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About Google Book Search Google's mission is to organize the world's information and to make it universally accessible and useful. Google Book Search helps readers discover the world's books while helping authors and publishers reach new audiences. You can search through the full text of this book on the web at |http: //books .google .com/I f SIR WILLIAM JONES'S DISCOURSES. SECOND EDITION. r SI!fS.^WT:!LlLI[AM JOSJJKS'S ...^■ ./r4. ^^c/i.'..'^ DISCOURSES DKL1VCBED BKFDRB tS!bt Astatic Sbocttts : AND MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS, ON THE RELIGION, POETRY, LITERATURE, ETC. OF THE NATIONS OF INDIA. BY SIR WILLIAM JONES. WITH AN €008; on W iBsme, %Htntii^ attQ Cliatacter. BY THE RIGHT HON. LORD TBIGNHOUTH. SEIiECTED AND BDITBD BY JAMES ELMES, AUTHOR OF LECTURES ON ARCHITECTURE, IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: PRINTED FOR CHARLES S. ARNOLIT^ TAVISTOCK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. 1824. C. Whiuintrham Clinmrk. TO THE RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF LIVERPOOL, K.G. FIRST EORO OF THE TREASURY, COMMISSIONER FOR THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA, PRIME MINISTER OF THE UNITED KINGDOM, ETC. ETC. ETC. MY LORD, The variety, value, and extent of the talents and character of Sir William Jones, are ac- knowledged wherever the English language is. spoken or understood. The immensity of his literary attainments, his fertile capacity, his great and unerring judgment, his zeal, his patriotism, and his Yi DEDICATION. public services to his country, in the admi- nistration of justice in \yer most important colony, India, are as nniversally acknow- ledged at home as they are felt and valued in our Eastern settlements. His works are a monument of his greatness; and the two volumes of the lighter and more generally interesting parts, the elegit amusements of his leisure hours, selected from his vast store- house of intellect, which your Lordship has permitted me to dedicate to you, are proofs of the brilliancy and versatility of his powers, the blanched purity of his vigorous mind, and the ardent love of his fellow creatures, which so prominently distinguish this illustrious character. It is delightful, instructive, and exhilarating, to follow this great lawyer, unbending from a pursuit which generally requires the entire occupation of the strongest minds, informing, ]>EDICAtIOM Tli amdsiDg, and enlfghfening bis aildiiors and readers wiih discussions 6n law; langaage; the elegant literature of France, Spain and Italy, by turns witb that of Greece and Rome; diving into ' Hebrev with ease and success*^' acquiring the Arabic and Persiaii with an ac* curacy acknowledged by natives to be equal to their own; couTersant wilh the Turkish idiom, and the characters of that singularly constructed language, the Chinese; reading, translating, and writing law, religion and poetry with equal profoundness, sincerity, and elegance. He was a phenomenon in li<* terature, and one of the greatest ornaments of the English name. It is also satisfactoty, if religion requires such consolation, to find this profoundly investigating philosopher, who acknowledges, with our great Newton, that we must not admit more causes of natund * Lord Teigomoath's Discourse. Vlii DEDICATION. « things than those which are true, and suf- ficiently account for natural phenomena*; expressing his firm conviction of the trnth of our national religion f. He was in short, my Lord, in literature, what Rafiaelie was in art. Like that justly celebrated painter, he was distinguished by the precocity of his intellect, by the elegance of his manners, by the goodness of his heart, and by the cultivation of the minor graces of society. Like that great' man also, he was cut off in the spring and vigour of his life ; and like him too, his name will be as immorr tal as language, and as great an ornament to 'Eqglandy as H^ffi^cilQ is to Italy, Your Lordship has had the gratification of having pursued a liberal policy in the govern- • Vol. 11. p. 3. t Vol. I. pp. 145, 146. DEDICATION. IX ment of a nation of which Sir William Jones was a native, with a continued perseverance under clouds of apparently appalling difficul- ties, which have terminated in a success as brilliant as any in our history, and most aptly illustrative of your Lordship's family motto, Palmatn ngn sine pvlvere. The part which your Lordship has taken in all the public measures of the late reign, of the brilliant epoch of the regency, and of the present mo- mentous period, will be amply honoured by the historian, done justice to by posterity, and acknowledged by the most enlightened of your cotemporaries. I did not mean in this dedication to touch upon politics, but it was unavoidable, nor have I said half what I feel: but a Dedica- tion of the Discourses of Sir William Jones, and not flattery, is my object; and whenever your Lordship may retire from the fatigues of X DEDICATION. the public station yoa have so long^ graced, may your private life be gilded with all the happiness and comforts that a long life, a green old age, and the satisfaction of seeing your country safe from the storms of a con- Tujsed age, can render you. I have the honour to be, Your Lordship's obliged and very obedient servant, JAMES £LM£S. 29, Charlotte Street, Portland Place, Aogast 12th, 1831. ADVERTISEMENT. Jiv preparing that course of Lectures on Architec- iqre, which I delivered last winter at the Aussel and Surrey Institutions of London, and this spring at the Philosophical Society of Birmingham, the architecture and antiquities of India naturally came under my investigation ; and led me to cou- solty among other writings, the voluminous and phi- losophical works of Sir William Jones. Perceiving in these interesting and delightful volumes, gems of the rarest kind, scattered among discussions of the severest nature, I was led to wish a selection of his Discourses and lighter works, separated from those connected with law, jurisprudence, physiology and other graver and more important investigations. This selection I proposed to my Publisher, and the result of our discussions and agreement are the two volumes which I have now the happiness of pre- senting to the Public, coiyointly with him. These volumes will, I trust, be accepted as an addition of no common order, to the lighter and more elegant specimeos of English literature. With the lately collected Letters of the same emi- nent character, with the beautiful Discourses of Sir Xii ADVERTISEMENT. Joshua Reynolds, and with other elegant £oglish classical works recently published, of the same size, will these Discourses and Papers be suitable com- panions. I originally intended to have written a brief life of this illustrious man, but it is done so well by Lord Teignmouth in the complete collection of his works, that I preferred referring the reader of this selection to that memoir, and substituting, in its stead, his Lordship*s eloquent Discourse* on the Name, Character, and Talents of Sir William Joneis', which rivals for beauty of composition, and truth of statement, any of tlie beautiful eloget of the French ^ to that of intruding any thing of my own. The unbounded pleasure which I have received in the selection and compilation of these two vo- lumes, and the satisfaction which I feel in present- ing their elegant and profound contents to my countrymen, are rewards that infinitely compensate whatever labour they have required of me. J. E. London, Aug. 12, 1821. • See Vol. II. pp. 55, 56, et leq. SIR WILLIAM JONES'S DISCOURSES. DISCOURSE L IBcnittrcty Bt tl^c Opening of tj^e lU^atic Sodctfi, FEBRUAIIT 84, 1784. ImportSDce of Ada in the hiatory of mankind — AdvaDtagea to be derived from coitiviitiog its history, aniiqnitiea, &c.— Hints for the foondaiion of the Society's objects and foiure views. GBHTLEMEW, Vr HEN I was at sea last Angust, on my voyage to this country, which I had long and ardently desired to visit, I found one evening, oh inspecting the ob- servations of the day, that India lay befora ns, and Persia on our left, whilst a breeze from Arabia blew nearly on our stem. A situation so pleasing in itself, and to me so new,coald not Tail to awaken a train of reflections in a mind which had early been accustomed to contemplate with delight the eventful liistorirs and agreeable fictions of this eastern world. It gave me inexpressible pleasure B Sir WILLIAM JON£S*S to find myself in the midst of so noble an amphi- theatre, almost encircled by the vast regions of Asia, which has ever been esteemed the narse of sciences, the inventress of delightful and useful arts, the scene of glorious actions, fertile in the produc- tions of human genius, abounding in natural won- ders, and infinitely diversified in the forms of reli- gion and government, in the laws, manners, ciutoms, and languages, as well as in the features ^iro com- plexions of men. I could not help remarking how important and extensive a field was yet unexplored, and how many solid advantages unimproved: and when I considered, with pain, that, in this fluctna- ting, imptf feet, and limited condition of life, such inquiries and improvements could only be made by the united efforts of many, who are not easily brought, without some pressing inducement or strong Impulse, to converge in a common point, I consoled myself with a hope, founded on opinions, which it might have the appearance of flattery to mention, that, if in any country or community such an union could be effected, it was among my coun- trymen in Bengal; with some of whom I already had, and with most was desirous of having, the plea- sure of being intimately acquainted. Yoh have realized that hope, gentlemen, and even ainticipated a declaration of my wishes, by your alacrity in laying the foundation of a Society for inquiring into the History and Antiquities, the Na- tural Productions, Arts, Sciences, and Literature of Asia. I may confidently foretell, that an institution so likely to afford entertainment, and convey know- ledge to mankind, will advance to maturity by slow, yet certain, degrees; as the Royal Society, whicb^ 1. . DiscouasBS. 3 at first, was only a meetini^ of a few literary friends at Oxford, rose gradually to that splendid zenith, at which a Halley was their secretary^ and a Newton their president. Althoagfa it is my humble opinion, that, in order to ensure our success and permanence^ we must keep a middle course between a languid remissness and an over zealous activity, and that the tree, which yon have auspiciously planted, will produce fairer blossoms, and more exquisite fruit, if it be not at first exposed to too great a glare of sunshine, ye^ I 4ake the lil>erty of submitting to ^our consideration a few general ideas on the plan of our Society ; assuring you, that, whether ydu reject or approve 4hem, your correction will give me both pleasure and instruction, as your flaitering attentions have already conferred on me the highest honour. It is your design, 1 conceive, tdjj^ke an ample space for your learned investigatio4y^o*'°d>'iS ''^■■^ only by the geographical limits or Asia; so that considering Hindustan as a centre, and turning your eyes in idea to the north, you have on your right many important kingdoms in the eastern peninsula; the ancient and wonderful empire of China, with all her Tartarian de^^^encies; and that of Japan, with the cluster of t^recious islands, in which many singular curiosities have too long been concealed; Before you lies that prodigious chain of mountains which formerly perhaps were a barrier against the violence of the sea; and beyond them the very in- teresting country of Tibet, and the vast regions of Tartary, from which, as from the Trojan horse of the poets-, have issued so many consummate warriors, whose domain has extended at least from the banki 4 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S of the Ilissm to the months of the Ganges. On your left are the beautiful and celebrated provinces of Iran, or Persia; the unmeasured, and, perhaps, un- measurable deserts of Arabia ; and the once flourish- ing kingdom of Yemen, with the pleasant isles that the Arabs have subdued or colonized : and farther westward, the Asiatic dominions of the Turkish sultans, whose moon seems approaching rapidly to its wane. By this great circumference the field of your useful researches will be enclosed: but, since Egypt had unquestionably an old connexion with this country, if not with China ; since the language and literature of the Abyssinians bear a manifest affinity to those of Asia; since the Arabian arms preYailed along the African coast of the Mediterra- nean, and even erected a powerful dynasty on the continent of Europe; you may not be displeased occasionally to follow the streams of Asiatic learn- ing a little beyond its natural boundary. And if- it be necessary or convenient that a short name or epithet be given to our Society, in order to distin- guish it in the world, that of Asiatic appears both classical and proper, whether we consider the place or the object of the institution; and preferable to Oriental, which is, in truth, a word merely relative, and though commonly used in Europe, conveys no very distinct idea. If now it be asked what are the intended bl\ject8 of our inquiries within these spacious limits, we an«- swer, Maft and Natcre; whatever is performed by the one, or produced by the other. Human knowledge has been elegantly analysed according to the great faculties of the mind, memory^ reason^ and imaginatiouy which we constantly find employed in 1. DISCOURSES, 5 arranging and retaining, comparing and distinguish- Sng, combining and diversifying, the ideas which we receive through our senses, or acquire by reflection ; hence the three main branches of learning are his^ titry^ sciencey and art. The first comprehends either an account of natural productions, or the genuine records of empires and slates ; the second embraces the whole circle of pure and mixed mathematics, together with ethics and law, as far as they depend on the reasoning faculty ; and the third includes all the beauties of imagery, and the charms of inven- tion, displayed in modulated language, or represent- ed by colour, figure, or sound. Agreeably to this abalysis, you will investigate whatever is rare in the stupendous fabric of nature; will correct the geography of Asia by new obser- vations and discoveries ; will trace the annals, and even traditions, of those nations, who, from time tQ time have peopled or desolated it ; and will bring to light their various forms of government, with their institutions civil and religious. You will examine their improvements and methods in arithmetic and geometry, in trigonometry, mensuration, mechanics, optics, astronomy, and general physics ; their sys- tems of morality, grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic $ their skill in chirurgery and medicine; and their advancement, whatever it may be, in anatomy and •chemistry. To this you will add researches into their agriculture, manufactures, trade; and, whilst you inquire with pleasure into their music, architect ture, paiintihg, and poetry, will not neglect tho86 inferior arts by which the comforts, and even ele^ giincies of social life are supplied or improved. Yon inayt observe that I have omitted their languages, the 6 SIR H^ILLIAM JONB8*8 dWenity and difficulty of which are a sad obstacle* to the progreffii ~«f usefal knowledge; but I have ever considered langaages as the mere instnimentB of real learning, and think them improperly con- founded with learning itself: the attainment of them is, however, indispensably necessary ; and if to the Persian, Armenian, Turkish, and Arabic, conld be added not only the Sanscrit, the treasures of which we may now hope to see unlocked, but even the Chinese, Tartarian, Japanese, and the various insu- lar dialects, an immense mine would then be open, in which we might labour with equal delight and advantage. Having submitted to yon these imperfect thoughts on the litttit3 and objtcU of our future Society, I re* quest your permission to add a few hints on the conduct of it in its present immature states Lucian begins one of his satirical pieces against historians with declaring, that the only true propo* sition in his work was, that it should contain nothing true: and, perhaps it may be advisable at first, in order to prevent any difference of sentiment on par^ ticular points not immediately before us, to establish but one rule, namely, to have no rules at a}l. This only I mean, that in the infancy of any society^ there ought to be no confinement, no trouble, no ex* pense, no unneciinsary formality. Let us, if you please, for the present, have weekly evening meet- ings in this hall, for the purpose of hearing original papers read on such subjects aa fall within the circle of our inquiries. Let all curious and learned men be invited to send their tracts to our secretary, for which ,th^ ought immediately to receive our thanks s and if, towards the end of each year, we should be I> msCOURSBB. 7 HuppUed with a sufllciency of valaable materials to fill a Yolume, let us present our Asiatic miscellany to the literary world, who have derived to much pleasure and information from the agreeable work of Kcempfer, than, which we can scarce propose a better model, that they will accept with eagerness any fresh entertainment of the same kind. You will not, perhaps, be disposed to admit mere tran^ lations of considerable length, except of such un- published essays or treatises as may be transmitted to us by native authors : but whether 3'ou will enrol as members any number of learned natives, you will hereafter decide, with many other questions, as they happen to arise : and yon will think, I presume, that all questions should be decided, on a ballot, by a majority of two thirds ; and that nine members should be requisite to constitute a board for such decisions. Tliese points, however, and all others, I submit entirely, gentlemen, to your determination, having neither wish nor pretension to claim any more than my single right of suffrage. One thing only, as essential to your dignity, I recommend with earnestness, on no account to admit a new member, who has not expressed a voluntary desire to become so; and in that case you will not require, I suppose, any other qualification than a love of knowledge, and a zeal for the promotion of it. Tour institution, I am persuaded, will ripen of itself; and your meetings will be amply supplied with interesting and amusing papers, as soon as the object of your inquiries diall be generally known. There are (it may not be delicate to name them, but there are) many from whose inyportant studies I cannot but conceive high expectations. 8 SIR WILLIAM JOKBS*8 And, as far as mere labour will aTail, T sincerely prombe that, if, in my allotted sphere of jurispru- dence, or in any intellectual excursion that I may have leisure to make, 1 should be so fortunate as4o collect by accident, either fruits or flowers which may seem valuable or pleasing, 1 shall offer my hum- ble N*tr to your Society with as much respectful zeal as to the greatest potentate on earth. D1SC0UR8BS. 9 DISCOURSE II. DELIVERED FEBRUARY 24, 1785. Con'gratnl%tions at the snccess of the ioititotion.— Reflection! on the history, laws, manners, arts, and antiqaities of Asia.— Parallel between the works and actions of the western and eastern world. — The botany, medicine, chemistry, fine and liberal arts, poetry, architecture, sciences, Jurisprodence, &c. of the Asiatics considered.— ContribntionS and desiderata pointed out. 6SNTLEMEN, If the Deity of the Hindus, by whom all their just requests are betieved to be granted with singular in- dulgeQce, had proposed last year to gratify my warmest wishes, I could have desired nothing more ardently than the success of your Institution ; be» cause I can desire nothing in preference to the ge* neral good, which your plan seems calculated. to promote, by bringing to light the many useful and interesting tracts, which, being too short for separate publication, might lie many years concealed, or^ peihaps irrecoverably perish. My wishes are accom- plished, without any invocation to Csimadhenn $ and your Society, having already passed its infant state, is. advancing to maturity with every mark of a healthy and robust constitution. When I reflect, indeed, on the variety of subjects which have been discussed before you, concerning the history, laws, b2 10 SIR WILLIAM JOMES*S manners, arts, and antiquities of Asia, I am nnable to decide whether my pleasure or my surprise be the greater i for I will not dissemble, that your progress has far exceeded my expectations; and though we must seriously deplore the loss of those excellent men who have lately departed from this capital, yet there is a prospect still of large contributions to your stock of Asiatic learning, which, 1 am persuaded, will continually increase. My late journey to Be- nares has jena bled me to assure you, that many of your members, who reside at a distance, employ a part of their leisure in preparing additions to your archives ; and unless I am too sanguine, you will soon receive light from them on several topics en- tirely new in the republic of letters. It was principally with a design to open sources of such information, that I long had meditated an expedition np the Ganges during the suspension of my business ; but, although I had the satisfaction of visiting two ancient seats of Hindu superstition and literature, yet, illness having detained me a conside- rable time in the way, it was not in my power to continue in them Ipog enough to pursue my inquiries ; and I left them, as iGneas is feigned to have left the shades, when his guide made him recollect the neift flight of irrevocable time, with a curiosity raised to the height, and a regret not easy to be described. Whoever travels in i^sia, especially if he be coc- vefisaiit with the literature of the countries through which he. passes, must naturally remark the supe- riority of European talents. The observation, in- deed, is at least as oldas AlMander: And though we cannot agree with the sage preceptor of that ambitious Prince, that " the Asiatics are born to 2. DI6COURRE9. 11 be slaves,'* yet the Athenian poet seems perfectly in ' the right, when he represents Europe aa a sovereign PrincesSf and Jiia as her Handmaid : Bat, if the. mistress be transcendently .majestic, it cannot be denied that the attendant has many beauties, and some advantages peculiar to herself. The ancients were aoeiistomed to pronounce panegyrics on their own countrymen at the expense of all other nations, with a political view, perhaps, of stimulating them by praise, and exciting them to still greater exertions: tint such arts are here unnecessary ; nor would they indeed become a Society who seek nothing but truth unadorned by rhetoric ; and, although we must be conscious of our superior advancement in all kinds of useful knowledge, yet we ought not therefore to contemn the people of Asia, from whose researches into nature, works of art, and inventions of fancy, many valuable hints may be derived for our own improvement and advantage. If that indeed, were not the principal object of your institution, little else could arise from it but the mere gratification of curiosity ; and I should not receive so much de- light from the humble share which you have allowed me to take in promoting it. To form an exact parallel between the works and actions of the Western and Eastern Worlds, would require a tract of no inconsiderable length ; but we may decide on the whole, that reason and taste are the grand prerogatives of European minds, while the Asiatics have soared to loftier heights in the sphere of imagination^ The civil history of their vast empires, and of India in particular, must be highly interesting to our common country ; but w^ have a still nearer- interest in knowing all former nodej) of ruling these inestimable pravMceSf on the 12 SIR WILLIAM J01IBS*S prosperity of which so much of our nationa] welfare aod individual benefit seems to depend. A minute geographical knowledge, not only of Bengal and Bahar, but, for evident reasons, of all the kingdoms bordering on them^ is closel}' connected trith an ac- count of their many revolutions; but the natural productions of these territories, especially in the vt» getabU and mineral systems, are momentous oli^ects of research' to an imperial^ bnt, which is a character of equal dignity, a commercial people. If botany may be described by metaphors drawn from the science itself, we may justly pronounce a minute acquaintance with plants^ their classes, orders, kinds, and species, to be itsjlowers f which can only produce fruit by an application of that knowledge to the purposes of life, particularly to diet, by which diseases may be avoided ; and to medicine, by which they may be remedied. For th6 improvement of the laot mentioned art, than which none surely can be more beneficial to mankind, the virtues of minerals also should be accurately knownj So highly has medical skill been prized by the an* cient Indians, that one of the fourteen Retnd*8, or precious things, which their gods are believed to have produced b^ churning the ocean with the moun- tain Mandara, was a learned physician. What their old books contain on this subject we ought certainly to discover, and that -without loss of time ; lest the venerable but abstruse language in which they are composed, should cease to be perfectly intelligible even to the best educated natives, through a want of powerful invitation to study it Bernier, who was himself of the faculty, mentions approved medical books in Sanscrit, and cites a few aphorisms which anni>ar Judicious and rational $ but we can expect 2. UISCOUR8E9. IS ttothing so important from the works of Hindu or Muselman physicians, as the knowledge, which ex* perimce most have given tliem, of nimpU medicines. I have seen an Indian prescription of fifttf-fowt and another Of fifty-Hx ingretiients ; but socii compo- sitions are always to be suspected, since the effect .of one ingredient may destroy that of another; and it were better to find certain accounts of a single leaf or berry, than to be acquainted with the most elaborate compounds, unless they too have been proved by a multitude of successful experiments. Thf noble deobstment oil, extracted from the eranda nut, the wliole family of BaUamst the incomparable stomachic root from Golumbo, the fine astringent ridiculously called Japan earth, but in truth pro- duced by the decoction of nn Indian plant, have long been used in Asia; and who can foretell what glorious discoveries of otiier oils, roots, and salutary juices may be made by your Society? If it be doubtful whetlier the Peruvian bark be aUcays efficacious in thb country, its place may, perhaps, be supplied by some indigenous vegetable equally anti8epti<^ and more congenial to the climate. Whether any treatises on Agriculture have been written by experienced natives of these provinces^ I am not yet informed ; but since the court of Spaiu expect td find useful remarks in an Arabic tract preserved in the Escurial, on the cultivation of land in that kingdom^ we should inquire for similar com- positions, and examine the contents of such as we can procure. The sublime science of Chemistry, which I was on the point of calling divine, must be added as a key to the richest treasures of nature i and it is im- ftfC^i^^^tJ^- - .>i m «w«»»> f »«'-«*^ 14 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S possible to foresee how greatly it may improve oar ' manufactures, especially if it can fix tliose brilliant dpet, which want nothing of perfect beauty hat a longer continuance of their splendour i or how far it may lead to new methods o^ fluxing and eompound- ing metals, which the Indians, as well as the Chinese, are thought to have practised in higher perfection than ourselves. In those elegant arts which are called fine and liheraly though of less general utility than^he labours of the mechanic, it is really wonderful how moch a single nation b^ excelled the whole world : I mean (he ancient Ghreeks, whose sculpture, of which we have exquisite remains, both on gems and on marble, no modem tool can equal $ whose architecture we can only imitate at a servile distance, but are un- able io teake one addition to it, without destroying its graceful simplicity ; whose poetry still delights us in youth, and amuses us at a matnrer age; and of whose painting and music we have the concurrent relations of so many grave authors, that it would be strange incredulity to doubt their excellence. Paint' ing, as an art belonging to the powers of the imagi- nation, or what is commonly called genius, appears to be yet in its infancy among the people of th« east : but the Hindu system of music has, I believe, been formed on truer principles than our own ; and all the skill of the native composers is directed to the great object of their art, the natural expression of strong passions, to which melody, indeed, is often sacrificed ; though some of their tunes are pleasing «ven to an European ear. Nearly the same may be tro^f asserted of the Arabian or Persian system; and, by a correct explanation of the best books oa i, DISCOURSES. 15 that rabject, mnch of the old Grecian theory may probably be recovered. The poetical works of the Arabs and Persians, which differ surprisingly in their style and form, are here pretty generally known; and though tastes, concerning which there can be no disputing, are divided in regard to their merit, yet we may safely say of them, what Abulfazl pronounces of the Ma- h&bh&rat, that, ** altbongh they abound with extra- vagant images and descriptions, they are in the highest degree entertaining and instructive." Poets of the greatest genius, Pindar, iEschylns, Dante, Petrarch, Shakespeare, Spenser, have most abound- ed in images not far from the brink of absurdity ; but, if ttieir luxuriant fancies, or those of Abulola, Firdausi, Niz^mi, were pruned away at the hazard of their strength and majesty, we should lose many pleasures by the amputation. If we may form a just opinion of the Sanscrit poetry from the speci- mens already exhibited (though we can only judge perfectly by consulting the originals), we cannot but thirst for the whole work of Vyasa, with which a member of our Society, whose presence deters me from saying more of hlro, will in due time gratify the public. The poetry of Mathura. which is the Parnassian land of the Hindus, has a softer and less elevated strain; but, since the inhabitants of the districts near Agra, and principally of the Duab, are said to surpass all other Indians in eloquence, and to have composed many agreeable tales and lore-songs, which are still extant, the Bh^hd, or vernacular idiom of Vraja, in which they are writ- ten;, should not be neglected. No specimens of ge- noioe oratory can be expected from nations, among 16 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S whom the form of goyernment precludes even the idea of popular eloquence ; but the art of .ijrritingy In elegant and modulated periods, has been culti- vated in Asia from the earliest ages ; the Y^da^s, as well as the Alkoran, are written in measured prose; and the compositions of Isocrates are not moro highly polished than those of the best Arabian and Persian authors. Of the Hindu and Muselman architecture 'there are yet many noble remains in Bahar, and some in the vicinity of Malda ; nor am I unwilling to be- lieve, that even those ruins, of which you will,. I trust, be presented with correct delineations, may furnish our own architects with new ideas of beauty and sublimity. Permit me now to add a few words on the sciencesy properly so named; in which it must be admitted, that the Asiatics, if compared with our Western nations, are mere children. One of the most sagacious men in this age, who continues, I hope to improve and adorn it, Samuel Johnson, re- marked in my hearing, that, '' if Newton had flou- rished in ancient Greece, he would have been won- shiped as a divinity." How zealously then would be be adored in Hindustan, if his incomparable writings could be read and comprehended by the Pandits of Cashmir or Benares! I have seen a mathematical book in Sanscrit of the highest an- tiquity; but soon perceived, from the diagrams, that it contained only simple elements. There may, indeed, have been in the favourable atmosphere of Asia, some diligent observers of the celestial bodies; and such observations as are recorded should indis* putably be made public ; but let us not expect anj 2. DISCOURSB8. 17 new tnethodif or the analysis of new ctirtief, from tlie geometricians of Iran, Turkistan, or India. Could (he works of Archimedes, the Newton of Sicily, be restored to their gennine purity by (be help of Arabic versions, we might then have reason (o triumph on the success of our scientifical inqui- ries i or, could (he successive improvements and various rules of algebra be traced through Arabian channels, to which Cardan boas(ed that he had ac- cess, the modern history of Mathematics would receive considerable illustration. The jurisprudence of the Hindus and Mnselmans will produce more immediate advantage; and if some standard lam tracts were accurately translated from (he Sanscrit and Arabic, we might hope in (ime to see so complete a Digest of Indian Laws, that all disputes among the natives might be decided without uncertainty^ which is, in truth, a disgrace, (hough satirically called a glory^ to the forensio science. All these objects of inquiry must appear io you. Gentlemen, in so strong a light, that bare intima- tions ot them -will be sufiicient: nor is it necessary to make use of emulation as an incentive to an ardent pursuit of them : yet I cannot forbear ex- pressing a wish that the activity of the French in the same pursuits may not be superior to ours; and that the researches of M. Sonnerat, whom the court of Yefiailles employed for seven years in these climates, merely io collect such materials as we are peeking, may kindle, instead of abating, our own curiosity and zeal. If you assent, as I flatter my- self you do, to these opinions, you will also concur 10 promoting the object of Ui^ s d & ^^^ ideas tS SIR WILLIAM JONBS'S having presented themseWes to my mind, I presume to lay tbem before you, with an .entire submission to your judgment. No contributions, except those of the literary kind, will be requisite for the support of the So- ciety f but if each of us were occasionally to con- tribute a succinct description of such manuscripts as he had perused or inspected, with their dates, and the names of their owners, and to propose for solu- tion such gaestions as had occurred to him concerning Asiatic Art, Science, aud History, natural or civil, we should possess without labour, and almost by imperceptible degrees, a fuller catalogue of Oriental books than has hitherto been exhibited; and our correspondents should be apprised of those points to which we chiefly direct our investigations. Much may, I am confident, be expected from the communications of learned nativesy whether lawyers, physicians, or private scholars, who would eagerly, on the first invitation, send us their Mek&m4t and Ris&lahs on a vari^y of subjects ; some for the sake of advancing general knowledge ; but most of them from a de- sire, neither uncommon nor unreasonable, of attract- ing notice, and recommending themselves to favour. With a view to avail ourselves of this disposition, and to bring their latent science under our inspec- tion, it miglit be advisable to print and circulate a short memorial, in Persian and Hindi, setting forth, in a style accommodated to their own habits and prejudices, the design of our institution. Nor would it be improper hereafter, to give a medal annually, with inscriptions in Persian on one side, and on the reverse in Sanscrit, as the prize of merit, to the writer of the best essay or dissertation. To instruct S. D1SCOOR8E8. 10 others, is the prescribed duty of learned Brahmans i and, if they be men of substance, without reward ; but they wooid all be flattered with an honorary mark of distinction $ and the Mahomedans have not only the permission, but the positive command of their law^giver, to iearchfor learning even in the remotest parts of the globe. It were snperfluoos to suggest, with how much correctness and facility their com- positions might be translated for our use, since their languages are now more generally and perfectly nnderstood than^ they have ever been by any nation of Europe. I have detained you, 1 fear, too long by this ad* dress, though it has been my endeavour to reconcile comprehensiveness with brevity. The subjects, which I have lightly slcetched, would be found, if minutely examined, to be inexhaustible ; and, since no limits can be set to your researches, but the boundaries of Asia itself, I may not improperly conclude with wishing for your Society, what the Commentator on the Iaws prays for the constitution of our country, that it majf beperpeiuaL 90 SIR WILLIAM JOMBS*! DISCOURSE III. DELIVERED FEBRUARY 9, 1786. On the Hindai.—Hi8tory of the ancient world.— Etymology, &c. of Che Ariatlcs.— the five principal nations of the contU nent of Asia.— Soorcea of Asiatic wealth.~>rhe langaages, letters, philosophy, religion, aonlptare, architecture, sciences, and arts, of the Eastern nations.— Antiqaity, structure, and description of the Sanscrit language.— Characters of the same.— Of the Indian religion and philosophy.— Chronology of the Hindus.— Of the remains of architecture and sculpture in India.— or the arts and manufactures of Ind(a.'<»lnven- t ions of the Hindus. GENTLEMEN, Iif the former discourses ivbfch I had the honour of addressing to you, on the instttution and objects of our Society, I confined myself purposely to ge> neral topics ; giving in the first a distant prospect of the vast career on which we were entering, and, in the second, exhibiting a more diiTuse, but still superficial sketch of the various dis* coveries in History, Science, and Art, which we might justly expect from our inquiries into the Literature of Asia. I now propose to fill up that outline so comprehensively as tp omit nothing eBsen<> tial, yet so concisely as to avoid being tedious ; and if the state of my health shall suiTer me to continue long enough iq this dimatei^ it is my design, with 3. DISCOURSES. £1 your permisBion, to prepare for out annual meet- ings a series of short dissertations, unconnected in tlieir titles and subjects, but all tending to a com- mon point of no small importance io the pursuit of interesting truths. Of all the works which have been published' in our own age, or, perhaps in any pther, on the His- tory of the Ancient World, and the population of this habitable globey that of Mr. Jacob Bryant, whom I name with reyerence and affection, has the best claim to the praise of deep erudition inge- niously applied, and new theories, happily illus- trated* by an assemblage of numberless Converging rays from a most extensive circumference: it f&lls, neverUieless, as every human work must fall, short of perfection $ and the- least satisfactory part of it seems to be that which relates to the derivation of words from Asiatic languages. Etymology has, no doubt, some use in historical researches; but it is a. medium of proof so very fallacious, that where it elucidates one fact, it obscures a thousand ; and more frequently borders on the ridiculous, than leads to any solid conclusion. It rarely carries with it any tn^erfia/ power of conviction from a resem- blance of sounds or similarity of letters $ yet often, where it is wholly unassisted by those advantages, it may be indisputably proved by extrinsic evidence. "We know d. posteriori, that both fitz and Ayo, by the nature of two several dialects, are derived from Jilius ; that ifnc/« comes from atjuif and stranger from extra; that Jotir is deducible, through the It&lian^ from dies} and rossignol from lusdniai or the singer in groves; that sciurOy icureuil, and squirrel are compounded of two Greek words, de- $9 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S scriptive of the animal ; which etymologies, thoogh they could not have been demonstrate d priorij might seiVe to confirm, if any such cootlnnation were necessary, the proofs of a connexion between the members of one great empire $ but when we derive oar hanger y or short pendant 9Word, from the Persian, because ignorant travellers thus mispel the word khanjar, yfhichf in truth,, means a different weapon,- or sandal-wovd from the Greek, because we suppose that sandals were sometimes made of it, we gain no ground in proving the affinity of nations^ and only weaken arguments which might otherwise be firmly supported. That C6s, then, or, as it cer«> tainly is written in one ancient dialect, C6/, and in others, probably, Cds, enters into the composition of many proper names, we may very reasonably be* lieve I and that Algeziras takes its name from the Arabic word for an island^ cannot be doubted ; but when we are told from Europe, that places and provinces in India were clearly denominated from those words, we cannot but observe, in the first in- stance, that the town in which we now are assembled ^is properly written and pronounced CaUedtH i that both Cdtd and Cia unquestionably mean placet of strength, or, in general, any enclosures; and that Gujerdt is at least as remote from Jezirah in sound as it is in situation. Another exception (and a third could hardly be discovered by any candid criticism) to the AnalyHs of jincUnt Mifthologyy is, that the method of reason* ing, and arrangement of topics, adopted in that learned work, are not quite agreeable to the titte, bat almost wholly synthetical f and, though synthesU may be the better mode in pure science, where the 3. DI6COURSB9. US principles are nndenSable, yet it seems less calcu- lated to give complete satisfaction in Aif/oWcii2. dis- quisitions, where every postnlatum will, periiapsi be refused^ and every definition controverted. This may seem a sliglit ol^jection; but the subject Is in itself so interesting, and the full conviction of *all reasonable men so desirablei that it may not be lost labour to discuss tlie same or a similar theory in a method purely analytical, and, after beginning with facts of general notoriety, or undisputed evidence, to investigate such truths as are at first unknown, or very imperfectly discerned. The jiue principal nations who have in different ages divided among themselves/ as a kind of inhe- ritance, the vast continent of Asia, with the many islands' depending on it, are the Indians, the Chinese, the Tartars, the Arat>s, and the Persians : who they severally were, whence and when they came, where they now are settled, and what advantage a more perfect knowledge of them all may bring to our European world, will be shown, I trust, in Jiue distinct essays; the last of which will demonstrate the connexion or divenity between them, and solve the great problem, whether they had any common origiii, and whether that origin was the tame which we generally ascribe to them. I begin with India; not because I find reason to believe it the true centre of -population or of know- ledge, but because it is the country which we now inhabit, and from which we may best survey the regions around us; as, in popular language, we speak of the rising sun, and of hyaptogreee through the Zodiac^ although it had long ago been imagined, and is now demonstratedi that he is himself the 24 SIR WILLIAM JON£S*8 centre of our planetary system. Let me here pre- mise, that in all these inquiries concerning the His- tory of India, I shall confine my researches down- wards to the Mohammedan conquests at the begin- ning of the eleventh century, but extend them iip« wards, as high as possible, to the earliest authentic records of tlie human species. India then, on its most enlarged scale, in which the ancients appear to have understood it, comprises an area of near forty degrees on each sidCf includ- ing a space almost as large as all Europe ; being divided on the west from Persia by the Arachosian mountains, limited on the east by the Chinese part of the farther Peninsula, confined on the north by the- wilds of Tartary, and extending to the south as far as the Isles of Java. This trapezium, therefore, comprehends the stupendous hills of Potyid or Tibet, the beautiful valley of Cashmir, and all the domains of the old Indoscythians, the countries of N^p&l and But&nt,-C&mrtlp or Asam, together with Siam, Ava, Racan, and the bordering kingdoms, as far as the China of the Hindus, or Sin of the Arabian Geo- graphers : not to mention the whole Western Pen- insula, with the celebrated island of Sinhala, or Lion-lUtt Metiy at its southern extremity. By India, in short, I mean that whole extent of country in which the primitive religion and languages of the Hindus prevail at this day with more or less of their ancient purity, and in which the N4gari letters are still used with more or leas deviation from their original form. The Hindus themselves believe their own country, to which they give the vain epithets of Medhyamn^ or Ctntraly and Punyabhkmiy or the Land of Vir- 3, DISCOURSES. $$ tue9i to have been the portion of Bfaaratj one of the nine brothers, whose father had the dominion of the whole earth; and they represent the mountainaof Himalaya as lying to the north ; and to the west^ those of y indfaya, called also Yindian by the Greeks ; beyond which the Sindhu runs in seTeral branches to the sea, and meets it nearly opposite to the point of Dw^aca, the celebrated seat of their Shepherd God. In the souih-east they ptape the great riyer Saravatya; by which they probably niean that of Ava, called also AirkiBii in part of its course, and giving perhaps its ancient name to the gulf of 8a« bara. This domain of Bharat they consider as the middle of the Jambadwipa, which the TibetiaiHi also call the Land of Zambu ; and the appellation is extremely remarkable, for Jamhu is the Sanscrit name of a delicate fruit, called Jkman by the Musel- mans, and by us rose^pph ; but the largest and richest sort is named Amrita^ or Immortal; and the Mythologists of Tibet apply the same word to a celestial tree bearing ambrosial fruity and adjoining to four vast rocks, from which as many sacred rivers derive their several streams. The inhabitants of this extensive tract are de- scribed by Mr. Lprd with great exactness, and wiih a picturesque elegance peculiar to our ancient lan- guage : *' A people (says he) presented themselves to mine eyes, clothed in linen garments somewliat low descending, of a gesture and garb, as I may say, maidenly and well nigh effeminate, of a coun- tenance shy and somewhat estranged, yet smiling out a glozed and bashful familiarity.'* Mr. Orme, the Historian of India, who unites an exquUite teste for every fine art witk an accurate knowledge c wanAM 1< DNCS'l 'o, Ihal th'u e eariirsl ai ID bU elegant prelt- " conntrf bai be«D itiquitj bj' a people S6 of Asiatic m minsry D1)9< Inhnbilrd from the i nhobave no reseDiblaiicc, cither in their figure or manner, with any of the nations cnnliguoOB to ihemj" and that "allhoDgb conqueron have eslablbhed themcelvPi at difiereni timeB in different parta of India, yet the original inhabitants have lost Ter; rule of their original character." Tlie ancients, ia fad, i^ve > descTiplion of Ihem, which our early (rOTdiera confirmed, and onr own penonai know- ledge of Ihem nearly verifies t a» yoil will p TCeiTe from a passage in the Geographical Poem uf Dio- nyslus, which (he AnitlyBl of Ancient Mythology bag translated with great spirit; " To llie- eait 1 loTcly conntry oiile olfndi, lmlli,whoiFbori1»ilhc>ririi«tinlwiC8, from sonAe UDpolished idiom ; but the basis of the Hindust&Di^ particularly the inflexions and regimen of verbs, differed as t^idely from both those tongues, as Arabic differs from Persian, or German from Greek. Now the general effect of conquest is to leave the current language of the con- quered people unchanged, or very little altered, in its groundwork, but to blend with it a considerable number of exotic names both for things and for ac- tions; as it has happened in every country, that I can recollect, where the conquerors have not pre- served their own tongue unmixed with that of the nativesj.like the Turks in Greece, and the Saxons in. Britain ; and this analogy might induce us to be- lieve, that the pure Hindi, whether of Tartarian or Chaldean origin, was primeval in Upper India, into which the Sanscrit was introduced by conquerors from other kingdoms in some very remote age ; for we cannot doubt that the language of the Veda's was used in the great extent of country which has before been delineated, as long as the religion of Brabm& has prevailed in it. The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure ; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more ex* quisitely refined than either ; yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs, and in the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong, indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three without believing them, to have sprung from some commoo source, which, perhaps, no longer exista There is a similar reason, though not quite so forci- ble^ for supposing that both the Gothic and the Cel- 3. DISCOURSBfl. S9 tic, though blended with a very differcDt idiom, had the same origin with the Sanscrit; and the old Per- sian might be added to the same family, if this were the place for discussing any question concerning the antiquities of Persia. The cliaracteps, in which the languages of India were -originally written, are called N&garf, from Nagara, a city, with the word D6va sometimes pre- fixed, because they are believed to have been taught by the Divinity himself,' who prescribed the arti- ficial order of them in a voice from heavep. These letters, with no greater variation in their form, by the change of straight lines to curves, or conversely, than the Gusick alphabet has received in its way to India, are still adopted in more than twenty king- doms and states, from the borders of Cashgar and Khoten, to Rama's Bridge, and from the Sindhu to the river of Siam. Nor can I help believing, although the polished and elegant D^vandgari may not be so ancient as the monumental characters in the caverns of Jarasandha, that the square Chaldaic letters, in which most Hebrew books are copied, were origi- nally the same, or derived from the same prototype, both with the Indian and Arabian characters. That the Phenician, from which the Greek and Roman alphabets were formed by various changes and in- versions, had a similar origin, there can be little doubt : and the inscriptions at Can^ah, of which you now possess a roost accurate copy, seem to be compounded of N%ari and Ethiopic letters, which bear a close relation to>each other, both in the mode of writing from the left hand, and in the singular manner of connecting the vowels with the conso«> nants. These reiparks may favoor an opinion en*. so trrtainrd bj many, ihal all the ejimbala of BOimif, whicb at first, probably, wrre only rade outlines of the different organg of speecb, bad a common origin. The lymbola of ideal, now ubhI in Cbinaand Japan, and formerly perfaapa in Eg.VpC and Mexico, are qaile of a distinct naiuTPt '"■' it is very remarkable that Ibe order of soandi in the Chtneu grammar! corrrsjionds nearly with Ihal observed in Tibet, and hardly diffrn frnm that which tbe Hiodus coDsider OB the I mention of Ibeirgoda. II. Of Ibe Indian religion and philosophy I idiaU heri^ say but little i becauie a full aciiouni of each ' ftouid require a separate volume. It will be auffi- cienl in tbii dinerlalion to awnme, what might be proved beyond controversy, that ne now live among the adorers of those very deities who were wor- shiped under different names in old Greece and Italy; and among the profeseors of those pfailoso)ihi- cal leneti, wbich the Ionic and Attic writer! illus- trated with all the beauties of their melodious lao- EBage. On one hand we see the trident of Neptnne, the eagle nf Jupiter, the satyrs of Bacchus, the bow of Cnpid, and the chaiiot of the Bung on another we hear the cymbals of Rliea, the songs of tbe Musei,and (he patloral tales of Apollo Nomiui. Id more retired scenes, in groves, and in seminaries of learning, we ma; perceive the Btihmaus and the Sarmancs menlinned by Clemens, disputing in the ■ on the vanity of hu- in eiyoymcijls, on Ibe immortality of the soni, her ' ' - mind, her debasemeni, with her source. The 3. DISCQURBES. 3% physics of the old Academy, the Stoa, the Lyceum $ nor is it possible to read the Y^d&Dta, or the many fine compositions in illustration of it, without be- lieving that Pythagoras and Plato derived their sublime tlieories from the same fountain with the sages of India. The Scythian and Hyperborean doctrines and mythology may also be traced in every part of these eastern regions; nor can we doubt that Wod, or Oden, whose religion, as the northern historians admit, was introduced into Scandinavia by a foreign race, was the same with Buddh, whose rites were probably imported into India nearly at the same time, though received much later by the Chinese, who soften (lis name into FO. This may be a proper place to ascertain an impor- tant point in the chronology of the Hindus ; for the priests of Buddha left in Tibet and China the pre- cise epoch of his appearance, real or imagined, in this empire; and their information, which has been preserved in writing, was compared by tlie Christian missionaries and scholars with our own era. Cou- plet, De Guignes, Giorgi, and Bailly, differ a little in their account of this epoch ; but that of Couplet seems the most correct On taking, however, the medium of the four several dates, we may fix the time of Buddha, or the ninth great incarnation of Vishnu, in the year one thousand and fourteen b&> fore the birth of Christ, or two thousand seven hun- dred and ninety-nine years ago. N^ow the C&sh- mirians, who boast of his descent in their kingdom, assert that he appeared on earth about two centuries after Chrishna the Indian Apollo, who took so de- cided a part in the war of the M&habh4rat ; and, if an. etymologist were to suppose that the Athenians SIR WlLUAM JONES'S had embeHisbed their poetical history of PandioD*8 expulsion, and the restoration of iGgeus, with the Asiatic tale of the P&odus and Yudhishtir, neither of which words they could have articulated, I should not hastily deride his conjecture : certain it is that P4ndiimandel is called by the Greeks the country of Pandion. We have, therefore, determined another interesting epoch, by fixing the age of Chrishna near the three thousandth year from the present time i and, as the three first Avatars, or descents of Vishnu, relate no less clearly to an Universal De- luge, in which eight persons only were saved, than the fourth and fifth do to the puniakmenl of impiety and the humiliation of the proud^ we may for the present assume, that the second, or silver age of the Hindus was subsequent to the dispersion from Babel; so that we have only a dark interval of about a thousand years, which were employed in the settlement of nations, the foundation of states or empires, and the cultivation of civil society* The great incarnate gods of this intermediate age are both named Rima, but with different epithets; one of whom bears a wonderful resemblance to the In- dian Bacchus, and his wars are the subject of several heroic poems. He is represented as a descendant from Sfirya, or the Sun ; as the husband of Sit&, and the son of a princess named Cadseyla. It is very remarkable that the Peruvians, whose Incas boasted of the same descent, styled their greatest festival Ramasitoa; whence we may suppose that South America was peopled by the same race who imported into the farthest parts of Asia the rites and fobulous history of R4ma. These rites, and this history axe extremely curious 9 and although I. iiPiBHHH«B««H«VSHHnVHMHiVII«i«P« 3. DISCOURSES. 