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Theory of Government in Ancient India (Post-Vedic) c15: Chapter XII. The Basic Principles of the Hindu Theory of Government

Theory of Government in Ancient India (Post-Vedic) c15

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Chapter XII. The Basic Principles of the Hindu Theory of Government

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From a survey of the political ideas in the vast range of Hindu literature it is clear that political theory in ancient India was essentially a theory of the governmental act. As a whole, it is a theory of the art of government. It touches but incidentally on the deeper problems of political obligation, foundations of the state, or the rights of man. It seeks, above all, to guide the practical course of administration.¹ In the natural order of things it should be studied at every step in the light of the actual working of institutions; its sources should be traced in practice; its conformity to contemporary usage examined and its real influence on events estimated. But this method of treatment is not open to the student. He can rarely dogmatise on the dates of the theoreticians, which, only too often, range over centuries. In the second place, all the literary, epigraphic and numismatic evidence on Ancient Indian History does not suffice to give an idea of the details of Hindu administration at a given epoch. Only such general features are clear as the predominance of the monarchy; occasional disputes about the succession; a number of ministers; a powerful commander-in-chief; several grades of local administration; swarms of spies; royal courts of justice with assessors and ordeals; numerous items of taxation varying from place to place, and time to time; guilds discharging many functions in the north and south alike; incessant diplomatic negotiations and frequent wars between neighbouring states. It is only broad facts of this nature which can be consistently kept in view in the study of governmental theory. But whenever it is possible to check theory by indubitable historical details, such, for instance, as are furnished by Yuan Chwang in the seventh and Alberûnî in the eleventh century, it appears that while the writers faithfully reflect the salient features of administration, they freely improve upon the details, and of course, the ideals are their own. It is rather strange that the attempts which have been recently made to reconstruct the history of administration in ancient India are based largely on just a few theoretical works and thus end in placing the cart before the horse.

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¹ Ante, Ch., I, pp. 4, 5.

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There is nothing surprising in the fact that a good deal of Hindu¹ political thought is imbedded in religious compositions. Writing of an important epoch in European history, Figgis remarks that ‘of political principles whether they be those of order or of freedom, we must seek in religious and quasi-theological writings for the highest and most notable expressions.’² In spite of differences in the context and method of speculation, the same tendency operated yet more strongly in India. Here the whole outlook on life has been deeply tinged by religion; law has always been associated with religion and all literature has been coloured by it. The manner in which governmental ideas are only too often interwoven into the texture of theology is sometimes irritating to the modern inquirer, but it has one indubitable advantage. It presents political thought as part of the current intellectual stock and as related to the whole of life. It is thus possible to detect certain principles which lie behind it, which are not clearly stated but which emerge out of the whole set of ideas and their context.

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¹ In the present work, the term Hindu has been used in a generic sense, including not only followers of Brâhmanic sects but also Buddhists and Jainas.

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² J. N. Figgis, from Gerson to Grotius, p. 6.

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Hindu political thought has a spirit, a *milieu*, an atmosphere of its own as different from their Western counterparts as Hindu personality, temperament and outlook are different from what one finds in Western Europe. Hindu thought does not fall under any of the accepted categories of Western speculation. It stands by itself. But inevitably it presents some points of resemblance and contrast with ancient and modern schools of political thought in Europe. In their fundamental assumptions, Hindu writers come somewhat near the idealism which we associate with the Greeks and which found a resurrection in Rousseau to form the basis of idealistic philosophy in Germany and England. Hindu social theory does not take society or the state and the atomic individual respectively. Here is no individuality to be fenced round against the impact of social forces. Society is not a mere conglomeration of men and women. It is a working conception of life. As Plato said of the state, it is a conception which guides every living member in the performance of his functions. Individuality derives its worth and significance from its contribution of service to the universal whole. The individual possesses no independent value, ultimately, no independent life of his own. He is absorbed in society.

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Akin to this is another idea common to Plato and Hindu thinkers. They believed that every class in the community has a distinctive type of mind which pre-eminently qualifies its members or their respective functions. In Hindu thought this conception followed from the doctrine of transmigration of soul which allots every living being a

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| Hindu and European political thought. |

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| Division of labour. |

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station in life and moulds a person's temperament according to the sum-total of his past deeds. So, the working of these types of mind, in intimate connection with one another, is the essence of the community. "Society, *prima facie*," says Bosanquet, "exists in the correlated dispositions by which a plurality of individual minds meets the need for covering the ground open to human nature, by division of labour in the fullest sense." Hindu theory likewise assumes that the human mind can attain its real and full life—at any rate that part of it which is not to be spent in renunciation—only in a community of minds or rather in a community pervaded by a single mind which expresses itself harmoniously, though differently, in the life and action of all members. It is this intimate connection which secures the subordination of parts to the common good.

