selves to be dazzled by a false glare, nor mistake enigmas and allegories for hiftorical verity. Attached to no fyftem, and as much disposed to reject the Mofaick history, if it be proved erroneous, as to believe it, if it be confirmed by found reasoning from indubitable evidence, I propofe to lay before you a concife account of Indian Chronology, extracted from Sanfcrit books, or collected from converfations with Pandits, and to fubjoin a few remarks on their system, without attempting to decide a question, which I fhall venture to ftart, "whether it is 66 not in fact the fame with our own, but em"bellished and obfcured by the fancy of their poets and the riddles of their aftronomers."

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One of the most curious books in Sanferit, and one of the oldeft after the Véda's, is a tract on religious and civil duties, taken, as it is believed, from the oral inftructions of MENU, fon of BRAHMA', to the first inhabitants of the earth: a well-collated copy of this interesting law-tract is now before me: and I begin my differtation with a few couplets from the first chapter of it: "The fun caufes the divifion of "day and night, which are of two forts, those "of men and thofe of the Gods; the day, for "the labour of all creatures in their several " employments; the night, for their flumber. "A month is a day and night of the Patriarchs;

"and it is divided into two parts; the bright half "is their day for laborious exertions; the dark "half, their night for fleep. A year is a day "and night of the Gods; and that is alfo di"vided into two halves; the day is, when the "fun moves towards the north; the night, "when it moves towards the fouth. Learn

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now the duration of a night and day of "BRAHMA', with that of the ages respectively "and in order. Four thousand years of the "Gods they call the Crita (or Satya), age; and "its limits at the beginning and at the end

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are, in like manner, as many hundreds. "In the three fucceffive ages, together with "their limits at the beginning and end of "them, are thousands and hundreds dimi"nished by one. This aggregate of four ages,

amounting to twelve thousand divine years, is "called an age of the Gods; and a thousand "fuch divine ages added together must be con"fidered as a day of BRAHMA': his night has "alfo the fame duration. The before men❝tioned age of the Gods, or twelve thousand "of their years, multiplied by seventy-one, "form what is named here below a Manwan

tara. There are alternate creations and de"ftructions of worlds through innumerable "Manwantara's: the Being Supremely Defira"ble performs all this again and again."

Such is the arrangement of infinite time, which the Hindus believe to have been revealed from heaven, and which they generally underftand in a literal fenfe: it seems to have intrinfick marks of being purely aftronomical; but I will not appropriate the obfervations of others, nor anticipate thofe in particular, which have been made by two or three of our members, and which they will, I hope, communicate to the fociety. A conjecture, however, of Mr. PATERSON has fo much ingenuity in it, that I cannot forbear mentioning it here, especially as it seems to be confirmed by one of the couplets juft cited: he supposes, that, as a month of mortals is a day and night of the Patriarchs from the analogy of its bright and dark halves, fo, by the fame analogy, a day and night of mortals might have been confidered by the ancient Hindus as a month of the lower world; and then a year of such months will consist only of twelve days and nights, and thirty fuch years will compofe a lunar year of mortals; whence he furmises, that the four million three hundred and twenty thousand years, of which the four Indian ages are supposed to confist, mean only years of twelve days; and, in fact, that fum, divided by thirty, is reduced to an hundred and forty-four thousand: now a thousand four hundred and forty years are one pada, a period in the

Hindu aftronomy, and that fum, multiplied by eighteen, amounts precisely to twenty-five thoufand nine hundred and twenty, the number of years in which the fixed ftars appear to perform their long revolution eastward. The last mentioned fum is the product also of an hundred and forty-four, which, according to M. BAILLY, was an old Indian cycle, into an hundred and eighty, or the Tartarian period, called Van, and of two thousand eight hundred and eighty into nine, which is not only one of the lunar cycles, but confidered by the Hindus as a mysterious number and an emblem of Divinity, because, if it be multiplied by any other whole number, the fum of the figures in the different products remains, always nine, as the Deity, who appears in many forms, continues One immutable effence. The important period of twenty-five thousand nine hundred and twenty years is well known to arise from the multiplication of three hundred and fixty into feventytwo, the number of years in which a fixed ftar seems to move through a degree of a great circle; and, although M. LE GENTIL affures us, that the modern Hindus believe a complete revolution of the ftars to be made in twenty-four thousand years, or fifty-four seconds of a degree to be paffed in one year, yet we may have reafon to think, that the old Indian aftronomers

had made a more accurate calculation, but concealed their knowledge from the people under the veil of fourteen MENWANTARA's, Seventyone divine ages, compound cycles, and years of different forts, from those of BRAHMA' to those of Pátála, or the infernal regions. If we follow the analogy suggested by MENU, and suppose only a day and night to be called a year, we may divide the number of years in a divine age by three hundred and fixty, and the quotient will be twelve thousand, or the number of his divine years in one age; but, conjecture apart, we need only compare the two periods 4320000 and 25920, and we shall find, that among their common divisors, are 6, 9, 12, &c. 18, 36, 72, 144, &c. which numbers with their feveral multiples, especially in a decuple progreffion, conftitute fome of the most celebrated periods of the Chaldeans, Greeks, Tartars, and even of the Indians. We cannot fail to observe, that the number 432, which appears to be the basis of the Indian fyftem, is a 60th part of 25920, and, by continuing the comparison, we might probably folve the whole enigma. In the preface to a Váránes Almanack I find the following wild ftanza: "A thousand Great Ages are a day of "BRAHMA'; a thousand fuch days are an In"dian hour of VISHNU; fix hundred thousand "fuch hours make a period of RUDRA; and a