To this objection, it may be replied, in the first place, that although I have supposed, with Meiners, the first rude draught of the Sanscrit to have been formed soon after Alexander's invasion had introduced the learned in India to an acquaintance with the Greek language and philosophy, this supposition was not meant to exclude other languages from having contributed their share to its subsequent enrichment. The long commercial intercourse of the Romans with India, both by sea and land, accounts sufficiently for any affinity which may subsist between Sanscrit and Latin. When we consider that the former was (according to the hypothesis assumed in this argument) an artificial language, emanating solely from the priesthood, it is impossible to say what changes might not be introduced into it by the caravans of Roman merchants, who, from time to time, visited India, or even by the solitary adventurers who might occasionally find their way into that country; and from whom, it may reasonably be supposed, that the more inquisitive individuals of the order would be eager to acquire some knowledge of a tongue spoken by the conquerors of the world. It strikes me as a very curious and important circumstance, that the names of numbers in Sanscrit are in part nearly the same as in Greek, in part nearly the same as in Latin. The same thing may be remarked with respect to the names of the different members of the human body.* It seems to me very

the Sanscrit to the Latin, strong as they are, do not amount to any thing so full and precise as that of Mr. Brown, who must have derived his information from the translators of the Gospels, with respect to the similarity between the Sanscrit and the Greek. Some farther information on this subject, from competent scholars, seems to me to be still desirable.

*This circumstance, with respect to the Indian numbers, is noticed by Bayer; who adds, that a learned correspondent of his was of opinion, that the Bramins had derived the names of numbers not from the Greeks, but from the Romans. "Reverendus Benjamin Schultzius, qui Madrasta in littore Coromandelino ecclesiam Christo ex paganis colligit, Brahmanas hæc numerorum nomina a Romanis accepisse existimavit. Haud equidem dissimulare queo, in quibusdam formam Romanis potius congruere quam Græcis, ut sapta, septem, nova, novem. Consideremus præter

ea, in progressione numerorum cardinalium, eorum rationem. In omnibus enim numeris cardinalibus, qui denarium proxime antecedunt, ita effari solent Indostani, unawi, undeviginti, unatri, undetriginta, unatschaheli, undequadraginta, unapangja, undequinquaginta. Et tametsi ejusmodi rationem Græci quoque sequuntur, tamen non video illam apud eos formam esse, quæ in Romanis Indicisque quasi ex condicto est eadem "-Bayeri Hist. &c. p. 117. After stating some other particulars which seem, at first view, to favor his friend's hypothesis, Bayer observes, "Sed quid adeo negotii cum Romanis fuerit Indis non invenio. Si Plocamus aliquis aut Romanus

difficult to explain these facts, but on the supposition that the Sanscrit was formed in some such way as I have conjectured. As for the Persian, some knowledge of which must have been coëval in India with Alexander's invasion, and which had probably made its way into that country at a still earlier period, it is reasonable to think, from the peculiar beauties of that language, that it would enter largely among the original elements of the Sanscrit."*.

There yet remains another argument, which I can conceive to have much weight with some, against the

civis alius versatus est in Indiâ, nihil hoc adhuc efficere potuit, ut Indi a paucis peregrinis, exiguo tempore inter eos versantibus mercaturæ caussâ, numeros peregrini soni addiscerent et cum suis commutarent."-Ibid. p. 119. But although this consideration may be conclusive against the probability of a great innovation in the popular language of India being effected by a few, foreign merchants, it is of no force against the supposition, that many Latin words may have been incorporated with the sacred language of the priests, in consequence of an intercourse between these sages and Roman adventurers. The priests, we may presume, would always be on the watch to enrich Sanscrit with whatever improvements they could borrow from foreign tongues.

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"As to the members of the human body," says Monboddo, " Mr. Wilkins has given me the names of some of them; of the foot, which is pada, undoubtedly the same with rous, rodos, of the Greeks, and of the nose, which is nasa, the same with the Latin word nasus."-Anc. Metaph. Vol. IV. p. 328. To which he adds the following anecdote, which he seems to give in the words of Mr. Wilkins. Observing one day a three-footed stool in a pagoda, on which a statue was placed, I asked the Bramin who was with me what the name of it was in Sanscrit, and he told me it was tripada. And in like manner they compound the word danta, signifying a tooth, with the same number three, and say tridanta, that is, a trident." Ibid. p. 330.

"And here," says Monboddo, "the reader may observe, that as the Latin is the most ancient dialect of the Greek, many of the words of the Sanscrit have a greater resemblance to the Latin than to the Greek. Thus, as I have observed before, the word nasa, denoting a nose, is plainly Latin, but entirely different from the Greek word expressing that feature of the face, which is pí.”—Ibid. p. 328.

All this, I must own, appears to me to admit of a very easy explanation upon the hypothesis which I have proposed, and to be scarcely reconcileable with any other.

