A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c11.s1.26

c11.s1.26

When we turn from the above to consider the author's attitude towards morality in so far as his rules of policy are concerned, we find him occupying a position which, in its attempt to condone a partially Machiavellian statecraft from the point of view of authoritative example, betrays the influence of the Mahābhārata.† In the beginning of his work he broadly inculcates the king's observance of the rule of virtuous conduct. The king who is devoted to righteous conduct, he says, unites himself and afterwards his people with the threefold end of life, while he who is of an opposite nature destroys both without doubt. In the following lines he drives his lesson home by quoting the example of the good king Vaijavana and the wicked king Nahuṣa, and he admonishes the king to seek his welfare with righteousness as his guide.‡ This, however, does not prevent the author from reproducing in the actual details of his statecraft some of the typical rules of the Arthaśāstra. Thus in his chapter relating to the suppression of disturbers of the public peace he writes that the king should slay without delay the wicked ones (dūṣyāḥ)—that is, as the author explains, those sinful favourites of the king who singly or collectively harm the kingdom—either secretly, or else publicly after causing them to incur the enmity of the people.∗ In another place Kāmandaka, while analysing the seven traditional forms of policy (upāya) divides punishment into three classes, of which the first-named (viz. slaying) is subdivided into two kinds, namely the open and the secret. While the former should be applied, Kāmandaka thinks, against the enemy who is hated by the people, the latter should be inflicted upon those who irritate the subjects, who are the king's favourites, and who are powerful and oppressive to the others. This last form of punishment, the author explains, consists in the application of poison, secret appliances, weapons, and ointments causing sores.† In the third and last extract bearing on this point Kāmandaka divides fighting into two classes, namely fair and treacherous. The former, we are told, should be resorted to when the king has the advantage of time and place, has seduced the enemy's elements of sovereignty (or subjects) and is powerful, but the latter should be followed in the contrary circumstances. This last form of fighting comprises, as we learn from the numerous examples given by the author, various methods of slaying the enemy by attacking him on unfavourable ground or when he is off his guard.∗