centre of all Afia, under the title of the Mahabadian dynasty, founded by the renowned Maha-Beli, or Great Belus, and from which they afterwards migrated to regions nearer the rifing fun. This great extent in ancient periods of the Indian empire, and the prevalence of the Indian fciences and mythology over the greater part of that vaft continent, cannot be more decifively proved than by the following remarks extracted from Mr. Halhed, to whom thofe fciences and that mythology, as well as their languages, are fo familiarly, known.

It is a very generally received maxim, that the wide diffufion of any particular language evinces the fuperiority in power and confequence of the nation with whom that language originated. Now Mr. Halhed afferts the 'Sanfcreet, or ancient language of India, generally spoken before the invasion of Alexander, to be a language of the most venerable and profound antiquity; the grand fource as well as facred repofitory of Indian literature, and the parent of almoft every dialect, from the Perfian Gulph to the China Sea. He is even of opinion, that the Sanfcreet was, in ancient periods, current not only over ALL INDIA, confidered in its largest extent, but

over ALL THE ORIENTAL WORLD, and that traces of its original and general diffufion may ftill be discovered in almoft every region of Afia. In the courfe of Mr. Halhed's various reading, (and few men have perused more Oriental volumes,) he was astonished to find the fimilitude which it in many inftances bore to the Chaldaic, Perfian, and Arabic. He difcovered the visible traces of its character, that character which he defcribes to be fo curious in its ftructure and fo wonderful in its combination, on the most ancient medals and imperial fignets of Eastern kingdoms; and he hints that it might have been the original language of the earth.*

If the bounds of ancient India were thus large, not lefs fo were thofe of ancient Scythia, for they extended from Caucafus to the borders of the Arctic circle, a tract including the vaft plains of Tartary, the deferts of Siberia, and Afiatic Ruffia: yet through all this immenfe region no genuine veftiges of arts and sciences flourishing among them are clearly to be traced, notwithstanding the boasted

* See the very elegant and learned preface to that Grammar,

P. 5:

B 4

discoveries

difcoveries of fome eminent modern antiquaries. Among these, ftands foremost the celebrated M. Bailli, who endeavours to prove, in a treatise On the Origin of the Sciences in Afia, that a nation of profound wisdom, of elevated genius, and of antiquity far fuperior even to the Egyptians, Indians, and Chinese, once inhabited the deferts of Siberia, and from the cold and barren region of SELINGINSKOI, in the fiftieth degree of north latitude, propagated throughout the world the firft rudiments of the fciences, particularly astronomy. He labours to demonftrate that fome celebrated difcoveries in aftronomy could only have taken place in the high northern latitudes of Afia; that most of the ancient mythologic fables of Afia, confidered in a phyfical sense, have relation to the northern parts of our globe; and that arts and improvement progreffively travelled from the polar regions to those of the equator. This learned primitive, but long-extinct, race of Scythian philofophers, for whofe existence neither hiftory nor tradition, but certain fanciful conjectures of the author, are alone brought in evidence, M. Bailli fupposes to have been the mafters of the Brahmins of India, but certainly erro

neously;

neously; for their own pride and felf-importance would never permit them to fubmit to be taught by the fages of any nation; much lefs by a race of men, whom they ever confidered as barbarians, and inhabiting what they thought the extremeties of the world. From thefe pofitive and dogmatical affertions of Bailli, let us attend a better judge of the matter, Sir W. Jones, who, in his differtation upon the ancient hordes that peopled the vaft extent of northern Afia, describes them in general as a race of undisciplined favages, without the polish of arts, and without even the advantage of letters. As the fubject has been little canvaffed, and never before in fo mafterly and decided a manner, the reader will be eafily induced to pardon my presenting him with the fubftance of what he has faid on this point in his Effay on the Tartars.

"TARTARY, which contained, according to PLINY, an innumerable multitude of nations, by whom the reft of Afia and all Europe has, in different ages, been over-run, is denominated, as various images have prefented themselves to various fancies, the great hive of the northern fwarms, the nursery of irresistible legions, and, by a ftronger metaphor, the foundery

1

foundery of the human race; but M. BAILLI, a wonderfully ingenious man, and a very lively writer, feems firft to have confidered it as the cradle of our fpecies, and to have fupported an opinion, that the whole ancient world was enlightened by fciences brought from the most northern parts of Scythia, particularly from the banks of the Jenifea, or from the Hyperborean regions: all the fables of old Greece, Italy, Perfia, India, he derives from the north; and it must be owned, that he maintains his paradox with acuteness and learning. Great learning and great acutenefs,' together with the charms of a most engaging ftyle, were indeed neceffary to render even tolerable a system which places an earthly paradise, the gardens of Hefperus, the islands of the Macares, the groves of Elyfium, if not of Eden, the heaven of INDRA, the Periftan, or fairy-land, of the Persian poets, with its city of diamonds and its country of Shadcam, fo named from Pleasure and Love, not in any climate which the common fenfe of mankind confiders as the feat of delights, but beyond the mouth of the Oby in the Frozen Sea, in a region equalled only by that, where the wild imagination of DANTE led him to fix the

worft