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It is through the idea of caste that Hindu theory sought to rescue society from the dispersion which private interest constantly occasions. It gave the individual a definite standard of life and of work. Through caste he fell into line with his fellows. Through caste his particular interest became the common one. The theory of caste distributes the power, prestige, privileges and goods of this world according to functions. The idea of duty which lies behind the functional concept implies that the individual does not live for himself. He exists for a greater whole to which his own ambitions must be subordinated. Thus, organised society becomes something more than the individuals who compose it. In Hindu theory, as in modern idealism, "righteousness consists for each man in the fulfilment of his appointed function in the life and action of the community.¹ The Bhagavad Gîtâ, which represents the highest level of Hindu thought, lays down that "one's own duty, though defective is better than another's duty well-performed. Death in performing one's own duty is preferable; the performance of the duties of others is dangerous." ¹ The whole discourse of the Gītā was uttered by Kṛiṣṇa to persuade Arjuna to perform a task from which he shrank but to which he must bend himself as a Kṣatriya. The Gītā gives a message of Niṣkāma Karma, desireless action,—action without an eye on consequences to oneself.² Personality is thus taught to transcend itself by giving its devotion to something beyond itself. Thanks to this philosophy, Hindu theory has no ideal of liberty or rights independently of those which arise from the necessity and desirability of performing social functions.

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¹ Ernest Barker. Political Thought in England from Spencer to To-day, p. 24.

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¹ The Bhagavad Gītā, Ch. XVIII, III.

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² Ibid., Ch. II.

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To every one, theory prescribes a way of life which accords best with the duties he has to discharge. It inculcates a life of poverty and austerity to priests, scholars and educationists of whom the Brāhmaṇic order was composed or ought to be composed. The Mahābhārata, Manu and other authorities would like Brāhmaṇas to know several ways of livelihood and teach them to those concerned, but for themselves they must spurn all wealth and confine themselves to their special vocations.³ It seems to have been assumed that colossal fortunes or great material responsibilities would prove too burdensome to them and would fatally interfere with the special calling to which their lives are devoted. They must be free to cultivate the higher interests untrammelled by worldly cares. Their lives must be missionary, not mercenary. The reward for piety and learning is not money but honour on earth and, of course, bliss in Brāhmaṇas.

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³ Along with the passages referred to in the foregoing chapters, see Manu, I, 93, 98-101; IV, 10-12, 15-17; X, 2.

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after-life. Yet while depriving himself voluntarily of much that ordinary mortals prize, the Brâhmaṇa surrounded himself with privileges. After the struggle for supremacy between Brâhmaṇas and Kṣatriyas, which is reflected in the earlier writings, had ended in favour of the latter, the ground was clear for the Brâhmaṇa to entrench himself firmly against all attack. For more than two thousand years he has insisted that he must be honoured and worshipped. For more than a thousand years he claimed exemption from taxes on the ground that his proper contribution to the state was spiritual, and that he had no superfluous worldly goods to offer. Obviously on this last line of argument many writers exempt some other classes of people from taxes. The Brâhmaṇa, however, goes further and claims an extraordinarily wide benefit of clergy which seems to convert his supremacy into a loathsome tyranny. He is painting himself worse than he was in actual practice. But the fact remains that Hindu social philosophy draws its darkest stain from caste-privilege. The evil did not stop with Brâhmaṇas. The Dharma Sûtras and Dharma Śâstras work out regular systems of punishments based on gradations of caste in which the Śûdra finds himself deprived of elementary justice. A protest, indeed, was raised in antiquity. The Buddhists and Jainas attacked the Brahmanic supremacy. They could not abolish caste. They reconciled themselves to it. Jainism, in particular, adopted the current notions on social organisation, social superiority and etiquette. But neither Buddhists nor Jainas harp constantly like Brâhmaṇas on caste prerogatives. The Buddhists concede a sort of primacy to Kṣatriyas.

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All the Jaina Tirthakaras and heroes take birth in Kṣatriya bodies. When Mahâvira, the twenty-fourth and last of the Tirthakaras was conceived by a Brâhmaṇi, the king of gods felt bound to remove him miraculously to the womb of a Kṣatriyâṇi. All are declared equal in respect of the highest things which matter in life. Aśvaghoṣa in his Vajrasuchi declares that all are equal in feelings and interests.¹

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¹ Ante, Ch. IX.

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The Brâhmaṇas themselves sometimes perceived that the extreme position they had taken up required some modification and some justification. The Mahâbhârata which is so strong in its advocacy of Brâhmanic supremacy recognises that in ultimate analysis the whole world is an emanation from Brahman and that distinctions among men are based on character and conduct alone. There was at first no caste. It was only on the unfoldment of various types of mind and capacity that men were divided into classes. Elsewhere it remarks that there was nothing peculiar about caste; that in the beginning all had been created Brâhmaṇas and that on account of their actions alone had people fallen into different castes.² Śukra, though he is a late writer and recognises caste as a matter of course, makes bold to declare in the first chapter of his Niti that birth does not matter and that character and deeds alone are the basis of caste.³ Even Manu whose primacy among lawgivers was recognised by Bṛihaspati himself, says that the force of tapas or penance and austerity can elevate, and sensual indulgence can degrade, a man in the hierarchy of caste. Tapas can achieve anything. It is resistless. But it is added that the greatest tapas for a Śûdra is the performance of his duty.⁴ None of the lawgivers regards a Śûdra as beyond the pale of society proper. When the Vedic Puruṣasûkta derives all castes from the same divine body, it postulates their vital organic unity.

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² The Mahâbhârata, Venaparva, CCXVI, CLXXX.

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³ Śukraniti, I, 38—44.

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⁴ Manu, IV, 19, 24 : IX, 335, XI, 234—236, 238; XII, 104.

