Page:Systems-of-Sanskrit-Grammar-SK Belvalkar.pdf/64

 Systems of Sanskrit Grammar § 41 - ] Beginning with the dim and half poetic speculations of the Brahmanic exegetes, we saw how the science of grammar flowed onward broadening down from precedent to precedent until we reach the age of Yäska who sums up the results achieved by his predecessors and makes his own contribution to the stream. The leap from Yaska to Panini is probably a very great one, but the course of development is, to a large extent, hidden from us--is underground as it were--until it issues in a perfect form in the Ashtadhyayi of Pauini. 56 The subsequent history of the science is marked by three well-defined stages. The first which ends with the Mahabhäshya busies itself with the perfection of Panini's work, adding a rule here, restricting the application of another there, and so on. This period may be charac- terised as the creative stage of the science. This is followed by a period of critical elaboration, the chief work of which consists in giving a precise point to these rules, changing the wording of some for the sake of brevity, of others for including in it a word or two in- advertently left out by the earlier grammarians, or not in vogue in their time; but for the main part in writing vast commentaries on the works of their predecessors so as to explain their intention. This was also the stage when the theory of the paribhashas and jñäpakas was worked out in details. The branching off from the main stem of a separate school, the Chandra, which belongs to this period, is to be explained as due rather to the neces- sities of the times, than to any real split in the domain of the science itself. This period extends roughly to about 1000 A. D. The last stage marks a progressive deterioration in the study of grammar. We have in the first place the rise of a number of new and popular schools of grammar intended to simplify the science for the enlightenment of