THE

BRITISH CRITIC,

For JUNE 1793.

PRO PATRIA.

ART. I. Afiatic Refearches; or, Tranfactions of the Society infiituted in Bengal, for inquiring into the Hiftory and Antiquities, the Arts, Sciences, and Literature of Afia. Vol. II. 4to. 21. 12s. 6d. Calcutta printed. Elmfly, London.

SOME

OME copies of this fecond volume of the Afiatic Researches arrived in England a confiderable time ago; but as it is a work fo peculiarly circumftanced in point of publication, fo high in price, fo little acceffible to the generality of readers, and yet fo very interefting in its contents, we venture, in this fingle inftance, which cannot become a precedent, to deviate from our general determination, not to notice books that appeared before the present year, and to gratify our friends with an account of its contents.

The title of these volumes is fufficiently explanatory of their utility and importance; the execution of them is fuch, as renders the labour of the critic both eafy and agreeable. It will, doubtlefs, be fufficient, on our parts, after we have, in the name of the public, given the thanks which are due to Sir William Jones, and the fociety of which he is the head, to specify briefly, and in order, the various articles which this valuable addition to univerfal literature contains, fubjoining a few curfory obfervations. Before, however, we enter upon this, it may not be inexpedient to communicate to our readers, the invitation which the Bengal Society holds out to all Europe, both to facilitate, BŘIT, CRIT. VOL. I. JUNE 1793.

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facilitate, and render more generally beneficial their learned and philofophic researches. It is conveyed in these terms :

"It may greatly conduce to the advancement of useful knowledge, if the learned Societies established in Europe, will tranfmit to the fecretary of the Society in Bengal, a collection of fhort and precife queries on every branch of Afiatic hiftory, natural and civil, on the philofophy, mathematics, antiquities, and polite literature of Afia, and on Eastern arts, both liberal and mechanic; fince it is hoped, that accurate answers may, in due time, be procured to any queftions that can be propofed on these fubjects; which muft, in all events, be curious and interefting, and may prove in the highest degree beneficial to mankind."

We are willing to believe that this Advertisement, which does the greatest honour to those who propose it, will receive the attention which its importance merits; and that by these means Europe and Afia may hereafter be united by far more endearing ties, than thofe which the auri facra fames can poffibly cement. It is a delightful fpeculation to the pious and philofophic obferver, to contemplate individuals, feparated by fo great a distance of place, variety of manners, and of language, harmonizing in one benevolent exercise of their faculties, and combining to multiply the fources of universal happiness.

"Nullos his mallemus ludos fpectare."

The volume commences with three of the Anniversary Difcourses of the Prefident, the 4th, 5th, and 6th, on the Arabs, the Tartars, and the Perfians: the 7th, on the Chinese, is postponed to the XVth Article of this volume, and will be noticed in its place. In his introduction to the first of these, Sir William Jones fixes the name of Arabia to that extenfive peninfula which the Red Sea divides from Africa, the great Affyrian river from Iran, and of which the Erythræan fea wathes the bafe. In fhort, to the whole of that country in which the Arabic language and letters, or fuch as have a near affinity to them, have been immemorially current. He next proceeds to prove, that the Arabs have never been entirely fubdued, which, as we all recollect, a certain eminent hiftorian has endeavoured to deny; that the natives of Hejaz and Yemen have preferved for ages the fole dominion of their deserts and pastures, their mountains and fertile valleys: and he reasonably concludes, from the courtefy, urbanity, love of poetry and eloquence, which have ever distinguished this people; that they muft have been eminently civilized for many ages before the conqueft of Perfia. One great line of diftinction between the "Arabic and Sanfcrit languages the prefident remarks to be this'that the latter delights in compounds to fuch excefs, that words

of more than twenty fyllables may be produced, while the former fo abhors the compofition of words, that the Arabs invariably exprefs very complex ideas by circumlocution. He obferves also of their religion, that before the Mahommedan revolution the noble and learned Arabs were Theifts, the lower orders of people, Idolaters. He tells us, that few monuments of antiquity are preferved in Arabia, and the best accounts of thofe few very uncertain; and that writing was fo little practifed among them, that their old poems may be confidered as originally unwritten. The prefident here takes occafion to controvert what Johnfon has faid on the extreme imperfection of unwritten languages, as a general pofition; fince a language which is only fpoken, may be highly polished by a people, who, like the ancient Arabs, make the improvement of their idiom a national concern, appoint folemn affemblies for the purpofe of difplaying their poetical talents, and hold it a duty to exercise their children in getting by heart the most approved compofitions.

The fecond difcourfe is upon the Tartars, a people differing as much from the Hindus and Arabs as those two nations from each other. Tartary is here also confidered on its most extensive fcale. The reader is requested to conceive a line drawn from the mouth of the Oby to that of the Dnieper, and, bringing it back eastward acrofs the Euxine, fo as to include the peninfula of Krim, extend it along the foot of Caucafus, by the rivers Cur and Aras, to the Cafpian lake; from the oppofite fhore of which he is to follow the courfe of the Jaihun and the chain of Caucafean hills, as far as thofe of Imaus; thence to continue the line beyond the Chinese wall to the White Mountain and the country of Yetfo; fkirting the borders of Perfia, India, China, Corea, but including part of Ruffia, with all the diftricts which lie between the Glacial fea and that of Japan.

