A History of Hindu Chemistry from the Earliest Times to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century A.D. v1.c17.29

v1.c17.29

The arts being thus relegated to the low castes and the professions made hereditary, a certain degree of fineness, delicacy and deftness in manipulation was no doubt secured but this was done at a terrible cost. The intellectual portion of the community being thus withdrawn from active participation in the arts, the *how* and *why* of phenomena—the coördination of cause and effect—were lost sight of—the spirit of enquiry gradually died out among a nation naturally prone to speculation and metaphysical subtleties and India for once bade adieu to experimental and inductive sciences.¹ Her soil was rendered morally unfit for the birth of a Boyle, a Des Cartes or a Newton and her very name was