flence of the material world, and af ferts nothing to be real but our own ideas, feems to have been known in India as well as in Europe; and the fages of the eaft, as they were indebted to philofophy for the knowledge of many important truths, were not more exempt than thofe of the welt from its delufions and errors. He who "inherent in his nature. man is praifed, who, having fub"dued all his paffions, performeth "with his active faculties all the func "tions of life unconcerned about the " event. Let the motive be in the "deed, and not in the event. - Be 66 68 not one whofe motive for action is "the hope of reward. Let not thy "life be fpent in inaction. Depend upon application, perform thy duty, "abandon all thought of the confequence, and make the event equal, whether it terminate in good or in ❝evil; for fuch an equality is called แ "ritual.) Seck an afylum then in "wifdom al ne; for the miferable and "unhappy are fo on account of the event of things. Men who are en"dued with true wifdom are unmind"ful of good or evil in this world. "Study then to obtain this applica"tion of thy undertanding, for fuch "application in bafinefs is a precious ❝ art. 2d, Ethics. This fcience, which has for its object to afcertain what diftinguishes virtue from vice, to investigate what motives fhould prompt men to act, and to prefcribe rules for the conduct of life, as it is of all others the moft interefting, feems to have deeply engaged the attention of the Brahmins. Their fentiments with refpect to these points were various, and, like the philofophers of Greece, the Brah-Tog (i. e. attention to what is fpimins were divided into fects, diftin. guished by maxims and tenets often diametrically oppofite. That fect with whofe opinions we are, fortunately, beft acquainted, had eftablished a fyftem of morals, founded on principles the most generous and dignified which unaflifted reafon is capable of discovering. Man, they taught, was formed, not for fpeculation or indolence, but for action. He is born, not for himfelf alone, but for his fellow men. The happinefs of the fociety of which he is a member, the good of mankind, are his ultimate and highest objects.In chufing what to prefer or reject, the juftnefs and propriety of his choice are the only confiderations to which he thould attend. The events which may follow his actions are not in his own power, and whether they be profperous or adverfe, as long as he is fatisfied with the purity of the motives which induced him to act, he can enjoy that approbation of his own mind, which conftitutes genuine happinefs, independent of the power of fortune or the opinions of other men. "Man "(fays the author of the Mahabarat) enjoyeth not freedom from action. "Every man is involuntarily urged to act by thofe principles which are O VOL. XIV. No. 8o. Wife men who have aban"doned all thought of the fruit which "is produced from their actions, are "freed from the chains of birth; and go to the regions of eternal happi"nefs." From thefe, and other paffages which I might have quoted, we learn that the diftinguishing doctrines of the Stoical Scho I were taught in India many ages before the birth of Zeno, and inculcated with a perfuafive earneftuefs nearly refembling that of Epictetus; and it is not without altonishment that we find the tenets of this manly active philofophy, which feem to be formed on 'y for men of the most vigorous fpirit, prefcribed as the rule of conduct to a race of people more eminent for the gentleness of their difpofition than for the elevation of their minds. 3d, Phyfics. In all the fciences which which contribute towards extending our knowledge of nature, in mathematics, mechanics, and aftronomy, A. rithmetic is of elementary ufe. In whatever country then we find that fuch attention has been paid to the improvement of arithmetic as to ren der its operations molt eafy and correct, we may prefume that the fciences depending upon it have attained a fuperior degree of perfection. Such improvement of this fcience we find in India. While, among the Greeks and Romans, the only method uftd for the notation of numbers was by the letters of the alphabet, which neceffarily rendered arithmetical calculation extremely tedious and operofe, the Indians had, from time immemorial, employed for the fame purpose the ten cyphers, or figures, now unive fally known, and by means of them performed every operation in arithmetic with the greatet facility and expedition. By the happy invention of giving a different value to each figure according to its change of place, no more than ten figures are needed in calculations the most complex, and of any given extent; and arithmetic is the most perfect of all the iciences. The Arabians, not long after their fettlement in Spain, introduced this mode of notation into Europe, and were candid enough to acknowledge that they had derived the knowledge of it from the Indians. Though the advantages of this mode of notation are obvious and great, yet fo flowly do mankind adopt new inventions, that the use of it was for fome time confined to fcience; by degrees. however, men of business relinquithed the former cumbersome method of computation by letters, and the Indian arithmetic came into general ufe throughout Europe. It is now fo familar and fimple, that the ingenuity of the people, to whom we are ind-bred for the invention, is lefs obferved and lefs celebrated than it merits. proof ftill more confpicuous of their The aftronomy of the Indians is a valore, a fmall town on the Coroman del del coaft, about twelve miles west