306 Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland. 



and England, as most advanced in refinement, is, for that very 

 cause, the most beholden ; and, by acquisition of dominion in 

 the East, is bound by a yet closer tie. As Englishmen, we 

 participate in the earnest wish, that this duty may be fulfilled, 

 and that obligation requited ; and we share in the anxious de- 

 sire of contributing to such a happy result, by promoting an 

 interchange of benefits, and returning in an improved state 

 that which was received in a ruder form. 



" But improvement, to be efficient, must be adapted to the 

 actual condition of things : and hence a necessity for exact in- 

 formation of all that is there known, which belongs to science; 

 and all that is there practised, which appertains to arts. Be 

 it then our part to investigate the sciences of Asia; and in- 

 quire the arts of the East, with the hope of facilitating ameli- 

 orations, of which they may be found susceptible. 



" In progress of such researches, it is not perhaps too much 

 to expect, that something may yet be gleaned for the advance- 

 ment of knowledge, and improvement of arts, at home. In 

 many recent instances, inventive faculties have been tasked 

 to devise anew, what might have been as readily copied from 

 an Oriental type; or unacknowledged imitation has repro- 

 duced in Europe, with an air of novelty, what had been for 

 ages familiar in the East. Nor is that source to be considered 

 as already exhausted. In beauty of fabric, in simplicity of 

 process, there possibly yet remains something to be learnt 

 from China, from Japan, from India ; which the refinement 

 of Europe need not disdain. 



" The characteristic of the arts in Asia is simplicity. With 

 rude implements, and by coarse means, arduous tasks have 

 been achieved, and the most finished results have been ob- 

 tained ; which, for a long period, were scarcely equalled, and 

 have but recently been surpassed, by })olished artifice, and 

 refined skill, in Europe. Were it a question of mere curiosit}', 

 it might yet be worth the inquiry, what were tlie rude means 

 by which such things have been accomplished ? The question, 

 however, is not a merely idle one. It may be investigated 

 with confidence, that an useful answer will be derived. If it 

 do not point to the way of perfecting Eui'opean skill, it as- 

 suredly will to that of augmenting Asiatic attainments. The 

 course of inquiry into the arts, as into the sciences of Asia, 

 cannot fail of leading to nuich which is curious and instruc- 

 tive. The inquiry extends over regions the most anciently 

 and the most numerously peopled on the globe. The range 

 of research is as wide, as those regions are vast; and as various, 

 as the people who inhabit them are diversified. It embraces 

 their ancient and modern history; their civil polity ; their long- 

 end urinsf 



