To the present civilized inhabitants of India, who, although generally a mixed race of Dravidian and Aryan origin, now form ninny distinct nations, no general statement can apply. The acute but timid Bengali resembles little the warlike Sikh of the Pun jab, or the fierce Afghan of Rohilcund; and the patient weaver of Dacca is wholly unlike the high-spirited Bajpat of Central India. The Sikh is a born soldier, who despises the Hindu, and hates the INIussulman. He cares nothing for caste, and is brave, faithful, and independent. The Mohammedans of India are degenerate followers of the prophet, and their religion is a strange mixture of the doctrines of the Koran with the idolatry of Asia. The Parsees, a mercantile and educated class, seated at Bombay and along the w. coast of India, are the descendants of the fugitive fire-worshipers of Persia (see PAESEE4 Of the morality of the civilized races of India, in general, Mr. Markham says that, whatever may be said of the larger towns, the residents of villages are "singularly temperate as a rule, chaste, honest, peaceful, singularly docile, easily governed, and patient." Two of the most striking peculiarities of the social condition of the Hindus are the institution of caste (q.v.) and the The latter is very simple. A village in Hindustan does not mean a collection of houses at a particular spot, but corresponds rather to what is called a township in America. It is a district embracing an area of some hundreds or thousands of acres of land, and is under the administration of native functionaries, the principal of whom is the potail (head-inhabitant), a kind of chief mag istrate, who superintends the affairs of the community, settles disputes, attends to the police and the collection of taxes. Among the other functionaries may be mentioned the caimans, who keeps a register of the produce and the names of the proprietors, and draws up all deeds of sale, transfer, etc.; the Brahman, or village priest; and the school master. Besides these, every village has its astrologer, smith, carpenter, potter, barber, doctor, dancing-girl, musician, and poet, all of whom are rewarded for their labors out of the produce of the village lands. " Under this simple form of municipal govern ment, the inhabitants of the country have lived from time immemorial. The boundaries of the village have been but seldom altered; and though the villages themselves have been sometimes injured, and even desolated by war, famine, and disease, 'the same name, the same limits, and even the same families, have continued for ages. The inhabitants. give themselves no trouble about the breaking up and division of kingdoms; while the village remains entire, they care not to what power it is transferred, or to what sovereign it devolves; its internal economy remains unchanged; the potail is still the head-inhabitant, and still acts as the petty judge and magistrate, and collector, or renter of the village." or Brahmanism is the religion of the great majority of the inhabitants of India. Mohammedanism comes next, and it appears, from the last cen sus, that the number of persons professing this creed is much greater than had been supposed. Of the 66,000,000 forming the population of Bengal, 21,000,000 arc Mohatn Ice:dans. In the Punjab, 9,000,000 are Mohammeda':ns and 6,000,000 Hindus. In Oude there are 1,000,000 of Mohammedans to 10,000,000 of Hindus. In the North-western Provinces there are 25,000,000 of Hindus to 4,000,000 of Mohammedans. In the whole of India it is believed there are nearly three times as many Hindus as Mohammedans. The Sikh religion (sec Snots) is professed, according to the census for the Punjab, by 1,000,000 of the inhabitants. They hate alike the Hindus and the Mohammedan,. Buddhism at one period prevailed very generally throughout India; it is now confined to Bhotan, Ceylon. and the Burmese frontier. Several of the forms of religion preva lent among the natives of India are treated of apart (see BUDDHISM, MOHAMMEDANISM, PARSERS, Srxus); what we shall here specially consider is that variety of creeds which is derived from Brahmanic sources, and known as the Hindu religion, or Hinduism. The term Hinduism, however, must not be taken as restricted to those forms of the Brahmanic religion which arc in existence now; we have to look upon it as comprising all the phases of this creed up to its earliest period.
