Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 544

504
(J
REEK AND HINDU PHILOSOPHY
what account her system of polity, until Pythagoras,
Lycurgus, and other famous Greek travellers, animated by
the desire of educating themselves, studied the manners and
customs of Asiatic peoples, and borrowed, from the Hindus
many precepts and doctrines ?
But though the philosophy of the Greeks was
especially,
of later
origin than that of the Vanaprasthas, it soon surpassed the
latter in the clearness of its principles and the soundness of
Under the guidance of the Greek philosophers
its morality.
an immense impulse was given to the cultivation of learn-
and the most profound and luminous investigations
ing
were made regarding the nature of the Deity, until the gods
of paganism were shorn of all the false glory which had
The Vanaprasthas had already,
hitherto surrounded them.
but yield-
it is true, made great progress in this direction
ing to the impulses of an unbridled imagination, they soon
buried their philosophy beneath a heap of false ideas and
vain imaginings with regard to the means of purifying the
The ridicu-
soul and to the spiritual side of life generally.
lous principles which they enunciated ended by becoming,
and from
in their eyes, divinely sanctioned obligations
that time forward the wisest Hindus really became the
;
;
;
most
foolish.
This chimera of soul-purification which they pursued, so
to speak, beyond the range of their own reasoning powers,
led
them from
error to error,
they likewise dragged
oracles they were.
from
pitfall to pitfall, until
down with them
the people whose
The question arises, was there ever any connexion
between the Hindu Gymnosophists and Zoroaster, or the
Magi of Persia ? All that I can say in answer to this
question is that, though some resemblances may be traced
between the Ghebres, or descendants of the ancient Persian
fire-worshippers, and the Hindus in the worship w hich they
both render to this element and to the sun, their religious
doctrines and customs are in every other respect entirely
different.
Indeed, so far as I can see, the Hindu religious
and political system is sui generis in its very foundations,
and contains special characteristics of which no trace can
be found in that of any other nat on.
Only minute examination can bring to light certain
r