Part 1 (1/2)

Ceylon; an Account of the Island Physical, Historical, and Topographical with Notices of Its Natural History, Antiquities and Productions.

by James Emerson Tennent.

Volume 1.

NOTICE TO THE FOURTH EDITION.

The gratifying reception with which the following pages have been honoured by the public and the press, has in no degree lessened my consciousness, that in a work so extended in its scope, and comprehending such a multiplicity of facts, errors are nearly unavoidable both as to conclusions and detail. These, so far as I became aware of them, I have endeavoured to correct in the present, as well as in previous impressions.

But my princ.i.p.al reliance for the suggestion and supply both of amendments and omissions has been on the press and the public of Ceylon; whose familiarity with the topics discussed naturally renders them the most competent judges as to the mode in which they have been treated. My hope when the book was published in October last was, that before going again to press I should be in possession of such friendly communications and criticisms from the island, as would have enabled me to render the second edition much more valuable than the previous one. In this expectation I have been agreeably disappointed, the sale having been so rapid, as to require a fourth impression before it was possible to obtain from Ceylon judicious criticisms on the first. These in due time will doubtless arrive; and meanwhile, I have endeavoured, by careful revision, to render the whole as far as possible correct.

J. EMERSON TENNENT.

NOTICE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

The call for a third edition on the same day that the second was announced for publication, and within less than two months from the appearance of the first, has furnished a gratifying a.s.surance of the interest which the public are disposed to take in the subject of the present work.

Thus encouraged, I have felt it my duty to make several alterations in the present impression, amongst the most important of which is the insertion of a Chapter on the doctrines of Buddhism as it developes itself in Ceylon.[1] In the historical sections I had already given an account of its introduction by Mahindo, and of the establishments founded by successive sovereigns for its preservation and diffusion. To render the narrative complete, it was felt desirable to insert an abstract of the peculiar tenets of the Buddhists; and this want it has been my object to supply. The sketch, it will be borne in mind, is confined to the princ.i.p.al features of what has been denominated ”_Southern Buddhism_” amongst the Singhalese; as distinguished from ”_Northern Buddhism_” in Nepal, Thibet, and China.[2] The latter has been largely ill.u.s.trated by the labours of Mr. B.H. HODGSON and the toilsome researches of M. CSOMA of Korros in Transylvania; and the minutest details of the doctrines and ceremonies of the former have been unfolded in the elaborate and comprehensive collections of Mr. SPENCE HARDY.[3] From materials discovered by these and other earnest inquirers, Buddhism in its general aspect has been ably delineated in the dissertations of BURNOUF[4] and SAINT HILAIRE[5], and in the commentaries of REMUSAT[6], STANISLAS JULIEN[7], FOUCAUX[8], La.s.sEN[9], and WEBER.[10] The portion thus added to the present edition has been to a great extent taken from a former work of mine on the local superst.i.tions of Ceylon, and the ”_Introduction and Progress of Christianity_” there; and as the section relating to Buddhism had the advantage, previous to publication, of being submitted to the Rev. Mr.

GOGERLY, the most accomplished Pali scholar, as well as the most erudite student of Buddhistical literature in the island, I submit it with confidence as an accurate summary of the distinctive views of the Singhalese on the leading doctrines of their national faith.

[Footnote 1: See Part IV., c. xi.]

[Footnote 2: MAX MuLLER; _History of Sanskrit Literature_, p. 202.]

[Footnote 3: _Eastern Monachism_, an account of the origin, laws; discipline, sacred writings, mysterious rites, religious ceremonies, and present circ.u.mstances of the Order of Mendicants, founded by Gotoma Budha. 8vo. Lond. 1850; and _A Manual of Buddhism in its Modern Development_. 8vo. Lond. 1853.]

[Footnote 4: BURNOUF, _Introduction a l'Histoire du Bouddhieme Indien_.

4to. Paris. 1845; and translation of the _Lotus de la bonne Loi_.]

[Footnote 5: J. BARTHELEMY SAINT-HILAIRE _Le Bouddha et sa Religion_.

8vo. Paris. 1800.]

[Footnote 6: Introduction and Notes to the _Fo[)e] Kou[)e] Ki_ of FA HIAN.]

[Footnote 7: Life and travels of HIOUEN THSANG.]

[Footnote 8: Translation of _Lalitavistara_ by M. PH. ED. FOUCAUX.]

[Footnote 9: Author of the _Indische Alterthumskunde;_ &c.]

[Footnote 10: Author of the _Indische Studien_; &c.]

A writer in the _Sat.u.r.day Review_[1], in alluding to the pa.s.sage in which I have sought to establish the ident.i.ty of the ancient Tars.h.i.+sh with the modern Point de Galle[2], admits the force of the coincidence adduced, that the Hebrew terms for ”ivory, apes, and peac.o.c.ks”[3] (the articles imported in the s.h.i.+ps of Solomon) are identical with the Tamil names, by which these objects are known in Ceylon to the present day; and, to strengthen my argument on this point, he adds that, ”these terms were so entirely foreign and alien from the common Hebrew language as to have driven the Ptolemaist authors of the Septuagint version into a blunder, by which the ivory, apes, and peac.o.c.ks come out as '_hewn and carven stones_.'” The circ.u.mstance adverted to had not escaped my notice; but I forebore to avail myself of it; for, although the fact is accurately stated by the reviewer, so far as regards the Vatican MS., in which the translators have slurred over the pa.s.sage and converted ”_ibha, kapi_, and _tukeyim_” into [Greek: ”lithon toreuton kai peleketon”] (literally, ”stones hammered and carved in relief”); still, in the other great MS. of the Septuagint, the _Codex Alexandrinus_, which is of equal antiquity, the pa.s.sage is correctly rendered by ”[Greek: odonton elephantinon kai pithekon kai taonon].” The editor of the Aldine edition[4] compromised the matter by inserting ”the ivory and apes,” and excluding the ”peac.o.c.ks,” in order to introduce the Vatican reading of ”stones.”[5] I have not compared the Complutensian and other later versions.

[Footnote 1: Novemb. 19, 1859, p. 612.]