and Geography, to correct our old-fashioned notion by their new light!

The other Puranas are not more rational. If we take the Sheeve Purana, we find Bramah, one of their chief deities, giving this account of his origin. He says, that from the navels of the first man and woman sprang a lotus flower several thousand miles long, and that from this lotus he came into existence. He then reflected ' with vast astonishment,' who he was and whence he had come. He at last wisely determined, that as he came into existence from the lotus flower this must be his creator, and therefore travelled a hundred years towards its root; but as he could not reach that, he turned about and travelled a hundred years upwards, and yet could not get out. At last Vishnu appeared to him, with whom he quarelled and was going to fight, when the other god, Siva, who is here made the Supreme, appeared and prevented the combat. Vishnu then, for a thousand years, in the shape of a boar, descended to Patal; and Brahma, in the figure of a goose, wandered to the world above.

In the same Purana we read of a mountain making an image and drawing the figure of a letter on paper; of the god Siva's cutting off one of Brahma's five heads for some impoliteness of speech, and of the head's constantly pursuing Siva till he came in sight of a certain ling. We cannot decently explain what is meant by a ling, yet we have them in abundance in this book, and are told, that he who rising early shall repeat the names of twelve of them, will be freed from all his crimes and obtain his desire.

The Brahme Vivertte Purana appears to have no other end than to assert the merit of living at Benares, and it pursues its subject in a series of dull, though fantastic absurdities. We particularise these three Puranas, because they have appeared in an European dress. We wish the two latter had been fully translated.

6

It is of some importance to give these cursory specimens of the contents of the Puranas, because together with the two sacred poems, they seem to comprise all that the Bramins have of ancient history. Lieutenant Wilford tells us that these intelligent men discountenance both historical and geographical books. This,' he adds, they have often acknowledged to me, saying They have the Puranas; what do they want more?'* Such a remark suits the taste and intellect of a people whose poets, according to Mr. Wilkins, have made the Goose the emblem of eloquence and elegance.†

Their Bibliography is on a par with their Geography and Chronology. If it were worth while,' says Sir William Jones, ' to calculate the age of Menu's institutes according to the Bramins, we must multiply 4,320,000 years by six times seventy-one, and add to the product the number of years already passed in the seventh Manwantara." Surely it is more reasonable to extract sun-beams from

*As. Res. vol. 8, p. 268. † Heetoopades, p. 296. As. Res. v. 2, p. 116.

cucumbers with the philosophers of Laputa, than to take our history or our chronology from the writings of the Bramins.

Yet it is amazing to see, in the dissertations and publications of most of our Asiatic gentlemen, how anxious they are to accredit more or less of these absurd antiquities. Although nothing has ever appeared in the world with the characters of wilful and wanton falsehood more grossly palpable; although the fictitious Histories of Annius of Viterbo, Jeffery of Monmouth, and Archbishop Turpin, are probable and reasonable in comparison, yet have the Braminical antiquities been listened to with a respect, and repeated with a credulity in the highest degree discreditable to a reasoning age. In vain had our most learned and scientific scholars during the last two centuries, by their Herculean labours, settled the chronology of the world, and of ancient history, on just and true foundations; in vain had the historiographers of the various countries of Europe at last emancipated themselves from the wild fables of ostentatious vanity, and determined the antiquities of their several nations by precise and authentic boundaries. These desirable objects had scarcely been obtained with laudable, but in some cases painful, sacrifices of national vanity, when a sudden assault was made upon our chronological repose by the phantoms of Hindostan. Even enlightened men, misled by other theories and other wishes, caught a revolutionary mania, and one of them received the fantastic apparitions with such fond credulity, that he wrote volumes to assure us that not only our history but our geography must be subverted; and that Siberia, now the region of eternal snows, was once the scene of an equatorial summer, and the source of human civilization! The follies of former times were revived and the dreamer of Sweden, Olaus Rudbeck, found, in the eighteenth century, a competitor for the laurels of visionary history in a Parisian philosopher.

6

6

We have hitherto mentioned only the reveries of the orthodox Bramins. If from thence we proceed to other Hindu sects, as for instance, to the numerous sect of the Jains, it is literally going farther and faring worse. We there hear of a period of two thousand millions of millions of oceans of years; of men living ten millions of years, &c. &c.* Well might Mr. Colebrooke say that the Jainas are still more extravagant in their inventions than the prevailing 'sects of Hindus, absurd as these are in their fables.' But when we reflect that on the faith of books containing such monstrous reveries as those we have noticed, the simple and probable chronology of the Hebrews has been deserted by many, though strictly coinciding with all the authentic remains of ancient history, we cannot but perceive with regret, how many can swallow the camel with ease who can find no room for the gnat!

It is in this spirit of credulous incredulity, that it has been gravely

*As. Researches, vol. 9, p. 313, 314.

proposed as a serious question, whether Moses did not borrow from the Bramins!