of " aftronomy of Europe, when improvNegapatam. The epoch of thefe tables "ed by the lateft and molt nice deis of high antiquity, and coincides "ductions from the theory of gravitawith the beginning of the celebrated "tion." The fe conclufions are renæra of the Calyougham or Callee dered peculiarly in eretting, by the eJogue, which commenced, according vidence which they afford of an adto the Indian account, three thoufand vancement in fcience unexamp led in one hundred and two years before the the history of rude nations. The Inbirth of Chrift. dian Brahmins, who annually circulate a kind of almanack, containing aftronomical predictions of fome of the more remarkable phenomena in the heavens, fuch as the new and full moons, the eclipfes of the fun and moon, are in poffeffion of certain methods of calculation, which, upon examination, are found to involve in them a very extenfive fyftem of aftromical knowledge. M. le Gentil, a French aftronomer, had an opportunity, while in India, of obferving two eclipfes of the moon, which had been calculated by a Brahmin, and he found the error in either to be very inconfi. derable. Thefe four fets of tables have been examined and compared by M. Bailly, who with fingular felicity of genius has conjoined an uncommon degree of eloquence with the parient refarches of an aftronomer, and the profound inveftigations of a geometrician. His calculations have been verified, and his reafonings have been illuftrated and extended by Mr Piayfair, in a very mafterly differtation, published in the Tranfactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Inttead of attempting to follow them in reafonings and calculations, which, from their nature, are often abftrufe and intricate, I fhall fatisfy myself with giving such a general view of them as is fuited to a popular work. This, I hope, may convey a proper idea of what has been publified concerning the aftronomy of India, a fubject too curious and important to be omitted in any account of the ftare of fcience in that country; and without interpofing any judgment of my own, I fhall leave each of my readers to form his own opinion. It may be confidered as the general refult of all the inquiries, reafonings, and calculations, with refpect to Indian aftronomy, which have hitherto been made public, "That the mo"tion of the heavenly bodies, and "more particularly their fituation at "the commencement of the different "epochs to which the four fets of "tables refer, are afcertained with "great accuracy; and that many of "the elements of their calculations, "efpecially for very remote ages, are "verified by an aftonishing coinci"dence with the tables of the modern 0 2 The accuracy of thefe refults is lefs fu prifing than the juttnefs and feientific nature of the principles on which the tables by which they calculate are conftructed. For the method of predicting eclipfes which is followed by the Brahmins, is of a kind altogether different from any that has been found in the poffeffion of rude nations in the infancy of aftronomy. In Chaldæa, and even in Greece, in the early ages, the method of calculating ecliptes was founded on the obfervation of a certain period or cycle, after which the eclipfes of the fun and moon return nearly in the fame order; but there was no attempt to analyse the different circumstances on which the eclipfe depends, or to deduce its phenomena from a precife knowledge of the motions of the fun and moon. This laft was referved for a more advanced period, when geometry, as well as arithmetic, were called in to the affitance of aftronomy, and if it was attempted at all, feems not to have been attempted with fuccefs before the age of Hipparchus. Parchus. It is a method of this fuperior kind, founded on principles, and on an analyfis of the motions of the fun and moon, which guides the calculations of the Brahmins, and they never employ any of the groffer eftinations, which were the pride of the firft aftronomers in Egypt and Chaldæa. The Brahmins of the prefent times are guided in their calculations by thefe principles, though they do not now underfland them; they know only the ufe of the tables which are in their poffeffion, but are unacquainted with the method of their construction. The Brahmin who vifited M. le Gentil at Pondicherry, and inftru&ted him in the ufe of the Indian tables, had no knowledge of the principles of his art, and difcovered no curiofity concern ing the nature of M. le Gentil's obfervations, or about the inftruments which he employed. He was equally ignorant with refpect to the authors of thefe tables; and whatever is to be learnt concerning the time or place of their conftruction, must be deduced fro the tables themfelves. One fet of th fetables (as was formerly obferv. ed)profefs to be as old as the beginning of the Calyougham, or to go back to the year 3102 b fore the Chriftan æra; but as nothing (it may be fuppofed) is easier than for an aftronomer to give to his tables what date he pleafes. and, by calculating backwards, to eft blith an epoch of any affigned antiqnity, the pretentions of the Indian aftronomy to fo remote an origin are not to be admitted without examina tion. Teat examination has accordingly been inftituted by M. Bailly, and the refult of his inquiries is affcrted to be, that the atro: omy of India is founded on obfervations which cannot be of - a much later date then the period a bove mentioned. For the Ind an ables reprefent the state of the heavens at that period with aftouthing exactne's; and there is between them an t the calculations