mate.

and to perceive an agreeable change of cliOur days, though fhort, give me ample time for ftudy, recreation, and exercife; but my joy and delight proceed from the surprising health and fpirits of Anna Maria, who joins me in affectionate remembrance to Lady Ashburton. As to you, my dear Lord, we confider you as the fpring and fountain of our happiness, as the author and parent, (a Roman would have added, what the coldnefs of our northern language will hardly admit) the god of our fortunes. It is poffible indeed, that by inceffant labour and irksome attendance at the bar, I might in due time have attained all that my very limited ambition could afpire to; but in no other station than that which I owe to your friendship, could I have gratified at once my boundless curiofity concerning the people of the Eaft, continued the exercise of my profeffion, in which I fincerely delight, and enjoyed at the fame time the comforts of domeftic life. The grand jury of Denbighfhire, have found, I understand, the bill

against the Dean of St. Afaph, for publishing my dialogue; but as an indictment for a theoretical effay on government was I believe never before known, I have no apprehenfion for the confequences. As to the doctrines in the tract, though I fhall certainly not preach them to the Indians, who muft and will be governed by abfolute power, yet I fhall go through life with a persuasion, that they are juft and rational, that substantial freedom is both the daughter and parent of virtue, and that virtue is the only fource of public and private felicity. Farewell.

In the course of the voyage he stopped at Madeira, and, in ten additional weeks of profperous failing from the rugged iflands of Cape Verd, arrived at Hinzuan or Joanna. Of this ifland, where he remained a few days only, he has published an interesting and amufing defcription. He expatiates with rapture on his approach to it, delineates with the fkill of an artist the beauties of the scene

ry, and sketches with the difcriminating pen

of a philofopher, the characters and manners of the unpolished but hospitable natives. The novelty of the scene was attractive, and its impreffion upon his mind is strongly marked by the following juft and elegant reflection, which in fubftance is more than once repeated in his writings:-" If life were not

66

too short for the complete discharge of all 66 our respective duties, public and private, "and for the acquifition even of neceffary

66

knowledge in any degree of perfection, "with how much pleasure and improve

56

ment might a great part of it be spent in

admiring the beauties of this wonderful "orb, and contemplating the nature of man ❝in all its varieties*!"

But it would be injustice to his memory, to pass over without particular notice, the fenfible and dignified rebuke, with which he repelled the rude attack of Muffulman bigotry on the divinity of our Saviour. During a vifit which he made to a native of the island, a Coran was produced for his infpec

* Sir William Jones's Works, vol. iv. p. 274.

tion, and his attention was pointedly directed to a paffage in a commentary accusing the Chriftians of blafphemy, in calling our Saviour the Son of God. "The commen

"tator (he replied) was much to blame for paffing so indifcriminate and hafty a cen"fure; the title which gave your legislator, "and which gives you fuch offence, was "often applied in Judea by a bold figure,

agreeably to the Hebrew idiom, though ❝ unusual in Arabic, to angels, to holy men, " and even to all mankind, who are com"manded to call God their father; and in "this large fenfe, the Apoftle to the Romans "calls the elect the children of God, and "the Meffiah the first born among many brethren; but the words only begotten are ap"plied transcendantly and incomparably to him alone; and as for me, who believe "the Scriptures which you also profess to "believe, though you affert without proof "that we have altered them, I cannot refuse ❝ him an appellation, though far furpaffing "our reafon, by which he is distinguished

" in the Gospel; and the believers in Mo"hammed, who expressly names him the "Meffiah, and pronounces him to have "been born of a virgin (which alone might fully justify the phrase condemned by this author) are themselves condemnable, for cavilling at words when they cannot object to the fubftance of our faith, confiftently with their own*."

This quotation affords a decifive proof of the belief of Sir William Jones, in the fublime doctrines of the Chriftian religion. Had he been an infidel, he would have fmiled at the fcoffs of Muffulman bigotry; and had he been indifferent to his faith, he would have been filent on an occafion, where he could expect neither candour nor conceffions from his antagonists. Indeed he was well aware, that a religious difpute with thofe zealots, would have been fruitless and unfeafonable, and might have been dangerous; but, as it was inconfiftent with his principles, to difavow or conceal what he firmly believed

Sir William Jones's Works, vol. iv. p. 269.