33 cannot believe, with Newton, that ancient mytho- logy was nothing but historical troth in a poetical dress; nor with Bacon, that it consisted solely of moral and metaphysical allegories; nor with Bry- ant, that all the heathen divinities are only different attributes &nd representations of the Sun, or of de- ceased progenitor ; but conceive that the whole system of religious fables rose, like the Nile, from severai distinct sources ; yet I cannot but agree that one great spring and fountain of all idolatry, in the four quarters of the globe, was the veneration paid by men to the vast body of fire which ** looks from bis sole dominion like the God of this world ;" and another, the immoderate respect shown to the me- mory of powerful or virtuous ancestors, especially, the founders of kingdoms, legisilators, and warriors, of whom the Sun or the Mo6n were wildly supposed to be the parents. TIL The remains of Architecture and S\;ulpture in India, which I mention here as mere monuments of antiquity, not as specimens of ancient art, seem to prove an early connexion between this country and Africa. The pyramids of Egypt, the colossal statues described by Pausanias and others, the Sphinx, and the Hermes Canis (which last bears a great resemblance to the Var^h&vat&r, or the incarnation of Vishnu in the form of a Boar), indi- cate the style and mytholc^y of the same indefa- tigable workmen ^wbo^ formed' the vast excavations of Can^rah, the various temples and images of Buddha, and the id»U which are continually dug up at Gayd, or ip its vicinity. The letters on many of those monuments appear, as I have before inti- matedy partly of Jndian^and partly of Abyssinian c2 34 SIR WILLIAM Jones's or Ethiopic origin ; and all these indabitabie facto may induce no iil-groiinded opinion, that Ethiopia' and Hindustan were peopled or colonized by the same extraordinary race ; in confirmation of which, it may be added, that the mountaineers of Bengal and Bahar can* hardly be distinguished in some of their features, particularly their lips and noses, from the modem Abyssinians, whom the Arabs call the children of Ctisb. And the ancient Hindus, accord- ing to Strabo, differed in nothing from the Africans* but in the straightness and smoothness of their hair, while that of the others was crisp or woolly ; a dif- ference proceeding chiefly, if not entirely, from the respective humidity or dryness of their atmospheres. Hence the people who received the first light ofthm rising sun^ according to the limited knowledge of the ancients^ are said by Apuleius to be the Arit and Ethiopians, by which he clearly meant certain nations of India; where we frequently see figures of Buddha with curled hair, apparently designed for a representation of it in its natural state. IV. It is unfortunate that the Silpi Sdstra^ or Collection of Treoiisea on Arts and Manufactures^ which must have contained a treasure of useful in*' formation on dying y painting ^ and metallurgy^ has been so long neglected, that few, if any traces of it are to be found ; but the labours of the Indian loom and needle have been universally celebrated ; and fine linen is not improbably supposed to have been called Sindon, from the name of the river near which it was wrought in the highest perfection. The peo- ple of Colchis were also famed for this manufacture ; and the Egyptians yet more, as we learn from se- veral passages in Scripture, and particularly from a beautiful chapter in Ezekiel^ containing the most 3. DISCOURSES. 35 anthentic delineation of ancient commerce, of which Tyre had been tlie principal mart. Silk was fabri- cated immemorially by the Indians, though com- monly ascribed to the peopl« of Serica or Tancut, among whom probably the word Shr, which the Greel^ applied to the silk-vsorm^ signified gold; a sense which it now bears in Tibet. That the Hin- dus were in early ages a commercial people, we have many reasons to believe; and in the first of their sacred law tracts which they suppose to have been revealed by Menu many millions of years ago« we find a curious passage on the legal interest of money, and the limited rate of it in dif" ferent cases, with an exception in regard to adven- tures at sea ; an exception which the sense of man- kind approves, and which commerce absolutely re- quires ; though it was not before the reign of Cbailes I. that our own jurisprudence fully admit- ted it in respect to maritime contracts. We are told by the Grecian writers, that the In- dians were the wisest of nations; and in moral wis- dom they were certainlv eminent. Their Niti SAb- tra, or System of Ethics, is yet preserved ; and the Fables of V ishnuserman, whom we ridiculously rail Pllpay, are the most beautiful, if not the most an- cient collection of apologues in the world. They were first translated from the Sanscrit in the sixth century, by the order of Buzerchumihr, or Bright as the Sun, the chief physician, and afterwards Vezfr, of the great Antishirevan, and are extant under vari- ous names in more than twenty languages ; but their original title is Hit6pad^sa, or Amicable In- struction : and, as the very existence of ^sop, whom the Arabs believe to have been- an Abyssinian, ap- pearv rather doubtful, I am not disinclined to sup- 36 SIR WiLLf AM JONES'S pose that the first moral fables which appeared in Europe were of Indian or Ethiopian origin. The Hindus are said to have boasted of three in- ventions, all of which, indeed, are admirable ; the method of instnicling by Apologuee; the decimal Scale, adopted now by all civilized nations ; and the game of Chess, on which they have some curious treatises : but, if their numerous works on Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric, Music, all which are extant and accessible, were explained in some language gene- rally known, it would be found that they had yet higher pretensions to the praise of a fertile and in- ventive genius. Their lighter poems are lively and elegant ; their epic, magnificent and sublime in the highest degree. Their Pur4na*8 comprise a series of mythological Histories, in blank verse, from the Creation to the supposed incarnation of Buddha: and their Y^das, as far as we can judge from that compendium of them which is called Upanishat, abound with noble speculations in metaphysics, and fine discourses on the being and attributes of God.^ Their most ancient medical book, entitled Chereca, is believed to be the work of Siva : for each of the Divinitit s in their Triad has at least one sacred composition ascribed t« him. But as to mere humaa works on History and Geography, though they are said to be extant in Cashmfr, it has not been yet in my power to procure them. What their astronomi- cal and mathematical writings contain, will not, I trust, remain long a secret: they are easily pro- cured, and their importance cannot be doubted. The philosopher whose works are said to Include a System of the Universe, founded on the principle of attraction and the central Position of the Sun, is named Yavan Achikrya, because he had traveled^ 3. DTSCOURtES. 97 we are told, into Ionia. If this be true, he might have been one of those who conversed with Pytha- goras. This at least is undeniable, that a book on Astronomy in. Sanscrit bears the title of Yayana J&tica, which may signify the Ionic Sect. Nor is it improbable that the names of the Planets and Zodi- acal Stars, which the Arabs borrowed* from the Greeks, but which we find in the oldest Indian records, were originally devised by the same ingeni- ous and enterprising race, from whom both Greece and India were peopled ; the race who, as Dionysius describes them, -* first assayed the deep. And wafted merchandise to coasts nnknown. Those who digested firtt the starry choir, Their motions mark'd, and call'd them by their names.' Of these cursory observations on the Hindus, which it would require volumes to expand and il- lustrate, this is the result ; that they had an imme- , mortal affinity with the old Persians, Ethiopians, and Egyptians; the Phenicians, Greeks, and Tus- cans; the Scythians N or Goths, and Celts | the Chi- nese, Japanese, and Peruvians; whence, as no rea- son appears for believing that they were a colony from any one of those nations, or any of those nations from them, we may fairly conclude that they all proceeded from some central country, to investigate which will be the object of my future Discourses ; and I have a sanguine hope that your collectionii during the present year, will bring to light many useful discoveries ; although the departure for £u« rope of a very ingenious member, who first opened the inestimable mine of Sanscrit literature, will often deprive us of accurate and solid informatioa concerning the languages and antiquities of India. 38 SIR WIUJAM IONES'8 DISCOURSE IV. DELIVEBED FEBRUARY 15, 1787. ON THE ARAB3. Remarks on tlie old inhabitantB of Tndia.-»Sim{larity of Ian- gqage, religion, arU, and manners.— On Ihe Arabs; and the knowledge of tlieir langaage possessed by tlie Earopeans.— ■ On the Sanscrit, Greek, Persian, and German langaages. — Religion of the Arabi.->Their munaments of antiqae art.— Dr. Johnson's opinion on the imperfections of unwritten langoages.— On the knowledge of Hiodu law and Sanicrit llteratare. GENTLEMEN, I HAD the honour last year of opening to yon my intention to discourse at oor annual meeting;8 on Che Jive principal nations who have peopled tlie continent and islands of Asia, so as to trace, by an historical and philological analysis, the number oS ancient steobs from which those five branches have sererally sprung, and the central region from which they appear to have proceeded ; you may, there- fore, expect that, having submitted to your consider ration a few general remarks on the old inhabitants of India, I should now offer my sentiments on some other nation, who, from a similarity of languagey religion f mrtSf tiuA mannertt may be supposed to 4. DISCOURSES. 59 have bad an early conoexioD with the Hindus; but, sidGe we find some Asiatic nations totally dissimilar to them in all or most of those particulars, and since (be dilTerence will strike you more forcibly by an immediate and close' comparison, I design at present to give a short account of a wonderful p«o« pie, who seem in every respect so strongly con- trasted to the original natives of this country, that they most have been forages a distinct and separate race. For the purpose of these discourses, I discovered India on its largest scale, describing it as lying be- tween Penia and China, Tartary and Java ; and, for the same -purpose, I now apply the name of Arabia, as the Arabian geographers often apply it, to that extensive peninsula which the Red Sea di- vides from Africa, the great Assyrian river from Iran, and of which the Erythrean Sea washes the base, without excluding any part of its western sides, which would be completdy maritime, if no fetbmus intervened between the Mediterranean and the Sea of Kolzom : that country in short 1 call Arabia, in which the Arabic language and letters, or such as have a near affinity to them, have beeb ifflraemorially ciurrent. . Arabia^ thus divided from India by a vast ocean, or at least by a broad bay, could hardly have been connected in any degree with this coumry, until na- vigation and conunerce had been considerably im- proved ; yet, as the Hindus and the people of Yemen were both commercial nations in a very early age, tbey were probably the first instruments of convey* lag to the western worid the gold, ivory and per- famct of India, as well as the firagrant wood called 40 SIR Wll L1AM JONESES Alluwwa in Arabic, and jiguru in Sanscrit, which grows in the greatest perfection in Anam, or Cochin- china. It is possible too that a part of the Arabian idolatry might have been derived from the same source with that of the Hindus ; but sueh an inter- course ma}' be considered as partial and accidental only ; nor am. I more convinced than I was fifteen years ago, when I took the liberty to animadvert on a passage in the History of Prince Kantemir, that the Turks have any just reason for holding the coast of Yemen to be a part of India, and calling its inhabitants Yellow Indians. The Arabs have never been entirely subdued, nor has any impression been made on them, except on their borders ; where, indeed, the Phenicians, Per- sians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, and, in modem times, the Othman Tartars, have severally acquired settle- ments; bul, with these exceptions, the natives of H dis- similarity I shall mention two remarkable instances;' the Sanscrit, like the Greek, Persian, and German, delights in compounds, but in a much higher degree, and indeed to such an excess, that I could produce words of more than twenty syllables, not fQnne4 ludicrously, like that by whith the buffoon in AiAi* tophanes describes a feast, but with perfect serious- ness, on the most solemn occasions, and in the most elegant works; while the Arabic, on the other hand, and all its sister dialects, abhor the composition of words, and invariably express very complex ideas by circumlocution; so that if a compound word -be found in any genuine language of tiie Arabian pen- insula (fenmerdak for instance which occurs in the Hamasab) it may at once be pronounced an exotic. Again : It is the genius of the Sanscrit, and other languages of the same stock, that the roots of verbs be almost universally biliteraly so that fioe-and- twenty hundred such roots might be formed by the ' composition of the Jtfty Indian letters ; but the Arabic roots are as universally trilHeraU so that the composition of the ticenty-eight Arabian letters would give near two-and'twenty thousand tUmintt of the language : and this will demonstrate the sur- prising extent of it; for although great numbers of its roots are confessedly lostj and some, perfaapsi 44 SIR WILUAM JQNES'S were never in use, yet, if we suppose ten thousand of them (without reckoning quadriliterals ) to exist, and each of them to admit only Jive variations, one with another y in forming derivative nouns, even then a perfect Arabic dictionary ought to contain Jifty thousand words, each of which may receive a mul- titude of changes by the rules of grammar. The derivatives in Sanscrit are considerably more na- meroos: but a farther comparison between the two languages is here unnecessary, since, in whatever ^ight we view them, they seem totally distinct, and must have been invented by two different races of men; nor do I recollect a single word in common between them, except Suruj, the plural of SiraJ, meaning both a lamp and the sun; the Sanscrit name of which isy in Bengal, pronounced Surja ; and even this resemblance may be purely acciden* tal. We may easily believe with the Hindus, that noi even Indra ftimselfy and his heavenly bands, much less any mortal, ever comprehended in his mind such an ocean of words as their sAcred language cow tains ; and with the Arabs, that no man uninspired was ever a complete master of Arabic: in fact, no person, I believe, now living in Europe or Asia, can. read without study an hundred couplets toge- ther, in any connexion of ancient Arabian poems ; and we are told, that the great author of the Kamus learned by accident from ihe mouth of a child, in a village of Arabia, the meaning of three words, which he bad long sought in vain from grammarians, and from books of the highest reputation. It is by approximation alone thata knowledge of these two venerable languages can be acquired ) and, with moderate attention, enoagh may be known to de« 4. DISCOURSES. 45 li|^ a,Dd inelract us -in an iofioite degree. I con- clude this head with remarking, that the nsUure of the Ethiopic dialect seems to prove an eaiiy estab- lishment of the Arabs in part of Ethiopia, from ivhich they were afterwards eipelled, and attacked even in their own country by the Abyssiniaos, who bad been invited over as auxiliaries against the tyranny of Yemen, about a century before the birth of' Mohammed. Of the characters in which the old compositions of Arabia were written, we know but little, except that the Kdran origiaally appeared in those of Gufah, from which the modem Arabian letters, with all their elegant variations, weredeiived, and which unqoestionatvly had a common origin with the He« brew or Chaldaic; but, as to theHimyrac lettersj or those which we see mentioned by the name of Almusnad, we are still in total darkness; the tra* Teller Niebuhr having been unfortunately prevented from visiting some ancient monuments in Yemen* which are said to have inscriptions on them. If those letters bear a strong resemblance to the Nagari, and if a story current in India be true, that some Hindu merchants heard the Sanscrit language spokea in Arabia the Happy, we might be confirmed in our opinion that an intercoune formerly subsisted between the two nations of opposite coasts,— but should have no reason to believe that they sprang from the same immediate stock. The first syllable of Hamtfar^ as many Europeans write it, might per* haps induce an etymologist to derive the Arabs of Yemen frdm -the great ancestor of the Indians ; but we must observe, that Himyar is the proper ap« pellation of those Arabs; and many reaaons. can* 48 ffS WILLIAM JOKES*S of any pbtimopby but etkies ; and even their sysiem of mof^ generouf and enlaf]ged as it seems to have been io the minds of a few illwtrioas chieAains, •ros 00 the whole miseiably depraved for a eentory at least before Mohammed. The distiogubbiag vir- toes which they boasted of incolcatiog and prae- tlslog, were a contempt of riches, and even of death ; hot, in the n^e of the Seven Poets, their liberality had deviated into mad profusion, their courage Into ibrocity, and their patience into an obstinate spirit ofencouotering fruitless dangers; but I forbear to expatiate on the manoers of the Arabs in that age, because the poems, entitled AhnoallakaU which have appeared io our own language, exhibit an exact picture of their virtues and their vices, their wisdom and their folly; and show what may be constantly expected from men of open hearts and boiling pauioos, with no law to control, and little rellgioa to restrain them. * III. Few monuments of antiquity are preserved in Arabia, and of those few, the best accounts' are very uncertain ; but we are assured that inscriptions on roclcs and mountains are still seen in various pifcrts of the peninsula; which, if they are in any known language, and if correct copies of them can be procured, may be deciphered by easy and inlkl- lible rules. The tint Albert Schultens has preserved in bis An. cient Memorlali of Arabia, the most plei^ing of all his works, two little poems in an elegiac strain, which arc said to have been found, about the mid- dle of the seventh century, on some fmgmeots of ruined edifices in Hadramut, near Aden, and are •opposed to be of an indelbiite, bat very remote 4. DISCOURSES. 49 age. It may natiurally be asked — In what charac- ters were tbey written? Who deciphered then? lYhy were not the original letters preserved in the book where the Terses are cited ? What became of the marbles which Abdnrrabman, then governor of Yemen, most probably sent to the Khalifah at Bag^ dad ? If they be genuine, they prove the people of Yemen to have been ' herdsmen and warriors, in* habiting a fertile and well watered country, fall of game, smd near a fine sea abounding with fish, under a monarchical govemmeat, and dressed in green silk) or vests of needle-work,' either of their own manufacture or imported from India. The mea- sure of these venes is perfectly rq;ular, and the dia* lect UDdistinguishable, at least by me, Arom that of Kuraish ; so that, if the Arabian writers were much addicted to literary impostures, I should strongly suspect them to be modem compositions on the ivh stability of human greatness, and the consequences of irreligion, illustrated by the example of the Hy* myaric princes ; and the same may be suspected of the first poem quoted by Schultens, which he ascribes to an Arab in the age of Solomon. The supposed houses of the people called Thamod, are also still to be seen in excavations of rocks % and, in the time of Tabriz! the Grammarian, a castle was extant in Yemen which bore the name Alad*> bat, an old bard and warrior, who first, we are told, formed his army, thence called alkhamit^ in ^00 parts, by which arrangement he defeated the troops of Himyar in an expedition s^ainst Sanaa. Of pillars erected by Sesac, after his invasion of Yemen, we find no mention in Arabian histories 9 andy perhaps, the storjr has no more foundation than D 50 SIR WILLIAM J0NES*9 another told by the Greeks and adopted by Newton, that the Arabs worshiped Urania, and even Bac- chus by name, which, they say, means great in Arabic ; but where they found sach a word, we cannot discover : it is true that Beccah signifies a great and tumultuous crowd ; and, in this sense, is .one name of the sacred city commonly called Meccah. The Cabahy or quadrangular edifice at Meccah, is indisputably so ancient, that its original use and the name of its builder are lost in a cloud of idle traditions. An Arab told me gravely, that it was mised by Abraham, who, as I assured him, was sever there: others ascribe it, with more probability, to Ismail, or one of his immediate descendants ; but whether it was built as a place of 'divine worship, as u fortress, as a sepulchre, or as a monument of the treaty between the old possessors of Arabia and the sons of Kidar, antiquaries may dispute, but no mortal can determine. It is thought by Reland to have been the mansion of some ancient patriarch , and revered on that account by his posterity; but the room in which we are now assembled, would con- tain the whole Arabian edifice; and, if it were large enough for the dwelling-house of a patriarchal familyt it would seem ill adapted to the pastoral manners of the Kedarites. A Persian author insists, that the true name of Meccah is Mahcadah^ or the Templeof the Moon; but, although we may smile at his etymology, we cannot .but think it probable that the GMah was originally designed for religious purposes. Three couplets are cited in an Arabic history of this building, which, from their extreme simpUcify, have less appearance of imposture than 4. DISCOURSES. , M Other resscs of the same kind ; they are ascribed to Asady a Tobba or king by «ucc«snoii, who is gens* rally allowed to have reigned in Yemen an hundred and twenty-eight years before Christ's birth; and they commemorate, without any poetical imagery, the' magnificence of the prince in covering the holy temple mth striped cloth and fine linen, and in making keys for its gate. This temple, however, the sanctity of which was restored by Muhammed, had been strangely profaned at the time o€ his birth, when it was usual to decorate its walls, with poems on all subjects, and often on the triumphs of Ara* bian gallantry and the praises of Grecian wine, which the merchants of Syria brought for sale into the deserts. . ■ From the want of materials on the subject of Arabian antiquity, we find it very difficult to &x the chronology of the Ismaelites with accuracy beyond the time of Adnan, from whom the impostor was descended in the twenty-first degree ; and, although we have genealogies of Alkamah and other Hi- myaric bards as high as the thirtieth degree, or for a period of nine hundred years at least, yet we can hardly depend on them so far as to establish a com- plete chronological system. By reasoning down- wards, however, we may ascertain some points of considerable importance. The universal tradition of Yemen is, that Yoktao, the son of £ber, first settled his family in the country ; which «ejtUement, by the computation admitted in Europe, must have been above three thousand six hundred years ago, and nearly at the time when the Hindus, under the conduct of Rama^ were subduing the fint inhabit- ants of these regions, and extending the Indian 62 SIR WILLIAM iOMB9*8 empire from Ayodbyd or Audb, as far as the isle of Sintial or Silan. According to ' this calcnlatioo, Nomnan, king of Yemen, in the nintk generation from Eber, ivas contemporary with Joseph ; and, if a Tene composed by ttmt prince, and quoted by Abnlfeda, was really preserved, as it might easily have been, by oral tradittOn> it proTes the great antiquity of the Arabian language and metre. This is a literal Teirsion of the couplet : « When thou, who art in power, conductest affairs with courtesy, thou attainest the high honours of those who are most exalted, and whose mandates are obeyed.' We are told, that from an elegant verb in this dis- tich, the royal poet acquired the surname of Al- ■ muaoser, or the Courteous. Now the reasons for believing this verse genuine are its brevity, which made it easy to be remembered, and the good sense comprised in it, which made it become proverbial ; to which we may add, that the dialect is apparently old, and differs in three words from the idiom of Hcjaz. The reasons for doubting are, that sentences and verses of indefinite antiquity are sometimes ascribed by the Arabs to particular persons of emi- nence ; and they even go so far as to cite a pathetic elegy of Adam himself on the death of Abel, but in Tery good Arabic and correct measure. Such Stfe the donbts which necessarily must arise on such a subject i yet we have no need of ancient monu- ments or traditions to prove all that our analysis requires, namely, that the Arabs of Hijas and Ye- men sprang from a stock entirely different from thai of the Hindus, and that their first establishments in the respective countries where we now find them, were nearly coetak 4. DISCOURSES. 53 I cannot finish this article without obserriog, that, when the King of Denmark's ministers instructed the Danbh travellers tb collect historical books in Arabic, but not to busy themselves with procuring Arabian poemsy they certainly were ignorant that the only monuments of old Arabian history are col- lections of poetical pieces, and the commentaries on them ; that all memorable transactions in Arabia were recorded in verse; and that more certain facts may be known by reading the Hamasab, the Diwan of Hudhail, and the valuable work of Obai- duUab, than by turning over a hundred volumes in prose, unless indeed those poems are cited by the historians as their authorities. lY. The manners of the Heja"^! Arabs, which have continued, we know, from the time of SolotHon to the present age, were by no means favourable to the cultivation of arts ; and, as to sctences, we have no reason to believe that they were acquainted with any ; for the mere amusement of giving names to stars, which were useful to them in their pastoral or predatory rambles through the deserts, and in their observations on the weather, can hardly be considered as a material part of astronomy. The only arts in which they pretended to excellence (I except horsemanship and military accomplish- ments) were poetry and rhetoric. That we have none of their compositions in prose before the Koran, may be ascribed, perhaps, to the little skill which they seem to have had in writing, td their predilection in favour of poetical measure, and to the facility with which verses are committed to me- mory; but all their stories prove that they were eloquent in a high degree, 'and possessed wonderfal 54 SIR WILLIAM Jones's powers of speaking, without preparation, in flow* ing and forcible periods. I liave ne¥er been able to discover what was meant by their boolLs called Rawasim ; but suppose that they were collections of their common or customary law. Writing was 90 little practised amongst them, that their old poems, which are now accessible to us, may al- most be considered as originally unwritten ; and I am inclined to think that Samuel Johnson's rea- soaing on the extreme imperfection of unwritten languages was too general ; since a language that is only spoken, may nerertheless be highly polished by a people who, like the ancient Arabs, make the improvement of their idiom a national concern, appoint solemn assemblies for the purpose of dis- playing their poetical talents, and hold it a duty to exercise their children in getting by heart their most ^pproted compositions. The people of Yemen had possibly more mecha' ideal arts, and, perhaps, more science ; but, although their ports must have been the emporia of conside* ble commerce between Egypt and India, or part of Persia, yet we have no certain proofs of their proficiency in navigation, or even in manufiu;tnres. That the Arabs of the Desert had musical instru- ments, and names for the different notes, and that they were greatly delighted with melody, we know from themselves; but their lutes and pipes were pro- bably very simple, aad their music, I suspect, was little more than a natural and tuneful recitation of their elegiac verses and lovesongs. The singular property of thcllr language, in shunning compound words, may be urged, according to Bacon's idea, as a proof that they had made no progress in arit^ ** which re- 4. DISCOURSES. 5d quire,*' ssys he, ^ a variety of combinations to ex- press the complex notions arising from them ;'* but the singularity may perhaps be imputed wholly to thegenios of the language^ and the taste of those who spoke it, since the old Germans who knew no art, appear to hare delighted in compound words, which poetry and oratory, one would conceive, might require as much as any meaner art whatsoever. So great on the whole was the strength of parts^ or capacity^ either natural or acquired from habit, for whi<:h the Arabs were ever distinguished, that we cannot be surprised when we see that blaze of geniu» which they displayed, as far as their arms ex-> tended, when they burst, like their own dyke Arim, through their ancient limits, and spread like an in» undation over the great empire of Iran. That a race of Tazis or Coursers as the Persians call them, *' who dnuk the milk of camels and fed on lizards, should entertain a thought of subduing the kingdom of Feridnn,'' was considered by the General of Yezde- gird*8 army as the strongest instance of fortune*s levity and mutability ; but Firdausi, a complete master of Asiatic manners, and singularly impartial, represents the Arabs, even in the age of Feridun, as ** disclaiming any kind of dependence on that mo- narch, exiUting in their liberty, delighting in elo- quence, acts of liberality, and martial achievements; and thus making the whole earth," says the poet, << red as wine with the blood of their foes, and the air like a forest of canes with their tall spears." With such a character they were likely to conquer any country that they could invade ; and if Alex- ander had invaded their dominions, they would un- questionably have made an obstinate, and probably a successful resistance. 56 SIR WILLIAK JONKS'S Bot I have detained yo« too lon^ geDtlemeo, with a nation who have ever been my favoarites, and hope at your next anniversary meeting to tra- vel with you over a part of Asia which exhibits a race of men distinct both from Hindus and from the Aral>9. In the mean time, it shall be my care to superintend the publication of your transactions ; in which, if the leaned in Europe have not raised their * expectations too hinhytbey will not, I believe, be disappointed : my own imperfect essays I always eicept} but, though my other engagements have prevented my attendance on your Sc»ciety for the the greatest part of last year, and I have set an example of that freedom from restraint, without which no society can flourish, yet, as my few hours of leisure wiU now be devoted to Sanscrit literature, i cannot but hope, though my chief olject be a knowledge of Hindu law, to make some discovery in other sciences, which I shall impart with hnmi^ lity, and which you wUl^I doubt Dot» receive with iqdalgence^ DISCOURSES. 57 DISCOURSE V. DELIVERED FEBRUART 21, 1788« ON THE TARTARS. The boimdariei of Tartary.— Ancient Scythiani.— Tartary con- sidered according to Pliny.<~Tiie Atlantis of Plato. — Re- ' marks on de Gaignes, and other modern anthors. — Dialects of the Tart&r8.-~Of the Mogul8.-«Of the Persians.— The pri- mitive religion of mantund.— The laws of Zamolxis.— Reli- , gioas opinions and allegorical fahles of the Uiadas.«-Ancient monnments of the Tartars. — Ontlie Tosac of Taimar. — Asia originally peopled by the Hindas, Arabs, and Tartars. GENTLEMEN, At the close of my last address to you, Gentlemen, I declared my design of introducing to your notice ^ people of Asia, who seemed as different in most respects from the Hindus and Arabs, as those two nations had been shown to differ from each other ; I mean the people whom we call Tartars : but I enter with extreme diffidence on my present subject, because I have little knowledge of the Tartarean dialects ; and the gross errors of European writers on Asiatic literature have long convinced me that no satisfactory account can be given of any nation with whose language we are not perfectly acquaint- ed. Such evidence, however, as 1 have procured by d2 68 SIR WILLIAM JOIIEB'S attentiTe reading and scropulous ioquiries, I will now lay before you { iotenpeniog soch remarks as I coold not but make on tbat evidence, and submit- ting- the wliole to your impartial decision. ' Confocmably to the method before adopted in de- scribing Arabia and India, I consider Tartkry also, for the purpose of this discourse, on its most exten- sive scale; and request your attention whilst I trace the largest boundaries that are assignable to it. Conceive a line drawn from the mouth of the Oby to that of the Dneiper, and, bringing it back east- ward across the Euxine, so as to include the penin- sula of Krim, extend It along the foot of Caucasus^ by the riTcrs Cur and Aras, to the Caspian Lake> from the opposite shore of which, follow the course of the Jaihun, and the chain of Caucasean hills, as Ihr as those of Imaus; whence continue the line be- yond the Chinese Wall to the White Mountain and the country of Yetso ; skirting the borders of Persia, India, China, Corea, but including part of Russia, with all the districts which lie between the Glacial Sea and that of Japan. M. de Guignes, whose great work on the Huns abounds more in solid learning than in rhetorical ornaments, presents us, howeyer, wHh a magnificent image of this wide region ; de- scribing it as a stupendous edifice, the beams and pillars of which are many ranges of lofty hills, and the dome one prodigions mountain, to which the Chinese give the epithet of C^fetftai; with a consU derable number of broad fivers flowing down its sides. If the mansion be so amaringly sublime, the land anmnd It is proportlonably extended, bot more wonderfully divenlfied; for some parts of It are encnnted with ice, othen paitlMd with inflnmai ^ 4 5. SISCOVRSKS. 59 air, and covered with a kind of laya : here we meet with immeDse tracts of sandy deserts, and forests almost impenetrable; there, with gardens, ^ves, and meadows, perfumed with musk, watered by numbecless riTulets, and abounding in fruits and flowers \ and, from east to west lie many considera^ ble provinces, which appear as valleys in comparison of the hills towering above them, but in truth are the flat summits of the highest mountains in the world, or at least the highest in Asia. Near one- fourth in latitude of this extraordinary region is in the same charming climate with Greece, Italy, and Provence ; and another fourth in that of England, Germany, and the northern parts of France; but the Hyperborean countries can have few beauties to re- commend them, at least in the present state of the earth's temperature. To the south, on the frontiers of Iran, are the beautiful vales of Soghd, with the celebrated cities of Samarkand and Bokhara; on those of Tibet are the territories of Cashagar, Kh»- ten, Chegil, and Khata, all famed for perfumes, and for the beauty of their inhabitants; and on those of China lies the country of Chin, anciently a powerful kingdom ; which name, like that of Khata, has in modern times, been given to the whole Chinese em- pire, where such an appellation would be thought an insult* We must not omit the fine territory of ^ancut, which was known to the Greeks by the name of Serica, and considered by them as the farthest eastern extremity of t^e habitable globe. Scythia seems to be the general name which the ancient Europeans gave to as much as they knew of the country thus bounded and described; but whe- ther that word be derived, as Pliny seems to intimate. €0 SIR l¥if.LiAM Jones's from Sacai, a people known by a similar name to tlie Greeks and Persians, or as Bryantimagine8,fiom Cnthia, or as Colonel Vallancey believes, from words denoting navigation^ or as it might have been sup- posed, from a Greek root implying wrath and fero- city, this at least is certain, that, as India, China, Persia, Japan, are not appellations of those coun- tries in the languages of the nations who inhabit them, so neither Scythia nor Tartary are names by which the inhabitants of the country now under our consideration, have ever distinguished themselves. Tartaristan is indeed, a word used by the Persians for the south-western part of Scythia, where the musk-deer is said to be common ; and the name Tar- tar is by some considered as that of a particular tribe ; by others, as that of a small river only; while Turan, a$ opposed to Iran, seems to mean the an- cient dominion of Afrasia, to the north and east of the Ozns. There b nothing more idle than a debate concerning names, which after all are 'of little con* sequence when our ideas are distinct without them. Having given therefore a correct notion of the coun- try which I proposed to examine, I shall not scruple to call it by the general name of Tartary; though I am conscious of using a term equally improper in the pronunciation and the application of It. Tartary, then, which contained,according to Pliny, an ODe encamped on plnlM in ambulator; mauiont, which they reaon tima paWure to pailarc, mail be aa different in tbur fwturci aa in their diaJeclii yet, among Ikon lAo l».pi...i.T"iKi-'('-'l i"i". in. ilhtrcoontty, and nixed Mlth aoolbrr imliun, v.f niny diocera a fhaily likc- ""^'i )«pecially In thrirc>naiidcoanlc9BBce,aadia eoadgunlloa of liiieauenti whtck we gcacnlly k^ 5. DISCOURSES. 63 call 4 Tartar face ; but^ ivithottt making anxioos in- quiries, ^whether all the inhabitants of the vast region before described b^e similar features, we may con- elude from those whom we have seen, and from the original portraits of Taimur and- his descendants, that theTartars in general differ wholly In com- plexion and countenance from the Hindus and from the Arabs : an observation which tends in some de- gree to confirm the account given by modern Tarlars themselves of their descent from a common ancestor. Unhappily, their lineage cannot be proved by au- thentic pedigrees or historical monuments, for all their writings extant, even those in the Mogul dia« lect, are long subsequent to the time of Muhammed ; nor is it possible to distinguish their genuine tradi- tions firom those of the Arabs; whose religious opi- nions they have in general adopted. At the begin- ning of the fourteenth century, Khwajah Raahid^ Bumamed Fadlullah, a native of Kazvin, compiled his account of the Tartars and Mongals, from the papers «f one Pulad, whom the great grandson of HcrtacQ had sent intoTartaristan for tlie sole purpose •f collecting historical information $ and the com- mission itself shows how little the Tartarian p^liiees really knew of their own origin. From this work of Rashid, and from other materials, Abulghazi, king of Khwarezm composed in the Mogul lan- guage his Genealogical History, which, having been purcliased from a merchant of Bokhara by some Swedish officers, prisoners of war in Siberia, has found its way into several European tongues: ii contains much valuable matter, but, like all Muham medan histories, exhibits tribes or nations as indi- vidual BOvereigns; and if Baron DeTott.had not 64 SIR WILLIAM JOITES^S slraogely neglected to procure a copy of the Tar- tarian history, for the original of -which he. nnneces- iarily offered a large sum, we should probably have found that it begins with an accooot of the delnge» taken from the Koran, and proceeds to rank Torc^ Chin, Tatar, and Mongal, among the sons of Yafet. The genuine traditional history of the Tartars, in all the boolu that I have inspected, seems to begin with Oghuz, as that of the Hindus does with Rama : they place their miraculous hero and patriarch /our tAou- iand years before Chengiz Khan, who was bom in the year 1164, and with whose reign their historical period commences. It is rather surprising that M. Bailly, who makes frequent appeals to etymological arguments, has not derived Ogyges from Oghuz,and Atlas from Atlai, or the Golden Mountain of Tar- tary : 'the Greek terminations might have been re« jected from both words ; and a mere transposition of letters is no difficulty with an etymologist. My remarks in this address. Gentlemen, will be confined to the period preceding Chengiz ; and, al- though the learned labours of' M. de Guignes, and the Fathers Visdelou, Demailla, and Gaubil, who have made an incomparable use of their Chinese li« terature, exhibit probable accounts of the Tartars from a very early age, yet the old historians of China were not only foreign, l^ut generally hostile to them^ and for both those reasons, either through ignorance or malignity, may be suspected of fnisrepresenting their transactions: if they speak truth, the ancient history of the Tartars presents us, like most other histories, with a series of. assassinations, plots, trea- 8008^ massacres, and all the natural frnits of selfish ambition. I should have no inclination to give you 5. DISCOURSES. 05 a sketch of such horron, even if the occasioB called for it, and will barely observe, that the first king of the Hyumnas or Huns, b^gan his reign according to Yisdelou, about three thoueand Jive hundred and *ijcty years ago^ not long after the time fixed in my former discoorses for the first regular establishments of the Hindus and Arabs in their several countries. I. Our first inquiry concerning the languages and Utters of the Tartars, presents us with a deplorable void, or with a prospect as barren and dreary as that of their deserts. The Tartars, in general, had no li- terature (in this point all authorities appear to coo- cur); the Turcs had no letters ; the Huns, according to Procopius, had not even heard of them i the magw nificent Chengis, whose empire included an area* of near eighty square degrees, could find none of his own Mongals,as the best authors inform us^ able to write his dispatches ; and Taimur, a savage of strong natural parts, and passionately fond of hearing his- tories read to him, could himself neither write nor read. It is true that I bun Arabshah mentions a set of characters called Dilberjin, which were used in Khata : ^ he had seen them," he says, " and found them to consist of forty-one letters, a distinct sym- ' bol being appropriated to each long and short vowel, and to each consonant hard or soft, or otherwise varied in pronunciation ^ but Khata was in Soath^ cm Tartary, on the confines of India ; and, from his description of the characters there in use, we cannot but suspect them to have been those of Tibet, which are manifestly Indian, bearing a greater resem- blance to those of Bengal than to Devanagari. The learned and eloquent Arab adds, ** that the Tartan ofKhata write in the DUbeijin letteiB all their tales 66 SIR WILLIAM JOHES'S andiiistories, their journals, poems, and miscellanies, their diplomas, records of state and justice, the laws of Chengiz, their public registers, and thejr compo- sitions of every species." If this be tme, the people of Khata most have been a polished and even a let- tered nation, and it may be true, without alfecting the general position, that the Tartars were illiterate*; bat Ibnu Arabshah was a professed rhetorician, and it is impossible to read the original passage without full conviction that his object in writing it was to display his power of words in a flowing and modu- lated period. He says further, that in Jaghatai, th^ people of Oighmr, as he calls them, ** haute a system of fourteen letters only, denominated from then^ selves Qighari ;*' and those are the characters which the Mongals are supposed by most authors to have borrowed. Abulghazi teUs us only that Chengiz employed the natives of Eighur as excellent pen- men } but the Chinese assert that he was forced to employ them because he had no writers at all amoing his natural-bom subjects ; and we are assured by many that Kablaikhan ordered letters to beinvented for his nation by a Tibetian, whom he rewarded with the dignity of chief Lama. The small number of Eigfauri letters niight induce us to bdieve that they were Zend or Pahlavi, which most have been current in that coudtry when it was governed by the sons of Feridun ; and, if die alphabet Kcribed to the Eighorians by M. Des Hantefraycs be correct, w« nay safely decide, that in many of its letters it re- ■enbles both the Zend and the Syriac, with a remark- able dlffereiicc in the mode of connecting them ; b«ty ms we can scarce hope to see a genaiiie speci* of thcBi omt doubt mast remain in ngud to f 5. uncooRSEt. 67 their form and origin. Tire page exhibited by Hyde as Khatayan writing, is evidently a sort of broken Cnfick; and the fine manuscript at Oxford from which it was taken is more probably a Mendean work on some religious subject, than, as he imagined, a code of Tartarian layrs. That very learned man appears to have made a worse mistake, in giving us for Mongal characters a page of writing which has the appearance of Japanese or mutilated Chi- nese letters. If the Tartars in general, as we have eyery reason to believe, have no written memorials, it "cannot be ' thought wonderful that their languages^ like those of America, should have been in perpetual fluctua^ tion, and that more than fifty dialects, as Hyde had been credibly informed, should be spoken between Moscow and China, by the many kindred tribes or their several branches, which are enumerated by Abalgbazi. What those dialects are, and whether they really sprang from a common stock, we shall probably learn from Mr. Pallas^ and other indefatU gable men employed by the Russian court ; and it is from the Russians that we must expect the most accurate information concerning the Asiatic sub- jects : I persuade myself that if their inquiries be judiciously made and faithfully reported, the result of them will prove that all the languages, -properly Tartarian, arose from one common source; except- ing always the jargons of such wanderers or moun- taineers as having long been divided from the main body of the nation, must, in a course of ages, have framed separate idioms for themselves. The only Tartarian language of which 1 have any knowledge, is the Turkish of Constantinople, which is however ^8 6IR WILLIAM JONES*8 60 copious, that whoever shall know It perfectly, will easily oBderstand, as we are assured by iotelll- gent authors, the dialects of Tartarisian; and we may collect from Abulgfaazi, that he would find little difficulty in the Calmac and the Mogul. I will not offend your ears by a dry catalogue of similar words in those different languages; but a careful investiga- tion has convinced me, that as the Indian and Anu bian tongues are severally descended from'ft common parent, so those of Tartary might be traced to one an- cient stem, essentially differing from the two others. It appears indeed, from a story told by Abulghazi, that the Yirats and the Moogals could not under- stand each other, but no more can the Danes and the English, yet their dialects beyond a doubt are branches of the same Gothic tree. The dialect of the Moguls, in which some histories of Taimur and his descendants were originally composed^ is called in India, where a learned native set me right when I used another word, Turci ; not that it is precisely the same with the Turkish of Othmanlos, but the two. idioms differ perhaps less than Swedbh and German, or Spanish and Portuguese, and certainly less than Welsh and Irish. In hope of ascertaining this point, I have long searched in vain for the ori« ginal works ascribed to Taimur and Baber; but all the Moguls with whom I have convened in this country, resemble the crow in one of their popular fables, who, having long affected to walk like a pheasant, was unable after all to acquire the grace^^^ fulness of that elegant bird, and in the mean time totgoi his own natural gait. They have not learned the dialect of Persia, but have wholly foigotten that of their ancestora. A very considerable part of the 6. oiscouRsfis. 6d •Id Tartarian lani^age, which in .Asia would pro- bably have been lost, is happily preserved in Europe^ and, if the ground work of the western Turkish, when separated from the Persian and Arabic with which it is embellished, be a branch of the lost Og- huzian tongue, I can assert with confidence that it has not the least resemblance either to Arabic or Sanscrit, and must have been invented by a race of men wholly distinct from the Arabs or Hindus. This fact alone oversets the system of M. Baiily, who con- siders the Sanscrit, of which he gives in several places a most erroneous account, as *' Afint mont*- mtant o/Af«jrrtmeva/ Scythians, lAe preceptori of nankindf andplanieri of a subUme philosophy even in India; for he holds it an incontestable truth, that a language, which i$ dead^ aupposee a nation which is destroyed ; and he seems to think such rea- soning perfectly decisive of the question, without having recourse to astronomical arguments, or the spirit of ancient institutions. For ttiy part, I desire no better proof than that which the lanjguage of the Brahmans aiTords, of an immemorial and total dif- ference between the savages of the mountains, as the old Cliinese justly called the Tartars, and the stu- dious, placid, contemplative inhabitants of these Indian plains^ 1 1. The geographical reasoning of M. Bailly may perhaps be thought eqnolly shallow, if not incon- sistent in some degree with itself. ^ An adoration of the sun and of fire," says he *' must necessarily have arisen in a cold r^iod; therefore it must have been foreign to India, Persia, and Arabia ; there* fore it must have been derived from Tartary. No man, I believe, who has trayeled in winter through 7& SIR WILLIAM JONES'S Babar, or has even passed a cold season at Calcutta ivithia the tropic, can doubt that the solar wannth is often desirable by all, and might have been con- sidered as adorable by the ignorant in these climates; or that the return of spring deserves all the salata^ tions which it receives from the Persian and Indian poets; not to rely on certain historical evidence, that Antarah, a celebrated warrior and bard actu- ally perished with cold on a mountain of Arabia. To meet however an objection which might nato- rally enough be made to the voluntary settlement and amazing population of his primitive race in the icy regions of the north, he takes refuge in the hy- pothesis of M, Buffon, who imagines that our whole globe was at first of a white heat, and has been gra>- dually cooling from the pole to the equator; so that the Hyperborean countries bad once a delightful temperature, and Siberia itself was hotter than the clinufte of our temperate tones ; that is, was in too hot a climate, by his first propositiooy for the pri- mary worship of the sun* That the temperature of countries has not sustained a change in the lapse of ages, I will by no means insist ; but we can hardly reason conclusively from a variation of temperature to the cultivation and difiiision of science. If as many female elephants and tigresses as we now find in Bei^al had formerly littered in the Siberian fo- rests, and the young as the earth cooled had sought a genial warmth in the climate of the south, it would not follow that other savages, who migrated in the same direction and on the same account, brought religion and philosophy, language and writing, art and science, into the southern latitudes. We are told by Abulghazi that the primitive re- 5. DISCOURSES. 71 ligion of huoian creatures, or the ^are adcfration of one Creator, prevailed in Tartary during the first generations of Yafet, but was extinct before the birth of Oghuz, who restored it in his dominions ; that some ages after him, the Mongols and the Turcs relapsed into gross idolatry, but that Chengiz was a Theist, and in a conversation with the Mnhamroe- dan doctors, admitted their arguments for the being 9nd attributes of the Deity to be unanswerable, while he contest^ the evidence of their prophet's le- gation. From old Grecian authorities we learn that the MassagetSB worshiped the sun, and the narra- tive of an embassy from Justin to the Rhaken or emperor, who then resided in a fine vale near the soinrce of the Irtish, mentions the Tartarian cere- mony of purifying the Roman ambassadors by con- ducting them between two fires. The Tartars of •that age are represented as adorers of the /our ele^ menU^ and believers in an invisible spirit, to whom they sacrificed bulls and rams. Modem travellers relate, that in the festivals of some Tartarian tribes they pour a few drops of a consecrated liquor on the statues of their gods, after which an attendant sprinkles a little of what remains three times U>» ward the south, in honour of fire ; toward the west and east, in honour of water and air; and as often toward the north, in honour of the earth, which con- tained the reliques of their deceased ancestors. Now all this may be very true, without proving a national aflSnity between the Tartars and Hindus, for the Arabs adored the planets and the beauties of Na- ture ; the Arabs had carved images, and made liba- tions on a black stone ; the Arabs turned in prayer to different quarters of the heavens ; yet we know tft SIR WILLIAM JONES'S with certainty that the Arabs are a distinct race from the Tartars ; and we might as well infer that they were the same people, because they had each* their Nomades, or wanderers for pasture, and be- cause the Turcmans described by Ibmuarabshah^ and by him called Tartan, are, like most Arabian tribes, pastoral and warlike, hospitable and gene- rous, wintering and summering on different plains, and rich in herds and flocks, horses and camek : but thb agreement in manners proceeds from the slmi> lar nature of their several deserts, and their similar choice of a free rambling life, without evincing a eommanity of origin, which they could scarce have had without preserving some remnant at least of a common language. Many Lamas, we are assured, or priests of Buddha, have been found settled in Siberia, but it can hardly be doubted that the Lamas had traveled thither from Tibet ; whence it is more than probable that the religion of' the pauddhas was imported inttf Southern or Chinese Tartary, since we know that rolls of Tibetian writing have been brought even from the borders of the Caspian. The complexion of Cuddha himself, which, according to the Hindus, was between white and ruddyy would peihaps have convinced M. Bailly, had he knovm the Indian tra- dition, that the last great legislator and god of the east was a Tartar; but the Chinese consider hinLai a native of India ) the Brahmans insist that he was bom in a forest near Gaya; and many reasons may IcsMl OB to suspect, that his religion was carried from the west and the south, to those eastern and northern, countries in which it prevails. On the whole, we :t with fisw or BO tnc$s in Scythia of Indian 5. DISCOURSES. 