The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c6.2

c6.2

The Greek philosopher Plato was for some time tutor to a king of Syracuse in Sicily. Machiavelli, the Florentine deplomat, who has bequeathed his name to a school of politicians, was the author of a work that proved to be the Bible of kings and princes in mediaeval Italy and Europe. The *Schoolmaster* of Roger Ascham was written for the princesses of an English royal family.¹ The sage Śukrāchāryya, or at any rate, his *nom de plume*, belongs to the same gallery of world's *Rājagurus* or royal tutors. And his *Nītiśāstra* or 'Treatise on Morals' is dogmatically asserted to be the sole authoritative text book on political science that should be used by Hindu kings and statesmen (IV, vii, lines 851-856). This opinion of Śukrāchāryya about the position of *Nītiśāstra* has been referred to by Kāmandaka also (II. 5) as follows: ''According to the school of Uśanas (Śukra) there is only one division of learning, namely, *Daṇḍanīti* and the origin of all kinds of learning lies in this one.'' It would, therefore, be interesting to find out for which Hindu Court or Courts this manual was intended, or which may be said to have supplied data for the rules and generalisations embodied in it.