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V. 



OBSERVATIONS ON THE SECT OF JAINS, 



BY H. T. COLEBROOKE, ESQ.. 



XHE information collected by Major MACKE]>f- 

 ziE, concerning a religious sect hitherto so imperfectly 

 known, as that of the Ja'mas, and which has been 

 even confounded with one more numerous and more 

 widely spread (the sect of Budd'ha), may furnish 

 the ground of further researches, from which an exact 

 knowledge of the tenets and practice of a very re- 

 markable order of people, may be ultimately expected. 

 What Major Mackenzie has communicated to the 

 society, comes from a most authentic source; the de- 

 clarations of two principal priests of the Jainas them- 

 selves. It is supported by similar information, pro- 

 cured from a like source, by Dr. F. Buchanan, 

 during his journey in Mysore, in the year following 

 the reduction of Seringapatam. Having the permis- 

 sion of Dr. Buchanan, to use the extracts, which I 

 had his leave to make from the journal kept by him 

 during that journey ; I have inserted, in the preced- 

 ing article, the information received by him from 

 priests of the Jaina sect. 



I am enabled to corroborate both statements, from 

 conversation with Jaina priests, and from books, in 

 my possession, written by authors of the Jama per- 

 suasion. Some of those volumes were procured for 

 me at Benares ; others were obtained from the pre- 

 sent Jagat-S'e't, at Morshedabad, who, having 

 changed his religion, to adopt the worship of Vish- 



