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10
EDITOR'S PREEACE
The part of my task for which the help of others was most necessary was the collection of MS evidence, which kept dribbling in at all stages of the work and indeed continues to do so even now. At a very conservative antimate, there exist today some 3000 MSS of Bhartrhari. Most of these, being hidden away in private collections, will be destroyed unused by the action of time, air, rain, mice, white ants and all other vermin except scholars. The greatest factor that prevents this material from becoming useful is the sloth and negligence of their owners, who rarely know what they possess but are even mor rarely willing to have their collections examined. In one case, this was due to the fear of losing alchemical formulae which might have been hidden away in the mass of scrap paper by some ancestor; in several other cases, it was due to the fear of titles to property being proved defective by examination of the old bundles. Our public collections, apart from regarding red tape as .ample preservative for the MSS, also leave a great deal to be desired. There are no microfilm facilities; copyists are inaccurate, catalogues misleading; correct information is rarely supplied. It has too often been my unfortunate experience to have to pay from two to ten times as much as the original estimate for scribes' work, at distant centres in India, which did not follow the very simple instructions given nor yielded the information sought. It is a general rule (Kosambi's law!) that the actual use-value of a MS is inversely proportional to the fuss made in lending it.
Under these circumstances, I have to express my special gratitude to those curators, librarians, and private individuals who have helped "So generously in this work; and to the following in particular, P, K, Gode, curator of the Bombay Government MS collection at the Bhandarkar 0. R. Institute not only put all his material at my disposal and gave special facilities for work at the BORI, but used his wide acquaintanceship amony Sanskritists to get MSS from every possible source. His powerful influence produced MSS out of the cumbersome mechanism of our public collections, where I myself could produce nothing more than a faint creak. Dr. H. N. Randle, former Librarian of the India (now Commonwealth Relations] Office Library at London, also went far out of his way to make accessible all his material as well as whatever could be tapped in other British and European collections, by rotograph or direct comparison. To Ācārya Jinavijaya Muni is due more such material, special advice about palaeography, the invitation to publish in this Series, and our simplified orthography. From my friend and former colleague Prof. Dr. V. V. Gokhald (of the Fergusson College, Poona] I have derived the maximum of critical, active, unflagging encouragement. The preparatory expenses - the very sinews of soholarship,
परीक्ष्य सुबहूः स्वयं विविधदेशसंपादिताः करोल्लिखितमातृकाश्चिरतरं विना जामिताम् । विचित्रतरपाठसंग्रह विनोदहर्षोदयो भजत्यमरभारती कविजनौघकामप्रदाम्॥३॥ बहूनि शतकत्रयोदरनिविष्टपद्यान्तराण्यवेक्ष्य गलहस्तिका व्यतरदेष तेषां बहिः। यतः प्रथितभर्तृह्यभिधयान्यसंदृब्धतां विचार्य परिशिष्टतां निरणयद्धि सुध्यग्रणीः॥४॥ अथात्मसुरभारतीपरिचयाभिसंवर्धने प्रशस्यतरमग्रहीच चतुरधीरुपायं ध्रुवम् । तथान्यकविनिर्मितान् रसवतः सुकाव्योत्करान् क्रमेण परिशीलयन् भवतु पण्डिताग्रेसरः॥५॥ धर्मेण प्रेप्सितानन्दधर्मानन्दस्य नन्दनः॥ कोसंबिकुलमूर्धन्यो मयेत्थमभिनन्यते॥६॥
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