We may divide Hinduism into three great periods, which, for brevity's sake, we will call the Vedic, Epic, and Purtinic periods, as our knowledge of the first is derived from the sacred books called the Veda; of the second, from the epic poem called the Rcindyarta, and more especially from the great epos, the ilfaheibharata; while the chief source of our information relative to the last period is that class of mythological works known under the name of Purdnas and Tantras. It is necessary here to guard the reader against attempting to connect dates with the earlier of those periods. It has not been uncommon for writers on this subject to assign thousands of years before the Christian era as the starting-points of various phases of Hindu antiquity; others, more cautious, marked the beginnings of certain divisions of Vedic works with 1200,1000, 800, and 600 years 13.C. The truth is, that while Hindu literature itself is almost with
out known dates, owing either to the peculiar organization of the Hindu mind, or to the convulsions of Indian history, the present condition of Sanskrit philology does not afford the scholar the.,requisite resources for embarking with any chance of success in such chronological. speculations: This -question of Hindit chronology will be more particularly considered in the article VEDA. In the mean time, tke utmost stretch of assumption which in the actual condition of Sanskrit philol_og,y it is permitted to make is, that the latest writings of the Vedic class are not more recent than the 2d c. below Christ. A like uncertainty hangs over the period at which the two great epic poems of India were composed, although there is reason to surmise that the lower limits of that period did not reach beyond the beginning of the Christian era. The Puranic period, on the other hand, all scholars are agreed to regard as corresponding with part of our medimval history.
If the Rig-Veda—the oldest of the Vedas, and probably the oldest literary document in existence—coincided with the beginning of Hindu civilization, the popular creed of the Hindus, as depicted in some of its hymds, would reveal not only the original creed of this nation, but throw a strong light on the original creed of humanity itself. Unhappily, however, the imagination, indulging in such an hypothesis, would have us little foundation to work on as that which would fix the chronological position of tnis Veda. The Hindus, as depicted in these hymns, are far removed from the starting-point of human society; nay, they may fairly claim to be ranked among those already civil ized communities experienced in arts, defending their homes and property in organized warfare, acquainted even with many vices which only occur in an advanced condition of artificial life. See VEDA. Yet in examining the ideas expressed in the greatest num ber of the Rig-Veda hymns, it cannot be denied that they are neither ideas engendered by an imagination artificially influenced, nor such as have made a compromise with. philosophy. The Hindu of these hymns is essentially engrossed by the might of the elements, The powers which turn•his awe into pious subjection and veneration are— Mai, the fire of the sun and lightning; India, the bright, cloudless firmament; the Xmas, or winds (see MARUT); SarYa, the sun (see SORYA); Usltes, the dawn (see USII.1*); and various kindred manifestations of the luminous bodies, and nature in general. He invokes them, not as representatives of a superior being, before whom the human soul professes its humility; not as superior beings themselves, which may reveal to his searching mind the mysteries of creation or eternity. bat because lie wants their assist ance against enemies—because he wishes to obtain from them rain, food, cattle, health, and other worldly goods. lie complains to them of his troubles, and reminds them of the wonderful deeds they performed of yore, to coax them, as it were, into aquieseence and friendly help. " We proclaim eagerly, Marais, your ancient greatness, for the sake of inducing your prompt appearance, as the indication of (the approach of) the showerer of benefits;" or: "Offer your nutritious viands to the great hero (India), who is pleased by praise, and to Visleittc (one of the forms of the sun), the two invincible deities who ride upon the radiant summit of the clouds as upon a well-trained steed. Iadra and Vidtnu, the devout worshiper glorifies the radiant approach of you two who are the granters of desires, and who bestow upon the mortal who worships you an immedi ately receivable (reward), throt:gh the distribution of that fire which is the scatterer (of desired blessings)." Such is the strain in which the Hindu of that period addresses hits gods. He seeks them, not for his spiritual, but for his material welfare. Ethical con siderations are therefore foreign to these instinctive outbursts of the pious mind. Sin and evil, indeed, are often adverted to, and the gods are praised because they destroy sinners and evil-doers; but one would err in associating with these words our notions of sin or wrong. A sinner, in these hymns, is a man who does not address praises to those elementary deities, or who does not gratify then with the oblations they receive at the hands of the believer. He is the foe, the robber, the demon—in short. the borderer infesting the territory of the "pious" Ina)), who, in his turn, injures and kills, but, in adoring Agni, Intim, and their kin, is satisfied that lie can commit no evil net. Yet we should be likewise wrong did we judge of those acts of retaliation by the standard of our own ethical laws. So far, indeed, from reflecting unfavoralfy on the internal condition of the Hindu community, the features of which may be gathered from these hymns, they seem, on the contrary, to bespeak the union and brotherhood which existed amongst its members; and the absence, in general, of hymns which appeal to the gods for the suppression of internal dissensions or public vices, bears, apparently, testimony to the good moral condition of the people whose wants are recorded in these songs.