ANTIQUITIES. 
direction of Mr. Hastings gave the first spe- 
cimen which appeared of the early wisdom 
of the Indians, and their extensive skill in 
jurisprudence. But the attention of the world 
was principally roused by the publication of 
the Bhagvat Geeta, edited in 1785 by Mr. 
Wilkins? It was the episode only of a larger 
poem ; but its theological and metaphysical 
doctrines were of the profoundest kind : it 
was represented to contain all the grand 
mysteries of the Hindoo religion ; and laid 
claim to the venerable antiquity of four 
thousand years. Tire Heetopades, the Sa- 
contala, and Ayeen Akbery, were the prin- 
cipal succeeding publications ; the lights 
from which, added to those of the Asiatic 
Researches, occasioned Mr. Maurice to give 
the antiquities ot India a more deep and 
elaborate investigation, than they ever had 
received before." Till this book appeared, 
the antiquities of the Hindoos were consi- 
dered by the generality of readers as unfa- 
thomable ; and by the sceptical philosopher 
as affording arguments in respect to the age 
of the world, which struck at once at the 
root of the Mosaic system. With these au- 
thorities in hand, Mr. Maurice proceeded 
to elucidate the obscure history of the Ava- 
tars, or the ten descents of Veeshnu. The 
persons who are stated by the Indian writers 
to have flourished so many thousand years in 
the earliest ages, he supposes to have been 
not of terrestrial but celestial origin; and 
that their empire was rather the empire of 
imagination in the skies than that ot real 
power on the earth. He considers that the 
year of ordinary reckoning, and the year of 
Brahma, are of a nature very widely differ- 
ent ; and that the whole jargon of yugs, or 
grand periods, has no foundation but in the 
great solar and lunar cycles, or planetary re- 
volutions. In the Indian Antiquities the 
greater part of the preliminary ground, which 
the student must of necessity go over, is 
cleared. The antient geographical divisions 
of India, according to the classical writers 
of Greece and Rome, and of Hindostan, ac- 
cording to the Hindoos themselves, are re- 
conciled : the analogies of the Brahmanic 
with other systems of theology considered ; 
and the grand code of civil laws, the ori- 
ginal form of government, and the various 
and profound literature of Hindostan, are 
compared throughout with the laws, govern- 
ment, and literature, of Persia, Egypt, and 
Greece. 
But after all, perhaps, the clearest notions 
of what the student may expect to discover 
in his Indian inquiries, may be gathered 
from the few papers published in the Asiatic 
Researches, by sir William Jones ; written 
in consequence of the institution of a so- 
ciety for inquiring into the history, civil and 
natural, the antiquities, arts, sciences, and 
literature, of Asia. 
His first dissertation was on the orthogra- 
phy of Asiatic words in Roman letters, a 
want of attention to which had occasioned 
great confusion in history and geography; 
and he proposed a system, which was not 
only at once useful to the learned, and es- 
sential to the student, but the convenience of 
which had been proved by careful observa- 
tion and long experience. The gods of 
Greece, Italy, and India, were the next ob- 
jects of attention ; and in this dissertation 
the general union or affinity between the 
most distinguished inhabitants of the primi- 
tive world in regard to theological concerns, 
at the time when they first deviated from 
the rational adoration of the true God, is 
inferred. The general character and affini- 
ties of the antient pantheon of India are con- 
sidered with the best attention. Ganesa, 
the Hindoo divinity of Wisdom, is compared 
with the Janus ot the Romans ; Menu, or 
Satyvrata (whose general history bears a 
trong resemblance to Noah’s), with Saturn ; 
the Lachsmi of the Hindoos, or goddess of 
Abundance, with Geres ; and Zeus, or Jupi- 
ter, in his various capacities, compared with 
the triple divinity Veeshnu, Siva, Brahma. 
Others of minor consideration are also fully 
noticed, the explanation of whose various at- 
tributes must be sought for in the disserta- 
tion itself : in which it seems to be fairly 
proved, that a connection subsisted between 
the old idolatrous nations of Egypt, India, 
Greece, and Italy, long before they migrated 
to their several settlements, and consequent- 
ly before the birth of Mpses.; a proposition, 
says sir William Jones, which will in no de- 
gree affect the truth and sanctity of the Mo- 
saic history. 
From Goverdhan Caul, the society al- 
ready mentioned received a valuable com- 
munication on the literature of the Hindoos, 
from a work in the Sanscrit. It was trans- 
lated, and a commentary added. In the 
text, the Vedas are considered by the Hin- 
doos as the fountain of all knowledge human 
and divine ; and the commentary concludes 
with this remarkable expression, that if Eu- 
ropeans wish to form a correct idea of Indian 
religion and literature, let them begin with 
forgetting all that has been written on the 
subject by antients or moderns, before the 
publication of the Gita. 
