The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century c7.15

c7.15

It has been long the practice in Malabar to translate the Sanscrite writings into the common tongue, and to transcribe them in the vernacular character. By this means knowledge has been more generally diffused among the inhabitants; it is less confined to any order or class, and the people are better acquainted with the mysteries and dogmas of their religion. This spirit of enquiry and of liberty has most probably been affected by the sooders who compose the great body of population, and who were in possession of the principal authority and property in the country.