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In defence of Śûdra disabilities, some of the Dharma Śâstras and Purâṇas adopted a line which deserves a passing notice. They sometimes speak of Śûdras as "youngest," "latest born" or "littlest brothers." Of course, all of them are "once-born" as distinguished from the "twice-born." They had not reached that stage of spiritual development when they could comprehend esoteric doctrines and when they could perform the higher religious ceremonies. There is a Sanskrit saying that the Veda is afraid of men of little knowledge and apprehends injury from them. Śûdras, therefore, should have nothing to do with the Vedas, not even listen to them. None the less, a Śûdra is capable of a good and virtuous life. Though he cannot be entrusted with the power of mantras, he should be helped in his other studies.¹ Hindu theory believes all men to be capable of virtue, though the form of virtue may be different.

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¹ Manu, IX, 335; X, 42, 127-128.

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Hindu writers are not content with laying down the broad features of organisation. They must prescribe the minutest details. They would leave nothing to the blind regulation of impulse. They will not leave anybody to rely on his own intelligence. They evince an implicit faith in the necessity of a customary standard by which all should differentiate right from wrong, good from evil. They seem to believe that the acceptance of a common way of action is the condition precedent of corporate life. It is needless to criticise the details of their manuals of conduct, but it may be stated that the fundamentals of their position can be challenged on philosophic ground. It is true that within the sphere of a caste they allow any of its members to rise to the full stature of his being. It is true again that under extraordinary circumstances they would permit a person to follow the occupations of a lower caste. But, ordinarily, they would hold everybody down to the occupation and way of life pertaining to his caste. Each man had a station allotted to him and must fulfil its duties. But as Prof. Laski remarks in his criticism of Bradley "it is the primary fact in personality as such that it has no allotted station. It wins or ought to win the station in which it may best fulfil itself. It can do so by experiment alone........ Any attempt at the division of society into 'natural classes' with 'natural' functions is bound to break down. We discover what we naturally are in terms only of what we seek to become. And the discovery is intimately our own."¹ Under the Brāhmanic scheme the son of a warrior or a trader had no chance of discovering whether he was fit for a scholastic career. Nor could a priest's children try their hand at crafts for which they might possess a natural talent.

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¹ Laski, Grammar of Politics, p. 95.

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Yet it is the scheme of life, as proposed in the sacred texts, which the Government must recognise and enforce. It is not the state which originates social organisation. It is possible, *mutatis mutandis*, to apply to Hindu theory Bosanquet's statement that "the work of the state is *de facto* for the most part 'endorsement' or 'taking over'—setting its imprimatur, the seal of its force, on what more flexible activities or the mere progress of life have wrought out in long years of adventurous experiment or silent growth."²

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² Bosanquet, Philosophical Theory of the State, Indroduction, p. xxxiii.

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Society and Government.

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In Hindu theory the king is bound to ascertain social law or usage from those who know it, and to enforce it to the best of his capacity. The government thus implies force. Its coercion represents a force opposed to another force, which is antagonistic to the social purpose. Force, indeed, is inherent in the state. Bosanquet's remarks again serve to exemplify the Hindu position. "We make a great mistake in thinking of the force exercised by the state as limited to the restraint of disorderly persons by the police and the punishment of intentional law-breakers. The state is the flywheel of our life. Its system is constantly reminding us of duties from sanitation to the incidents of trusteeship, which we have not the least desire to neglect, but which we are either too ignorant or too indolent to carry out apart from instruction and authoritative suggestion." ¹ The drug of violence has to be administered "as a counter-poison to tendencies which would otherwise give no chance to the logical will." ² Hindu theory sums up this idea in one word 'protection' which it postulates as the purpose and function, *par excellence*, of government. That is how *danda* or punishment is represented as part of 'protection.' Viewed in this light, punishment is, in its essence, neither retributive, nor deterrent nor reformatory, but a reaction of the social order against an unsocial tendency. This is the idea underlying the doctrine of coercion in which the Mahābhārata seems to revel. It gives the name to the science of government in Kauṭalya and his successors. This is what they mean when they proclaim that chastisement lies at the root of the social order. It is implied that ultimately the state or government regulates and arbitrates between all claims, guarantees life and security and

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¹ Ibid., p. 152.

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² Ibid., p. 189.

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enables a system to operate in the body-politic. As such it issues commands (without violating the sacred fundamental law) to do or not to do certain acts.¹ In connection with the whole complex of institutions, Hindu theory views the governmental power as sustaining social life, and giving it security and completeness. So, the king who stands for the government and for the state, is extolled as divine and even more than divine. It is interesting to compare the Hindu idea with one set of medieval, and another set of modern, European conceptions. The Hindu eulogies of the kingship remind one, for instance, of Ambrosiaster who spoke of the ruler as "the Vicar of God," and of St. Optatus of Milevis who, in his treatise on the Donatist Schism in North Africa, explicitly declared that the ruler was the representative of God. The spirit of Hindu political sayings recalls certain passages in Hegel's Philosophy of History. "The State," says the German idealist, "is the divine idea as it exists on earth." "The state is the divine will as the present spirit unfolding itself to the actual shape and organisation of a world." "The state is a form of the absolute spirit, which is the essence of all things." "All the worth which the living being possesses—all spiritual reality—he possesses only through the state." The state "is the absolute power on earth." There is one fundamental difference between Hegelianism and Hindu political thought. The latter will not subordinate the fundamental Law to the state or the government. But when after postulating this condition, the Hindus embark on the glorification of the sovereign power, they leave even Hegel far behind. The government claims all loyalty. It is the incarnation of the absolute, a super-personality which absorbs the real, living personality of men and women.