After making mention of the opinion of M. Bailly, that arts and sciences had their fource in Tartary, the prefident proceeds to remark, that it is not poffible to diftinguifh the genuine traditions of this nation from those of the Arabs, whofe religious opinions they have in general adopted. It is univerfally agreed, that the Tartars had no literature: this, however, feems only to have been true as a general remark; for the Tartars of Khata appear to have been a polished, and even a lettered nation. We are informed, that more accurate knowledge of the present dialects of the Tartars is to be expected from individuals employed by the Ruffian Court; and that it is nearly certain, that the Tartarian language does not bear the least resemblance to either the Arabic or Sanfcrit. The reafoning of M. Bailly is fuccefsfully oppofed by argument throughout this difcourfe, which involves a great deal of curious and novel information on a fub

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ject hitherto but little explored. The great object is, to prove that Afia generally has been peopled by three confiderable nations, the Hindus, Arabs, and Tartars; all of them fubdivided into an infinite number of branches, and all of them fo different in features, language, and manners, that, if they fprang originally from one common root, they must have been separated for ages.

The prefident begins his discourse on the Perfians with giving the boundaries of this vaft empire. Thefe it cannot be impertinent to place before our readers. Beginning then with the fource of the Euphrates, we must defcend to its mouth in the Green fea, or Perfian gulf, including various diftricts on each fide the river: then coafting Perfia, properly fo called, and other Irarian provinces, we come to the Delta of the Sindhu, or Indus; whence afcending the mountains of Cafhghar, we difcover its fountains, and those of the Jaihun, down which we are conducted to the Cafpian. We next are led from the fea of Khozar, by the banks of the Cur, or Cyrus, and along the Caucafean ridges, to the fhore of the Euxine, and thence, by the feveral Grecian feas, to the point where we began, not far from the Mediterranean. In this outline the Lower Afia is to

be included.

The prefident imputes our ignorance of the ancient hiftory of Perfia to the fuperficial knowledge of the Greeks and Jews, and the lofs of Perfian archives. The Greek writers, before Xenophon, knew little of Perfia beyond its bordering kingdoins under feudatory princes. Cyrus was the first Persian emperor whose life they knew with any tolerable accuracy; and him Sir Wm. Jones calls, without fear of contradiction, Caikhofran.

The learned author pretends not to fay, that what is related by Xenophon of Cyrus is hiftorically true; but it cannot, he thinks, with any reafon be denied, that the outline of the story related to a fingle hero, whom the Afiatics, converfing with the father of European hiftory, defcribed, according to their popular traditions, by his true name, which the Greek alphabet could not exprefs.

The prefident, agreeably to his former plan, goes on to make many new and important remarks on the ancient languages and characters of Iran. When Muhammed was born, and Anufhiraran fat on the throne of Perfia, two languages were generally prevalent in the empire of Iran. The one of the court named Deri, and that of the learned, called Pahlavi. Befides thefe, there was a more ancient and abftrufe tongue, confined to the priests and philifophers: this was the language of the Zend. The Zend and the Pahlavi are now almost extinct, whilst the the Deri, or Parfi, is now become a new language, exquifitely polished by a series of fine writers in profe and verfe. A great affinity

affinity is obferved betwixt the Parfi and the Sanferit, from which it is concluded, that the Parfi, like the various Indian dialects, was derived from the language of the Brahmans, and by no means from an Arabian stock. Whilft, on the contrary, the Pahlavi has a great refemblance to Arabic, and was not improbably a dialect of the Chaldaic.

The primeval religion of Iran was what Newton calls the oldeft; and Sir W. Jones, rather too ftrongly, the nobleft of all religions. "A firm belief that ONE fupreme God made the "world by his power, and continually governed it by his pro"vidence. A pious fear, love, and adoration of him: a due "reverence for parents and aged perfons: a fraternal affection "for the whole human fpecies, and a compaffionate tenderness even for the brute creation. With the religion of the old Perfians, the prefident obferves, that their philofophy was intimately connected, as they were careful obfervers of the luminaries, which they adored. It does not appear that any complete or fatisfactory evidence of the fciences or arts of ancient Perfia now remain. It is, nevertheless, fixed, that a powerful monarchy was established in Iran long before the Affyrian government; that the language of the first Persian empire was the mother of the Sanfcrit; confequently of the Zend and Parfi, as well as of Greek, Latin, and Gothic. From the fame evidence it is afferted, that the language of the Affyrians was the parent of the Chaldaic; and that from the earlieft dawn of hiftory, the three diftinct races of men are discovered in Perfia, before defcribed, as the poffeffors of India, Arabia, and Tartary. It is prefumed, that these three races migrated from Iran as from their common country; and it is confidered as a propofition firmly established, that Persia was the true centre of pulation, knowledge, language, and arts. We cannot, without the fincereft regret, perceive an intimation at the conclufion of this difcourfe, that the fociety, which has produced fo much inftruction and ingenuous amufement to Europeans, is not in the most flourishing state; and fomething is implied of an imputation against the liberality of its members, incompatible with the objects they profefs to purfue, and inconfistent with our ideas of Afiatic munificence.

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Art. IV. Is on the defcent of the Afghans from the Jews, and contains a fpecimen of their language. This is fupplied by the late Mr. Vanfittart, and is tranflated from a Perfian abridgment, from the original Pushto, or Afghan language. The Afghans, according to their own tradition, are the pofterity of Melic Talut (King Saul), who, in the opinion of some, was a defcendant of Judah, the fon of Jacob; and, according to others, of Benjamin, the brother of Jofeph.

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