Sanskrit
the name of the ancient literary language of India. It forms the extreme branch of the great Indo-Germanic (Indo-European, Aryan) stock of languages, and the one which, thanks to its early literary cultivation (from 1500 B. c.) and grammatical fixation, and its consequent transparency of structure and fulness of form, approaches nearest to the parent language. In some respects, however, the primitive appearance of the Sanskrit, as of the closely allied Iranian or Persic branch, is now generally ascribed to a special Indo-Iranian development, or to a later return to a phonetic phase already outgrown by the parent language at the time of the separation. While it is admitted on all hands that the Aryan dialect, out of which the literary language of India has developed, cannot have been indigenous to the peninsula, but must have been introduced from the N. E., there is still considerable difference of opinion as to the original home of the primitive Aryan community-whether it is to be sought for in Asia, as used to be universally believed, or whether, as many scholars are now inclined to think, it was from some part of Europe that the Asiatic Aryans originally came. On entering India, the Aryan tribes found the country occupied by people of different races; but, favored by physical and intellectual superiority, they gradually succeeded in extending their sway, as well as their language and their social and religious institutions, over the whole of northern India.
Though the term Sanskrit, as the "perfected" language, properly speaking only belongs to the grammatically fixed form of the language which was employed from about the 4th or 5th century B. C., and which came more and more to assume the character of a mere literary and learned idiom, it is usual to extend the term so as to include an earlier form of the same language used in the Vedic language writings, and hence often called Vedic SANSKRIT Sanskrit. The two phases of the language show considerable differences as regards both vocabulary and grammar.
In accordance with the general development of the language, the history of the ancient literature of India may conveniently be divided into two chief periods, the Vedic Literature and the (Classical) Sanskrit Literature.
The Hindus possess two great national epics, the "Mahâbhârata" and the "Râmâyana." Along with these may be classed the "Purânas," which, though in their present form they were doubtless composed or recast for sectarian purposes several centuries after Christ, seem to contain a considerable amount of genuine old legendary matter akin to large portions of the Mahâbhârata. Though the final redaction of the two epics can scarcely be assigned to an earlier period than about the beginning of our era, it can hardly be doubted that the vast mass of legendary lore and complete epic lays of which the Mahâbhârata is composed, at all events must have required centuries to grow and assume its present shape. At a subsequent period, from about the 5th or 6th century A. D. onward, there arose a second crop of epic poems, artificial in style, product of an age when the literary language had long lost touch of the popular mind. Their subject-matter, such as there is, is entirely derived from the old legends; but the form in which it is here presented has nothing of the old popular ring about it. Of such poems (kâvya) there existed a considerable number; but the native taste has singled out six of them as mahakavyas or great poems-viz., two by Kâlidâsa, by far the greatest poet of this period, the "Raghuvam'sa" and the "Kumarasambhava"; further the "Kirartârjunîya" by Bharavi (probably a contemporary of Kâlidâsa, 500-550 A. D.) the "S'is'upâlabadhâ" by Mâgha, hence also called "Mâhakâvya," the "Râvanabadha" or "Bhattikâvya," composed by Bhatti with the view of illustrating the less common grammatical forms of speech; and the "Naishadhiya" of S'ri Harsha (12th century).
While the main body of the Vedic hymns are the immediate outgrowth of a worship of the elemental forces of nature, not a few of the hymns, especially the later ones, evidence a strong tendency toward metaphysical speculation. It is only in the "Upanishads," however, that we meet with the first attempts at some kind of systematic treatment of the great problems of mundane existence, and of the nature of the absolute spirit and its relation to the human mind. The drift of speculative inquiry in those days, as ever afterward, is determined by two SAN STEFANO cardinal notions which are never questioned, and have assumed the force of axioms in Hindu philosophy-viz., the pantheistic notion of the spiritual unity of all sentient beings, and the transmigration of souls. Six philosophical systems are recognized by orthodox Hindus, which fall, however, into three pairs so closely connected that each pair forms a common school of philosophy-viz., "Mîmâmsâ" and "Vedânta," "Sânkhya" and "Yoga," "Nyâya" and "Vai'seshika." Nothing certain is as yet known as to their date or order. The tenets of each system are propounded in a manual of concise aphorisms, ascribed to the respective founders, and commented on by numerous writers.
The "Vedanta," i. e., "end of the Veda" the "Uttara-Mîmâmsa" ("Later -as 241 SANTA BARBARA CHANNEL Inquiry") is more commonly called-is the system most closely in accord with the development of religious thought in Brahmanical India. According to this system, God is the omniscient and omnipotent cause, efficient as well as material, of the world: He is both creator and nature; and at the consummation of things all are resolved into Him.
The individual soul is of the same essence as the supreme one; it emanates Him like of the sparks that issue from a blazing fire, and ultimately returns to Him. It is not a free agent, but ruled by God; its activity-the source of its suffering-being solely due to its bodily organs.
The "Yoga" school, founded by Patanjali, accepts the speculative system of the Sânkhya with its 25 principles; but adds thereto a 26th-viz., the "self devoid of attributes," the supreme god of the school, whence the "Yoga" is also called the Theistic Sânkhya.