emancipation. It was thus that the Upani@sad style of expression, when it once came into use, came to possess the greatest charm and attraction for earnest religious people; and as a result of that we find that even when other forms of prose and verse had been adapted for the Sanskrit language, the Upani@sad form of composition had not stopped. Thus though the earliest Upani@sads were compiled by 500 B C., they continued to be written even so late as the spread of Mahommedan influence in India. The earliest and most important are probably those that have been commented upon by S'ankara namely B@rhadâra@nyaka, Chândogya, Aitareya, Taittiriya, Îs'a, Kena, Katha, Pras'na, Mundaka and Mândûkya [Footnote ref 1]. It is important to note in this connection that the separate Upani@sads differ much from one another with regard to their content and methods of exposition. Thus while some of them are busy laying great stress upon the monistic doctrine of the self as the only reality, there are others which lay stress upon the practice of Yoga, asceticism, the cult of S'iva, of Visnu and the philosophy or anatomy of the body, and may thus be respectively called the Yoga, S'aiva, Visnu and S'ârîra Upani@sads. These in all make up the number to one hundred and eight. Revival of Upani@sad studies in modern times. How the Upani@sads came to be introduced into Europe is an interesting story Dâra Shiko the eldest son of the Emperor Shah Jahan heard of the Upani@sads during his stay in Kashmir in 1640. He invited several Pandits from Benares to Delhi, who undertook the work of translating them into Persian. In 1775 Anquetil Duperron, the discoverer of the Zend Avesta, received a manuscript of it presented to him by his friend Le Gentil, the French resident in Faizabad at the court of Shujâ-uddaulah. Anquetil translated it into Latin which was published in 1801-1802. This translation though largely unintelligible was read by Schopenhauer with great enthusiasm. It had, as Schopenhauer himself admits, profoundly influenced his philosophy. Thus he ______________________________________________________________________ [Footnote 1: Deussen supposes that Kausîtaki is also one of the earliest. Max Müller and Schroeder think that Maitrây@anî also belongs to the earliest group, whereas Deussen counts it as a comparatively later production. Winternitz divides the Upani@sads into four periods. In the first period he includes B@rhadâra@nyaka, Chândogya, Taittirîya, Aitareya, Kausîtaki and Kena. In that second he includes Kâ@thaka, Ís'â, S'vetâs'vatara, Mu@ndaka, Mahânârâyana, and in the third period he includes Pras'na, Maitrâya@nî and Mân@dûkya. The rest of the Upani@sads he includes in the fourth period.] 40