Handbook of Universal Literature, From the Best and Latest Authorities Part 2

4. HISTORY.--The earliest extant j.a.panese record is a work ent.i.tled "Kojiki," or book of ancient traditions. It treats of the creation, the G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses of the mythological period, and gives the history of the Mikados from the accession of Jimmu, year 1 (660 B.C.), to 1288 of the j.a.panese year. It was supposed to date from the first half of the eighth century, and another work "Nihonghi," a little later, also treats of the mythological period. It abounds in traces of Chinese influence, and in a measure supersedes the "Kojiki." These are the oldest books in the language. They are the chief exponents of the s.h.i.+nto faith, and form the bases of many commentaries and subsequent works.

The "History of Great j.a.pan," composed in the latter part of the seventeenth century, by the Lord of Mito (died 1700), is the standard history of the present day. The external history of j.a.pan, in twenty-two volumes, by Rai Sanyo (died 1832), composed in cla.s.sical Chinese, is most widely read by men of education.

The j.a.panese are intensely proud of their history and take great care in making and preserving records. Memorial stones are among the most striking sights on the highways and in the towns, villages, and temple yards, in honor of some noted scholar, ruler, or benefactor. Few people are more thoroughly informed as to their own history. Every city, town, and village has its annals. Family records are faithfully copied from generation to generation. Almost every province has its encyclopaedic history, and every high-road its itineraries and guide-books, in which famous places and events are noted. In the large cities professional story-tellers and readers gain a lucrative livelihood by narrating both legendary and cla.s.sical history, and the theatre is often the most faithful mirror of actual history. There are hundreds of child's histories in j.a.pan. Many of the standard works are profusely ill.u.s.trated, are models of style and eloquence, and parents delight to instruct their children in the national laws and traditions.

5. THE DRAMA.--The theatre is a favorite amus.e.m.e.nt, especially among the lower cla.s.ses; the pieces represented are of a popular character and written in colloquial language, and generally founded on national history and tradition, or on the lives and adventures of the heroes and G.o.ds; and the scene is always laid in j.a.pan. The play begins in the morning and lasts all day, spectators bringing their food with them. No cla.s.sical dramatic author is known.

Poetry has always been a favorite study with the j.a.panese. The most ancient poetical fragment, called a "Collection of Myriad Leaves," dates from the eighth century. The collection of "One Hundred Persons" is much later, and contains many poems written by the emperors themselves. The j.a.panese possess no great epic or didactic poems, although some of their lyrics are happy examples of quaint modes of thought and expression. It is difficult to translate them into a foreign tongue.

6. GEOGRAPHY. NEWSPAPERS AND NOVELS.--The largest section of j.a.panese literature is that treating of the local geography of the country itself.

These works are minute in detail and of great length, describing events and monuments of historic interest.

Before the recent revolution bat one newspaper existed in j.a.pan, but at present the list numbers several hundred. Freedom of the press is unknown, and fines and imprisonment for violation of the stringent laws are very frequent.

Novels const.i.tute a large section of j.a.panese literature. Fairy tales and story books abound. Many of them are translated into English; "The Royal Ronans" and other works have recently been published in New York.

Medical science was borrowed from China, but upon this, as upon other matters, the j.a.panese improved. Acupuncture, or the introduction of needles into the living tissues for remedial purposes, was invented by the j.a.panese, as was the moxa, or the burning of the flesh for the same purpose.

7. POSITION OF WOMAN.--Women in j.a.pan are treated with far more respect and consideration than elsewhere in the East. According to j.a.panese history the women of the early centuries were possessed of more intellectual and physical vigor, filling the offices of state and religion, and reaching a high plane of social dignity and honor. Of the one hundred and twenty-three j.a.panese sovereigns, nine have been women.

The great heroine of j.a.panese history and tradition was the Empress Jingu, renowned for her beauty, piety, intelligence, and martial valor, who, about 200 A.D., invaded and conquered Corea.

The female children of the lower cla.s.ses receive tuition in private schools so generally established during the last two centuries throughout the country, and those of the higher cla.s.ses at the hands of private tutors or governesses; and in every household may be found a great number of books exclusively on the duties of women.

SANSKRIT LITERATURE.

