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THE PHILOSOPHY OF SUCCESS
stratification of the Buddhist tradition but is a reflection of the fact, apparently, that there were stupas in existence to the memories of Mahāpuruṣas of these four kinds.
As we have said, the ideal of the Universal Monarch goes back to pre-Aryan times in India (third and fourth millenniums B.C.). But traits have been added from a second, equivalent ideal, associated rather with the horse than with the native Indian elephant, which must have been developed by the Aryan semi-nomads before they moved into India proper from Afghanistan through the Khyber Pass. At that distant period the steppe-domains of the various chieftains were somewhat flexible as to boundaries; power and the possession of lands being understood in terms of claims to certain grazing areas. The ranging herds of cattle and horses were accompanied by armed riders, Aryan cowboys, who went as defenders of their chieftains' claims to both the animals and the grounds on which they grazed. When a king, in those remote times, wished to announce himself as paramount sovereign, he would do so by letting loose to graze a perfect specimen of a horse-one fit to be offered in the most solemn rite of the horse-sacrifice (aśvamedha). This beast was to be allowed to go where it liked, followed by an elite-guard of young warriors, ready and fit to overthrow anyone who should attempt to drive the horse from his own grazing grounds, or to make it captive. When this stately animal, in imitation of the horselike sun, had wandered over the earth for the full cycle of a year, extending its adventurous stroll of conquest as far as it pleased and wherever it chose, it was then escorted home again to be slaughtered sacrificially with the most elaborate and solemn rites. This royal sacrifice elevated the king who owned the animal to the supreme position over all his neighbors; for he had demonstrated that he could send his herds to graze as far as they pleased; the world was his grazing ground; no one would dare to interfere. His property, the valor
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| SR No. | 007309 |
| Book Title | Philosophies of India |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Heinrich Zimmer, Joseph Campbell |
| Publisher | Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd |
| Publication Year | 1953 |
| Total Pages | 709 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 34 MB |