1892.] V. A. Smith —On tlce Civilization of Ancient India. 71 
triangle ascribed by the Greeks to Pythagoras, and even to attempts at 
the quadrature of the circle. 
In connection with this subject, L. v. Schroder has recently (in 
1884) maintained the pi*oposition that this very theorem was borrowed 
along with other things by Pythagoras from India. 
But nothing is known concerning the date of the S'ulvasutra, which 
is itself only an appendix to one of the so-called S'rautasutras of the 
Yajur Veda. Pythagoras is generally assumed to have flourished be¬ 
tween B. C. 540-500, and this is rather an early period in which to 
suggest importation from India. 
It is in reality unnecessary in this case to adopt the hypothesis of 
borrowing at all, for it is quite possible that correct mathematical results 
may be attained independently in different places. The definite rules 
of the S'ulvasutra were elaborated as the result of practical experience. 
It should further be observed that the S'ulvasutra has remained quite iso¬ 
lated in India, and has, according to all appearance, undergone no 
further development. We shall come later to the consideration of the 
supposed studies of Pythagoras in India. 
Indian medicine also appears not to have been uninfluenced by 
Greek. The tendency of early writers was to exaggerate the high 
antiquity of medical science in India. Haas has gone too far in the 
other direction in supposing the Susruta to have been subject not only 
to Greek but to Muslim influence, though it is possible that some modern 
works of Indian medicine may have been affected by Muhammadan 
teaching. Rudolf Roth has shown in an interesting way the relation 
between the Asclepiad oath and the teaching of the Charaka concerning 
the duties of the physician. The identity of the doctrine of the three 
humours is obvious. Should further coincidences of the kind be estab¬ 
lished, chronology, at any rate, will oppose no obstacle to the deriva¬ 
tion of the Indian doctrines from Greek sources. 
So far as concerns philosophy, and religious ideas, which in India 
are hardly separable from it, the statements of the Greek authors leave 
no doubt that the Indian ascetics, yuyuvoo-o</>i<7Tai, v\o/3lol made a deep 
impression on Alexander and his companions. The voluntary burning of 
Kalanos at Athens aroused a feeling of profound, but at the same time, 
compassionate astonishment. Nor is any doubt possible that the doc¬ 
trines of the Alexandrian Neo-Platonists and Neo-Pythagoreans, especi¬ 
ally the doctrines of Philo of Alexandria, and the doctrine of the Aoyos 
derived from him as given in St. John’s Gospel, bear Indian features, 
or rather appear to have been impregnated with Indian ideas. 
But to go back to still earlier times, and to derive the Pythagorean 
doctrine of metempsychosis also from India appears to me, on the 
contrary, to be doubtful. 
