* தமிழர் மதம்
37
including their wives and children as their own kindred and made no difference whatever between their own and others. The olden day ascetic thought it a sin to leave his wife and children to mourn over his separation, instead of living with them and guiding them to follow in his footsteps the spiritual path which he pursued. This form of ascetic life led by the ancient Tamils is clearly mentioned in the Tholkappiam and for further details on this point the reader is referred to the Tamil text.
Before closing this subject, one more important point has to be brought to the notice of students who take interest in the study of antiquities. As pointed out before, the ascetic life was peculiar to the Tamils, the theory and practice of yoga being indispensably and closely bound up as much with the virtue of non-killing and abstaining completely from flesh-eating, and drinking, as with the loving worship of Siva, the almighty God of the universe. I need hardly say that this ascetic mode of life, being quite incompatible with the life of the Aryans who were addicted to flesh-eating and drinking, and worshipping deified heroes, could not have originated with them in the remote past, but must have been discovered and brought into use by the ancient Tamil sages as the essential means of holding communion with God and attaining salvation.
Then, the final thirtyfifth section advocates such of the reforms as are necessarily and immediately required to ameliorate the present condition of the Tamilians. The chief of all is that the Tamilians who now allow themselves to be called Sudras or slaves or sons of concubines must understand to what great height their forefathers had risen in social, moral, intellectual, religious and linguistic cultures and to what a bottomless pit of ignorance and illiteracy their descendants have fallen at present and are being down-trodden by the very people who are fattening themselves on their wealth.
In the next place they must realize that the glory of a nation consists in the cultivation they have bestowed and are bestowing on their language and literature and the extreme care with which
