1GG Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. [July, 



this rule. For, rich and immense as the resources of this language are, 

 a very large number of Greek and Persian terms were adopted, even 

 from the time before the Hijra, which in some cases seem altogether 

 useless. Thus we find even in classical works cjLL*)L«» or cA^UjjJ P. 

 hospital, for A. U-kJ \j\*j&&& to cast up an estimate, from the P. 

 cjU? for the good^!^£> £<*& a tax, tribute, the Greek tci£is for the 

 A. ^f^ and hundreds more. The Arabs have certainly a large number 

 of indigenous scientific terms, as is shewn in the grand dictionary 

 published by Drs. Sprenger and Lees for our Society. But these 

 technical terms are altogether insufficient for modern science. It is 

 a well known fact that the Arabic and Sanscrit possess a large number 

 of metaphysical technical terms ; and I think that every modern work 

 on metaphysics could be easily translated into Arabic and Sanscrit, 

 without the use of a single Western technical term. But this is 

 the case with every language. For in metaphysics we have as yet 

 no general terminology, as in Natural Science, nor do even the 

 technical terms of one English philosopher in every case agree with 

 those of another. I mention this, in order that the immense number 

 of Sanscrit metaphysical terms, which are more or less accepted, may 

 not induce some of my learned friends to extend their expectations 

 to the technical terms of other sciences. 



Babu Rajendralala Mitra mentioned among others, the fact, that 

 useless words, like ' hot baths' for yarm gosl, had become accepted by 

 the vulgar. I would not call this a technical term, but view it rather 

 as an adoption necessary to avoid ambiguity, like jposrnan, a/is, slece, 

 cldk, silwaran, for postpone, office, slice, clock, sale -wan ant, &c. 

 Europeans have not recommended their use. The vulgar has got hold 

 of them and refuses to let them go now. But Babu Bajendralala Mitra 

 mentioned also Botany, and said that the Bengali or Sanscrit had 

 beautiful words for petal, stalk, &c. and that the introduction of these 

 English words would be mischievous. But the introduction of such terms 

 even is not intended. We do not care whether the English, French, 

 German, Bengali, &c. have the same or different words for things 

 like petal, stalk, &c. : we could not call such words technical terms. 

 For they existed in the language before the science of Botany was 

 cultivated. But all European savants give to the plants the same 

 scientific name, and in this respect it is desirable, that India 



