The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c11.s8.7

c11.s8.7

The Boswell and the Johnson, the St. Paul and the Jesus are two different persons by all means. But they are contemporaries, they belong to the same age like Vālmīki and Rāma. In the present instance the *Arthaśāstra* belongs to the Maurya epoch as the Indian tradition has been created by the editor. Thus considered, the situation is quite akin to or rather almost identical with Hillebrandt's hypothesis in 1908 about the school or pupils of Kauṭalya as being responsible for the *Arthaśāstra* as compiled in the form in which we have it today. This school constitutes, however, the immediate entourage of the master himself and does not have to be regarded as any the least remote from him in time.