Let everyone try to remember, as we ourselves remember, that not
very long ago a poor Hungarian, who not
Only had no means of any
kind but was almost a beggar, traveled on foot to Tibet through
unknown and dangerous countries, led only by the love of learning
and the eager wish to pour light on the historical origin of his
nation. The result was that inexhaustible mines of literary
treasures were discovered. Philology, which till then had wandered
in the Egyptian darkness of etymological labyrinths, and was about
to ask the sanction of the scientific world to one of the wildest
of theories, suddenly stumbled on the clue of Ariadne. Philology
discovered, at last, that the Sanskrit language is, if not the
forefather, at least - to use the language of Max Muller - "the elder
brother" of all classical languages. Thanks to the extraordinary
zeal of Alexander Csoma de Koros, Tibet yielded a language the
literature of which was totally unknown. He partly translated it
and partly analyzed and explained it. His translations have shown
the scientific world that (1) the originals of the Zend-Avesta,
the sacred scriptures of the sun-worshippers, of Tripitaka, that
of the Buddhists, and of Aytareya-Brahmanam, that of the Brahmans,
were written in one and the same Sanskrit language; (2) that all
these three languages - Zend, Nepalese, and the modern Brahman
Sanskrit - are more or less dialects of the first; (3) that old
Sanskrit is the origin of all the less ancient Indo-European
languages, as well as of the modern European tongues and dialects;
(4) that the three chief religions of heathendom - Zoroastrianism,
Buddhism and Brahmanism - are mere heresies of the monotheistic
teachings of the Vedas, which does not prevent them from being
real ancient religions and not modern falsifications.
The moral of all this is evident. A poor traveler, without either
money or protection, succeeded in gaining admittance to the
Lamaseries of Tibet and to the sacred literature of the isolated
tribe which inhabits it, probably because he treated the Mongolians
and the Tibetans as his brothers and not as an inferior race - a
feat which has never been accomplished by generations of scientists.
One cannot help feeling ashamed of humanity and science when one
thinks that he whose labors first gave to science such precious
results, he who was the first sower of such an abundant harvest,
remained, almost until the day of his death, a poor and obscure
worker. On his way from Tibet he walked to Calcutta without a
penny in his pocket. At last Csoma de Koros became known, and
his name began to be pronounced with honor and praise whilst he
was dying in one of the poorest parts of Calcutta. Being already
very ill, he wanted to get back to Tibet, and started on foot again
through Sikkhim. He succumbed to his illness on the road and was
buried in Darhjeeling.
It is needless to say we are fully aware that what we have undertaken
is simply impossible within the limits of ordinary newspaper articles.
All we hope to accomplish is to lay the foundation stone of an
edifice, whose further progress must be entrusted to future generations.
In order to combat successfully the theories worked out by two
generations of Orientalists, half a century of diligent labor
would be required. And, in order to replace these theories with
new ones, we must get new facts, facts founded not on the chronology
and false evidence of scheming Brahmans, whose interest is to feed
the ignorance of European Sanskritists (as, unfortunately, was
the experience of Lieutenant Wilford and Louis Jacolliot), but on
indubitable proofs that are to be found in inscriptions as yet
undeciphered. The clue to these inscriptions Europeans do not
possess, because, as I have already stated, it is guarded in MSS.
which are as old as the inscriptions and which are almost out of
reach. Even in case our hopes are realized and we obtain this clue,
a new difficulty will arise before us. We shall have to begin a
systematic refutation, page by page, of many a volume of hypotheses
published by the Royal Asiatic Society. A work like this might be
accomplished by dozens of tireless, never-resting Sanskritists - a
class which, even in India, is almost as rare as white elephants.
Thanks to private contributions and the zeal of some educated Hindu
patriots, two free classes of Sanskrit and Pali had already been
opened - one in Bombay by the Theosophical Society, the other in
Benares under the presidency of the learned Rama-Misra-Shastri.
In the present year, 1882, the Theosophical Society has, altogether,
fourteen schools in Ceylon and India.
Our heads full of thoughts and plans of this kind, we, that is to
say, one American, three Europeans, and three natives, occupied a
whole carriage of the Great Indian Peninsular Railroad on our way
to Nassik, one of the oldest towns in India, as I have already
mentioned, and the most sacred of all in the eyes of the inhabitants
of the Western Presidency. Nassik borrowed its name from the
Sanskrit word "Nasika," which means nose. An epic legend assures
us that on this very spot Lakshman, the eldest brother of the
deified King Rama, cut off the nose of the giantess Sarpnaka,
sister of Ravana, who stole Sita, the "Helen of Troy" of the Hindus.
The train stops six miles from the town, so that we had to finish
our journey in six two-wheeled, gilded chariots, called ekkas, and
drawn by bullocks. It was one o'clock A.M., but, in spite of the
darkness of the hour, the horns of the animals were gilded and
adorned with flowers, and brass bangles tinkled on their legs.
Our waylay through ravines overgrown with jungle, where, as our
drivers hastened to inform us, tigers and other four-footed
misanthropes of the forest played hide-and-seek. However, we had
no opportunity of making the acquaintance of the tigers, but enjoyed
instead a concert of a whole community of jackals.
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