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¹ Mīmāmsā Sūtra, I, i, 2.

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All this, however, is not, philosophically speaking, inconsistent with another Hindu idea that political power is a trust. Behind the fervent exhortations to loyalty and the principles of taxation lie the dogma that the sovereign must regard himself and behave as the agent of the common good. Sukra is not alone in looking upon a king as the servant of the people and on taxes as his wages. On the eve of a battle, Kautalya wants a king to proclaim to his soldiers that like them he too was a paid servant and that the kingdom was to be enjoyed by him along with them. Numerous writers insist that the king must refrain from oppression and caprices. He has to serve a definite purpose and loses his essential character if he fails therein. The inference was drawn that a ruler who grossly violated his trust was liable to punishment. There were those who, like European medievalists, leave him to the judgment and wrath of the supernatural power. But others declared that he might be forsaken, deposed or even put to death. The Mahâbhârata, Manu, Sukra and some Purâṇas are explicit on the point. Danda or coercion, we are told, is a double-edged weapon capable of striking the king as well as his subjects. If the idea does not occupy a large space in Hindu thought, it is because the writers were chary of furnishing pretexts for disorder.

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Theory found a check to misrule not in any constitutional checks but in the inculcation of the idea of Dharma, to which all must conform.² That supreme, all-comprehensive Law represented the Divine will and purpose, the true way of life. The Jaiminiya Sûtras define dharma as something which is commanded.¹ In Nyâya, in Vaiśeṣika, in Jaina metaphysics, as elsewhere, Dharma denotes the property of a thing. There was a harmony, an order, divine and eternal, which pervaded the universal law and every part of it, which naturally covered the world of man and embraced rulers and ruled alike. As in medieval Europe, so in ancient India, theory saw the universe as one articulated whole. The unity of all life in which Jainas and Buddhists believed with other Hindus, strengthened this habit of thought. Not merely in Hindu poetry, but in serious Hindu speculation on moral and religious life, the fortunes of men and gods are linked together so that there almost appears the vision of a common wealth of which human and celestial beings alike are members. To quote a single instance, in the Jaina Harivaṁśa Purâṇa the kings of Videha are gods who have descended to earth on the expiry of their allotted life in heaven.² In short, there were principles applicable to all, principles which were of a universal nature. These must be respected by the mightiest of potentates. The supremacy of the law is an axiom in all Hindu political speculation. One is reminded of medieval Europeans, like Celsus and Origen who, though differing in many points, agreed in holding that law is the king of all things. A yet closer analogy is furnished by the saying which Herodotus attributes to Pindar, viz., that "custom is the king of all things." In ancient India Dharma included both law and custom.

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² Arthaśāstra, 365. br. 442. Mahâbhârata, Śāntiparvan, LXXX, 10. Agni Purâṇa, CCXXIII, 12, 14, 22. Śukranīti, I, 188. Ante, Chs. I and II

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¹ Jaiminîya Sûtras, I, 1, 2.

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² (Jaina) Harivaṁśa Purâṇa, II, 3-4.

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It is in consonance with this dictum that the ultimate purpose of government is defined in Hindu theory as part of the general purpose of institutions. It may be summed up as the promotion of the excellence of human souls. The ultimate object of life is salvation. The Brâhmaṇic conception of

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The Purpose of Government.

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Mokṣa differs from the Buddhist Nirvāṇa and either is different from the Jaina idea of salvation. But all agree that the soul must free itself from all material contact to realise the full happiness of which it is capable. The doctrine leads logically to the Nivṛttimārga or the Path of Renunciation, but every one is not ripe for it. One has to live the life of the world until one has reached that stage of spiritual experience and development when worldly relationships and material possessions may be profitably abandoned. It is, indeed, futile to resort to renunciation until one has had sufficient experience of the world. The Viṣṇu Bhāgavata¹ illustrates the point by a significant tale. At the beginning of creation, Brahman ordered his son Dakṣa to go forth and multiply. After practising a good deal of tapas, Dakṣa created successively two bands of 10,000 and 5,000 ‘sons’ called Haryaśvas and Śabalaśvas and sent them to live the life of the world. But the sage Nārada taught ‘the way of the spirit’ to the two groups in succession. So they were lost to Dakṣa. The latter then explained to Nārada that without experience the soul can never realise the sharpness of the sense objects. Every soul should have the opportunity to find salvation through its own experience. Nārada had done wrong in teaching the path of renunciation to innocent souls. He was condemned to everlasting wanderings while his victims were brought out to assume anthropoid forms. The moral of it all is that the Pravṛtti-mārga or the Way of Pursuit should precede the way of renunciation. That is why in the scheme of life prescribed for the twice-born, household life precedes Vānaprastha and Sanyāsa. Even from the point of view of the last two stages, the household is an imperative necessity. The householder alone can support the homeless. There is yet another essential service which he and he alone can render. He offers oblations to departed ancestors. He performs those sacrifices the essence of which sustains the gods in heaven. The household, then, is a thing of the first rate importance. Manu says that men of all stages of life depend on the householder who is the elder of the Brahmachârin, Vânaprastha and Sanyâsin alike.¹

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¹ VI, 5, 41.