1. The Language.--2. The Social Const.i.tution of India. Brahmanism.--3.

Characteristics of the Literature and its Divisions.--4. The Vedas and other Sacred Books.--5. Sanskrit Poetry; Epic; The Ramayana and Mahabharata. Lyric Poetry. Didactic Poetry; the Hitopadesa. Dramatic Poetry.--6.. History and Science.--7. Philosophy. 8. Buddhism.--9. Moral Philosophy. The Code of Manu.--10. Modern Literatures of India.--11.

Education. The Brahmo Somaj.

1. THE LANGUAGE.--Sanskrit is the literary language of the Hindus, and for two thousand years has served as the means of learned intercourse and composition. The name denotes _cultivated_ or _perfected_, in distinction to the Prakrit or _uncultivated_, which sprang from it and was contemporary with it.

The study of Sanskrit by European scholars dates less than a century back, and it is important as the vehicle of an immense literature which lays open the outward and inner life of a remarkable people from a remote epoch nearly to the present day, and as being the most ancient and original of the Indo-European languages, throwing light upon them all. The Aryan or Indo-European race had its ancient home in Central Asia. Colonies migrated to the west and founded the Persian, Greek, and Roman civilization, and settled in Spain and England. Other branches found their way through the pa.s.ses of the Himalayas and spread themselves over India. Wherever they went they a.s.serted their superiority over the earlier people whom they found in possession of the soil, and the history of civilization is everywhere the history of the Aryan race. The forefathers of the Greek and Roman, of the Englishman and the Hindu, dwelt together in India, spoke the same language, and wors.h.i.+ped the same G.o.ds. The languages of Europe and India are merely different forms of the original Aryan speech. This is especially true of the words of common family life. _Father, mother, brother, sister_, and _widow_, are substantially the same in most of the Aryan languages, whether spoken on the banks of the Ganges, the Tiber, or the Thames. The word _daughter_, which occurs in nearly all of them, is derived from the Sanskrit word signifying _to draw milk_, and preserves the memory of the time when the daughter was the little milkmaid in the primitive Aryan household.

It is probable that as late as the third or fourth century B.C. it was still spoken. New dialects were engrafted upon it which at length superseded it, though it has continued to be revered as the sacred and literary language of the country. Among the modern tongues of India, the Hindui and the Hindustani may be mentioned; the former, the language of the pure Hindu population, is written in Sanskrit characters; the latter is the language of the Mohammedan Hindus, in which Arabic letters are used. Many of the other dialects spoken and written in Northern India are derived from the Sanskrit. Of the more important among them there are English grammars and dictionaries.

2. SOCIAL CONSt.i.tUTION OF INDIA.--Hindu literature takes its character both from the social and the religious inst.i.tutions of the country. The social const.i.tution is based on the distinction of cla.s.ses into which the people, from the earliest times, have been divided, and which were the natural effect of the long struggle between the aboriginal tribes and the new race which had invaded India. These castes are four: 1st. The Brahmins or priests; 2d. The warriors and princes; 3d. The husbandmen; 4th. The laborers. There are, besides, several impure cla.s.ses, the result of an intermingling of the different castes. Of these lower cla.s.ses some are considered utterly abominable--as that of the Pariahs. The different castes are kept distinct from each other by the most rigorous laws; though in modern times the system has been somewhat modified.

THE RELIGION.

In the period of the Vedas the religion of the Hindus was founded on the simple wors.h.i.+p of Nature. But the Pantheism of this age was gradually superseded by the wors.h.i.+p of the one Brahm, from which, according to this belief, the soul emanated, and to which it seeks to return. Brahm is an impersonality, the sum of all nature, the germ of all that is. Existence has no purpose, the world is wholly evil, and all good persons should desire to be taken out of it and to return to Brahm. This end is to be attained only by transmigration of the soul through all previous stages of life, migrating into the body of a higher or lower being according to the sins or merits of its former existence, either to finish or begin anew its purification. This religion of the Hindus led to the growth of a philosophy the precursor of that of Greece, whose aims were loftier and whose methods more ingenious.

From Brahm, the impersonal soul of the universe, emanated the personal and active Brahma, who with Siva and Vishnu const.i.tute the Trimurti or G.o.d under three forms.

