Page:A Comparative Grammar of the Modern Aryan Languages of India Vol 1.djvu/57

Rh be marvellous. Such a fact can only be admitted under the following conditions. Either the word in its original Sanskrit form must have been short, strong, and simple, so that it offered no encumbrances to be got rid of, and no difficult combinations to be simplified, such as राजा, जन, कुल, which could not be made easier or simpler than they were: or the Sanskrit word must have embodied some ceremonial, religious, or political idea which has preserved it intact, and apart from the current of general usage, as ब्राह्मण, दर्शन, पूजा; in which case there are often two forms of the same word in existence—the Tatsama form used in a religious or special sense, and the Tadbhava in an ordinary sense; thus, we have दर्शन करना, used to express the act of visiting the shrine of an idol, and देखना, for the general act of seeing. In English the same thing occurs in the case of words derived direct from the Latin, which correspond to the Indian Tatsamas, and the same derived through the medium of the French, which are like Tadbhavas. Thus, we have the Tatsamas legal, regal, hospital, and the Tadbhavas loyal, royal, hotel, both sets of words coming from legalis, regalis, and hospitalis, respectively. In French the instances are still more numerous. A few have been given in § 7.

The excessive number of Tatsamas in Bengali and Oriya, so far from indicating a high standard of preservation, points rather to great poverty in the language. These two forms of speech were in use in the two remotest provinces of the Indian empire. The arts and sciences and the busy movements of the world centred at first in the Antarbed, or country between the Ganges and Jamnâ, and round the great Hindu capitals, such as Dilli, Kanauj, Ayudhya, Kasi, and in later ages round the first-named, by that time corrupted into Delhi, and its twin capital, Agra. In those places, therefore, Sanskrit words expressive of a variety of ideas remained alive, and underwent gradual simplification from constant use. The