विष्णु स्मृति (वैष्णव धर्मशास्त्र - नन्दपण्डित कृत वैजयन्ती टीका सहित सटीक)

4 PREFACE.
laws of sandhi have been constantly corrected in the Mantras,
but not elsewhere, where they may be viewed as archaisms. The
numerous analogous and identical passages in the other law-
books have been carefully compared, and have occasionally
determined my choice between the several traditional readings,
but I have very rarely admitted a reading from them, whatever
its intrinsic merits, if I did not find it in one of my texts as well,
or if it was decidedly opposed to Nandapaṇḍita's comment. An
equally sparing use has been made of the numerous quotations
from the Vishṇu-smṛiti to be found in most other commentaries
on law works. Among these, Aparárka's Commentary on
Yájñavalkya-smṛiti (Ap.) has been preferentially used, both on
account of its comparative antiquity, and because it contains a
greater number of quotations from the Vishṇu-smṛiti, than all
the other Dharmanibandhas, I know, taken together. Un-
fortunately Aparárka does not show himself more accurate in
making quotations than Hindu jurists generally are, and among
the passages taken from the Vishṇu-smṛiti are several which he
quotes in confirmation of one doctrine in one place, and in con-
firmation of a totally different doctrine in another place. Readings
found in the works of Aparárka, Vijñáneśvara and Jagannátha
have been substituted for those given by Nandapaṇḍita in four or
five cases, the only important one of which will be found in the
chapter on debts (VI, 38, 39). It remains to add that in
a certain number of mostly quite irrelevant cases Nandapaṇḍita's
readings have been discarded in favour of readings found in MSS.
or prints of one or several among the three classes, simply be-
cause the former seemed decidedly less suitable, or less certain,
than the latter. But while I had from the first been very dis-
trustful of my own discernment in this respect, a repeated exami-
nation of the whole text and commentary has caused me, before
sending this edition to the press, to restore the readings ap-
parently guaranteed by the authority of Nandapaṇḍita even in
several places, where I had rendered different readings in the
translation. It is to this cause that the majority among the