T IBE T. 
281 
After much inquiry, and long investigation, I could never learn that 
either their tradition, or written records, mention any ancient people 
eminent for their knowledge, inhabiting towards the north. The ge¬ 
neral belief, as I was repeatedly assured by the Regent and Soopoon 
Choomboo, which prevails amongst them, is, that both the sciences 
and the arts had their origin in the holy city of Benares, which they 
have been taught to esteem, as the source and centre both of learning 
and religion. Hither they refer, as to a common origin, all the know¬ 
ledge of other nations, as well as the first dawn of light, that beamed 
upon their own spiritual and civil institutions. 
The ancient teachers of the faith which they profess, are said to have 
first proceeded from this sacred city, and, after having advanced to¬ 
wards the east, over the empire of China, to have directed their course 
towards the kingdoms of Europe. Their own instruction, in science 
and religion, they refer to a period, long prior to the appearance of the 
first gleam of knowledge, which enlightened the European world; 
though they are just enough to acknowledge their own marvellous defi¬ 
ciency, and confess, that, in these times, the natives of Asia are far 
surpassed by the inhabitants of Europe. But they attribute the unequal 
progress which different nations have made in the cultivation of the 
arts, to the difference of climate, and to the various degrees of appli¬ 
cation, which local deprivations and defects may have required, to 
guard against the particular evils resulting from them. As for them¬ 
selves, they retained so much of the arts as was necessary, or useful, 
in their peculiar situation and circumstances. 
Perfection in philosophy, or mechanics, in an inland region, remote 
