408 the president's seconb 



are momentous objects of refearch to an imperial, but, 

 which is a character of equal dignity, a commercial, 

 people. 



\1lotany may be defcribed by metaphors drawn from 

 the fcience itielf, we may juftly pronounce a minute 

 acquaintance with plants, their claffes, orders, kinds, 

 and f pedes, to be its flowers, which can only produce 

 fruit by an application of that knowledge to the pur- 

 pofes of life, particularly to diet, by which difeafesmay 

 be avoided ; and to medicine, by which they may be re- 

 medied. For the improvemen of the laft mentioned 

 art, than which none furely can be more beneficial to 

 mankind, the virtues of minerals alfo mould be accu- 

 rately known. So highly has medical fkill been prized 

 by the ancient Indians, that one of the fourteen Retna's, 

 or precious things, which their gods are believed to have 

 produced by churning the ocean with the mountain 

 Mandara,\vas a learned phyfician. What their old books 

 contain on this fubjecl we ought certainly to difcover, 

 and that without lofs of time ; left the venerable, but 

 abitrufe, language in which they are compofed, mould 

 ceafe to be perfectly intelligible, even to the beft edu- 

 cated natives, through a want of powerful invitation to 

 ftudy it. Bernier, who was himTelf of the faculty, men- 

 tions approved medical books in Sanfcrit, and cites a 

 few aphorifms, which appear judicious and rational; 

 but we can expect nothing fo important from the works 

 of Hindu, or Mufelman phyficians, as the knowledge, 

 which experience muft have given them, ofifimple me- 

 dicines. I have feen an Indian prefcription of fifty-four, 

 and another of ffty-fix, ingredients ; but fuch compo- 

 fitions are always to be fufpected, fince the effe£t of one 

 ingredient may deftroy that of another; and it were 

 better to find certain accounts of a lingle leaf or berry, 

 than to be acquainted with the molt elaborate com- 

 poundsj unlefs they too have been proved by a multi- 

 tude 



