits, an independent, not to say contrary, tradition of political thinking. The Chatuhśatikā written by the Buddhist monk Āryadeva is a didactic and philosophical work, but it has even in its existing fragmentary condition at least two extracts bearing specifically on the subject-matter of politics. It will be convenient to treat these extracts along with the accompanying commentary which, however distant it might be in time, elucidates the author's meaning by connecting it with the imaginary *prima facie* argument (pūrva-pakṣa) to which it apparently furnishes an answer. The first extract is concerned with the nature of the king's office. Replying, as the commentator mentions, to the argument that the king's pride is justified because all undertakings depend upon him, Āryadeva states with angry impatience, "What superciliousness is thine, (O King!), thou who art a (mere) servant of the multitude (gaṇadāsa) and who receivest the sixth part (of the produce) as thine wages."[^asterisk] In the above passage, it will be observed, an idea frequently represented in the earlier literature, namely, that the king is an official paid by the