24 Kshatriya families of kings reigned for a period of 2,418 years 9 Kaista kings " " " " 250 " 11 Of the Adisur families " " " 714 " 10 Of the Bhopal family " " " 689 " 10 Of the Pala dynasty (from 855 to 1040 A.D.) " " 185 " 10 The Vaidya Rajahs reigned for a period of " " 137 "
--------
Years . . . . 4,393 "

If we deduct from this sum 1,203, we have 3,190 years B.C. of successive reigns.  If it can be shown on the unimpeachable evidence of the Sanskrit texts that some of the reigns happened simultaneously, and the line cannot therefore be shown as successive (as was already tried), well and good.  Against an arbitrary chronology set up with a predetermined purpose and theory in view, there will remain but little to be said.  But if this attempt at reconciliation of figures and the surrounding circumstances are maintained simply upon “critical, internal evidence,” then, in the presence of these 3,190 years of an unbroken line of powerful and mighty Hindu kings, the Orientalists will have to show a very good reason why the authors of the Code of Manu seem entirely ignorant even of the existence of Bengal—­if its date has to be accepted as not earlier than 1280 B.C.!  A scientific rule which is good enough to apply to the case of Panini ought to be valid in other chronological speculations.  Or, perhaps, this is one of those poor rules which will not “work both ways?”

—­A Chela

THEOSOPHICAL

What is Theosophy?

According to lexicographers, the term theosophia is composed of two Greek words—­theos “god,” and sophas “wise.”  So far, correct.  But the explanations that follow are far from giving a clear idea of Theosophy.  Webster defines it most originally as “a supposed intercourse with God and superior spirits, and consequent attainment of superhuman knowledge by physical processes, as by the theurgic operations of some ancient Platonists, or by the chemical processes of the German fire-philosophers.”

This, to say the least, is a poor and flippant explanation.  To attribute such ideas to men like Ammonius Saccas, Plotinus, Jamblichus, Porphyry, Proclus, shows either intentional misrepresentation, or ignorance of the philosophy and motives of the greatest geniuses of the later Alexandrian School.  To impute to those, whom their contemporaries as well as posterity styled “theodidaktoi,” god-taught, a purpose to develop their psychological, spiritual perceptions by “physical processes,” is to describe them as materialists.  As to the concluding fling at the fire-philosophers, it rebounds from them upon some of the most eminent leaders of modern science; those in whose mouths the Rev. James Martineau places the following boast:  “Matter is all we want; give us atoms alone, and we will explain the universe.”