The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c5.22

c5.22

The influence of race as a determinant of the course of social and political evolution cannot be traced so readily as that of geography or economic conditions. “National Character” has been the subject of some strange theories. As an English political writer puts it, national character is a wonder-worker at the beck and call of every embarrassed historian. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that a mass of men in a given region often differ in important psychological traits from another group. The ultimate origin of these differences may be traceable to geography,—to soil, climate and resulting habits of life and thought—but the presence of a set of deep-seated psychological traits constitutes a series of influences by itself in historical times. The “innate characteristics,” as they may be called, have not been the same everywhere in India. For instance, the Tâmil character which has so profoundly impressed the whole of South India is an entity by itself. The temperament of the Marâthâs who, of all Indian communities, come nearest to the Teutons in their intellectual and moral make-up, differs much from that of the people of Bengal or the Puñjâb. Yet behind all the diversities it is possible to discern some common characteristics, which, in their aggregate, sharply differentiate the people of India from those of any other country. The Indian temperament displays an emotional flow and vibration which, on the whole, militates against rigidity of discipline and organisation and bars uniformity in associated life. The religiosity of the Hindus is proverbial but there never arose any ecclesiastical organisation like the Roman Catholic Church or the Anglican Church. The Buddhist Saṃgha which represented the maximum of organisation in Hindu religious life, was pervaded by a spirit of intense localism. The Jaina orders were more loose, while the Brâhmaṇas seem to have been positively averse to ecclesiastical systematisation Prayer and worship which have been congregational in Europe have, for the most part, been individual among Hindus. Here culture has been embodied in institutions to a far lesser extent than in the West. It is true that in certain matters, for instance, in ritual and caste, a degree of discipline was prescribed and an amount of organisation attempted, which is unknown in Western Europe. But even here endless multiplicity of forms and diversity of details are apparent. Again, a caste or a subcaste rarely had a definite machinery of government, legislative, executive or judicial. It left a great deal to the operation of custom and the informal working of group-opinion. This lack of organisation goes a long way to discount the Brahmanic claims to supremacy which fill Brahmanic literature. Whatever the theorists might say, the fact remained that the Brâhmaṇas had no organisation, no independent financial resources, no effective means of