१३वा ] वेद व वदागें. १३१ सर्व ग्रंथसमूहाचें त्यांत उत्तम रीतीनें संरक्षण केलेले आढ- ळतें. यामुळे त्यांचा आज मित्तीसही इतिहासकारांस, भा- षातत्वज्ञांस, आणि तत्ववेत्यांस मोठाच उपयोग होतो. हिंदुस्थानच्या लोकांविषयीं थॉर्न्- टन् हा हिंदुस्थानचा इतिहास लि- हित असतांना असें ह्मणतो कीं:- हिंदू लोकांविषयीं टन इतिहासका राचे मत. - “ Ere yet the Pyramids looked down upon the valley of the Nile — when Greecc and Italy, those cradles of modern civilization, housed only the tenants of the wilderness, India was the seat of wealth and grandeur. A busy population had covered the land
- * * “ At the same time the attention or
the historian the philo-logist and the philosopher was roused to the fact that a complete literature had been preserved in India, which promised to open a new leaf in the ancient history of mankind," and de- served to beeome the object of serious study." “ No one who wishes to acquire a thorough knowledge of these or any other of the Indo-Euro- pean languages, no one who desires to study the history of that branch of mankind to which we ourselves belong, and to language and discover in it the first •germs of the mythology of our fore-fathers—can for the future dispense with some knowledge of the language and ancient literature of India. " (Muller's Sanskrit literature.)
