Page:A History of Hindu Chemistry Vol 1.djvu/26



scripture has been questioned in the several law-books of the Apastamba, the Vishnu, the Yájñavalkya and the Manu schools, and the practices it sanctions strongly condemned.

As Hindu medicine has seldom been able to shake itself completely free from the influence of magic and alchemy as auxiliaries, physicians, as practicers of the "black art," have been given an inferior position in the legal treatises. The Mahábhárata, reflecting the spirit of the above law-books, regards the physicians as impure. In spite of this "the Atharvan retains in a measure its place by virtue of its profound hold upon popular beliefs, because the Atharvan performs, especially for the king, inestimable services in the injury and overthrow of enemies."

In the A. V., the hymns for the cure of diseases and possession by demons of disease are known as "bhaishajyáni," while those which have for