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thus where MENU fays, that emiffaries are the eyes of a prince, the Perfian phrase makes him afcribe four eyes to the person of a king; for the word chár, which means an emissary in Sanfcrit, fignifies four in the popular dialect.

The work, now prefented to the European world, contains abundance of curious matter extremely interesting both to fpeculative lawyers and antiquaries, with many beauties, which need not be pointed out, and with many blemishes, which cannot be juftified or palliated. It is a system of defpotism and priestcraft, both indeed limited by law, but artfully confpiring to give mutual fupport, though with mutual checks; it is filled with strange conceits in metaphysicks and natural philosophy, with idle fuperftitions, and with a scheme of theology moft obfcurely figurative, and confequently liable to dangerous mifconception; it abounds with minute and childish formalities, with ceremonies generally abfurd and often ridiculous; the punishments are partial and fanciful, for fome crimes dreadfully cruel, for others reprehenfibly flight; and the very morals, though rigid enough on the whole, are in one or two inftances (as in the case of light oaths and of pious perjury) unaccountably relaxed; nevertheless, a

fpirit of fublime devotion, of benevolence to mankind, and of amiable tenderness to all fentient creatures, pervades the whole work; the ftyle of it has a certain auftere majefty, that founds like the language of legislation and extorts a refpectful awe; the fentiments of independence on all beings but GOD, and the harsh admonitions even to kings, are truly noble; and the many panegyricks on the Gayatri, the Mother, as it is called, of the Veda, prove the author to have adored (not the visible material fun, but) that divine and incomparably greater light, to use the words of the most venerable text in the Indian fcripture, which illumines all, delights all, from which all proceed, to which all must return, and which alone can irradiate (not our visual organs merely, but our souls and) our intellects. Whatever opinion in fhort may be formed of MENU and his laws, in a country happily enlightened by found philofophy and the only true revelation, it must be remembered, that those laws are actually revered, as the word of the Most High, by nations of great importance to the political and commercial interefts of Europe, and particularly by many millions of Hindu fubjects, whose well directed industry would add largely to the wealth of Britain, and who afk no more in return than protection for their perfons and places of abode,

justice in their temporal concerns, indulgence to the prejudices of their own religion, and the benefit of those laws, which they have been taught to believe facred, and which alone they can poffibly comprehend.

W. JONES.

THE

LAWS OF MENU,

SON OF BRAHMÁ.

CHAPTER THE FIRST.

On the Creation; with a Summary of the Contents.

1. MENU fat reclined, with his attention fixed on one object, the fupreme GOD; when the divine Sages approached him, and, after mutual falutations in due form, delivered the following addrefs:

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2. Deign, fovereign ruler, to apprize us ot 'the facred laws in their order, as they must be ⚫ followed by all the four claffes, and by each of 'them, in their feveral degrees, together with the ' duties of every mixed clafs ;

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For thou, Lord, and thou only among 3. mortals, knowest the true sense, the first prin'ciple, and the prescribed ceremonies, of this ' univerfal, fupernatural Véda, unlimited in extent and unequalled in authority.'

4. HE, whofe powers were measureless, being thus requested by the great Sages, whose thoughts were profound, faluted them all with reverence, and gave them a comprehenfive answer, faying:

Be it heard!

5. This universe existed only in the first di• vine idea yet unexpanded, as if involved in darknefs, imperceptible, undefinable, undiscoverable by reafon, and undiscovered by revelation, as if it ' were wholly immersed in fleep:

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6. Then the fole felf-existing power, him• self undiscerned, but making this world dif'cernible, with five elements and other principles of nature, appeared with undiminished glory, expanding his idea, or dispelling the ' gloom.

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7. HE, whom the mind alone can perceive, • whofe effence eludes the external organs, who has no vifible parts, who exifts from eternity, < even HE, the foul of all beings, whom no being can comprehend, fhone forth in perfon.

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8. HE, having willed to produce various beings from his own divine fubftance, first with

a thought created the waters, and placed in them a productive feed:

9.

• That feed became an egg bright as gold, blazing like the luminary with a thousand beams; and in that egg he was born himself, in

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