73 rites andsoperstiUons, or of that poetical mythology with which tiie Sanscrit poems are decorated ; aod we may allow the Tartars to haye adored the sun with more reason than any southern people, without admitting them to have been the sole original in* YeotorS/ of that universal folly. We may even doubt the originality of their veneration for the four eiU- tnents, which forms a principal part of the ritual in- troduced by Zeratusht, a native of Rai in Persia, bom in the reign of Gushtasp, whose son Pashuten is believed by the Parsis to have resided long in Tartary, at a place called Cangidiz, where a mag* nificent palace is said to have been built by the father of Cyrus, and where the Persian prince, who was a zealot in the new faith, would naturally have disseminated its tenets among the neighbooring Tartars. Of any philosophy, except nalural ethics, which the rudest society requires and experience teaches, we find no more vestiges in Asiatic Scythia than in ancient Arabia, nor would the name of a philosopher and a Scythian have ever been connected, if Ana- charsis had not visited Athens and Lydia for that instruction which his birth-place could not have af- forded him : but Anacharsis was the son of a Gre- cian woman, who had taught him her language, aod he soon learned to despise his own. He was un- questionably a man of a sound understanding and fine parts; and, among the lively sayings which gained htm the reputation of a wit even in Greece, it is related by Diogenes Laertius, that when an Athenian reproached him with being a Scythian, be answered, ** My country is indeed a disgrace to me, but thou art a disgrace to thy country.'' What his 74 SIR WILLIAM JONESES country was, in regard to manners and civil datieSt we may learn from his fate in it, for when, on bis retnm from Athens, he attempted to reform it by in- trodncing the wise laws of his friend Solon, he was killed on a hunting party with an arrow, shot by hia own brother, a Scythian chieftain. Such was the philosophy of M. Bailly's Atlantes, the first and most enlightened of nations! We are assured, however, by the learned author of the Dabistan, that the Tar- tars under Chengiz, and his descendants, were lovers of truth, and would not even preserve their lives by * a violation of it De Gnignes ascribes the. same ve- racity, the parent of all virtues^ to the Huns, and Strabo, who might only mean to lash the Greeks by praising Barbarians, as Horace extolled the wander- ing Scythians merely to satirize his luxurious coun- trymen, informs us that the nations of Scythia de- serve the praise due to wisdom, heroic friendship, and justice; and this praise we may readily allow them on his authority, without supposing them to have been the preceptors of mankind. As to the laws of Zamolxis, concerning whom we know as little as of the Scythian Deucalion, or of Abaris. the Hyperborean, and to whose story even Herodotus gave no credit, I lament for many rea- sons that if ever they existed they have not been prfMrved. It is certain that a system of laws called Yasac has been celebrated in Tartary since the time of Chengiz, who is said to have republished them in bis empire, as his institutions were afterwards adopt- ed and enforced by Taimur; but th^ seem to have been a common or traditionary law, and were pro- bably not reduced into writing till Chengiz had conquered a nation who were able to write. 5. DISCOURSES* 75 III. Had the religious opinions and aHegorical fables of the Hindus been actually borrowed from Scythia, travellers must have discovered in that conntry some ancient monuments of them ; such as pieces of grotesque sculpture, images of the Gods and Avatars, and inscriptions on pillars or in < ca- verns, analagous to those which remain in every part of the western peninsula, or to those which many of us have seen in Babar and at Baoares ; but (except a few detached idols) (he only great monu- ments of Tartarian antiquity are in a line of rmn- parts on the west and east of the Caspian, ascribed * indeed by ignorant Muselmans to Yajuj and Majuj, or Gog and Magog, that is, to the Scythians, but. ma« nifestly raised by a very different nation, in order to stop their predatory inroads through the passes of -Caucasus. The Chinese wall was built, or finished, on a similar construction and for a similar purpose, by an emperor who died only two hundred and ten years before the beginning of our aera, and the other mounds were very probably constructed by the old Persians, though, like many works of un- known origin, they are given t(^ Secander, not the Macedonian, but a more ancient hero, supposed by some to have been Jemshid. It is related, thqt py- ramids and tombs have been found inTataristan, or Western Scythia, and some remnants of edifices in the lake Saison ; that vestiges of a deserted city hate been recently discovered by the Russians near the Cas{>ian Sea, and the Mountain of Eagles ; and that golden ornaments and utensils, figures of elks and other quadrupeds in metal, weapons of various kinds, and even implements for mining, but made of cop- per instead of iron, have been dug up in the country of the Tshudes ; whence M. Bailly infersy with great 76 SIR WILLIAM JOMES*S jreasoo, the bigli antiqaily of that people : but the high antiquity of the Tartars, and their establish- ment in that country near four thousand years ago, no man disputes; we are inquiring into their an- cieot religion and philosophy, which neither orna- ments of gold nor tools qf copper will prove to have had an affinity with the religious rites and the sciences of India. The golden utensils might possibly have been fabricated by the Tartars themselves, but it is possible too that they were carried from Rome or from China, whence occasional embassies were sent to the kings of Eighur. Towards the end of the tenth century the Chinese emperor dispatched an ambassador to a prince named Erslan, which, in the Turkish of Constantinople signifiies a lion, who resided near the Golden Mountain, in the same station, perhaps, where the Romans had been re- ceived in the middle of the sixth century. The Chi- nese oh his return home reported the £ighuris tti be a grave people, with fair complexions, diligent workmen, and ingenious artificers not only in gold, silver, and iron, but in jasper and fine stones ; and the Romans had before described their magnificent reception in a rich palace adorned witli Chinese manufactures : but these times were comparatively modern, and even if we should admit that the Kig- buris, who are said to have been governed for a pe- riod of two thou^nd years by an Idecut or sove»- reign of their own race, were in some very early age a literary and polished nation, it would prove nothing in favour of the Huns, Turcs, M ongals, and other savages to the north of Pekin, who seem in all ai^es before Mubammed to have been equally fero- cious and illiterate. Without actual inspection of t^e manuscripts ^hat 5. DISCOURSES. 77 have been found near the Caspian, it would be im- possible to give a cerrect opinion concerning them ; but one of them, described as written en blue silky paper in letters of gold and silver, not unlike He- brew, was probably a Tibetian composition of the same kind with that of which lay near the source of the Irtish, and of which Gassiano, I believe, made the first accurate version. Another, if we may Judge from the description of it, was probably modern Turkish ; and none of them could have been of great antiquity. IV. From ancient monuments, therefore, we have no proof that the Tartars were themselves wdl in- structed, much less that they instructed the world \ nor have we any stronger reason to conclude, from their genera] manners and character, that they had made an early proficiency in arts and sciences. Even of poetry, the most universal and most natural of the fine arts, we find no genuine specimens ascribed to them, except some horrible war songs expressed in Persian by Ali of Yezd, and possibly invented by him. After the conquest of Persia by the Mon- galSy their princes indeed encouraged learning, and even made astronomical observations at Samarkand i * ' as the Turc became polished by mixing with the Persians and Arabs, though their nery nature, as one of their own writers confesses, had before been like an incurcAle distemper j and their minds clouded with ignorancs : thus also the Mancheu monarcbs of China have been patrons of the learned and ingenious; and the emperdi' Kien Long is, if he be now living, a fine Chinese poet. In all these instances the Tartars have resembled the Romans, who before they had subdued Greece, were little better than tigers in war, aod/aufif or sjflvans in science and art. 78 SIR WILLIAM JOMfU'S Before I left Europe, I bad insisted in convefsa- tion, that the Tuzuc, translated by Major Dary, was never written by Taimur himself, at least not as Cassar wrote his Gommentaries, for one very plain reason, that no Tartarian king of his age 6ould write at all; and in support of my- opinion, I had cited Ibnu Arabshab, who, though justly hostile to the sa- yage by whom his native city, Damascus, had been ruined, yet praises his talents and the real greatness of his mind i but adds, ** He w^s wholly illiterate | he neither read nor wrote any thing ; and he knew nothing of Arabic, though of Persian, Turkish, and the Mogul dialect he knew as much as was sufficient for his purpose, and no more. He used with plea- sure to hear histories read to him, and so frequently beard the same book, that he was able by memory to correct an inaccurate reader.*' This passage had < no effect on the translator, whom great and learned men in India had aasuredj it seems, that the work uta authentic^ by which he meant composed hy the conqneror himself: but the great in this country might have been unlearned^ or the learned might not have been great enough to answer any leading ques- tion in a manner that opposed the declared inclina- tion of a British inquirer ; and, in either case, since no witnesses ^are named, so general a reference to them will hardly be thought conclusive evidence. On my part, I will name a Muselman whom we all know, and who has enough both of greatness and of ismming to decide the question both impartially and Batlsfkctorily : The Nawwab Mozaffer Jang informed me of bis own accord, that no man of teoK in Hindustan briicved the work to have been compoaed by Taimur, but that bb Invonrite, snr* named Hindu Shah, was known to have wiitten 5. DISCOURSES. 79 that book and others ascribed to his patron, after many confidential discourses with the Emir, and perhaps nearly in the prince's words as welt as in his person : a story which Ali of Yezd, who attained the court of Taimur, and has given us a flowery panegyric instead of history, renders highly pro- bable, by confirming the latter part of the Arabian account, and by a total silence as to the literary productions of his master. Jt is true, that a very in- genious but indigent native, whom Davy supported, has given me a written memorial on the subject, in which he mentions Taimur as the author of two works in Turkish, but the credit of his information is over- set by a strange apocryphal story of a king of Yemen, who invaded, he says, the Emir^s dominions, and in whose library the manuscript was afterwards found, and translated by order of Alishir, first minister of Taimur's grandson ; and Major Davy himself, before he departed from Bengal told me, that he was greatly perplexed by finding in a very accurate and old copy of the Tuzuc, which he designed to repub- lish with considerable additions, a particular account written unquestionably by Taimur, of his own death. No evidence therefore has been adduced to shake my opinion, that the Moguls and Tartars, before their conquest of India and Persia, were wholly un- lettered, although it may be .possible, that even without art or science, they had, like the Huns, both warriors and lawgivers in their own country some centuries before the birth of phrist. If learning was ever anciently cultivated in the region to the north of India, tlie seats of it, I have reason to suspect must have been Eighur, Cashghar, Khata, Chin, Tancot, and otheir countries of Chinese Tartary, which lie between the thirty-fifth and forty. 80 SIR WILLIAM Jones's fifth degrees of noitbern latitude; bat I shall, in another ^iiscoorse^ produce my reasons for supposing^* that those very countries were peopled by a race allied to the Hindus, or enlightened at least by their vicinity to India and China; yet in Tancut, vvbich by some Is annexed to Tibet, and even among its old inhabitants the Seres, we have no certain accounts of uncommon talents or great improvements : they were famed, indeed, for the faithful discharge of moral duties, for a pacific disposition, and for that longevity which is often the reward of patient vir- tues and a calm temper; but they are said to h^ve been wholly indifferent in former ages to the elegant arts, and even to commerce; though Fadlu'llah had been informed, that near the close of the thirteenth century many branches of natural philosophy were cultivated in Cam-cheu,then the metropolisof Serica* We may readily believe those who assure us, that some trib?s of wandering Tartars had real skill in applying herbs and minerals to the purpose of me- dicine, and pretended to skill 'iii magic ; but the general character of thieir nation Seems to have been this, they were professed hunters or fishers, dwell* ing on that account in forests or near great rivers, under huts or rude tents, or in waggons drawn by their cattle from station to station ; they were dex- terous archers, excellent horsemen, bold coiAbatants, appearing often to flee in disorder for the sake of renewing their attack with advantage, drinking the milk of marrs, and eating the flesh of colts, and thus in many respects resembling the old Arabs, but in nothing more than in their love of intoxicating li- quors, and in nothing less tlmn in a taste for poetry and the improvement of then: language. Thus baa it been proved, and in my humble opj- 5. OISCOCTRSBS. 81 nion beyond controversy, that the far greater part of Asia has been peopled and immemoriallyvpossessed by three considerable nations, whom for want of better names we may call Hindus, Arabs, and Tar- tars: each of them divided and subdivided into an infinite number of branches, and all of them so dif- ferent in form and features, language, manners, and religion, that if they sprang originally from a com- mon root, they must have been separated for ages. Whether more than three primitive stocks can be found, or in other words, whether the Chinese, Ja- panese, and Persians, are entirely distinct from them or formed by their intermixture, I shall hereafter, if your indulgence to me continue, diligently in- quire. To what conclusions these inquiries will lead, I cannot yet clearly discern ; but, if they lead to truth, we shall not regret our Journey through this dark region of ancient history, in which, while we proceed step by step, and follow every glimmering of certain light that presents itself, we must beware of those false rays and luminous vapours which mislead Asiatic travellers, by an appearance of water, but are found on a nearer approach to be de- serts of sand. e2 82 SIR WILLIAM JONES** DISCOURSE VI. DELIVERED FEBRUARY 19, 17S9. ON THE PERSIANS. Important remarks on their ancient languages and cliaraeters. — PrimeTal religion, and its connexion with their phil0M>< phy.— On the ancient inonnments of Persian scalptnre and architectare.—The arts and sciences of the old Penrians. GENTLEMEN, I TORN with delight from the vast mouDtains and barren deserts of Turao, over which we traveled last year with no perfect knowledge of our coarse, and request you now to accompany me on a literary journey through one of the most cdebrated and most beautiful countries in the world : a country, the his* .tory and languages of which, both ancient and mo« dern, T have long attentively studied, and on which I may without arrogance promise you more positive information than I could possibly procure on a na- tion so disunited and so unlettered as the Tartars : I mean that which Europeans improperly call Per- sia, the name of a single province being appljed to the whole empire of Iran, as it is correctly denomi- nated by the present natives of it, and by the learned Mosetmans who reside in these British territories. To give you an account of its largest boundaries, 6. DISCOURSES. 83 agreeably to my former mode of describing India, Arabia, and Tartary, between which it lies, let us begin with the source of the great Assyrian stream Euphrales (as the Greeks, according to their custom, were pleased to miscall the Forat) and thence de- scend to its month in the Green S^, or Persian Gulf, including in our line some considerable districts and towns on. both sides of the river; then, coasting Per- sia, properly so named, and other Iranian provinces, we come to the Delta of the Sindhu or Indus; whence ascending to the mountains of Casbghar, we discover it» fountains and those of the Jaihun, down which we are conducted to the Caspian, which for- merly perhaps it entered, thoqgh it loses itself now in the sands and lakes of Khwarezn. We are next led from the Sea of Khozar, by the banks of the Cur, or Cyrus, and along the Caucasean ridges to the shore of the Euxine, and thence by the several Gre- cian Seas to the poinc whence we took our depar* ture, at no considerable distance from the Mediter- ranean. We cannot but include the Lower Asia within this outline^ because it was unquestionably a part of the Persian, if not of the old Assyrian em- pire ; for we know that it was under the dominion of Caikhosrau; and Diodorus we find asserts, that the kingdom of Troas was dependent on Assyria, since Priam implored and obtained succours from his emperor Teutames, whose name approaches nearer to Tahmures than to that of any other Assyrian mo- narch. Thus may we look on Iran as the noblest inland (for so the Greeks and the Arabs woiild have called it) or at least as the noblest peninsula on this habitable globe i and if M. Bailly had fixed on i^as tbo Atlfuitis of Plato, he might have supported bis i opinion Kith far itronger argumenlB Ihan an; that lie has odducrd in ravour oF Neir Zrmbla. If (he account, indeed, of tbe Atlantes be not purelj' an - E^yplian or an Ulapian fable, I should bff mofe in- clined to (ilace them in Iran than in any r^ion with which I am acqaainted. II may seem strange, thai the ancient biilory of to diijtingalshrrj an empire should be yel so imperfeclly hnown ; but very utisfaclory reatona may be as- signed for our ignorance of il ; fhe principal of Ihem are the superficial knowledge of Ihe Greeks and Jews, and Ihe loss of Penian archives, or histwical com poail ions. Thai Ihe Grecian writere, before X*- nopboD, had no acquaintance with Peraia,and Ihat all [heir accounts of it are rioHn fabulous, is a pa- deed been generally confined to bordering kingdoms under feudatory princes; and Ihe firsi Penian etn- prrar, whose life and character they seem to have known with talerabUaccnracy, was Ihe great Cyrva,' whom I call, nitbontfearof cocliadiction, Caikhos- rau; for 1 shall then only doubt that the Khoerau of Firdausli was Ihe Cyms of the first Greek bislo- riau, and the hero of the oldest political and moral romam^, when I doubt thai Louis Qualorze nnd Lewis Ihe Fonrtcenlb wenrone and Iheianie French King. It is utterly incredible (hat two different princes of Persia shoDld each have been bom in a foreign and liostile territoTy | should each have been doomed lo death in his infancy by his maternal grand- faliier, in con-equence of porleolout dreams, real or Invcnied ; t-houlil each have been saved by Ihe re- morse of his destined murdereri and should each. 6. DISCOURSES. 85 after a similar education among herdsmen^ as the son of a herdsman, haye found means to revisit his paternal kingdom ; and having delivered it, after a long and triumphant war, from the tyrant who had invaded it, should have restored it to the summit of power and magnificence ! Whether so romantic a story, which is the subject of an epic poem as ma- jestic and entire as the Iliad, be historically true, we may feel perhaps an inclination to doubt; but it cannot with reason be denied, that the outline of it related to a single hero, whom the Asiatics, convers- ing with the father of European history^ described according to their popular traditions by his true ' name, which the Greek alphabet could not express : nor will a difference of names affect the question, since the Greeks had little regard for truth, which they sacrificed willingly to the graces of their lan- guage and the nicety of their ears; and, if they could render foreign words melodious, they were never so- licitous to make them exact ; hence they probably formed Cambyses from Cambakhsh, or granting de- sireSf a title rather than a name ; and Xerxes from Shiniya, -a prince and warrior in the Shahnamab, or from Shirshah, which might also have been a title; for the Asiatic princes have constantly assumed new titles or epithets at different periods of their lives, • or on different occasions : a custom which we have seen prevalent in our own times both in Iran and ^ Hindustan, and which has been a source of great confusion even in the scriptural accounts of Baby- lonian occurrences. Both Greeks and Jews have in foct accommodated Persian names to their oirn ar- ticulation ; and both seem to have disregarded the native literature of Iran, without which they could 86 SIR WILLUM JORES^S at most attaio but a general and imperfect know- ledge of the country. As to the Persians themsel ves, who were contemporary with the Jews and (kveks, they must have been acquainted with the history of their own times, and with the traditional accounts of past ages; but for a reason which will presently ap- pear> they chose to consider Cayumers as the foander of their empire ; and, in the numerous distracticHis which followed the overthrow of Dara, especially in the great revolution on the defeat of Yezdc^ird, their civil histories were lost, as those of India have unhappily been, from the solicitude of the priests^ the only depositaries of their learning, to preserve their books of law and religion at the expense of all others. Hence it has happened, that nothing remains of genuine Persian history before the dyaasty of Sasan, except a few rustic traditions and fables, which furnished materials for the Shahnamah, and which are still suppoied to exist in the Pahlavi lan- guage. All the annals of the Pishdadi, or Assyrian race, must be considered as dark and fabulous; and those of the Cayani family, or the Medes and Per- lians, as heroic and poetical; though the lunar eclipses said to be mentioned by Ptolemy, -fix the time of Gushtasp, the prince by whom Zeratush was protected, of the Parthian kings descended from Ar- sbac or Arsaces, we know, little more than the names, but the Sasan is had so long an intercourse with the emperors of Rome and Byzantium, that the period of their dominion may be called an historical age. In attempting to ascertain the beginning of the As- syrian empire, we are deluded, as in a thousand in- stances, by names arbitrarily imposed. It had beei^ ; settled by c^ronologers, that the first monarchy e»- 6. DISCOURSES. 87 tablisbed in Persia was the Assyrian ; and Newton finding some of opinion, that it rose in the first cen- tury after the Flood, but unable by his own calcula- tions to extend it farther back than seven hundred and ninety years before Christ, rejected part of the old system, and adopted the rest of it ; concluding, that the Assyrian monarchs began to reign about two hundred years after Solomon, and that in all preced- xoS aS^9 ^^^ government of Iran had been divided into several petty states and principalities. Of this opinion I confess myself to have been, when, disre- garding the wild chronology of the Muselmans and Gabrs, I had allowed the utmost natural duration to the reigns of eleven Pishdadi kings, wltbout being able to add more than a hundred years to Newton's computation. It se«ned indeed unaccountably strange, that although Abraham had found a regth* lar monarchy in £gypt>; although the kingdom of Yemen bad just vpretensions to very high antiquity $ although the Chinese, in the twelfth century before our sera, had made approaches at least to the present form of (heir extensive dominion ; and although we can hardly suppose the first Indian monarchs to have reigned less than three thousand years ago, yet Per- sia, the most delightful, the most compact, the most desirable country of them all, should have remained for so many ages unsettled and disunited. A fortu- nate discovery, for which I was first indebted to Mir Af idiammed Husain, cme of the most intelligipnt Mu- selmans in India, has at once dissipated the cloud, and cast a gleam of it on the primeval history of Iran and of the human race, of which I had long despaired, and which could barely have dawned from any other quarter. S8 SIR WILLIAM JOVES'S The rare and interesting tract on ttoelve different religiotUj entitled the Dabistan, and composed by a Mohammedan traveller, a native of Casbmir, named Mohsan, but distinguished by the assumed surname of Fani, or periahabUy begins with the wonderfully curious chapter on the religion of Hushang, which was long anterior io that of Zeratusht, but had con- tinued to be secretly possessed by many learned Per- sians even to the author's time ! and several of the most eminent of them, dissenticg in many points from the Gabrs, and persecuted by the ruling powers of their country, had retired to India, where they compiled a number of books, now extremely scarce, which Mohsan had perused, and with the writers of which, or with many of them, he had contracted an intimate friendship. From them he learned, that a powerful monarchy had been established for ages in Iran before the accession of Cayumers ; that it was called the Mahabadian dynasty, for a reason which will soon be mentioned ; and that many princes, of whom seven or eight are only named in the Dabis- tan,' and among them Mahbul, or Maha Beli, had raised their empire to the zenith of human glory. If we can rely on this evidence, which to me appears unexceptionable, the Iranian monarchy must have been the oldest in the world; but it will remain du- bious to which of the three stocks Hindu, Arabia, or Tartar, the first kings of Iran belonged; or whether they sprang from n. fourth race distinct from any of the others ; and these are questions which we shall be able, I imagine, to answer precisely, when we have carefully inquired into the languages and letterSj re- ligion and philosophy^ and incidentally into the artt and acienceSf of (he ancient Persians. 6. ]>1SC6URSE9« 89 . L In the new and important remarks which I am going to offer on the ancient languages and charac- ters of Iran, I am sensible that you must give me credit for many assertions, which on this occasion it is impossible to prove ; for I should ill deserve your indulgent attention, if I were to abuse it by repeat- ing a dry list of detached words, and presenting yo^ with a vocabulary instead of a dissertation; but, since I have no system to maintain, and have not suffered im^ination to delude my judgment, since 1 have habituated myself to form opinions of raea and things from eviefenoe, which is (he only solid basis of civil, as experiment is of natural, knowledge, and since I have maturely considered the questions which I mean to discuss, you will not, I am per- suaded, suspect my testimony, or think that I go to Besides the Parsi and Pablavi) a very ancient and abstruse tongae •was known to the priests and pbiLosophen, called ike language of the Zend^ because a book on reli- gious and moral duties, which they held sacred, and which bore that name, had been written in it, while the Pazand, or comment on that work, was composed in Pahlavi, as a more popular idiom ; but a learned follower of Zeratusht, named Bahman, who lately died at Calcutta, where he had lived with me as a Persian reader about three years, assured me that the letters of his prophet's book were properly called Zend, and the language Avesta, as the words of the Vedus are Sanscrit, and the characters Nagari; or as the old Sagas and poems of Iceland were expressed in Runic letters. Let us however, in compliance with custom, give the name of Zend to the sacred language of Persia, until we can find, as we shall very soon, a fitter appellation for it. The Zend and the old Pahlavi are almost extinct in Iran; for among six or seven thousand Gabrs, who reside chiefly at Yezd, and in Cirman, there are very few who can read Pahlavi; and scarce any who even boast of knowing the Zend ; while the Parsi, which remains almost pure in the Shabnamah, has become by the intermixture of numberless Arabic words, and many imperceptible changes, a new language, exquisitely polished by a series of fine writers in prose and verse, and analogous to the different idioms gradu* ally formed in Europe after the subversion of the Roman empire: but with modern Persian we have no concern in our present inquiry, which I confine to the ages that preceded the Mohammedan conquest. Having twice read the works of Firdaosi with great 6. DISCOURSES. 91 attention, since I applied myself to the study of old Indian literature, I can assure you with confide nce^ that hundreds of Parsi nouns are pure Sanscrit, with no other change than such as may be observed in the numerous bhashas, or vernacular dialects of India ^ that very many Persian imperatives are the roots of Sanscrit verbs ; and that even the moods and tenses of the Persian verb substantive, which is the model of all the rest, are deducible from the San- scrit by an easy and clear analogy : we may hence conclude^ that the Parsi was derived, like the various Irdian dialects, from the language of the Brahmans ; and I must add, that in the pure Persian', I find no trace of any Arabian tongue, except what proceeded from the known intercourse between the Persians and Arabs, especially in the time of Bahram, who was educated in Arabia,, and whose Arabic verses are still extant, together with his heroic line in Deri, which many suppose to be the first attempt at Per-^ sian versification in Arabian metre; but, without having recourse to other arguments, the composition ofwordSf in which the genius of the Persian delights, and which that of the Arabic abhors, is a decisive proof that the Parsi sprang from an Indian, and not from an Arabian stock. Considering languages as - mere instruments of knowledge, and having strong reasons to doubt the existence of genuine books in Zend or Pabiavi (especially since the well informed author of the Dabistan affirms the work of Zeratusht to have been lost, and its place supplied by a recent compilation), I had no inducement, though I had an opportunity, to learn what remain of those ancient languages; but I often conversed on them with my friend Bahman ; and both of us were conviaced, after 99 SIR WILLIAM JOMES'S foil consideration, tliat the Zend bore a strong re- semblance to Sanscrit, and the Pahlavi to Arabic. He had at my request translated into Pahlavi the fine inscription exhibited in the Gulist^n, on the dia^ dem of Cyrus ; and I had the patience to read the list of words from the Pazand in the appendix to the Farliangi Jehangiri. This examination gave me perfect conviction that ttie Pahlavi was a dialect of the Chaldaic, and of this curious fact I will exhibit a short proof. By the nature of the Chaldean tongoe, Qost words ended in the first long vowel, like ahenUay heaven ; and that very word, unaltered in a single letter, we find in the Pazend, together with laila^ night; meifdt water; nira, fire; matra^ rain; and a multitude of others, all Arabic or Hebrew, with a Chaldean termination ; so zamary by a beautiful metaphor, from pruning trees, means in Hebrew to compos^ verseSy and thence, by an easy transition, to ting them ; and in Pahlavi we see the verb zamru' niten, to sing, with its forms zamrunemi, I sing, and zamrunidy he sang ; the verbal terminations of the Persian being added to the Chaldaic root. Now all those words are integral parts of the language, not adventitious to it like the Arabic nouns and verbals engrafted on modern Persian; and this distinction convinces me, that the dialect of the Gabrs, which they pretend to be that of Zeratusht, and of which 3ahman gave me a variety of written specimens, is a late invention of their priests, or subsequent at least to the Muselman invasion; for, although it may be possible that a few of their sacred books were preserved, as he used to assert, in sheets of lead or copper at the bottom of wells near Yezd, yet, at the conquerors had not only a spiritual, but a poU« 6. DI8COU1I8E8. 95 tital interest in persecuting a warlilce^rpbust, and in- dignant race of irreconcileable, conquered subjects, a long time must have elapsed before the bidden scriptures could have been safely brought to light, and few who could perfectly understand th6m must then liave remained ; but, as they continued to pro- fess among themselves the religion of their for^ fathers, it then became expedient for the Mubeds to supply the lost or mutilated works of their legislator by new compositions, partly from their imperfect recollection, and partly from such moral and relt* . gious knowledge as they gleaned, most probably, among the Christians, with whom they had an inter- course. One rule we may fairly establish in decid- ing the question, Whether the books of the modern Gabrs were anterior to the invasion of the Arabs K When an Arabic noun occurs in them, changed only by the spirit of the Chaldean idiom, as toerta for werd, a rose ; daba for dhakaby gold ; or demon for zeman, time, we may allow it to have been ancient Pablavi ; but when we meet with verbal nouns or infinitives,' evidently formed by the rules of Arabian ^ammar, we may be sure that the phrases in which they occur are con^>aratively modern ; and not a single passage which Babman produced from the books of bis religion would abide this test. We come now to the language of the Zend, and bere I must impart a discovery which I lately made, and from which we may draw the most interesting consequences. M . Anquetil, who had the merit of undertaking a voyage to India in his earliest youth, with no other view than to recover writings of Ze- catusht, and who would have acquired a brilliant re- putation in France, if he had not sullied it by hi M SIR WILUAM J01fRS*S lininodenUe canity and Yimlence of temper, ^hich alienated the good will eveo of bis own coantrymen, has exhibited in his work entitled Zendavesta, two ▼ocabalaries in Zend and Pahlavi, which ^e had found in an approved collection of Rawayat, or Traditional Pieces, in modem Persian. Of his Pah- lavi, no more need to be said than that it strongly confirms my opinion concerning the Chaldsuc origin of that language; but, when I perused the Zend glossary, I was inexpressibly surprised to find that six or seven words in ten were pure Sanscrit, and even some of their inflexions formed by the roles of Vyacaran; as yushmacatn, the genitive plural o€ yushmad, Now M. Anquetil most certainly, and the Persian compiler most probably, had no know- ledge of Sanscrit ; and could not therefore have in- Tented a list of Sanscrit words: it is, therefore, an authentic list of Zend words which had been pre- served in books, or by tradition : and it follows, that the language of the Zend was at least a dialect of the Sanscrit, approaching perhaps as nearly to it as the Pracrit, or other popular idioms, which we know to have been spoken in India two thousand years ago. From all these facts it is a necessary conse- quence, that the oldest discoverable languages of Persia were Chaldaic and Sanscrit, and that, when they had ceased to be vernacular, the Pahlavi and ^end were deduced from them respectively, and the Parsi either from the Zend, or immediately from the dialect of the Brahmans ; but all had perhaps a mix- ture of Tartarian; for the best lexicographers assert, that numberless words in ancient Persian are taken from the language of the Cimmerians, or the Tartars of Kipchak ; so that the three families, whose lineage 6. DISCOURSES. 95 itre have examiifed in former discourses, had left vi- sible traces of themselves, in Iran long before the Tartars and Arabs had rushed from their deserts, and returned from that very country from which, io all probability, they originally proceeded, and which the Hindus had abandoned in an earlier age, with positive commands from their legislators to revisit it no more. I close this head with observing, that no supposition of a mere political or commercial inter- course between the different nations will account , for the Sanscrit and Chaldaic words which we find in the old Persian tongues ; because they are, in the first place, too numerous to have- been introduced by such means ; and secondly, are not the names of exotic animals, commodities, or arts, but those of material elements, parts of the body, natural objects and relations, affections of the mind, and other ideas common to the whole race of ma,n. If a nation of Hindus, it may be urged, ever pos- sessed and governed the country of Iran, we should find on the very ancient ruins of the temple or pa- lace, now called tht Tlirone ofJemshid^ some in- scriptions in Devanagari, or at least in the charac- ters on the stones at £lephanta, where the sculptu^re is unquestionably Indian, or in those on the staff of Firuz Shah, which exist in the heart of India; and such inscriptions we probably should have found, if that edifice had not been erected after the migration of the Brahmans frpm Iran, and the violent schism in the J^ersian religion, of which we shall presently speak; for, although the popular name of the build- ing at Istakar or Persepolis be no certain proof that it was raised in the time of Jemshid, yet 8U<:h a faqt might easily have been preserved by tradition ; and SB giR WILLIAkt JONEg'i ve iball Boon have Rbandsnl eridellce thai Ihe tem- f\e was pmterior to the reign of the Hindu moDarchii. Tbee^rejiei indeed, wbidi nre represented with the . 0gurea,in procoaion, might induce a reader of the SbahnaiDBta to believe, that the acalplurea related to tile Dew faith introduced bj Zeratusht; but at a Cfpren i> a benntiful orDameot, and as maa; of the fignm appear inconshteat with Ibe reformed adora- lion of fire, we moat have reeoune to stronger proo^ that the Takhti Jenuhid was erecle^after Cajumen. Tbe building baa latel}> been « iii)ted> and tbe cbaiac* ters on It eiamiaed, by Mr. Francklln, from whom we learnlhalNiebufar has delineated theiD with great accuracy ; but wilhoul such tntimon; I should baie suspected the correctuest of the delioealion, because the Danish traveller has eihibiled two inscriptions tn modern Persian, and one of Ihem from tbe same place, which cannot have been eiactly transcribed : they are very elegant vmei of Nizanii and Sadl, tH the tialaiilUy of human grtalntis, but so Ml en- graved or so ill copied, tliat if I had not had them nearly \iy heati, I should not have been able to read tbem g and M. Romseau of Isfahan, who Irenslated them with shameful inaccuracy, must have been de- ceived by the badness of the copy, or he never would have created a new Ling Wakam, by fonning one word oi Jem and the particle prefixed to if. As- itimlng, however, that we may reaaon as conclaaively on the characters pnblisbed by Niebuhras wemigfat on the monuments themselves, were they now befor* IB, we may begin with observing, as Chardin hod obMrved on the very spot, that Ibey bear no resem- d by theGabn in ^' DISCOURSES. 97 to an amicable debate with Babman, as a proof (bat tbe Zend letters were a modern invention; bat be seemed to hear me witbont snrprise, and insisted tbat the letters to which I alluded, and which be bad often seen, were monumental characters never used in books, and intended either to conceal some reli- gious mysteries froto the vulgar, or to display the art of the sculptor, like the embellished Cufick and Nagari on several Arabian and Indian monuments* He wondered that any man could seriously doubt the antiquity of the Pahlavi letters; and in truth the inscription behind the horse of Rustam, which Niebubr has also given us, is apparently Pahlavi, and might with some pains be decyphered ; that cha- racter was extremely rude, and seems to have been written, like tbe Roman and the Arabic, in a variety of hands ; for I remember to have examined a rare collection of old Persian coins in tbe museum of the great Anatomist William Hunter; and, though I be- lieved the legends to be Pahlavi, and had no doubt that they were coins of Parthian kings, yet I could jiot read the inscriptions without wasting more time than I had then at command, in comparing the let- ters and ascertaining the proportions in which they severally occurred. The gross Pahlavi was improv- ed by Zeratusht or bis disciples into an elegant and perspicuous character, in which the Zendavesta was copied ; and both were written from the right hand to tbe left, like other Chaldaic alphabets, for they Are manifestly both of Chaldean origin ; but the Zend has the singular advantage of expressing all the long and short vowels by distinct marks in tbe body of each word, and a}\ the words are distin- fuisbed by full points between tbem ; so that if mo- 98 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S I derii Persian were unmixed with Arabic, it might be written in Zend with the greatest convenience, as any one may perceive, by copying in that character a few pages of the Shahnamah. As to the unknown inscriptions in the palace of Jemshid, it may reason- ' ably be doubted whether they contain a system of letters which any nation ever adopted : in Jive of them the letters, which are separated by points,' may be reduced to forty, at least I can distinguish no more essentially diflferent; and they all seem to be regular variations and compositions of a straight line and an angular figure like the head of a javelin, or a leaf (to use the language of botanists) hearted and ianced. Many of the Runic letters appear to have been formed of similar elements; and it has been ob- served that the writing at Persepolis bears a strong resemblance to that which the Irish call Ogham. The word Agam in Sanscrit means mysterious knowledge ; but I dare not affirm that the two words had a com- mon origin } and only mean to suggest, that if the characters in question be really alphabetical, they were probably secret and sacerdotal, or a mere cy- pher perhaps, of which the priests only had the key. They might, I imag'me, be decyphered, if the lan- guage were certainly known; but in all other in- scriptions of the same sort, the characters are, too complex^ and the variations of them too numerous, to admit an opinion that they could be symbols of aiticulate sounds ; for even theNagari system, which h^s more distinct letters than any known alphabet, consists only of forty-nine simple characters, two of which are mere substitutions, and four of little use in Sanscrit, or in any other language; while Ijhe more complicated figures exhibited by Niebuhr, must be 6. DISCOURSES. 90 as numerous at least as the Chinese keys, which are the signs of ideas only, and some of which resemble the old Persian letters at Istakhr. The Danish tpo- ▼eller was convinced from his own observation that they were written from the left hand, like all the characters used by Hindu nations; but I must leave this dark subject, which I cannot illuminate, with a remark formerly made by myself, that the square Chaldaic letters, a few of which are found on the Persian ruins, appear to have been originally the same with the Devanagari before the latter were en* closed, as we now see them, in angular frames. II. The primeval religion of Iran, if we rely on the authorities adduced by Mohsani Fani, was that which Newton calls the oldest (and it may be justly called the noblest) of all religions : ** A firm belief that One Supreme God made the world by his power, and continually governed it by his providence ; a pious fear, love, and adoration of him; a due reve- rence for parents and aged persons ; a fraternal af- fection for the whole human specie^, and a compas- sionate tenderness even for the brute creation." A system of devotion so pure and sublime c5uld hardly, among mortals, be of long duration ; and we learn from the Dabistan, that the popular worship of the Iranians under Hushang, was purely Sabian; a word of which I cannot offer any certain etymo- logy) ^^^ which has been deduced by grammarians from Saba, an host, and particularly the host ofhea^ t;en, or the celestial bodies t in the adoration of which the Sabian ritual is believed to have consisted. There is a description, in the learned work just mentioned, of the several Persian temples dedicated to the Suo and PlanetSy.of the Images adored in them, and of VOO SIR WILLIAM Jones's the magaificent processions to them on prescribed festivals ; one of which is probably represented by sculpture in the ruined city of Jemshid. But tlie planetary worship in Persia seems only a part of a far more complicated religion, which we now find in these Indian provinces; for Mc^san assures us, that in the opinion of the best informed Persians who professed the faith of Hushaog, distinguished from that of Zeratusht, the first monarch of Iran, and of the whole earth, was Mahabad (a word ap^ parently Sanscrit) who divided the people into four orders, the religious, the military, the commereial, and the tervile^ to which he assigned names unques- tionably the same in their origin with those now applied to the four primary classes of the Hindus. They added, that he received from the Creator, and promulgated among men, a sacred book in a heavenly language, to which the Muselroan author gi^es the Arabic title of Desatir, or Regulations, but the ori- ginal name of which he has not mentioned ; and that fourteen Mahabads bad appeared or woold appear in human shapes for the government of this world. Now 'when we know that' the Hindus believe in fourteen Menua^ or celestial personages, with similar functions, the Jirst of whom left a bo(^ of regulations or divine ordinances, which they bold equal to the Veda, and the language of which they believe to be that of the gods, we can hardly doubt that the first corruption of the purest and oldest religion, was the system of Indian theology invented by the Brahmans, and pre^ valeot in these territories where the book of Maha- bad or Menu is at this moment the standard of all religious and laoral duties. The accession of Cayu- mers to the throne of Persia, in the eighth or nioth 6. ' DISCOURSES.^ ]0l century before Christ, seeins to have been accompa- nied by a considerable revolution both in government and religion : he Tvas most probably of a different race from the Mahabadians who preceded him, and began perhaps the new system of national faith which Hushang, whose name it bears, completed ; btft the reformation was partial ; for, while they re- jected the complex polytheism of their predecessors, they retained the laws of Mahabad, with a super- stitious veneration for the sun, the planets, and fire; thus resembling the Hindu sects called Sauras and Sagnicas, the second of which is very numerous at Banares, where many agnihotras are continually blazing, and where the Sagnicas, wh«i the^' enter on their sacerdotal office, kindle, with two pieces of the hard wood Semi, a lire which they keep lighted through their lives, for the nuptial ceremony, the performance of solemn sacrifices, the obsequies of departed ancestors, and their own funeral pile. This remarkable rite i^as continued by Zeratushtj who re- formed the old religion by the addition of genii, or angels, presiding over months and days, of new ce- remonies in the veneration shown to fire, of a new work which he pretended to have received from Heaven, and, above all, by establishing the actual adoration of one Supreme Being. He was born, according to Mohsan, in the district of Rai ; and it was he (not, as Ammianus asserts, his protector Gush- tasb) who traveled into India, that he might receive^ information from the Brahmans in theology and ethics.. It is barely possible that Pythagoras knew bira in the capital of Irak; but the Grecian sage most then have been far advanced in years; and we 102 SIR WILLIAM JONE8*S have no eertaio evidence of an intercoorse between the two philosopherB. The reformed religion of Penia continued in force till that country was sub- dued by the Muselmans : and, without studying the Zend, we have ample information concerning it in the modern Persian writings of several who professed it. Bahman always named Zeratusht with reveredte, but he was in truth a pure theist, and strongly dis- claimed any adoration of the^Ere or other elements : he denied that the doctrine of two coeval principles, supremely good and supremely bad, formed any part of his faith ; and he often repeated with em- phasis the verses of Firdausi on the prostration of Cyms and his paternal grandfather before the blaz- ing altar: <* Think not that they were adorers of fire ; for that element was only an exalted object, on the lustre of which they fixed their eyes ; they humbled themselves a whole week before God ; and if thy understanding be ever so little exerted, thou must acknowledge thy dependence on the Being su- premely pnre.*' In a story of Sadi, near the close of his beautiful Bustan, concerning the idol Soma- nath, or Mahadeva, he confounds the religion of the Hindus with that of the Gabrs, calling the Brah- mans not only Moghs (which might be justified by a passage in the Mesnavi) but even readers of the Zend Mid Pazend. Now, whether this confusion pre- ceded from real or pretended ignorance I cannot decide, but am as firmly convinced that the doctrines of the Zend were distinct from those of the Veda, as I am that the religion of the Brahmans, with whom we converse every day, prevailed in Persia before the accession of Cayumers, whom the Parsis, 6. DISCOURSES. 103 from respect to his memory, consider as (he fint of men, although they believe in an utdvernU dtluge before his reign. With the religion of the old Persians, their philo^ 9ophy (or as much as we know of it) was intimately connected : for they were assiduous observers o^ the luminaries, which they adored and established, ac- jcording to Mofasan, who confirms in some degree the fragments of Berosus, a number of artificial cycles with distinct names, which seem to indicate a knowledge of the period in which the equinoxes ap- pear to revolve. They are said also to have known the most wonderful powers of nature, and thence to have acquired the fame of magicians and enchanters : but I will only detain you with a few remarks ba that metaphysical theolt^ which has been profess- ed immemorially by a numerous sect of Persians and Hindus, was carried in part into Greece, and prevails even now among the learned Muselmans, who sometimes avow it without reserve. The modern -philosophers of thu persuasion are called Sufis, either from the Greek word for a sage or from the woollen .mantle which they used to wear in some provinces of Persia : their fundamental tenets are. that nothing exists absolutely but God $ that the human soul is an emanation from his essence, and though divided for a time from its heavenly source, will be finally re- united with it ; that the highest possible happiness will arise from its reunion ; and that the chief good of mankind in this' transitory world consists in as perfect an union with the Eternal Spirit as the en- cmnbrances of a mortal frame wiH allow; that for this purpose they should break all connexion (or iamllukf as they call it) with extrinsic objects, and 1 04 SIR Wll LI AM JON ES'S pass (hrough life wtthout aiUckmentSj as a swimmer in the oceaa strikes freely iv it bout the impediment of clothes ; that they should be straight and free as the cypres, whose frait is hardly perceptible, and not sink under a load, like fruit trees attached to a trellis ; that, if mere earthly charms have power to influence the soul, the idea of celestial beauty must overwhelm it in ecstatic delight ; that for want of apt words to express the divine perfections and the ardour of devotion, we must borrow such expressions as approach the nearest to oor ideas, and speak of Beauty and Love in a transcendent and mystical sense ; that, like a reed torn from its native bank, like wax separated from its delicious honey, the son of man bewails its disunion with melancholy musiCf and sheds burning tears, like the lighted taper wait- ing passionately for the moment of its extinction, as a disengagement from earthly trammels, and the means of returning to its Only Beloved. Such In part (for I omit the minuter and more subtle meta- physics, of the Sufis which are mentioned in the Da- bistan) is the wild and enthusiastic religion of the modem Persian poets, especially of the sweet Hafiz and the great Maulavi : such is the system of the Vedanti philosophers and best lyric jioets of India; and, as it was a system of the highest antiquity in both nations, it may be added to the many other proofs of an immemorial affinity l)etween them. III. On tlie ancient monuments of Persian sculp-, ture and architecture, we have already made such observations as were sufficient ibr our purpose ; nor will you be surprised at the diversity between the figures at Rlephanta, which are manifestly Hindu, and those at Persepolis, which are merely SabiaOi if mm 6, OI6C0URSBS. 105 you concur with me in belieying (hat the Takbti Jem^hid was 'erected after the time of Caywnen« when the Brabmans had migrated from Iran, and when their intricate mythology had been superseded by the simpler adoration of the planets and of iire. IV. As to the iciences or arts of the old Persians^ I have little to say ; and no complete evidence of them seems to exist. Mobsan speaks more than once of ancient verses in the Pahlavi language : and Bah- man assured me that some scanty remains of them had been preserved ; their music and painting which Nizami celebrated, have irrecoverably perished; and in regard to M ani, the painter and impostor, whose book of drawings called Arlang, which he pretended to be divine, is supposed to have been destroyed by the Chinese, in whose dominions he had sought re- fuge, — ^the whole tale is too modern to throw any light on the questions before us concerning the origin of nations and the inhabitants of the primitive world. Thus has it been proved Jby clear evidence and plain reasoning, that a powerful monarchy was es- tablished in Iran long before the Assyrian or Pish- dadi government: that it was in. truth a Hindu mo- narchy, though if any chnse to call it Cusian, Cas- dean, or Scythian, we shall not enter into a debate on mere names ; that it subsisted many centuries^ and that its history has been engrafted on that of the Hibdus, who founded the monarchies of Ayodhya and Indraprestba : that the language of the first Persian empire was the mother of the Sanscrit, and consequently of the Zend and Parsi, as well as of Greek, Latin, and Grothic; that the language of the Assyrians was the parent of Chaldaic and Pahlavi, and that the primary Tartarian language also had ¥2 106 81 R WILLIAM J0N£&'S been current in the same empire $ although, as the Tartars had no books or evenlettersiwe cannot with certainty trace their unpolished and yariable idioms. Mfe discover therefore in Persia, ' at the earliest dawn of history, the three distinct races of men whom we described on former occasions, as possess- ors of India, Arabia, Tartary; and whether they were collected in Iran from distant regions or di- verged from it as from a common centre, we shall easily determine by the following considerations. Let us observe in the first place, the central position of Iran, which is bounded by Arabia, by Tartary, and by India; whilst Arabia lies contiguous to Iran only, but is remote from Tkrtary, and divided even from the skirts of India by a considerable golf; no country, therefore, but Persia seems likely to have sent forth its colonies to all the kingdoms of Asia. The Brahmans could never have migrated from India to Iran, because they are expressly forbidden by th<^ir oldest existing laws to leave the region which they inhabit at thb day ; the Arabs have not even a tradition of an emigration into Persia before Mo- hammed, nor had they indeed any inducement to quit their beautiful and extensive domains; and as to the Tartars, we have no trace in history of their departure from their plains and forests till the inva- sion of the Medes, who, according to etymologists, were the sons of Madai ; and even they were con- ducted by princes of an Assyrian family. The three races, therefore, whom we have already mentioned, (and more than three we have not yet found) mi- grated from Iran as from their common country ; and thu'd the Saxon Chronicle, I presume from good authority, brings the first inhabitants of Britain from mm 6. DISCOURSES. 