Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: length, under the great Asoka, it became a political power, it not only brought about the one great crisis in the history of brahminism, but at one time even threatened its extinction. After severe contests the tide of opposition was rolled back; brahminism, once more triumphant, was considerably popularized, and the Puranic system was rapidly developed. Henceforth in Hindustan, all knowledge, all philosophy were confined to the brahmin caste. But little was the author of Buddhism aware that he was founding an awful system of religion; which when completed and carried into other lands by his successors, should subjugate the minds of half the human race for many, many centuries; an awful system of fatal error, which while denying the existence of the Supreme God, should lead its disciples to take as their model, and the support of all their future hopes, an utterly Annihilated Man. NAMES AND CHARACTER OF THE HINDU SYSTEMS. The various schools of Hindu philosophy which were formed under the circumstances we have now described are distinguished from each other by names expressive of their origin or of the opinions which they advocate. As we have seen, the doctrines of some are taken from the Vedas, or are at least consistent with the tenor of brahmin teaching, and the maintenance of brahminical authority. The speculations of others directly and indirectly tend to destroy that authority. The former are declared to be orthodox; the latter, heretical. Thesystem of the Buddhists, and that of the Jains which sprang from it, are the most ancient of the heretical schools, and have been most largely followed: but others have arisen and contended with brahminism in later days. The schools which are reckoned peculiarly orthodox are six. in number, and are well known by the names of the ...
评价“The Religious Aspects of Hindu Philosophy Stated and Discussed. A Prize Essay”