On the Hindu Astronomical Tables* 



[July 



ON THE HINDU ASTRONOMICAL TABLES. 



(From the Edinburgh New Philosophical Journal, Jan. 1836.} 



There is a very singular revival of a justly exploded opinion of the 

 character of these tables, in the published proceedings of the Anni- 

 versary Meeting of the Royal Asiatic Society, held on Saturday 9th 

 May 1835, appended to the journal of that Society. 



Few persons at all conversant with the recent progress of science 

 and literature, are ignorant of the opinions of Bailly and Playfair on. 

 this subject, and of the advantage that some persons took of them to 

 propagate, with great zeal, a total scepticism respecting the autherjT 

 ticity of the true records of mankind, which we possess in Europe, the 

 acknowledged chronology of these not agreeing with such an early 

 advance of science in India. It was in vain that Mr. Jones had early 

 demonstrated the true nature of the Hindu Tables, in opposition to the 

 opinion of Bailly and Playfair. By a certain class of writers, they 

 were held forth as a faithful record of actual observations, for many 

 years after the death of Bailly. In the Edinburgh Review, especially,, 

 as if some writer in that work had taken the opinion of Bailly and. 

 Playfair under his special protection, we had a series of papers taking 

 the accuracy of that opinion for granted, down to the very time when 

 the question was finally set at rest in Laplace's Systeme du Monde. 



Sir Alexander Johnston, as we learn from a note appended to the 

 report of the Anniversary Meeting, has been requested to reduce 

 his observations to writing; and it is to be hoped may correct the 

 oversight, in the published report, of the lucid statement of Laplace, 

 It is the object of the Royal Asiatic Society, as we learn from Sir Alex- 

 ander Johnston's speech, to diffuse European learning and science in 

 India; but the young gentlemen whom we send out thither with that 

 view, would be less stimulated to their noble task, and especially could 

 feel no interest in the introduction among the Hindus of that which is 

 infinitely more valuable than human learning and science, and that 

 is our revealed Theology and Ethics, were they to leave our shores 

 infested with any degree of the scepticism appended to the opinion of 

 Bailly and Playfair, and go into regions where they could have little 

 opportunity for correcting that erroneous opinion. 



What follows is copied from Harte's translation of the Systeme du 

 Monde, vol. ii. pp. 220, 221, 222 (Dublin 1830). The demonstrations 

 are too varied, complete, and consis tent, to leave any doubt that the 

 Hindu Tables are the result, not of observation, but of erroneous calcu^ 

 lation backwards to anterior time. 



"In Persia and India," says Laplace, " the commencement of astro- 

 nomy is lost in the darkness which envelopes the origin of these people. 



" The Indian tables indicate a knowledge of astronomy considerably 

 advanced, but every thing shews that it is not of an extremely remote 



