Caste in India: The Facts and the System c5.34

c5.34

In any case, the problem of tradition will always be an imperative one. It will always commend itself with the same urgency to those who seek to obtain a clear view of the trend of India's beliefs, speculations, and institutions which form the bases of her individuality. Among these, caste occupies a prominent place. The perspectives opened up by its study are very instructive. I should be loath to seem to exaggerate the scope of this little book, but it brings once more under discussion an order of ideas on which I have long striven to focus attention, and without which one is tempted to follow an apparently simple though incorrect line of deduction in the history of religious evolution. An occasion is now offered me to draw attention once again to these considerations, and I must be forgiven for taking advantage of it.