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the heart-rending scenes that invariably occur when a woman loses her dear lord, and is about to undergo a thorough change in her features by being deprived of not only her artificial but also her natural beauty. They have truly represented the inevitable crimes of fæticide, infanticide and suicide to which helpless widows are often driven. And these they have made the principal grounds of introducing remarriage notwithstanding the supposed abolition of it by the Shastras. But as none will doubt the truth of these representations, so also few will admit that the strength of these grounds is singly sufficient to warrant the innovation ; for the matrimonial ceremony is considered from time immemorial as purely a religious institution, the permanent obligation of which depended entirely upon the decree of the Shastras. It is necessary for the advocates of remarriage, therefore, to challenge the oppositionists on their own conditions, and thoroughly convince them that the Shastras, instead of being diametrically opposed to the new views, as is erroneously supposed, perfectly coincide with them. And this has been accomplished best by the help of this work. The opponents of Reform views have enjoyed to this day an incalculable advantage in discussion from the imperfect acquaintance on the part of the Reformers with the teaching of