107 Armenia; wiiile a late very learned writer con- cludesy after all bis laborious researches, that the Goths or Scythians came from Persia $ and another contends with great force, that both the Irish and^ old Britons proceeded severally from the borders of the Caspian ; a coincidence of conclusions from dif* ferent media by persons wholly unconnected, which could scarce have happened if they were not ground* ed on solid principles. We may therefore hold this proposition firmly establislied, that Iran, or Persia in its largest sense, was the true centre of population, of knowledge, of languages, and of arts; which, in- stead of traveling westward only, as it has been fan- cifuUy supposed, or eastward, as might with equal reason have been asserted, were expanded in all di- rections to all the regions of the world in which the Hindu race had settled under various denominations : but whether Asia has not produced other races of men, distinct from the Hindus, the Arabs, or the Tartars ; or whether any apparent diversity may not have sprung from an intermixture of those three in different proportions, must be the subject of a future inquiry. There is another question of more immediate importance, which you, gentlemen, only can decide ; namely, " By what means we can pre- serve our Society from dying gradually away? as it has advanced gradually to its present (shall I say flourishing or languishing?) state." It has subsisted five years without any expense to the members of it, until the first volume of our Transaction^ was pub- lished; and the price of that large volume, if we compare the different values of money in Bengal and in England, is not more than equal to the annual coQtribntioii towards the charges of the Royal So- 108 filR WILtrAM JONES'S ciety by each of Its fellows, who may not have chosen to compound for it on bis admission. This I men- tion not from an idea that any of us could object to the purchase of one copy at least, but from a wish to inculcate the necessity of our common exertions in promoting the sale of the work both here and in London. In vain shall we meet as a literary body, if our meetings shall cease to be supplied with ori- ginal dissertations and memorials; and in yain shall we collect the most interesting papers, if we cannot publish them occasionally without exposing the su- perintendents of the Company's press, who undertake to print them at their own hazard, to the danger of a considerable loss. By united efforts, the French have compiled their stupendous rej^ositories of uni- versal knowledge ; and by united efforts only can yre hope to rival them, or to diffusef^ over our own country and the rest of Europe the light attainable by our Asiatic Researches. '^^r*^^^i^^r^i^m-'^^^^^m^K^^mmimmm^^mm^mmgeSfttSKS9 DISCOURSES. 109 DISCOURSE VII. DELIVERED FEBRUARY S5, 1790. ON THE CHINESE. Origin of the people ivho governed China before they were conqnered by the Tartars.— Examination of the language, and letters, religion and philosophy, of the present Chinese. — Remarks on their ancient monuments, sciences, and artf . — llie importation of a new religion into China. GENTLEMEN, Although we are at this moment considerabry nearer to the frontier of China than to the forthest limit of the British dominions in Hindustan, yet (he first step that we should take in the philosophical journey which I propose for your entertainment at the present meeting, will carry us to the utmost verge of the habitable globe known to the best geo- graphers of Old Greece and Egypt; beyond the boundary of whose knowledge i^e shall discern, from the heights of the northern mountains, an em- pire nearly equal in surface to a square of fifteen degrees ; an empire, of which I do not mean to as- sign the precise limits, but which we may consider, for the purpose of this dissertation, as embraced on two sides by Tartary and India, while the ocean se- parates its other sides fk-om yarious Asiatic isles of 110 SIR WILLIAM JOMES'S great importance in the commercial system of Eu- rope. Annexed to this immense track of land is the peninsula of Corea, which a vast oval bason divides from Nison or Japan, a celebrated and imperial island, bearing in arts and in arms, in advantl^ge of situation, but not in felicity of government, a pre- eminence among eastern kingdoms analagous to that of Britain among the nations of the west. So many climates are included in so prodigious an area, that while the principal emporium of China tics nearly under the tropic, its metropolis enjoys the tempera- ture of Samarkand : such too is the diversity of soil in its fifteen provinces, that, while some of them are exquisitely fertile, richly cultivated, and extremely populous, others aje barren and rocky, dry and unfruitful, with plains as wild or mountains as rugged as any in Scythta, and those either wholly deserted, or peopled by savage hordes, who, if they be not still independent, have been very lately sub* , dued by the perfidy, rather than the valour of a monarch, who has perpetuated his own breach of faith in a Chinese poem, of which I have seen a translation. The word China, concerning which I shall oflfer some new remarks, is ^ell known to the people whom we call the Chinese; but they never apply it (I speak of the learned among them) to themselves or to thfir country. Themselves, according to Fa- ther Visdelou, they describe as the people of Han, or of some other illustrious family, by the memory of whose actions they flatter their national pride; and their country they call Chum-cue, or the Central Kingdom^ representing it in their symbolical charac- ters by a parallelogram exactly bisected. At other 7. DISCOURSES. Ill times they dist'iDguish it by the words Tien-hai, or fVhat is under Heaven ; meaning all that is va/u- able on earth. Since they never name themselves with moderation, they woukl have no right t^i com* plain, if they knew that European authors have ever spoken of them in the extremes of applause or of censure. By some they have been extolled as the oldest and the wisest, as the most learned and most ingenious of nations ; whilst others have derided their pretensions to antiquity, condemned their govern- ment as abominable, and arraigned their manners ad inhuman, without allowing them an element of sci- ence, or a single art, for which they have not been indebted to some more ancient and more civilized race of men. The truth perhaps lies, where we usually find it, between the extremes; but it is not my design to accuse or to defend the Chinese, to de- press or to aggrandize them : I shall confine myself to the discussion of a question connected with my former discourses, and far less easy to be solved than any hitherto started : ^ Whence came the singular people who long had governed China, before they were conquered by tl^e Tartars ?'* On this problem (the solution of which has no concern, indeed, with onr political or commercial interests, but a very ma- terial connexion, if I mistake not, with interests of a higher natnre) four opinions have been advanced, and all rather peremptorily asserted than supported by argument and evidence. By a few writers it has been urged, that the Chinese are an original race, who have dwelt for ages, if not from eternity, in the land which they now possess ; by others, and chiefly, by the missionaries, it is insisted that they sprang from the same stock with the Hebrews and 1 1 2 SIR WILLIAM JONESES Arabs; a third assertion is that of the Arabs them* selves, and of M. Pauw, who bold it indubitable, that they were originally Tartars, descending in wild clans from the steeps of Imaus ; and a fourth, at least as dogmatically pronounced as any of the preced* ing, is that of the Brahmens, who decide, without allowing any appeal from their decision, that the Chinas (for so they are named in Sanscrit) were Hindns of the Cshatriya, or military class, who, abandoning the privileges of their tribe, rambled in different bodies to the north-east of Bengal ; and, forgetting by degrees the rites and religion of their ancestors, established separate principalities, which were afterwards united in the plains and valleys which are now possessed by tbem. If any one of the three last opinions be just, the first of them must necessarily be relinquished; but of those three, the first cannot possibly be sustained, because it rests on no firmer support than a foolish remark, whether true or false, that Sem in Chinese means life and procreation; and because a tea-plant is not more different from a palm than a Chinese from an Arab. They are men, indeed, as the tea and the palm are vegetables; but human sagacity could not, 1 be- lieve, discover any other trace of resemblance be* tween them. One of the Arabs, indeed (an account of whose voyage to India and China has been trans- lated by Renaudot), thought the Chinese not hand<* Boroer (according to his ideas of beauty) than the Hindus; but even more like his own countrymen in features, habiliments, carriage, manners, and ce» remonies: and this may be true, without proving an actual resemblance between the Chinese and Ai^abs, except in dress and complexion. The next opinion 7. UlflCOUR»BS. ltd is more comiected with that of the l^rabmens than M. Pauw probably imagioed; for, though he tells tts exproisly that by Scythians he meant the Turks^ or Tartars, yet the Dragon on the standard, and ^me other peculiarities, from which he woold infer a clear affinity between the old Tartars and the Chi- nese, belonged indubitably to those Scythians who are known to have been Goths ; and the Goths had manifestly a common lineage with the Hindus, if hb own argument, in the preface to his Researches on the Similarity of Language be, as all men agree ihat it is, irrefragable. That the Chinese were an- ciently of a Tartarian stocky is a proposition which I cannot otherwise disprove for the present than by insisting on the total dissimilarity of the two races in manners and arts, particularly in the fine arts of imagination, which the Tartars, by their own ap> xoniit, never cultivated; but if we show strong grounds for believing that the first Chinese were ac- tually of an Indian race, it will follow that M. Pauw Bnd the Arabs are mistaken. It is to the. discus- sion of this new, and in iny opinion, very interest- ing point, that I shall confine the remainder of my discourse. In the Sanscrit Institutes of civil and religious duties, revealed, as the Hindus believe, by Menu, the son of Brahma, we find the following curious pafr- sage: ^' Many families of the military class having gradually abandoned the ordinances of the Veda and the company of Brahmens, lived in a state of d^radation ; as the people of Pundraca and Odra, those of Dravira and Camboja, the Yavanas mod. Sacas, the Paradas and Pahlavas, the Chinas, and »orae other nations.*' A fail comment on his text 1 14 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S would here be saperflnous; but since the testimoDy of the Indian author, who, though ce^ainly not a dWine personage, was as certainly a very ancient lawyer, moralist, and historian, is direct and posi- tive, disinterested and unsuspected, it would, I think« decide the question before us, if we could be sure that the word China signified a Chinese, as all the Pandits, whom I have separately consulted, assert with one voice. They assure me that the Chinas of Menu settled in a line country to the north-east of Gaur, and to the east of Camarup and Nepal ; that they have long been, and still are, famed as inge- nious artificers ; and that they had themselves seen old Chinese idols, which bore a manifest relation to the pAmitive religion of India before Buddha*s ap- pearance in it. A well informed Pandit showed me a Sanscrit book in Cashmirian letters, which, he said, was revealed by Siva himself, and entitled Sac- tisangama: be read to me a whole chapter of it on the heterodox opinions of Chinas, who were divided, says the author, into near two hundred clans. I then laid before him a map of Asia; and, when I point- ed to Cashmir, his own country, he instantly placed his finger on the north-western provinces of China, where the Chinas, he said, first established them- selves; but he added, that Mahachina, which was also mentioned in his book, extended to the eastern and soathern oceans. I believe, nevertheless, that the Chinese empire, as we now call it, was not formed when the laws of Menu were collected $ and for this belief, so repugnant to the general opinion, I an bound to offer my re^isons. If (he outline of history and chronology for the last two thousand years be correctly traced (and we must be hardy sceptics to 7. DISCOURSIiS. H5 doobt it) the poems of Calidas were composed before tbe beginnii]|r of onr era. Now it is clear, from in- terrial and external evidence, that the Ramayan and Mahabharai were considerably older than the pro- ductions of that poet; and it appears from the style and metre of the Dherma Sastra, revealed by Meno^ that it was reduced to writing long before the age of Valmic or Vyasa, the second of wliom names it with applause. We shall not therefore be thought ex- travagant if we place the compiler of those laws between a thousand and fifteen hundred years before Christ ; especially as Buddha, whose age is pretty well ascertained, is tiot mentioned in them $ but iii the twelfth century before our era, the Chiniese em- pire was at least in its cradle. This fact it is necessary to prove, and my first witness is Confucius himself. 1 know to what keen satire I shall expose myself by citing that philosopher, after the bitter sarcasms of M. Pauw against him, and against the translators of his mutilated but valuable works $ yet I quote with- out scruple the book entitled Lun Yn, of which I possess the original, with a verbal translation, and which I know to be suflSciently authentic for my^ present purpose. In the second part of it Confu-tsu declares, that '* although be, like other men, could relate as mere lessons of morality, the histories of the first and second imperial bouses, yet, far war^ cf evidenccy he could giv^ no certain account of them." Now, if the Chinese themselves do not even pretend that any historical monument exbted in the age of Confucius, preceding the rise of their third dynasty, about eleven hundred years before the Christian epoch, we may justly conclude that the reign of Vuvam was in the infancy of their empiro, 116 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S which hardly grew to maturity till some ages after that prince ; and it has been asserted by very learn- ed Ettropeans, that even of the third dynasty, wbk^ he has the fame of having raised, no unsuspected memorial can now be produced. It was not till tlie eighth century before the birth of. our. Saviour, that a small kingdom was erected in the province of Sben-si, the capital of which stood nearly in the thirty-fifth degree of northern latitude, and about five, degrees to the west of Si-gan ; botb the country and its metropolis were called Chin ; and the do- minion of its princes was gradually extended to the east and west. A king of Chin, who makes a figure in the Shahnamab among the allies of Afra- siyab, was, I presume, a sovereign of the country just mentioned ; and the river of Chfta, which the poet frequently names as the limit of his eastern geography, seems to have been the Yellow River, which the Chinese introduce at the Ix^ioning of their fabulous anoals. I should be tempted to expatiate on so curious a subject, but the present occasion al- lows nothing superfluous, and permits me only to add, that Mangukhan died in the middle of the thirteenth ceqtury, before the city of Chin, which was afterwards taken by Kublai, and that the poets of Iran perpetually allude to the districts around it which they celebrate, with Chrgil and Kboten, for a number of musk animald roving on their bills. The territory of Chin, so called by the old Hindus, by the Persians, and by the Chinese (while the Greeks and Arabs were obliged by their defective articu* latioB to miscall it Sin) gave its name to a race of «mperors, whose tyranny made their memory so un- popttlar, that the modern inl»bitant» of China hold 7. DISCOURSES. 117 Hbe word in abhotreDce, and speak of themselves as the people of a milder and more virtuous dynasty ; bat it is highly probable that the whole nation de- scended from the Chinas of Menu, and, mixing with the Tartars (by whom the plains of Honan and the more southern provinces were thinly inhabited) formed by degrees the race of men whom we now see in possession of the noblest empire in Asia. In support of an opinion, which I offer as the re- volt of long and anxious inquiries, I should regularly proceed to examine the language and letters, reli- gion and philosophy, of the present Chinese, and subjoin some remarks on their ancient monuments, on their sciences, and on their arts both liberal and mechanical $ but their spoken language, not having been preserved in ihe usual symbols of articulate sounds, must have been for many ages in a continual 0ax: their Utters^ if we may so call them, are merely the symbols of ideas ; their popular religion was imported from India in an age comparatively modern; ami their phildiophy seems yet in so rude a state as hardly to deserve the appellation. They have no ancient monuments^ from which their origin COM be traced even by plausible coqjecture; tl^ir sciences are wholly exotic ; and their mechanical arts have nothing in them characteristic of a particular fa- mily; nothii^ which any set of men, in a country so highly favoured by nature, might not have dis- covered and improved. They have indeed both na- tional music and national poetry, and both of them beautifully pathetic; biit of painting, sculpture, or architecture, as arts of imagination, they seem (like other Asiatics) to have no idea. Instead, therefore, of enlarging separately on each of those heads, I 118^ SIR WILLIAM J0NE8*S shall briefly inquire bow far Ihe literature and re- li^ous practices of Cbina confirm or oppose the pro- position whicb I have advanced. Tbe declared and fixed opinion of M. DeGuignes, on the subject before us, is nearly connected with that of the Brabmens: be maintains that the Chi- nese were emigrants from Egypt; and the Egyp- tians or Ethiopians (for they were clearly the same people) had indubitably a common origin with the old natives of India, as tbe aflbiity of their languages and of their institutions, both religious and political, fully evince ; but that China was peopled a few centuries before our era by a colony from the banks of tbe Nile, though neither Persians nor Arabs, Tar- tan nor Hindus, ever heard of such an emigration, is a paradox which the bare authority even of so learned a nmn cannot support; and, since reason ' grounded on facts can alone decide such a question, we have a right to demand clearer evidence and stronger arguments than any that he has yet adduced. The hieroglyphics of Egypt bear, indeed, a strong resemblance to the mythological sculptures and paintings of India, but seem wholly dissimUar to the symbolical system of the Chinese, which m^ht easily have been itivented (as they assert) by an individual, and might very naturally have been contrived by the first Chinas, or outcast Hindus, who either never knew or had forgotten the alphabetical characters of their wiser ancestors. As to the table and bust of Isis, they seem to be given up as modem forgeries ; but if they were indisputably genuine, they would be nothing to the purpose; for the letters on the bast appear to have been designed as alphabetical ; and tbe fabricator of them (if they really were fa- ^* DISCOURSES. 119 bricated in Europe) was uncommonly happy, since two or three of them are exactly the same with those on a metal pillar yet standing in the north of India. In Egypt, if we can rely on the testimony of the Greeks, who studied no language but their own, there were two sets of alphabetical characters ; the one popular^ like the various letters used in our Indian provinces ; and the other sacerdotal, like the Devanagari, especially that form of it which we see in the Veda : besides which they had two sorts of sacred sculpture ; the one simple, like the figures of Buddha and the three Ramas ; and the other alle- gorical, like the images of Ganesa, or Divine Wis- dom, and Isani, or Nature, with all their emblema- tical accompaniments. But the real character of the Chinese appears wholly distinct from any Egyptian writii^, either mysterious or popular: and, as to the fancy of M. De Guignes, that the complicated sym- bols of China were at first no more than Phenician monograms, let us hope that he has abandoned so wild a conceit, which he started probably with no other view than to display his ingenuity and learning. We have ocular proof that the few radical cha- racters of the Chinese were originally (like ouras- ' tronomical and chymical symbols) the pictures or outlines of visible objects, or figurative signs for simple idei^, which they have multiplied by the most ingenious combinations and the liveliest metaphors ; but as the system is peculiar, I believe, to them- selves and the Japanese, it would be idly ostenta- tions to enlarge on it at present ; and, for the rea- sons already intimated, it neither corroborates nor weakens the opinion which I endeavour to support. The same may as truly be said of their spoken lao* "T" 1 20 SIR WIIXIAM JOVES'S nonage; for, iDdependently of its constant flactua- tion daring a series of ages, it has the peculiarity of excloding four or five sounds which other nations articulate, and is clipped into monosyllables, even when the ideas expressed by them, and the written symbols for those ideas, are very complex. This has arisen, I suppose, from the singular habits of the people; for, though their common tongue be so musically accented as to form a kind of recitative, yet it wants those grammatical accents, without which all human tongues would appear monosyllabic. Thus Amita^ with an accent on the first syllable, •means, in the Sanscrit language, immtaiurahh; and the natives of Bengal pronounce it Omito; but when the religion of Buddha, the son of Maya, was carried hence into China, the people of that country, unable to pronounce the name of their new God, -called him Foe, the son of Mo-ye, and divided bis epithet Amita into three syllables O'mi-to, annexing to them certain ideas of their own, and expressing them in writing by three distinct symbols. We may judge from this instance, whether a comparison cf their spoken tongue with the dialects of other na- tions can lead to any certain conclusion as to their origin ; yet the instance which I have given sup- plies me with an argument from analogy which I produce as conjeclnral only, but which appears more and more plausible the oftener I consider it. The Buddha of the Hindus is unquestionably the Foe of China; but the great progenitor of the Chinese is ^dyo named by them Fo-hi, where the second mono- syllable signifies, it seems, a victim. Now the an- cestor of that military tribe whom the Hindus call Gfaaiidravansa, or Children of the Moon, wwy ao* 7. DISCOURSES. iSi Cording to their Paranas or legends, Buddha, or the genius of the planet Mercury, from whom, in the fifth degree,' descended * a prince named Druhya ; whom his father Yayati sent in exile to the east of Hindustan, with (bis iroprecalion, '' May thy pro- geny be ignorant of the Veda.** The .name of the banished prince could not be pronounced by the mo- dern Chinese; and, though I dare not conjecture that the last syllable of it has been changed into Yao, I may nevertheless observe that Yao was the fifth in descent from Fo-hi, or at least the fifth mortal in the first imperial dynasty ; that all Chi- nese history before him is considered by the Chinese themselves as poelital or fabulous; that his father Ti-co, like the Indian king Yayati, was the first prince who married several women ; and that Fo-hi, the head of their race, appeared, say the Chinese, in a province of the west, and held his court in the territory of Chin, where the rovers, mentioned by the Indian legislator, are supposed to have settled. Another circumstance in the parallel is very remark- able: — According to Father De Premare, in his tract on Chinese Mythology, the mother of Fo-hi was the Daughter of Heaven, surnamed Flower' loving ; and as the nymph was walking alone on the bank of a river with a -similar name, she found her- self on a sudden encircled by a rainbow ; soon after which she became pregnant, and at the end of twelve years was delivered of a son radiant as herself, who, among other titles, had that of Soi, or Star of the Year. Now, in the mythological system of the Hindus, the nymph Rohini, who presides over the fourth lunar mansion, was the favourite mistress of ^ma, or the Mooo^ among whose numerous epi- ]SS 8lk WILLIAM JONES'S thets we fiod Cumudanayaca, or. Delighting in a species of water-Jlower that blossoms at oig^bt ; and their offspring was Buddha, regent of a planet, and called also', from the names of his parents, Rauhineya or Saumya. It is true that the learned missionary explains the word Sui by Jupiter; but an exact re* semblance between two such fables could not have been expected ; and it is sufficient for my purpose that they seem to have a family likeness. The God Buddha, say the Indians, married Ila, whose father was preserved in a miraculous ark from an univer- sal deluge. Now, although I cannot insist with con* fidence that the rainbow in the Chinese fable alludes to the Minaic narrative of the - flood, nor build any solid argument on the divine personage Niu-va, of whose character, and even of whose sex, the histo- rians of China speak very doubtfully, I may nev<^- theless assure you, after full inquiry and considenu tion, that the Chinese, like the Hindus, believe this earth to have been wholly covered with water, which, in works of undisputed authenticity, .they describe as flowing abundantly^ then subeiding^ qnd $eparating the higher firom the lower age of mankind; that the division oftime^ from which their poetici^ history begins, just preceded the appearance of Ff>>hi on the mountains of Chin ; but that the great inun- dation in the reign of Yao was either confined to the lowlands of his kingdom, iCthe whole account of it be not a fable, or, if it contain any allusion to the flood of Noah, has been ignorantly misplaced by the Chinese annalists. The importation of a new religion into Chiqa in the first century of our era, must lead us to suppose that the former system, whatever it was, .had been 7. mscointiEs. 1 S3 foond inadequate to the purpose of reitrainiDg the great body of the people from those offences agaiud conscience and yirtue, which the civil power could not reach ; and it is hardly possible that, without such restrictions, any government could long have Bubststed with felicity ; for no government can long subsist without equal justice, and juirtice cannot be administered without the sanctions of religion. Of the religious opinions ratertained by Confucius and his followers, we may glean a general notion from the fragments of their works jtransliUed by Coaplet« They professed a firm belief in the Supreme Gk>d, and gave a demonstration of his being and of bis providence from the exquisite beauty and perfection of the celestial bodies, and the wonderful order of nature in the whole fabric of the visible world. From this belief they deduced a system of ethics, which the philosopher sums up in a few words at the close of the Lun-yu : *' He," says Confucius, ^ who will be fully persuaded that the Lord of Heaven governs the universe, who shall in all things choose moderation, who shall perfectly know bis own spe- cies, and so act ajnong them that his life and manners may conform to his knowledge of God and man, may be truly said to discharge all the duties of a sage, and to be far exalted above the common herd of the human race." But such a religion and such morality could pever have been general ; and we find that the people of China had an ancient system of ceremonies and superstitions, which the government and the philosophers appear to have encouraged, and which has an apparent affinity with some parts ^f the oldest Indian worship. They believed in the agency of genii, or tutelary spirits, presiding over u 124 the awn and Ike d(M>d<,0T« lakes and riven, monD- Imta, tbIIfjb, and trood*, aver crrtain rrgloDB and towoa, oter all Ibe ele meniB (of wliich, like (he Hio- ita, Ihey Ttckaaaijive) and paitkolarly over fin, (be moM brilliant of [faeiD. To tbose deities they oBi^red viFtimB on high places: and the roUowing )taBSB|^ froni the Sbi-cin, or Book of Odes, ii very Uncli in tlie ityle of tlie Brahmnns : — " Even they, who perfDrm a sacrilice with a due revo'ence, caii. not perfectly assure Ihemaelvea ttiat the divine ipirila accept ttiFir oblations | and far less can they, who adore the Goda ivitta laDgnor and oscilancy, clearly perceive their sacred lllapses." Tliese are imperfect traces indeed, but they are traces of an affinity be- tween the religion of Menu and that of the Chinas, wbom he names among the apostates frtm it. H. Le Genlil observed, he says, a strong resemblance be- tween the funeral ritei -of the Chinese, and the Slraddba of Itae Hindosi and M. Bailly, after a learned Investigation, condndes, tbal ■* Even the puerile and alwatd stories af the Chinese fabnlisli, contain a remnant of ancient Indian history, with a faint sketch of tbe first Hindu ages." As the Bnd- dhas, indeed, were Hindus, it may naturally be ima- gined that they carried into China man; cereoioniea practised in tbeir own country i bnt tbe Buddbai positively forbade the immolation of eattie; yet we ,know that various animids, even bulls and men, were anciently sacrificed by tbe ChineK) betides which, we discover many singular marks of relation be- tween them and the old Hindus: B« In the TemarlL> aUe period of four hundred and ■ilHrla^ma lAow- Mml, and Ihe cycle of fifty years g in tbe predUec- tien foT-ihcniystical number nins; in muy similar 7. DISCOURSES. 195 hats abd great festivals, especially at tKe solstices and equinoxes; in the just mentioned obsequies con- sisting of rice and fruits offered to the manes of their ancestors $ in the dread of dying childless, lest such offering should be iniermitted; and, perhaps, in their common abhorrence of red objects, which the « Indians Carried so far, that Menn himself, where he allows a Brahmen to trade, if he cannot otherwise support life, absolutely forbids *' his trafficking in any sort of red clothes, whether linen, or woollen, or' made of woven bark/' All the .circumstances, which have been mentioned under the two heads of Literature and Religion^ seem collectively to prove (as £ur as sach a question admits proof) that the Chi- nese and Hindus were originally the same people; but having been separated near four thousand years, have retained few strong features of their ancient consanguinity, especi^ly as the Hindus have pre* served their old language and ritual, while the Chi-' oese very soon lost both; and the Hindus have constantly intermarried among themselves, while the Chinese, by a mixture of Tartarian blood from the time of their first establishment, have at length formed a race distinct in appearance both from- Indians and Tartars. A similar diversity has arisen, I believe, from si- milar causes, between the people of China and Japan; on the second of which nations we have now, or soon shall have, as correct and as ample instmction as can possibly be obtained without a' perfect acquaintance with the Chinese characters* Kaempfer has taken from M. Titsingb the honour of being the first, and he from Kssmpfer, that of being the only European, who by ^ long residence iD< 126 SIR WILtlAM JOMES'S Japan, «od a fkmiliar intercourse wtth the principal natives of it, lias been able to collect authentic nia^ terials for the nataral and ciyil history of a country aeeiuded (as the Romans used to say of our own island) from the rest of the world. The works of those illusirious travellers will confirm and embellish each other; and when M. Titsingb shall have ac- ^ired a knowledge of Chinese, to which a. part of his leisure in Java will be deVoted, his precious col- lection of books in that language, on the laws and revolutions, the naturaA productions, the arts, ma« ttuftctures, and sciences of Japan, will be in bis bands an inexhaostible mine of new and important information. Both he and his predecessor assert with confidence, and, I doubt not, with truth, that the Japanese would resent, as an insult on their dig- nity, the bare suggestion of their descent from the Chinese, whom they surpass in several of the me- chanical arls, and, what is of greater consequence, in military spirit ; but they do not, I understand, mean to deny that they are a branch of the same ancient stem with the people of China; and were that fact ever so warmly contested by them, it might be proved by an invincible argument, if the preceding part of this discourse, on the origin of the Chinese,be thought to contain just reasoning. In the first place, it seems inconceivable that the Japanese, who never appear to have been conijuerors or conquered, should have adopted the whole system of Chinese literature with all its inconveniences and intricacies, if an imme- morial connexion had not subsisted between tlie two nations, or, in other words, if the bold and in- genious race who peopled Japan in the middle of the thirteenth century before Christy and, about six 7. DISCOURflBi. 1^27 hundred yean afterwards established their monarchy, had not carried with them the letters and learning which they and the Chinese had possessed in com- mon ; bat my principal argament is, that the Hinda or Egyptian idolatry has prevailed in Japan from the earliest ages; and among the idols worshiped, according to Ksmpfer, in that country, before the innovatioos of Sacya or Buddha, whom the Japanese also call Amida, we find many of those which we see every day in the. temples of Bengal'; particularly the goddess with many armSy representing the powers of natnre ; in Bgypt named Isis, and here Isani or Isi ; whose image, as it is exhibited by the German traveller, all the Brahmans to whom I showed it immediately recognized with a mixture of pleasure and enthusiasm. — It is Very true that the Chinese differ widely from the natives of Japan in their vernacular dialects, in external manners^ and perhaps in the strength of their mental faculties; but as wide a dif- fiierence is observable among all the nations of the Gothic family; and we might account even fDr a greater dissimilarity, by considering the number of ages during which ^e several swarms have been se-< parated from the great Indian hive, to which they primarily belonged. The modern Japanese gave Kaempfer the idea of polished Tartars ; and it is reasonable to believe, that the people of Japan, who were originally Hindus of the martial class, and ad- vanced farther eastward than the Chinas, have, like them, insensibly changed their features and charac- ters by intermarriages with various Tartarian tribes, whom they found loosely scattered over their isles, or who afterwards fixed their abode in them. Having now shown, in five dbcourses, that the "ifWfc:^-*-"»!i«1F'S^^r'^^"««^f"W^ 128 SIR WILUAM JONE6*S Arabs and Taiian were origioally distioct races* while the Hindus, Chinese, and Japanese proceeded from another ancient stem, and that alt the three steins may be traced (o Iran, as to a common centre, froita which it is highly probable that they diver]§;ed in various directions about four thousand years ago, I may seem to have accomplished my design of in- vestigating the origin of the Asiatic nations : but the questions which I undertook to discuss, are not yet ripe for a strict analytical ai^ument; and it will first bepecessary to examine with scrupulous atten- tion ^1 the detached or insulated races of men, who either inhabit the borders of India, Arabia, Tartary, Persia, and China, or are interspersed in the moun- tainous and uncultivated parts of those extensive regions. To this examination I shall, at our next annual meeting, allot an entire discourse; and if, after all our inquiries, no more than three primitive races can be found, it will be a subsequent conside- ration whether those three stocks had one common root; and, if they had, by what means that root was preserved amid the violent shocks which our whole globe appears evidently to have sustained* oncouRsist. 1S9 DISCOURSE VIII. DELIVERED FBBRUART 24, 179l« ON THE BORDERERS, MOUNTAINEERS, AND ISLANDERS OF ASIA. Obscrvttions od the Idam«an», their arts and idenoef.— The written Abyasiaiao lanxaagev— The Islands near Tcmcn.-^ On the Sanganians.— Origin of that singular people called Oipsies.-olnhabitantsorthe Indian islands. — People of Tibet* >-Tartars.—ArmeBi«ni.--Oree1i8.— Phrygians.— And Phoeui- - dans* GBNTI.ESrBW, Wb have taken a general vfew, at onr five last an* naal meetings, of as many celebrated nations, 'whom we have proved, as far as the subject admits of proof, to have descended from three primitive stocks, which we Old] for the present Indian, Arabian, Tartarian ; and we have nearly traveled over all Asia, if not with a perfect coincidence of sentiment, at least with as mach unanimity as can be naturally expected in a large body of men, each of whom must assert it as his right, and consider it as his duty, to decide on all points fbr himself i and never to decide on ob- scure points without the best evidence that can pos- sibly be adduced. Our travels will this day be con- cluded $ but our historical researches would have 62 ISO SIR WILLIAM JON ES*S been left incomplete, if we had passed without at- tention over the numerous races of borderers, who have long been established on the limits of Arabia^ Persia, India, China, and Tartary ; over the wild tribes residing in the mountainous parts of those ex- tensive regions; and the more civilized inhabitants of the islands annexed by geographers to their Asiatic division of this globe. Let us take our departure from Idume near the gulf of Elanitis, and having encircled Asia, with such deviations fVom our course as the subject may requite, let us return to the point from which we began; endeavouring, if we are able, to find a -nation, who may clearly be shown, by just reasoning from their language, religion, and manners, to be neither Indians, Arabs, nor Tartars, pure or mixed ; but always remembering, that any small family de- tached in an early age from the parent stock, with- out letters, with few ideas beyond objects of the first necessity, and consequently with few words, and fixing their abode on a range of mountains, in an island, or even in a wide region, before uninhabit- ed, might in four or five centuries, people their new country, and would necessarily form anew language, with no perceptible traces, perhaps, of that spoken by their ancestors. Edom or Idume, and Erithrea or Phenice, had originally, as many believed, a simi- lar meaning, and were derived from words denoting a red colour ; but whatever be their derivation, it seems indubitable, that a race of men were anciently Kttled in Idume and in Median, whom the oldest and best Greek authors call Erythreans, who were irery distinct from the Arabs; and whom, from the concurrence of many strong testimonies) we may 8. mscouRSBs. 131 safely refer to the Indian stem. > M. D*Herbelot mentions a tradition (which he treats indeed as a fable) that a colony of those Idumeans bad migrated from the northern shores of the Erytbrean sea, and sailed across the Mediterranean to Europe, at the time fixed by cbronologers for the passage of Evan* der with his Arcadians into Italy, and that both Greeks and Romans were the progeny of these emi- grants : it is not on vague and suspected traditions that we must build our belief of snch events ; but Newton, who advanced nothing in science without demonstration, and nothing in hbtory without such evidence as he thought conclusive, asserts from au- thorities which he had carefully examined, that the Idumean voyagers ** carried with them both arts and sciences, among which were their astronomy, navi- gation, and letters t for in Idume," says he, '* they- had letters and names for constellations before the days of Job, who mentions them.'*^ Job, indeed, or the author of the book which takes its name from him, was of the Arabian stock, as the language of that sublime work incontestibly proves ; but the in- vention and propagation of letters and astronomy are by all so justly ascribed to the Indian family, that if Strabo and Herodotus were not grossly de- ceived, the adventurous Idumeans, who first gave names to the stars, and hazarded long voyages in ships of their own construction, could be no other than a branch of the Hindu race: in all events, there is no ground for believing them of a fourth distinct lineage ; and we need say no more of them, till^ we meet them again on our return under the name of Phenicians. As we pass down the formidable sea, which rolls 1S8 SIR WILLIAM Jones's oyer its coral bed between the coast of the Ambs^ or those who speak tbe pure language of Imaily and ttiat of the Ajams, or those who mutter it bar" barouslyy we fiod no certain traces on tbe Arabian side, of any people who were not originally AnUbs of the genuine or mixed breed : anciently, peib^is, there were Troglodytes in part of tbe peninsula,^ but tbey seem to have been long supplanted by the No- mades, or wandering herdsmen; and who those Troglodytes were, we shall see very clearly; if we deviate a few momeats from our intended path, and make a short excursion into eountries very lately explored, on the Western or African side of the Red Sea. That the written Abyssinian language, -which we call Ethiopic, is a dialect of old Chaldean, and eister of Arabic and Hebrew, we know with cer- tahity$ not only from the great muititode of iden* tical wards, but (which is a Car stronger prooO from the similar grammatical arrangement of the several Idioms 7 we know at the same time, that it is written like all the Indian characters, from the left hand to tbe right, and that the vowels are annexed, as in D^van^gari, to the consonants ; with which they form a syllabic system extremely dear and conve* nient, but disposed in a less artificial order than tbe system of letters now exhibited in the Sanscrit gnm* mars; whence it may justly be inferred, that the order contrived by P4nini or his disciples is cam* paratively modern; and I have no doubt, from a cursory examination of many old inscriptions on fiillars and in caves, which have obligingly been sent to me from all parts of India, that the Nigari and Ethiopian letters had at firrt atlmilar fomi.' It 8. DiicouasEs. 1S9 Iws loag beea my opinion, that tlie AbyssiolaiM of the Arabian stock, having no symbols of their own to represent articulate sounds, borrowed those of the Uack Pai^ans, whom the Greeks call Troglodytes, from their primeval habitations in natural caverns* 9r in mountains excavated by their own labours they were probably the first inhabitants of Africa; where they became in time the builders of magnio ficent cities, the founders of seminaries for the ad* fSBceinent of science and philosophy, and the ittyentors (if they were not rather the importers) of symbolical characters. I believe on the whole, that the Ethiops of Meroe were the same people with the first Egyptians, and consequently, as it might easily be shown, with the original Hindus. To the ardent and intrepid Mr. Bruce, whose travels are to my taste uniformly agreeable and satisfactory, though he thinks very differently from me on the language and genius of the Arabs, we are indebted for more important, and, I believe, more accurate infwroation concerning the nations established near the NUcj from its fountains to its mouths, than all Bttsope united could before have supplied ; but since he has not been at the pains to compare the seven laogu^es, of which he has exhibited a specimen, and since I have not leisure to make the comparison, I must be satisfied with observing, on his authority, that the dialects of the Gafots and the Gallas, the Agows of both races, and the Falashas, who must originally have used a Chaldean idiom, were never preserved in writing* and the Amharick only in mo- dern timesi they must, therefore, have been forages in flactuation, and can lead perhaps to no oertain as to the origin of the leveial tribes ivha 1S4 SIR WILLIAM JONBS*S aacitfDtlj spoke them. It is very remarkable, as Mr. Brace and Mr. Bryant haye proved, that the Greeks gave the appellation of Indians both to the southern nations of Africa, and to the people among whom we now live ; nor is it less observable, that, according to Ephorus, quoted by Strabo, they called all the southern nations in the world Ethiopians, thus using Indian and Ethiop as convertible terras : but we must leave the gymnosophists of Ethiopia, who seem to have professed the doctrines of Bad* dha, and enter the great Indian Ocean, of which' their Asiatic and African brethren were probably the first navigators. On the islands nearYemen we have little to remark; they appear now to be peopled chiefly by Moham- medans, and aiTord no marks of discrimination with which I am acquainted, either in language or man- ners^ but I cannot bid farewell to the coast of Ara- bia without assuring you, that whatever may be said of Omm&n and the Scythian colonies, who, it is ima- gined was formerly settled there, I have met with no trace, in the maritime part of Yemen, from Aden , to Maskat, of any nation who were not either Arabs or Abyssinian invaders. Between that country and Iran are some islands, which, from their insignificance in our present in*' 4uiry, may here be neglected ; and as to the Curds or other independent races, who inhabit the branches of Taurus, or the banks of Euphrates and Tigris, they have, I believe, no written language, nor any certain memorials of their origin : it has indeed been asserted by travellers, that a race of wanderers in Diy&becr yet speak the Chaldaic of our scripture; and the rambling Torcmtobave retained, I intfH^nei 8. DISCOURSEg. 135 some traces of tbeir Tartarian idioms; but,8iDce oo vestige appears, from the (^ulf of Persia to the riTen Car and Aras, of any people distinct from the Arabs, Persians, or Tartars, ivre may conclude, that no snch people exists in the Iranian mountains^ and return to those which separate Iran from India. The princio pal inhabitants of the mountains, called P&reici, where they run towards the west ; Parveti, from a ^nown Sanscrit word, where they turn in an east* em direction ; Paropamisus, where they join Imaus in the north, were anciently distinguished among the Br&hmans by the name of Derados, but seem to bave been destroyed or expelled by the numerous tribes of Afgb^s or Patans, among whom are the BaI6ja«, who give their name to a mountainous district $ and there is very solid ground for believing that the Af- ghans descended from the Jews, because they some«> times in confidence avow that unpopular origin which in general they sedulously conceal, and which other Muselmans positively assert ; because Haza* ret, which appears to be the Asareth of Esdras, is one of their teiritories; and, principally, because their language is evidently a dialect of the scriptural Chaldaic. We come now to the river Sindhu, and the coun- try named from it : near its mouths we find a district called by Nearchus in his journal Sangada, which M. D'Anville jostly supposes to be the seat of the Sanganians, a barbarous and piratical nation men- tioned by modern travellers, and well known at pre* sent by dur countrymen in the west of India. Mr; Malet, now resident at P6na on the part of the Bri- tish government, procured at my request the San- ganian letteiSy which are a sort of Niigari^ and a mm^n^i^iiSft—' <^i^^>— r .,'J 136 81 K WILLI AH JONES'S q^imen oC their langmage, which is apparently d«* rived, lilce other Indian dialects, from the Sanscrilf .oor can I doabt, from the descriptions which I have received of their persons and manners, that they are P^uneras, as the Br&bmans call them, or outcast Hin- dus, immemorially separated from the rest of the nation. It seems agreed that the singular people called Egyptians, and by corruption Gipsies, passed the Mediterranean immediately from Egypt ; and - their motley language, of which Mr. Grellman ex- hibits a copious vocabulary, contains so many San*> scrit words, that their Indian origin can hardly be doubted ; the authenticity of that vocabulary seems established by a multitude of Gipsy words, as ang&r^ charcoal ; edshth^ wood ; pdr, a bank; M6, earth ; and a hundred more for which the collector of them could find no parallel in the vulgar dialect of Hin- dustan, though we know them to be pure Sansorit, scarce changed in a single letter. A very ingenious friend, to whom this remarkable fact was imparted, suggested to me, that those very words might have been taken from old Egyptian, and that the Gipsies were Troglodytes from the rocks near Thebes, where a race of banditti still resemble them in their habits and features; but, as we have no other evidence of so strong an affinity between the popular dialects of old Egypt and India, it seems more probable thai the Gipsies, whom the Italians call ZIngaros and Zinganos, were no other than Zinganians, as M. D'Anville also writes the word, who might, in soma piratical expedition, have landed on the coast of Arabia or Africa, whence they might have rambled to Egypt, and at length have migrated, or been driven into Europe. To the kindness of Mr. Malet ^■^B^P«"« l-i- 8. DISCOURSES. 187 |. am also indebted for an account of the Boras, s remarkable race of men inhabiting chiefly the cities pf Gi^ferit, who, though Muselmans in religion^ are Jews in features, genius, and manners : they foml in all places a distinct fraternity, and are every where noted for address in bargaining, for rainuta thrifty and constant attention to lucre, but profess total ignorance of their origin ^ though it seems probable, that they came first with their brethren, the Afghans, to the borders of India, where they learned in time to prefer a gainful and secure occu- pation, in populous towns, to the perpetual wars and laborious exertions on the mountains. As to the Moplas in the western parts of the Indian em* pire, I hayeseen their books in Arabic, and am per- suaded that, like the people called Malays, they descended from Arabian traders and mariners after the age of Muhammed. On the continent of India, between the river Yi- p^ or Hyphasis, to the west, the mountains of Tripura and C4mar6pa to the east, and Him&laya to the north, we find many races of wild people; with more or less of that pristine ferocity, which in- duced their ancestors to secede from the civilized inhabitants of the plains and valleys : in the most ancient Sanscrit books they are called Sacas, Gir4tas, C61as, Pulindas, Barbaras, and are all known- to Europeans, though not all by their true names ; but many Hindu pilgrims, who have traveled through their haunts, have fully deseribed them to me i and J have found reasons for believing, that they sprang- from the old 1 ndian stem, though some of Ihem were 8pon intermixed with the first raml^lersfromTartary^ tS8 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S whese langnage seems to have been iht basis of that DOW spokeo by the Mogab. We come back to the Indiao islands, and hasten to those which lie to the 80uth*east of SiUui or Tapro* bane; for Siliin itself, as we know from tbe Ian- gnafes, letters, relij^ion, and old monuments of its various inhabitants, was peopled beyond time of me- mory by the Hindu race, and formerly perhaps ex- tended much farther to the west and to the soath, so as to inclnde lAuca, or tlie equinoctial point of the Indian astronomers ; nor can we reasonably doubt that the saoie enterprising family planted colonies in the other isles of the same ocean from the Malay- adwipas, which take their mane from the mountain of Malaya, to the Moluccas or Mallic&s, and pro- bably far beyond them. Captain Forrest assured me, that he found the isle of Bali (a great name in the historical poems of India) cbi^y peopled by Hin- dus, who worshiped the same idols which he had seen in^this province ; and that of Madhuramust have been, so denominated, like the well known territory in the western peninsula, by a nation who understood San- scrit. We need not be surprised that M; D'Anville was unable to assign a reason why the Jabadios or Yavadwlpa of Ptolemy, was rendered in the old Latin version the isle of Barley ; but we must ad- mire the inquisitive spirit and patient labour of the Greeks and Romans, whom nothing observable seems to have escaped : Yava means barley in Sanscrit ; and though that word or its regular derivative be now applied solely to Java, yet the great French geo- grapher adduces very strong reasons for briieving ^hat the ancients applied it to Samatra* In whatever 8. DISCOURBBS. 