703 



WILKINS, SIR CHARLES. 



WILKINS, JOHN. 



704 



intimate friendship of those distinguished men, who took the most 

 lively interest in his literary pursuits, and whose approbation stimu- 

 lated his exertions ; nor can it be doubted that his knowledge of the 

 Oriental languages, and the salutary influence which his Sanskrit 

 learning gave him over everything connected with the Brahmins, were 

 often eminently useful in the civil and judicial government of India. 

 In some manuscript letters of Sir William Jones's addressed to 

 Mr. \Vilkins, which are in the possession of his family, are numerous 

 instances of Sir William's references to him in aid of his own studies 

 in Sanskrit, as well as relating to questions connected with his judicial 

 office. In one of these letters he says, " You are the first European 

 who ever understood Sanskrit." In another, " it is of the utmost 

 importance that the stream of Hindoo law should be pure, for we are 

 entirely at the mercy of the Hindoo lawyers through our ignorance of 

 Sanskrit." 



In the year 1784 Mr. Wilkins was instrumental, in union with the 

 same accomplished scholar, in establishing the Literary Society of 

 Calcutta, whose publications, called ' The Asiatic Researches,' were 

 regarded with the greatest interest by the learned of Europe. A 

 separate work however of his own operated perhaps still more strongly 

 to excite curiosity, and to give hopes of an ample harvest in the field 

 of Sanskrit letter's : namely, his translation of the Bhagvatgita, one 

 of the Episodes of the Mahabhaiata, or great national poem of the 

 Hindoos. This translation having been transmitted in manuscript by 

 the governor-general to the chairman of the Court of Directors in 

 1785, with a recommendation that it should be published, was printed 

 accordingly at the expense of the Company, together with the annexed 

 letter of Mr. Hastings before alluded to, in which that enlightened 

 statesman took occasion to communicate his views on the encourage- 

 ment necessary to be given by the government of India to the culti- 

 vation of languages and science. In 1786 the decline of Mr. Wilkins's 

 health, caused by the unremitted attention given to his studies and 

 public duties, rendered necessary his return to Europe. At Bath in 

 the following year he published an English translation of the ' Hito- 

 paddsa of Vishnu Sarma,' being the Sanskrit original of that Persian 

 collection of fables, the French and English versions of which are 

 known by the name of the ' Fables of Pilpay.' Not long afterwards 

 he began to arrange the materials for a Sanskrit grammar, which he 

 had brought with him from India ; and at his residence at Hawkhurst 

 in Kent, following the same method which he had employed at 

 Hoogley with the Bengalee types, he formed with his own hands a 

 set of Devandgari characters in steel, made matrices and moulds, and 

 cast from them a fount of types. He had already printed twenty 

 pages of the grammar, when, in May 1796, his house was burnt to the 

 ground, and so suddenly that although his books and manuscripts 

 were saved, together with the greatest part of the punches and 

 matrices, the types were lost or rendered useless. A copy of the 

 printed pages had been sent to his friend the late William Marsden, 

 Esq. [MARSDEN, WILLIAM], and is probably the only one extant. 

 This misfortune, added to other circumstances, prevented the re- 

 sumption of his labours till 1806, when, soon after the formation of 

 the East India College at Hertford, the study of Sanskrit having 

 become one of the most desirable branches of the system of education 

 there established, Mr. Wilkins zealously aided this object, the gram- 

 mar was speedily completed, new letters were cast, and in less than 

 two years this, the greatest of Mr. Wilkins's works, was published. 



In 1801 he had been appointed librarian to the East India Com- 

 pany. Under his fostering care the library and museum attained a 

 degree of importance, utility, and interest which they had not before 

 possessed; and became an attraction to visitors both native and 

 foreign, who, in common with those connected with India con- 

 tinually resorting thither, were not less gratified by the obliging 

 attentions of the librarian, than impressed with admiration of his pro- 

 found and extensive knowledge : an elegant testimony to this effect 

 is to be found in the amusing romance of 'Hadji Baba.' In 1805 he 

 became visitor and examiner of the students in the Oriental depart- 

 ment both at Haileybury and at Addiscombe. These offices he held 

 and performed the duties of them, with scarcely any intermission, 

 until his death, which occurred on the 13th of May 1836, within a 

 few days of attaining his eighty-seventh year. To such a degree did 

 he enjoy the faculties of his mind to the last, that, not many days 

 before the short illness which preceded his decease, he made, at the 

 request of the president of the Board of Control, a translation of a 

 letter from the Imam of Muscat, and forwarded it to that minister. 

 Sir Charles Wilkins was twice married, and left three daughters. 



The published works of Sir Charles Wilkins, beside those already 

 mentioned, are a new edition of Richardson's 'Arabic and Persian 

 Dictionary' (1806-10), and the roots of the Sanskrit language (1815). 

 In Dalrymple's ' Oriental Repertory ' are found also a translation of 

 the Dushwarta and Sakoontala, an episode of the Mahabhdrata ; and 

 in the ' Annals of Oriental Literature ' another portion of a translation 

 of the same great poem. To these may be added some papers in the 

 early volumes of the ' Asiatic Researches.' Among his unpublished 

 translations from the Sanskrit are ' The Institutes of Menu,' of which 

 he had completed more than two-thirds, when he was induced to desist 

 by the knowledge that Sir William Jones was engaged on the same work, 

 and which the latter published in 1794. Mr. Wilkins was a member 

 of the Royal Institute of Paris, and of many other learned societies 



abroad as well as at home. In 1825 the Royal Society of Literature 

 presented to him their gold medal, bearing the inscription ' Carolo 

 Wilkins, Literaturao Sanucritse Principi.' In 1833 George IV. conferred 

 on him the honour of knight bachelor and knight commander of the 

 Quelphic order. 



