Part 4 (1/2)

Having been patronized by Caesar at Roreat Cesarina of the North, Catherine the Great (1762-1796) Even as Grand-duchess Catherine was engrossed with the idea of a Universal Dictionary, on the plan suggested by Leibniz She encouraged the chaplain of the British Factory at St Petersburg, the Rev

Daniel Dumaresq, to undertake the work, and he is said to have published, at her desire, a ”Coes,” in quarto; a work, however, which, if ever published, is now completely lost The reputed author died in London in 1805, at the advanced age of eighty-four

When Catherine came to the throne, her plans of conquest hardly absorbed ical studies; and she once shut herself up nearly a year, devoting all her time to the compilation of her Comparative Dictionary A letter of hers to Zimmermann, dated the 9th of May, 1785, may interest some of my hearers:-

”Your letter,” she writes, ”has drawn me from the solitude in which I had shut myself up for nearly nine uess what I have been about I will tell you, for such things do not happen every day I have beena list of froe, and I have had theons as I could find Their number exceeds already the second hundred Every day I took one of these words and wrote it out in all the languages which I could collect This has taught me that the Celtic is like the Ostiakian: that what , vault, in others; that the word God in certain dialects hest, in others, sun or fire (Up to here her letter is written in French; then follows a line of German) I became tired of ain in French) But as I should have been sorry to throw such a mass of paper in the fire;-besides, the rooth, which I use as a boudoir in e, was pretty ar an honest confession of reed to publish these collections, and thus make them useful to those who like to occupy the for soe will or will not see in this work bright ideas of different kinds, must depend on the disposition of their minds, and does not concern me in the least”

If an empress rides a hobby, there are many ready to help her Not only were all Russian ambassadors instructed to collect raton himself, in order to please the eenerals of the United States, enjoining them to supply the equivalents from the American dialects The first volume of the I a list of 285 words translated into fifty-one European, and 149 Asiatic languages Though full credit should be given to the e, it is but fair to remember that it was the philosopher who, nearly a hundred years before, sowed the seed that fell into good ground

As collections, the works of Hervas, of the Eh, such is the progressthe last fifty years, that few people would now consult them Besides, the principle of classification which is followed in these works can hardly clairaphically, as the languages of Europe, Asia, Africa, Ah, at the same time, natural affinities are admitted which would unite dialects spoken at a distance of 208 degrees Languages seemed to float about like islands on the ocean of huether to forer continents This is a most critical period in the history of every science, and if it had not been for a happy accident, which, like an electric spark, caused the floating eleular fores and dialects, enu, could long have sustained the interest of the student of languages This electric spark was the discovery of Sanskrit Sanskrit is the ancient language of the Hindus It had ceased to be a spoken language at least 300 B C At that ti to the ancient Vedic Sanskrit in the relation of Italian to Latin We know some of these dialects, for there were more than one in various parts of India, froraved on the rocks of Dhauli, Girnar, and Kapurdigiri, and which have been deciphered by Prinsep, Norris, Wilson, and Burnouf We can watch the further growth of these local dialects in the so-called _Pali_, the sacred language of Buddhism in Ceylon, and once the popular dialect of the country where Buddhisadha(135) We ain in what are called the Prakrit idioms, used in the later plays, in the sacred literature of the Jainas, and in a few poetical coh a es of the various conquerors of India, the Arabic, Persian, Mongolic, and Turkish, and through a concoed into theall this tie of the Brah birth to its nu; and even at the present day, an educated Brahali Sanskrit hat Greek was at Alexandria, what Latin was during the Middle Ages It was the classical and at the sae of the Brahmans, and in it ritten their sacred hymns, the Vedas, and the later works, such as the laws of Manu and the Puranas

The existence of such a language as the ancient idioe literature, was known at all times; and if there are still any doubts, like those expressed by Dugald Stewart in his ”Conjectures concerning the Origin of the Sanskrit,”(136) as to its age and authenticity, they will be best relance at the history of India, and at the accounts given by the writers of different nations that becae and literature of that country

The argument that nearly all the names of persons and places in India mentioned by Greek and Roman writers are pure Sanskrit, has been handled so fully and ably by others, that nothing more remains to be said

The next nation after the Greeks that becae and literature of India was the Chinese Though Buddhision before the year 65 A D, under the E-ti,(137) Buddhist missionaries reached China from India as early as the third century B C One Buddhist missionary is mentioned in the Chinese annals in the year 217; and about the year 120 B C, a Chinese general, after defeating the barbarous tribes north of the desert of Gobi, brought back as a trophy a golden statue, the statue of Buddha

The very naed in Chinese into Fo-t'o and Fo,(138) is pure Sanskrit, and so is every word and every thought of that religion