139 way the mne of (he laal mentiotied idaod may be writteo by Europeans, it is clearly an Indian word, implying ahuwtUmce or excellence $ bat we cannot help wOnderioKf, that neither the natives of it, nor the best informed of onr Pandits, iLnow it by any sach appellation ; especially as it still exhibits Tisible traces of a primeval connexion with India : from the very accurate and interesting account of it by a learn* ed and ingenious member of our own body, we disco- ver, without any recourse to etymological conjecture, that multitudes of pure Sanscrit words occur in the principal dialects of the Sumatrans; that among their laws, two positive itiles concerning sureties and /n- teresi appear to be taken word for word from the Indian legislators N4red and H&rita; and what is yet more obsenrable, that the system of letters used by the people of R parent affinity in religion as well as in language: the Dorian, Ionian, and Eolian families having emi* grated from Europe, to which it is universally agreed that they first passed from Egypt, I can add nothing to what has been advanced concerning them in for- mer discourses ; and no written monuments of old Phrygia being extant, I shall only observe, on the authority of the Greeks, that the grand object of mysterious worship in that country was the Mother of Uhe Gods, or Nature personified, as we see her among the Indians, in a thousand forms and under a thoo- 144 SIR WILLIAM JOhES'S sand names. Sbe was called in the Pbrygiao dialect M&, and represented in a car drawn by lions, with a drum in her band, and a totwered coronet on her bead : her mysteries (which seem to be alluded'to in the Mosaic law) are solemnized at the autumnal equinox in these provinces, where she is named in one of her characters M&, is adored in all of them as the great Mother, is figured sitting on a lion, and Appears in some of her temples with a diadem or mitre of turrets : a drum is called dindima both in Sanscrit and Phrygian; and the title of Diadymene seems rather derived from that word than from the name of a mountain. The Diana of Ephesus was manifestly the same goddess in the character of pro* dnctrve Nature « and the Astarte of the Syrians and Phenicians (to whom we now return) was, I doubt not, the same in another form : I may on the whole assure you, that the learned works of S^lden and Jablonskj, on the Gods of Syria and Egypt, would receive more illustration from the little Sanscrit book entitled Cbandi, than from all the fragments of ori* ental mythology that are dIsperMd in the whole com« pass of Grecian, Roman, and Hebrew literature. We are told that the Phenicians, like the Hindus^ adored the Sun, and asserted water to he the first of -created things; nor can we doubt that Syria, Sanuu ria, and Pbeulce, or the long strip of land on the shore of the Mediterranean, were anciently peopled by a branch of the Indian stock, but were after- wards inhabited by that race, which for the present we call Arabian: in all three the oldest religion was the Assyrian^ as it Is called by Selden, and the Samaritan letters appear to have been th« same at flrbt with those of Phenice; but the Syriac 8. DISCOURSES. 145 language, of which ample remains are preserved « and the Panic, of which we have a clear specimen in Plautus, and on monuments lately brought to light, were indbputably of a Chaldaic or Arabic origin. The seat of the first Phenicians having extended to Idnme, with which we began, we have now com- pleted the circuit of Asia; but we must not pass over in silence a most extraordinary people, who escaped the attention, as Barrow observes, more than once, of the diligent and inquisitive Herodotus: I mean the people of Judea, whose language demon- strates their affinity with the Arabs, but whose man- ners, literature, and history, are wonderfully distin- guished from the rest of mankind. Barrow loads them with the severe but just epithets of malignant, unsocial, obstinate, distrustful, sordid, changeable, turbulent $ and describes them as furiously zealous in succouring their own countrymen, but implacably hostile to other nations; yet, with all the sottish perverseness, the stupid arrogance, and the brutaT atrocity of their character, they had the peculiar merit, among all the races of men under heaven, of preserving a rational and pure system of devotion, in the midst of wild polytheism, inhuman or obscene rites, and a dark labyrintli of erron produced by %norattce, and supported by interested fraud. Theo- logical inquiries are no part of my present subject; but I cannot refrain from adding, that the collection of tracts, which we call from their excellence ike $cn>ftire#, contain, independently of a divine origin, more true sublimity, more exquisite beauty, purer morality, more important history, and finer «*»<»« both of poetry and eloquence, than could f 146 SIR WILLIAM JOlfES'S DISCOURSES. ed within the same compass from all other books that were ever composed in any a^ or in any idionu The two parts, of which the Scriptures consist, are connected by a chain .of compositipns, which bear no resemblance in form or style to any that can be prddeced from the stores of Grecian, Indian, Persian, or even Arabian learning: the antiquity of those compositions no man doubts ; and the unstrained ^ip- plication of them to events long subsequent to their publication, is asolid ground of belief that they were genuine predictions, and .consequently inspired ; but, if any thing be the absolute exclusive property of each individual, it is his belief; and, I hope, I should be one of the last men living, who could harbour a thought of obtruding my own belief on the free minds of others. I mean only to assume, tvhat, I trust, will be readily conceded, that the first He« brew historian must.be entitled, merely as such, to an equal degree of credit, in his account of all civil transactions, with any other historian of antiquity : bow &r that most ancient writer confirms the result^ of our inquiries into the genealogy of nations, I pro^ t>ose to show at our next anniversary meeting; when after an approach to demonstration, in the strict method of the old analysis, I sluiU resume the whole argument concisely and synthetically: and shall then have condensed in seven discourses, a mass of evi* dence, which, if brevity had not been my object, might have been expanded into seven large volumes, with no other trouble than that of holding the pen ; but (to borrow a turn of expression from one of our poets) ** for what X have produced I claim only your indulgence | it u for what I have suppressed that I am entitled to your thanks." ^^^^^•■s INDEX TO VOLUME I. DISCOURSE I. Importance of Asia in the history of mankind. — Advantages to be derived from cultivating its his* tory, antiquities, &c. — Hints for the foundation of the Society's objects and future views p. 1 DISCOURSE ir. Congratulations at the success of the institution. — Reflections on the history, laws, manners, arts, and aotiqaitieB of Asia. — Parallel between the works and sciences of the western and eastern worlds. — ^The botany, medicine, chemistry, fine and libe- ral arts, poetry, architecture^ sciences, jurispru- dence, &c. of the Asiatics considered. — Contri- butions and desiderata pointed out 9 DISCOURSE III. ,• On the Hindus. — History of the ancient world. — Etymology, &c. of the Asiatics. — ^the five princi- pal nations of the continent of Asia. — Sources 6f Asiatic wealth. — The languages, letters, philoso- phy, religion, sculpture, architecture, sciences, and arts of the Eastern'nations. — Antiquity, structure, and description of the Sanscrit language. — Cha- I^d IHOEX. ractera of the same. — Of the Indiab religioii aod philosophy. — Chrooolc^ of the Hindus. — Of the remains of architecture and sculpture in India.— Of the arts and manufactures of India. — lnven> ttons of the Hindus 20 DISCOURSE ly. Remarks on the old inhabitants. — Similarity of lan- l^uage, religion, arts, and manners. — On the Arabs, and the knowl^ge of their language possessed by the Eoropeans.»On the Sanscrit, Greek, Persian, and German languages. — Religion of the Arab^. — Their monuments of antique art. — Dr. Johnson*s opinion on the imperfections of unwritten lan- guages. — On the knowledge of Hindu law and Sanscrit literature 38 • DISCOURSE V. The boundaries of Tartary. — Ancient Scyfhians.— - Tartary considered according to Pliny. — The At- ' lantes of Plato. — Remarks on De Guignes, and other modem authors. — ^^Dialects of the Tartars. — Of the Moguls.— >Of the Persians. — The primitive religion of mankind. — ^The laws of Zamoliis. — Religious opinions and allegorical fables of the Hindus. — Ancient monuments of the Tartars. — On the Tuzac of Taimur. — Asia originally peo- pled by the Hindus, Arabs, and Tartars 57 DISCOURSE VI. Important remarks on their ancient languages and characters. — Primeval religion, and its connexion INDEX. 149 with their philosophy. — On the ancient monuments 6( Persian sculpture and architecture. — The arts and sciences of the old Persians 82 DISCOURSE VII. Origin of the people who governed China before they were conquered by the Tartars. — Examina- tion of the language and letters, religion and phi- losophy, of ,the present Chinese. — Remarks on their ancient monuments, sciences, and arts. — ^The importation of a new religion intQ China. . . 109 DISCOURSE VIII. Observations on the Idnmeans, their arts and sciences. — The written Abyssinian language.— The islands near Yemen. — On the Sanganians. — Origin of that ■singular people called Gipsies.-^lnhabitants of the Indian islands. — People of Tibet — Tartars.— Armenians. — Greeks. — Phrygians. And Pheni- cians 129 END OF VOL. r. O, Whittingham, College Hoase, Chiewick. I SIR WILLIAM JONES'S DISCOURSES. SECOND EDITION. / DISCOURSES DSUYBRED BEFORE 'STj^e Astatic Sbocietp : AND MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS, ON THE RELIGION, POETRY, LITERATURE, ETC. OF THE NATIONS OF INDIA. BY SIR WILLIAM JONES. WITH AN (tiffiui^ on %ifi JBame, tS^alent^, anQ Ct^aractet. BY THE RIGHT HON. LORD TEION MOUTH. 8XLBCTKD ANt> EDITED BY JAMES ELMES, AUTHOR OI-- LECTURES ON ARCHITECTURE, ETC. IN TWO VOLUMES. •VOL. II, LONDON: PRINTED FOR CHARLES S. ARNOLD, TAV^TOCK STREET, COYENT GARDEN^ 1324, I » ' ■ I ■ ai h m— M C. VVhIttiDgliam, aii«wick. * . • I«i9*"«^ ■■> ' SIR WILLIAM JONES'S DISCOURSES. DISCOURSE IX. DELIVERED FEBRUAllY 23, 1792. ON THE ORIGIN AND FAMILIES OF NATIONS. Philosophical proposition of the tvhote of maoklnd proceeding from one pair of oar species.— Observations on the books of Moses.— The establishment of the only human family attcr the tlelage ; and its diffusion. GENTLEMEN^ You have attended with so much indulgence io my discourses on the five Asiatic nations, and on the va- rious tribes established along their several borders, or iotersipersed over their mountains, that I cannot but flatter myself with an assurance of being heard with equal attention) while I trace to one centre the three great families, from which those nations appear to have proceeded, and then huxard a few conjectures on the different courses, which they may. be supposed to have taken, towards the <)untries in which we find Ihem settled at- the dawn jf all ge- nuine history. Let us begin with a short review of uie nroposi- B I 2 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S tions to which we have gradually been led, and se- parate such as are morally certain from such as are only probable : that the first race of Persians and Indians, to whom we may add the Romans and Greeks, the Goths, and the old Egyptians or Ethiops, originally spoke the same language and professed the same popular faith, is capable, in my humble opinion, of incontestible proof; that the Jews and Arabs, the Assyrians or second Persian race, the people who spoke Syriac, and a numerous tribe of Abyssinians, used one primitive dialect wholly distinct from the idiom just mentioned, is, I believe undisputed, and I am sure, indisputable ; but that the settlers in China and Japan had a common ori- gin with the Hindus, is no more than highly pro* bable ; and that all the Tartars, as they are inaccu« rfitely called, were primarily of a ^ird separate branch, totally differing from the two others in Ian-, guage, manners,and features, may indeed be plausibly coi\jectured, but cannot, from the reasons alleged in a former essay, be perspicuously shown, and for the present therefore must be merely assumed. Could these facts be verified by the best attainable evidence, it would not, I presume, be doubted that the whole earth was peopled by a variety of shoots from the Indian, Arabian, and Tartarian branches, or by such intermixtures of them, as in a course of Ages might naturally have happened. Now I admit without hesitation the aphorism of Linnaeus, that *' in the "beginning God created one pair only of every living species, which has a diver- sity of sex :** but, since that incomparable naturalist argues principally from the wonderfu^ diffusion of vegetables, and from an hypothesis that tlie water w^^^f^m^mam 9. DISCOURSES. 3 OB this globe has been conttDually subsidiDg,! Tenttire to produce a shorter and closer argument in support of his doctrine. That Nature^ of which simplicity appears a distinguishing attribute, does nothing in vain, is a maxim in philosophy; and against those who deny maxims, we cannot dispute ; but it is vain and superfluous to do by many means what may bo done by fewer, and this is anotiier axiom received into courts of judicature from the sdiools of philoso- phers : we must not therefore, says our great Newton,, admit more cataes of natural things than those which are true, and sufficiently account for natural pheno^ menu; but it is true^ that one pair at least of erery living species must at first have been created ; and that one human pair was sufficient for the population of our globe in a period of no considerable length, (on tlie very moderate supposition of lawyers and p<^itical arithmeticians, that every pair of ancestors left on an average two children, and each of them two more) is evident from the rapid increase of Bombers in geometrical progression, so well known to those who have ever taken the trouble to sum a series of as many terms as they suppose generations of men in two or three thousand years. It follows, that the Author of Nature (for all nature proclaims its divine Author) created but one pair of our dpe« cies ; yet, had it not been (among other reasons) for the devastations which history has recorded of water and fire, wars, famine, and pestilence, this earth would not now have had room for its multiplied inhabitants. • If the human race then be, as we may confidently assume, of one natural species, they ronst all have proceeded from one pair; and if per- fect justice be» as it is most indubitably, an essential attribute of GOD, that pair must have been gifted t 4 SIR WILLIAM JONBS'S with saiBcient wisdom and strength to be Yirtuons, and, as far as their nature admitted, happy; but in- trusted with freedom' of will to be vicious, and eon- sequently degraded : whatever might be their option, they must people in time the region where tbey first were established, and their numerous descendants must necessarily seek new countries, as inclination might prompt, or accident lead them ; they woold of course migrate in separate families and claos, which, forgetting by degrees t|ie language of their common progenitor, would form new dialects to convey new ideas, both simple and complex ; natu- ral affection would unite them at first, and a seose of reciprocal utility, the great and only cement of Boci&l union in the absence of public honour and justice* for which in evil times it is a general substi- tute, would combine them at length in communities more or less regular ;' laws would be proposed by a part of each community, but enacted by the whole $ and governments would be variously arranged for the happiness or misery of the governed, according to their own virtue ^nd wisdom, or depravity and folly ; so that in less than three thousand years, the world would exhibit the same appearances which we may actually observe on it in the age of the great Arabian impostor. On that part of it to which our united researches are generally confined, we see five races of men pe- culiarly distinguished in the time of Muhammed, for their multitude and extent of dominion ; but we have reduced them to three, because we can discover DO more that essentially difibr in language, religion, manners, and other known characteristics f now Ihese three races, how variously soever they may at present be dispersed and intermixed, must (if the ^■^^^^■■■■■■■■■WWH 9. DISCOURSES. 5 preceding conclnsioDs be justly drawn) have migrat- ed originally from a central country, to find whicb is the problem proposed for solution. Suppose it solved ; and give any arbitrary name to that centre : let it if you please be Iran. The three primitive languages therefore must at tirst have been concent trated in Iran, and there only, in fact, we see traces of them in the earliest historical age; but, for the sake of greater precision, conceive the whole em- pire of Iran, with all its mountains ^d valleys,- plains and rivers, to be every way infinitely dimi- nished ; the first winding courses therefore, of all the nations proceeding from it by. land, and nearly at the same time, will be little right lines, but without intersections, because those courses could not have thwarted and crossed one another : if then you con- sider the seats of all the migrating nations as pointft in a surrounding figure, you will perceive that the several rays divei^ing from Iran may be drawn to them without any intersection; but this will not happen if you assume as a centre Arabia or Egypt, India, Tartary, or China: it follows that Iran or Persia (I contend for the meaning, not the name) was the central country which we sought. This mode of reasoning I have adopted, not from any af- fectation {as you will do me the justice to believe) of a scientific diction, but for the sake of concise- ness and variety, and from a wish to avoid repeti- tions ; the substance of my argument having been detailed^in a difierent form at the close of another discourse ; nor does the argument in any form rise to demonstration, which the question by no means ad- mits : it amounts however, to such a proof, grounded on written evidence and credible testimony, as all SIR WILLIAM JONES'S ._^ t^ fcold mfficlent for decisioni affectiBg pro- •T* A«e4uia) and life- 'vw then fuive we proved that the inhabitants of A J^Mid coMcqo'D^'y as it mijrht be proved, of the ^f^^ cafiliy sprang from three brandies of one stem : riMiiiKsC thic branches have shot into their present I^J^^f luioriance, in a period comparatively short, rV,pgre«t from a fact universally acknowledged^ Am* we find 00 certain monument, or even probable uudition, of nations planted, empires and states rabrdf laws enacted, cities built, navigation im« iMvvedy commerce encooraged, arts invented, or Mtcn contrived, above twelve, or at most fifteen or lixtf en centuries before the birth of Christ, and from MQHther fact which cannot be controverted, that g^yfO hundred or a thousand years would have been fylly adequate to the supposed propagation, diflfu« ijoa, and establishment of the human race. The most ancient history of that race, and. the- oldest composition perhaps in the world, is a work In Hebrew, which we may suppose at first, for the take of our argument, to have no higher authority than any other work of equal antiquity, that there* searches of the. curious had accidentally brought to light: it is ascribed to Mnsah; for so he writes his own name, which after the Greeks and Romans, we have changed into Moses ; and, though it was mani- festly his object to give an historical account of a single family, be has introduced it with a short view of the primitive world, and his introduction has been divided, perhaps improperly, into eleven chapters. After describing with awful sublimity the creation of this universe, he asserts, that one pair of every animal species was called from nothing into exist- 9. DISCOURSES. 7 ence; thai the human pair were strong enough to be happy, but free to be miserable ; that, from delusion and temerity, they disobeyed their supreme bene- factor, whose goodness could not pardon them coi>> sistently with his justice; and that they received a punishment adequate to their disobedience, but sof- tened by a mysterious promise to be accoropliished in their descendants. We cannot but believe, on the supposition just made of a history uninspired, that these facts were delivered by tradition from the first pair, and related by Moses in a figurative style; not in that sort of allegory which rhetoricians de- scribe as a mere assemblage of metaphors, but in the symbolical mode of writing adopted by eastern sages to embellish and dignify historical truth; and, if this were a time for such illustrations, we might produce the same account of the creation and the/a//, express- ed by symbols very nearly similar, from the Pur&i^s themselves, and even from the V^da, which appears to stand next in antiquity to the five books of Moses., The sketch of antediluvian history, in which we find many dark passages, is followed by the narra- tive of a deluge, which destroyed the whole race of man except four pairs ; an historical fact admitted as' true by every nation to whose literature we have access, and particularly by the ancient Hindus, who have allotted an entire Purina to the detail of that event, which they relate, as usual, in symbols or al* legories. I concur most heartily with those, who insist that in proportion as any fact mentioned in history seems repugnant to the course of nature, or in one word, miraculous, the stronger evidence is required to induce a rational belief of It ; but we bear without incredulity, that cities have been over*^ ^p 8 SIR WILLIAM JONE6*8 whelmed by eruptions from burning mountains, ier' ritories laid waste by hurricanes, and whole islands depopulated by earthquakes : if then ive look at the firmament sprinlded with innumerable stars; if we conclude by a fair analogy that every star is a snn, attracting like ours a system of inhabited planets ; and if our ardent fancy, soaring hand in band with sound reason, waft us beyond the visible sphere into regions of immensity, disclosing other celestial ex- panses, and other systems of suns and worlds on all sides without number or end, we cannot but consider the submersion of our little spheroid as an infinitely less event in respect of the immeasurable universe, than the destruction of a city or an isle in respect of this habitable globe. Let a general flood, however, ^e supposed improbable, in proportion to the mag- nitude of so ruinous an event, yet the concurrent evidences of it are completely adequate to the sup- posed improbability ; but, as we cannot here expa- tiate on those proofs, we proceed to the fourth im- portant fact recorded in the Mosaic history^ I mean the first propagation and early dispersion of man- kind in separate families to separate places of re- sidence. Three sons of the just and virtuous man, whose li- neage was preserved from the general inundation, traveled, we are told, as they began to multiply, in three large divisions variously subdivided ; the chil- dren of Y&fet seem, from the traces of Sklavonian names^ and the mention of their being enlarged^ to have spread themselves far and wide, and to have produced the race which, for want of a correct ap- pellation, we call Tartarian ; the colonies fbrmed by the sons of Ham and Shem appear to have been 1^1 ^mt' III 9. DISCOURSES* 9 nearly simultaneous; and, among those of the latter branch, we find so many names incontestibly pre- served at this hour in Arabia, that we cannot hesi« tate in prronouncing them the same people, whom hitherto we have denominated Arabs; while the for- mer branch, the most powerful and adventurous of whom were the progeny of Ctish, Misr, and Rama, (names remaining unchanged in Sanscrit, and highly revered by the Hindus) were, in all probability, the face which I call Indian, and to which we may now give any other name that may seem more proper and comprehensive. Tbe general introduction to the Jewish history closes with a very concise and obscure account of a presumptuous and mad attempt, by a particular colony, to build a splendid city, and raise a fabric of imraeniK height, independently of the divine aid, ' and, it should seem, in defiance of the divine power ; a project which was baffled by means appearing at first view inadequate to the purpose, but ending in violent dissension among the projectors, and in the ultimate separation of them : this event also seems, to be recorded by the ancient Hindus in two of their Pur&nas; and it will be proved, I trust, on some lotnre occasion, that the lion bursting from a pillar t^ destroy a blaspheming giantt and the dwarf, who beguiled and held in derision the magnificent Bell, are one and tbe same story, related it a symbolical style. Now these primeval events are described as hav- ing happened between tbe Ozus and Euphrates, the mountains of Caucasus and the borders of India, that is, within the limits of Iran ; for, though most of the Mosaic names have been considerably altered, i«p 10 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S yet nnmbers of them remain unchangpd : we still find Harr&n in Mesopotamiaf and travellers appear unanimous in fixing the site of ancient Babel. Thus, on the preceding supposition, that the fifst eleven chapters of the book, which is thought pro- per to call Genesis, are. merely a preface to the oldest civil history now extant, we see the truth of them confirmed by i£tatecedent reasoning, and by evidence in part highly probable, and in part cer- tain ; but the connexion of the Mosaic history with that of the Gospel by a chain of sublime predictions unquestionably ancient, and apparently fulfilled, must induce us to think the Hebrew narrative more than human in its origin, and consequently true in every substantial part of it, though possibly ex- pressed in figurative language ; as many learned and pious men have believed, and as the most pious may believe without injury, and perhaps with advantage to the cause of revealed religion. If Moses then was endued with supernatural knowledge, it is no longer probable only, but absolutely certain, that the whole race of man proceeded from Iran, as from a centre, whence they migrated at first in three great colonies ; and that those three branches grew fktHn a common stock, which had been miraculously pre-' served in a general convulsion and inundation of this globe. Having arrived by a different path at the. same conclusion with Mr. Bryant as to one of those fkmi-' lies, the most ingenious and enterprising of the three, but arrogant, cruel, and idolatrous, which we both conclude to be various shoots from the Hamian or* Amenian branch, I shall add but little to my former observations on his profound and agreeable work. 11 which IhaTclhrice periued wilh increaied oltentian nni pleasure, though nol with perfect acquinccDce in (he other lera imponant parts of his plausible ays- (em. The siim of bis ai^ument seems reducible to three heads. First, " ir the deluge really happened at the time recorded by Mosed, those natiotu whose monuments are preserved, or whose writings are ai> eeaible, miut have relainr d memoriiila of aa event io stDpendoos aod comparatively so recent ; but In fact (hey have retained such memorials:" this reft- louing seems Justi and the fact is true bi-yoad con- troveny. Secondly, " those memaiiala were ex- pressed by (he race of Ham, before the use of letters, ID Tude sculpture or painting, and mostly io symbo- lical figures of tlie arit, the eight persons cmcealed in il, and the birds which first were dismissed from it : this fact is probable, but, I think nol siifficieutly ascertained." Thirdly, " all ancient mythology (ex- cept what was purely Sublan) had its primary source in (base various symbols misunderstuod ; so that an- cient mylbelogy stands now In the place of symbo- lical sculpture or painting, and mnit be eiplaiaed ■D the same principles on which wc should be^n to decipher Ibe originals, if they now existed :" tbli part of the system is, in my opinion, car. ied too far) nor can I persuade myself (in give one instance out of many) thai the beautiful allrgnry of Cupid and Psyche had the remotest allusion to the deluge, or that Hymen signiHed the vtU which covered the patriarch and his family. These propositions, how- ever, are supported with great ingenuity and solid erudition | but, unprofitably for t^e argument, and unfortunately, perhaps, for the fame of the work it^ ■elf, recoiine is bad to etymologicot conjecture, than t9 SIR WILLIAM JONBS*9 which DO mode of reasoning is in general weaker or more delusive. , He, who professes to derive the words of any one language from those of another, must expose himself to the danger of perpetual errors, unless be be perfectly acquainted with both { yet my respectable friend, thoo^ eminently sl^illed in the idioms of Greece and Rome, has no sort of ao quaintance with any Asiatic dialect except Hebrew $ and he has consequently made mistalces, which every learner of Arabic and Persian must instantly detect. Among Jifty radical words (may taph, and ram being included) eighteen are purely of Arabian origin, twelve merely Indian, and seventeen both Sanscrit and Arabic, but in senses totally different ; while two are Greek only, and one Egyptian, or barbarous ; if it be urged that those radicals (which ought surely to have concluded, instejid of preceding an analytical inquiry) are precious traces of the primitive Ian* guage froD) which all others were derived, or to which at least they were subsequent, I can only de- clare my belief, that the language of Noah is lost irretrievably, and assure you, that after a diligent search, I cannot find a single word used in common by the Arabian, Indian, and Tartar families, before the intermixture of dialects occasioned by Maho* roedan conquests. There are, indeed, very obvious traces of the Hamian language, and some hundreds of words might be produced which were formerly used promiscuously by most nations of that race i but I beg leave, as a philologer, to enter my protest against conjectural etymology in historical researches, and principally against the licentiousness of etymo- logists in transposing and inserting letters, io sub- stituting at pleasure any consonant for another of the 9. DISCOURSES. Id same arder, and in totally disre§;arding the Towels: for sacb permatatioos few radical words woul^ be more convenient than Cus or Cush, since, dentals being changed for dentals, and palatials for palatialst it instantly becomes coQi^ goosey and by transposi« tion, ducky allwater birds, and evidently symbolical-i it next is the goat worshiped in Egypt, and by a metathesis^ the dog adored as an embleqa. of Siriusv or, more obviously, a cat^ not the domestic animal^ but a sort of ship, and the Catos or great sea fish of the Dorians. It will hardly be imagined that I mean by this irony to insult an author whom I respect and. esteem ; but no consideration should induce me to assist by my silence in the diifusion of error; and I contend, that almost any word or nation might be derived from any other, if such licences as I am op« posing, were permitted in etymological histories t' when we find, indeed, the same words, letter for let- ter, and in a sense precisely the same, in diflerent languages, we can scarce hesitate in allowing them a common origin ; and, not to depart from the ex* ample before us, when we see Cush or Cus (for the Sanscrit name also is variously pronounced) among the sons of Brahmd, that is, among the progenitors of the Hindus, and at the bead of an ancient pedi- gree preserved in the Rimdy^n; when we meet with his name again in the f;unily of Rdma; when we know that the name is venerated in the highest degree, and given to a sacred grass, described as a Poa by Koenig, which is used with a thousand cere^ monies in the oblations to fire, ordained by Menu to form the sacrificial zone of the Brahmans, and so^ lemnly declared in the V ^a to have sprung up soon after the deluge, whence the PauMnics consider it 14 SIR WILLIABf JONES'S as the briitly hair of the boar which supported the globe; wfaen we add, that one of the seven dwipas,* or great peoinsulas of this earth has the same appel- latioo, we can hardly doubt that the Cosh of Moses and y^mic was the same personage and an ancestor of the Indian race. From the testimonies adduced in the six last an- nual discourses, and from the additional proofs laid before you, or rather opened on the present occa- sion, it seems to follow, that the only human family after the flood, established themselves in the northern parts of Iran : that as they multiplied, they were divided into three distinct branches, each retaining little at fir&t, and losing the whole by degrees, of their common primary language, but agreeing sever rally on new expressions for new ideas; that the branch of Y&fet was enlarged in many scattered shoots over the north of Europe and Asia, diffusing themselves as far as the western and eastern seas, > and, at length, in the infancy of navigation, beyond them both; that they cultivated qo liberal arts, and had no use of letters, but formed a variety of dia- lects, as their tribes were variously ramified; that secondly, the children of Ham, who founded in Iran itself the monarchy of the first Chaldeans, invented letters, observed and named the luminaries of the firmament, calculated the known Indian period of four hundred and thirt^two thousand years, or ad hundred and twenty repcftitions of the saros, and contrived the old system of mythology, partly alle- gorical, and partly grounded on idolatrous veneration for their sages and lawgivers; that they were dis-. persed at various intervals and in various colonies, over land and ocean} that the tribes of Misr^Cush, 9. DISCOURSES. 15 and Rama settled in Africa and India ; while some of them having improved the art of sailing, passed from Egypt, Pbenice, and Phrygia, into Ital}- and Greece, which they found thinly peopled hy former emigrants, of whom they supplanted some tribei, and united themselves with others ; whilst a swarm from the same hive moved by a northerly course into Scandinavia, and another by the head of the Oxus, . and through the passes of Imaus into Cdshgar and Bightir, Khat&, and Khoten, as far as the territories of Chin and Tanctit, where letters have been used and arts immemorially cultivated ; nor is it unrea^ sonable to believe, that some of them found their way from the eastern isles into Mexico and Peni^ where traces were discovered of rude literature and mythology analogous to those of Egypt and India ; that thirdly, the old Chaldean empire being over- thrown by the Assyrians under Cayiimers, other mi- grations took place, especially into India, while the rest of Shem's progeny, some of whom had before settled on the Red Sea, peopled the whole Arabian peninsula, pressing close on the nations of Syria and Phenice ; that lastly, from all the three families were detached many bold adventurers, of an ardent spirit and a roving disposition, who disdained sub- ordination, and wandered in separate clans, till they settled in distant isles, or in deserts and mountain- ous r^ons ; thdt on the whole, some colonies might have migrated before the death of their venerable progenitor, but that states and empires could scarce have assumed a regular form, till fifteen or sixteen hundred years before the Christian epoch, and that for the first thousand years of that period, we have no history unmixed with fable, except that of the 16 SIR WILLIAM JONES*S turbulent and variable, but eminently distinguished nation, descended from Abraham. My design, gentlemen, of tracing the origin and progress of the five principal nations who have peo- pled ^sia, and of whom there were considerable remains in their several countries at the time of Mu^ bammed's birth, is now accomplished; succinctly, from the nature of these essays ; imperfectly, from the darkness of the subject and scantiness of my ma- terials, but clearly and comprehensively enor ** to form a basis for subsequent researches : yon nave seen, as distinctly as I am able to show, who those nations originally wereywhence and when they moved towards their final stations ; and, in ray future an- nual discourses, I propose to enlarge on the parti" cular advantages to our country and to mankind, which may result from our sedulous and united in- quiries into the history, science, and arts, of these Asiatic regions, especially of the British domfaiiens in India, which we may consider as the centre (not of the human race, but) of our common exertions to promote its true interests ; and we shall concnr, I trust, in opinion, that the race of man, to advance whose manly happinesb is our duty, and will of course be our endeavour, cannot long be hs^py without virtue, nor actively virtnons without frer- dom, nor securely free without rational knowledge. mm DISCOURSES, 17 DISCOURSE X. DELIVERED FEBRUARY 28, 1793. ON ASIATIC HISTORY, CIVIL AND NATURAL. Introductory remarks.— The Mosaic account of the primitive world confirmed.— 'I4ie practical use of history.— Observa- tions on animals, oiinerals, and vegetable sabstances.— On the mechanical arts, &c. GENTLEMEN, BefoUe our entrance into the Disquisition promised at the close of my Ninth Annual Discou^rse, on the particular j^dvantages which may be derived from our concurrent Researches in Asia, it seems neces- sary to fix with precision the sense in which we mean to speak of advantage or utility. Now, as we have described the five Asiatic regions on their largest scale, and have expanded our conceptions in proportion to the magnitude of that wide field, w^ should use those words which comprehend the frnit of all our inquiries, in their most extensive ac- ceptation; including not only the scdid conveniences and comforts of social life, but its elegances and inno- cent pleasures, and even the gratification of a natural and laudable curiosity ; for, though labour be dearly the lot of man in this world, yet, in the midst of his most active exertions, be cannot but feel the sub- 18 SIR WILUAM JOHBS'S stantial benefit of every liberal amosniicot wfaidi may loll hb pasioos to rest, and afiml him a sort of repose, without the pain of tolal ioactioo, and th^ real osefuInesB of every porsait which may enlarge and diversify his ideas, withoat intcrferinf^ with the principal objects of hb civil station or economical doties ; nor slionid we whoUj exdade eveo the tri- vial and worldly sense of mtiHty^ which too many consider as merely synonymous with btarc, bnt dMxdd reckon among useful objects those practical, and by no means illiberal arts, which may eventually con-> duce both to national ai^ to privateemolumenL With a view then to advantages thus eiplained, let n ex- amine every point in the whole circle of arts and sciencses, according to the received order of their dependence on the faculiics of the mind, their mutual connexion, and the different subjects with which they are conversant : our inquiries indeed, of which Na- ture and Man are tlie primary objects, must of course be chiefly kitiariemi; but since we pn^iose to investigate the aeiioms of the several Asiatic nat- taons, ti^ether with their respective progress in Mcieaee and arty we may arrange our investigations under the same three heads to which our European aaalysb have ingeniously reduced all the branches of human knowledge : and my present Address to the Society shaU be confined to Hbtory, civU and natural, or the observation and remembrance of mere facie^ independently of ratiocinatioa, which b^ong^ to philosophy i or of imif aliMu and saAslt- iuUams, wliich are the province of art. Were a superior created intelligence to delineate a map of gnieral knowledge (exdunvely of that snblinie and stupcndouB theology, which hhasdf 10. DISCOURSES. 19 could oBly hope humbly to know by an infinite ap- proximation) he would probably begin by traciag with Newton the system of the universe, in wtiicb lie would assign the true place to our little globe; and having enumerated its various inhabitants, contents^ and productions, would proceed to man in his natural station among animals, exhibiting a detail of all tho knowledge attained or attainable by the human rac^ $ and thus observing perhaps the same order in which he had before described other beings in other inha- bited worlds ; but though Bacon seems to have had a similar reason for placing the History of Nature before that of Man, or the whole before one of its parts, yet, consbtently with our chief object already mentioned, we may properly begin with the Civil History of the Five Asiatic Nations, which neces* sarily comprises their geography, or a description of the places where they have acted, and their astro* nomy, which may enable us to fix with some accu- racy the time of their actions: we shall thence be led to the history of such other animals, of such minerals, and of such vegetables, as they may be supposed to barve found in their several migrations and settle- ments, and shall end with the uses to which they have applied, or may apply, the rich assemblage of natural substances. I. In the first place, we cannot surely deem it an inconsiderable advantage that all our historical re- searches have confirmed the Mosaic ac'counts of the primitive world ;- and our testimony on^tbat subject ought to have the greater weight, because, if the re- sult of our observations had been totally diflferent, we ^ould nevertheless have published them, not in- deed with equal pleasure, but with equal confidence; iO SIR WILLIAM JONES*8 for truth is mighty, and, whatever be its coDse- queoces, must always prevail; but, indepeDdently of oar interest in corroborating the multiplied evi- dences of revealed religion, we could scarce gratify our minds with a more useful and rational entertain- ment than the contemplation of those wonderful re- volutions in kingdoms and states which have hap- pened within little more than four thousand years ; revolutions, almost as fully demonstrative of ah all- ruling Providence, as the structure of the universe, and the final causes which are discernible in its whole extent, and even in its minutest parts. Figure to your imaginations a moving picture of that event- ful period, or rather, a succession of crowded scenes rapidly changed. Three families migrate in diffe- rent courses from one region, ani}, in about four cen- turies, establish very distant governments and various modes of society : Egyptians, Indians, Gottis, Phe- nicians, Celts, Greeks, Latians, Chinese, Peruvians^ Mexicans, all sprung from the same immediate stem, appear to start nearly at one time, and occupy at length those countries, to which they have given, or from which they have derived their names. In twelve or thirteen hundred years more, the Qreeks ' overrun the land of their forefathers, invade India, conquer £gypt, and aim at universal dominion ; but the Romans appropriate to themselves the whole empire of Greece, and carry their arms into Britain, of which they s^eak with haughty contempt. The Goths, in the fulness of time, break to pieces the unwieldy Colossus of Roman power, and seize on the whole of Britain, except its wild mountains; but even those wilds become subject to- other invaders, of the same Gothic lineage. During all those trans* •v^^^ 10. DISCOURSES. H actions, the Arabs possess both coasts of the Red Sea, subdue the old seat of their first progenitors, and extend their conqaests, on one side through Africa, into Europe itself; on another, beyond the borders of India, part of which they annex to their flourishing empire. In the same interval the Tar^ tars, widely diffused over the rest of the globe, swarm in the north-east, whence they rush to complete the reduction of Constantine's beautiful domains, to sut^ugate China, to raise in these Indian realms a dynasty splendid and powerful, and to ravage, like the two other families, the devoted regions of Iran. By this time the Mexicans and Peruvians with many races of adventurers variously intermixed, have peo- pled the continent and isles of America, which the Spani^irds, having restored their old government in Europe, discover, and in part overcome : but a. co« lony from Britain, of which Cicero ignorantly de- clared that it contained nothing valuable, obtain the possession, and finally the sovereign dominion, of extensive American districts; whilst other British subjects acquire a subordinate empire in the finest provinces of India, which the victorious tropps of Alexander were unwilling to attack. This outline of human transactions, as far as it includes the limits of Asia, we can only hope to fill up, to strengthen, and to colour, by the help of 'Asiatic literature; for in history, aa in law, we must not follow streams when we may investigate fountains, nor admit any secondary proof where primary evidence is attain- able: I should nevertheless make a bad return for your indulgent attention, were I to repeat a dry list of all the Musseiman historians whose works are pre^ served in Arabic, Persian, and Turkish, or expatiate 2$ 8IR.1W1LLIAM JONES'S on the histories and medals of Ghioa and Japan, which may in time be accessible to Members <»f oar Society, and from which 'alone we can expect information concerning the ancient state of the Tar- tars; bat on the history of India, which we aatoraUy consider as the centre of our inqoiries, it may not be soperfluous to present you with a few particular observaticHis. Our knowledge of Civil Asiatic History (I always except that of the Hebrews) exhibits a short eveoio^ twilight in the Tenerable introduction to the first book of Moses, followed by a gloomy night, in which different watches are faintly discernible, and at length we see a dawn succeeded by a sunrise more or less early, according to the diversity of regtoDi. Tliat no Hindu nation but the Cashmirians, have left us regular histories in their aneient language, we must ever lament; but from the Sanscrit literature, which our country has the honour of having unveil- ed, we may still collect some rays of historical truths though time and a series of revolutions have obecur*> ed that light which we might reasonably have ej^^ pected from so diligent and ingenious a people. The numerous Pufanas and Itihasas, or poems my- tholc^ical and heroic, are completely in our power; and from them we may recover some disfigured but talimble pictures of ancient manners and govern* meats ; while the popular tales of the Hindus, in prose and in verse, contain fragments of history ; and even in- their dramas we may find as many real characters and events as a future ajge might find in our own plays, if all hbtories of England were, like those of India, to be irrecoverably lost. For eiam* ]^ie: A most beautiful poem by Somadeva, compris- 10. DISCOURSES. S3 ing a very lotfg chain of instractive and agreeable stories, begins with the famed revelation at Patali- putra, by the murder of king Nanda with his eight sons; and the usurpation of Chandragupta ; and the same revolution is the subject of a tragedy in Sans- crit, entitled, the Coronation of Chandra, the abbre- viated name of that able and adventurous usurper. From these once concealed, but now accessible, com« positions, we are enabled to exhibit a more accurate sketch of old Indian history than the world has yet seen, especially with the aid of well attested obser- vations on the places of the colures. It is now clearly proved, that the first Purana contains an account of the deluge; between which and the Mohammedad conquests the history of genuine Hindu government must of course be comprehended: but we know from an arrangement of the seasons in the astrono- mical work of Parasara, that the war of the Pan- davas could not have happened earlier than the close of the twelfth century before Christ ; and Seleucus must therefore have reigned about nine centuries after that war. Now "the age of Yicramaditya is given ; and if we can fix on an Indian prince con- temporary with Seleucus, we shall have three given points in the line of time between Rama, or the first Indian colony, and Chandrabija, the last Hindu mo- narch who reigned in Bahar ; so that only eight hun- dred or a thousand years will remain almost wholly dark ; and they must have been employed in raising empires or states, in framing laws, improving lan- guages and arts, and in observing the apparent mo- tions of the celestial bodies. A Sanscrit history of the celebrated Yicramaditya was inspected at Be- aares by aPandit| who would not have deceived me. 94 SIR WILUAM JONES'S aod coold not himself have been deceived ; but the owner of the book is dead, and his family dispersed ; oor have my friends in that city been able, with all their exertions, to procure a copy of it. As to the Mogul conquests, with which modem Indian history be^ns, we haye ample accounts of them in Persian, from Ali of Yezd, and the translations of Turkish books composed even by some of the conquerors, to Ghulam Husain, whom many of us personally know, and whose impartiality deserves the highest applause, though his unrewarded merit will give no encourage- ment to other contemporary historians, who, to use his own phrase jn a letter to. myself, may, like him, consider plain truth as the beauty of historical com- position. From all these materials, and from these alone, a perfect history of India (if a men; compi- latioh however elegant, could deserve such a title) might be collected by any studious man who had a competent knowledge of Sanscrit, Persian, and Ara- bic ; but even in the work of a writer so qualified, we could only give absolute credence to the general outline; for, while the abstract sciences are all truth, and the fine arts all fiction, we cannot but own, that in the details of history, truth and fiction are so blended as to be scarce distinguishable. The practical use of history, in affording particu- lar examples of civil and military wisdom, has been greatly exaggerated $ but principles of action may certainly be collected from it ; and even the narra* tive of wars and revolutions may serve as a lesson to nations, and an admonition to sovereigns. A desire indeed of knowing past events, while the future cannot be known, and a view of the present gives often more pain than delight| seems natural to th^ 10. DISCOVRSBS, S.^ human mind : and a happy propensity would it be if every reader of hbtory would open bis eyes to some very important corollaries, which flow from the whole extent of it. He could not bat remark the constant effect of despotism in benumbing and de- basing all those faculties which distinguish men from the herd that grazes; and to that cause he would impute, the decided inferiority of most Asiatic na- tions, ancient and modern^ to those in Europe who are blessed with happier governments; he would see the Arabs rising to glory while they adhered to the free maxims of their bold ancestors, and sinking to misery from the moment when those maxims were abandoned. On the other hand, he would observe with regret, that such republican governments as tend to produce virtue and happiness, cannot in their na- ture be permanent, but are generally succeeded by oligarchies which no good man would wish to be durable. He would then, like the king of Lydia, remember Solon, the wisest, bravest, and most ac- complished of men, who asserts in four nervous lines, that ** as hail and snow which mar the labours of husbandmen, proceed from elevated clouds, and, a6 ■the destructive thunderbolt follows the brrlliant flash, thus is a free state ruined by men exaUed in power and splendid in wealth ; while the people, from gross ignorance, choose rather to become the slaves of one tyrant, that they may escape from the domination of many, than to preserve themselves from tyranny of any kind by their union and their virtues." Since, therefore, no unmixed form of government could both deserVte permanence and eqjoy it, and since changes, even from the worst to the best are always attended with much temporary mischief, he would 96 SIR WILLIAM JONESES .fix on our British constitiitloo (I meao our pabtie law, not the actual state of things in any given pe* riod) as the best form ever e^blished, though we can only make distant approaches to its theoretical perfection. In these Indian territories, which Pro- vidence has thrown into the arms of Britain for their protection and welfare, the religion, sMinners, and laws of the natives preclude even the idea of politic cal freedom; but their histories may possibly suggeit hints for their prosperity, while our country derives essential benefit from the diligence of a placid and submissive people, who multiply with such increaie, eveo after the ravages of famine, that in one^coUec- torship out of twenty-four, and that by no means the largest or best cultivated (I mean Crishoarnagar) there have lately been found, by an actual enume- ration, a million and three hundred thousand native inhabitants ; whence it should seem, that in all India there cannot be fewer than thirty millions of black British subjects. Let us proceed to geography and chronology, without which history would be no certain guide, but would resemble a kindled vapour without either a settled place or a steady light. For a reason be- fore intimated, I shall not name the various cosno^ graphical books which are extant in Arabic and Persian, nor give an account of those which the Turks have beautifully printed in their own im- proved language, but shall expatiate a little on the geography and astronomy of India; having first ob- served generally, that all the Asiatic nations must be far better acquainted with their several conntKes than mere European scholars and travellers; that consequently, we must learn their geography from 10. DISCOURSES. $7 their own writings: and that by collating many copies of the same work, we may correct blund^. of transcribers in tables, names, and descriptions. " Geography, astronomy, and chronology have, in this part of Asia, shared the fate of authentic history; and, Mice that, have been so masked and bedecked in ^e fontastic robes of mythology and metaphor, that the real system of Indian philosophers and ma^ thematicians can scarce be distinguished : an accn- rate knowledge of Sanscrit, and a confidential in- tercourse with learned Brahmens, are -the only means of separating truth from fable ; and we may expect the most important discoveries from two of our mem- bers, concerning whom it may be safely aaeerted, that if our Society should have produced no other advantage than the invitation given to them for the public display of their ttdents, we should have a claim to the thanks of our country and of all Eu- rope. Lieutenant Wilford has exhi bited aa interest- ing specimen of the geographical knowledge de- ducible from the Puranas, and will in time present you with so complete a treatise on the ancient world known to the Hindus, that the light acquired by the Greeks will appear but a glimmering in comparir son of that he will difi'use; while Mr. Davis, who has given us a distinct idea of Indian computations and cycles, and ascertained the place of the colures at a time of great importance in history, will here* after disclose the systems of Hindu astronomers, from Xared and Parasar to Meya, Yarahamihir, and Bhaacar; and will soon, I trust, lay before you a perfect delineation of all the Indian asterisms in both hemispheres, where you will perceive so strong a general resemblance to the constellations of the Gmfcs, as to prore that the Iho sjritnns wrre ort- ^Bolly Due and (he mmr, yel with igch a. divcnit)' Id part), ■! to >haw incoDlnlibly that neilbrnjitem nai copltd from the atbcri wbencc it will folloir, ThejariiprudeDce of the Ilindiu and Aiabi being Ibe fdd which I have cho««'a Tor my ptcnliar toil. yoDCSiuiat expect that iBbonld gTeatl} enlai^e your collrclian of biMarical knowledge; but 1 ma; be able to offer you some occasiunal tribateiand I can- not helpmentiaaing a discoTrry which accident threw in my n-ay, tboagh my pTOofi roast be rraened for an euay nhicb 1 have dotined for tbe fourth volnme of your TraoMtclioiu. To fii the situation of that Paljbolbra {for there may have been seteral of the name) wbich was visited and described by Hegas- theneiibadalwHys appeared a lery difficult pioblem, for though it rould not have been Prayaga, where Bn ancient mclropolis ever stood, nor CanyocDbja, wbieh has no epithet a( all resfmbling the word uaed by theCreeki; norGaur, otherwise called Lacshma- navBlit which all know Id be a totrn comparatively modern, yet we could not coofidrnlly decide that it «ia Palulipuira, Ibonghnames and most circnDh ■tBDCct nearly correspond, becnnse that renowaed capital •xlcnded from the confluence of the Sone and the Ganges io the site of Palna, while Pali- botbra >M(h1 at the Junction of 4he Gai^^ and Eiannoboss, Hhicb the accurate M. D'Anville had prornuDced to be the Yamunaf bat this only diffi- ' catty was cemoved, when 1 found in a classical Snnsrrit book, near £000 yean old, that Hiranya. I>.'