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A
man should therefore pay regard to the place, to the time, and to the practice which is to be
carried out, as also as to whether it is agreeable to his nature and to himself, and then he may
or may not practise these things according to circumstances. But after all, these things being
done secretly, and the mind of the man being fickle, how can it be known what any person
will do at any particular time and for any particular purpose.
Footnotes
1
This practice appears to have been prevalent in some parts of India from a very ancient time.
The Shustruta, a work on medicine some two thousand years old, describes the wounding of
the lingam with the teeth as one of the causes of a disease treated upon in that work. Traces
of the practice are found as far back as the eighth century, for various kinds of the
Auparishtaka are represented in the sculptures of many Shaiva temples at Bhuvaneshwara,
near Cuttack, in Orissa, and which were built about that period. From these sculptures being
found in such places, it would seem that this practice was popular in that part of the country
at that time. It does not seem to be so prevalent now in Hindustan, its place perhaps is filled
up by the practice of sodomy, introduced since the Mahomedan period.
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