Nor is there any necessity, as I have already hinted, for supposing, that all the elements of the Sanscrit, as it is now taught to Europeans, entered from the beginning into the composition of that language. How much may have been since added by the subsequent improvements of the Bramins! How much must have been added in consequence of the intercourse which the Hindoos have since had with foreign nations! A large mixture of the Persian (and, through the medium of the Persian, of the Teutonic,) must have been the result of the Mahomedan conquests. Sir William Jones tells us, that "the jargon of Indostan (very improperly called the language of the Moors) contains so great a number of Persian words, that he was able, with very little difficulty, to read the fables of Pilpai, which are translated into that idiom."-Works of Sir William Jones, Vol. II. p. 132. Now, it is impossible to suppose that the popular speech should be so much adulterated with this foreign admixture, without communicating a certain portion of it to the language of the learned. The impurities formerly mentioned, which the Latin compositions of the Monkish historians of the dark ages every where derived from the popular languages spoken in their respective countries, afford sufficient illustrations of this remark. How, indeed, was it possible for men, accustomed to the daily use of their KitchenLatin, to avoid contaminating their written style with similar barbarisms ?

scope of the foregoing observations. In the article of the Edinburgh Review above referred to, I find the following sentence: "To adopt the hypothesis of the learned Bayer, we must suppose the inhabitants of Hindustan to have waited till Alexander the Great conquered Bactria, in order to obtain appellations for the most endearing ties of nature, and to enable them to express the venerable relations of father and mother." *

I cannot help suspecting that the learned and respectable author of this criticism had never seen Bayer's book: For, that Bayer did not think so meanly of the attainments of the Hindoos prior to Alexander's invasion he has himself expressly said. His only object, he tells us, was to check that disposition which was beginning to display itself at the time he wrote, (and which has since been manifested on a much greater scale,) to refer to this people all the science and all the arts of which the Greeks are commonly reputed the authors. As I have reason to believe that his work is very seldom to be met with in this country, I shall transcribe his own words. "Credidi autem dignam esse eruditorum hominum studio operam, cum satis appareat, artes et disciplinas in humano genere peregrinatas et aliis atque aliis in populis vel diversatas fuisse, vel domicilium collocâsse, earum si nos quasi itinera investigemus. Non semper eædem gentes fuerunt vel sapientes, vel barbaræ ; fuit hujusce et dedecoris et laudis quædam in genere humano vicissitudo. Neque una aliqua gens per se vidit omnia et reperit; neque quæ aliquid invenit, eadem semper perfecit aut constanter retinuit. Ne in Græcis quidem hæc statuo; quamquam, si ea gens non plurima vel prima vidit, vel expolivit, tamen nulla est alia, in quâ illustriora ad fidem extent monumenta, quantum fuerit enisa. Græcorum testimonio gentes præterea recolimus sapientes, Chaldæos, Ægyptios, Indos: ast eorum numquam mihi sese probavit oratio, qui omnia præclare inventa ad eos referrent auctores, et nescio quid immensæ scientiæ et omni quidem ævo in iis fuisse prædicarent. Si hujus tantæ existimationis causam requiratis, fastidium est rerum notarum: ita fit, ut, quæ non satis sint cognita, ea ubi in mentem venerit aliquo in loco esse habenda, tanto cupidius efferamus, quo minus cognoscuntur. Itaque Græcos ab iisdem nonnulla accepisse, ultro et lubenter quidem concedo modo item alii eosdem populos a Græcis quædam cum ut nova et inchoata, tum prope consummata accepisse consentiant."-Bayeri Hist., &c. in præfat.

From this extract, it appears that the opinion of Bayer, with respect to the history of the sciences in general among the Indians, coincides remarkably with that which, after long deliberation, has been formed with respect to astronomy in particular, by the illustrious La Place. "M. La Place," says his learned friend M. Delambre, "qui avoit quelque intérêt à soutenir la grande ancienneté de l'Astronomie Indienne, et qui avoit d'abord parlé des mouvemens moyens et des époques des Hindous de la manière la plus avantageuse, a fini pourtant par croire et imprimer que leurs tables ne remontent pas au-delà du 13me siècle."-Letter of M. Delambre to the late Quintin Crawford, dated July 21, 1815, quoted in Mr. Crawford's Researches concerning the Laws, &c. of India.-London, 1817.

While La Place, however, thus rejects the extravagant conclusions of Bailli, he readily admits that the Indians have cultivated successfully astronomy, and some other branches of mathematics, from the earliest periods of which we have any authentic accounts. "Cependant l'antique réputation des Indiens ne permet pas de douter qu'ils aient dans tous les temps cultivé l'astronomie. Lorsque les Grecs et les · Arabes commencèrent à se livrer aux sciences, ils allèrent en puiser chez eux les premiers élémens. C'est de l'Inde que nous vient l'ingénieuse méthode d'exprimer tous les nombres avec dix caractères, en leur donnant à-la-fois une valeur absolue et une valeur de position; idée fine et importante, qui nous paroit maintenant si simple, que nous en sentons à peine le mérite. Mais cette simplicité même, et l'extrême facilité qui en résulte pour tous les calculs, place notre systême d'arithmétique au premier rang des inventions utiles; et l'on appréciera la difficulté d'y parvenir, si l'on considère qu'il a échappé au genie d'Archimède et d'Apollonius, deux des plus

The hypothesis of Bayer here alluded to is, I presume, that which I already mentioned, as forming one of the leading positions in his Historia Regni Græcorum Bactriani, That the Indians borrowed some things from the Greeks, which the Greeks have been more generally supposed to have borrowed from the Indians.

