THEORY OF THE EARTH. 151 



three nations which still exists, namely, the In- 

 dians. 



The truth is, that history does not exist at all 

 among them. In the midst of that infinity of books 

 on mystical theology and abstract metaphysics 

 which the Brahmins possess, and many of which 

 have been made known to us by the ingenious per- 

 severance of the English, we find no connected 

 account of the origin of their nation, or of the 

 vicissitudes of their society. They even pretend 

 that their religion prohibits them from recording 

 the events of the present time, their age of mis- 

 fortune *. 



According to the Vedas, the first revealed 

 works, on which are founded the whole religious 

 opinions of the Hindoos, the literature of this 

 people, like that of the Greeks, had its origin at 

 two great epochs ; the Ramaian and the Maha- 

 barat, a thousand times more monstrous in their 

 wonders than the Iliad and Odyssey, but in 

 which we also perceive some traces of a meta- 

 physical doctrine of that description generally 

 termed sublime. The other poems, which, toge- 

 ther with the two mentioned, compose the great 

 body of the Pouranas, are nothing else than me- 

 trical legends or romances, written at different 



* See Polier. Mythology of the Hindoos, vol. i. p. 8& 91. 



