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Veddnta-Sara, or Essence of the Ve'ddnta, an introduction into the 

 Veddnta Philosophy by Saddnanda Parivrdjakdchdrya, trans- 

 lated from the original Sanscrit by E. Roer, Librarian to the 

 Asiatic Society of Bengal. 



PREFACE. 



Of the Vedanta-Sara two translations have already been published, 

 one by Mr. Ward, (in his work View of" the History, Literature and 

 Mythology of the Hindoos) and the other in the German language, 

 by the late Professor O. Frank. Ward's translation, which is evident- 

 ly not taken from the Sanscrit, is very far from conveying a fair like- 

 ness of the original to the reader, and I need only quote the opinion 

 of Colebrooke with regard to it, to prove its entire failure as a correct 

 rendering of the original*. 



The German for which we are indebted to O. Frank, was published 

 together with the original text, in 1835 ; but, however creditable it is to 

 the author, it is also inexact as a translation. Although a good Sanscrit 

 scholar, and one of the first in Europe, who devoted his talents to that 

 language, he had to struggle with the difficulty of ascertaining the real 

 value of its technical terms, a difficulty which he had hardly the means 

 of removing ; for in Professor Wilson's excellent Sanscrit Dictionary, 

 only a few philosophical terms are explained, and without an expla- 

 nation of such terms by pundits, or an extensive course of reading, the 



* Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society Vol. II, p. 9. note. Mr. Ward has given, 

 in the fourth volume of his View of the History, Literature and Mythology of the 

 Hindoos (third edition,) a translation of the Vedanta-Sara. I wish to speak as gently 

 as I can of Mr. Ward's performance, but having collated this, I am bound to say, 

 it is no version of the original text, and seems to have been made from an oral expo- 

 sition through the medium of a different language, probably the Bengalese. This 

 will be evident to the Oriental Scholar on the slightest comparison, for example the 

 introduction, which does not correspond with the original in so much as a single word, 

 the name of the author's preceptor alone excepted ; nor is there a word of the trans- 

 lated introduction countenanced by any of the commentaries. At the commence- 

 ment of the treatise too, where the requisite qualifications of a student are enumerat- 

 ed, Mr. Ward makes his author say, that a person, possessing those qualifications, 

 is an heir to the Veda; there is no term in the text, nor in the commentaries, which 

 could suggest the notion of heir, unless Mr. Ward has so translated adhicari, (a com- 

 petent or qualified person) which in Bengalese signifies proprietor, or with the epithet 

 uttara, uttara adhicari, heir or successor. It would be needless to pursue the com- 

 parison further. The meaning of the original is certainly not to be gathered from 

 such translations as this, and (as Mr. Ward terms them) of other principal works of 

 the Hindoos, which he has presented to the public. 