<1m, or folden armed, which the Greeks changed . iiiiD Eranooboas, nr the river with a lotely murmur, 10. DI8C0VRSES. '29 was in fbct another name for the Sona itself; though Megasthenes, from ignorance or inattention, has named them separately. This AtAcovery led to ano- ther of greater moment, for Chandragupta, who, from a military adventurer, became like Sandracottus the sovereign of Upper Hindustan, actually fixed the seat of his empire at Pataliputra, where he received ambassadors from foreign princes ; and was no other than that very Sandracottus who concluded a treaty with Ssleucus Nicator; so that we have tolved ano- ther problem, to which we before alluded, and may in round numbers consider the twelve and three hundredth years before Christ, as two certain epochs between Rama, who conquered Stlan a few centu* ries after the flood, and Vlcramaditya, who died at Ujjayini fifty-seven years before the beginning of our era. II. Since these discussions would lead us too far, I proceed to the History of Nature, distinguished, for oor present purpose, from that of Man ; and di- vided into that of other animals who inhabit this globe, of the mineral substances which it contains, and of the vegetables which so luxuriantly and so beautifully adorn it* 1. Could the figure, instincts, and qualities of birds, beasts, insects, reptiles, and fishes, b:: ascer- tained, either on the plan of Buffon, or on that of Linnssus, without giving pain to the objects of our examination, few studies would aflTord us more solid Instruction, or more exquisite delight; but I never could learn by what right, nor conceive with what feelings, a naturalist can occasion the misery of an innocent bird, and leave its young perhaps to perish in a cold nest, because it has gay plumage, and has never been BCCDiBtelj delineated) or deprive even > bntterflj' <^ its natural enjajmenli, becawe it bag the misfortane to be rare or beonlifnl ; nor shall I ever forget Ibe couplet of Firdasi, for vhicb Badi, frbo cite? it with applau«ei poura blo^ngv on hia departed spirit ; — TtiM may be only a confession of weakness, and II certainly is not meant ai a boast of prcoliar sen- ribility t but wbatercT name may be given to my opinion, it boi such an effert on my conduct, thai I never would luffer Ilie Cocila, nlioie wild native woodnolcfl aapounce the approacb of spring, to be caught in my ^den, for the sake of compBiIng it nilh BuflToa's description j though I have often ex- amined the domestic and engaging Majaaa, which bids u peorance; but I met with nothing valuable coucem-' ing them in Persian, except what may be gleaned from Ibe medical dictionaries) nor have I'yet seen a ioak in Sanscrit that expressly Ireals of them. Oil the whole, Ihaiigh rare animals may be found in all Asia, yet I can only recommend an examina- tion uf them with this couditiqfi, that they be left ac 10. DISCOUKIEI. 31 much aa poaible id a itale of ulnral freedom i or made aa happ j a* ponible, if it be aaxtmj to keep them coa fined. i. Ttw History of Minerals, to which no inch ob- jection caa be made, ia eitnmely aimple and easy, if we merely consider tlteir eilerior look and con- figoraliop, aiid their visible teitare; but the analy- lil of their interaal propcrtiea belanp particularij to the sublime reaearchea of Chemialry, on wbich we may bope Id find useful diEquiaitiaos in Sanscril, since the old Hiodua Dnqueslionably applied (bem- Bclves to thatenchnnlingatudy; and even from tbcli (reatisei od alchymy we may poasibly collect the re- sults of actual experiment, aa tbeir ancient aalro- logical worka bave preserred many valnable facia Tdaliog to the Indian apbere, and Ibc procewion of the equinox. Bolh in Persian and SHnaciil Ibere are booka OD metals and minerals, particnlarly on genu, which the Hindu philowpbera considered (nilb aa except iuD of tbe diamond) as vorietiea of one crystal- line Bubslanee, either simple orcompound: but wo must not expect from the rhemisu of Asia those beautiful examples of ODalysia which bave but lateljr beck, and Tbrntberg; of India, by Rbeede aad KumphiiH, Ibe two Burmans, and the moeh la- mented KiKDig, yel nolle itf thaw naUiraJUlB were deeply rened ia the literature of the wieral coon- friei from which their vegetaUe treasures had beeo pracared; and the nameroai works in Saoscrit on medical 8 ubslancea, and chiefly on plantg.have never been inspected, or never at lea>t nodenlood, by any Earopean attached to the itudy of ualDrc. Until the ^rden of the India Company gball be fiilly ■lored (as it will be, do doobt, in dne time) wilb Arat>ian, Peni;in,Hnd Chroeae plants, we may wdt be latiifled wlih examining IheaaliveSonen of our own provincrsi bnt unlcu we can discover the Sanicril names of all celd>rated vegelablei, wesbaH neither compreheod Ibe allusions which Indian Poets perpettially make lo (hem, nor (what is far worse) be able to find accounli of their tried virlaes io Ibe writings of Indian physicians ; and (what is worst of all) we shall miss an appartnnlty which never a^ln may present itself) for the Pandits tbemselvei have nlmoit wholly forgottsn their ancient appella- tions of particular planlsi aod, with all my pains, I have not yet ascertained more than two hundred Onl of twice that number, which are named io their inedical or poetical compositions. Ii ia much to be deploJ^d, that the illustrious Van Rheede had no sciiuainliincc with Sanscrit, which even bis three Bnihuu'iu, who composed Ibeshort preface engraied 10. DISCOURSES. 33 iD that language, appear to have anderstood very im- perfectly, and certainly wrote with disgraceful imc* curacy. In all his twelve volumes, I recollect only Bnnaroava, in which the Nagari letters are tolerably right; the Hindu words in Arabian characters are shamefally incorrect ; and the Malabar, I am credibly informed, is as bad as the rest. His delineations, in* deed, are in gentfhd excellent; and though Linnaeus himself could not extract from his written descrip- tions the natural character of every plant in the collection, yet we shall be able, I hope, to describe them all from the life, and to add a considerable number of new species, if not of new genera, whicb Rheede, with all his noble exertions, could never procure. Such of our learned members as profess medicine, will no doubt cheerfully assist in these researches, either by their own observations, when they have leisure to make any, or by communica- tions fk'om other observers among their acquQiotance, who may reside in different parts of the country: and the mention of their art leads me to the various ustt of natural substances, in the three kingdoms or classes to which they are generally reduced. . III. Yon cannot but have remarked, that almost all the sciences, as the French call them, which are distingnisbed by Greek names, and arranged under the head of Philosophy, belong for the most part to History; such as philology, chemistry, physic, anatomy, and even mdaphysics, when we barely relate the phenmnena of the human mind; for, in all branches of knowledge, we are only historians when we announce facts; and philosophers only when we reason on them : the same may be confi- dently said of law and of medicine, the first of c 2 d-1 BIR WIfXiAM JCfKEi'9 ■which beSoDg? principaily to Civil, and the second chiefly to Natural History. Here, therefore, I speak of medicine, as far only as it is grounded oo experiment; and, without believing implicitly what Arabs, Persians, Chinese, or Hindus may have writ- ten on the virtues of medicinal subjects, we may surely hope to find in their writings what our own experiments may confirm or disprove, an^ what might never have occurred to us without such ifl» tlmations. Europeans enumerate more than two hundred and fifty mechanical arts, by which the productions'of na- ture may be variously prepared -for the convenience and ornament of life; and though the Silpasastra reduces them to sixty-four, yet Abulfazl had been assured that the Hindus reckoned three hundred arts and sciences ; now, their sciences being comparatively few, we may conclude that they anciently practised at least as many useful arts as ourselves. Several PandHs bave informed me, that the treatises 6n art, which they call Upavedas, and believe to have been inspired, are not so entirely lost but that considera^ ble fragments of them may be found at Benares ; and they ceitainly possess many popular, but an- cient works on that interesting subject. The ma- nufactures of -sugar and indigo have been well known in these provinces for more than two thou- sand years«; and we cannot entertain a doubt that their Sanscrit books on dying and metallurgy, con« tain very curious facts, which might indeed be dis- covered by accident in a long course of years, bat which we may soon bring to light by the help of Indian literature, for the benefit of manufactures and artists, and consequently of our nation, who are 10. HISCOURSES. 95 interested in their prosperity. Discoveries of the same kind might be collected from the writings of other Asiatic nations, especially of the Chinese; but, though Persian, Arabic, Turkish, and Sanscrit are languages now so accessible, that in order to attain a sufficient knowledge of them, little more seems re-, quired than a strong inclination to learn them, yet the supposed number and intricacy of the Chinese characters have deterred our most diligent students from attempting to find their way through 90 vast a labyrinth. It is certain, however,1that the difficulty has been magnified beyond the truth ; for the per- spicuous grammar of M. Fourmont, together with a copious dictionary, which I possess in Chinese and Latiny Would enable any man who pleased, to com- pare the original works of Confucius, which are easily procured, with the literal translation of them by Couplet; and havin^^ made that first step with Attention, he wou\d probably find that he had tra- verse at least half of his career. But I should be led beyond the limits assigned to me on this occasion, if I were to expatiate farther on the historical divi- sion of the knowledge comprised in the literature of Asia; and I must postpone till next year my re- marks on Asiatic Philosophy, and on those arts which depend on imagination ; promising you. with confidence, that in the course of the present year, your inquiries into the civil and natural history of this eastern world will be greatly promoted by the learned labours of many among our associates and correspondents. DISCOURSE XI. DELIVBKED PBBSVAIIT 80, 1TB4. OK THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE ASIATICS. CniTLEMKIi, Had it been of any itDpartaoee to uraoge Oae A d- DiTcnary Di»eTtatioDa accordii^ to (be ordinary progmi of Ibe hunuBmiDd, in Ibrpadoal npaiBion ofiU three moat conriiierBble poneniiiwiii0r)F,tiiiit- ginaUon, uid na»ii, 1 abonid cFrtUDly have pre- leutnl jOD wilb an (SU; oo tbe Uitral artt of Ibe five Ajialb; natSom, before I produced mj wmMkl OB their ttiitract tdcnatt beoBitte, from my own obferrstion >l leoal, it aeenn evident tbat famiy, or the faculty of rombiniDg our Ideaa apeeably, by TariDOi aiodei of imitation and mbtlitDtioD, ii in fe- iirriil I .'irllcr exercised, and Bosner attain! matarily Hum tiir' pDwrr of aeparating and comparing (iuK idrua liy llie laboriooa eiertioiu of iotellectt asd hcncr, 1 believe, it bai bappened, tbat all oalioM in tlie norlJ bad poeli htfom tbey bad-biereiAUoso- 11. DISGO0R8BS. 37 pherv: but, as M. D'Alembert bas deliberately placed science before art, as the question of prece* dence is on tbis occasion of no moment whatever, and as many new facts on the sut^ject of Asiatic Phi- losophy are fresh in my remembrancse, 1 propose to address you now on the sciences of Asia, reserving for our next annual meeting a disquisition concern- ing tbose fine arts which have immemorially been cultivated, with different success, and in very di^ ferent modes, within the oircle of our common in- quiries. By science I mean an assemblage of transcendental propositions discoverable by human reason, and re- ducible to first principles, axioms, or maxims, from which they may all be derived in a regular succession : and there are consequently as many sciences as there aregederal objects of our intellectual powers. When man first exerts those powers, his objects are hinueif nod the rest of nature. Himself he perocives to be composed of body wad mind; and in hia indioiduat capacity he reasons on the uses of hu animal frame and of its parts, both exterior and internal ; on the ^ dUnrdert impeding the regular functions of those parts, and on the most fH'obable methods of prevent- ing those disorders, or of removing them ; he soon feels tbe dose connexion between his corporeal and mental faculties; and when bis mind is reflected on itself, he discourses on its essence and its operations : in his social character, he analyzes his various duiies . and rightSy both private and public; and in the leisure which the fullest discbarge of those duties al- ways admits, his intellect is directed to nature at large, to tbe substance of natural liodies, to their se- veral properties, and to their quantity both separate 38 SIR WILLIAM J0MBI*8 and onitedy finite and infinife; from all which ob- jects he deduces notions^ either purely abstract and universal, or mixed with undoabted facts; hearses from phenomena to theorems, from those theorems to other phenomena.; from causes to effects, from effects to causes, and thus arrives at the demonstra- tion of a First Intelligent Cause : whence his col- lected wisdom, being arranged in the form of science^ chiefly consists of physiology and medidney. meta* physics and logic^ ethics and jurisprudence^ natural philosophy and mathematics ; from which the reN^ gion of nature (since revealed religion must be re- ferred to history^ as alone affording evidence of it) has in all ages and in all nations been the sublime and consoling result.. Withojut professing to have given a logical definition of science, or to have ex- hibited a perfect enumeration of its objects, I shall confine myself to those five divbions of Asiatic Phi* losophy ; enlarging for the most part on the progress which the Hindus have made in them, and occasion* ally introducing the sciences of the Arabs and Per* ians, the Tartars and the Chinese: but, how exten- sive soever may be the range which I have chosen, I shall beware of exhausting your patience with te- dious discussions, and of exceeding those limits which the occasion of onr present meeting has necessarily prescribed. I. The first article affords little scope; since I have no evidence, that in any language of Asia, there exists one original treatise on medicine con- sidered as a science : physic, indeed, appears in these regions to have been from time immemorial, as we see it practised at this day by Hindus and Musel- mans, a mere empirical history of diseases and reme? 11. DISCOURSES. 59 dies; useful I admit, in a high degree, and worthy of attentive examination, but wholly foreign to the subject before as. Though the; Arabs, however, have chiefly followed the Greeks in this branch of knowledge, and have themselves been implicitly fol- lowed by other Mohammedlin writers, yet (not to mention the Chinese, of whose medical works I can 8t present say nothing with confidence) we still have access to a number of Sanscrit books on the old Indian practice of physic, from which, if the Hindus had a theoretical system, we might easily collect ir. The Ayurveda, supposed to be the work of a celes- tial physician, is almost entirely lost, unfortunately, perhaps for the curious European, but happily for the patient Hindu; since a revealed science pre- cludes improvement from experience, to which that of medicine ought, above all others, to be left per- petually open : but I have myself met with carious fragments of that primeval work ; and, in the V^a itself, I found with astonishment an entire Upanlflbad on the internal parts of the human body; with an eniimeration of the nerves, veins, and arteries; a de- scription of the heart, spleen, and liver; and various disquisitions on the formation and growth of the foetus. From the laws, Indeed, of Menu, which have latdy appeared in oar own language, we may perceive that the ancient Hindus were fond of rea- soning, in their way, on the mysteries of animal ge- neration, and on the comparative influence of the •exes in the production of perfect oflTspriog ; and we may coUect from the authorities adduced in the learned ^Essay en Egypt and the Nile, that their physiological disputes led to violent schisms in re- ligion, and even to bloody wars. On the whole, we 40 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S cannot expect to acquire many valuable truths from an examination of eastern books on the science of medicine ; but examine them we must, if we wish to complete the history of universal philosophy, and to supply the scholars of Europe with authentic mUf terials for an account of the opinions anciently formed on this bead by the philosophers of Asia. To know indeed with certainty, that so much and no more can be known on any branch of science, would in itself be very important and useful know- ledge, if it had no other effect than to check Jhe boundless curiosity of mankind, and to &x them in the straight path of attainable science, especially of such as relates to their duties, and may conduce to their happiness. II. We have an ample field in the next division, and a field almost wholly new, since the metaphysics and logic of the Br^mens, comprised in their six philosophical S6stras, and explained by numerous glosses, or comments, have never yet been acc^sible to Europeans ; and, by the help of the Sanscrit lan- guage,, we may now read the works of the Sangatns, Bauddhas, Arhatas, Jaioas, and other heterodox philotophers, whence we may gather the metaphysi- cal tenets prevalent in China and Japan, in the east* em peninsula of India, and in many considerable nations of Tartary. There are also some valuable tracts on these branches of science, in Persian and Arabic, partly copied from the Greeks, and partly comprising the doctrines of the Sufb*. which anciently prevailed, and still prevail in a great measure over this oriental world; and which the Greeks themsdves condescended to l>orrow from eastern sages. The little treatise in four chapters, ascribed to 11. DISCOURSES. 41 Tjr&Ba, 18 the only philosophical S&Btia, the original text of which I have had leisure to pernse with a BiiUimeo of the T^dsUiti school : it is extremely ob- scure, and though composed in sentences elegantly modulated, has more resemblance to a table of con- tents, or an accurate summary, than to a regular systematical tract; but all its obscurity has been cleared by the labour of the very judicious and most learned Sancara, whose commentary on the V^d&nta which I read also with great attention, not only elu- cidates every word of the text, but exhibits a per- spicuous account of all other Indian schools, from that of Capila to those of the more modem heretics. It is not possible, indeed, to speak with too^ much applause of so excellent a work; and I am confi- dent in asserting, that, until an accurate translation of it sliall appear in some European language, the general history of philosophy must remain incom- plete; for I perfectly agree with those who are of opinion, that one correct version of any celebmted Hindu book would be of greater value than all the dissertations or essays that could be composed on the same subject. You will not, however, expect, that in such a discourse as I am now delivering', I should expatiate on the diversity of Indian philoso- phical schools^ on the several founders of them^ on the doctrines which they respectively taught, or on their many disciples, who dissented from their in- structors in some particular points. On the present occasion, it will be sufficient to say, that the oldest bead of a sect, whose entire work is preserved, was (according to some authors) Capila; not the divine personage, a reputed grandson of Brahm4, to whom Crisbna compares^ himself in the Gita; hut a safe of 42 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S his iiaaie, who inTented the Saa'ch^a, or Nomeiml pbiloaopby, which Crisbna himself appears to ioh pugB io bis conversation with .Air^na; and which, as for as I can collect it frosa a few original texts* resembled in part the metaphysics of Pythagoras, and in part the theolo|;y of Zeno^ His doctrines were enforced and illustrated, with some additioasi by the venerable Pataojali, who has also left- us a fine comment on the grammatical roles of P&nini, which are more obscorcy willioat a gloss, than the darkest oracle; and liere, by the way, let me add, that I refer to metaphysics tlie curious and import tant science of universni grammar^ on which many . subtle disquisitions may be found interspersed in the particalar grammars of the ancient Hindus, and in those of the more modern Arabs. The next founder, I believe, of a philosophical school, was G6tama; if, indeed, he was not the most ancient of all ; for his wife Alialy^ was, according to Indian legends, r& stored to a human shape by the great. Il4ma ; and a sage of his name^ whom we have no reason to sap- pose a different personage, is frequently mentioned in the V^da itself: to his rational doctrines those of Canada were in general conformablef and the phi* losupfay of tliem both is usually^ called Ny4ya, or lo* gical: a title aptly bestowed; for it seems to be a ^fitem of metaphysics and logic batter accommo* dated than any other anciently known in India, to the natural reason and common sense of mankind, adoiilting the actual existence of malaria/ safotence in the popular acceptation of the word malter; and comprising not only a body of sablimc dialectics, tfut an artificial method of reasoning, with, distinct names for the tiuee parts of a proposition, and even 11. DlSCOimiES. 43 for those of a regular syllogism. Here I cannot re- frain from introducing a singular tradition, which prevailed, according to the well informed author of the Dabist&n, in the Panj&b and in sereral Persian provinces f that, ** among other Indian curiosities which Callisthenes transmitted to his uncle, was a technical ajfstem oflogicy which Che Brahmens had communicated to the inquisitive Greek,** and which the Mohammedan writer supposes to have been the groundwork of the famous Aristotlean method. If this be true, it is one of the most interesting facts that I have met with in Asia : and if it be false, it is very extraordinary that such a story should have been fabricated either by the candid Monshanv F&nf , or by the simple P^rsls and P4ndits with whom he had conversed ; but, not having had leisure to study the Nyiiya S^tra, I c^n only assure you that I have fre^ quently seen perfect syllogisms in the philosophical writings of the Brahmens, and have often heard them used in their verbal controversies. Whatever might have been the merit or age of G6tama, yet the liiost celebrated Indian school is that with whidi 1 began, founded by Vydsa, and supported in most respects by his pupil Jaimini, whose dissent on a few points is mentioned by his master with respectful raodera- tion : their several systems are frequently distinguish* ed by the names of the first and second MimkoBk; a word which, like Ny&ya, denotes the operations and conclusions of reason i but the tract of Vy^sa has in general the appellation of VM&nta, or the scope and end Of the vlda; on the texts of which,a!( they were understood by the philosopher who collected them, hi9 doctrines are principally grounded. The fnnd»> mental tenet of the V^d&nta school, to which in a 44 SIR WILLIAM JONBS*S more modern age the incomparable Sancara was a firm and iUastrtoas adherent, consisted not in deny- ing the existence of matter, that is, of solidity, im- penetrability, and extended figure (to deny which would be lunacy) but, in. correcting the popular notion of it, and in contending that it has no essence independent of mental perception ; that existence and perceptibility are convertible terms ; that ex- ternal appearances and sensations are illusory, and would vanish into nothing, if the divine energy which alone sustwns them, were suspended but for a mo- ment: an opinion which Epicharmus and Plato seem to have adopted, and which has been maintained in the present century, with great elegance, but with little public applause; partly because it has been misunderstood, and partly because it has been mis- applied by the false reasoning of some unpopular writers, who are said to have disbelieved in the moral attributes of God, whose omnipresence, wisdom, and goodness, are the basis of the Indian philosophy. I have not snfllcient evidence on the subject to pro- fess a belief in the doctrine of the V^danta, which human reason alone could, perhaps, neither fully de- monstrate nor fully di^rove ; but it is manifest, that nothing can be farther removed from impiety than a system wholly built on the purest devotion ; and the inexpressible difficulty which any roan who shall make the attempt, will assuredly find in giving a sa> tisfactory definition of material substance, roust in- duce us to deliberate with coolness, before we cen- sure the learned and pious restorer of the ancient y^ai though we cannot bnt admit, that if the gomroon opinions of mankind be the criterion of .philosophical tmth, we must adhere to the system of 11. DISCO OASES. 45 G6tamk, which the Br^ens of this province almost muvenally follow. If the metaphysics of the Y^aotis be wild and erroneous, the pupils of Buddha have run, it is asselrt- ed» into an error diametrically opposite; for they are charged with denying the existence of pure spirit, and with believing nothing absolutely and really to exist but material substance : a heavy accusation, which ought only to have been made on positive and intontestible proof, especially by the orthodox Br&h- mens, who, as Buddha dissented from their ancestors in r^ard to bloody sacrifices^ which the V^a cer- tainly prescribes, may not unjustly be suspected of low and interested malignity. Thougli I cannot cre- dit the charge, yet I am unable to prove it entirely false, having only read a few pages of a Saogata book, which Captain Kirkpatrick had lately the kindness to give me; but it begins like other Hindu books, with the word Om, which we know to be a symbol of the divine attributes; then follows, indeed, a mysterious hymn to the Goddess of Nature by the name of A ry4, but with several other titles, which the Bridimens themselves continually bestow on their O^vf. Now the Brkhmens, who have no idea that any inch persdnage exists as D6vi, or the Goddess, and only mean to express allegorically the power of God, exerted in creating, preserving, and renovating this universe, we cannot with justice infer that the dissenters admit no deity but visible nature. The Pandit who now attends me, and who told Mr. Wil- kins that the Saugatas were atheists, would not have attempted to resist the decisive evidence of the con- trary, which appears in the very instrument on which he was consulted, if his understanding had not been 46 SIR WILLIAM JONESES blinded by the intolerant zeal of a mercenary priest- hood. A literal version of the book just mentioned (if any studious man bad learning and industry eqnal to the task) would be an- inestimable treasure to the compiler of such a history as that of the la- borious Brucker. But let us proceed to the morals und jurisprudence of the Asiatics, on which I could expatiate, if the occasion admitt^ a full discussion of the snl^ect, with correctness and confidence. III. That both ethics and abstract law might be reduced to the method of science, cannot surely be doubted; but, although such a method would be of infinite use in a system of universal, or even of na- tional jurisprudence, yet the principles of morality are so few, so luminous, and so ready to present themselves on every occasion, that the practical utility of a scientifical arrangement in a treatise on ethics may very j ustly be questioned . The moralists of the east have in general chosen to deliver their precepts in short sententious maxims, to illustrate them by sprightly comparisons, or to inculcate them in the very ancient form of agreeable apologues. There are indeed, both in Arabic and Persian, philosophi- cal tracts on ethics, written wilh sound ratiocination and elegant perspicuity ; but in every part of this eastern world, from Pekin to Damascus, the popu- lar teachers of moral wisdom haveimmemoriafiy been poets, and there would be no end of enumerating their works, which are still extant in the five prin- cipal languages of Asia. Our divine religion, the truth of which (if any history be true) is abundsuitly proved by historical evidence, has no need of such aids as many are willing to give it, by asserting, that the wisest men of this world were ignorant of the 11. DltCOUHfSS. 47 two great maxims, that we must act in re9p»ti of others at we should wish them to act in respect of ourselves, and that, instead of returning evil for evil, we should confer beneJitSy even on those who injure us : bat the first rule is implied in a speecli of Ly- sias, and expressed in distinct phrases by Thales and Pittacos; and I have even seen it, word for word, in the original of Confucias, which I carefully com- pared with the Latin translation. It has been usual with zealous men to ridicule and abuse all those who dare on this point to quote the Chinese philosopher; but, instead of supporting their cause they would shake it, if it could be shaken, by -their uncandid asperity ; for they ought to remember, that one great end of revelation, as it is most expressly declared* was not to instruct the wise and few, but the many and unenlightened. If the conversion, therefore, of the Pandits and Maulavis in this country shall ever be attempted by Protestant missionaries, they most beware of asserting, while they teach the gospel of troth, what those Pandits and Maulavis would know to be false. The former would cite the beautiful Aryli couplet, which was written at least three cen- turies before our era, and which pronounces the duty of a good man, even in the moment of his destruc- tion, to caasat not only in forgiving^ but even in a desire of henejiting his destroyer, as the sandgl tree, in the instant of its overthrow, sheds perfume on the ajte which fells it; and the latter would triumph in repeating the verse of Sadi, who represents a return of good for good as a slight reciprocity f but sa^is to the virtuous man. Confer benefits on him who has ir^ured theef using an Arabic sentence, and a maxim apparently of the ancient Arabs. Nor would the 49 81 R WltLIAM JONES'S Moselmaiis fail to recite four disticte of Hkfiz, who has illustrated that maxim with fanciful but elegant allusions : Learn ftom yon orient shell to love thy foe. And store Mrith pearls the hand that brings thee woe; Free, like yon rock, from base vindictive pride, Emblaze with gems the wrist that rends thy side: Mark, where yon tree rewards the stony shower, With frait nectarioos, or the balmy flower : Ail nature rails alood, " shall man do lest 'l%an heai ihg imiter, and the ratter blest f Now there is not a shadow of reason for beliering that the poet of Shiraz had borrowed this doctrine from the Christians ; but, as ^e cause of Christianity could never be promoted by falsehood or error, so it will never be obstructed by candour and veracity ; for the lessons of Confucius and Chanacya, of Sadi and H46ie, are unknown even at this day to millions of Chinese and Hindus, Persians, and other Mabom- medans, who toil for their daily support ; nor, were they known ever bo perfectly, would they have a di- vine sanction with the multitude} so that, in order to enlighten the qninds of the ignorant, and to en- force the obedience of the perverse, it is evident, ^ priori^ that a revealed religion was necessary in the great system of Providence : but my princlj»al mo- tive for introducing this topic was to give you a specimen of that ancient oriental morality which is comprised in an Indnite number of Persian, Arabic, and Sanscrit compositions. Nearly one half of jurisprudence is closely con- nected with ethics; but, since the learned of Asia consider most of their laws as positive and divine institutions, and not as the mere conclusions of bnman ■immnnnwi 1 ll« DISCOURSES. 49 jeason $ and since I have prepared a mass of ex- tremely curious materials which I reserve for an io* troductroD to the digest of Indian laws, I proceed to the fourth division ; which consists principally of sciences transcendently so nam^d, or the knowledge of abstract quantitiesy of their limits, properties^ and relations, impressed on the understanding with the force of irresistible demonstration $ which, as all other knowledge depends, at best, on our fallible senses, and in a great measure on still more fallible testimony, can only be found in pure mental ab- stractions ; though for all the purposes of life, our own senses, and even the credible testimony of others, give us in most cases the highest degree of certainty, physical and moral. IV. I have already had occasion to touch on the Indian metaphysics of natural bodies, sccord'iDg to the most celebrated of the Asiatic schools, from which the Pythagoreans af e supposed to have borrowed many of their opinions; and, as we learn from Cicero that the old sages of Europe had an idea of centripetal force, and a principle of universal gravi- tation (which they never indeed attempted to demon- strate), so I can venture to affirm, without meaning to pluck a leaf from the never fading laurels of our immortal Newton, that the whole of his theology, and part of his philosophy, may be found in the V^as, and even in the works of the S(itis. The most subtil spirit, which he suspected to pervade natural bodies, and lying concealed in them, to cause attraction and repulsion; the emission, reflection, and refraction of light; electricity, calefactlon, sen- sation, and muscular motion ; is described by the Hin- 4u8 as t^ fifth eUmentf endued with those very powers ; 50 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S and the V^as abomd with allusions to a force unf- versally attractive, which they chiefly ascribe to the. Sun, thence called Aditya, or the Aitraetory a name designed by the mytholc^ists to mean the Child of the Goddess Aditi$ but the most wonderful passage on the theory of attraction occurs in the charming allegorical poem of Shirin and FerbM, or the Divine Spirit and a human aoul disitUerestediy pious: a work which, from tlie firet veise to the last, is a blaze of religious and poetical fire. The whole passage appears to me so curious, that I make no apology for giving you a faithful translation of it : '' There is a strong propensity which dances through every atom, and attracts the minutest pAfticle te some particular object. Search this universe from its base to its summit, from fire to air, from water to earth, from all below the Moon to all above the celestial spheres, and thou wilt not find a corpurcle destitute of that natural attractability ; the very point of the first thread, in this apparently tangled skein, is no other than such a principle of attraction ; and all principles beside are void of a real basis ; from such a propensity arises every motion perceived in heavenly or in terrestrial bodies: it is a disposi* tion to be attracted which taught hard steel to rush from its place and rivet itself on the magnet : it is the same d4sp06ition which impels the light straw to attach itself firmly on amber: it is this quality which gives every substance in nature a tendency toward another, and an inclination forcibly directed to a determinate point.'' These notions are' vague, in- deed, and unsatisfactory; but, permit me to ask, whether the last paragraph of Newton*s incompara- ble woik goes much farther? and whether any -sub- 11. DfSCOCRSBI. 51 sequent experiments have thrown light on a subject so abstruse and obscure? That the sublime astro- nomy and exquisitely beautiful geometry with which that work is illumined, should in any d^ree be approached by the mathematicians of Asia, while of all Europeans who ever lived Archimedes alone was capable of emulating them, would be a vain expec- tation; but we must suspend our opinion of Indian astronomical knowledge till the S^irya Siddhanta shall appear in our own language, and even then (to adopt a phrase of Cicero) our greedy and capacious targ will by no means be satisfied ; for, in order to complete an historical account of genuine Hindu astronomy, we require verbal translations of at least three other Sanscril books ; of the treatise of Para- ^ sara, for the first age of Indian science; of that by Var^a, with the copious comment of his yery learn- ed son, for the middle age; and of those written by Bhascara for times comparatively modern. The va- luable and now accessible works of the last men- tioned philosophy, contain also an universal, or specious arithmetic, with one chapter at least in geo- metry; nor would it surely be difficult to procure, through our several residents with the Pishw4 and with Scindhya, the oldar books on algebra which Bhascara mentions, and on which Mr. Davis would justly set a very high value; but the Sanscrit work from which we might expect the most ample and importent information, is entitled Csh^tr&dersa, or a View of Geometrical Knowledge, and was compiled In a very large volume by order of the illustrious Jayasinha, comprising all that remains on that science in the sacred language of India: it was inspected in the west by a Pandit now in the service of Lien^-^ 1>2 SIR WILLIAM JOMB6*8 V oant Wilford, and might, I am persuaded, be pur- chased at Jayaoagar, ivhere Colonel Poller had permission from the R^j& to buy the four V^d^ themselves. Thus have I answered to the best of my power, the three first questions obligingly trans- mitted to us by Professor Playfair, — Whether the Hindus have books in Sanscrit expressly on geometry ? Whether they have any such on arithmetic ? and. Whe- ther a translation of the SCirya Siddh&nta be not the great desideratum on the subject of Indian astro- nomy? To his three last questions,— Whether an accurate summary account of all the Sanscrit works on that subject? A delineation of the Indian celes- tial sphere, with correct remarks on it ? and, A de- scription of the astronomical instruments used by the ancient Hindus, would not severally be of great utility ? we cannot but answer in the affirmative, . provided that the utmost critical sagacity were ap- plied in distinguishing such works, constellations, and instruments, as are clearly of Indian origin, from such as were introduced into this country by Muselman a^ronomers from Tartary and Persia, or in later days by mathematicians from Europe. y. From all the properties of man and of nature, from all the various branches of science, from all the deductions of human reason, the general corollary, admitted by Hindus, Arabs, and Tartars, by Persians,^ and by Chinese, is the supremacy of an all-creating and all-preserving Spirit, infinitely wise, good, and powerful, but infinitely removed from the compre- hension of his most exalted creatures { nor are there in any language (the ancient Hebrew always except- ed) more pious and sublime addresses to the Being of beings, more splendid enumerations of his attri- 11. DISCOURSES. 5$ botes, or more beantiful descriptions of his viable worlLs, than in Arabic, Persian, and Sanscrit, espe- cially in the Koran, the introductions of the poems of Sadi^ Nizkmi, and Firdaus'i, the four Y^d^s, aD4 many parts of the numerous Purdnas: but suppli- cation and praise would not satisfy the boundless imagination of the Ved^nti and Siifi theologists, who, blending uncertain metaphysics with undoubted principles of religion, have presumed to reason con- fidently on the very nature and essence of the Divine Spirit, and asserted in a very remote age, what mul- titudes of Hindus and Muselmans assert at this hour, ' that all spirit is homogeneous; that the spirit of God is in kind the same with that of man, though dilTer- ing from it infinitely in degree; and that, as material substance is mere illusion, there exists in this univencr only one generic spiritual substance, the sole pru' mary cause, efficient, substantial, and formal of all secondary causes and of all appearances whatever, but endued, in its highest degree, with a sublime pro- vidential wisdom, and proceeding by ways incom- prehensible to the spirits which emanate from it : an opinion which G6tama never taught, and which we have no authority to believe, but which, as it is grounded on the doctrine of an immaterial Creator supremely wise, and a constant Preserver supremely benevolent, differs as widely from the pantheism of Spinoza and Toland, as the affirmation of a proposi- tiod differs from the negotiation of it ; though the last named professor of that insane philosophy had the baseness to conceal his meaning under the very words of Saint Paul, which are cited by Newton for a purpose totally different, and has even used a phrase which occurs indeed in the V^da, but in a 54 SIR WILLIAM JONES'S DISCOURSES. flense diametrically opposite to that which he woidd have ^en it. The passage to which I allude is in a speech of Yaruqa to his sob, where he says, ^' That ^irit, fron which these created beings proceed} through wlrich, having proceeded from it. they live; foward which they tend, and in which they are ul« timately absorbed, — that spirit study to know ; that spirit is the Great One.*' The subject of this discourse. Gentlemen, is inex* haustibie : it has been my endeavour to say as much on it as possible in the fewest words ; and, at the beginning of next year, I hope to close these general disquisitions with topics measureless in extent, tNit less abstruse than -that which has this day been dis* cussed; and better adapted to the gaiety which seems to have prevailed in the learned banquets of the Greeks, and which ought surely to prevail in every symposiac assemUy. ENP OF SIR WM. JONES*S DISCOURSES. 55 Shortly after the delivery of the foregoing Dis- course the Society was deprived of its President by death. The Editor of this selection of his works in- tended to have written a brief life of their author, but he found it so admirably executed in the follow- ing, or Twelfth* Anniversary Discourse by the new President, that he preferred printing it entire, and adding a few of the most interesting of Sir William *s other papers, to the gratifying his own vanity by the composition of a new memoir. * AdTertisement.— The nnfortanate death of Sir William Jones, on the 27th of April, 1794, having deprived the Societsr of their Fonnder and President, a meeting of the Memberi wat convened on the Ist of May following, when it was unani- moosly agreed to appoint a Cominittee, consisting of Sir Eo- bert Chambers, Mr. Jasiice Hyde, Colonel John Murray, Johii Briston, and Thomas Graham, Esquires, to wait on Sir John Shore, and, in the name of the Society, reqoest his acceptance of the office of their President. With this request, he, in term s highly flattering to the Society, agreed to comply; and on the 32d of May, 1794. took his seat as President, and delivered the Pisconrse No. 18, of this volume. EDMUND MORRIS, Secretary. 56 LORD TEIGMMOUTH ON DISCOURSE IBcIidfreti at a jiftecting of ti^e ISsiatic Socict^^ ON THE nD OF MAY, 1794. BY SIR JOHN SHORE*, BART. preAdent. I GEWTLEMBy, If I had consalted my competeDcy only, for iht station whiqh your choice has conferred upon me, I must, without hesitation, have declined the honour of being the President of this Society; and although I most cheerfully accept your invitation, with every inclination to assist, as far as my abilities extend, in promoting the laudable views of our association, I must still retain the consciousness of those disquali- fications, which you have been pleased to overlook. It was lately our boast to possess a President, whose name, talents, and character, would have been honourable to any institution ; it is notr our misfor- tune to lament, that Sir William Jones exists bqt in the affections of his friends, and in the esteem, vener ration, and regret of all. * Now Lord Telf^nmoDUi, the biographer of Sir Wm. Jones, and editor of bii worki. SIR WILLIAM 10NE8. 5^ I cannot, I flatter myself, ofer a more gratefnl tribute to ^be Society, than by makiog bis cbaractf r tbe sobject of my first address to yoa ; and if, in tbe deliBeatioo or it, fon^KSs or affection for the nan sboaid appear blended with my reverence for hid genius and abilities, in the sympathy of your feelings I shall find my apology. To define with accuracy the variety, yalue, and extent of his literary attainments, requires more ''learning than I pretend to possess; and I am there* fore to solicit your indulgence for an imperfect sketch, rather than expect your approbation for a complete description, of the talents and knowledge of your late and lamented President. I shall begin with mentioning bis wonderful capa- city for tbe acquisiticm of languages, which has never been excelled. In Greek aad Roman literature, his early proficiency was the subject of admiration and applause ; and knowledge of whatever nature, once obtained by him, was ever afterwards progre»- sive. The more elegant dialects of modem Europe, the French, the Spanish, and the Italian, he spoke and wrote with the greatest fluency and precision ; and the German and Portuguese were familiar to bim. At an early period of life his application to oriental literature commenced: he studied the He« brew with ease and success ; and many of the most learned Asiatics have the candour to avow, that his knowledge of Arabic and Persian was as accurate and extensive as their own; he was also conversant in the Turkish idiom; and the Chinese had even at- tracted his notice so far, as to induce him to learn the radical characters of that language, with a view perhaps to further improveoients. It was to be ex- d2 53 LORD TBIGMMOUTH OK pecCed, after his arrival in India, that he would eagerly embrace the opportunity of making himself master of the Sanscrit; and the most enlightened professors of the doctrines of Brahma confess with pride, delight, and surprise, that his knowledge of their sacced dialect was most critically correct and profound. The Pandits who were in the habit of attending him, when I saw them after his death at a public Durbar, could neither suppress their tears for his .loss, nor find terms to express their admira- tion at the wonderful progress he had made in their sciences. Before the expiration of his twenty-second year, he bad completed his Commentaries on the Poetry of the Asiatics, aUbough a considerable <\me after- wards elapsed before their publication; and this work, if no etho' monument of his labours existed, would at once furnish proofs of his consummate 9klll in the oriental dialects, of his proficiency in those of Rome and Greece, of taste and erudition for )>eyond his years, and of talents and application with- out example. But the judgment of Sir William Jones was too discerning to consider language in any other light than as the key of science;, and he would, have -de- spised the reputation of a mere linguist. Knowledge and truth were the objects of all his studies, and his ambition was to foe useful to m,ankind. With these views, he extended his researches to all languages, nations, and times. ■ Such were the motives that induced .him to pro- pose to the government of this country, what he justly denominated a work of national utility and importance ; the compilation of a copious Digest of Hindu and MobBininedan Law, from Sanscrit and Arabic originals, with an offer of his serviers to BU- periDtend the cooipilalion, and nilh a promise to translate ft. He had foreseen, prerious to liig de- partare from Europe, that, nilhont the aid of sucb a Hark, the wise and benevolept inlentioni of the ie- g:blature of Great Brilaiii in leaving to a certain eitent the nalivea of tiiese provinces in possesion of Iheir OK n Iaw9, could no and his eiperiencf, after a-short residence in India, confirm d whiLt his sagacity had anticipated, that withou principles to refer 0, in a language familiar to the J udges of the court thenat e subject to an nncerlalo and em neousezpoiition.o wilful misinterpretation of their laws. To the superintendence of this worit, which was immedlatelj' undertaken at his saggeslion, he asai- duousty devoted those hours which he could spare from bb profc'ssional duties. After tracing the plan of the digest, be prescribed its arrangement and mode of eieculion, and selected from the most learned Hindus and Hahaniniedana lit persons for the task of compiling it. Flattered by his attention,' and en. Cooraged by his applause, the Pandits prosecuted their Uboura with cheerful zeal, to a salisfactary conclusion. The Molnvees have also nearly finished their portion of the work ; but we must ever regret . that the promised translation, as well as the medi- tated preliminary dissertation, bare been frustrated by that decree which so often intercepts the petfui in- ance of hnman purposes. During the eourse of this compilation, and ~ • i aiuiliary la il, he was led to tlady tbe workl of Menu, repHled by tbe Ilisdus (a be tbe aides! and bolieit of l^islBloni and finding then to compriae a system of religious and civil dutin, and of law In all it> branctaea, so compreheaaive and minatd; eiacl (hal il mighl be coBsiderrd ai the iDSlitalei at Hindu law, be preseoted a tramlalion of them to the GoTeromeot of BeogaL Daring the Nuae period, deeming no labour eicnsife or nper&BOH thai tended in any retpeclto promolelbe welfare or hap- piness of maDkiDd, be gave the public an £i«iisb veision of Ibe Arabs text of the Sirajiyyab, or Ha- hommedan Law of Iiilierila>ce, wiib a Cammeutary. He had already published in Eni^and, a traDdotioa «f a tiaci on the hoc subjccl, by anotkei Makon»> medan lawyer, coDtaintng, aa his own wo*^ ex- prKs, a lively aod elegaat epiUwie of the Idw of loheri lance, according to Zaid, To these learned aod important works, to far aol of the road of anmement, noltaii^ could have en- gaged his applicsttoB b«t that desire which be ever professed, of mderiag hia knowledge aaefal (o ha own nation, and beneficial to the iahabilaali of IbcM Wilbairt attending to the chronological arder of their pablication, I ihall briefly rrcapilulate hii other perfonaaocea in Asiatic Literalure, n faraa my knowledge and recOlleCIioB of Ibem eitrad. The TBoily aad petntence of An({aelil dn PermD, with his illiberal reflection! on some of tbe learned Mrinlien oflbe Uniiersity of Oxford, eitoned fron hiin n lelter in the French Ungw^e, which baa beca admired for «ccnnteeriticiiiB,JiBl laiirei and gaace with the precision of agfammarian ; and every admirer of Arabic poetry most acknowledge his obligations to him for an English Version of the seven celebrated poems, so well known by the name of Hoallakat,' from the distinction to which their ex- cellence had entitled them, of being suspended in the temple ai Mecca. I should scarcely think it of im- portance to mention, that he did not disdain the office of Editor of a Sanscrit and Persian work,af it did not afford me an opportunity of adding, that the latter was published at bis own expense, and was sold for the benefit of insolvent debtors. A , similar application was made of the produce of the Sirajiyyah. Of bis lighter productions, the elegant amusements of his leisure hows, comprehending hymns on the Hindu mythology ; poems, consisting chiefly of trans- lations from the Asiatic languages; and the version of Sacontala, an ancient Indian draraa^ — it would be unbecoming to speak, in a style of importence which be did not himself annex to them. They show the activity of a vigorous mind, its fertility, its genius, and its taste. Nor shall I particularly dwell on the discourses addressed to the Society, which we have aU perused or heard, or on the other learned ^ and intemlingdisKrtaliiHii.wbich fonn h> large aad valoBble a porlion of the records of our researcbeat let US lament that the apirit which dictated them ii to IB extinct; and that the voice, to whicb weliMCD- cd with ImproTement idiI rapture, will be heard by lu no more. But I cannot pasa over a paper, whkh baa fallen . into m; poaacaaioD atnce hia dnnUe, in the hBDd- writii^ of Sir Williain JODea himieir, entitled De- alderata, as more explanatory than any thing 1 can aay of the comprebeoBive viewa of hia enlightened mind. II conmiUB, on a pefural of it will ibow, whatever ia most curious, imparlanl, and atlainabiet , in tbeacicncea and hiatoriea of India, Arabia, China, and Taitary; aubJKlB which he had already moat aaiplj discuBsed in the disquisitiooa which be laid befbre Ibe Society. BnsibnatB. INDIA. 1. Hk Ancient Get^raphy of India, &c. from the Pur&naa.- S. A Botanical Desciiption of Indian Plants, from the C&haa, &c S. A Gianimar of the Sanjcnt Language, from Pk- nini, &c. 4. A DiclioDBry of tbe Sonwrit Lftnpiage, from Ihirty-lwo original Vocabulariea and Nirnclb 5. On Ihe Ancient Huaic of the Indiana. 0. On the Medical Subatancea of India, and Ibe Indian AM of Medicine. T. Ob the PbUoaopby of tbe Ancient IndiaM. SIR If^LLIAM JORSS. - 53 8. A Translation of the V^da. 9. On Ancient Indian Geometry, Astronomy, and Algebra. 10. A Translation of the Purknas. 11. Translations of the Mah^bharat Rlun&yan l«. On the Indian Theatre, &c. &c. IS. On the Indian Constellations, with their Mytho- logy, from the Purknas. 14. The History of India before the Mahommedan Conquest. From the Sanscrit-Cashmir His- tories. ARABIA. 15. The History of Arabia before Mohammed. 1 6. A Translation of (he Hamiisa. i7. A Translation of Hariri. 18. A Translation of the F^hatM Khuiafa. OftheCkfiah. PERSIA. 19. The History of Persia, from Authorities in San- scrit, Arabic, Greek, Turkbh, Persian, ancient and modem. Firdaosi's Khosraa nama. 20. The five Poems of Niz&mi, translated in prose. A Dictionary of pore Persian. Jehangire. CHINA. 21. A Translation of the Shi-eia^, ' 82. Tie Text of Can-fii-tea verbrJly translated. TARTARY. 