k, from
which has been borrowed, perhaps, the classical Hindu drama,[3]--there
is no real literature that was not religious originally, or, at least,
so apt for priestly use as to become chiefly moral and theosophic;
while the most popular works of modern times are sectarian tracts,
Pur[=]nas, Tantras and remodelled worldly poetry. The sources, then,
from which is to be drawn the knowledge of Hindu religions are the
best possible--the original texts. The information furnished by
foreigners, from the times of Ktesias and Megasthenes to that of
Mandelslo, is considerable; but one is warranted in assuming that what
little in it is novel is inaccurate, since otherwise the information
would have been furnished by the Hindus themselves; and that,
conversely, an outsider's statements, although presumably correct,
often may give an inexact impression through lack of completeness; as
when--to take an example that one can control--Ktesias tells half the
truth in regard to ordeals. His account is true, but he gives no
notion of the number or elaborate character of these interesting
ceremonies.

The sources to which we shall have occasion to refer will be, then,
the two most important collections of Vedic hymns--the Rig Veda and
the Atharva Veda; the Brahmanic literature, with the supplementary
Upanishads, and the S[=u]tras or mnemonic abridgments of religious and
ceremonial rules; the legal texts, and the religious and theological
portions of the epic; and the later sectarian writings, called
Pur[=a]nas. The great heresies, again, have their own special
writings. Thus far we shall draw on the native literature. Only for
some of the modern sects, and for the religions of the wild tribes
which have no literature, shall we have to depend on the accounts of
European writers.

DATES.

For none of the native religious works has one a certain date. Nor is
there for any one of the earlier compositions the certainty that it
belongs, as a whole, to any one time. The Rig Veda was composed by
successive generations; the Atharvan represents different ages; each
Br[=a]hmana appears to belong in part to one era, in part to another;
the earliest S[=u]tras (manuals of law, etc.) have been interpolated;
the earliest metrical code is a composite; the great epic is the work
of centuries; and not only do the Upanishads and Pur[=a]nas represent
collectively many different periods, but exactly to which period each
individually is to be assigned r