Page:Agastya in the Tamil land.djvu/94

Rh procedure called "the Occam's Razor." Where one hypothesis is sufficient to explain adequately a number of observed facts, it is a vicious scientific procedure to formulate more than one hypothesis for the same purpose. Applying this principle to the phenomenon of many Agastyas appearing in the history of different countries and at different times, are we to go on assuming the existence of separate Agastyas for each country and for each century? Or are we to ascribe the whole phenomenon to a common psychological characteristic of the races concerned—the strong tendency to hero-worship ingrained in them? It is very likely that the first Agastya was a historic character but the subsequent Agastyas were all the result of popular imagination catching hold of an ancient hero and spinning round him all sorts of stories. Where such a solitary hypothesis as this is sufficient to account for all the facts of the case, is it not a violation of legitimate scientific procedure to go on creating Agastyas ad libitum to suit the multiplicity of historical circumstances turning up? If anywhere, here it is that the necessary pruning, insisted upon by the old Logician, should be effected.

The following observations of Mr. Bhagabat Kumar Goswami made in the introduction (pp. xxxii-xxxiii) of his work, the Bhakti Cult in Ancient India, will, I think, be of interest as bearing upon the pruning he attempts to do in the case of Vyāsa:—

"Whenever a new system of thought arose in Hindustan, it was not only sought to be based upon some teaching of the Vedas but the name of Vyāsa was generally sought to be connected with the department of thought some way or other while the names of the Vedic seers themselves were utilised for similar purposes wherever necessary and possible. This was specially the case after the Buddhistic onslaught on Vedicism. Vyāsa then figured as a writer of philosophical commentary Yogabhasya, an author of a philosophical system, Brahma Sūtra, an author of a Smṛti system, Vyāsa Smṛti, a writer on polity, a writer on Astrology. He was again claimed as the author of all the Purāṇas and to crown all, the author of the whole of the greatest