2S. A History of the Tartar Nations, chiefly of the Moguls and Othmans, from the Turkish and Peniao. U LORB nicmiaiTTH oh We are not authorized to conclode thai he had htnself ibmed a delerminalion lo complele the works tthich his genius apd knowledge had tbm ikelcbed f the task uema la require a period beyond the probable dnratiaa of aoj human life; bat we who had the happiaea to kaaw Sir WHiiam Jones, wlio were witnenet of hia inde&tigatde penevnancs in the pursuit of knowled^, and of hit sTdour to accompliah whatever be derated importaiit, who saw the eitenl of hia intcUectaal powers, his wonderfal attainments in literature and science, and the^ilil; with which all hit compasiliont were made, cannot doubt, if It had pleased Proiidence to protract the date nf bis eitslence, that he would have abl; exe- cuted Diuch of what he had so FilemiTely planned. I have hitherto principally confined my discourse to the porsnitB of our late President in orienlal lite- rature, which, from their eilent, might appear to ba^ occupied all his lime; bnt thej neither preclnd- ed his attention tu proTessional studies, nor to scietH:e in general. Amongst his pufaUcalioDS in Europe, in polite literature, eiclnsive of various compositiom in prose and verse, I find a Iianslalion of the Speeches of IsKDS, witba learord comment: aDd,ialBw,aD Essay on the law of Bailments. Upon the sutyecl of this last work, I c^inot deny mjKlf the gratifi- cation of ijuoljng the sentiments of a celebrated his- torian: — " Sir V finity between the most distinguished inhabitants of the primitive world, at the time when they deviated, as they did too early deviate, from the rational ado- ration of the only true God. Hiere seems to have been four principal sources of all mythology. I. Historical or natural truth has been perverted into fable by ignorance, imagination, flattery, or stupidity; as a king of Crete, whose tomb had been discovered in that island, was con- ceived to have been the God of Olympus; and Minos, a legislator of that country, to have been his son^and to hold a supreme apellate jurisdiction over departed Bonis; hence too probably flowed the tale of Cad- mus, as Bochart learnedly traces it ; hence beacons or volcanos became one-eyed giants, and monsters vomiting flames ; and two rocks, from their appear- ance to mariners in certain positions, were supposed to crush all vessels attempting to pass between them ; of which idle fictions many other instances might be collected from the Odyssey, and the various Argo- n'autlc poems. The less we say of Julian stars, dei- fications of princes or warriors, altftrs raised, with those of Apollo, to the basest of men, and divine 78 ON THE GODS OF GREECE, tiilcB bestowed on such wretches as Caius Octavianus, the less we shall expose the infamy of grave senators and fine poets, or the brutal folly of the low multi- tude : but we may be assured, that the mad apo- theosis of truly great men, or of little men falsely i»Iled great, has been the origin of gross idolatrous errors in every part of the pagan world. II. The ^ next source of them appears to have been a wild admiration of the heavenly bodies, and, after a time, tte systems and calculations of astronomers; hence came a considerable portion of Egyptian and Gre- cian feble; the Sabian worship in Arabia; the Per- sian types and emblems of Mihr, or the Sun ; and the far extended adoration of the elements and the powers of nature; and hence, perhaps, all the arti- ficial chronology of the Chinese and Indians, with the invention of demigods and heroes to fill the vacant niches in their extravagant and imaginary periods. III. Numberless Divinities have been created solely by the magic of poetry, whose esseo- tial business it is to personify the most abstract notions, and to place a Nymph or a Genius in every grove, and almost in every flower; hence Hygieia and Jaso, health and remedy, are the poetical daugh- ters of ^sculapius, who was either a distinguished physician, or medical skill penonified ; and hence Chlons, or verdure, is married to the Zephyr. 1 V. The metaphors and allegories of moralists and metaphysicians have been also very fertile in Dei- ties; of which a thousand examples might be ad- duced from Plato, Cicero, and the inventive com- jnentators on Homer, in their pedigrees of the Gods, and their fabulous lessons of morality. The fichest and noblest stream from this abundant fountain is ITALY, AND INDU. 73 tte charming philosophical tale of Psyche, or the 'Progress of the Soul; than which, to my taste, a more beautiful, sublime, and well supported allegory •was never produced by the wisdom and ingenuity of man. Hfence also the Indian M&y&, or, as the word is explained by some Hindu scholars, ^ the first Jn- clination of the Godhead to diversify himself (9uch is their phrase) by creating Worlds^* is feigned to be Ihe Mother of universal Nature, and of all the .inferior Gods; as a Cashmirian informed m'e, when I asked him why C^ma, orXove, was represented as her Son; but the word M^y6, or Delusion^ has a more subtle and recondite sense in the Y^d^nti phi- losophy, where it signifies the system of perceptions, whether of secondary or primary qualities, which the Deity was believed by Epicharmus, Plato, and many truly pious men, to raise by his omnipresent spirit in the minds of his creatures ; hut which had not, in their opinion, any existence independent of mind. In drawing a parallel between the Giods of the Indian and European Heathens, from whatever source they were derived, I shall remember, that no- thing is lets favourable to inquiries after truth than a systematical spirit, and shall call to mind the saying of a Hindu writer, ** that whoever obstinately ad- Jieres to any set of opinions, may bring himself to believe that the freshest sandal wood is a flame of fire.*' This will effectually prevent me from insist- ing, that such a God of India was the Jupiter of Greece; such, the Apollo; such, the Mercury. In fact, since all the causes of polytheism contributed largely to the assemblage of Grecian Divinities (though Bacon reduces them all to refined allegories, and Newton to a poetical disguise of true history). pmume in snfgeil mon, than liuU, io one o^iacity or analber, there exiiti s striking simiUtade between the chief objects of warship in >DcipnI Greeee or Ital]'> and in the tery inleraling coontrj wbicti we The compariMMi which I proceed In la; before you most Deeds be very Mperficial ; partly frora m; ■hart resideDce in HinduHtan, and partly from my waul of cwnplele leianre for literary amnscraenU ; but principally, becune I have no European booh, to refresh my meiDaTy, of old fHblrB,e>cepl the con- ceited though not unlearned work of Poaiey, entitled the PantbeOD, and that so miiefabl; liaoBl^ed that it can hardly be read witb patience. A thoaand more strokes of memMaDce mi^t, I aai sore, be collected by aoy one who should with that view pe- nne Hesiod, Hysinis. C^ori^hb, and the niber my- thologisls; or, whieh would be a Sorter and a pleasaotrr way, rfiould be salisfled with the very d^ant SyotiigmatB of Liljoi Giraldns. Disquisitions CDDcernin); ibe tBaxaen aiMi cooduct of our species in early times, or indeed at any tlaw, are always curious, at least, and amsHngi bat tbey are higfely interesting la s«ch as can say of theo- tb Chremes in the play. ** We ai Tlipy may eren be vf solid importance in ao age 11 hen s oiae intelligent and nnaow pemos are in- • lined to doobl the aatiienticity of the accMsnts d«- li>ered by Moses, canceniag the prinilive wofld ; ~iiice DO aiodes or sources of ri asnnin], can l>e ■•- iinpoMant, which h«(e ITALY, AMD IIIDEA. 75 doQbts. Either the first eleven chapters of Genesii, all doe allowances being* made for a figurative East- ern style, are true, or the whole fabric of oar na- tional religion is false; a conclusion which none of us, I trost, would wish to be drawn. I, who cannot help^ believing the divinity of the Messiah, from the undis- puted antiquity and manifest completion of many prophecies, especially those of Isaiah, in the only perMMi recorded by history to whom they are applit cable, am obliged of course to believe the sanctity of the venerable books to which that sacred person refers as genuine: hut it is not the truth of our na- tional religion, as sach, that I have at heart ; it is truth itself; and, if any cool unbiased reasoner wiU clearly convince me, that Moses drew his narrative throngfa Egyptian conduits from the primeval foun- tains of Indian literature, I shall esteem him as a friend for having weaned my mind from a capital error, and promise to stand among the foremost in assisting to circulate the truth, which he has ascer- tained. After such a declaration, I cannot but per- suade myself, that no candid man will be displeased, iff in the coune of my work, I make as free with any arguments that he may have advanced, as I should really desire him to do with any of mine that lie may be disposed to controvert Having no system of my own to maintain, I shall not pursue a very legnlar method, but shall take all the Gods, of whom I discoune, as they happen to present themselves; beginning, however, like the Romans and the Htn* dus, with Janus or G an^sa. The titles and attributes of this old Italian deity are fully comprised in two choriambic verses of Sul- } . '' FarlierJaniu,Bll-b(boldingJHiiiu,llNiudiTiD;ty with two heads, and with two farmsf O sagacrons plaElorofall thii^, and iFadcr of deities I" , He was the God, we tee, of Wiadom j whenoe he ii repmrnled on caiDs nilh lam, and, on (be He- tnncaii image found at F^iici, with faur faces; enblems of prudence and ciicumBfiectiai): Ibus i> GaniaB, the God of Wisdom in HindoatHn, painted with an E/cpAonCi head, Ibeijinbolof EHgaciom die- cemmeat, and attended b; a fovourite rat, which Ibe ladiBDS eoDsider as a wise and providenl Boimal. Hii next |:reBtchBrBCtcr(lbe plentiful sourceof many ■uperstitiaas usages) was that from wbicb he is em- phatically Biyled the father, and wbicb the secant vene before cited more fully exprenes, tht arigln niid founder of all Ihinga. Whence this oMion arose, udUsb from a tcadilion that he first built -dirlne*, railed aTlars, and inslitated eacrificee, it is not easy to coi|jecture ; hence it came however, that his name wae invoked before an; other God; that, in the old sacred ritesv corn and nine, and la later limes in- cense also, were tirsi oB'ered to Jannsj tbnl the doart or cnfronm to priyate bouses were called Jaane, and any penious passage or Ihoroughfare, in the plura\ nomber, Jani, or tcilh twa btgittningi ; that hf ivoj represented boldiiig %rod, as guardian of 11 ^} 9, and a key, as opening not gates only, but alt iinj)ortatU ssorJti and affairt of -mankind) that be ITALY, AND INDIA. 77 was thought to preside oyer the morning, or begin-' ning of day; that, althoug;h the Roman year began regularly with March, yet the eleventh month, named Janoarius, was considered as Jirst of the twelve^ whence the whole year was supposed to be under his guidance, and opened with great solemnity by the consok inaugurated in his fane, where his statue was decorated on that occasion with fresh laurel; aiid^ for the same reasou, a solemn denunciation of war, than. which there can hardly be a more momentous national act, was made by the military consul's opening the gates of his temple with all the pomp of his magistracy. The twelve altars and twelve chapels of Janus might either denote, according to the general opinion, that he leads and governs twelve months, or that, as, he says of himself in Ovid, all entrance and access mii3t be made through him to the principal Gods, who were, to a proverb, of the same number. We may add, that Janus was imagined to- preside over infants at their birth, on the beginning of life. . The Indian Divinity has precisely the same cba^ racter: all sacrifices and religious ceremonies, all addresses even to superior Gods, all serious coippo* sitions in writing, and all worldly affailTB of moment, are begun by pious Hindus with an invocation of Gan^; a w*rid composed of Ua, the governor Qr leader y9nd ganOf or a company of deities, nine of which companies are enumerated^ in the Amarc^sh. Instances of opening business auspiciously by an ejaculation to the Janus of India (if the lines of re- semblance here traced will justify me in. so calliog him) might be multiplied with ease. Few books are begun without the words *' salutation to Gan4s 2'* 78 ON THE GODS OF GRECCB, and he is fint iDvoked 1^ the Brihnan, who cim- ^ duct the trial by ordeal, or peifona the ceremony of the k6may or sacrifice to fire. M. SoDoerat repie> Bents him as hi^y revered on the coast of Coroman- del$ ** where the Indians/' lie says, ** woold not wt any account build a house, wirbont having: placed on the ground an ima^ of this deity, which tliey sprinkle with oil, and adorn every day with flowers : they set up his lignre in alh their temples, in the streets, in the high roads, and in open plains at the foot of some tree; so that persons of all ranks may ■UToke him, before they undertake any business, and travellers worship him, before they proceed on their journey." - To this I may add, from my own obser- ▼ation, that in the commodious and useful town, which now rises at Dharmiianya or Gaya, nnder the anspices of the active and benevolent Thomas Law, £>q. collector of Rotas, every new built hoase, agreeably to an immemorial usage of the Hindus^ has the name of Gan^sa sapencribed on its door; nnd in the old town, liis image is placed over the gntes of the temples. We come now to Satura, the oldest of the Pagan Gods, of whose office and actions much is recorded. The jargon of his being the son of Earth and Hea- ven, who was the son of the Sky and the Day, Is purely- a confession of ignorance who were his pap rents or wba his predecessors; and there appears nMre sense in the tradition said to be mentioned by the inquisitive and well informed Plato, ^ that both Saturn, or .Time, and his consort Cybele, or the Bartb, together with their attendants, were thechlU dren of Ocean and Thetis; or, in less poetical lan^ fnage, sprang from the waters of the great deep/' ITALY, AND INDIA. 79 Ceres, the goddess olF harvests, was, it seeBOs, their daughter; and Virgil describes 'Mhe mother and ODise of all as crowned with turrets, in a car drawn by lions, and exulting in her hundred grandsons, all divine, all inhabiting splendid celestial mansions. As Ihe God of Time, or rather as time itself personified, Saturn was usually painted by the heathens holding a scythe in one hand, and in the other a snake with its tail in its mouth, the symbol of perpetual cycles and revolutions of ages: he was often represented in the act of devouring years, in the form of children, and sometimes encircled by the seasons, appearing like boys and girls. By the Latins he was named Satumus ; and the most ingenious etymology of that word is given by Festus the grammarian ; who traces it, by a learned analogy to many similar names, d «ah(, from planting, because, when he reigned in Italy, he introduced and improved agriculture: but his distinguishing character, which explains, indeed, all his other titles and functions, was expressed al- legorically by the stern of a ship or galley on the reverse of his ancient coins i for which Ovid assigns a very unsatisfactory reason, *' because the divine stranger arrived in a ship on the Italian coast ;" as if he could have been expected on horseback or hover- ing through the air. The account quoted by Pomey from Alexander Polyhbtor, casts a clearer light, if it really came from genuine antiquity, on the whole tale of Saturn; *^ that he predicted an extraordinary fall of rain, and or- dered the construction of a vessel, in which it was necessary to secure men, beasts, birds, and reptiles, from a general inundation.*' Now it seems not easy to take a cool review of f 80 ON THE GODS OF dKEECB, all these testimonies coDcerning the birth, kindred, oflTspriDg, cliaracter, occapatiotis, and entire life of Saturn, without assenting to the opinion of Bochart, or admitting it at least to be highly probable, that the fable was raised on the true history of Noah; from whose flood a new period of time was comput- ed, and a new series of suges may be said to have sprung; who rose fresh, and as it were, newly bom, from the waves; whose wife was in fact the univer- sal mother; and, that the earth might soon be re- peopled, was early blessed with numerons and flou- rishing descendants: if we produce, therefore, an Indian king of divine birth, eminent for his piety and beneficence, whose story seems evidently to be that of Noah dii^uised by Asiatic fiction, we may safely offer a conjecture, that he was also the same person- age with Saturn. This was Menu, or Satyavrata, whose patronymick name was Yaivaswata, or Child •f the Sun; and whom the Indians not only believe to have reigned over the whole world in the earliest age of their chronology, bat to have resided in the country of Dravira, on the coast of the eastern In- dian peninsula: the following narrative of the prin- cipal event in bis life, I have literally translated from the Bhkgavat; and It is the subject of the first Pu« rana, entitled that of the Matsya, or Fish. ** Desiring the preservation of herds, and of BriUi- mans, of genii and virtuous men, of the Y^das, of law, and of precious things, the lord of the universe assumes many bodily shapes; but, though he per- vades, like the air, a variety of beings, yet he is him- self unvaried, since he has no qualify subject to change. At the close of the last Calpa, there was a general destructidn, occasioned by the sleep .of ITALY, INU INDIA. Bt Brahinai whence his creatures in different worlds were drowned in a vast ocean. Brahmk, being in- clined to slumber, desiring; a repose after a lapse of ages, the strong demon Hayagriva came near him, and stole the Y^das which bod flowed from bis lips. When Heri, the preserver of the universe, discover* ed this deed of the prince of Dknavas, be took the shape of a minute fish called sap 'ban. A holy king, named Satyavrata, then reigned ; a servant of the spirit which moved on the waves, and so devout, that water was bis only sustenance. He was the child of the Suo, and, in the present Galpa, is invested by Narkyan in the office of Menu by the name of Sr6d- dhadlva, or the God of Obsequies. One day, as he was making a libation to the river Critamkia, and held water in the palm of bis band, he perceived a small fish moving in it. The king of Dravira imme- diately dropped the fish into the river, together with the water which he had taken from it$ when the 8ap*haii thus pathetically addressed the benevolent moaarch: * How canst thou, O king, who showest Bffeclion to the oppressed, leave me in this river water« where I am too weak to resut the monsters of the stream, who ill me with dread V He, not knowing who had assumed the form of a fish, applied bis mind to the preservation of the sap*barl, both from good nature, and from regard to his own soul i and, having heard its very suppliant address, he kindly placed it under his protection in a small vase full of water; but, in a single night its bulk was so increased, that it could not be contained in the jor, and thus again addressed the illustrious prince: * I am not pleased with living miserably in this little vase; malte me a laiige mansion, where I may dwell 8S ON TAE GODS OF GRBECB, io comfort.' The kln^, removing it tbence, placed it in the water of a cistero; bat it grew three cobits in less than fifty minotes, and said, * O king, it pleases me not to stay vainly in this nanrow astern : since thou hast granted me an asylnm, give me a -spacions habitation.' He then removed it, and iplaced it in a pool, where, having ample space juround its body, it became a fish of considerable size. * This abode, O king, is not convenient for me, who most swim at laige in the waters: exert thyself for my safety; and remove me to a deep lake' Thus addressed, the pious monarch threw the sop- pliant into a lake, and, when it grew of eqnal bnlk with that piece of water, he cast the vast fish into the tea. When the fish was thrown into the waves, he thus again spoke to Satyavrata: * Here the homed sharks, and other monsters of great strength, will de- vour me ; thou sbooldst not, O vaUant man, leave me in this ocean.' Thus repeatedly deluded by the fish, who had addressed him with gentle words, the king saidi ' Who art thoy, that begnilest me in that as- sumed shape ? Never before have I seen or heard of so prodigious an inhabitant of the waters, who, like thee, hast filled up io a single day a lake an hundred leagues in circumference. Surely thou art Bhliga- vat, who appearest before me; the great Heri, whose dwelling was on the waves; and who now, in com-' passion to thy servants, bearest the form of the natives of the deep. Salutation and praise to thee, O first male, the lord of creation, of preservation, of de> struction! Thou art the highest object, O supreme ruler! of us thy adorers, who pieudy seek thee. Ail thy delusive descents in this world give existence to various beings: yet I am anxious to know for what ITALY, AND INDIA. 83 cause that shape has beeo assumed by .thee. Let me not, O lotos-eyed, approach in Vain the feet of a ' deity, whose perfect benevolence has been extended to all ; when thou hast shown us to our amazement the appearance of other bodies, not in reality exist- ing, but successively exhibited.' The lord of the uni- verse, loving the pious man who thus implored him, and intending to preserve him from the sea of de- struction, caused by the depravity of the age, thus told him how he was to act : ' In seven days from the present time, O thou tamer of enemies, the three wwlds will be plunged in an ocean of death; but, in the midst of the destroying waves, a large vessel, sent by me for thy use, shall stand before thee. Then shalt thou take all medicinal herbs, all the variety of seeds: and, accompanied by seven saints, encircled by pain of all brute animals, thou shalt enter the' spacious ark, and continue in it secure from the flood, on one immense ocean, without light except the ra- diance, of thy holy companions. When the ship shall be agitated by an impetuous wind, thou shalt fasten it with a large sea serpent on my horn ; for I will be near thee; drawing the vessel with thee and thy attendants. . I will remain on the ocean, O chief of men, until a night of Brahmk shall be completely ended. Thou shalt then know my true greatness, lightly named the supreme Godhead ; by my favour all thy questions shall be answered, and thy mind abundantly instructed.' Heri, having thus directed the monarch, disappeared; and Satyavrata humbly waited for the time which the ruler of our senses had appointed. The pious king, having scattered toward the east the pointed blades of the grass darhhoy and turning his face toward the north^ sat meditating on (be tot of the Gwl, wh> bii b>ae the to coBfonDcd to Ibc ilirrrtiaai at Hrri. IW 9b addiCMrd kia : ' O king, Bcditste aa CJsaw, wto will lardj dritTer « rrm Ifca daagB-, asd paat la prisptrilj.' TbFGodfbdBgwTakcd bjthc ——irk, appeared agahi dnttBccl; «■ tkc fast octaa ia Ihe fOTHi of a i>b,blaiiR{ likegidd, niatdiag a BiHim •f ItBpirt, with mc itaprBdoB boia; oa wkid the king;, at be kad befon been euaiiuidfd bj Beri, tied Ibeibip •rilkacableiiiade(ifaTBiticrpcD(,aBd bspp; in bl> piaeivalion, uood praMiDg (be dc- •tioycr of Uadbo. Wben Ihe BBaanh bad fia^rd bb bjmii, the primeval male Bhigavat.wba walcbed for bb hMj on (faegrealrreipaitseof water, rpuke akrad tohi*ai>ndiTiDe(s(:TKc,praBaDiKiii);aiactal Purina, wbicb coataiaed the niln or tbe Simc'hya pbilonphji: but il «ia> as JD&Dilemjrteryto becoa- cealed Hilhiatlie briBit of Satyairaia; wbo,utting In (be TCMel n ilb the ninti, heard Ike principle of Ike Mol, the Eitemal Being, pnictaiaird by tbe preierriif power, l^en Heri, riiiiiB together with Brahmh, Trooi the deMractire ddoge, which wM obated, ilew (he demon Hayagiira, and Ttcorered llic Bacred booki. SalyaTrala, iulnicted io ail di> MBc and boman knowiedge, was appointed in (tie lircvDt Calpa, bythe favour of Vbban, tbeKTrnth Alcnn, Barnamcd VaiTaawata: bnl the apprarancf? nl a homed fiib to the religiau monarck wai Ukyk, ITALY, AND INDIA* 85 or delnslon; and he who shall devoutly hear this im* porCftnt allegorical narrative, will be delivered from the booda^^e of sin/' This epitome of the first Indian history that is now extant, appears to me very cnrioua and very impor- tant; for the story, though whimsically dressed up in the form of an allegory, scenes to prove a primeval tradition in this country of the universal deluge de* scribed by Moses, and fixes consequently the time when the genuine Hindu chronology actually begins. We find, it is true, in the Pur&n, from which the nariBtive is extracted, another deluge^ which hap- pened towards the close of the third age, when Yodhbtliir was labouring under the persecution of bis inveterate foe Dury6dhan$ and when Chrisbna, who had recently become incarnate for the purpose of succouring the pious and destroying tjie wicked* was performing wonders in the country of Mat'huni; but die second flood was merely local, and intended only to affect the people of Vraja : they, it seems, had offended Indra, the god of the firmament, by their enthusiastic adoration of the wonderful child, ^ who lifted up the mountain G6verdbena, as if it bad been a flower, and, by sheltering all the herds* men and shepherdesses from the storm, convinced Indra of his supremacy.*' That the Satya, or (if we may venture so to call k) the Satnrnian age, was in truth the age of the ge^ neral flood, will appear from a close examination of the ten Avatitrs, or descents of the deity, in his ca** pacity of preserver: since, of the four which are de* clared to have happened in the Satya yug, the three first apparently relate to some stupendous convuN fiion of our globe from the fountains of the deep t ■e lawta nMkin *r a frideaail imfi-n. Fin(,» wc hiii ihiBB . Ihii ■», ia ibr tyiejM of Ac HibAk, aa •^BfHiiiaa •4 Pttn Ukuct !• f «» M * i. a *ii— « f«a aid Ib bmalj 'fqr all Ike PaadiB a^m ttat b wife, wkked iKTe dntm^rd: bfiI, ikc p aa «i at tke doff detcrBdi in tW bra af a t«r. Ac iy> ri af Un^tb, to draw ap aad a^raA •• y> tmks Ihe wImIc rank, wk Ku tad beea task bcBBHk Ac anu : Ibirdlj-, Ike taoc power it KpKwaHd m a tmUim HMataiog Ibc eUbe, whiek 1^ h:ca libi^lI by tbtTinleotai " ' ■ .-.--- fd (ke Ka wilk Ike a ■o diigvrge ike Mcrrd tkinp aai ai wilk (ke water of life,.wUck il TkcM three (tone* relale, I driak, m shadowed by a awral, a nel^ikjacal, ai lumlcal allefiorj: and all ibree w Ihe hierogljphical scalpliina af the partly for a ainiilar purpoae, and partly with a view to Ihin Ihe world uf nnjust and impioB uiMi, who had multiplied in that age, and b^uto ITALY, AND INDIA. 87 swarm on the approach of the Cali yuf , or the age 4>f contention and baseness. As to Buddha, he seems to have been a refoqner of the doctrines contained in the y^das ; and though his good nature led him to censure those ancient books, because they enjoined 8acri6ces of cattle, yet he is admitted as the ninth Avat&r even by the Brkhmans of Ciisi, and his praises are sung by the poet Jayad^va: his character is in many respects very extraordinary ; but, as an ac- count of it belongs rather to history than to mytho^ logy, it is reserved for another dissertation. The tenth Avathr, we are told, is yet t& come, and is expected to appear mounted (like the crowned con- querer in the Apocalyps) on a white horse, with a cimeter blazing like a comet, to mow down all in- corrigible and impenitent offenders who shall then be on earth. ' These €onr Tugs have so apparent an affinity with the Grecian and Roman ages, that one origin may be naturally assigned to both systems. The first in both is distinguished as abounding in gold, though Satya means truth and probity^ which were found, if ever^ in the times immediately following' so tremendous an exertion of the Divine Power as the destruction of mankind by a general dctuge : the next is charac- terized by silver f and the third by copper: though their usual names allude to proportions imagined in each ^tween vice and virtue. The present, or earthen age, seems more properly disoriminated than by irony as in ancient Europe; since that metal is not baser or less useful, though more common in our times, and consequently less (irecioos than copper ; while mere earth conveys an 'idea of the lowest de- gradation. We may here observe, that the true W OB TUB 60DS OF CBBBCB, Hii(0ffy of the Worid /nrrogd or periods; wkUk may be cilleil, iiM^ the Difamao,ar pareaC age; — rfy^ the thii i fracg4" ii^4he dcliiee»aad thote socceediog it tai the Hod imnMlvctMMi «f idolatry at Babrl: aezt, the F^tri* archal, or pare age, ia which iadceJ, there nighty hantcn of beasts and patriarchi io the bakXy of Sent, to the cftabUsbmeat of great eatpires by the dcMOBdaalBof his brother H&m : thirdly, the Mosaic, or less pare age; from the Icgatioa of M«iset,aad daring dbetiaK when his ordinances were compantitaly well o b i tti > cdf and oocorrapted : lastly, the profheUemiy or i pure age, beginning with the giren by the prophets to apostate kii^ and dsqge- oemte nations, but stiU sobsisting, and to ontil all genuine prophecies shall be faUy plished. The duration of the historical ages most needs be very unequal and disproportionate; while that of the Indian Yng^ is disposed so regnlady and artificially, that it caanot be admitted as natural or probable. Men do not become reprobate in a geD» Bietrical prDgresBion,or at the termination of rcgalar periods; yet so well proportioned are the Yqgs, tbot even the> length of human life is diminished as they advance, from an hundred thousand years, in a sab* decuple ratio ; and, as the number of principal Ava« Ihrs in each decreases arithmetically from four, to the number of years in each decreases geometrically^ and ail together constitute the extravagant snnr of four mjllion three hundred and twenty thoosaod years, which aggregate, multiplied by setenty-onep is the period in which every Menu is believed to preside over the world. Such a period, one might ITALY, AND INIUA. 89 conceive, woald have satisfied Archefas, the mea- surer of tea and earthy and the numberer of their Mtnds : or Archioledes, who invented a notation that was capable of expressing the number of them ; bat the comprdiensive mind of an Indian chronologist has no limits ; and the reigns of fourteen Menus are only a single day of Brahmk, fifty of which days have elapsed, according to the Hindus, from the time of the creation. That all this puerility, as it «eema at first view, may be only an astronomical riddle, and 'allude to the apparent revolution of the fixed stars, of which the Brkhmans made a mystery, I rea- dily admit, and am even inclined to believe; but so technical an arrangement excludes all idea of serious history. I am sensible how much these remarks will offend the warm advocates for Indium antiquity; but we must not sacrifice truth to a base fear of giv- ing offence. That the Y^das were actually written before the flood, I shall never believe; nor can we infer from the preceding story, that the learned Hin- dus believe it ; for the all^orical slumber of Brahmk ,and the theft of the sacred books mean only, in simpler language, that the human race was become corrupt} but that (he V^das are very ancient, and far older than other Sanscrit compositions, I will venture to assert from my own examination of them, and a comparison of their style with that t>f the Pu- rkns and the Dherma S&st^a. A similar comparison justifies me in pronouncing, that the excellent law-* book ascribed to Sw&yambhova Menu, though not even pretended to have been written by him, is more aincieot than the Bb&gavat ; but that it was composed in the first age of the world, the Brkhmans would find it bard to- persuade me; and the date which haa i beta coUatoi for Be: in ftct, tke nppoeal d comprucd iBSTcncKhichflatJjcaitndktilhewaTk itudf { for il wn Dot tttnm who conpnwd Ike ijMrB of law by (he connaiid of Ilia hthcT Biahmi, but a holy prnotu^ or iaaigoA, naBed Br^ha, who TC' italtd to mm what Heou bMd deUrered al ibe rc- qa«lof him and other iUDttaDd patriarchs. Id Ibe Hinaia S^tra, to coDclude lliii dignxuaa, the nea- ■ore U lo ODifann and mrlodioai, and Ihe llyle » perfectly Sanicril, or polithtd, that the book matt bo more mndera than the tcriptms of Mous, in which Ibe limplicily, or rather DalLcdDCK of the lb- brew dialect, meCrc. and atyle, mait cMrelDce eiciy Uohiaiied man of their superior satiquily. I leave elymolngiitB, Mo decide everj thing, lo decide whrthn- the word Menn, or in the nominalive cate, Menut, bai any cmiaeiion with HiDna tbe lal*- giver, and luppoied ion of Jove. The CretaiM, ac- cording to Diodoru of Sicily, lued to fe^ thai most of the great men who had bees deified in re- turn for Ibe benefitt whicta tbey had conferred bb roaakind, were bum in their inland; and bence ■ doubt may be railed, whether Minoa was really a Cretan. The Indian legialator was the fim, not tiw WTcnth Menu, or Saljavrata, whom I lappow lo be the Saturn of Italy. Fart of Saturn's cb deed, wu thai of a lawgiver : Qui ttan IndDclte tc iLlipiriiani n And we may trnpect that all Ihe fonrleen Henin are reducible lo one, who wai called Nnb by the Arahs, ITALY, AND INDIA. 91 and probably by the Hebrews; tboagfa we have di&« pused his oame by an improper pronunciation of it. Some near relation between the seventh Menu and the Grecian Minos, may be inferredlfrom the singular character of the Hindu god Yama, who was also a child of the Sun, and thence named Yaivaswata. He bad too the same title with his brother Sr&ddhad^va. Another of his INDIA. 95 masculine gender also ; and when they view him in the light of Destroyer^ or rather Changer of forms, they give him a thousand names, of which Siva, Isa, or Iswara, Radra, Uara, Sambha, and Mah^^va, or III ah^sa, are the most comQU>n. The first operations of these three Powers are variously described in the different Parknas by a number of allegories, and from them we may deduce the Ionian Philosophy of primeval water, the doctrine of the Mundane £gg, and the veneration paid to the Nymphte, or Lotoe, which was anciently revered in Egypt, as it is at present in Hindustan, Tibet, and N^pai. The Tl- betians are>said to embellish their temples and altar» with it : and a native of N^pal made prostrations l>efore it on entering my study, where the fine plant and beautiful flowers lay for examination. Mi'. Holwell, in explaining his first plate, supposes Brahmk to be floating on a leaf of ie/eZ in the midst 4»f the abyss; but it was manifestly intended by a bad painter for a lotos leaf, or for that of the Indian fig-tree; nor is the species of pepper known in Ben- gal by the name of TkrnbiUa, and on the coast of Ma- labar by that of betel, held sacred, as he asserts, by the Hindus, or necessarily cultivated under the in- spection of Br&hmans; though, as the vines are ten- der, all the plantations of them are carefully secured, add ought to be cultivated by a particular tribe of Sddras, who are thence called Tkmbiilis. -That water was the primitive element, and first work of the Creative Power, is the uniform opinion of the Indian Philosophers; bat, as they give so particular an account of the general deluge, and of the creation, it can never be admitted that their whole system arose from traditions concerning the 96 oa TBB CODS or osbxce, flood only, and nmt appear iadabitablTy that their doctriae ib ia pait borrowed from tlie opcnia^ of Birimt or Gcoais, thaa wWch a saMiawr passage, from the lint word to the last, aevcr flowed, or will flow, from aoy homaa pen: ** In the kegimmtng God created the heaveos and the cartk — ^And the earth was Yoid aod waste, and darknfss was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved mpom the face of the -waters; aod God said. Let Light be — and Light wag" The sublimity of this passage Js con- riderably dimioished by the Indian paraphrase of it, with which Meno, the son of Bnhma, b^ns his ad- dress to the sages who coosnlted him on the form- ation of the universe. ^ This world (says he) was all darkness, nndiscemible, nndistiognishable, alto- gether as' in profouod sleep ; till the self-existent invisible God, making it manifest with five elements and other glorious forms, perfectly dispelled the gloom. He, desiring to raise op various creatures by an emanation from bis own glory, first created the waterst aod impressed them with a power of motion ; by ttiat power was produced a golden egg, blazing like a thousand suns, in which was born firahmk, self- existing, the great parent of all rational beings. The waters are called luzrd, since they are the ofi^pring of Nera or Iswara ; and thence was Narhyana named, because his first Ojfana^ or moving ^ was on (hem. *' That which is, the invisible cause, eternal, self- existingf but unperceived, becoming masculine /rom neuter^ is celebrated among all creatures by the name of Brahmh. That God, having dwelled in the Egg^ through revolving years, Himself meditating on him- self) divided it into two equal parts ; and from those ITALY, AND INDIA. 97 halves formed the heavens and the earth, placing in the midst the subtle ether, the eight points of the world, and the permanent receptacle of waters." ' To this curious description, with which the M&- nava S4stra begins, I cannot refrain from subjoining the four verses which are the text of the Bh^avat, and are believed to have been pronounced by the Supreme Being to Brahmd: the. following version is most scrupulously literaL *^ Even I was even at first, not any other thing; that which exists, unperceived; supreme: afterwards / am that which is; and he, who must remain, am I. •* Except the First Cause^ whatever may appear, and may not appear, in the mind, know that to be the mind^s Mdyd, or Delusion, as light, as darkness. " As the great elements are in various beings, en- tering, yet not entering (that is,. pervading, not de- stroying), thus am I in them, yet not in them. '* Even thus far may inquiry be made by him who seeks to know the principle of mind, in union and separation, which must be every vhere always*^ . Wild and obscure as these ancient verses must ap- pear in a naked verbal translation, it will perhaps be thought by many, that the poetry or mythology of Greece and Italy afford no conceptions more awfully magnificent : yet the brevity and simplicity of the Mosaic diction are nnequaled. As to the creation of the world, in the opinion of the .Romans, Ovid, who might naturally have been expected to describe it with learning and el^ance, leaves us wholly in the dark, which of the Gods was th» actor in it. Other mythologists are more ex- plicit; and we may rely on the authority of Cor* nutns, that the old European heathens constdtsred 98 ON THE G0U8 OF GREECE, Jove (not the son of Saturn, bnt of the Ether, that Is, of an unknown parent) as the great Life-giver, and Father of Gods and Men: to which may be added the Orphean doctrine, preserved by Proclus, that, ** the abyss and empyreurn, the earth and sea, the Gods and Goddesses, were produced by Zeus or Jupiter/' In this character he corresponds with Brahm4; and, perhaps, with that God of the Baby- lonians (if we can rely on the accounts of their an- cient religion) who, like Brahma, reduced the uni- verse to order, and like Brahmi, lost his head^ with the blood of w^ich new animals were instantly form- ed. I allude to the common story, the meaning of which I cannot discover, that Brahm4 had five beads^ till one of them was cat off by N&r&y&n. That, in another capacity, Jove was the Helper and Supporter of all, we may collect from his old 'Latin epithets, and from Cicero, who informs us, that his usual name is a contraction of Juvans Pater ; an etymology, which shows the idea entertained of bis character, though we may have some doubt of its accuracy. CallimachuS) we know, addresses him as the hestower of all good^ and of security from grief ; and, since neither wealth without virtue, nor virtue without wealth, give complete happiness, he prays, like a wise poet, for both. An Indian prayer for riches would be directed to Lacshmi, the wife of Vishnu, since the Hindu goddesses are believed to be the powers of their respective lords. As to Cuv^ra, the Indian Plutus, one of whose names is Paulastya, he is revered, indeed, as a mag- nificent Deity^ residing in the palace of Alaca,:or borne through the sky in a splendid car, named Push- paca, but is manifestly subordinate, like the other ITALY, AND INDIA. 99 seven Genii, to three principal Gods, or rather, to the principal God considered in three capacities. . As the soul of the world, or the pervading mindySo finely ^escribed by Virgil, we see Jove represented by se- veral Roman poets; and with great sablimity by LuCfin in the known speech of Cato concerning the Ammonian oracle: <' Jupiter is wherever we look, wherever we move." This is precisely the Indian idea of Vishnu, according to the four verses above exhibited: not that the Brahmans Imagine their male Divinity to be tlie divine Essence of the great one, which they declare to be wholly incomprehen- sible; but, since the power of preserving created things by a superintending providence, belongs emi- nently to the Godhead, they hold that power to exist transcendently in the preserving member of the Triad, whom they suppose to be every where always ; not in substance, but in spirit and energy: here,, however, I speak of the Vaishnavas; for the Saiva's ascribe a sort of preeminence to Siva, whose attri- butes are now to be concisely examined. It was in the capacity of Avenger and Destroyer, that Jove encountered and overthrpw the Titans and Giants, wbomTyphon, Briareus, Tityus,and the rest of their fraternity, led against the God of Olympus; to whom an Eagle brought lightning and thunder" bolts during the warfare. Thus in a similar contest between Siva and the Daityas, or children ofDiti, who frequently rebelled against heaven, Brahma is believed to have presented the God of Destruction with^erj/ shafts. One of the many poems, entitled Ram^yan, the last book of which has been translated into Italian, contains an extraordinary dialogue be- tween the crow Bhushunda, and a rational Eagle UrO ON THE GODS OF GREECE, ■amed Gaitida, wbo is ofken painted with the face of a beautiful youtb aod the body of ao ima^nary bird ; and one, of the eighteen Purinas bears his name, and comprises his whole history. M. Sqnne- rat informs usi that Vishnu is represented in some places riding on the Gar6da, which he supposes to be the Pondicheri eagle of Brisson, especially as the Brkhmans of the coast highly venerate that bird, and provide food for numbors of them at stated hours. I rather conceive the Garuda to be a fabulous bird, but agree with him, that the Hindu God who rides on it, resembles the ancient Jupiter, In the old temples at Gaya, Vishnu is either mounted on this, poetical bird, or attended by it together with a little page ; but, lest an etymologist should find Ganymed in Garud, I must observe that the Sanscrit word is pronounced Ganira ; though I admit tliat the Grecian and Indian stories of the celestial bird and the page appear to have some resemblance. As the Olympian Jupiter fixed his Court and held his Councils on a lofty and brilliant mountain, so the appropriated seat of Mahid^va, whom the Saiva's consider as the Chief of the Deities, was mount Cail&sa, every splinter of whose rocks was an inestimable gem. His terrestrial haunts are the snowy hills of Him&laya, or that branch of them to the East of the Brahmaputra, which has the name of Chandrasic*hara, or the Moun^ tain of the Moon, When, after all these circum- stances, we learn that Siva is believed to have three eyes, whence be is named also Tril6chan, and know from Pausanias, not only that Triopthalmos was an epithet of Zeus, but that a statue of hitn had been found so early as the taking of Troy, with a third eye in his forehead^ as we see him represented by ITALY, AND INDIA. 101 the Hindus, we mnst conclude that the identity of the two Gods falls little short of being demonstrated. In the character of Destroyer also, we may look upon this Indian Deity as corresponding with the Stygian Jove, or Pluto; especially since C41f, or Time in^ the feminine gender, is a name of his consort, who will appear hereafter to be Proserpine. Indeed, if we can rely on a Persian translation of the Bha- gavat(fotr the original is not yet in my possession), the sovereign of Patala, or the Infernal Regions^ is the King of Serpents^ named S^sban^a; for Chrishna is there said to have descended with his favourite Agun to the seat of that formidable divinity, from whom he instantly obtained the favour which he re- quested, that the souls of a Br&hman*8 six sons, who bad been slain in battle, might reanimate their re- spective bodies; and S^shankga is thus described. '* He had a gorgeous appearance, with a thousand heads, and on each of them a crown set with resplen- dent genis, one of which was larger and brighter than the rest; his eyes gleamed like flaming torches; but bis neck, his tongues, and his body, were black; the skirts of his habiliment were yellow, and a sparkling jewel bung in every one of bis ears ; his arms were extended, and adorned with rich bracelets; and his hands bore the holy shell, the radiated weapon, the mace for war, and the lotos." Thus Pluto was often , exhibited in painting and sculpture, with a diadem and sceptre ; but himself and his equipage were of the blackest shade. . There is yet another attribute of Mh&d^va, by which he is too visibly distinguished in the drawing$ and temples of Bengal. To destroy, according to 102 ON THE GODS OF GREECE, the V^d4nti*s of India, the Stigi's of Persia, aod many philosopben of our European schools, is only to generate and reproduce in another form. Hence the God of Destruction is holden in this country to preside over Generation; as a symbol of urhicb he rides on a white bull. Can we doubt that the loves and feats of Jupiter Genitor (not forg^etting the white bull of Europa) and his extraordinary title of Lapis, for which no satisfactory reason is commonly given, have a connexion with the Indian philosophy aod mythology ? As to the deity of Lampsacus, he was originally a mere scarecrow, and ought not to have a place in any mythological system; and, in regard to Bacchus, the god of Vintage (between whose acts and those of Jupiter we find, as Bacon observes, a wonderful affinity), bis Ithyphallick images, mea- sures, and ceremonies, alluded probably to the sup- posed relation of Love and Wine; unless we believe them to have belonged originally to Siva; one of whose names is Vigis or Biiigis, and to have been af- terwards improperly applied. Though, in an Essay on the Gods of India, where the BHihmins are po- sitively forbidden to taste fermented liquors, we can have little to do with Bacchus, as God of Wine, who was probably no more than the imaginary Pre- sident over the vintage in Italy, Greece, and the lower Asia, yet we must not omit Surkd^vf, the Goddess of Wine, who arose, say the Hindus, from the ocean, when it was churned with the mountain Mandar; and this fable seems to indicate, that the Indians came from a country in which wine was an- ciently made and considered as a blessing ; though the dangerous effects of intemperance induced their ITALY, AND INDIA. 10^ «ar1y legislators to prohibit the use of all spirituond liquors; and it were much to be vrished that so wise a law' had never been violated. Here may be introduced the Jupiter Marinas, of Neptune of the Romaqs, as resembling Mahad^va in his generative character; especially as the Hindu God is the husband of Bhav&ni, whose relation to the waters is evidently marked by her image being re- stored to them at the conclusion of her great festival called Durg6tsav^ She is known also to have at tbe uniwiw) (be EartA a tbe oatiual parent of all incrrasct acid b; jtir all things brcatbing tre animatrd. May tsa,tbep«Krprop>lia«s)]rappairnt in IheK eight fonm, bl«s and HEtain yon." Tbe jtne elnKBU, thrrefbre, ai well as tbe Son and Moon, are coniderrd aa In, or (be Rmlcr, fran whicb word l>i may be regnlady fanned; tbongfa Itkni be the nsoal nme of his aetivr Paieer, adored ■I tbe Godden of Nalare. I baie Dot yrt faand in Gancrit, the wild ihoi^ poetical tale of lo; bnl am pemi^ed, that by means of the Paiauaii, we dull in tioie disconr all tbe Iroruin); of tbe Egyp- tiana, witboal decypbefing their bierogljpUcj. lie ball of Iswaia trnas lobeApBorAp, asbcii more corrretly named in tbe doe readtD]> of a piiaagi. in Jerrni^ ; asd, if the Trooatiaa sbonn both ■■ Ti- bet and IndialosoamiaMeanl airfal ■ qaadreped a> the Cow, tnpAher with the rrgcmrratitn of the haata himself, have not nme aSaiiy with the re- ligioa of Egypt and Ae idotatry of loael, we maM ■ re waoderMI; ») and ■■ Una M|9«e Ihe wife of UahUiva lo be a • ITALY, AND INDIA. tOf well the Juno Cinxia or Lncina of the Romans (called also by them Diana Solvizooa, and by the Greeks, lUithyia) as Venus herself: not the Italian Queen of Laughter and JTMlity, who, with her Nynophs and Giaces, was the beautiful child of poetical imaginationa and answers to the Indian Rembbh, with her celestial train of Apsara's or dam- sels of paradise : but Venus Urania, so luxuriantly painted by Lucretius, and so properly invoked by him at the opeaing of a poem on nature; Venus, presiding over generation', and on that account ex- hibited sometimes of both sexes (an union very com- mon IB the Indian sculptures), as in her bearded statue at Rome, in the images perhaps called Her- mathena, and in those figures of her which had the form of a conical marble ; "' for the reason of which figure we are left (says Tacitus) in the dark." The reason appears too clearly in the temples and paint- ings of Hindustan, where it never seems to have en- tered the heads of the legislators or people, that any thing natural could be offensively obscene; a singu- larity which pervades all their writings and conver* sation, but is no proof of depravity in their morals. Both Plato and Cicero speak of Eros or the J^eavenly Capid, as the son of Venus and Jupiter - which proves, that the Monarch of Olympus and the Goddess of Fecundity were connected, as Mah4d6va and Bhavkni. The God Cama, indeed, had Ukvk and Casyapa, or Uranus, for his parents, at least cording to themythologistsof Cashmir; but in ^^' respecte he seems the twin-brother of Cunid ""^* richer arid more lively appendages. One of hi *^^^ epithets Is Dipaca, the Jn/iamer, which ig err ^^^^ written Dipuc ; and I am now convipc^ j|!^>' 108 ON THE GODS OF GhEBCE, sort of resemblance which has been observed between his Latin and Sanscrit names, is accidental: in eacti name the three first letters are the root, and between them there is no affinity. Whether any mythological connexion subi^isted between the amaraaiSj with the fraji^nt leaVes of which Hymen bound his temples^ and the tulasi of India, most be left undetermined t the botanical relation of the two plants (if amararns be properly translated tnajorum) is extremely near. One of the most remarkable ceremonies in the fes- tival of the Indian Goddess is that before-mentioned » of castinr her' image into the river. The Pandits, of whom 1 inquired concerning its origin and import, answered, *'tbat it was prescribed by the V^a, they knew not why;*' but this custom has, I con- ceive, a relation to the doctrine, that nutter is a. form of Iswara, and consequently of Isani, who is even represented by some as the patroness of that element, to which her figare is restored, after having received all due honours on earthy which is considered as another form of the God of Nature, though subse- qaent in the order of Creation to the primeval 'fluid. There seems nodecisiveproof of one original system among idolatrous nations, in the worship of river- gods and river-goddesses, nor in the homage paid to their streams, and the ideas of purification annexed to them; since Greeks, Italians, Egyptians, and Hin- dus, might (without any communication with each other") have adored the several Divinities of their great rivers, from wliich they derived pleasure, health, and abundance. The notion of Doctor Mus- grave, that large rivers were supposed, from their strength and rapidity, to be conducted by« Gods, while rivulets only were protected by female Pei- ITALY, AND INDIA. 109 lies, is, like most other ootions of grammariuis on the genders of noans, overthrown by facts. Most of the great Indian rivers are feminine; and the three goddesses of the waters, whom the Hindus chiefly ve« nerate, are Gangk, who sprang, like armed Pallas, from the head of the Indian Jove; Yamunk, daugh- ter of thb Sun ; and Sereswati. All three met at Prayiga, thence called Triy^nt, or the three plated locks; but Sereswatf, according to the popular be- lief, sinks under ground, and rises at another Triv^ni near Hdgti, where she rejoins her beloved Gangk. The Brahmaputra is indeed a male river; and, as his name signifles, the Son of Brahma, I thence took occasion to feign that he was married to Gangky though I have not yet seen any mention of him, as a God, in the Sanscrit books. Two incarnate deities of the first rank, Rlima and Grishna, must now be introduced, and their several attributes distinctly explained. The iirstof them, I believe, was the Dionysos of the Greeks, whom they named Bromins, without knowing why; and Bu- genes when they represented him horned; as well at Lyaios and Eleutherios, the Deliverer; and Triam* bos, or Dithyrmnbos, the Triumphant. Most of those titles were adopted by the Romam, by whom he was called Bruma,TaoriformM, Liber, Triomphtu | and both nations had records or traditionary ac* counts of his giving Imw* to men, and deciding their eontetts, of bis improving navigation and commerce, and, what may appear yet more observable, of hi* conquering India and other countries with un army of Satyrs, commanded by no Iras a pf rsonim<» than Pan; whom Lilius GiralduM, on what authorltv t \nom not, asserts to have resMfd In lberi«i ^ wrm'll fee h^ RWncd (aji the IcaiKd Bjlkslae^) Emh tk I^iu (nr.iH whick be wtaapa^rd BKcfen.' ItwfrenptrlmwMatftCTajtar^ jjy toigtfc u Ik panlld betscca Ika Ewopcu Gnd, a^ the •OTOT^D Ajrodhjra, whoB the Uuds believe lo h»e beca u> apfBuantt mi e^4 of the Pnttrwimg Hcf IbrUghetf rc- ■owB, aad tbe deiive ■ell Mtoftito ting of LdBca ; umI to kiic whkk oar Bataalias, or M uBStrd IndiOD Saljn. Hb geami, the Piiaee af Sujn, wai aaBrd llf—m. fir aalk higk dUtk tfri; >nl, Bith workan of tach a^tj, he ■ooa taiird a bfid^ sf lorks eiei Ibe na, part of which, B}ikeIli>dB,}vt nmaiai; aad il ii probabl; the Kfio of rocki, lo nUch ibr llorrlMaw or the Psr- ioed, hul atWitri } However that naj be, the b^c bnvd sf iBdiu Apa « >t ihii ■— ft beU ia ' iBb7theIIiBdB,a^fcdwitbdeTatMa •B Ihr haokiof Ihefiaofis.tabaicarrgBhreBfaii- Bal fw ihe lappon of them. IV; liR ia triha of three or faar hndn< an ■•■derfkll} pmlr (I ^eak ai aa ryrmitarml, aad appfar to ban: him hiad of aider aad Mbmliaatiaa ia their little tiliu pMlj. We BBt m» ow^ ibi the biher of Haaa- BM wai the God of H'lae, aawed Pana, aae of i^eiSbtGau;!^ ai Pia Miaand the pipe b} ITALY, AND INDIA. ill adding 'six reeds, and ** played exqoisitelj on the; cithern a few moments after bis birth,** so one of the four systems of Indian music bears the name of Hanumat, or Hanum4n in the nominative, as its in- ventor, and is now in general estimation. The war of Lanc& is dramatically represented at the festival of R&ma on the ninth day of the new moon of Chaitra; and the drama concludes (says Holwel, who had often seen it) with an exhibition of the fire-ordeal, by which the victor's wife SIti gave proof of her connubial fidelity. ** The dialogue (he adds) is taken from one of the eighteen holy books,** meaning, T suppose, the Pur&nas; but the Hindus have a great number of r^nlar dramas, at least two thousand years old, and among them are 'several very fine ones on the story of R&ma. The first poet of the Hindus was the great V&lmic, and bis R&m&yan is an Epic Poem on the same subject, which, in unity of action, magnificence of imagery, and el^ance of style, far surpasses the learned and elaborate work of Nonnus, entitled Dionyslaca, half of which, or twenty-four book?, I perused with great eagerness when I was very young, and should have traveled to the conclusion of it, if other pursuits bad not engaged me. 1 shall never have leisure to compare the Dionysiacs with the R&m&yan, but am confident, that an accurate comparison of the two poems would prove Dionysos and R&ma to have been the same person ; and I incline to think that he was R&ma the son of Ctisb, who might have esta- blished the first regular government in this part of Asia. I had almost forgotten, that Meros is said by the Greeks to have been a mountain of India, on which their Dionysos was born; and that M^ru, 112 ON THE GODS OF CaKECe, though it generally means the north pole in the In- dian geography, is also a mountain near the city of Naishada or Nysa, called by the Grecian geographers Dionysopolis, and universally celebrated in the San* scrit poems; though the birthplace of R^ma is sup- posed to have been Ay6dhy& or Audh. That ancient city extended, if we believe the Brdhmans, over a line of ten Yojans, or about forty miles; and the present city of Lac^hnau, pronounced Lucnow, was only a lodge for one of its gates, called Lacshman- ad wara, or the gate of Lacshman, a brother of R^ma, M . SoDoerat supposes Ay6dhy& to have been Siam } a most erroneous and unfounded supposition, which would have been of little consequence, if be had not grounded an argument on it, that Rdma was the same pprson with Buddha, who must have appeared many centuries after the conquest of Lancd. The second great divinity, Crisbna, passed a life, according to the Indians, of a most extraordinary and Incomprehensible nature. He was the son of D^vaci by Vasfideva ; but his birth was concealed through fear of the tyrant Causa, to whom it had been predicted, that a child born at that time in that family would destroy him : he was fostered, there- fore in Mat'hur^ by an honest herdsman surnamed Ananda, or Happy ^ and his amiable wife Yas6d4, who, like another Pales, was constantly occupied in her pastures and her dairy. In their family were a multitude of young G6pa's or cowherds, and beauti- ful G6pi*s or milkmaids, who were his playfellows during his infancy; and in bis early youth he select^ ed nine damsels as his favourites, with whom he passed his gay hours in dancing, sporting, aud play- ing on bis flute. For the remarkable number of his ITALY, AMD INDIA. 