The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c12.138.4

c12.138.4

Amidst the surrounding twilight, it is lighted up by its own glorious bequest and displays its features so clearly. It represents, in a concrete form, the ideal which a Hindu state at its best aspired to attain. It shows more than anything else, that in ancient India the state recognised no limits to its activities; it would regulate everything. It concerned itself as much with the material as with the higher interests of its subjects. It is a culture-state. Under Aśoka it is a missionary state. Aśoka, as is well-known, dispatched missionaries beyond his dominions.¹