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¹ Manu, III, 76-77; VI, 88-90.

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Thus the worldly life has to be cared for if the excellence of souls is to be promoted. In proportion to the importance of worldly life is the importance of government. It is true that in the Brâhmanic, Buddhist and Jaina Golden ages when life was ethereal or perfect, government was conspicuous by its absence. But those days were long past; the times had deteriorated; and the conditions were totally different. On all hands government was now admitted to be necessary, essential and indispensable. There was a psychological reason which made government doubly important. The Mahâbhârata, Manu, Kauṭalya and others take a rather low view of human nature, justifying it on the degeneracy of the present Kali Age. There is only too much ignorance to be removed, too much wickedness to be repressed. Government stands forth as the Saviour of Society. The worldly life has a three-fold aim, Dharma, Artha and Kâma,—duty or religion, profit and pleasure. There are those who would restrict it to one or two of these objects, but the general consensus of opinion favoured the comprehensive idea.² Dharma, of course, takes precedence of the other two aims. For as the Mahâbhârata and Matsya Purâṇa put it, Dharma sustains, ennobles and fulfils the whole life.¹ For one thing, it restrains the selfishness of man and makes good social life possible. Manu expressly interdicts pleasures and profits which are contrary to Dharma.² Government is concerned with all the three aims. As such, it touches human happiness at every point. Real happiness on earth is bound up with that excellence which is summed up in Dharma. According to the Vaiśeṣika Sûtras, that which enables us to achieve happiness here and hereafter is Dharma.

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² Manu, II, 224; III, 16; XII, 38, 88-90. Viṣṇu Bhâgavata, XI, 20, 8. Yoga Bhaviṣya, I, 2.

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¹ Mahâbhârata, Karṇa-parvan, CXIX, 59. Matsya Purâṇa, CXLV, 27; CCXLI, 3, 4.

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² Manu, IV, 176.

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The Functions of Government.

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The Mahâbhârata has it that the truth, the law, is that which leads to the greatest happiness of creatures.³ It falls to the government to enforce Dharma. It is to promote the true religion, but it is significant that Hindu theory rarely advocates religious persecution. Excepting a few brief interludes, ancient India witnessed a wonderful tolerance of all sects by governments. Aśoka burnt with zeal for Buddhism and utilised all his resources for the propagation of the true faith but he never thought of persecution. Harṣavardhana in the seventh century leaned towards Buddhism but patronised Brâhmaṇas as well. Theory was true to facts and seldom counselled violence towards those who did not profess the faith of the rulers. Religion in the ordinary sense of the term is, however, only one part of Dharma. It has also the sense which Latimer had in mind when he said that "pure religion......... standeth......in righteousness, justice and well-doing." The state must actively promote and rigidly enforce righteousness and morality. Now true morality pertains to the inner life of man and touches the springs of action. No external agency can really enforce it. The thing is a contradiction in terms—a contradiction which Hindu theory in its zeal fails to recognise. But what the state or government can do is to ally itself with the forces of good, to bring about the conditions favourable to morality, and to repress outward immoral conduct. A Hindu government is constantly enjoined to do all it can in these directions. The state thus becomes more than a culture-state, it assumes the position of an all-pervasive moral and spiritual association. Its higher function is ethical. It is to promote the observance of those ethical principles which are supreme, which apply to man in all relations, to life on all sides and which, in a word, are archetectonic. The state itself thus becomes archetectonic. Even writers like Kauṭalya and Somadeva Sûri who set out with the avowed purpose of composing political treatises, give lengthy disquisitions on ideal law or positive morality. Their precise and elaborate rules remind one of the ecclesiastical writers of Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

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³ The Mahâbhârata, Vaṇa-parvan, Ch. CCXIII.

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The government is more than the wielder of Daṇḍa. It should be the constant teacher and guide of the people.

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The Educational State. In the Mahâbhârata, in the Bhâgavata and elsewhere, King Pṛithu in the early ages of this planet taught the people how to level the surface of the earth, grow cereals in it, milk cows, and so on. By practical demonstrations he explained the ways of laying out villages and towns; constructing tents and market-places; building houses and cattle-pens, forts and strongholds of various descriptions. He led the way in quarrying stone and working the mines.¹ In the Yogavâsiṣṭha the sage informs Râma that he, Nârada and others, led by Sanatkumâra, as directed by Brahman, had instituted kings in various regions to guide the perplexed people. The Jainas work out in full detail the process of the education of man into the ways of 'civilisation' under the guidance of patriarchs. What the chiefs had done in the childhood of the world, their successors were expected to continue in its adolescence. The government must be the leader and teacher of its wards in everything that concerned their welfare.

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¹ Viṣṇu Bhâgavata, IV, xvi, 15; V, xviii, 29–32.

