A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c8.s3.43

c8.s3.43

A word may be added about the method of the Arthaśāstra. A perusal of the treatise of Kauṭilya is enough to show that the conclusions of the Arthaśāstra authors were reached by a process of reasoning based upon the facts of human nature and of political life. The method of these writers, in other words, was an empirical one. In Kauṭilya, who has left us the only complete work of Arthaśāstra now extant, the empirical method is supplemented by some very interesting applications of what may be called the historical method. In one place (Ibid pp. 11-12), e.g., Kauṭilya is solemnly urging the king to master the category of six senses which he calls the 'six enemies.' In stressing this point he quotes the instances of no less than eleven kings or republican communities (saṅghas) that perished through indulgence of the senses, while he mentions two kings who won success through their self-restraint. For other instances of the use of the historical method, vide Ibid pp. 41,329,360.