Siva is the second of the Hindu deities, and represents the primitive animating and destroying forces of nature. His symbols relate to these powers, and are wors.h.i.+ped more especially by the Sivaites--a numerous sect of this religion. The wors.h.i.+pers of Vishnu, called the Preserver, the first-born of Brahma, const.i.tute the most extensive sect of India, and their ideas relating to this form of the Divinity are represented by tradition and poetry, and are particularly developed in the great monuments of Sanskrit literature. The myths connected with Vishnu refer especially to his incarnations or corporeal apparitions both in men and animals, which he submits to in order to conquer the spirit of evil.

These incarnations are called Avatars, or descendings, and form an important part of Hindu epic poetry. Of the ten Avatars which are attributed to Vishnu, nine have already taken place; the last is yet to come, when the G.o.d shall descend again from heaven, to destroy the present world, and to restore peace and parity. The three forms of the Deity, emanating mutually from each other, are expressed by the three symbols, A U M, three letters in Sanskrit having but one sound, forming the mystical name _Om_, which never escapes the lips of the Hindus, but is meditated on in silence. The predominant wors.h.i.+p of one or the other of these forms const.i.tutes the peculiarities of the numerous sects of this religion.

There are other inferior divinities, symbols of the forces of nature, guardians of the world, demi-G.o.ds, demons, and heroes, whose wors.h.i.+p, however, is considered as a mode of reaching that divine rest, immersion and absorption in Brahm. To this end are directed the sacrifices, the prayers, the ablutions, the pilgrimages, and the penances, which occupy so large a place in the Hindu wors.h.i.+p.

3. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LITERATURE AND ITS DIVISIONS.--A greater part of the Sanskrit literature, which counts its works by thousands, still remains in ma.n.u.script. It was nearly all composed in metre, even works of law, morality, and science. Every department of knowledge and every branch of inquiry is represented, with the single exception of history, and this forms the most striking general characteristic of the literature, and one which robs it of a great share of worth and interest. Its place is in the intellectual rather than in the political history of the world.

The literary monuments of the Sanskrit language correspond to the great eras in the history of India. The first period reaches back to that remote age, when those tribes of the Aryan race speaking Sanskrit emigrated to the northwestern portion of the Indian Peninsula, and established themselves there, an agricultural and pastoral people. That was the age in which were composed the prayers, hymns, and precepts afterwards collected in the form of the Vedas, the sacred books of the country. In the second period, the people, incited by the desire of conquest, penetrated into the fertile valleys lying between the Indus and the Ganges; and the struggle with the aboriginal inhabitants, which followed their invasion, gave birth to epic poetry, in which the wars of the different races were celebrated and the extension of Hindu civilization related. The third period embraces the successive ages of the formation and development of a learned and artistic literature. It contains collections of the ancient traditions, expositions of the Vedas, works on grammar, lexicography, and science; and its conclusion forms the golden age of Sanskrit literature, when, the country being ruled by liberal princes, poetry, and especially the drama, reached its highest degree of perfection.

The chronology of these periods varies according to the systems of different orientalists. It is, however, admitted that the Vedas are the first literary productions of India, and that their origin cannot be later than the fifteenth century B.C. The period of the Vedas embraces the other sacred books, or commentaries founded upon them, though written several centuries afterwards. The second period, to which belong the two great epic poems, the "Ramayana" and the "Mahabharata," according to the best authorities ends with the sixth or seventh century B.C. The third period embraces all the poetical and scientific works written from that time to the third or fourth century B.C., when the language, having been progressively refined, became fixed in the writings of Kalidasa, Jayadeva, and other poets. A fourth period, including the tenth century A.D., may be added, distinguished by its erudition, grammatical, rhetorical, and scientific disquisitions, which, however, is not considered as belonging to the cla.s.sical age. From the Hindu languages, originating in the Sanskrit, new literatures have sprung; but they are essentially founded on the ancient literature, which far surpa.s.ses them in extent and importance, and is the great model of them all. Indeed, its influence has not been limited to India; all the poetical and scientific works of Asia, China, and j.a.pan included, have borrowed largely from it, and in Southern Russia the scanty literature of the Kalmucks is derived entirely from Hindu sources. The Sanskrit literature, known to Europe only recently, through the researches of the English and German orientalists, has now become the auxiliary and foundation of all philological studies.

