62
-
மறைமலையம் -29
but lend a free, unstinted, undisguised support to such a whole-some fusion of the select, was also shown by quotations taken direct from the writings of the founders and exponents of tha religion. How useful the booklet proved to those who looked forward with eagerness to such a reform of castes, thought they themselves had not the courage to express the need of it might be seen from the rapid sale the thousan copies of it had in a few months.
Inevitably the book had been long out of print, though demands for it increased day after day. The elaborte research - work unaided I had to do, in order to redeem the literary and religious history of the land from the thick gloom of myth and uncertainty created and cast over it by selfish and selfinterested persons, the constantanduremitting study I pursued of works on 'New psychology', stimulated by a strong desire to introduce its subjects into Tamil, left me little leisure to devote to the preparation of its second edition earlier. But, now that I was enabled to undertake the work, years of study and research - work facilitating it for me, I set myself to enlarging the briefly - touched - subject on 'The origin and growth of the institution of caste,' since I thought that, for healing its present corruption and infusing new life into it, only a thorough knowledge of its past history could afford a proper and effective remedy. And accordingly the subject has been amplified and treated fully and extensively in the first five chapters of this edition.
In the first chapter, it is shown that the present day castes cannot be identified with those of the past since the callings of the former have undergone so radical a change as is opposed to the ordinances laid down in the Sanscrit Vedas and Dharma Sastras. Modern castes have become hardened into unworkable masses by losing completely their pliancy of meaning and original good quality. When the composition of the first nine mandalas of the Rig Veda took place, the four castes were quite unknown to the Aryans. But, by the time when the tenth was added, the institution of four castes had become almost an established fact. Still it should be borne in mind that this division of the Indian people into four castes was based merely upon division of labour and was introduces as a convenient theoretic classification intended for the purposes of social and economical sciences. Practically there
