in Indian literature the gradual progress of Hindu religious ideas through all their phases which de* velopment must have taken time abnormally long, enough to bring the earliest skirts of Indian litera* ture to an archaic age.
'(iii) Prof. Max Muller's earliest estimate of 1200 B. C,, appears to be much near the mark. A lapse of three centuries from 130© to 1000 B. C. amply accounts for the difference between what is oldest and newest in Vedic Hymn poetry.
<iv) The recent theory of Prof. Jacobi of Bonn, fixes the date back to at least 4000 B. C. The theory is based on astronomical calculations connected with a change in the beginning of the seasons, which he supposes had taken place since the time of the Rig Veda. But this estimate is falsified by the assumption of a doubtful and improbable meaning in a Vedic word, which forms the very starting point of the theory.
CHAPTER II.
The history of Indian literature falls into two periods : the Vedic and the Classical,
I. The Vedic period 1500—200 B. C.
The Vedic literature comprises the four Vedas : the Rik, the Yajus, the Saman and the Atharvan. Each of these has three forms or parts, the Samhita, the Brahmana and the Upanishad portions.
The Samhita of the Rik is purely a lyrical collection, forming., the immediate source of the other three. Thef its relation