before mentioned: Madhusudana Saraswati names the same
nineteen of Yajnavalkya's list, also Devala, Narada, Paithinasi:
Rama Krishna, in his gloss to the _Grihya Sutras_ of Paraskara,
mentions thirty-nine, of whom nine (distinguished by three crosses)
are new ones. There is also a Dharma Sastra attributed to Sankha
and Likhita jointly, thus making forty-seven in the whole. The
professor considers all to be extant; and has himself met with
quotations from all, except Agni, Kuthumi, Budha, Satyayana, and
Soma.

To those may be added several recensions of the same Dharma
Sastras, of which professor Stenzler speaks to having read of
twenty-two.

The entire forty-seven are independent sources of and authorities upon
Hindu law.

The Digest of Jagannat'ha Tarcapanchanana, as translated by
Colebrooke, is a valuable repertory of texts; but, detached and
isolated as they necessarily are, those texts can with difficulty be
appreciated or applied.

Yajnavalkya is second in importance to Manu alone: and, with the
commentary, is the leading authority of the Mithila school.

The resident of British India needs not to be informed, that the
orthodox Hindu regards his Dharma Sastras as direct revelations of
the Divine will: still less need such an one be told, that, among this
people, law is entirely subservient to the mysterious despotism of
cast,[8] a religious, rather than a political ordinance.

With the Hindu, all religious tenets and aspirations are centred in
the idea of BRAHMA, the one, pervading, illimitable substance, without
multiple, division or repetition. This idea has two modes or phases,
1st. as representing the absolute, self-included Brahma; 2nd. as
representing Brahma in connection with, relative to, the world. In the
latter, Brahma is creator of the world, or, the very world, a
semblance or a development of the former, the absolute idea. Man's
highest aspiration and aim is, to know Brahma absolutely: to have
attained this knowledge implies a total renunciation of worldly
concerns, to coalesce with, to be ultimately absorbed in, reunited
with, Brahma. Brahmanas are held to possess, to represent, this
knowledge. Again, Brahma is the creator, the preserver, also, the
objects created and preserved. Kshattriyas represent Brahma, the
preserver: Vaisyas, Brahma the preserved. The dogma is otherwise
explained: in the secondary or relative notion, Brahma is _Sattwa_,
_Rajas_, _Tamas_, _i. e._ goodness, activity, dark