Charaka-Samhita — trans. Kaviraj Avinash Chandra Kaviratna

Charaka’s method, and the planting of a large tract of land with such herbs and trees as enter into the composition of the medicines mentioned by Charaka are indispensably necessary and mainly in view, still without going the length of doing so much at the outset we shall at present rest content with a series of popular lectures on particular chapters of Charaka, Susruta &c. There are many Kavirajes in Calcutta who are perfectly competent, by education and experience, to do this. The Ayurvedic Institute offered an excel¬ lent organisation for bringing together such Kavirajes. It offered a good platform from which to address the lay public.

The speaker adverted with regret to another topic. The British Government has done so little for the ancient learning of India, and is really so little acquainted with its ’ ancient medical system, that although millions of people are being cured by that system of treatment, still the Indo-Sanskrit medical system is not recognised as a science. But the real truth will best appear from the opinions, already quoted, of competent judges, Those opinions, it may be confidently asserted, are not dictated by the desire of paying com¬ pliments to a brother physician who is engaged in a laudable undertaking. On the other hand, they are characterised by plain sincerity.

At the conclusion of the address, Babu Kisori Mohan Ganguli addressed the meeting. He said that, there are passages in Charaka whose poetical excellence would challenge admiration. He could quote a few lines from Charaka which really represented the quin¬ tessence of the entire literature of love in the line of poetry or novels that he had read. There is, again, a chapter on the im¬ portance of progeny or offspring the like of which it is difficult to instance in any literature. Emerson has a fine passage on what he does not hesitate to say, the omniscience of the ancients. Their writings teem with illustrations drawn from every branch of know¬ ledge, and every department of human action.

In truth, the Rishis were inspired men. They had “yoga” power, otherwise called “genius” which sees by intuition or the inner light. There are many truths in Charaka which we moderns fondly ■ imagine to be the discoveries of our age. The “Ayurvedic Institute”, by working on the lines laid down, will, it is hoped, achieve impor¬ tant work.

CHA RAKA-SA MH I TA.

p. 859

Hence she should be treated according to the ordinances laid down above.

She should, in especial, be treated in accordance with the ordi¬ nances laid down in respect of food and drink and of rubbing and chafing and washing and bathing with the paste, boiled in oil or dis¬ solved in water (or used otherwise), of the drugs that fall within the classes called Bhautika, Jivaniya, Bringhaniya, and Vatahara.* * * §

It should be remembered that women, after delivery, become empty-bodied in a great measure.fi°o

On the day after the expiration of the tenth night, the mother with the child, should bathe in water mixed with those drugs which fall under the class called ‘sarvagandha’ (all the scents), and into which has been thrown some mustard seeds of the white variety and some wood of Symplocos racemosa.

She should then wear a light and untorn piece of cloth, and a few clean, agreeable, light, and beautiful ornaments.

She should then touch the (usual) auspicious articles.

Next she should worship those deities that are proper to be worshipped at such a time.j

After this she should cause some Brahmanas who have coronal locks, who are clad in white garments, and who are not defective of any limb, to utter benedictions upon her.§

* For an explanation of these terms, vide note to aphorism 57 of this Lesson, ante. As regards Bhautika, it should be here taken as standing for Bhutika (Ptychotis Ajowan, syn. Legusticum Ajowan) and the other articles included in the group called after it. — T.

t What is stated here is this : diseases to which women become subject after delivery are either those which are difficult of cure or those which are incurable ; in other words, such diseases seldom come to them as are easy of cure.

The reason why the diseases of women after delivery become difficult is that the growth or increase of the fcetus produces the inevitable result of attenuating many ingredients of the body. (Increase of one ingredient is followed by the decrease of others). When, again, the fcetus, or, rather, the child, comes out of the womb, various kinds of kletha, and much blood also, come out. The woman becomes empty-bodied. Her vital forces become weakened. Hence any disease that arises then becomes either difficult of cure or incurable. — T