466 ESSAY, &c. 



From this very clear rule it plainly appears, that whatever may havs 

 been the cafe in Europe^ yet long before the time of Briggs the /I?/ 

 bians were acquainted with *• the rule for generating the coefficients 

 the terms fucceflively one from another, of any power of a Binom 

 independently of thofe of any other power;*' and thus proof 

 added to the many others, that Mufulmans^ before the Ilimulus i 

 Muhammed's newly imbibed do6trines had ceafed and their narcot 

 effefts began to appear, were much fuperior in fcience to contemp( 

 rary Chriftians. 



It is but juftice that I fhould add, that my firft knowledge of th 

 rule was obtained from the KhazanuUul Urn, which is a complet 

 fyftem of Arithmetic, Algebra, and Geometry, as far as known to th 

 Arabians and Hindus, compofed in the prelent day by Khan Jee, 

 moft intelligent inhabitant of Patna* On my requeuing to know frora 

 what original authors the rule was taken, this gentleman was kin(' 

 enough to favour me with the above extraft. No more I think i? 

 required to demonftrate, that his own work highly deferves tranflatioi 

 and publication. 



