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xvi
INTRODUCTION

is the final test of conduct or good or justice was not settled. No single test of the kind was uncompromisingly imposed on the society. The ideal of most general acceptance among the Brahmaņas was that the conduct should be conformed to sciences. This is the one which they were following in practice. When any person would come for advice they would consult the sciences and not the Vedas. But even there the claims of a single science were not brought forward. The thought had reached so far; the further progress of sciences and philosophy was arrested by the foreign invasion.

Every Hindu is advised to follow the principles of dharma, but inasmuch as the principles of dharma are unknown and as whatever that is good is regarded as dharma, the question whether caste-system is dharma or adharma means only whether caste-system is good or bad.

Scientific inquiry in this volume.— This volume has two- fold aspects. The first is historical. This aspect consists in narrating the development of a particular society, and to this narration a forecast regarding the future and a polity to determine the future have been added. The other aspect is scientific and philosophical. A theory of social evolution is described with the help of facts which come within the scope. Exploitation of this philosophical aspect made it necessary to make the following digressions in logic.

(i) Definition of a religion, and the principles of the scientific study of religions.

(ii) Ethnological classification and its place in the history of man.

Scientific study of religion and theology.—The use of the term religion in general social science is condemned,

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