contemporary 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 monarch, who reigned in Behar; so that only eight hundred or a thousand years will remain almost wholly dark; and they must have been employed in raising empires or states, in framing laws, improving languages and arts, and in observing the apparent motions of the celestial bodies. A Sanscrit history of the celebrated Vicramaditya was inspected at Benares by a Pandit, who would not have deceived me, and could not himself have been deceived; but the owner of the book is dead and his family dispersed; nor 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 modern Indian history begins, we have ample accounts of them in Persian, from Ali of Yezd, and the translations of Tuskish 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 encouragement to other contemporary historians, who, to use his own phrase in a letter to myself, may, like him, consider plain truth as the beauty of historical composition. From all these materials, and from these alone, a perfect history of India (if a mere compilation, however elegant, could deserve such a title) might be collected by any studious man who had a competent knowledge of Sanscrit, Persian, and Arabic; 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 narrative 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 the human mind; and a happy propensity would it be, if every reader; of history would open his eyes to some very important: corollaries, which flow from the whole extent of it. He could not but remark the constant effect of despotism in benumbing and debasing all those faculties which distinguish men from the herd that grazes; and to that cause he would impute the decided inferiority of most Asiatic nations, ancient and modern, to those in Europe who are blest 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 astend to produce virtue and happiness, cannot in their VOL. IV.

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nature

nature 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 accomplished of men, who asserts in four nervous lines, that, "as hail and snow, which mar the labours of husband"men, proceed from elevated clouds, and, as the de"structive thunderbolt follows the brilliant flash, thus " is a free state ruined by men exalted in power and "splendid in wealth, while the people, from gross igno

rance, chuse 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 deserve permanence and enjoy it, and since changes, even from the worst to the best, are always attended with much temporary mischief, he would fix on our British constitution (I mean our public law, not the actual state of things in any given period) as the best form ever established, though we can only make distant approaches to its theoretical perfection. In these Indian territories, which Providence has thrown into the arms of Britain for their protection and welfare, the religion, manners, and laws of the natives preclude even the idea of political freedom; but their histories may possibly suggest hints for their prosperity, while our country derives essential benefit from the diligence of a placid and submissive people, who multiply with such increase, even after the ravages of famine, that in one col

lectorship

lectorship out of twenty-four, and that by no means the largest or best cultivated (I mean Chrishna-nagar) there have lately been found, by an actual enumeration, 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 before intimated, I shall not name the various cosmographical books which are extant in Arabic and Persian, nor give an account of those which the Turks have beautifully printed in their own improved language, but shall expatiate a little on the geography and astronomy of India; having first observed generally, that all the Asiatic nations must be far better acquainted with their several countries than mere European scholars and travellers; that, consequently, we must learn their geography from their own writings; and that, by collating many copies of the same work, we may correct the blunders of transcribers in tables, names, and descriptions.

GEOGRAPHY, astronomy, and chronology have, in this part of Asia, shared the fate of authentic history; and, like that, have been so masked and bedecked in the fantastic robes of mythology and metaphor, that the real system of Indian philosophers and mathematicians can scarce be distinguished: an accurate knowledge of Sanscrit and a confidential intercourse with learned

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learned Brahmens, are the only means of separating truth from fable; and we may expect the most important discoveries from two of our members; concerning whom it may be safely asserted, that if our Society should have produced no other advantage than the invitation given to them for the public display of their talents, we should have a claim to the thanks of our country and of all Europe. Lieutenant Wilford has exhibited an interesting specimen of the geographical knowledge deducible 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 comparison of that which he will diffuse; 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 hereafter disclose the systems of Hindu astronomers, from Nared and Parasar to Meya, Varahamihir, and Bhascar; 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 Greeks, as to prove that the two systems were originally one and the same, yet with such a diversity in parts, as to show incontestibly, that neither system was copied from the other; whence it will follow, that they must have had some common source.

THEjurisprudence of the Hindus and Arabs being the field which I have chosen for my peculiar toil, you cannot expect that I should greatly enlarge your collection

of