6_Glorious_Epochs_of_Indian_History

loo SIX GLORIOUS EPOCHS OF INDIAN HISTORY
army crossed the Narmada in order to march upon the-
Andhras themselves and subdued a corner of Aparantak
(north Konkan). But mindful of the concentrated armed
might of the Andhras, Kanishka dared not attack them. So
he withheld his southern conquests forthwith. Thereafter he
marched with a huge army to oppose the Chinese general who
had invaded his north-Himalayan territories. After a series
of battles, he vanquished even the Chinese general and
annexed the Chinese provinces of Kashgar (Tashkand),.
Chaskand, and Khotan to his empire.
THE TEST OF A NATION'S PROWESS AND ITS
RIGHT TO LIVE
237. The propriety of recounting this whole incident
here is to show clearly that this sudden eruption of the
Saka-Kushans throughout Asia did not convulse India alone;
it discomfited even the then strongly built and well-organised
empire like China too for a time on the battlefield*". But just
as it is tom-foolery, born out of jealousy, to say that the
Chinese nation had been weak throughout all these years and
was never better fitted for anything else than to be rotting
in slavery simply because they suffered temporary defeats
against the Saka-Kushans or at some such other times, it is
equally foolish and jealously blind to say, as some of our
enemies do, that the Indian national life was a series of
defeats. It only shows that they cannot read history
properly.
238. It is not the number of foreign aggressions over
a nation that is the last criterion of deciding its vitality or
virulity or the absence of both, but the query, whether that
nation was destroyed as a result of those aggressions or
whether in the final phase of that national struggle that
nation was able to overcome those foreign aggressions, that
determines a nation's prowess, its vitality and its right to
live.
239. Let us see which of the three, the Sakas, the
Kushans or the Indians, passed this test successfully, and