74 Oriental Literature. 



lished his History of Nadir Shah, and the year foh 

 lowing his Persian Grammar; both of which 

 works hold an important place among the events 

 in oriental literature with which the age is mark- 

 ed. The version of the former from the original 

 Persian into French, he undertook and accom- 

 plished from a regard to the literary reputation of 

 his country, that it might not be carried out of 

 England with the reflection that no person had 

 been found in the British dominions capable of 

 translating it. The same accomplished Briton af- 

 terwards made several important publications, con- 

 nected with Persian literature, and shed much ad- 

 ditional light on this department of eastern learn- 

 ing. 



To Mr. Francis Gladwin, also of Great- 

 Britain, one of the most unwearied labourers in 

 oriental literature which the eighteenth century 

 produced, the public is much indebted for the aid 

 which he rendered to students of the Persian lan- 

 guage. Besides several important translations, 



most enlightened professors of the doctrines of Brahmah confessed, with 

 pride, delight, and astonishment, that his knowledge of their sacred dia- 

 lect was most critically correct and profound. To a proficiency in the 

 languages of Greece, Rome, and Asia, he added a knowledge of the phi- 

 losophy of those countries, and of every thing curious or valuable that had 

 been taught in them. The doctrines of the Academy, the Lyceum, or the 

 Porch, were not more familiar to him than the tenets of the Vedas, the 

 mysticisms of the Sufis, or the Religion of the Ancient Persians ; and whilst, 

 with a kindred genius, he perused with rapture the compositions of the 

 most renowned poets of Greece, Rome, and Asia, he could turn with equal 

 delight and knowledge to the sublime inquiries or mathematical calculations 

 of Barrow and Newton. Besides all these acquisitions the theory of 

 music was familiar to him ; he had made himself acquainted with the 

 modern interesting discoveries in chemistry, and his last and favourite pur- 

 suit was the study of botany, in which he made great progress, and had 

 his life been spared, would probably have been a reformer and discoverer. 

 His poetic productions discover a vigorous imagination and an elegant taste. 

 His learning and talents as a lawyer were still more eminent. His abili- 

 ties and integrity as a magistrate and a judge were universally applauded; 

 and, to crown all, the purity of his life, and the fervour of his piety, as a 

 christian, shed a lustre upon every other accomplishment. See a Discourse 

 delivered before the Asiatic Society in May, 1 794, by Sir John Shore, now Lord 

 Teignmoutb, prefixed to the frst volume of Sir William Jones's Works. 