The language which the Chinese pilgrims went to India to study, as the key to the sacred literature of Buddhism, was Sanskrit They call it Fan; but Fan, as M Stanislas Julien has shown, is an abbreviation of Fan-lan-mo, and this is the only way in which the Sanskrit Brahman could be rendered in Chinese(139) We read of the E Tsa-in and other high officials to India, in order to study there the doctrine of Buddha They engaged the services of two learned Buddhists, Matanga and Tchou-fa-lan, and some of the most important Buddhist works were translated by them into Chinese The intellectual intercourse between the Indian peninsula and the northern continent of Asia continued uninterrupted for several centuries Missions were sent froious, political, social, and geographical state of the country; and the chief object of interest, which attracted public eriion of Buddha About 300 years after the public recognition of Buddhisrian to flow from China to India The first account which we possess of these pilgries refers to the travels of Fa-hian, who visited India towards the end of the fourth century His travels were translated into French by A Re and Song-yun, ere sent to India, in 518, by co sacred books and relics Then followed Hiouen-thsang, whose life and travels, from 629-645, have been rendered so popular by the excellent translation of M Stanislas Julien

After Hiouen-thsang the principal works of Chinese pilgrims are the Itineraries of the Fifty-six Monks, published in 730, and the travels of Khi-nie, who visited India in 964, at the head of 300 pilgrie e all this time was Sanskrit, we learn, not only froious and philosophical terriation in Sanskrit which one of the) has inserted in his diary

As soon as the Muhammedans entered India, we hear of translations of Sanskrit works into Persian and Arabic(140) Harun-al-Rashi+d (786-809) had two Indians, Manka and Saleh, at his court as physicians Manka translated the classical work on medicine, Susruta, and a treatise on poisons, ascribed to Chanakya, fro the Chalifate of Al Maebra was translated by Muhammed ben Musa from Sanskrit into Arabic (edited by F Rosen)

About 1000 A D, Abu Rihan al Biruni (born 970, died 1038) spent forty years in India, and coives a complete account of the literature and sciences of the Hindus at that time Al Biruni had been appointed by the Sultan of Khawarazm to accompany an embassy which he sent to Mahmud of Ghazni and Masud of Lahore The learned Avicenna had been invited to join the same embassy, but had declined Al Biruni e of Sanskrit, for he not only translated one work on the Sankhya, and another on the Yoga philosophy, from Sanskrit into Arabic, but likewise torks from Arabic into Sanskrit(142)

About 1150 we hear of Abu Saleh translating a work on the education of kings from Sanskrit into Arabic(143)

Two hundred years later, we are told that Firoz Shah, after the capture of Nagarcote, ordered several Sanskrit works on philosophy to be translated from Sanskrit by Maulana Izzu-d-din Khalid Khani A work on veterinary medicine ascribed to Salotar,(144) said to have been the tutor of Susruta, was likewise translated from Sanskrit in the year 1381 A copy of it was preserved in the Royal Library of Lucknow

Two hundred years n of Akbar (1556-1605) A ht up as a Muhaion of the Prophet as superstitious,(145) and then devoted hiion He called Brahmans and fire-worshi+ppers to his court, and ordered theions with the Muhammedan doctors When he heard of the Jesuits at Goa, he invited them to his capital, and he was for many years looked upon as a secret convert to Christianity He was, however, a rationalist and deist, and never believed anything, as he declared hiion which he founded, the so-called Ilahi religion, was pure Deism mixed up with the worshi+p of the sun(146) as the purest and highest eh Akbar himself could neither read nor write,(147) his court was the home of literary e, proht on the problems nearest to the emperor's heart, he ordered to be translated into Persian

The New Testament(148) was thus translated at his command; so were the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, the Amarakosha,(149) and other classical works of Sanskrit literature But though the es of different nations, he does not see from the Brahmans a translation of the Veda A translation of the Atharva-veda(150) was made for him by Haji Ibrahim Sirhindi; but that Veda never enjoyed the same authority as the other three Vedas; and it is doubtful even whether by Atharva-veda is meant more than the Upanishads, some of which may have been composed for the special benefit of Akbar There is a story which, though evidently of a legendary character, sho the study of Sanskrit was kept up by the Brahul emperors

”Neither the authority (it is said) nor promises of Akbar could prevail upon the Brahion: he was therefore obliged to have recourse to artifice The stratagem he made use of was to cause an infant, of the name of _Feizi_, to be committed to the care of these priests, as a poor orphan of the sacerdotal line, who alone could be initiated into the sacred rites of their theology Feizi, having received the proper instructions for the part he was to act, was conveyed privately to Benares, the seat of knowledge in Hindostan; he was received into the house of a learned Brahman, who educated him with the same care as if he had been his son After the youth had spent ten years in study, Akbar was desirous of recalling hihter of his preceptor The old Brah passion of the two lovers He was fond of Feizi, and offered hi ratitude, resolved to conceal the fraud no longer, and, falling at the feet of the Brahman, discovered the imposture, and asked pardon for his offences The priest, without reproaching hi to plunge it in his heart, if Feizi had not prevented hi man used everyto expiate his treachery The Brah into tears, promised to pardon him on condition that he should swear never to translate the _Vedas_, or sacred volumes, or disclose to any person whatever the symbol of the Brahman creed Feizi readily promised him: how far he kept his word is not known; but the sacred books of the Indians have never been translated”(151)

