that the human foul is an emanation from his effence, and, though divided for a time from its heavenly fource, will be finally re-united with it; that the highest poffible happiness will arife from its reunion, and that the chief good of mankind, in this tranfitory world, confifts in as perfect an union with the Eternal Spirit as the incumbrances of a mortal frame will allow; that, for this purpose, they should break all connexion (or taálluk, as they call it), with extrinsick objects, and pass through life without attachments, as a swimmer in the ocean strikes freely without the impediment of clothes; that they should be straight and free as the cypress, whose fruit 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 foul, the idea of celestial beauty must overwhelm it in extatick delight; that, for want of apt words to express the divine perfections and the ardour of devotion, we must borrow fuch expreffions as approach the nearest to our ideas, and speak of Beauty and Love in a transcendent and mystical sense; that, like a reed torn from its native bank, like wax feparated from its delicious honey, the foul of man bewails its difunion with melancholy mufick, and sheds burning tears, like the lighted taper, waiting paffionately for the moment of its extinction, as a difengagement from earthly trammels, and the means of returning to its Only Beloved. Such in part (for I omit the minuter and more fubtil metaphyficks of the Sufi's, which are mentioned in the Dabiftàn) is the wild and enthufiaftick religion of the modern Perfian poets, efpecially of the sweet HA'FIZ and the great Maulavì: fuch is the fystem of the Védánti philofophers and best lyrick poets 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 between them.

III. On the ancient monuments of Perfian sculpture and architecture we have already made fuch obfervations, as were sufficient for our purpose; nor will you be furprized at the diversity between the figures at

Elephanta,

Elephanta, which are manifeftly Hindu, and those at Perfepolis, which are merely Sabian, if you concur with me in believing, that the Takhti Jemshid was erected after the time of CAYU'MERS, when the Brahmans had migrated from Iràn, and when their intricate mythology had been fuperfeded by the fimpler adoration of the planets and of fire.

IV. As to the Sciences or arts of the old Perfians, I have little to say; and no complete evidence of them seems to exift. MOHSAN fpeaks more than once of ancient verfes in the Pahlavì language; and BaнMAN affured me, that some scanty remains of them had been preserved: their musick and painting, which NIZA'MI celebrated, have irrecoverably perished; and in regard to MA'NI', the painter and impoftor, whose book of drawings called Artang, which he pretended to be divine, is fuppofed to have been deftroyed by the Chinese, in whose dominions he had fought refuge, 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 by clear evidence and plain reasoning, that a powerful monarchy was established in Iràn long before the Affyrian, or Pishdádì, government; that it was in truth a Hindu monarchy, though, if any chufe to call it Cufian, Cafdean, or Scythian, we shall not enter into a debate on mere names; that it fubfifted many centuries, and that its history has been ingrafted on that of the Hindus, who founded the monarchies of Ayodhyà and Indrapreftha; that the language of the first Persian empire was the mother of the Sanfcrit, and consequently of the Zend, and Parfi, as well as of Greek, Latin, and Gothick ; that the language of the Affyrians was the parent of Chaldaick and Pahlavì, and that the primary Tartarian language alfo had been current in the fame empire; although, as the Tartars had no books or even letters, we cannot with certainty trace their unpolished and variable

idioms.

idioms.

We discover, therefore in Perfia, at the earliest dawn of history, the three diftinct races of men, whom we described on former occafions as poffeffors of India, Arabia, Tartary; and, whether they were collected in Iran from diftant regions, or diverged from it, as from a common centre, we shall eafily determine by the following confiderations. Let us observe in the first place the central pofition of Iràn, which is bounded by Arabia, by Tartary, and by India; whilst Arabia lies contiguous to Iràn only, but is remote from Tartary, and divided even from the skirts of India by a confiderable gulf; no country, therefore, but Perfia feems likely to have fent forth its colonies to all the kingdoms of Afia: the Bráhmans could never have migrated from India to Iràn, because they are expressly forbidden by their oldest existing laws to leave the region, which they inhabit at this day; the Arabs have not even a tradition of an emigration into Perfia before MOHAMMED, nor had they indeed any inducement to quit their beautiful and extenfive domains; and, as to the Tartars, we have no trace in history of their departure from their plains and forefts, till the invasion of the Medes, who, according to etymologists, were the fons of MADAI, and even they were conducted by princes of an Affyrian family. The three races, therefore, whom we have already mentioned, (and more than three we have not yet found) migrated from Iràn, as from their common country; and thus the Saxon chronicle, I presume from good authority, brings the first inhabitants of Britain from Armenia; while a late very learned writer concludes, after all his laborious researches, that the Goths or Scythians came from Perfia; and another contends with great force, that both the Irish and old Britons proceeded feverally from the borders of the Cafpian; a coincidence of conclufions from different media by persons wholly unconnected, which could scarce have happened, if they were not grounded on solid principles. We may therefore hold this propofition firmly established, that Iràn, or Perfia in its largest fenfe, was the true centre of population, of knowledge, of

languages,

languages, and of arts; which, instead of travelling weftward only, as it has been fancifully fuppofed, or eastward, as might with equal reason have been afferted, were expanded in all directions to all the regions of the world, in which the Hindu race had fettled under various denominations: but, whether Afia has not produced other races of men, diftinct from the Hindus, the Arabs, or the Tartars, or whether any apparent diverfity may not have fprung 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 preserve "our Society from dying gradually away, as it has advanced gradually "to its prefent (shall I say flourishing or languishing?) state." It has fubfifted five years without any expense to the members of it, until the first volume of our Tranfactions was published; 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 contribution towards the charges of the Royal Society by each of its fellows, who may not have chosen to compound for it on his admiffion: this I mention, 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 neceffity of our common exertions in promoting the fale of the work both here and in London. In vain shall we meet, as a literary body, if our meetings fhall cease to be supplied with original differtations and memorials; and in vain shall we collect the most interesting papers, if we cannot publish them occafionally without expofing the Superintendents of the Company's prefs, who undertake to print them at their own hazard, to the danger of a confiderable lofs: by united efforts the French have compiled their stupendous repofitories of univerfal knowledge; and by united efforts only can we hope to rival them, or to diffufe over our own country and the rest of Europe the lights attainable by our Afiatick Researches.

THE

THE SEVENTH

ANNIVERSARY DISCOURSE,

DELIVERED 25 FEBRUARY, 1790.

BY

THE PRESIDENT.

GENTLEMEN,

ALTHOUGH

HOUGH we are at this moment confiderably nearer to the frontier of China than to the farthest limit of the British dominions in Hinduftán, yet the first step, that we shall take in the philosophical journey, which I propofe for your entertainment at the present meeting, will carry us to the utmost verge of the habitable globe known to the beft geographers of old Greece and Egypt; beyond the boundary of whose knowledge we shall difcern from the heights of the northern mountains an empire nearly equal in furface to a square of fifteen degrees; an empire, of which I do not mean to affign the precise limits, but which we may confider, for the purpose of this differtation, as embraced on two fides by Tartary and India, while the ocean separates its other fides from various Afiatick ifles of great importance in the commercial system of Europe: annexed to that immense tract of land is the

peninfula