The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education in the Eighteenth Century c8.s1.t5.3

Language: English

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There are three kinds of colleges in Bengal—one in which chiefly grammar, general literature, and rhetoric, and occasionally the great mythological poems and law are taught; a second, in which chiefly law and sometimes the mythological poems are studied; and third, in which logic is made the principal object of attention. In all these colleges select works are read and their meaning explained; but instruction is not conveyed in the form of lectures. In the first class of colleges, the pupils repeat assigned lessons from the grammar used in each college, and the teacher communicates the meaning of the lessons after they have been committed to memory. In the others the pupils are divided into classes according to their progress. The pupils of each class having one or more books before them seat themselves in the presence of the teacher, when the best reader of the class reads aloud, and the teacher gives the meaning as often as asked, and thus they proceed from day to day till the work is completed. The study of grammar is pursued during two, three, or six years, and where the work of Panini is studied, not less than ten, and sometimes twelve, years are devoted to it. As soon as a student has obtained such a knowledge of grammar as to be able to read and understand a poem, a law book, or a work on philosophy, he may commence this course of reading also, and carry on at the same time the remainder of his grammar-studies.

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Those who study law or logic continue reading either at one college or another for six, eight, or even ten years. When a person has obtained all the knowledge possessed by one teacher, he makes some respectful excuse to his guide and avails himself of the instructions of another. Mr Ward, from whom many of the preceding details have been copied estimates that ‘amongst one hundred thousand Brahmans, there may be one thousand who learn the grammar of the Sunskritu, of whom four or five hundred may read some parts of the *kavyu* (or poetical literature), and fifty some parts of the *ulunkaru* (or rhetorical) shastras. Four hundred of this thousand may read some of the *smriti* (or law works); but not more than ten any part of the *tuntrus* (or the mystical and magical treatises of modern Hinduism). Three hundred may study the *nyayu* (or logic), but only five or six the *meemangsu*, (explanatory of the ritual of the veds), the *sunkhyu* (a system of philosophical materialism), the *vedantu* (illustrative of the spiritual portions of the veds), the *patunjulu* (a system of philosophical asceticism), the *vaisheshika* (a system of philosophical anti-materialism), or the *veda* (the most ancient and sacred writings of Hindoos). Ten persons in this number of Brahmans may become learned in the astronomical shastras, while ten more understand these very imperfectly.

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Fifty of this thousand may read the shree *bhaguvutu*, and some of the *pooranas*.’ At the present day probably the *alankar shastras* and the *tantras* are more studied than is here represented. The astronomical works also receive more attention. The colleges are invariably closed and all study suspended on the eighth day of the waxing and waning of the moon; on the day in which it may happen to thunder; whenever a person or an animal passes between the teacher and the pupil while reading; when a honorable person arrives, or a guest; at the festival of Saraswati during three days; in some parts during the whole of the rainy season, or at least during two months which include the Doorga, the Kali, and other festivals, and at many other times. When a student is about to commence the study of law or of logic, his fellow students, with the concurrence and approbation of the teacher, bestow on him an honorary title descriptive of the nature of his pursuit, and always differing from any title enjoyed by any of his learned ancestors. In some parts of the country, the title is bestowed by an assembly of Pundits convened for the purpose; and in others the assembly is held in the presence of a raja or zemindar who may be desirous of encouraging learning and who at the same time bestows a dress of honour on the student and places a mark on his forehead. When the student finally leaves college and enters on the business of life, he is commonly addressed by that title.