From sir William Jones’s fourth anniver- 
sary Discourse, delivered to the Asiatic So- 
ciety in 1786, we may form some notion of 
the various discoveries to which future ex- 
ertions may give rise, not only in the litera- 
ture, but the history, sciences, and art, of 
Asia. 
India on its most enlarged scale, in which 
the antients appear to have understood it, 
comprizes an area of near forty degrees on 
each side: it is divided on the west from 
Persia by the Arachosian mountains ; limited 
on the east by the Chinese part of the far- 
ther peninsula ; confined on the north by the 
wilds of Tartary ; and extending to the south 
as far as the isles of Java. By India, in 
short, is meant that whole extent of country 
in which the primitive religion and language 
of the Hindoos prevail at this day with more 
or less of their antient purity ; and in which 
the NV.gari letters are still used with more or 
less deviation from their original form. Its 
inhabitants have no resemblance either in 
their figure or manners to any of the na- 
tions contiguous to them ; their sources of 
wealth are still abundant : in their manufac- 
tures of cotton they surpass all the world ; 
and though now degenerate and abased, 
there remains enough to show that in some 
early age they were splendid in arts and 
arms, happy in government, wise in legisla- 
tion, and eminent in various knowledge. 
The Sanscrit language , whatever may be its 
antiquity, is of a wonderful structure ; more 
perfect than the Greek, more copious than 
the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than 
119 
either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger 
affinity, both in the roots of verbs and in the 
forms of grammar, than could possibly have 
been produced by accident. The characters, 
as we have already mentioned, are Nagari. 
Of the Indian religion enough has been al- 
ready said. Of their philosophy, sir William 
Jones observes, that in the more retired 
scenes, in groves and in seminaries of learn- 
ing, we may perceive the Brahmans and the 
Sarmanas of Clemens disputing in the forms 
of logic, or discoursing on the vanity of hu- 
man enjoyments, on the immortality of the 
soul, her emanation from the eternal Mind, 
her debasement, wanderings, and final union 
with her source. The six philosophical 
schools, whose principles are explained in 
the Dersana Sastra, comprise all the meta- 
physics of the old Academy, the Stoa, the 
Lyceum : nor is it possible to read the Ve- 
danta, or the many fine compositions in the 
illustration of it, without believing that Py- 
thagoras and Plato derived their sublime 
theories from the same fountain, with the 
sages of India. The remains of architecture 
and sculpture seem to prove an early con- 
nection between India and Africa. Of their 
antient arts and manufactures, little but the 
labours of the Indian loom and needle are at 
this day known ; but from a curious passage 
in one of their sacred law tracts relating to 
the extraordinary interest of money, in re- - 
gard to maritime concerns, it should seem - 
that they were in the early ages a commer- 
cial people. The Hindoos are said to har e 
boasted of three inventions, all of which are 
indeed admirable ; the method of instructing 
by apologues, the decimal scale, and the 
game of chess : and could their numerous 
works on grammar, rhetoric, and music, 
which are now extant, be explained in some 
language generally known, it would be found 
that they had still higher pretensions to the . 
praise of a fertile and inventive genius,. 
Their- lighter poems are lively and elegant;* 
their epic magnificent . and sublime. Their 
most antient medical book, entitled Chereca, • 
is believed to be the work of Siva: for each-* 
of the divinities in their triad has at least on a. 
sacred composition ascribed to him. On . 
history and geography their works are few ; . 
and their astronomical and mathematical 
writings are still secret. 
Cursory as the observations are which have 
been here brought together, their expansion, 
and illustration would require volumes. 
Of the Avatars, or descents of the Deity 
in his capacity of preserver, we have little to 
say. The three first, says sir William Jones, 
apparently relate to some stupendous con- 
vulsion of our globe from the fountains of the 
deep; and the fourth exhibits, the miracu- 
lous punishment of pride and impiety. The 
three first, he thought, related to the same 
event, shadowed by a moral, a metaphysical, , 
and a metaphysical and an astronomical al- 
legory ; and all three, connected with the 
hieroglvphical sculptures of the old Egyp- 
tians. The fourth avatar was a lion issuing 
from a bursting column of marble to devour 
a blaspheming monarch, who would other- 
wise have slain his religious son ; and of the 
remaining six he says, not one has the least 
relation to the deluge.. The tenth avatar, 
we are told, is yet to come ; and is expected 
to appear mounted (like the crowned con- 
queror in the Apocalypse) on a white horse,. 
