tensions of their own annals leave the Chinese inhabiting the tpoo^a^ 

 totally ignorant of agriculture^ nearly five hundred years after the de- 

 luge."* The Y King, or oldest of their sacred books, consists of hori- 

 zontal lines, entire or cut, which are multiplied and combined into sixty^ 

 four different forms or positions. They appear involved in almost im- 

 penetrable mystery, as well as antiquity ; but, so far as they have been 

 deciphered, they seem, in conjunction with the other sacred books, to 

 contain a nummary of patriarchal religion, or that which alone ought to 

 be regarded as the established religion of China ; under which the people 

 are taught to know and reverence the Supreme Being, and to contemplate 

 the emperor as both king and pontiff ; to whom, exclusively, it belongs 

 to prescribe ceremonies, to decide on doctrines, and, at certain times of 

 the year, to offer sacrifices for the nation.! 



It becomes me, however, to observe that, with all the researches of our 

 most learned writers, we are still involved in a considerable degree of un- 

 certainty concerning the chronology of several of the Oriental empires, 

 and still more so concerning their most ancient publications. Freret 

 and M. Bailly, generally speaking, concur in the periods assigned to the 

 earliest Oriental writings by Sir William Jones ; but the pretension of 

 several of them, and especially of the Puranas, or series of mythological 

 histories, to a very high antiquity, has lately been powerfully attacked by 

 Mr. Bentley, in his dissertation on the Suryk Siddhanta ;J and still later by 

 Captain Wilford, in his scries of Essays on the Sacred Isles of the West ;| 

 and a fall in the pretensions of these may probably be succeeded by a 

 like fall in those of various others. I! 



Elements of Chinese Grammar ; with a Preliminary Dissertation on the Cbaractera an^ 

 Colloquial Medium ol tht Chinese. Scranipore. 4to. 1814. 

 t Lettres Edif et Cur. torn. xxi. p. 218. 1781. 

 i Butler, p. ii. iit supr. p. 175. Asiatic Researches, yol. vi. 



§ Asiatic Researches, vol x. See also Edin. Rev. No. xxxii. p. 387—389. The differ- 

 ence is indeed wonderful ; for while Sir William Jones reckons the Puranas at nearly 2500 or 

 2600 years old, "it is evident, ' says Mr. Bentley, that none of the modern roiuattces 

 commonly called thf Puranas, at least in the form in which they now stand, are older than 

 484 ; and that some of them are ct mpilations of still later tiroes." — Asiatic Researches^ 

 vol. viii p. 240. And to nearly as late a date are they assiG;Bed by Mr. Wilford ; "They 

 are certainly," say? he, *' a modern compilation from valuable materials, that, I am afraid, 

 no longer exist. An astronomical observation of the heliacal rising of Canopus mentioned in 

 two of the Puranas \iuU this bey«»iid doubt." Id. vol. p. 244. Mr. Coleman is of this same 

 opinion ; at least in respect to one of them, the Sri Bhagaveta ; which, he further tells nSf 

 h considered even by many of the learned Hindus as the work of a grammarian supposed 

 to have lived about 600 years ago. Id. vol. viii. p. 487. 



H There is a doubt which has the best claim to the highest antiquity, the religion of Boodh 

 or that of Brahnaa. One of the most authentic accounts we have of the former is that trans°^ 

 mittfd to the Ame rican Board ot Missions by Mr. Judsoo, a man of great excellence and 

 intelligence, who has resided in ihe Burman empire as a missionary, at Rangoon or at Ava, 

 from 1814, io, I believe, the presen' time ; to which I shall also have occasion to advert 

 hereafter. Mr. Judson i« intimately acquainted with the language, the customs, and estab- 

 lished creed of the Burman empire ; and, according to his account, the priests of Boodhism, 

 thouffh they claim for themselves a higher origin than those of Brahnta, make no pretence to 

 au extravagant antiquity. " Boodh," says Mr. Judson, " whose proper name is Gandama, 

 appeared in Hindoostan about two thousand three hundred tears ago, and gave a 

 new form and dress to the old tran.smijrration systemj which, in some shape or other, has 

 existed (rom time immemorial. The Brahrrtans, in the mean tim£, dressed up the system 

 after their fashion ; and both these modifications struggled for the ascendancy. At length 

 the family of Gaudama, which had held the sovereignty of India, was dethroned, his religion 

 was denounced, and his disciples took refuge in Ceylon, and the neighbouring countries. In 

 that island, about 500 years after the decease and supposed ANNmiLATiON of xHEia 

 TEACHER OR DEITY, they composed their sacred writings in the Sanscrit which had obtained 

 in Ceylon ;. whence they were conveyed by sea to the Indo* Chinese nations (those of the . 

 Burman empire.) Bootlhism, however, ha'i gained a footing in Burmah before the arrival of 

 the sacred l^ooks from Ceylon. It is commonly maintained that it was iatrodoced by hw 

 emissaries before his death,*'* Correspondence^ 



