वेदों की प्राचीनता एवं काल-निर्णय / ओरायन (लोकमान्य बाल गंगाधर तिलक - खगोलीय वैदिक शोध)

464 THE ARCTIC HOME IN THE VEDAS.
and that there is no reason why the primitive Aryans should not
be placed on an equal footing with the pre-historic inhabitants of
Egypt in point of culture and civilisation. The vitality and
superiority of the Aryan races, as disclosed by their con-
quest, by extermination or assimilation, of the non-Aryan
races with whom they came in contact in their migrations in
search of new lands from the North Pole to the Equator, if not
to the farther south, is intelligible only on the assumption of a
high degree of civilisation in their original Arctic home; and
when the Vedas come to be further examined in the light of
the Arctic theory, we may certainly expect to discover therein
many other facts, which will further support this view, but
which are still hidden from us owing to our imperfect know-
ledge of the physical and social surroundings amidst which the
ancestors of the Vedic Ṛiṣhis lived near the North Pole in
times before the Glacial epoch. The exploration of the Arctic
regions which is being carried on at present, may also help us
hereafter in our investigation of the beginnings of the Aryan
civilisation. But all these things must be left to be done by
future investigators when the theory of the Arctic home of the
Aryans comes to be generally recognised as a scientific fact. Our
object at present is to show that there is enough evidence in
the Veda and the Avesta to establish the existence of an Arctic
home in inter-Glacial times; and the reader, who has fol-
lowed us in our arguments, set forth in the preceding pages,
will at once perceive that the theory we have endeavoured
to prove, is based on a solid foundation of express
texts and passages traditionally preserved in the two
oldest books of the Aryan race, and that it is amply forti-
fied by independent corroboration received from the latest
results of the correlative sciences, like Geology, Archæology
Linguistic Palæology, Comparative Mythology and Astronomy.