प्राचीन भारत में शिक्षा (डॉ. ए.एस. अल्तेकर - गुरुकुल एवं बौद्ध विहार शिक्षण इतिहास)

II] SOME EDUCATIONAL PRINCIPLES AND POSTULATES 37
supremacy among the gods not to any penance or previous
merit, but to his proper training during his studenthood.¹
A few centuries later we find a patriarch praying that
some of his sons should become good priests, others brave
warriors and the rest successful merchants (S. Br., X.4.1.10).
Obviously he did not much believe in heredity and held
that a good deal depended upon proper training and
education.
Karman Theory; Growing Faith in Nature: In
the course of time, however, the supreme confidence that
was placed in nurture began to weaken to a great
extent. When the Aryans settled down in a less
spectacular and more peaceful life and began to
investigate more carefully the phenomena of life around
them, they began to feel that man is not entirely an
architect of his own fortune, and that the powers and
capacities with which he is born determine the scope of
his prospects and activity to a considerable extent. The
doctrines of Karman and Rebirth, which were unknown
in the Vedic age, became universally accepted in the course
of time, swinging the pendulum considerably in favour of
nature as against nurture. It began to be averred that the
deeds (Karman) in previous lives, rather than the training
in the present one, will determine whether our intellect is to
be bright² and moral propensities strong. The development
of the caste system on hereditary lines did not strengthen
the hands of the advocates of nurture; it began to be
argued that the efficiency of a person as a priest or a
warrior does not so much depend upon the training he
receives in this life as upon the inherent qualities with
which he is born as a consequence of his Karman in

1. इन्द्रो ह ब्रह्मचर्येण देवेभ्यः स्वराभवत् । V. 1. 19.
   2, बुद्धिः कर्मानुसारिणी ।