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From this view of the nature and character of Government it follows that it can regulate the whole material basis of life. Of *laissez-faire* as a principle, Hindu theory knows nothing. It felt that the public offer of goods in daily use was not a purely private concern. It was essentially a matter of general interest. It was assumed that in the system of private wants there was involved a public interest which demanded constant vigilance. Hence, many writers prohibit profiteering and high rates of usury. Manu declares that while thieves and robbers are hidden cheats, traders are open cheats who must be rigidly controlled by the state. He would bring the followers of many occupations under state control.¹ Kauṭalya and the Agni Purāṇa, to mention only two authorities, lay down elaborate rules on labour. Public works should constantly engage the attention of the government. The Buddha impressed their importance on King Pasenadi.² There is, in fact, nothing which is excluded from the province of the state. Kauṭalya who presents the fullest account of the Hindu theory of government brings public houses, entertainment companies and all else under its purview. Economic corporations and village communities enjoyed a good deal of autonomy in practice but theory places them, in the last resort, under state supervision. Social and religious associations were better situated but, in theory at any rate, not even they can trench upon the Law of which the government is the guardian. Everywhere, on all occasions, the Law should be upheld. That is the fundamental distinction between the state and anarchy—unspeakably horrible anarchy—to which pacts or divine interference had put an end.

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¹ Manu, IX, 256-260.

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² Kosala Saṃyutta, ed. Feer, 3, 4.

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The Law which binds government and regulates its behaviour is, in ultimate theory, eternal. The Smritis claim to be grounded in Śruti. Manu, for instance, declares that whatever he teaches has been declared in the Vedas.¹

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¹ Manu, II, 7.

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The Interpretation of the Law.

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But no practical man could deny that the details of the Law and its application as a whole must vary according to time and place. Even Manu varies his scheme of duties according to variations of the Krita, Tretâ, Dwâpara and Kali ages. Elsewhere he sets out to recite the scheme of sacrifices to be performed in the region where the black antelope roams naturally.² Śankarâchârya, the leader of orthodox Brahmanism, in his Śârîraka Bhâṣya on Vâdarâyaṇa’s Vedântasûtras is even more explicit. He holds that the Dharma of a particular age and region becomes non-Dharma with reference to a different locality and period.³ Nârada remarks that many practices which were allowed anciently had been forbidden in the present fourth yuga.

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² Manu, I, 85; II, 23. Also Yâjñavalkya, I, 2.

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³ The Śârîraka Bhâṣya, III, 1, 25.

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Parâśara boldly declares that Manu’s laws belonged to the Krita age, those of Gautama to the Tretâ, those of Śaṅkha and Likkita to the Dwâpara while his own are applicable to the Kali. Changes may take place within the span of the Kali age itself. The Bhagavad Gîtâ opens the door to change when it admits individual conscience, along with the Vedas and Smṛtis, among the bases of Dharma. Yājñavalkya enumerates the roots of Dharma as follows :—

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"The Śruti, Smṛiti, conduct of good men, what appears pleasant to one's self and the desire which springs from a good resolution." The commentator Vijñāneśwara reminds us that in case of a conflict among these sources "those stated first are stronger than those which follow."¹ But long before those writers, Yudhiṣṭhira in the Mahābhārata, bewildered by the conflict of authorities, exclaimed that the true path is that which has been followed by the great. Besides the element of flexibility introduced in this manner, there is a provision for a machinery of interpretation of law on doubtful points. Many writers set up small pariṣads of Śiṣṭas to clarify and enunciate the law as occasion arose. The Matsya Purāṇa, indeed, declares that Śiṣṭas or the residue were some ancient sages who had stayed behind to assist Manu (the first of patriarchs and kings) in preserving the worlds in the present cycle and in preventing the old Dharma from decay and ruin by constantly instructing souls in their duties.² But the received meaning of the term was an exceptionally learned, pious, upright, exemplary Brāhmaṇa. Charged with the duty of interpretation they would necessarily modify the law. Since they owed their appointment to the king they might sometimes have registered the wishes of the government. On the whole, these assemblies served as an instrument of legislation. Their opinions, when accepted, and such decrees as the king might issue independently wore the only new laws, as distinct from the bye-laws of corporations, which were known to ancient India.

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¹ See also ante, Ch. VI.

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² Matsya Purāṇa, CXLV.

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The function of legal interpretation which rested with Brâhmaṇa scholars naturally threw some political power into the hands of Brâhmaṇas. The royal priest who figures so conspicuously in all governmental theory constituted another distinctively Brâhmaṇic influence. The employment of Brâhmaṇas in high offices of state is the third great factor which deserves notice. The intellectual supremacy of the class and the general reverence it commanded constituted a force by itself. Yet theory insisted in clear and unambiguous terms that the actual political power should be wielded not by Brâhmaṇas but by Kṣatriyas. Ancient India actually knew Brâhmaṇa and Śûdra kingship but theory, except in the legal commentators, would not recognise them as legitimate. The Brâhmaṇa should guide the king who is, indeed, sometimes depicted as merely the executive arm of the priest, philosopher and lawyer. But the latter should not himself hold the sceptre. The Mahâbhârata will have it that the experiment of Brâhmaṇic rule had been tried in antiquity and that it had failed egregiously. Political sovereignty had, therefore, been transferred to Kṣatriya hands. The tale is repeated in several Sanskrit works and a version of it was current at least until the eleventh century A.D. To Alberûnî, the great Arab Sanskritist, the Hindus related that "originally the affairs of government were in the hands of the Brâhmaṇas but the country became disorganised, since they ruled according to the philosophic principles of their religious codes, which proved impossible when opposed to the mischievous and perverse elements of the populace. They were even near losing also the administration of their religious affairs. Therefore they humiliated themselves before the lord of their religion. Whereupon Brahman intrusted them exclusively with the functions which they now have, whilst he intrusted the Kṣatriyas with the duties of ruling and fighting. Ever since the Brâhmaṇas live by asking and begging, and the penal code is exercised under the control of the kings, not under that of scholars.”¹ So, Brâhmaṇic secular dominion was out of the question. Some earlier writers had derived the kingly from the priestly power,² but this line of argument was soon given up. The king was extolled independently as a god. He had a rightful place of his own in the social system. Here Hindu theory has not much in common with doctrines like those of St. Augustine in his Civitate Dei or Aquinas’s De Regimine Principium.

