308 AN ESSAY ON THE^ 



the dwipa oi Hariri a, mentioned in the Bliagavata^ 

 along u'ith S'ancha, in the Soiith-West quarter of 

 the old continent. Tliis island being also called in 

 Arabic, the isle of the Moon, has occasioned some 

 confusion Doctor Vixcext has thrown much 

 light on this subject, in his learned and elaborate 

 treatise on the Periplus of the Krythrczan sea ; by 

 which it appears, that the notions of the Arabs, 

 relating to these seas, are more conformable to the 

 Purati'as than Ptolemy's description. The three 

 dwipas to the Eastward, are Yamala, or Malaya, 

 now the peninsula of Malaca, and the adjacent 

 islands; as for the dwipa o^Yama, its situation is 

 rather obscure; the third is Anga-dwipa, in the 

 North-East, by which they understand China. 

 There is very little about it in the Pur an as; and, 

 with regard to tlie dwipas of Yama and Ma- 

 laya, they will be the subject of a particular para- 

 graph. 



VI. There is another division of the old conti- 

 nent, extracted chiefly from the Bhdgdvata, the 

 Bramdn'dd, and Brahma-Pur anas, which represent 

 the world under the emblem of a Nymphcea, or Lo- 

 tos, floating on the ocean. There the whole plant 

 sig-nifies both the Earth and the two principles of 

 its fecundation. The stalk originates from the na- 

 vel of Vishnu, sleeping at the bottom of the 

 ocean ; and the flower is described as the cradle of 

 Brahma', or mankind. The germ is both Meru 

 and the Linga: the petals and filaments are the 

 mountains which encircle Meru, and are also the 

 type of the Yoni; the four lea\ es of the calyx are 

 the four vast dwipas. or countries, toward the four 

 cardinal points. Eight external leaves, placed two 

 by two, in the intervals, are eight subordinate 

 duipas or countries. 



