358 



Prannath Pandit- — Morals of Kaliddsa. 



[No. 3, 



standing before him as an affectionate mother. The whole was an illusion 

 called up by Nandini to test the sincerity of Dilipa's devotion, and pleased 

 with the result of the ordeal, she asks him to mention any boon, and, as 

 mi^ht be expected, he asks for a son, the founder of a race. Nandini 

 thereupon directs him to improvise a goblet of leaves and quaff her milk. 

 He had at last attained the goal of his long-cherished desires. After 

 toil, danger, and sacrifice, the prize lay within his grasp. What does he 

 do ? He informs her most respectfully that he would rather postpone 

 the consummation till her calf had been satisfied, the quantity sufficient 

 for sacrificial purposes obtained, and the permission of the sage accorded. 

 This is perhaps as high an ideal of self-control as may well be imagined. # 



Domestic Moeality. Sexual Morality, Love.— The ultimate mole- 

 cule of society is not the monad man, but the dual couple. Sexual mora- 

 lity, or the duties of the conjugal relation, comprise therefore the first 

 division of Domestic Morality. The union begins in love, and of that 

 we may be sure of having an abundant supply in the works of Kali- 

 dasa. Indeed wiseacres have been heard to exclaim what else of morality 

 could be expected in them. From the tender regard of Dilipa for his royal 

 spousef to the famished looks with which the latter drinks in the coun- 

 tenance of her husband when returning from the forest where he tended 

 Nandini% ; from the eloquent madness of Pururava to the feeling delusion 

 of the exiled Yaksha ; from the heart-rending dirge of Aja for his beloved 

 Indumati, which makes even the trees shed their tears of nectar, § to the 

 equally moving lament of JRati for her incinerated Kandarpa, which 

 attracts the sympathy of the forest, || there is ample room and space enough 

 to satisfy the most fastidious ideal of conjugal love. When Rati laments 

 the indelible stain which would attach to her for ever, that she had survived 

 her Cupid even for a moment, stain that not even* the self -ignited flames 

 of a Sati's pyre would cleanse,^" and when Sitd reproaches herself with 

 having survived the illusion of llama's decapitated head, which the 

 malignant ingenuity of Havana had conjured up, after she had once 

 believed it to have been true, ## there is a poesy of love that would bear 

 comparison with anything that has been written in different climes or 

 distant ages. 



* Raghu., I. 12—95. II. 1—66. 

 f Raghu., I. 54. II. 3. 

 X Raghu., II. 19. 

 § Raghu., VIII. 44—70; 

 || Kumara Sambhava, IV. 4 — 38. 

 If Kumara Sambhava, IV. 21. 

 ** Raghu., XII. 74, 75, 