4. THE VEDAS AND OTHER SACRED BOOKS.--The Vedas (knowledge or science) are the Bible of the Hindus, the most ancient book of the Aryan family, and contain the revelation of Brahm which was preserved by tradition and collected by Vyasa, a name which means compiler. The word Veda, however, should be taken, as a collective name for the sacred literature of the Vedic age which forms the background of the whole Indian world. Many works belonging to that age are lost, though a large number still exists.

The most important of the Vedas are three in number. First, The "Rig- Veda," which is the great literary memorial of the settlement of the Aryans in the Punjaub, and of their religious hymns and songs. Second, The "Yajur-Veda." Third, The "Sama-Veda."

Each Veda divided into two parts: the first contains prayers and invocations, most of which are of a rhythmical character; the second records the precepts relative to those prayers and to the ceremonies of the sacrifices, and describes the religious myths and symbols.

There are many commentaries on the Vedas of an ancient date, which are considered as sacred books, and relate to medicine, music, astronomy, astrology, grammar, philosophy, jurisprudence, and, indeed, to the whole circle of Hindu science.

They represent a period of unknown antiquity, when the Aryans were divided into tribes of which the chieftain was the father and priest, and when women held a high position. Some of the most beautiful hymns of this age were composed by ladies and queens. The morals of Avyan, a woman of an early age, are still taught in the Hindu schools as the golden rule of life.

India to-day acknowledges no higher authority in matters of religion, ceremonial, customs, and law than the Vedas, and the spirit of Vedantism, which is breathed by every Hindu from his earliest youth, pervades the prayers of the idolater, the speculations of the philosopher, and the proverbs of the beggar.

The "Puranas" (ancient writings) hold an eminent rank in the religion and literature of the Hindus. Though of a more recent date than the Vedas, they possess the credit of an ancient and divine origin, and exercise an extensive and practical influence upon the people. They comprise vast collections of ancient traditions relating to theology, cosmology, and to the genealogy of G.o.ds and heroes. There are eighteen acknowledged Puranas, which altogether contain 400,000 stanzas. The "Upapuranas," also eighteen in number, are commentaries on the Puranas. Finally, to the sacred books, and next to the Vedas both in antiquity and authority, belong the "Manavadharmasastra," or the ordinances of Manu, spoken of hereafter.

5. SANSKRIT POETRY.--This poetry, springing from the lively and powerful imagination of the Hindus, is inspired by their religious doctrines, and embodied in the most harmonious language. Exalted by their peculiar belief in pantheism and metempsychosis, they consider the universe and themselves as directly emanating from Brahm, and they strive to lose their own individuality, in its infinite essence. Yet, as impure beings, they feel their incapacity to obtain the highest moral perfection, except through a continual atonement, to which all nature is condemned. Hence Hindu poetry expresses a profound melancholy, which pervades the character as well as the literature of that people. This poetry breathes a spirit of perpetual sacrifice of the individual self, as the ideal of human life. The bards of India, inspired by this predominant feeling, have given to poetry nearly every form it has a.s.sumed in the Western world, and in each and all they have excelled.

Sanskrit poetry is both metrical and rhythmical, equally free from the confused strains of unmoulded genius and from the servile pedantry of conventional rules. The verse of eight syllables is the source of all other metres, and the _sloka_ or double distich is the stanza most frequently used. Though this poetry presents too often extravagance of ideas, inc.u.mbrance of episodes, and monstrosity of images, as a general rule it is endowed with simplicity of style, pure coloring, sublime ideas, rare figures, and chaste epithets. Its exuberance must be attributed to the strange mythology of the Hindus, to the immensity of the fables which const.i.tute the groundwork of their poems, and to the gigantic strength of their poetical imaginations. A striking peculiarity of Sanskrit poetry is its extensive use in treating of those subjects apparently the most difficult to reduce to a metrical form--not only the Vedas and Manu's code are composed in verse, but the sciences are expressed in this form. Even in the few works which may be called prose, the style is so modulated and bears so great a resemblance to the language of poetry as scarcely to be distinguished from it. The history of Sanskrit poetry is, in reality, the history of Sanskrit literature.

The subjects of the epic poems of the Hindus are derived chiefly from their religious tenets, and relate to the incarnations of the G.o.ds, who, in their human forms, become the heroes of this poetry. The idea of an Almighty power warring against the spirit of evil destroys the possibility of struggle, and impairs the character of epic poetry; but the Hindu poets, by submitting their G.o.ds both to fate and to the condition of men, diminish their power and give them the character of epic heroes.

