and in which he bestows due encomiums on the merits of his illustrious predecessor. Sir Wm. Jones discovered a passion, and a very extraordinary aptitude, for the acquirement of languages. Besides the usual accomplishments of a scholar, he was master of the more polished dialects of modern Europe, and spoke and wrote with the utmost fluency the French, Spanish, and Italian. Of the Portuguese and German, also, he had a competent knowlege. With such facility of apprehension, and great powers of memory, he commenced, at an early period of life, the study of Oriental literature. He became a thorough proficient in the Arabic and Persian tongues, understood the Hebrew, was even conversant with the Turkish idiom, and proceeded so far as to learn the radical characters of the Chinese language. It was to be expected, (says Sir J. Shore,) after his arrival in India, that he would eagerly embrace the opportunity of making himself master of Shanscrit, and the most enlightened professors of the doctrines of BRAHMA, confess with pride, delight, and surprize, that his knowledge of their sacred dialect was most critically correct and profound. The Pandits, who were in the habit of attending him, when I saw them after his death, at a public Durbar, could neither suppress their tears for his loss, nor find terms to express their admiration, at the wonderful progress he had made in their sciences.' Sir Wm. Jones, however, had views more enlarged than those of the mere linguist. He regarded languages as the instruments of knowlege, as venerable and instructive monuments of the opinions, the prejudices, and the institutions of the human race. Inspired by such motives, he proposed to the British government in India, as a work of national importance, the compilation of a copious digest of Hindu and Mohammedan law, from Sanscrit and Arabic originals. Humanity and sound policy indeed alike recommended it, to temper the decisions of English law by a respect to the antient usages of the natives. The task was immediately undertaken; and the hours which the president could spare from his professional duties were assiduously devoted to the superintendance of it. He traced the plan of the digest, prescribed its arrangement, and selected from among the learned Hindus and Mohammedans the most fit persons for its execution, The Pandits have proceeded with zeal, and brought their labours to a happy conclusion: the Maulavis have likewise nearly finished their portion of the work: but the death of Sir Wm. Jones has deprived us of the translation and the preliminary discourse which he designed to compose. He has only left us an English version and commentary of the Arabic text of the Sirajiyyah or Mohammedan law of inheritance; and it deserves to be mentioned, as an instance of his philanthropy, that the whole produce of that work, and of another in Sanscrit and Persian, was allotted for the relief of insolvent debtors. While occupied with more serious pursuits, he found leisure for recreating his mind with productions of fancy, which evince the versatility of his genius and the elegance of his taste. His hymns on the Hindu mythology, and his version of Sacontala, an antient Indian drama, will be admired by all the lovers of luxuriant poetry. From a paper in the hand-writing of Sir Wm. Jones, it appears that he had proposed to himself a wide range of inquiries. respecting the history and science of the Oriental nations. It consists of twenty three articles entitled Desiderata: the chief of which are, on the Philosophy, Geometry, Astronomy, Algebra, Medicine, Music, Mythology, and Drama of the antient Indians; translations of the Vedas and Puranas; a dictionary and grammar of the Sanscrit; and on the histories of India, Arabia, Persia, and the Tartar nations. It is a circumstance which deserves notice, that Sir William did not begin the arduous study of law till after he had reached his twenty-second year. His mind was then formed, and was seasoned by the maxims of general philosophy. As a judge, he was equally valued for his ability and his conscientious integrity. His addresses to the juries were models of liberality, tenderness, nice discrimination, and elegant diction. With most of the sciences he had some acquaintance. He was not ignorant of anatomy; and the interesting discoveries. lately made in chemistry engaged his attention. The lighter study of botany, originally begun under the confinement of a lingering disorder, was his last and favourite pursuit. Curiosity will ask, by what means Sir Wm. Jones was enabled to acquire such extensive knowlege, in the compass of a short life not exceeding eight-and-forty years? It was by the exact and regular distribution of his time. His studies began with the dawn of day, and were continued with a perseverance which surmounted every obstacle. Eager to gain information on all subjects, he listened with complacency to persons of every description, and of all varieties of talents and education. He was formed for social intercourse; and his gentle deportment and fluent conversation rendered him the delight of each company. He sought humble merit in her retreat, and fostered her with a maternal care. Humanity and Literature will long lament his loss! In examining the papers contained in this volume, we shall adopt that arrangement which the relation of the subjects naturally suggests. K 2 The The Tenth Anniversary Discourse delivered 28th February 1793, by the late President, on Asiatic History, civil and natural. Sir Wm. Jones here takes a rapid survey of the migrations of the human species, and the revolutions of empires, since the birth of history. He remarks the constant effect of despotism in benumbing the faculties, and debasing men to the level of the herds that graze; while he exults, with noble pride, in contemplating the energy and dignity of character which constantly attend the career of freedom. He laments that republican governments, as hitherto constituted, have seldom been durable, but have generally terminated in dark and oppressive oligarchies. Fragments exist, from which might be deduced a tolerably complete narrative of the history of the Hindus; and it would probably suggest hints for promoting the prosperity of those Indian territories which are subjected to British dominion, and which are inhabited by a placid and submissive race; amounting, in spite of the ravages of famine, to thirty millions of people. Geography, astronomy, and chronology, have in this part of Asia, shared the fate of authentic history, and, like that, have been so masked and bedecked in the fantastic robes of mythology and metaphor, that the real system of Indian philosophers and mathematicians can scarce be distinguished: an accurate knowledge of Sanscrit and a confidential intercourse with learned Bráhmens are the only means of separating truth from fable; and we may expect the most important discoveries from two of our members; concerning whom it may