image; I leave to abler judges the task of decifion.

There is no occafion, however, to trouble the reader with farther conjectures on the high proficiency in aftronomy of the ancient Brahmins, fince indubitable proofs of their rapid advance in that fcience are to be found in the most ancient pagodas of Hindoftan, all placed with such astronomical precision, as with their four fides conftantly to face the four cardinal points. These were examined and found to be exactly thus fituated by M. Gentil; and in this circumstance they refemble the pyramids of Egypt, probably the work of the fame artificers; for, a variety of facts tends to ftrengthen the hypothefis, that Egypt, or Mifra-fthan, was colonized by the firft Indians. On the roofs too and walls of many of these pagodas are deeply engraved the zodiacal afterifms. Various fets of their astronomical tables, of a very ancient date, imported into Europe by learned foreigners, have been deliberately investigated, and proved to give the true aspect of the heavens, and position of the stars, about the period they were formed. The tables of Tirvalore, in particular, brought to Europe and published

by

by M. Gentil, merit the most attentive confideration. For, the grand conjunction which those tables tend directly to establish, of all the planets, except Venus, in the first degree of MESHA, or ARIES, with which their celebrated æra of the CALI YUG commenced, has been found, upon the calculation of the ablest astronomers of Europe, to be true, with the addition of an eclipfe of the moon, from which their astronomical time is dated.* On an actual retrospective survey of the heavens, it appears that Jupiter and Mercury were then in the fame degree of the ecliptic; that Mars was diftant about eight degrees, and Saturn feventeen; and it refults from that furvey, that, at the time of the date given by the Brahmins to the commencement of the Cali Yug, they faw those planets fucceffively difengage themselves from the rays of the fun. This is the reprefentation of M. Bailly, that profound and accurate, though, in points of theology, Sceptical, astronomer; confirmed, in every inftance, by the ftill more elaborate calculations of the

* Le Gentil, Voy. tom. i. p. 133. Bailly's Aftronomie Ind.

p. 1o.

learned

learned Mr. Playfair, profeffor of aftronomy at Edinburgh. While the romantic and extravagant boasts of the Brahmin chronologers, in respect to the epoch of creation, remained unrefuted, I befitated to admit this decifion of M. Bailly as valid evidence; but the nature of their wild chimeras in aftronomy having been fince frequently explained in the Afiatic Researches, and it being now well understood by what kind of years their calculations were regulated, I am willing to give every due credit to the laborious and learned researches of that profound aftronomer, facrificed to the guillotine by his perfidious countrymen. It is a circumstance not lefs astonishing, than this its early maturity in Hindoftan, that fo little genuine aftronomy fhould at this day flourish in that degenerate country; and that the modern race of Brahmins fhould regulate their astronomical ftudies by the rules, without knowing the principles, that guided their ancestors in cultivating this fublime branch of ancient li

terature.*

* See Mr. Playfair on the Brahmin Aftronomy, in Philofoph. Tranfact. Edinburgh. vol. ii. p. 136.

The

The epoch of this celebrated æra of the Cali Yug, which, according to M. Bailly, answers to midnight between the 17th and 18th of February of the year 3102 before Christ, thus scientifically adjusted by learned Europeans, may be admitted, becaufe within the limits of the chronology of the facred books that ought to regulate our belief in these matters; for, the firft of February, 1790, exactly corresponded to the year 4891 of the Hindoo period of the Cali Yug; confequently above a thousand years within the Mofaic æra of the world. But there is no neceffity for our allowing a fimilar latitude to wild fpeculations in that fcience which directly militate against it; and this is evidently the case when these tables refer us to obfervations pretended to be made when, according to them, the folar year confifted of 365 days, fix hours, twelve minutes, and thirty feconds. In the time of Hipparchus, near two thousand years ago, that year was computed at 365 days, five hours, forty-five minutes, and twelve feconds. From Hipparchus, to the age of Ptolemy, the alteration in the length of the year was noted by the latter aftronomer; and, from Ptolemy to

our

our own, the decreafe has been ftill more regularly observed. By European aftronomers of the prefent day, it is reckoned at 365 days, five hours, forty-eight minutes, and fifty-five feconds. "Hence it would appear, (fays an ingenious modern writer,) that there is a gradual decrease in the length of the year; and, if these calculations can be relied upon," which they certainly cannot,

we must conclude that the earth approaches the fun; that its revolution is thereby fhortened; and that the tables of the Brahmins, or at least the obfervations that fixed the length of their year, must have been made 7300 years ago. Retrogreffive calculations have been probably made to fuit that diftant period, but certainly not actual obfervations; fince it afcends far beyond even the Septuagint date of the creation, which, as the most extended, I fet out with adopting; and the poffibility of the advantage of the fcientific exertions of the ante-diluvians; which, to obviate the objections of the sceptical philofopher, I have ever been willing in a certain degree to admit of, in the exten

* Sketches of the Hindoos, p. 216, ift edition.