Before I proceed to take any notice of this remark, in so far as it may be supposed to invalidate my own conjectures, I think it proper to observe, in the first place, in justice to Bayer, that I can see no foundation whatever in his work for the criticism above quoted, inasmuch as his argument is confined almost entirely to the names of numbers, the system of numeration, and a few other matters of a scientific nature. So far as I can recollect, the words expressing the different relations of consanguinity are not once alluded to.

But, admitting the criticism to be conclusive against Bayer's hypothesis, it can in no way affect mine; as it by no means follows, from the similarity between the Sanscrit names for particular objects, and those in Greek, that the Indians, till the invasion of Alexander, had no words of the same import in their native tongue. With the choice of different languages, which I have supposed the manufacturers of the Sanscrit to have had before them; it must have depended on the most trifling accidents, often upon mere caprice, to which of them they gave the preference on particular occasions in making their selections. Probably much would depend upon the sound that was most agreeable to the ear, or that suited best with their system of prosody; and much also upon the combination of letters which their organs were fitted to pronounce most easily.

grands hommes dont l'antiquité s'honore."-Exposition du Systême du Monde, Livre v. Chap. 1.

The reference which the Edinburgh Reviewer has made to the name of Bayer, and the deference due to the slightest hint concerning the literature of the East, which is sanctioned by the authority of Mr. Hamilton, will, I trust, be a sufficient apology for the length of this note.

The charge which Mr. Hamilton has brought against Bayer, of undervaluing the early advances which the Hindoos are said to have made in the sciences, might, with far greater justice, have been urged against Meiners, who has gone so very far as to assert," Ante Alexandri ætatem nullas inter Indos literas, neque veram philosophiam extitisse."-Historia de Vero Deo, p. 107. This opinion is, I think, sufficiently refuted by the universal testimony of antiquity.

In the foregoing conjectures, I have not thought it necessary to attend to the distinction pointed out by some writers, between Brahmans and Bramins, or to allude to the question, whether the worship of Boodh or that of Brahma was prior in order of time.* It is sufficient for my argument, if it be granted, that a learned, artful, and aspiring priesthood existed (at least in embryo,f) at the time of Alexander's conquest. And of this, the following circumstance mentioned by Strabo, on the authority of Onesicritus, (who was an eye and ear witness of the facts in question) is a sufficient proof, -That Alexander, being desirous to obtain some information concerning the tenets and manners of the Brachmans, resolved to send Onesicritus to converse with them; as he was given to understand, that, if they were summoned to attend him, they would decline to obey the invitation, on the pretence that they who wished for instruction should repair to those from whom they expected to receive it.

* See Pinkerton's Geography, Vol. I. p. 713.

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Mr. Crawford does not seem to have considered the difference between Brahmans and Bramins as very wide. If we compare the Bramins of the present day, with the Brahmans of antiquity, we shall, in almost every feature of their character, perceive the strongest resemblance. The difference that may exist between them, may partly have insensibly taken place in the lapse of time; but must chiefly be ascribed to the revolutions that have happened in their government. The words are evidently the same, and derive their origin from Brahma, God."-Sketches, &c. of the Hindoos, p. 190.

I have said at least in embryo; for although it does not appear from Strabo's account that, at the period in question, the Brahmans formed a distinct or Levitical tribe, possessing the unlimited influence in India which they afterwards acquired, yet it is plain from the particulars he mentions with respect to the studies to which these Sophists addicted themselves; their eagerness to attract notice by the singularity of their manners; and, above all, by their high pretensions in point of consequence, that they were already aiming systematically, and not without success, to attain an undue ascendant over the minds of their countrymen.

The following is the account of the Bramins given by Arrian in his Indian History (Not having the original at hand, I quote from Mr. Rooke's translation.) "The Indians are chiefly distinguished into seven ranks or classes among themselves, one of which is their sophists or wise men; these are much inferior to all the rest in numbers, but vastly superior to them in honor and dignity. They are never required to do any bodily labor, nor do they contribute any thing out of their gains towards the support of the public; nor, indeed, have they any manner of occasion to work at all, their only business being to offer sacrifices for the public welfare; and if any person sacrifices privately, some of these sophists are employed to show him the way and manner thereof, otherwise they imagine the gods would not accept his sacrifice. They are, moreover, the only diviners throughout all India, neither are any suffered to practise the art of divination except themselves. They never meddle with private affairs, either because they think that the art of divination extends not to inferior things, or, perhaps, because they think it beneath their art to stoop to trifles.”—Arrian's Indian History, chapters x. and xi., translated by Mr. Rooke, Vol. II. pp. 222, 223. The account given by Strabo of the motives which decided the conduct of Alex