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¹ Alberûnî, India, tr. Sachau, Vol. II, pp. 161-162.

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² Ante, Ch. I.

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Government thus ought to rest with Kṣatriyas. It was all the more necessary that these rulers should be well-versed in the scriptures and other learning. The Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad said long ago that those in ignorance and error, howsoever great in their own imagination, were like the blind leading the blind.³ From the Mahâbhârata downwards all Hindu texts insist on knowledge along with character as an essential qualification for rule. They remind one of the dialogues of Socrates and the philosopher-king of Plato. Manu declares that only those who are versed in the Vedas and Śâstras could be kings or suzerains, could command armies or administer justice.⁴ The Jaina Somadeva Sûri would prefer the horrors of anarchy to uninstructed rule.⁵

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³ Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad, I, ii, 8.

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⁴ Manu, XII, 100; also VII, 28, 30, 31, 44.

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⁵ Ante, Ch. VIII.

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Hindu theory has little to say on the forms of government which occupy such a large space in Greek and modern European thought. Greek accounts of India disclose a few non-monarchical states in the North-west. The *dialogues* of the Buddha and the Mahâbhârata speak of gaṇas, or republican oligarchies which flourished for a while in a few districts. But the monarchy was the predominant type of polity and, for long stretches of time, the only form of government prevalent in ancient India. Unlike Greek political philosophy, Hindu theory was not called upon to evaluate the respective merits of democracy, aristocracy and monarchy. Hindu writers perforce revolve round a single type of government. They simply accept the monarchy as the government and glorify it as the sustainer of justice, order, righteousness and life itself. But here and there they indicate a ruling class which surrounded the throne. In Vedic literature the terms Rājanya and Kṣatriya alike are applied to the second caste. The epics, lawyers and Purāṇas speak of the duties of the Kṣatriya when they describe the functions of the king. In general literature, too, the Kṣatriya is declared to be the protector of the people. In Kâlidâsa’s Raghuvamśa, for instance, Dilipa remarks that it was established throughout the universe that the Kṣatriya protected (the people) from injury.¹ Thus, the Kṣatriyas as a class are expected to share in the function of government. But the whole caste, scattered throughout a realm, could hardly respond to such a call. When several writers express their preference for hereditary royal servants, or prescribe birth as a qualification for high office, they contemplate a sort of ruling class. If it did not develop into a real aristocracy, it was largely because of a peculiarity of Hindu social organisation. Here caste distributed the brain power, the fighting power and the wealth of the community among different sections, and prevented that combination of intellectual, martial and economic strength which led to aristocratic regime in ancient Greece. Apart from the monarch, a Hindu ruling class could wield influence rather than power. Aristocracy was not the actual form of government and therefore did not engage the attention of theoreticians. Only a body of nobles is reflected in literature.

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¹ Raghuvamśa, II, 53.

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In practice their influence would vary with the personal equation, but theory demands with striking unanimity that the king should not merely reign but rule day by day, year after year, so long as he occupied the throne. A limited monarchy in which the sovereign is only a dignified part of the constitution would have been incomprehensible to Hindu writers. They want the king to run the governmental machine himself, to exercise a personal supervision over all his servants and all his affairs. The Matsya Purāṇa counsels that the king should abandon all sensuality and devote all his energies to administration. The Viṣṇudharmottara echoes the same sentiment. The lawgivers are, of course, unanimous on the point. Kauṭalya and Śukra, among others, frame a detailed time-table for the king.

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Personal Government.

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The monarchy was despotic. Hindu theory knows of no constitutional checks as distinct from the force of custom, tradition and spiritual sanctions. But it strongly deprecates arbitrariness. It would have been blasphemy for a Hindu king to say, like the Stuarts of England or the Bourbons of France that Rex is lex. In the Mahābhārata, the king swears at the coronation that he would observe Dharma and Niti. Apart from conformity to Dharma, the Mahābhārata wants the rule of law. The Smṛitis follow suit. All administration, central and local, must be conducted according to well-defined principles and regulation. Caprice is the

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No arbitrariness.

