An Outline of the Religious Literature of India c3.12

c3.12

It may be well also to point out the unavoidable limitations of the work. First of all, the whole of the secular literature is dropped out of sight. Secondly, since our aim is the study of the religions, the emphasis falls throughout on the religious rather than on the literary aspects of the books. Thirdly, our attention is restricted to the literature as the chief source of knowledge of the religions, and no attempt is made to deal, except in the most incidental way, with other sources, epigraphy, archaeology, art, and what not. Again, while the nature of the task makes it necessary to say a great deal about the religions, the work is not a history of the religions but a sketch of the religious literature. It may also be well to warn readers that large elements of Indian religion scarcely appear in our pages at all. Those cults which have produced no literature are necessarily outside our survey.