The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c16.s1.t1.30

c16.s1.t1.30

On the whole, therefore, it is not a roseate romantic conception of human tendencies and instincts that the *Mahâbhârata* offers. The dictum, "spare the rod, and spoil the child", proverbial in western pedagogics, might be dittoed by the Hindu thinkers. For, as we read in the Book on *Śânti*, by nature "men tend to overthrow⁸ one another. Left to itself the "whole world would be in a mess" like a devil's workshop. As a rule, men are used to behaving like "the creatures⁹ that cannot see one another when the sun and the moon do not shine", or like th "fishes in shallow waters", or "birds in places safe from molestat where they can fly at each other's throats in a suicidal strife".