Caste in India: The Facts and the System c6.s1.7

c6.s1.7

Since the last century there has been abundant speculation on this view of the organization, and the same fixed idea has persisted down to our own times. Men of intelligence, whose pursuits have brought them into constant touch with the facts, have recently, even since the modern progress of comparative law, regarded the caste institution in this light; they denounce in it the deliberate and treacherous scheming of an ambitious class; the origin of social institutions may be discovered in a gratuitous pact.¹ Is it to be wondered at? To do so would be to forget how strong is the power of preconceived ideas coined into current phraseology. Such errors prove at least the difficulty of the question, and it is all the more interesting since it deals with a unique phenomenon—a social order known only in India. Its solution is therefore well worth consideration.