Caste in India: The Facts and the System c8.s7.16

c8.s7.16

Let there be no misunderstanding. I do not pretend to maintain that the caste-system as we observe it to-day, with its infinite sections differing in nature and consistency, is limited to the development, logical and purely organic, of the primitive Āryan elements only. Groups of various origins and variable structure have at all times entered it and are still multiplying : clans of invaders who blaze the trail of successive conquests, aboriginal tribes tardily emerged from their wild isolation, casual subdivisions either of castes properly so called or of assimilated groups. Indeed, it is impossible to doubt that those mixtures which, aggravated by many permutations, give to the caste to-day so disconcerting and elusive a character appeared at an early date. Although they have become increasingly marked, they nevertheless began at the time when the system was in process of formation. I have already said, and I make a point of repeating, that if we condense a general conclusion into a summary formula there is a risk of appearing to exaggerate its principle ; whether it arise from a desire for precision or the charm of novelty, there is danger of falsifying a just conception by stretching it too far. I do not wish to be suspected of being carried away, for I am on my guard against that danger.