He gives to a woman a life of protection and security from a higher philosophical justification as he thinks that not only the sorrow and happiness of two families depend on their being good and virtuous but as a, woman is to continue the race and hence is the guardian of the race. He indirectly draws our attention to the responsible and important place of a wife in a home.

Women roust particularly be guarded against evil in clinations, however trifling they may appear; for, if they are not guarded, they will bring sorrow on two families. 55 The next two verses, too, 56 declare the same, more emphatically.

In the same context there is a verse that contradicts the above. ‘Women, confined in the house, under trust worthy and obedient servants, are not well guarded but those who, have there own accord, keep guard over them selves, are well guarded’. 57

This evidently contradicts the previous assertion, but we know that the former is the older view; for it is found in the earlier lawgivers, as Baudhayana and Vasishtha; the latter is the later. Kautilya, in his Artha Sastra, speaking of ‘duty towards the harem,’ describes women of the harem as being guarded by ‘eighty men and fifty women under the guise of fathers and mothers, and aged persons‘; and in the same context gives the reason for such a close guard.