be safely asserted, that, if our society should have produced no other advantage than the invitation given to them for the public display of their talents, we should have a claim to the thanks of our country and of all Europe. Lieutenant WILFORD has exhibited an interesting specimen of the geographical knowledge deducible from the Puranas, and will in time present you with so complete a treatise on the ancient world known to the Hindus, that the light acquired by the Greeks will appear but a glimmering in comparison of that, which He will diffuse; while Mr. Davis, who has given us a distinct idea of Indian computations and cycles, and ascertained the place of the colures at a time of great importance in history, will hereafter disclose the systems of Hindu astronomers from NARED and PARASAR to MEYA, VARAHAMIHIR, and BHASCAR, and will soon, I trust, lay before you a perfect delineation of all the Indian asterisms in both hemispheres, where you will perceive so strong a general resemblance to the constellations of the Greeks as to prove that the two systems were originally one and the same, yet with such a diversity in parts, as to shew incontestably, that neither system was copied from the other; whence it will follow that they must have had some common source.' The jurisprudence of the Hindus and Arabs was the province which more particularly belonged to Sir William Jones: but but his essay on that subject was reserved for a future occasion. He only mentions that a very antient and classical Sanscrit book had lately enabled him to ascertain the site of the famous Palibothra, visited by Megasthenes; and which is the same with Pátaliputra, situated on the confluence of the Ganges and the Sona; the latter rivers being otherwise named Hiranyabahn, by the Greeks written Erannobeas. This discovery suggested another of greater moment; for Chandragupta, who, from a military adventurer, became sovereign of upper Hindustàn, and fixed the seat of empire at Pátaliputra, was no other than Sandracottus, who concluded a treaty with Seleucus Nicator. Of zoology, mineralogy, and botany, Sir William takes a cursory survey, in which there is little to arrest our attention. The manufactures of sugar and indigo have been known in the East upwards of two thousand years; and the Sanscrit books on dying and metallurgy must undoubtedly contain very curious facts, of general importance. The knowlege of the other Oriental languages would unveil many valuable secrets in the arts; and the difficulty of that acquisition, even in the Chinese, according to Sir William, is not so great as it is usually represented. Discourse the Eleventh :-On the Philosophy of the Asiatics.Delivered 20th February 1794. By the (late) President. This discourse is arranged under five heads. 1. Medicine.No original work is known in any of the Oriental languages, that treats of medicine as a science. Physic was practised indeed among the Orientals from the remotest ages, but it was a mere empirical history of diseases and remedies. The Ayurvéda, a composition ascribed to a coelestial physician, is, happily for the patient Hindu, almost entirely lost since (as Sir William rightly observes) a revealed science precludes improvement from experience, to which that of medicine ought, above all others, to be left perpetually open.' Curious fragments of that primeval work, however, are still extant; and, in the Veda itself, there is an entire Upanishad on the structure of the human viscera, with disquisitions on the growth of the foetus and the mysterious process of animal generation. 2. Metaphysics.-This opens a wide field of research. An acquaintance with the Sanscrit language will enable the inquisitive European to study the logics and metaphysics of the Brahmens, as comprised in their six philosophical Sústras, and explained by numerous glosses. He may now read likewise the works of the Saugatas, Bauddhas, Arhatas, Jainas, and other heterodox philosophers. Sir William had leisure for perusing only a little treatise ascribed to Vyása, elegantly com K3 posed, posed, though extremely brief and obscure: but it is fully elucidated by the very learned Sancara, whose commentary on the Védanta is commended in the highest terms. The eastern nátions seem also to have cultivated, with much subtlety, universal grammar; and a curious tradition prevailed in the Panjab, and in several Persian provinces, that among other Indian curiosities, which Callisthenes transmitted to his uncle, was a technical system of logic, which the Brahmens had communicated to the inquisitive Greek.' If this fact be admitted, (and it is hard to reject its evidence,) the syllogistic method of Aristotle must have been derived from the East.-The fundamental tenet of the Védanti school consisted, not in absolutely rejecting the existence of matter, but in contending that it has no essence independent of mental perception; and that external appearances and sensations are illusory, and would vanish if not continually upheld by the divine energy. The disciples of Buddha, on the contrary, are said to deny the existence of pure spirit, and to allow the actual existence of nothing but material substance. Thus the opinions, which have divided metaphysicians in modern Europe, had subsisted from time immemorial in the East.-3. Ethics. The moralists in the East were generally poets; their precepts were delivered in sententious maxims, in sprightly comparisons, or in agreeable apologues. Some zealous defenders of Christianity, being pressed on every side, have lately asserted, in proof of its divine origin, that it promulgated a new system of morals, more pure and elevated than ever taught before:-but those injunctions of forbearances and charity, to which they allude, were implied in a speech of Lysias, were distinctly expressed by Thales and Pittacus, and appear literally in the original of Confucius. It has been usual with zealous men, to ridicule and abuse all those, who dare on this point to quote the Chinese philosopher; but, instead of supporting their eause, they would shake it, if it could be shaken, by their uncandid asperity; for they ought to remember, that one great end of revelation, as it is most expressly declared, was not to instruct the wise and few, but the many and unenlightened. If the conversion, therefore, of the Pandits and Maulavis in this country shall ever be attempted by protestant missionaries, they must beware of asserting, while they teach the gospel of truth, what those Pandits and Maulavis would know to be false: the former would cite the beautiful Arya couplet, which was written at least three centuries before our era, and which pronounces the duty of a good man, even in the moment of his destruction, to consist not only in forgiving, but even in a desire of benefiting, his destroyer, as the Sandal-tree, in the instant of its overthrow, sheds perfume on the axe which fells it; and the latter would triumph in repeating the |