64 Observations on Systems of Indian Philosophy [CH.
original system. Even Sarikara, probably the greatest man of
India after Buddha, spent his life in writing commentaries on the
Brahma-siUras, the U pani
ads, and the Bhagavadgitti.
As a system passed on it had to meet unexpected opponents
and troublesome criticisms for which it was not in the least pre-
pared. Its adherents had therefore to use all their ingenuity and
subtlety in support of their own positions, and to discover the
defects of the rival schools that attacked them. A system as it was
originally formulated in the siitras had probably but few problems
to solve, but as it fought its way in the teeth of opposition of
other schools, it had to offer consistent opinions on other problems
in which the original views were more or less involved but to
which no attention had been given before.
The contributions of the successive commentators served to
make each system more and more complete in all its parts, and
stronger and stronger to enable it to hold its own successfully
against the opposition and attacks of the rival schools. A system
in the siitras is weak and shapeless as a newborn babe, but if
we take it along with its developments down to the beginning
of the seventeenth century it appears as a fully developed man
strong and harmonious in all its limbs. It is therefore not possible
to write any history of successive philosophies of India, but it is
necessary that each system should be studied and interpreted in
all the growth it has acquired through the successive ages of
history from its conflicts with the rival systems as one whole 1.
In the history of Indian philosophy we have no place for systems
which had their importance only so long as they lived and were
then forgotten or remembered only as targets of criticism. Each
system grew and developed by the ulltiring energy of its adherents
through all the successive ages of history, and a history of this
growth is a history of its conflicts. No study of any Indian system
is therefore adequate unless it is taken throughout all the growth
it attained by the work of its champions, the commentators whose
selfless toil for it had kept it living through the ages of history.
1 In the case of some systems it is indeed. possible to suggest one or two earlier phases of the system, but this principle cannot be carried all through, for the supple- mentary information and arguments given by the later commentators often appear as harmonious elaborations of the earlier writings and are very seldom in conflict with them.