288 Asiatic Society. [May, 



ing the trifling expence which will be required to repair his nionunient, and to 

 preserve from obliteration that beautiful epitaph which he wrote for himself, and 

 which is so characteristic of the independent uprightness and the unaffected piety 

 of its author. 



" For the Committee of Papers, 

 " 20th May, 1835. " J. PRINSEP, -Secy." 



Proposed by the Rev. Dr. Mill, Vice-President, seconded by Mr. Col- 

 vin, and i-esolved, that the Report of the Committee be adopted and acted 

 upon. 



The draft of a Memorial to Government, regarding Oriental Publica- 

 tions, prepared by a Special Committee, appointed at the last meeting, was 

 then read by the President, taking the sense of the meeting on each para- 

 graph. The following is the Memorial, as finally adopted : 



To the Horible Sir C. T. Metcalfe, Bart. Gov. General of India in Council, 



6$c. S$c. 8$c. 

 Honorable Sir and Sirs, 



The Members of the Asiatic Society, now resident in Calcutta, have 

 requested me, as President of their body, to address the Honorable the 

 Governor General in Council, on a subject which engages their deepest 

 interest. 



2. — It has come to the knowledge of the Society that the funds which have 

 been hitherto in part applied to the revival and improvement of the lite- 

 rature and the encouragement of the learned natives of India, are hence- 

 forth to be exclusively appropriated to purposes of English education. 



3. — The Asiatic Society doesnot presume for a moment to doubt thepow- 

 er of the Government to apply its funds in such manner as it may deem to 

 be most consistent with the intentions of the legislature, and most advan- 

 tageous for the great object of educating its Indian subjects ; but they 

 contemplate with the most sincere alarm the effect that such a measure 

 might produce on the literature and languages of the country, which it 

 had been hitherto an object both with the Government and with the Edu- 

 cation Committee, under its orders, to encourage and patronize, unless 

 the proposition which they have the honor to submit, meet with the favo- 

 rable attention of Government. 



4. — The Society has been informed, that this depnrture from the course 

 hitherto pursued has been ordered to take such immediate effect, that the 

 printing of several valuable oriental works has been suddenly suspended, 

 while they were in different stages of progress through the press ; and that 

 the suspension has been alike extended to the legendary lore of the East, 

 and to the enlightened science of the West, if clothed in an Asiatic lan- 

 guage. 



5.— The cause of this entire change of system has been, the Society un- 

 derstand, a desire to extend the benefits of English instruction more widely 

 among the natives of India ; the fund hitherto appropriated to that pur- 

 pose not being deemed sufficient. 



6. — The Members of the Society are individually and collectively warm 

 advocates for the diffusion, as far as possible, of English arts, sciences, and 

 literature ; but they cannot see the necessity, in the pursuit of this favo- 

 rite object, of abandoning the cultivation of the ancient and beautiful 

 languages of the East. 



7. — The peculiar objects of the Asiatic Society, and the success with 

 which its members have, under the auspices of their illustrious founder, 

 prosecuted their researches into the hidden stores of oriental knowledge, 

 entitle them to form an opinion of the value of these ancient tongues, inti- 

 mately connected as they are with the history, the habits, the languages, 

 and the institutions of the people ; and it is this which emboldens them 



