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critus to the Court of Chandragupta at Patna, B.C. 315. 
So, Alexander the Great encountered on the frontiers of 
India powerful nations and civilized people, whose sages 
had even then acquired a character for wisdom ; their books 
were sought for, and, if there be any truth in the tradition, 
(v. p. 158), sent by Callisthenes to Aristotle. In the time 
of Theophrastus, or 300 B.C., the knowledge of India was 
more accurate than even in later times ; while even in 
Hippocrates, or 150 years earlier, we find notices of many 
Indian drugs. Ctesias, who was a contemporary, had ob- 
tained some knowledge of India by his residence at the 
Persian Court ; through which channel, or by that of 
Egypt, and with both we have shown that the Greeks held 
constant communication, a knowledge of Indian products 
might have been communicated to the West. 
The above period, or that of Ctesias and Hippocrates, 
is only a century posterior to the times when there seems 
to have been considerable mental activity, with cultivation 
of literature, among all the nations of the East. Then 
Buddhism rose in the plains of India ; Pharaoh Nechao 
reigned in Egypt, and is thought to have circumnavigated 
Africa by means of the Phoenicians ; while Zoroaster 
flourished in Persia, and Confucius in China. But we 
have no means of ascertaining when Sanscrit literature 
first became known to the Chinese, though we know that 
there was considerable intercourse between India and 
China previous to the Christian era. 
Hence, there would appear little difficulty in admitting, 
even if we were without positive testimony, that the 
Indians might, like other Oriental nations, even at that 
time have made some advances in the literature and the 
science which we find treasured up in their sacred language. 
This would, moreover, account for the perseverance with 
which Grecian sages travelled in Eastern regions, even 
