History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v2.c19.4.1

v2.c19.4.1

The caste system has been highly eulogised and also most severely condemned by Western writers. Sidney Low in his ‘Vision of India’ (pp. 262–263, 2nd ed. of 1907) speaks of the beneficent aspect of the caste system in the following eloquent passage ‘There is no doubt that it is the main cause of the fundamental stability and contentment by which Indian society has been braced up for centuries against the shocks of politics and the cataclysms of Nature. It provides every man with his place, his career, his occupation, his circle of friends. It makes him at the outset a member of a corporate body, it protects him through life from the canker of social jealousy and unfulfilled aspirations; it ensures him companionship and a sense of community with others in like case with himself. The caste organization is to the Hindu his club, his trade union, his benefit society, his philanthropic society. There are no work-houses in India and none are as yet needed.’ Abbe Dubois, who wrote about 130 years ago after being in close touch with Hindus of all castes for 15 years as a missionary, remarks (in his work on the character, manners and customs of the people of India, translated into English and published in London in 1817) ‘I consider the institution of castes among the Hindu nations as the happiest effort of their legislation;