But we are happy to hail the dawn of reason which is beginning to appear in the minds of our oriental literati, and it is to hasten the advancing day that we have indulged in this critique. The name of Mr. Bentley will descend with great distinction to posterity for his intelligent criticism on the antiquity of the Braminical books and their astronomical computations. It was a bold undertaking to be the first to break the spell of credulity which was lulling Europe into such an unphilosophical lethargy. But he will soon find himself rewarded by his success. We are satisfied that the venerated books of the Bramins need only to be translated, in order to enable every man who can read, to discover their imposture; but till these translations appear, the researches of Mr. Bentley and those of our Sanscrit students, who follow his footsteps, will be wanted to undeceive such as have been hitherto deluded. Lieutenant Wilford, who is familiar with the Puranas, and has personally experienced the frauds of the modern Bramins, has so far advanced in the progress to true criticism and common sense, as to tell us that with regard to history the Hindus really have nothing but romances.' He says their "works, whether historical or geographical, are most extravagant <compositions, in which little regard indeed is paid to truth.-In their treatises on geography they seem to view the globe through a < prism as if adorned with the liveliest colours. Mountains are of solid gold, bright like ten thousand suns, and others are of precious < gems. Some of silver borrow the mild and dewy beams of the ' moon. There are rivers and seas of liquid amber, clarified butter, milk, curds, and intoxicating liquors. Geographical truth is sacrificed to a symmetrical arrangement of countries, mountains, lakes, and < rivers, with which they are highly delighted. There are two geographical systems among the Hindus. The first and most ancient is according to the Puranas, in which the earth is considered as a 'convex surface gradually sloping towards the borders and surround'ed by the ocean. The second and modern system is that adopted 'by astronomers, and certainly the worst of the two. The Pauranics considering the earth as a flat surface, or nearly so, their knowledge 'does not extend much beyond the old continent or the superior hemisphere; but astronomers being acquainted with the globular shape of the earth, and of course with an inferior hemisphere, were under the necessity of borrowing largely from the superior part in order to fill up the inferior one. Thus their astronomical knowledge, instead of being of service to geography, has augment

* See the advertisement to the fifth volume of the Asiatic Researches.

❝ed the confusion, distorted and dislocated every part, every country, ' in the old continent.'*

Even Mr. H. Colebrooke, who still looks at these books with an eye of favour, in his last Esssay confesses that, "The mythology of the orthodox Hindus, their present chronology adapted to astronomical periods, their legendary tales, their mystical allegories, are 'abundantly extravagant.'+ We therefore hope that the day will soon arrive when Sanscrit literature will be read with the spirit of rational criticism, and the bold pretensions of the Bramins to an immeasurable antiquity, and the wild dates of their compositions be examined with a scepticism proportioned to their extravagance and obvious untruth.

Mr. Wilkins's preface to his Sanscrit Grammar has led us into these observations. But we have no desire to withhold from him or Mr. Colebrooke, or the other gentlemen who have employed themselves in studying this language and its literature, the commendations to which they are intitled. Though objectionable on the grounds we have mentioned, the Sanscrit books are still subjects of great curiosity, and it will be a high obligation to the world to put them into an English dress. We do not believe that even the Vedas are nearly so old as the poems of Homer, and we are satisfied that some of the Puranas are very modern. But still it is clear that they contain many fragments of ancient traditions which are worth exploring, and at all events they present us with a specimen of one of the ancient languages of the world.

Though the Sanscrit be neither so ancient nor so curious as the Hebrew it certainly is one of the Parent languages of Asia. In this light it may be contemplated as on a level with the Russian, the Welsh, and the Saxon, which represent so many other families of languages, and which therefore are worthy to be preserved and studied. What languages have emanated from each of these, or from some more remote ancestor of each, it is certainly highly curious to trace, as well as to observe the degree of affinity which the elder parents discover to each other. As far as our researches have extended, all the languages of Europe and Asia have a very strong degree of consanguinity; they all point to some great original tongue which has been broken to pieces, and whose fragments have been scattered round the world by the dispersion and diffusion of its primeval population. This is the fact which the Mosaic history implies, and the more fully we explore the ancient state of the various languages of the world, the more this interesting circumstance seems to be confirmed. But this is an immense subject which demands lucubrations of no common difficulty and no small extent, and probably one life would hardly suffice for its complete elucidation.

We cannot close this article without recommending that the Ve das and the Puranas should be fully translated like the Bagavadam. It is only by a close and minute comparison of the different books with each other, that the nature and origin of their traditions can be ascertained or their value appreciated. When extracts only are given, the literati of Europe can judge but imperfectly,-the most valuable parts are often left behind. Nor will the works be less acceptable, because they may abound with extravagant fictions. In this case the publication often removes a cloud of mysterious wonder, which an ignorance of its real nature has permitted to intervene. We all

know the tone in which the Zendavesta was mentioned while it remained inaccessible in its vernacular language. It was equalled with the Jewish and Christian scriptures, the value of which was depreciated by the solemn assurance that other nations had also their sacred books; their Zendavestas, their Sadders, and their Shasters, meriting as much attention as those which we had hitherto exclusively venerated. The Zendavesta was at last translated and published, and the bubble of wonder burst, because every one that could read might see that it was an unmeaning chaos of grave but fantastic nonsense. The sacred writings of the Bramins have been long mentioned with the same phrases of solemn wonder, which would still have misled the public if the translations and extracts of them, which have successively ap peared, had not discovered their puerility and imposture. It is therefore important that the Sanscrit books, which have been held up as so sacred and so ancient, and which some of our learned Orientalists obviously prefer to the Jewish historian, should be given to Europe in the languages familiar to every one; that we may not be blinded by the erroneous admiration of credulous and misjudging enthusiasts, but be enabled to criticise fairly and judge impartially for ourselves.

ART. VI. A translation of the Georgics of Publius Virgilius Maro, with the Original Text, and Notes critical and illustrative of Ancient and Modern Husbandry. By Wm. Stawell, A. M. Rector of Kilmalooda, in the Diocese of Cork. pp. 487. cr. 8vo. London, Longman. 1808.

The Georgics of P. Virgilius Maro, translated into English Blank Verse. By James R. Deare, L. L. B. pp. 138, foolscap 8vo. Longman, London, 1808.

THO

HOUGH the reading population of this country has been long the advance, the number of classical scholars by no means increases in the same proportion. An indifference to classical learning seems indeed to be gaming ground in society; and many parents