WILKINS, JOHN, Bishop of Chester in the reign of Charles II., 

 was, according to Anthony h, Wood, " a person endowed with rare 

 gifts," " a noted theologist and preacher, a curious critic in several 

 matters, an excellent mathematician and experimentist, and one aa 

 well seen in mechanisms and new philosophy (of which he was a great 

 promoter) as any of his time." He was the son of Walter Wilkins, a 

 goldsmith and citizen of Oxford, but was born at the residence of hia 

 maternal grandfather, John Dod (a nonconformist of some note, and 

 author of several theological works, from one of which, an Exposition 

 of the Ten Commandments, he is styled ' the Decalogist ') at Fawsley, 

 near Daventry in Northamptonshire, in 1614. Wilkins appears to have 

 remained with his grandfather until he arrived at a proper age for 

 entering a grammar-school, when his father placed him under Mr. 

 Edward Sylvester, an Oxford schoolmaster. In Easter Term 1627, at 

 the age of thirteen, he was admitted a student at New Inn Hall, 

 whence he shortly removed to Magdalen Hall, where for a short 

 time he was under the tuition of John Tombes, the celebrated 

 Anabaptist and opponent of Baxter. Tombes left the university 

 while Wilkins was an under graduate, and he did not proceed to 

 his first degree at the usual time ; but he took the degree of I'.A. 

 on the 20th of October 1631, and that of M.A. on the llth of 

 June 1634. Having then arrived at the age of twenty-one, he took 

 orders, and became successively chaplain to William, Lord Say, George, 

 Lord Berkeley, and Charles, Count-palatine of the Rhine, with whom 

 he resided for a considerable time while he was in England. The 

 skill of Wilkins in the mathematics, to which that prince was much 

 attached, is said to have been his chief recommendation for the last- 

 mentioned appointment, which gave him much opportunity for prose- 

 cuting his favourite studies. During this time he wrote several small 

 treatises on mechanical philosophy. His early education had given 

 him a strong bias towards puritanical principles, and accordingly on 

 the breaking out of the civil war he took part with the parliament 

 and Presbyterians, and became a party to the Solemn League and 

 Covenant. Academical studies at the universities being much inter- 

 rupted by the disturbances of that period, Wilkins assiduously pro- 

 moted those meetings in London which eventually led to the formation 

 of the Royal Society. According to Bishop Sprat and Dr. Wallis, 

 indeed, he was the principal promoter of the meetings referred to, at 

 which political and theological discussions were strictly avoided, while 

 every branch of natural philosophy was made a subject of inquiry. In 

 1648 he was selected by a committee appointed for the reformation of 

 the University of Oxford to fill the office of warden of Wadham 

 College, and on the 13th of April, having taken the degree of B.D. ou 

 the preceding day, he was put in possession of the wardeuship, which 

 was rendered vacant by the ejection of the loyalist warden, Mr. John 

 Pitt. On the 18th of December 1649 he became D.D.. and about the 

 same time he took the required engagement of fidelity to the new 

 commonwealth. Being unable after his removal from London to 

 attend the philosophical meetings, he took part in the establishment 

 of an association of similar character at Oxford, and from the year 

 1652, prior to which the society had met at the lodgings of Dr. Petty, 

 to the end of his wardenship, the meetings were held in Wadham 

 College. 



In or about the year 1656 Wilkins married Robina, widow of Peter 

 French, and sister of Oliver Cromwell, from whom he obtained a dis- 

 pensation for retaining his office, notwithstanding the rules of the 

 college, which imposed celibacy on the warden. Burnet states, in his 

 'History of his Own Time,' that he made no other use of this alliance 

 " but to do good offices, and to cover the University of Oxford from 

 the sourness of Owen and Goodwin." In the early part of 1659, after 

 the death of Oliver, Richard Cromwell appointed Wilkins master of 

 Trinity College, Cambridge, and there also he exerted himself to 

 increase a taste for experimental philosophy, as well as to substitute a 

 spirit of universal benevolence for narrow party feelings. At the 

 Restoration, in the following year, he was ejected from his mastership, 

 and for some time he remained out of favour, both at court, and with 

 the archbishop of Canterbury, on account of his marriage. While his 

 fortunes were at this low ebb, Wilkins was chosen preacher to the 

 Society of Gray's Inn, and being thus again brought to reside in 

 London, he entered with ardour iuto the proceedings of the philoso- 

 phical association with which he had formerly been connected, and 

 which now assumed a rnoi'e organised form. In 1662 he was pre- 

 sented to the rectory of St. Lawrence, Jewry, in the gift of the crown, 

 and on the formation of the Royal Society in the following year, he 

 became one of the council Having obtained favour at court, he waa 

 soon promoted to the deanery of Ripon, and in 166S to the bishopric 

 of Chester, to which he was consecrated on the 15th of November : 

 Dr. Tillotson, who had married his step-daughter, preached his conse- 

 cration sermon. It is related that he obtained this bishopric through 

 the interest of the Duke of Buckingham ; and Walter Pope, in his Life 

 of Seth Ward, bishop of Salisbury, said that he had it not ouly with- 

 out but against the consent of the archbishop of Canterbury (Sheldon), 

 who subsequently, after he knew him personally, declared that the 



