OF THE ASIATICS. \*]J 



selves, and that, instead of returning evil for evil, we 

 should confer benefits even on those who injure us : 

 but the first rule is implied in a speech of Ly si as, 

 and expressed in distinct phrases by Th ales andPiT- 

 tacusj and I have even seen it, word for word, in the 

 original of Confucius, which I carefully compared 

 with the Latin translation. It has been usual with 

 zealous men to ridicule and abuse all those who dare 

 on this point to quote the Chinese philosopher ; but, 

 instead of supporting their cause they would shake it, 

 if it could be shaken, by their uncandid asperity ; 

 for they ought to remember, that one great end of 

 revelation, as it is most expressly declared, was not 

 to instruct the wise and few, but the many and 

 unenlightened. If the conversion, therefore, of the 

 Pandits and Maul avis in this country shall ever be 

 attempted by Protestant missionaries, they must be- 

 ware of asserting, while they teach the gospel of 

 truth, what those Pandits and Maidavis would know 

 to be false. The former would cite the beautiful 

 Arya couplet, which was written at least three cen- 

 turies before our sera, and which pronounces the duty 

 of a good man, even in the moment of his destruction, 

 to consist not only in for giving , hut even in a desire of 

 tencfitting, his destroyer, as the Sandal tree, in the in- 

 stant of its overthrow, sheds perfume on the axe which 

 fells it\ and the latter would triumph in repeating the 

 verse of S adi, who represents a return of good for good 

 as a slight reciprocity ; but says to the virtuous man, 

 " Confer henejits on him who has injured thee ;" using 

 an Arabic sentence, and a maxim apparently of the 

 Vol. IV. N ancient 



