Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c15.31

c15.31

**Higher Academic Activities.** Besides the school for the young or the pupils proper, we have in the other texts references to institutions of a higher type meant for the advancement of learning of and by the elderly and mature scholars through the opportunities they afford of varied and vital academical intercourse. The friction of minds is necessary for sharpening their powers and strengthening their grasp of truth which must not remain only as a matter of one's subjective realization. The mastery of truth has to be proved by objective standards and established against external criticism. It is this sound principle of pedagogics on the basis of which the Nyāya philosophy has laid down *Suhṛitprāpti* as one of the aids to the acquisition of knowledge. Truth must triumph over all attacks. Hence the remarkable development in all ages of Indian culture-history of these characteristically Hindu institutions of academic gatherings for the purpose of holding intellectual tournaments, those Philosophical Conferences and Science Congresses which were known to India as early as 1000 B.C., as shown by the evidence of the *Brāhmaṇas* and Upanishads already dealt with.