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undoing of monarchs and officers. Next, theory insists on a government by consultation. Instruments of consultation occupy a notable place in Hindu administrative theory. Councils must be held regularly. The final decision and ultimate responsibility rest on the king himself but he must daily consult his ministers on policy and details alike. It was realised that government was a most difficult and complex undertaking which demanded the collaboration of many minds. Times without number ministers are exhorted to offer wholesome counsel. Somadeva Sûri, Śukra and others hold that a minister's test of fitness and capacity is that the king should be afraid of him. Along with the principle of consultation goes the principle of division of work. The business of the government should be divided into departments, each under a minister or superintendent. Kauṭalya draws a masterly picture of the departmental system. Śukra and others, though not equally full, appreciate the value of regular distribution of business. Akin to this was the principle of devolution. From Mahābhārata onwards, the administrative divisions of ten, twenty, and hundred, and two hundred, four hundred, eight hundred or a thousand villages are a commonplace in Arthaśāstras and Nītiśāstras and in the political passages of Smṛitis and Purāṇas. Everywhere, the village is the unit of administration. When we are told that the customs of cultivators should be respected, it is legitimate to infer that theory concedes some autonomy to village communities. For south India there is abundant epigraphic evidence that the village enjoyed a high degree of self-government.¹

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¹ Government Epigraphists' Reports. Epigraphia Indica. Archæological Survey Reports. The evidence is worked out in Krishnaswami Aiyangar's Ancient India.

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Theory concedes the same position to corporations as to cultivators. The government must keep them to their proper sphere, set matters right when their chiefs or members misbehave and provide courts of appeal from their decisions, but ordinarily they are allowed to manage their affairs according to their own lights.¹ Epigraphic evidence in the north and more abundant in the south proves that the rights conceded by theory were fully translated into practice.

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¹ Ante, Ch. XI.

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Government and Public Opinion. Governmental agencies and corporations, however, are not deemed enough for the fulfilment of the purpose for which government represents. It is desirable for every administration to enlist as much support and co-operation from the people in general as possible. Kautalya insists on active popular co-operation in the execution of public works, in apprehending criminals and in measures against fire, floods, etc. Manu would severely chastise or even execute those who afforded facilities to thieves and robbers. The people should be duly informed of royal edicts. Śukra wants the widest publicity to be given to all regulations by beat of drum and by inscriptions on esplanades, etc. In Bṛhaspati, Śukra and others, the popular element enters into the administration of justice. Families, castes and corporations may decide many cases arising among their members. Royal Courts should have assessors. Apart from specific matters, public opinion should always be carefully ascertained through spies and followed so far as possible.

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Feudatories. The small state was the norm in ancient India but the ever-present centrifugal forces were from time to time surmounted by organised military force and administrative vigour, aided by the

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cultural homogeneity of large areas. In the absence of natural frontiers every powerful state was tempted to reduce its neighbours to vassalage. Protected states constitute one of the permanent features of Indian history. No political status is so difficult to define as protectorate. Hindu theory sometimes confuses it with independence and sometimes with a mere administrative sub-division but a careful writer like Kauṭalya grasps its character very clearly and specifies the immunities and obligations which accompanied it. He agrees with other Hindu writers in recommending that a subjugated dynasty should not be altogether uprooted. All Hindu theorists want the laws and customs of countries to be respected. What may be good for one region may not suit another. But the foreign relations, and certain important administrative and other matters must be placed definitely under the control of the suzerain. No offensive measures against any foe, no fortification of any kind, can be undertaken without the sanction of the overlord. Capture of elephants, which had a military significance in ancient India, must await his permission. The installation of heir-apparent, that is to say, the succession to the dynastic throne, depends on the suzerain’s will. Nor is a vassal competent, without the overlord’s permission, to punish fugitives from his territory. Commercial undertakings are also included by Kauṭalya among matters for which the protector’s permission is necessary. Then there are general directions on the behaviour of a feudatory. He should be like “a servant to his master by serving the protector’s occasional needs.” Again “on all occasions of worshipping gods and of making prayers, he should cause his people pray for the long life of his protector.”¹

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¹ Arthaśāstra, 308, tr. 377-378.

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Elsewhere, Kauṭalya, the Mahābhārata, Śukra and others counsel a feudatory to throw off the yoke when a favourable opportunity presents itself. It meant a state of warfare which was intensified and perpetuated by the constant attempts which states made to extend their dominion. It was perhaps dimly felt that the political unification of the country was desirable. At any rate from the Atharva Veda onwards the ideal of " universal " sovereignty was extolled with almost religious fervour. Even those who like Kauṭalya recognised that peace and industry lay at the root of prosperity¹ and paid homage of the idea of the Chakravartin. In pursuance of it aggression was condoned and unscrupulousness was reduced to a code. As a result, no real system of international law could arise. There are no treatises on inter-statal usage as such. There is not even a name for it in Sanskrit literature. Reflections on interstatal affairs form an appendage to treatises on government. The ethics of the battle-field are often conceived in the loftiest spirit and few writers counsel righteousness even in diplomacy.

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¹ Ibid., 257, tr. 322.

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The Buddha condemns the methods of military aggression wholesale.² Once in the Śāntiparvan of the Mahābhārata, Bhīṣma counsels Yudhiṣṭhira to follow righteousness in warfare. " A king should never desire to subjugate the earth by unrighteous means even if such subjugation would make him master of the whole earth. What king is there that would rejoice after obtaining victory by unfair means ? A victory attained by unrighteousness is uncertain and never leads to heaven."³ But the Āpaddharma sections of the epic constitutes the quintessence of Machiavellianism.

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