115 G6pi'8 I have no authority but a wbidisical pictort, where nine girls are grouped in the form of ao ele- - pbant, on which he sits and pipes; and unfortunately , the word nava signifies both nine and neao, or young; so that in the following stanza, it may admit of two interpretations : taranijipaltnd navaballavi perUadi saha c^licat6halit drataviUmwitacbiravibirinam herimaliam hri day^na sadd vab6. *' I bear in my bosom continually that God, who for sportive recreation with a train of nine (young) dairymaids, dances gracefully, now quick, now slow, on the sands just left by the Daughter of the Sun/' Both be and the three Ramas are described ta youths of perfect beauty ; but the princesses of Hin- dustan, as well as the damsels of Nanda's farm, were passionatel)* in love with Crishna, who con- tinues to this hour the darling God of the Indian women. The sect of Hindus who adore him with enthusiastic and almost exclusive devotion, have broached a doctrine which they maintain with eagerness, and which seems general in these pro-' vinces; that he was distinct from all the Avatars, who had only an ansa or portion of his divinity; while Crishna was the person of Vishnu himself in a human form ; lience they consider the third Rama, his elder brother, as the eighth Avatar invested with an emanation of his divine radiance; and, in the principal Sanscrit dictionary, compiled about two thousand years ago, Crishua, Vasad^va, G6vinda, and other names of the Shepherd God, are intermixed with epithets of Narayan or the Divine Spirit, Ail lU OHTBBOOD Ibe Avatars an pwolnl wi(h giemmri Ethiopian or Purthiaa comaetti; nilhrajs CDcircliif thritlwsils: jeweh ID their tanj.twonnklaee*, one slraighr.aod one pMident OD tbrir boMin, with droppini; grms i gaiUnilsof welldiiposfilinany-coloarcd Bowets, tw coBlan of pearls, bmnpog daws brlow tbor waists ; loose maaila of golden timu «- djcd silk.embroi- der»l on Ibrir hnns with Bowers, rfPBanily thrown over one shoulder, ud folded like ribuids Bcim the breast; with braeeled too on oae am, ajid on each wrist : thej me naked to the waisH, and nnifotal; with dmrk laure fiesb, is allasioo pnibablj to the tint of that primordial Bnid, on whidi Nartjan nmied in the besiDDing oftuae; bnl their skirts are bright yellow, the colour of IhecnrioBs perkarpiom in the cjElre of the waler-lily, whrie ffittrt, as Dr. Hurray obsenes, in lomcdrgrcc dadaui krr letrtti, eaih seed coolainii^, before it getminalcs, a few perfect lea*a: they are HKnelimes diawD with thai flowerin one hand; a radiated dliptieal ri^, *sed as a misNle weapon, in a second ^ (he sacred sbril, or leflJiaDded bocciDsm, in a third ; and a laace, or battle-axe, in a fourth. Boi Crishna, when he ap. peais, as he HHaetimes does appeal, among the Aia- An, b more splendidly decorated than any. and wear^ a rich ^rioud of silnui Bowen, whence be a named Vanunali, as low as his ankles, which are ■domed witkstrinesofprwis. Dark bloe q>praarh- iog to iradt, which b the neanini; of the won) Crnhna, is believed lo have been his corapleiion j and hence the large bre of dial coloar is consecrated la him, and ts oflea drawn aauering oierhbhead. TlHt anre tint, wbidi approacbes lo blackness, is pecoliar, a> we haie already renarked, lo Vbhan ; ITALY, AND INDIA. 115 and hence in the great reservoir or cistern at Cat- m^ndu, tlie capital of N6pal, there is placed in a re- ciimbent posture, a large well proportioned image of blue marble, representing N^tayan floating on the waters. But let us return to the actions of Grishna, Tvho was not less heroic than lovely, and, when a boy, slew the terrible serpent C4liya, with a n»mbep of giants and monsters. At a more advanced age he put to death his cruel enemy Cansa; and having taken under his protection the king Yudhisbt*hir, and the other Pandiis, who had been grievously op- pressed by the Cuiiis and their tyrannical chief, he kindled the war described in the great Epic Poem, entitled the Mah4bhirat, at the prosperous conclusion of which he returned to his heavenly seat in Vai- cont*ha, having left the instructions comprised in the dta with his disconsolate friend Arjun, whose grand- son became sovereign of India. In this picture it is impossible not to discover, at th^ first glance, the features of Apollo, surnamed Nomios or the Pastoral, in Greece, and Opifer in Italy J who fed the herds of Admetus, an^slew the serpent Python; a God amorous, beautiful, and warlike. The word G6vinda may be literally trans- lated' Nomios, as C^sava is Crinitus, or with fine hairi but whether G6p4la or the herdsmany has any relation to Apollo, let our etymologists determine. Colonel Vallencey, whose learned inquiries into the ancient literature of Ireland are highly interest- ing, assures me that Crishna in Irish means the Sun ; and we find Apollo and Sol considered by the Ro- man poets as the same deity. I am inclined, indeed^ to believe, that not only Crishnu or Vishnu, but even Brahmd and Siva, when united, and expressed 1 16 OH TBI eOlH or OBIBGB, b)r tbe mntical word ffM, were dnigned by the GiBt idiriRlcn lo rcprcwDl the Solar Fire ; bat PluEbos, or (he art eflke Sua p TWiiificd, ii adorrd by tbe Indian mi the God Stirya, whence the mkC who pay faim particular adoratioa are called Santas. Tbcir poeM and paintm dacribe bi( car a> drawn by leven frtea bones, prrceded by Amn, or tbe Daun, who acta as hie charialeer, and fallowed by Ibov- «aruli of Geaii, nonhiping him and modnlaliog his piaiiei. He has a mullitadc of nanet, and among them twelve epithets or lillei, which denote his dis- tinct poiBiri ID each of Ihe tweUe moath; j those poKuri are called Adit>a>, or sons of Adili by C«- (yapa, the ladtan UianiBt and one of tbem bat, arcording to some aolboritin, the name of Viriina, Slirya it belie*ed to bate descended frequently from bin car in a human shape, and to have left a race on earth, who are equally renowned in tbe In- dian sinrin with (he Heliadaj of Greece. It is very singular that his two sons, called Aiwibau or Af- wiBtcumaran, in tbe dual, should be considered as twin-brolbeii, and panted like Castor and Pollui; but (hey hare each the character of fsculapim oatong (be Gods, and are belieied lo have been born of a nymph, who, \a the form of a mare, was Im- pre^oatrd with sunbcama. I soqwct the i^ole fable of Casyapa and his progeny lo be astTonotnical ; and cannot but imagine (hat tlw Greek name Caniopeis i>-i^ .1 relation to it. ADo[b«r i^eat Indian bmlly are called the Chit- dr-n af Ikt Mam, or C^aimt who is a male Deity, uid consequently not to be compared with Artemii or Dionaj imr b«Te I yet found a puaUel in India ITALY, AND INDIA. Il7 f(ir the Goddess of the Chase, who seems to have been the daughter of an European fancy, and very natu- rally created by the invention of Bucolic and Geor- gic poets ; yet, since the Moon is a form of Iswara, the God of Nature, according to the verse of G&li- d^, and since T^4ni has been shown io be his cott' sort or power^ we may consider her in one of her characters, as Luna ; especially as we shall soon be convinced, that in the shades below she corresponds with (he Hecate of Europe. The worship of Solar or Vestal Fire may be as- cribed, like that of. Osiris and Isif;, to the second source of mythology, or an enthusiastic admiration of nature^s wonderful powers; and it seems, as far as I can yet understand the V^das, to be the princi- pal worship recommended in them. We have seen, that Mah&d^va himself is personated by Fire ; bnt subordinate to him is the God Agni, often called Pk- vaca,or the Ptiri/fcr, who answers to the Vulcan of Egypt, where he was* a Deity of high rank $ and bis wife Sw4h& rf sembles the younger Vesta, or Vestta, as the Eolians pronounced the Greek word for a hearth, Bhavani or Venus is the consort of the Su- preme Destructive and Generative Power; but the Greeks and Romans, whose system is less regular than that of the Indians, married her to their divine artist, whom they also named Hepbaistos and Vul- can, and who seems to be the Indian Viswacarman, the forger of arms for the Gods, and inventor of the itgnyastra, or fiery shaft, in the war between them and the Daityas or Titans. It is not easy here to refrain from observing (and If the observation give offence in England, it is contrary to my intention)' that the newly discovered planet shonid unquestion- 118 OB THE GOIH OF SBEBCE, abl)' be BUMd Volaui ; liace tbe coafanoB of ana- logy in the naoKi af Ibe plaaeta ii ilwlrE^Dl, DD- •cbolaiijr, aad wiphilaKiphkaL The naoe Uiams is appropriated to the iraiaMieoti bul Vulcan, tbe ■lowest of tb^ Gods, and accordiog to the E^ptian priots, the aldett of Ibem, agrrv^ admirjbl; with an orb Bbicb miBt pcrfbrm its rrTolntion in a vr^ry long period I and bjgWing il thu deDomiaalkHi, (re shall have Kvea pripisrj ptanrtt, with the naates of ai maoy Roman Deities, Mercarj, VeDUsTdlos, Man, Japiter, Satnm, VulcaiL It baa already beea intimatfd, that the Movei aikd Nympbs are the G6pya of Math'uia, and of G6?eid- ban, the Pamasm of Ibe Hindnsi and the lyric poenu of Jajad^va will fully Justify thu opinion; but tbe Kympht of Hohc are (be l/iirty KaKiafa or Fcmtlt Patiimu, nbotr larions fuDCtiom aod pnh pettia are » ricMy delineated by tbe Indian paial- en, and so liiiely deuribed by the poets: but I will not anticipate what will require a separate Enay, by enlarging here on the beautiful allegories of tbe Hiadiu in tbeir fyilem of musical modes, which they call Rigii, or Paiwioai, and suppose to be Genii or Demigods. A very disiinguished son of Bnbma, named Nared, whose actions are Ibe subject of a Purina, bean a itrong resemblance to Ilmnes or Mercnry; be was a wise legislator, great Inarls and in anna, an eloquent messeuger of ibe Gods, either lo ooi^ another, or to favoured mortals, and a nmi- cion of exquisite skill, Hii invention of the Vina, i>r Indi.-in Inte, Is thus described in the poem ca> lilli'i Migba: " Nired sat watching from time to limi' his large Vina, wbich, by the impulse of tbe brecif, yielded note* that pierced successively tbe ITALY, AND INDIA. 119 regions of bis ear, and proceeded by musical inter- vals." The law tract supposed to have been repeal- ed by Nared, is at this bour cited by the Pandits ; and we cannot, therefore, believe him to haye been the patron of Thieves; though an innocent theft of Crishna's cattle, by way of putting his divinity to a proof, be strangely imputed in the Bhigavat, to his father Brahma. The last of the Greek or Italian Divinites, for whom we find a parallel in the Pantheon of India, b the Stygian or Tauric Diana, otherwise named Hecate, and often confounded with Proserpine; and there can be no doubt of her identity- with Calf, or the wife of Siva, in his character of the Stygian Jove. To this black goddess, with a collar of gol-^ den skulls, as we see her exhibited in all her princi- pal temples, human sacnficee were anciently offered, as the y^das enjoined; but in the present age they are absolutely prohibited, as are also the sacrifices of bulls and horses. Kids are still offered to her; and to palliate the cruelty of the slaughter, which gave such offence to Buddha, the Brahmans inculcate a belief, that the poor victims rise in the heaven of Indra, where they become the musicians of his band. Instead of the obsolete, and now illegal sacrifices of a man, a bull, and a horse, called Neram^ha, G6m4dha, and Aswam^dha, the powers of nature are thought to be propitiated by the less bloody ce- remonies at the end of autumn, when the festivals of Call and Lacshmi are solemnized nearly at the same time. Now, if it be asked, how the Goddess of Death came to be united with the mild Patroness of Abttodance, i most propose another question. How I'^O X)N THE GODS OF GREECE, came Proserpioe to be represented in the Enropean system as the daughter of Ceres? Perhaps both questions may be answered by the.propositioo of na- tural philosophers, that '* the apparent destruction of a substance is the production of it in a different form." The wild music of G4li's priests at one of her festivals, brought instantly to my recollection the Scythian measures of Diana*s ibdorers in the splendid opera of Iphigenia in Tauris, which Gluck exhibited at Paris, with leps genius, indeed, than art, but with every advantage that an orchestra could supply. That we may not dismiss this assemblage of Eu-^ ropean and Asiatic Divinities with a subject so hor- rid as the altars of Hecate and C4U, let us conclude witb two remarks, which properly indeed belong to the Indian Philosophy, with which we are not at pre- sent concerned. First, Elysium (not the place, but the bliss enjoyed there, in which sense Milton usep the word) cannot but appear, as described by the poets, a very trdious and insipid kind of -enjoyment : It is however more exalted than the temporary Ely- sium in the court of Tndra, where the pleasures, as in Muhammed's paradise, are wholly sensual; but the Mucti, or Elysian happiness of the V^danta school is far more sublime ; for they represent it as a total absorption, though not such as to destroy consciousness in the Divine Essence : but, for the reason before suggested, I say no more of this idea of beatitude, and forbear touching on the doctrine of transmigration, and the similarity of the Y^anta to the Sicilian, Itiilic, and old Academic Schools. Secondly, in the mystical and elevated character of Pan, as a personificatioB of the C/nioerM, ac- . ITALY, AND INDIA. 191 cording to' the notion of Lord BarOn, there arises a sort of similitude between him and Crisbna, consider- ed as Nariyan. The Grecian God plays ^divinely on his reed, to express, we are told, etherial harmony. He h£is his attendant Nymphs of the pastures and the dairy. His face is as radiant as the sky, and his bead iHumined with the horns of a crescent; whilst his lower extremities are deformed and sha^^gy, as a symbol of the vegetables which the earth pro- daces, and of the beasts who roam over the face of it. Now we may compare this portrait partly with the general character of Crishna, the Shepherd God, and partly with the description in the Bfaagavat of the Divine Spirit exhibited in tht form of thit Univer' gal World; to which we may add the foHowing story from the same extraordinary poem. The Nymphs had complained' to Yasdda, that the child Crishna had 'been drinking their curds and milk. On being reproved by his foster-mother for this in- dfecretion, he requested her to examine his mouth ; in which, 'to her just amazement, she beheld the whole unwerte in all Its plenitude of magnificence. We must not be surprised at finding, on a close examtaatioo, that the characters of all the Pagan* Deities, male and female, melt into each other, and at last into one or two ; for k seems a well founded opinion, that the whole crowd of gods and goddesses in ancient Rome, and modern V4rines, mean only tbe powers of nature, and principally those of the Sun, expressed in a variety of ways, and by a mul- titnde'of faficifol names. Thus have I attempted to trace, imperfectly at present for want of ampler materials, but with a Itft ON TMB OOD9 OF GRBBCB, confidence centinoally increasing as I advanced, a parallel between the Gods adored in three very dif« ferent nations, Greece, Italy, and India; but virhich was the original system, and which the copy, I will not presume to decide) nor are we likely, I. pre- sume, to be soon fumishrd with suflkieat gronnds for a decision. The fundamental rale, that natmrai and most human operaHoHB proceed from the aimtpie to the compound^ will afford no amistance on thia point; since neither the Asiatic nor European syi- tem has any simplicity in it ; and both are so com- plex, not to say absard, however intermixed with the beautiful and the sublime, that the honour, sock as it is, of the inveiition, cannot be allotted to either with tolerable certainty. Since Egypt appears to have been the gi^nd source of knowledge for the western, and India for the more eastern parts of the globe, it may seem a material question, whether the Egyptians coaunnni- cated their Mythology and Philosophy to the Hindus^ or conversely; hot what the learned of Memphis wrote or said concerning India, no mortal knows $ and what the learned #f Y^r&nes have asserted, if any thing, concerning Egypt, can give us little sa- tisfaction* Such circumstaBtiaJ evidence on this question as I have been able to collect, shall ncfer- theless be stated ; bccaase, unsatisfactory as it is, there may be something in it not wholly unwoitl^ of notice; though, after all, whatever oolonics may- have come from the Nile to the Ganges, we shall, perhaps, agree at last with Mr. Bryant, that Egyp* tians, Indians, Greeks, and Iteiiaos, proceeded ori- ginally from one oeatral place, and that the same ITALYy AMD INDIA. ISd people earried their religion and sciences hito Cbias and Japan : may we ne^ add^ even to Mexico and Peru? Every one knows that the true name of EgjpC is Mbr, spelkd with a palatialsibilant both in Hebrew and Arabic. It seems in Hebrew to liave been the proper name of the first settler in it ; and when the Arabs use the word for a great dt^^ they probably mean a city like the capital ef Egypt. Father Marco^ a Roman missionaTy, who, though not a scholar of the first rate> is incapable, I am persuaded, of a de* liberate falsehood y lent me the last bo€»k of a Riunk^^ yan, which he had translated through the Hindi into bis native language, and with it a short vocabulary of mythological and historical names, which had been explained to him by the Pandits of BetSya, where he had long resided. One of the articles in bis little dictionary was, ^ Tirtity a town or province in whicb the priests from Egypt settled ;'* and when I asked him what name Egypt bore among the Hindus^ he said M'lstf but observed, that they sometimes con- founded it with Abyssinia. I perceived that bis mfr> mory of what be had written was correct, for Misr was another word io his index, ^ from which couDtry {he said) came the Egyptian priests who settled In Tir6t." I suspected immediately that hhi intelll* gence flowed from the Muselmans, who call sugatw candy MiBii, or Egyptian; but when I examined him closely, and earnestly desired him to recollect from whom be had received bis informatioa, he re- peatedly and positively declaiedy that ** it bad been given him by several Hindus, and partieul«>ty by a Brahman his intimate friend, who was reputed a consideraUe Pandit, and had lived three years near IH OH THB fiODt OF ORSECB, U> boule." Wc then caDCri*ed tbat the sMI of hb EfjrpliaD colony most baie tw« Tirtfait. comnuHily prononnced Tirtit, and aadeotl; called Mitliili, the priDdpal town of Jumcaden.er North BaUri but Mab^is PsDdil, who mat bom in that vrr; datiict, and who snbmillcd palitmtl; la a, \ao^ exaaiinatmii Coaeerning War, oterwtall onr caaclieiDnai be de- ,med that the Bribman at bit coanfry were gcnr-- rallj nrnaoied Hur, ai we had been informed i ■Dd iaid that tbe addition of Mina to the name of Vichrspeti.aod other learDedaathon,wBsa title for- Bcriy coaferred on the writen of mliallanUt, or CMiyiliri of Tariont tiacti on rrligioo or science, the word being derived from a root lif^fying la mix, Beiifwked wbere the conntiy ofHhr was } « Tben; ■re two (he answered) of (hat Dame; one of thoa in IjIc nriiunder thedominion of MmrlBi&ai: and ■ootber, which all the Siui™ and Poiinaa mention, ■a ■ ■HHintaiiiooi region to tbe Donb of AjAdbri." It a erident that by the fint be mraol Egypt ; hat what he meant by the (econd it ii not easy to ascer- laio. Acoaatry called Tirahnt, by our ge<^rBph(TS, ajqiean in the ampf betwcn the BHth-eastem Eraotkn of Andb and the moontaiiB of N(]ibI t bat whether that WM the Tinit mentioBed to father Marco by hii Mend of Betiya I caanot decide. This only I know with certain^, that Hiua is an epi- thet of two Bfihamw in the drana of SarantalS. ■rUch wBi written oear a ceatary bebre tbe birth •f ChriM; that wme of llw greateat Uwyen, and two of the finett dramatic poeta of India bBTC tbe sane title; that we htar it freqaeiKly In conl added UlhenametofUindnpjtint awl that noae of the ITALY, AND INDIA. iQy- know the Irne meaning of the word, as a proper name,, or to give an^r other explanation of it, than that it is a surname of Brkhmans in the west, ' On the acconnt given to Colonel Kyd hy the old Brfijaof Grishnanagar, ** concerning traditions among the Hindus, that some Egyptians had settled in this country,'* I cannot rely ; because I am credibly in^ formed by some of the Rkja's own family, that he was not a man of solid learning, though he possessed curious books, and had been attentive to the conver- sation of learned men ; besides, I know that his son and most of his kinsmen have been dabblers in Per- sian literature, and believe them very likely, by con- founding one source of information with another, to puzzle themselves, and mislead those with whom they converse. The word Misr, spelled also in Sanscrit with a palatial sibilant, is very remarkable; and,^ far as etymology can help us, we may safely derive Nilus from the Sanscrit word ni{ay or blue: since Dionysius expressly calls the waters of that river *' an azure stream;^* and,^ if we can depend on Marco*s Italian version of the Ram^yan, the name of Nfla is given to a lofty and sacred mountaia with a summit of pure gold, from which flowed a ri^er of clearj sweety and fresh water.. M. Sonnerat refers to a dissertation by Mr. Schmit, which gained a prize at the Academy of Inscriptions, <' On an Egyptian Colony established In India.** It would be worth while to examine his authorities, and either to overturn or verify them by such higher authorities as are now accessible in these provinces. I strongly incline to think him right, and to believe that Egyptian priests have actually. CfUP^from the Nile to theGanga and Yaa)ui^»^^^^^ B of ladn, B Gnttt nrilcd Ihm, ntkrr to acqnn thai la iB> pwt kHHledgr: nor b it likrty ihat Ik irir-aiC- IdcM BiSh— wadd hw recond (kot ■■ Acir Be >ll tUi H k way, I aa prrmdrd ttet a «•- ■niH HbtMrd httwcra the aid idalMnMi aatiaw •TE^pt, India, Greece, B^ Italy, laagbrfin they fand; before tkrkrrth of Hosec bat the praaT of tkm propOHtiea will in no de^iee aflnt (ke traA aad — ctitjaf IfceMwit hiatnry, wbicfc,if carfi—tinw Ac Divine L^ate, edacaled by the da^btrr af a tiaf, aad ia all letyecti h^y atc a »pliihed, codd Mt bat kaow the my&alogkd lyUeA af Egjpt | batbea»i~ ma wai better BcqaaMed with 1 af Athen thu Soerates? Whs aorr acnmlcly TOied in the Rabbrnica) doclrinn thu Pam) } Wbo f^r m ri etearer ideas of all aacienl ailnBOBkal i jit c — ihno liewtan, or of •rholailKa] Brtaphjiiu (kaa Lackej In wlmn conld the BiMtn Cbarck bne had ■ narc fomidnble oppoaeal than in ChO- liafcWinth, whne derf haoide^ af in teoeli im- dercd hnaMcaMpelrat todiqntelheB? la a word, wh» Hare exacti j kaew the aboauadle rite* a^ ITALY, AND INDIA. 19,7 shocking idolatry of Canaan tlian Moses bimself ? Yet the iearniog of -tiiose great men only incited them to seek other sources of truth, piety, and virtue, than those in which they had Jong been immersed. There is no shadow then of a foundation for an opi- nion, that Moses borrowed the first nine or ten chap- ters of Genesis from the literature of Egypt ; stili less can the adamantine pillan of our Christian faith be moved by the result of any debates on the compara- tive antiquity of the Hindus and Egyptians, or of .any inquiries into the Indian Theology. . Very respectable natives have assured me, that one or two misBionaries have been absurd enough, in their zeal for the conversion of the Gentiles, to nrge, *^ tiiat the Hindus were even now almost Christians, because their Brahmi, Vishnu, and Mah^sa, were no other than the Christian Trinity;" a sentence in which we can only doubt whether folly, ignorance, or impiety predominates. The three powers, crea- tivBy preservative^ and destrueiivBy which the Hindns express by the triliteral word O'm, were grossly as* cribed by the first idolaters to the heat, light, and flame, of their mistalien divinity the Sun; and their wiser successors in the East, who perceived that the fiiin was only a created thing, applied those powers to its creator; bvt the Indian Triad, and that of Plato, which he calls the Supreme Good, the Reason, and the Soul, are infinitely removed from the holi'- oess and snblimity of the doctrine which pious Christians have deduced from texts in the Gospel ; though other Chrutians, as pious, openly profess their dissent from them. Each sect must be justified by 4ts own faith and good intentions. This only I mean to iDculcate, that the tenet of our Church cannot) 1S9 ON THE aODS OF eRCECB, fvithont profftneness, be compared with that of the Hindus, which Ims only an apparent resemblance to it, but a very diffiment meaning. One singular fact, howeyer, must not be snffered to pass unnoticed. That the name of Crishna, and the general outline of his story, were long anterior to the birth of our Saviour, and probably to the time of Homer, we know very certainly ; yet the celebrated poem entitled Bhagavat, which contains a proUz, account of his life, is filled with narratives of a most ejitraordinary kind, but strangely varie^ gated and intermixed with poetical decorations.. The incarnate Deity of the Sanscrit romance was cradled, as it informs us, sunong herdsmen; boC it adds, that he was educated among- them^nct passed his youth in playing with a party of milkmaids. A tyrant at the time of his birth ordered all new born males to be slain ; yet this wonderful babe was preserved by biting the breast, instead of sucking the poisoned nipple, of a nurse commissioned to kiH him. He performed amazing but ridiculous mira- cles in his Infancy ; and, at the age of seven years, held up a mountain on the tip of his little' finger.^ He saved nndtitodes, partly by his arms, and partly by his miraculous powers. He raised the dead, by descending for that purpose to the lowest regions* He was the meekest and best tempered of beings, washed'tbe feet of the Brdhmans,. and preached very nobly indeed, and sublimely, but always in their fa^ vour. He Was pure and chaste in reality, but exhi- bited an appearance of excessive, libertinism, and had wives or mistresses too numerous to be counted^ Lastly, he was benevolent and tender, yet fomented and conducted a. terrible war. This motley story ITALY) &HD INDIA. 1S9 most iadace an opioion, tlAt the spurious Gospels, whkh abounded in the first age of Christianity^ had been brought to India, and the wildest parts of them repeated to the Hindus, who ingrafted them on the old fable of C^va, the Apollo of Greece. • As to the general extension of our pure fatCb in Hiodustlo, there are at present many sad obstacles to it. The Museinians are already a sort of hefero* dez Christians. They are Christians, if Locke rea- sons justly, because they firmly believe the immac»> late conception, divine character, and miracles, of the Messiah; but they are heterodox, in denying vehemently bis character of Sou, and his equalky, as God^ with the Father, of whose unity and attributes they entertain and express tho most awful ideas; while they consider our doctrine as perfect bla»> phemy, and insist, that our copies of the Scr^tures have been .corrupted both by Jews and Christians. It will be inexpressibly difficult to undeceive then, and scarce possible to diminish their veneration for Mohammed and Ali, who were both very extraordi- nary men, and the second a man of unexceptionable morals. The Koran shines indeed, with a borrowed light, since most of its beauties are taken from our Scriptures; but it has great beauties, and the Musel- mkns will not be convinced that they were borrowed. The Hindus, on the other hand, would readily ad- mit the truth of the Gospel ; but they contend, that it is perfectly consbtent with their S&stras. The Deity, they say, has appeared innumerable times, in many parts of this world, and of ali worlds, for the salvation of his creatures; and though we adore him in one appearance, and they in others, yet we adore, they say, the same God, to whom our several wor- G3 190 OK TUB GOD* OF GRBBCE, &C. •bipa, ttos^ difKrent in form, are equallj accent- able, if Ihejp beuncere in bubstoncc. We maj asanre ODnelves, Ibal Deitber Hiueliniiu oor Hindin will ever be coaTertetl b; any miBiaii from Ibe Cburch of Rome, nr from unj otber Cburcb i and (he only human mode, pertiaps, of caming so great a revola- iulioD will be lo Iranalate inlo Sanscrit aad Persiea (ocb chapten of the PropbeUfpuiicDlarly-of laaiali, BM are indisputably erangelical, .together with one of the Goepelat andaplaia prcfalory discaarBe,co[>- tainiog full evideoce af the very diilanl a^, ia which the predictiou tfaemtelvei, and the faiglory of the Diviae FersoD predicted, were iCTemlly made public I and then quietly to dieperae the norli among the well edocated oatiieii with whom, if in due tune it failed of producing very salulary fruit by its natural influence, we could only lament mare than ever the itrengih of prt^udice, and the wcaknesa of 131 ov OP THE PERSIANS AND HINDUS. BY SIR WILLIAM JONES. A FiGnRATiYE mode of expressing the fervoor of devotion,. or the ardent love of created spirits to- ward their Beneficent Creator^ has prevailed from time immemorial in Asia; particularly among the Persian theists^ both ancient Hlishangis and modern Sufis, who seem to have borrowed it from the Indian philosophers of the V^ddnta school ; and their doc- trines are also believed to be the source of that sublime but poetical theology, which glows and sparkles in the writings of the old Academics. '' Piato traveled into Italy and Egypt," gays Claude Fleury, ^ to learn the theology of the Pagans at its fountain head:" its true fountain, however, was neither in Italy nor in Egypt (though considerable streams of it had been conducted thither by Pytha- goras, and by the family of Misra), but in Persia or ISf OK TnB MTSTICAL POETRY India, Hhirh the foaoder of the Italic ttt bad suit- ed with s simiUr dnign. What the Grecian ti«- TeUoileamrd aiaaiigllM ngrt of Ibe aul maj prr- hapi be full; eiplainrd at a srawn of leunre, in aootbcr ducmarioDg bat we cooiae Ihii etaaj to s tiugalar ipccin of poetr;, wbidi copnsti almoit wtiolljr of a mjitical rdi^us allrgatj, tbongh it ■ecsu, on a Uan^enC Tiew, to coDfain inly Ibe aeo* tiateoU nf a vild and TOloptDom-libeniaim i imiw, admitluf Ibe daDgrr of a poetical ityle, in wbidi ■Me a ( Co^eoUl to the nDdepraied nature of aiaa, whoae ■ind, naking onder tbe ma^ilnde of Ibe nbject, and straining to eipma its emaiiont, ha< reconrM teadi beyond the boonds of cool m»n, and often to Ac brink of absardily. Bartow, wbo wodM have beea Ihe laMiBBt malbesiaticiaii, if hn rdt- giOBS Inm of und had not made bin the deepest tbmlrerin nf his agr, desnibet Lore as " an mt-ec- ^INM of the sool toward an fthject. !>« an appreheiKiaa and esteem of cf or coovenif Dce in it, n> tl* teaafjF, L wnnh, or I LLliiTt and prodadi^, if it be absent, « L yinpaiii>Mi:f Mr dctirF, nnd eomniBnitly an cadea- 'in iBcb a prepert; in il, tacb pn-newiuu epfitwimmlirm (■ il, t naiaa «('! It, capable of; wilb a n^irt and d^ilea- begcitii^ likewise a cnaptaceace, taloCtc- OF THE PERSIANS AMD HINDUS. 155 tion, and deligkt in Us preseace, possession, or en- J4»yment, wbich is moreover aUended with a good will toward ii, suitable to its nature; tbat is, with a desire that it should arrive at, or continue in, its best state; with a delight to perceive it thrive and flou* rish ; with a displeasure to see it suffer or decay ( witl^ a consequent endeavour to advance it in all good, aad preserve it from all evil." Agreeably to this description, which consists of two parts, and was designed to comprise the tender love of ttie Creator Awards created spirits, the great ptiiiosopher bursts forth in another place, with his usual animation and command of language, into die following panegyrie an the pious love of human souls toward the author of their happiness; ** Love is the sweetest and most deleoti^ie of all passions ; and, when by the conduct of wisdom it is directed in a rational way toward a worthy, congruous, and attainable object, it cannot otherwise than fill the heart with ravishing delight; inch. In all respects, superlatively such, is God; -who, infinitely lieyond all ether things, deserveth onr alTeGtion, as most perfectly amiable and desir- able ; as having obliged us by innumerable and in- estimable benefits; all the good tbat we have ever enjoyed, or can ever eypect, being derived from his pure bounty ; all things in the worid in competition with him being mean and ugly ; all things without him vain, unprofitable, and hurtful to us. He is the most proper object of our love; for we chiefly were framed, and it is the prime law of our nature, to love him $ our soul^from its original instinct, verg- eth totoard him as its centre, and can have no rest HU it he fixed on him : he alone can satisfy the vast capacity of our minds, and fill our boundless desires. IS* en THE MYSTICAL POBTBT He, of all lovely (hii^, mint certtlnlj and eaiilj' ma; be attuned t for, nbereaa, comiDODt]' men we CTOMcd in Ibeir affection, and their lore is inbider- ed from Iheir afleMing thii^ imaginary, wklch the; cannot reach, or coy things which disdain and re- ject them; it is with God qaite olhemise: He is roost ready (o impart himseir; be most earnestly de^ Biretta and nooeth onr Iotci he is not only most wit ling to correspond in aSectioa, but even doth prerenl m therein: Ife doth cheriih and enCBVTogt our leva is ttmttat inftutnut and moil conioBng emiracti, by kindest eijiressions ot ravour, by most beneficial returns ( and, whereas all other ot^ects do in (be en^ joyment much Tail our eipectalloD^ he dolh even ftkr exceed it. Wherefore in all BOeclionatc molioni of oar hfarta tnnard God; in detiHng him, or seeking bis favour and friendship) in embracing bira, or set- ting our esteem, our good will, onr canfideoce on him I in cnfoy/n; him by devotional meditalionrand addresaesto him; In a reflectlse senseof ourinterest and propriety in him) in (Anf njotsn'oiu unioa oy ipirii, ahertis ■" '''> c'vn'ii odltcrE (D, anif are, (u it letre, inserted in him i in a beany complacence In his benignity, a grateful seoie of his kindness, and a zealous dewre of yieldiif some requital for il, we cannot but feel very pleasant transports; in- deed, that celestial flame, kindled in our hearts b; the spirit of love, cannot be void of warmth ; we cannot lix our eyea on infinite beauty, we cannot losle infinite sweetness, we eonnot cleave to infi- nite felicity, without also perpetually rejoicing in Hie lir«l daughter of Love to God, Gharity toward iiient which, in compleiion and careful disposition, lib mnch reteroble her mothett for ibe do||i ri4 m OF THE PERSIANS AND HINDUS. '4S5 from Ul those gloomy, keen, turbulent imaginations and passions, which cloud our mind, which fret our heart, which discompose the frame of our soul; from burning anger, from storming contention, from gnawing envy, from rankling spite, from racking suspicion, from distracting ambition and aYariceit and consc^quently, doth settle our mind in an even temper, in a sedate humour, in an harmonious order, in that pleasant state of tranquillity, which naturally doth result from the voidance of irre- ^lar passions.^ Now thb passage from Barrow (which borders, I admit, on quietism and entha6ia»> tic devotion) differs only from the mystical theology of the Stifis and Y6gi8, as the flowers and fruit of Europe differ in scent and flavour from those of Asia, or as European differs from Asiatic eloquence ; the same strain, in poetical measure, would rise up to the odes of Spenser on Divine Love and Beauty^ and in a higher key with richer embellishments, to the songs of Hafiz and Jayad^va, the raptures of the Masnavi, and the mysteries of the Bhagavat. Before we come to the Persians -and Indians, let me produce another specimen of European theology, collected from a late excellent work of -the illus- trious M. Necker. ** Were men animated," says he,* ^ with sublime thoughts, did they respect the intellec- tual' power with- which they are adorned, and take an interest in the dignity of their nature, they would embrace, with transport that sense of religion, which ennobles their faculties, keeps their miiids in fnU strength, and unites them in idea with him, whose immensity overwhelms them with astonishment: considering themselves as un emanation from that infinite Being, the source and cause of all things, they would then disdain •to-l>e misled by a gloomy 136 OB THI MTITIML MHCntT ud fake pfail(»apli7, aid woiiM cherak the idc* of a God, wbo cresferf, who rignurtfCi, nbaynKraa tlli* BDitrnc bjr unariaUe lam, amd bjr m caolnaed wbo perrada all natae with hb dn'me ipirit, a aa ■Bifonl H»t, which mma, dinxti, aiid. ndiaiai the noadcrfal fakrk of Ibit woild. Ite bU«M iiks nf a God iweeUna ctety Miiiii of oh' liw», •ad embrllitba befarc wm the path of lifcj aailci a ddightfully lo all (he beuilin of aatarc, aad ai^ eiata ns with ererj' tbing that lira or auna. Tea: the whisper of the ^«, Ibe BUinair of walrn, tke peaceful af itatioB of Ina and •hrabs, woald caacav la ffft o" mindi aad afftct mr jaaZi milk tmirr m Bimiohtmmt lett; if we marked the tracca of bk aosant Mrpi aod ikcBtgaant iatcBtioaat if we belie*- «d ODneWet aclaallj' pnieat al the duplay of hi* bModirs pawer, and the atagBificent exalioDS erf hi) Dniimited gDodnrsi. BeBemleiice, —Bug all tke virton, taai s character moie than haiiiTia. aad a eer- taio amiable liaiplidl; ia id aalnre, which u\ima aaatagOBi Is the jsrrt idait, the original inteatioo of cooferring delight, whieb we Dcceoarll; mppMe in tkc Crsator, when we prenme tnieek liii autire ia batowing eiiMeiKe : beneroteacc ii thai TirtDe, or* to ipeok more anphaticall j, tint primor^^ hemUift whidi preceded all tiata aod all worldit and, when reflect on it, there appfOis an aoalegj, obacuni iodeed at prcKOI, and lo n> iaiperfectly kaown, t>e- Iweea our maral natnre and a line yet veiy resole, wfcen we iball ■atisf]' oar ardent widwiaDd lively hopes, which GonMitule perhapa a liilb, aad (if Ibe pbiaae ma; be Mcd) a diMaat Mme. It may cttu OF^BB PERSIANS AND HINDUS. 137 be imagined, that love, the brightest ornament of our natmre, love, enchanting and subUrne, is a mysterious pledge for the assarance of those hopes y since love, |l>y disengaging us from ourselves, by transporting us )l>eyood the limits of our own being, is the first step in oar progress to a joyful immortality ; and, by af* fording both the notion and escample of a cherished object distinct from our own souls, may be consi- dered as an interpreter to our hearts of something which our intellects cannot conceive. We may seem even to hear the supreme Intelligence and eter- nal Soul of all nature give this commission to th« $pirits which emanated from him^'Go; admire a small portion of my wocks, and study them ^. mako your first trial of happiness^ and learn to love him who bestowed it; but seek, not to remove the veil spread over the secret of your existence: your na* tare is composed of those divine particles, which, at an infinite distance^ constitute my own essence; but you would be too near me, were you permitted to penetrate the mystery of our separation and union : wait the. moment ordained by my wisdom; and, un« til that moment come, hope to approach me only by adoration and gratitude.' '' - If these two passages were translated into San^ scrit and Persian, I am confident that the Y^dkntes and Slifis would consider them as an epitome of their common system ; for they concur in believing that the souls of men differ infinitely in degree, but not at all in kindy from the divine spirit, of which they ai« particles^ and in which they will ultimately be absorbed-: that the spirit of God pervades the uni- verse, alway& immediately present to his wonk, and CQQse^ueotly. f^lways in substance^ that he alone is 138 DN THB MYSTICAL POBTRY perfect beneYoi^nce, perfect (rath, perfect beauty { that the love of him alone is real and genaine iove, while that of all other objects it absurd and illaory, that the beauties of nature are Cunt resemblances, like images in a mirror, of the divine charms'; that, from eternity without beginning, to eternity with- out end, the supreme benevolence is occupied in be- stowing happiness, or the means of attaining it ; that nea can only attain it by performing their part of the prima/ covenant between them and the Creator; that nothing has a pure absolute existence but mind or spirit; that material substances j as the ignorant call them, are no more than pty pictures presented continually to our minds by the sempiternal artist; that we must beware of attachment to such pAantonu^ mod attach ourselves exclusively to God, who truly exists in us, as we exist solely in him ; that we re- tain, even in this forlorn state of separation from our beiof ed, the idea of heavenly beauty^ and the remenn brance of our primenal vows ; that sweet music, gea- He breezes, fragrant flowers, perpetually renew the primary idea^ refresh our fading memory, and melt lis with tender affections; that we must cherish those affections, and by abstracting our souls from vanity^ that is, from all but God, approximate to his essence, in our final union with which will consist our sa* preme beatitude. From these principles flow a thousand metaphors and other poetical flgnres, which abound in the sacred poems of the Persians and Hindus, who seem to mean the same thing in sob- stance, and differ only in expression, as their lan- guages differ in idiom; The modern S6fis, who profess a belief in the Koran, suppose with great •ublimity both of thought and of diction, an express OF TfilB PERSIANS AMD BINDfJS. 139 cofifraef, on the day of eternity with beginning, be- tween the assemblage of created spirits and the su- preme sou] j from wbicb they were detached, when a celestial voice pronounced these words, addl-essed to each spirit separately, <* Art thou not with thy Lord?* that is, art thou not bound by a solemn contract with liim ? and all the spirits answered with one voice, ** Yes :*' hence it is that aliH, or art thou not, and bell, or yes, incessantly occur in the mystical verses t>f the Persians, and Bf the Turltisfa poets, who imi- tate them as the Romans imitated the Greeks. The Hindus describe the same covenant under the figu- rative notion, so finely expressed by Isaiah, of a nuptial contract ; for considering God in the three • o^D la dai^rrant miiiatcrprelatioa, while it snp^ies Teal iB6deli with a preteit for laoghuis at religioD itKlf. On thii occaaian I caimot refraio from prodociug a aiiMt eitrBordiaar; ode b; a Siifi of BokUia, whoasumed Ibe poetical toniame of Ismal: amore medern poet, by prefixiog three line* to each coo- plet, which rhyme with tlie fint bemiitich, haa very eteganlly and ingenioinly converted Ibe Keridab lata a MokhamnHS, bal 1 preseni yon only with a illeral venion of the tKi(;iiial dialidB : « Yeiterday, half inebriated, I pased by the quarter nhrre the vintnen dwell, to Beek-Chedaogb-' tcT of an infidel who kIIi wior. " At the end of the itreet, there advanced before me a domiel, ivUh a fairy'a cbeeiu, who in Ibe bbh- arr nf a pagan, wore ber trenei disberelkd orrr her iboulden like Uie ncerdotal thread. Inid: OF THE PERSIANS AND HINDUS. . 145 *'0 thou, to the arch of whose eyebrow the new moon is a slave, what quarter is this, and where is thy mansion ? ' *< She answered : * Cast thy rosary on the ground ; bind on thy shoulder the thread of paganism ; throw stones at the glass of piety ; and quaff wine from a full goblet ; " ' After that come before me, that I may whisper a word in thine ear: thou wilt accomplish thy jour- ney, if thou listen to my discourse.' <' Abandoning my heart, and rapt in ecstasy, I ran after her, till. I came to a place in which religion and reason forsook me^ '' At a distance I beheld a company, all insane and inebriated, who came boiling and roaring with ardour from the wine of love; ** Without cymbals, or lutes, or viols-, yet all fait of mirth and melody; without wine, or g;oblet, or flask, yet all incessantly drinking. ^ When the cord of restraint slipped from my hand, I desired to ask her one question^ but she said : * Silence I ** * This is no square temple, to the gate of which thou canst arrive precipitately ; this is no mosque to which thou canst come with tumult, but without knowledge. This is the banquet house of infidels, and within it all are intoxicated ; all from the dawn of eternity to the day of resurrection lost m asto- nishment. ** * Depart then from the cloister, and take the way to the tavern ; cast off the cloak of a dervise, and wear the robe of a libertine.* ^* I obeyed; and, if thoa desirest the same strain H H6 ON THE MYSTICAL FOBTR Y mnd coloar with Igmat, imitate liim» and sell this world and the next for one drop of pure wine." Such is the strange religion, and stranger langua^ of the Stifis; but most of the Asiatic poets are of that religion, and if we thing it worth wUle to read their poems, we npnstjthinlL it ^rorth while to under- stand them : their great Maulayl assures us, that "• they profess eager desire, but with no carnal af- fection, and circulate the cop, but no material gob* let ; since all things are ^iritoal in. their sect, all is mystery within mystery;" consistently with which declaration, he opens bis astonishing work, entitled the Masnavi, with the following couplets : Hear how yon reed in sadly pleasing tales Departed bliss, and present woe bewails I * With me from native banks untimely torn. Love-warbling youths and soft-eyed virgins mourn. O ! let the heart, by fatal absence rent. Feel what I sing, and bleed when I lament: Who roams in exile from his parent bower. Pants to return, and chides each lingering hour. My notes, in circles of the grave and gay, Have haird the rbing, cheered the closing day 2 Each in my fond affections claimed a part. But none discern*d the secret of my heart. What though my strains and sorrows flow combined I Yet ears are slow, and carnal eyes are blind. Free through each mortal form the spirits roll^ But sight avails not.— Can we see the soul ? * Such notes breathed gently from yon vocal frame : Breathed, said I ? no; 'twas all enlivening flame. Tis love that fills the reed with warmth divine; - 'Tis love that sparkles in the racy wine. OF THE PERSIANS AND HINDUS. l47 Me, plaintive wanderer from my peerless maid, The reed has fired,' and all my soul betrayed. He gives the bane, and he with balsam cures; Afflicts, yet sooths; impassions, yet allures. Delightful pangs his amorons tales prolong; And LaiU*s frantic lover lives in song. Not he who reasons best this wisdom knows; Ears only drink what rapturous tongues disclose. . Nor fruitless deem the reed's heart-piercing pain: See sweetness dropping from the parted cane. Alternate hope and fear my days divide, I courted Grief, and Anguish was my bride. Flow on, sad stream of life! I smile secure: - Tbou Itvest; Thou, the purest of the pure I Rise, vigorous youth ! be free; be nobly bold, Shall chains confine you, though they blajse with gold2 Go; to your vase the gathered main conveys What were your stored ? The pittance of a day t New plans for wealth your fancies would invent ; Yet shells, to nourish pearls, must lie content. The man whose robe love's purple arrows rend Bids avarice rest and toils tumultuous end. Hail, heavenly love ! tnie source of endless gains ! Thy balm restores me, and thy skill sustains. Oh, more than Galen learn'd, than Plato wise ! My guide, my law, my joy supreme, arise; Love warms this frigid clay with mystic fire. And dancing mountains leap with young desire. Blessed is the soul that swims in seas of love^ And long the life sustained by food above. With forms imperfect can perfection dwell ? Here pause, my song, and thou, vain world, fare- well. 1 148 ON THB MYSTICAL POETRY A volume might be filled with similar passages from the Stifi poets; from Skib, Orfi, Mir Khosrau, J^i, Hacin, and Sabik, who are next in beauty of composition to H&fiz and Sadi, bat next at a consi- derable distance ; from Mesihi* the most elegant of ^ their Turkish imitators; from a few Hindi poets of . our own times, and from Ibnul Fkred, who wrote | mystical odes in Arabic; but we may ck>se this ac- count of the Stifis with a passage from the third book of the Bustan, the declared subject of which is di- vine lovei referring you for a particular detail of their metaphysics and theology to the Dabistan of Moshani Fani, and to the pleasing essay, called the Junction of two Seas^ by that amiable and unfortu- nate prince Dirk SbectjJi: *> The love of a being, composed like thyself, of < water and clay, destroys thy patience and peace of mind; it excites thee, in thy waking hours, with mi- nute beauties, and engages thee, in thy sleep, with vain imaginations: with such real affection dost thou lay thy head on her foot, that the universe, in comparison of her, vanishes into nothing before thee ; and, since thy gold allures not her eye* gold and mere earth appear equal in thine. Not a breath dost thou utter to any one else, for with her thou hast no room for any other; thou declarest that her abode is in thine eye, or, when thou closest it, in thy heart; thou hast no fear of censure from any man ; ihQu hast no power to be at rest for a moment; if she demands thy soul, it runs instantly to thy lip ; and if she waves a cimeter over thee, thy head falls immediately under it. Since an absurd love, with its basis on air, affects thee so violently, and com- mands with a sway so despotic, canst thou wonder, OF THE PERSIANS AND HINDUS. 149 that they who walk ia the true path are drowned in the sea of mysterioas adoration ? They disregard life through affection for its giver; they abandon the world through remembrance of its maker; they are inebriated witli the melody of amorous complaints; they remember their beloved, and resign to him both this life and the next. Through remembrance of God, they shun ail mankind: they are so enamoured of the cupbearer that they spill the wine from the cup. No panacea can heal the'm, for no mortal can be apprized of their malady; so loudly has rung in their ears, from eternity without beginning, the di- vine word alest with bell, the tumultuous exclama- tion of all spirits. They are a sect fully employed, but sitting in retirement; their feet are of earth, but their breath is a flame : with a single yell they could rend a mountain from its base ; with a single cry they could throw a city into confusion; like wind^ they are concealed and move nimbly; like stone, they are silent, yet repeat God's praises. At early dawn, their tears flow so copiously as to wash from their eyes the black powder of sleep : though the courser of their fancy ran so swiftly all night, yet the morning finds them left behind in disorder: night and day they are plunged in an ocean of ardent de- tire, till they are unable, through astonishment, to distinguish night from day. So enraptured are they with the beauty of Him who decorated the human form, that, with the beauty of the form itself they have no concern ; and if ever they behold a beautiful shape, they see in it the mystery of God's work. ^* The wise take not the husk in exchange for the kernel; and he, who makes that choice, has no un- derstanding. He only has drunk the pure wine of 150 ON TUB MYiTICAL POSTRY, ETC« onity, who has forgotten, by ranemberin^ God, n thingB else in both worlds." liet OS return to the Hindus, among whom we no* find the same emblematical theiriogy, which Pytlu goras admired and adopted. The loves of Crisbn and Radha, or the reciprocal attraction between tli divine goodness and the boman soul, are ifAd at larg in the tenth book of the Bb&gavat, and are the sub jectof alittle PMtora2J>rama, entitled Gftag6vinda it wps the work of Jayad^va, who flourished, it i said, before Calidas, and was bom, as he tells u: himself, in Gendnli, which many believe to be ii Calinga $ bnt, since there is a town of a similar nam< in Berdwan, the natives of it insist that the finest ly ric poet of India was their countryman, and cele< brate, in honour of him, an annual jubilee, passing a whole night in representing his drama, and in sing^ ing Eis beautiful songs. After having translated the Gitag6vinda word for word, I reduced my transla- tion to the form in which it is now exhibited: omit- ting only those passages, which are too luxuriant and too bold for an European taste, and the pre- fatory ode on the ten incarnations of Vishnu, with which you have been presented on another occasion : the phrases in Italics are the burdens of the several songs; and you may be assured, that not a single Image or idea has been added by the titunlator. INDEX TO VOLUME II. DISCOURSE IX. 'On the origin and families of nations. — Philosophi- cal proposition of the whole of mankind proceed- ing from one pair of our species. — Observations on the books of Moses. — The establishment of the only human family after the deluge; and its dif- fusion p* 1 DISCOURSE X. On Asiatic history, civil and natural. — Introductory remarks. — ^The Mosaic account of the primitive world confirmed^ — ^The practical use of history. — Observations on animals, minerals, and vegetable substances. — On the mechanical arts, &c 17 DISCOURSE XI. On the philosophy of the Asiatics. — Introductory observations. — On physiology and medicine. — Metaphysics and logic: — Ethics and jurispru- dence. — Natural philosophy and mathematics: — And the religion of nature 36 End of Sir Willi&m Jones's Discounes 54 153 ivdtX, Advertisement of the Editor ^ ^1 of the Secretary of the Asiatic So- 1 cicty ib., A Discourse delivered at a meeting of the Asiatic Society, on the S2d of May 1794, by Sir John Shore, Bart. President (new Lord Tei^moutb),| on the name, talents, and character of Sir Wil- liam Jones..... 561 SELECT MISCELLABTEOVS PAPERS OF SIR WM. JONE8.| Oq the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India 70] On the mystical poetry of the Persians and Hin- dus •. 131 THE END. C. WbiUiDghun, College House, Chitwick^ y^ <