We have thus traced the existence of Sanskrit, as the language of literature and religion of India, fron of Akbar A hundred years after Akbar, the eldest son of Shah Jehan, the unfortunate Dara, ious speculations which had distinguished his great grandsire He became a student of Sanskrit, and translated the Upanishads, philosophical treatises appended to the Vedas, into Persian This was in the year 1657, a year before he was put to death by his younger brother, the bigoted Aurengzebe This prince's translation was translated into French by Anquetil Duperron, in the year 1795, the fourth year of the French Republic; and was for a long time the principal source froe of the sacred literature of the Brahn of Aurengzebe (1658-1707), the cotemporary and rival of Louis XIV, the existence of Sanskrit and Sanskrit literature was known, if not in Europe generally, at least to Europeans in India, particularly to missionaries Who was the first European, that knew of Sanskrit, or that acquired a knowledge of Sanskrit, is difficult to say When Vasco de Gaan at once to preach to the natives, and had suffered a martyr's death before the discoverer of India returned to Lisbon Every new shi+p that reached India brought newtime we look in vain in their letters and reports for any mention of Sanskrit or Sanskrit literature Francis, now St Francis Xavier, was the first to organize the great work of preaching the Gospel in India (1542); and such were his zeal and devotion, such his success in winning the hearts of high and low, that his friends ascribed to hiift never claimed by St Francis himself It is not, however, till the year 1559 that we first hear of the , with the help of a converted Brahical and philosophical literature of the country, and challenging the Brahmans to public disputations

The first certain instance of a Europeans to a still later period,-to what uished fro spirit of Francis Xavier

Roberto de nobili went to India in 1606 He was hih family, of a refined and cultivated mind, and he perceived the her castes, and particularly the Brah the Christian communities formed at Madura and other places These communities consisted chiefly of men of low rank, of no education, and no refine hih and noble, the wise and learned, in the land He shut hie, not only of Tau, but of Sanskrit When, after a patient study of the language and literature of the Brahonists, he showed hiarb of the Brah their diet, and sub even to the complicated rules of caste He was successful, in spite of the persecutions both of the Brahmans, ere afraid of him, and of his own fellow-laborers, who could not understand his policy His life in India, where he died as an old blind man, is full of interest to the missionary

I can only speak of him here as the first European Sanskrit scholar A man who could quote from Manu, from the Puranas, and even from works such as the apastamba-sutras, which are known even at present to only those few Sanskrit scholars who can read Sanskrit MSS, uage and literature of the Brahmans; and the very idea that he came, as he said, to preach a new or a fourth Veda,(154) which had been lost, shoell he knew the strong and weak points of the theological syste that the reports which he sent to Roe of idolatry, and in which he drew a faithful picture of the religion, the customs, and literature of the Brahmans, should not have attracted the attention of scholars The ”Accommodation Question,” as it was called, occupied cardinals and popes for many years; but not one of the to the existence of an ancient civilization so perfect and so firmly rooted as to require accommodation even from the missionaries of Rome At a time when the discovery of one Greek MS would have been hailed by all the scholars of Europe, the discovery of a complete literature was allowed to pass unnoticed The day of Sanskrit had not yet co the attention of European scholars to the extraordinary discovery that had been made were the French Jesuit missionaries, whom Louis XIV had sent out to India after the treaty of Ryswick, in 1697(155) Father Pons drew up a comprehensive account of the literary treasures of the Brahmans; and his report, dated Karikal (dans le Madure), November 23, 1740, and addressed to Father Duhalde, was published in the ”Lettres edifiantes”(156) Father Pons gives in it a eneral, a very accurate description of the various branches of Sanskrit literature,-of the four Vedas, the grammatical treatises, the six systems of philosophy, and the astronomy of the Hindus He anticipated, on several points, the researches of Sir Williah the letter of Father Pons excited a deep interest, that interest rerammars, dictionaries, and Sanskrit texts to enable scholars in Europe to study Sanskrit in the same spirit in which they studied Greek and Latin The first who endeavored to supply this as a Carmelite friar, a German of the name of Johann Philip Wesdin, better known as Paulinus a Santo Bartholomeo He was in India frorarammar has been severely criticised, and is now hardly ever consulted, it is but fair to bear in e is a work of infinitely greater difficulty than any later grammar(157)

We have thus seen how the existence of the Sanskrit language and literature was known ever since India had first been discovered by Alexander and his coe, as it was spoken at the time of Alexander, and at the time of Solomon, and for centuries before his time, was intimately related to Greek and Latin, in fact, stood to them in the same relation as French to Italian and Spanish The history of what y dates from the foundation of the Asiatic Society at Calcutta, in 1784(158) It was through the labors of Sir William Jones, Carey, Wilkins, Forster, Colebrooke, and other e and literature of the Brahmans became first accessible to European scholars; and it would be difficult to say which of the two, the language or the literature, excited the deepest andinterest