Page:The history of caste in India.pdf/91

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THE BOOK OF THE LAWS OF MANU.
71

tensive than those throughout which the other castes can do so.

What we want to find out is the responsibility and the personal element in these doctrines, and therefore the traditional doctrines should be sharply separated from those of our author. Although we ought perhaps to hold an author responsible for the doctrines which he derives from others, and ought to base our conclusions regarding his personality upon them, nevertheless it would be safer to base our conclusions entirely on the innovations which the author has made. The only writers who allude to similar doctrines are Vasishtha and Baudhāyana. Vasishtha no doubt derides the validity of usages which are opposed to those of Aryavarta, but he feels a doubt as to the exact limits of the region. Whether it is the country situated between Ganges and Jamna or the one between Sarasvati and Black-forest (Kāla-vana), or whether it is the entire Northern India as our author holds. He again does not condemn the Dekkhan as the land of the Mlechchas.

Baudhāyana as I interpret him gives two sides of the question. One school said that the customs and practices of the North are valid for the North, and those of the South are valid for the South; while others held that the consideration whether a certain conduct is customary in the South or North should be left aside and the question decided according as the practice is approved by men pure and learned in the Vedas. He further holds that the rule of conduct that prevails in Aryāvarta is authoritative; but he also expresses two opinions as to the extent of Āryāvarta. The conservative opinion regarded the small strip of land between