to pardon an occasional error or two in the orthography, and not be surprised should he even find the same word differently written in different places. In the titles of books and quotations, the original orthography has been adopted where it could be ascertained, in other cases uniformity has been aimed at, but it is feared with but moderate success.

The usefulness of the present publication must of course chiefly depend upon the importance of the subject of which it treats-a question that seems sufficiently decided by the foundation and intention of the Boden professorship, and the new impulse which this has given to the culture of Sanscrit literature. The very fact, indeed, of a gentleman's bequeathing an immense property for the promotion of this object, from a conviction, resulting from his own experience, of its being the best means of extending the knowledge of Christianity to a hundred millions of our fellow-creatures, should, and must engage in its interest every one who feels the value of this blessing; while its recommend

b This has in some instances led to mistakes: as for example at p. 96, etc., where Damayanti has been improperly spelt Damajanti, in consequence of the compiler trusting to the correctness of the Quarterly Reviewer.

The late Joseph Boden, esq., Colonel in the Honourable the East India Company's service, bequeathed the whole of his property to the University of Oxford for the foundation of a Sanscrit professorship, and the encouragement of Sanscrit learning; being of opinion "that a more general and critical knowledge of the Sanscrit language will be a means of enabling his countrymen to proceed in the conversion of the natives of India to the Christian religion, by disseminating a knowledge of the sacred scriptures amongst them, more effectually than all other means whatsoever." Oxford Calendar, 1832, p. 48. Horace Hayman Wilson, esq., perhaps the first Sanscrit scholar of the present age, and highly distinguished for his taste and learning in general literature, was elected to this chair in the present year.

ations of a more worldly nature, though but a feather when weighed against this paramount one, are still otherwise of a high and powerful character. Both, no doubt, have operated in producing the rapid and accelerated motion with which the cultivation of Sanscrit literature has advanced within these very few years in Europe; and it appears a striking argument in its favour, that the interest taken in it has increased in proportion to the information obtained respecting it, and that each step has been regarded but as a new position from which to make a farther advanced. Some of its warmest admirers have, indeed, gone so far, as to predict that it would exercise the same influence upon the learning and general tone of European society, as the introduction of Greek did in the fifteenth century; and, though few readers may go so far as these enthusiasts, it must, at least, be admitted, that the curious structure of the language, its close analogy with those already familiar to scholars, its great antiquity, and its presumed connection with the religion, the arts, and the sciences of Greece and Rome, are all well calculated to excite a fond and anxious research into its literary remains—remains equally wonderful for their extent and the harmonious language in which they are composed,

d Adelung, in his preface, mentions it as a matter of surprise, and as proving a great predilection for this language, that in the short space of thirty years seven hundred works should have been published relating to it, while not above a hundred persons in all Europe have applied themselves to its study, and of these there certainly are not fifty who know it accurately.

e See below, p. 39, etc.

f Professor Wilson says, "The music of Sanscrit composition must ever be inadequately represented by any other tongue." M. Chézy, in his opening discourse, calls it the celebrated dialect, perhaps spoken by the gods of Homer, and if not, worthy to be so. The praise indeed which Sanscrit

and containing treatises, written at various periods from a hundred to three thousand years ago, on philosophy, metaphysics, grammar, theology, astronomy, mathematics, jurisprudence, ethics, poetry, rhetoric, music, and other sciences cultivated among the Hindoos, at a time when Europe lay buried in the deepest shades of ignorances.

To those who study the history of man, Sanscrit literature offers a surprising mass of novel information, and opens an unbounded field for speculation and research. A language, (and such a language!) which, upon the most moderate computation dates its origin beyond the earliest records of profane history, and contains monuments of theology, poetry, and science, and philosophy, which have influenced perhaps a hundred millions of human beings through a hundred generations, is a phenomenon in the annals of the human race which cannot fail to command attention. Common sense and experience suggest that these facts only require to be known to excite a more general interest in this new department of literature. The following

scholars bestow on this language is not at all inferior to what Gibbon says of the Greek : "In their lowest servitude and depression, the subjects of the Byzantine throne were still possessed of a golden key that could unlock the treasures of antiquity; of a musical and prolific language, that gives a soul to the objects of sense, and a body to the abstractions of philosophy." Gibbon's Rome, vol. viii, p. 162, Oxford edit.

The number of Sanscrit works described in the work of Mr. Adelung, amount to upwards of three hundred and fifty; many others have been added in the following pages. This, however, affords but a faint sketch of the copiousness of Sanscrit literature. The reader may perhaps form a more adequate notion by being informed, that Col. Kirkpatrick, in his account of Nepaul, quotes an instance of a single private library at Blatgong, the Benares of the Ghoorkali territory, amounting (according to his information) to fifteen thousand volumes. See also Col. Tod's preface to his splendid work on the Annals of Rajast'han, passim.

pages show that it has afforded subjects of sufficient interest to exercise the talents of writers of the highest reputation for taste and genius; and that Sanscrit literature still contains inexhaustible mines of wealth for those who have the industry to work them.

Compilers and translators have been somewhere designated as the pioneers of literature; and it will afford the compiler and translator of the following pages much satisfaction if they should clear the road, or lessen the toil of any more deeply engaged in the study of Sanscrit literature The very liberal indulgence with which his translation of Heeren's Researches has been received, emboldens him to hope for the same favour for the present attempt, which, as Mr. Adelung observes, will at least fill up a gap in bibliography, and abridge the labour of any one who may attempt a more complete work on the subject.

D. A. T.

Oxford, June, 1832.

THE SANSCRIT LANGUAGE, AS A LATER PRINCIPLE OF INTERPRETATION, STANDS AS IT WERE AT THE END OF A WHOLE SERIES OF LANGUAGES, AND THESE ARE BY NO MEANS SUCH AS BELONG TO A COURSE OF STUDY WHICH FOR PRACTICAL PURPOSES IS IN A CERTAIN DEGREE UNSERVICEABLE ON THE CONTRARY, THEY COMPREHEND OUR OWN MOTHER TONGUE AND THAT OF THE CLASSICAL NATIONS OF ANTIQUITY, AND CONSEQUENTLY THEREFORE THE TRUE AND DIRECT SOURCE OF OUR BEST FEELINGS, AND THE FAIREST PART OF OUR CIVILISATION ITSELF.

W. VON HUMBOLDT.