Imatges de pàgina
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CHAP.

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116. Learning, except that contained in the scriptures, art, as mixing perfumes and the like, work for wages, menial service, attendance on cattle, traffick, agriculture, content with little, alms, and receiving high interest on money, are ten modes of subsis'tence in times of distress.

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117. Neither a priest nor a military man, though distressed, must receive interest on loans, but each ' of them, if he please, may pay the small interest 'permitted by law, on borrowing for some pious use, to the sinful man, who demands it.

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118. A MILITARY king, who takes even a fourth part of the crops of his realm at a time of urgent necessity, as of war or invasion, and protects his people to the utmost of his power, commits no 'sin :

119. His peculiar duty is conquest, and he must "not recede from battle; so that, while he defends

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by his arms the merchant and husbandman, he may levy the legal tax as the price of protection.

120. The tax on the mercantile the mercantile class, which in times of prosperity must be only a twelfth part of 'their crops, and a fiftieth of their personal profits, may be an eighth of their crops in a time of distress, or a sixth, which is the medium, or even fourth in great publick adversity; but a twentieth of their gains on money, and other moveables, is the highest tax serving men, artisans, and mechanicks

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must assist by their labour, but at no time pay taxes. 6 121. IF

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121. IF a Súdra want a subsistence and cannot CHAP.

attend a priest, he may serve a Cshatriya; or, if he

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cannot wait on a soldier by birth, he may gain his • livelihood by serving an opulent Vaisya.

122. To him, who serves Bráhmens with a view 'to a heavenly reward, or even with a view to both ' this life and the next, the union of the word Bráhmen with his name of servant will assuredly bring

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success.

123. Attendance on Bráhmens is pronounced the best work of a Súdra: whatever else he may per'form will comparatively avail him nothing.

124. They must allot him a fit maintenance according to their own circumstances, after considering his ability, his exertions, and the number of those, ' whom he must provide with nourishment :

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125. What remains of their dressed rice must be given to him; and apparel which they have worn, ' and the refuse of their grain, and their old house'hold furniture.

126.THERE is no guilt in a man of the servile class who eats leeks and other forbidden vegetables: ' he must not have the sacred investiture: he has no 'business with the duty of making oblations to fire and the like; but there is no prohibition against his offering dressed grain as a sacrifice, by way of discharging his own duty.

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127. Even Súdras, who are anxious to perform

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CHAP. their entire duty, and, knowing what they should 'perform, imitate the practice of good men in the household sacraments, but without any holy text, except those containing praise and salutation, are SO far from sinning, that they acquire just applause :

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128. As a Súdra, without injuring another man, performs the lawful acts of the twice-born, even thus, without being censured, he gains exaltation in this world and in the next.

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129. No superfluous collection of wealth must be made by a Súdra, even though he has power to make it, since a servile man, who has amassed riches, becomes proud, and, by his insolence or neglect, gives pain even to Bráhmens.

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130. SUCH, as have been fully declared, are the • several duties of the four classes in distress for subsistence; and, if they perform them exactly, they 'shall attain the highest beatitude.

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131. Thus has been propounded the system of 'duties, religious and civil, ordained for all classes: 'I next will declare the pure law of expiation for 'sin.'

CHAP.

CHAP. XI.

On Penance and Expiation.

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1. HIM, who intends to marry for the sake of CHAP.

having issue; him, who wishes to make a sacrifice; 'him, who travels; him, who has given all his wealth

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at a sacred rite; him, who desires to maintain his preceptor, his father, or his mother; him, who needs a maintenance for himself, when he first reads 'the Védas; and him, who is afflicted with illness;

2. These nine Bráhmens let mankind consider as virtuous mendicants, called snátacas; and, to relieve 'their wants, let gifts of cattle or gold be presented to them in proportion to their learning:

3. To these most excellent Bráhmens must rice ' also be given, with holy presents at oblations to fire and within the consecrated circle; but the dressed

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' rice, which others are to receive, must be delivered ' on the outside of the sacred hearth: gold and the like may be given any where.

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4. On such Bráhmens as well know the Véda, let the king bestow, as it becomes him, jewels of all sorts, and the solemn reward for officiating at the 'sacrifice.

5. HE, who has a wife, and, having begged mo-
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ney to defray his nuptial expences, marries another woman, shall have no advantage but sensual enjoyment: the offspring belongs to the bestower of the gift.

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6. LET every man, according to his ability, give 'wealth to Bráhmens detached from the world and learned in scripture: such a giver shall attain heaven after this life.

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7. HE alone is worthy to drink the juice of the 'moon-plant, who keeps a provision of grain suf'ficient to supply those, whom the law commands him to nourish, for the term of three years or 6 more;

8. But a twice-born man, who keeps a less provi'sion of grain, yet presumes to taste the juice of the 'moon-plant, shall gather no fruit from that sacra

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ment, even though he taste it at the first, or solemn, much less at any occasional, ceremony.

9. HE, who bestows gifts on strangers, with a 'view to worldly fame, while he suffers his family to live in distress, though he has power to support them, touches his lips with honey, but swallows poison; such virtue is counterfeit :

10. Even what he does for the sake of his future spiritual body, to the injury of those, whom he is bound to maintain, shall bring him ultimate misery 'both in this life and in the next.

11. SHOULD a sacrifice, performed by any twice

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