of our modern aftronomy fuch a conformity, with refpect to thofe ages, as could refult from nothing, but from the authors of the former having accurately copied from na. ture, and having deleated truly the face of the heavens in the age wherein they lived. In order to give fome idea of the high degree of accuracy in the Indian tables, I fhall felect a few inftances of it, out of many that might be produced. The place of the fun for the aftronomical epoch at the beginning of the Calyongham, as ftated in the tables of Tirvalore, is only forty-feven minutes greater than by thẹ tables of M. de la Caille, when corrected by the calculations of M. de la Grange. The place of the moon, in the fame tables, for the fame epoch, is only th ry-feven minutes different from the tables of Mayer. The tables of Ptolemy, for that epoch, are erroneous no lefs than ten degrees with refpect to the place of the fun, and eleven degrees with refpect to that of the moon. The acceleration of the moon's motion, reckoning from the beginning of the Calyougnam to the prent time, agrees, in the Indian tables, with thofe of Mayer to a fingle minute. The inequality of the fun's motion, and the obliquity of the ecliptic, which were both greater in former ages than they are now, as reprefented in the tables of Tirvalore, are almoft of the precife quantity that the theory of gravitation affigns to them three thoufind years before the Chriftian era. It is accordingly for thofe very remote ages (about 5000 years diltant from the prefent) that their aftronomy is moît accurate, and the nearer we come down to our own times, the conform ity of its refults with ours diminithes. It feems reafonable to fuppofe, that the time when its rules are most accurate, is the time when thefe obtervations were made on which thefe rules are founded. In fupport of this conclufion, M. Pally maintains, that none of all the aft. onom cal aftronomical fyftems of Greece or Perfia, or of Tartary, from fome of which it might be fufpected that the Indian tables were copied, can be made to agree with them, efpecially when we calculate for very remote ages. The fuperior perfection of the Indian tables becomes always more cenfpicuous as we go farther back in to antiquity. This fhews, likewife, how difficult it is to conftruct any aftronomical tables, which will agree with the ftate of the heavens for a period fo remote from the time when the tables were conftructed, as four or five thousand years. It is only from aftronomy in its moft advanced ftate, fuch as it has attained in modern Europe, that fuch accuracy is to be expected. Whe an eflimate is endeavoured to be made of the geometrical fkill neceifary for the construction of the Indian tables and rules, it is found to be very confiderable; and, beside the knowledge of elementary geometry, it must have required plain and spherical trigonometry, or fomething equivalent to them, together with certain methods of approximating to the values of geometrical magnitudes, which feem to rife very far above the elements of any of thofe fciences. Some of thefe laft mark alfo very clearly (although this has not been obferved by M. Bailly) that the places to which thefe tables are adapted, muft be fituated between the Tropics, becaule they are altogether inapplicable at a greater distance from the Equa tor. From this long induction, the conclufion which feems obviously to refult is, that the Indian aftronomy is founded upon obfervations which were made at a very early period; and when we confider the exact agreement of the places which they affign to the fun and moon, and other heavenly bodies, at that epoch, with thofe deduced from the tables of De la Caille and Mayer, it ftrongly confirms the truth of the position which I have been endeavouring to etablifh, concerning the early and high state of civilization in India. Before I quit this fubject, there is one circumftance which merits particular attention. All the knowledge which we have hitherto acquired of the principles and conclufions of Indian aftronomy is derived from the fouthern part of the Carnatic, and the tables are adapted to places fituated between the meridian of Cape Comorin and that which paffes through the eastern part of Ceylon. The Brahmins in the Carnatic acknowledge that their fcience of aftronomy was derived from the North, and that their method of calculation is denominated Fakiam, or New, to distinguish it from the Siddantam, or ancient method established at Benarcs, which they allow to be much more perfect; and we learn from Abul Fazel, that all the aftronomers of Indoftan rely entirely upon the precepts contained in a book called Soorej Sudhant, compofed in a very remote period. It is manifeftly from this book that the method to which the Brahmins of the South gave the name of Siddantam is taken. Benares has been from time immemorial the Athens of India, the refidence of the most learned Brahmins, and the seat both of fcience and literature. There, it is highly probable, whatever remains of the ancient aftronomical knowledge and difcoveries of the Brahmins is ftill preferved. In an enlightened age and nation, and during a reign diftinguished by a fucceffion of the moft fplendid and fucceffful undertakings to extend the knowledge of nature, it is an object worthy of public attention, to take meafures for obtaining poffeffion of all that time has fpared of the philofophy and inventions of the most early and most highly civilized people of the Eaft. It is with peculiar advantages Great Britain may engage in this laudible |