Original Sanskrit Texts on the Origin and Progress of the Religion and Institutions of India

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1860 Excerpt: ...For a decision of this question, the manner iu which India is geographically distributed among the different nations by which it is occupied, is of great importance. The diffusion of the Arians towards the south, points to the conclusion that they came from the north-west, from the country to the north of the Vindhya, probably from the region bordering on the Jumna, and the eastern part of the Punjab. Their extension to the east between the Himalaya and the Vindhya, also indicates the same countries as their earlier seats. We find moreover evident tracas of the Arians, in their advance from the north-west, having severed asunder the earlier population of Hindustan, and driven one portion of it towards the northern, and another portion towards the southern bills. Further, we cannot assume that the Arians themselves were the earlier inhabitants who were pushed aside: for tbe inhabitants of the Dekhan, like those of the Vindhya range, appear always as the weaker and retiring party who were driven back by the Arians. We cannot ascribe to the non-Arian tribes the power of having forced themselves forward through the midst of an earlier Arian population to the seats which they eventually occupied in the centre of the country: but, on the contrary, everything speaks in favour of their having been originally settled in those tracts where we find them at a later period, and of their having once occupied a more extensive territory. These non-Arians were in fact feebler races, like the red men of America. The Arians on the other hand were a more perfectly organised, enterprising, and creative people, and were consequently the more recent; just as the earth has at a later period produced the more perfect M This circumstance, however, might be accounted for, as Weber re...