A History of Indian Philosophy, Volume IThe old civilisation of India was a concrete unity of many-sided developments in art, architecture, literature, religion, morals, and science so far as it was understood in those days. But the most important achievement of Indian thought was philosophy. It was regarded as the goal of all the highest practical and theoretical activities, and it indicated the point of unity amidst all the apparent diversities which the complex growth of culture over a vast area inhabited by different peoples produced. It is not in the history of foreign invasions, in the rise of independent kingdoms at different times, in the empires of this or that great monarch that the unity of India is to be sought. It is essentially one of spiritual aspirations and obedience to the law of the spirit, which were regarded as superior to everything else, and it has outlived all the political changes through which India passed.
The Greeks, the Huns, the Scythians, the Pathans and the Moguls who occupied the land and controlled the political machinery never ruled the minds of the people, for these political events were like hurricanes or the changes of season, mere phenomena of a natural or physical order which never affected the spiritual integrity of Hindu culture. If after a passivity of some centuries India is again going to become creative it is mainly on account of this fundamental unity of her progress and civilisation and not for anything that she may borrow from other countries. It is therefore indispensably necessary for all those who wish to appreciate the significance and potentialities of Indian culture that they should properly understand the history of Indian philosophical thought which is the nucleus round which all that is best and highest in India has grown. Much harm has already been done by the circulation of opinions that the culture and philosophy of India was dreamy and abstract. It is therefore very necessary that Indians as well as other peoples should become more and more acquainted with the true characteristics of the past history of Indian thought and form a correct estimate of its special features. |
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... sorrow like the mortal here below. The Vedic gods may be contrasted with them in this, that they are of an impersonal nature, as the characters they display are mostly but expressions of the powers of nature. To take an example, the ...
... sorrows of a man with his good and bad works when combined with the notion of an inviolable law or order, which we have already seen was gradually growing with the conception of rta, and the unalterable law which produces the effects of ...
... sorrow, with initiation; laughing, eating, etc., with the utterance of the Mantras; and asceticism, gift, sincerity, restraint from injury, truth, with sacrificial fees (daksinâ). The gifted mind of these cultured Vedic Indians was ...
... sorrow in the future according as it is good or bad. When the fruits of the actions are such that they cannot be enjoyed in the present life or in a human life, the individual has to take another birth as a man or any other being in ...
... Though the belief that the world is full of sorrow has not been equally prominently emphasized in all systems, yet it may be considered as being shared by all of them. It finds its strongest utterance in 2. The Doctrine of Mukti. ...
Contents
Section 23 | |
Section 24 | |
Section 25 | |
Section 26 | |
Section 27 | |
Section 28 | |
Section 29 | |
Section 30 | |
Section 9 | |
Section 10 | |
Section 11 | |
Section 12 | |
Section 13 | |
Section 14 | |
Section 15 | |
Section 16 | |
Section 17 | |
Section 18 | |
Section 19 | |
Section 20 | |
Section 21 | |
Section 22 | |
Section 31 | |
Section 32 | |
Section 33 | |
Section 34 | |
Section 35 | |
Section 36 | |
Section 37 | |
Section 38 | |
Section 39 | |
Section 40 | |
Section 41 | |
Section 42 | |
Section 43 | |
Other editions - View all
A History of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 2 (Classic Reprint) Surendranath Dasgupta No preview available - 2016 |