The Hindu mythology, however, is the great obstacle which must ever prevent this poetry from becoming popular in the Western world. The great personifications of the Deity have not been softened down, as in the mythology of the Greeks, to the perfection of human symmetry, but are here exhibited in their original gigantic forms. Majesty is often expressed by enormous stature; power, by mult.i.tudinous hands; providence, by countless eyes; and omnipresence, by innumerable bodies.

In addition to this, Hindu epic poetry departs so far from what may be called the vernacular idiom of thought and feeling, and refers to a people whose political and religious inst.i.tutions, as well as moral habits, are so much at variance with our own, that no labor or skill could render its a.s.sociations familiar.

The Ramayana and the Mahabharata are the most important and sublime creations of Hindu literature, and the most colossal epic poems to be found in the literature of the world. They surpa.s.s in magnitude the Iliad and Odyssey, the Jerusalem Delivered and the Lusiad, as the pyramids of Egypt tower above the temples of Greece.

The Ramayana (_Rama_ and _yana_, expedition) describes the exploits of Rama, an incarnation of Vishnu, and the son of Dasaratha, king of Oude.

Ravana, the prince of demons, bad stolen from the G.o.ds the privilege of being invulnerable, and had thus acquired an equality with them. He could not be overcome except by a man, and the G.o.ds implored Vishnu to become incarnate in order that Ravana might be conquered. The origin and the development of this Avatar, the departing of Rama for the battlefield, the divine signs of his mission, his love and marriage with Sita, the daughter of the king Janaka, the persecution of his step-mother, by which the hero is sent into exile, his penance in the desert, the abduction of his bride by Ravana, the gigantic battles that ensue, the rescue of Sita, and the triumph of Rama const.i.tute the princ.i.p.al plot of this wonderful poem, full of incidents and episodes of the most singular and beautiful character.

Among these may be mentioned the descent of the G.o.ddess Ganga, which relates to the mythological origin of the river Ganges, and the story of Yajnadatta, a young penitent, who through mistake was killed by Dasaratha; the former splendid for its rich imagery, the latter incomparable for its elegiac character, and for its expression of the pa.s.sionate sorrow of parental affection.

The Ramayana was written by Valmiki, a poet belonging to an unknown period. It consists of seven cantos, and contains twenty-five thousand verses. The original, with its translation into Italian, was published in Paris by the government of Sardinia about the middle of this century.

The Mahabharata (the great Bharata) has nearly the same antiquity as the Ramayana. It describes the greatest Avatar of Vishnu, the incarnation of the G.o.d in Krishna, and it presents a vast picture of the Hindu religion.

It relates to the legendary history of the Bharata dynasty, especially to the wars between the Pandus and Kurus, two branches of a princely family of ancient India. Five sons of Pandu, having been unjustly exiled by their uncle, return, after many wonderful adventures, with a powerful army to oppose the Kurus, and being aided by Krishna, the incarnated Vishnu, defeat their enemies and become lords of all the country. The poem describes the birth of Krishna, his escape from the dangers which surrounded his cradle, his miracles, his pastoral life, his rescue of sixteen thousand young girls who had become prisoners of a giant, his heroic deeds in the war of the Pandus, and finally his ascent to heaven, where he still leads the round dances of the spheres. This work is not more remarkable for the grandeur of its conceptions than for the information it affords respecting the social and religious systems of the ancient Hindus, which are here revealed with majestic and sublime eloquence. Five of its most esteemed episodes are called the Five Precious Stones. First among these may be mentioned the "Bhagavad-Gita," or the Divine Song, containing the revelation of Krishna, in the form of a dialogue between the G.o.d and his pupil Arjuna. Schlegel calls this episode the most beautiful, and perhaps the most truly philosophical, poem that the whole range of literature has produced.

The Mahabharata is divided into eighteen cantos, and it contains two hundred thousand verses. It is attributed to Vyasa, the compiler of the Vedas, but it appears that it was the result of a period of literature rather than the work of a single poet. Its different incidents and episodes were probably separate poems, which from the earliest age were sung by the people, and later, by degrees, collected in one complete work.

Of the Mahabharata we possess only a few episodes translated into English, such as the Bhagavad-Gita, by Wilkins.