We cannot well comprehend, how five such great and powerful kings, could find it necessary to confederate, for the purpose of attacking a horde of Arabs, in a part of the world so wild and uncultivated; nor, how Abraham was enabled to defeat such great and powerful monarchs, with only three - hundred country servants, or followers; nor, how he could possibly pursue them beyond Damascus. Some translators put Dan for Damascus, but Dan did not exist even in the time of Moses, much less in the time of Abraham. It is more than three hundred miles from the extremity of the Lake Asphaltide, where Sodom was situated, to Damascus. All this is far beyond our conceptions. Every thing is miraculous in the history of the Hebrews; but, we have already said, and now repeat, that we believe these, and all other Hebrew prodigies, without examination.

CHAPTER XVII.

OF INDIA.

We think we may safely venture to give it as our opinion, that the Indians, about the Ganges, were among the first of the nations. It is certain that the soil, yielding in the greatest abundance, food for the animal race, is very soon covered with the species to which it affords nourishment. Now, there is no country in the world, where the human species can more easily acquire the most wholesome and agreeable food, and in the greatest abundance, than towards the Ganges. Rice grows there without cultivation; ananas, cocoanuts, dates, and figs, on all sides, present to our acceptance the most delicious food: whilst, the orange and citron tree, afford the most refreshing drinks, with some nourishment. The sugar cane grows indigenous. Palm-trees, and fig-trees with large broad leaves, afford the most pleasant and delightful shades. It is not necessary, in this country, to slaughter the flocks, to provide clothing as a defence against the rigours of the season. Even in the present day, children are brought up

in a state of nature, until they reach the age of puberty. The people of the country were never obliged to risk their lives for their support, by hunting and attacking animals, and subsisting on their lacerated members, as has been the case in almost every other part.

In this delightful climate, men assembled, as it were, spontaneously, and formed themselves into societies. There were never any disputed claims to a paltry, barren, spot of land, for the purpose of rearing their lean flocks; nor did they ever make war upon each other for a spring, or well: as was the case with the barbarians of Arabia Petræa.

We do not intend to recapitulate, the ancient monuments, of which, the Bramins make so much boast. It will suffice to observe, that the greatest curiosities and rarities of antiquity, which the Chinese emperor, Cam-hi, had in his palace, were all Indian. He shewed our mathematical missionaries, some ancient Indian coins, stamped in the corner; and of a date, greatly anterior, to the copper coins of the Chinese emperors. It is highly probable, that the Persians acquired the art of coining money, from the Indians.

The Greeks, previous to Pythagoras, travelled into India for information. The signs of the seven planets, &c. are still, in almost all the world, the same as the Indians invented. The Arabs were obliged to adopt their arithmetical characters;

and, it is incontestable, that the game [chess] which does the greatest honour to human invention, is of Indian origin. The elephants, for which we have substituted castles, are a proof of it.

In fine, the people of the greatest antiquity,the Persians, the Phoenicians, the Arabians, and the Egyptians, were accustomed, from time immemorial, to travel into India; and to traffic for, and bring thence, those spices which nature has bestowed on these countries alone. But, the Indians, were never necessitated to resort to any of those countries, for produce of any kind.

We are told of a certain Bacchus, who, it is said, set out from Egypt, or from some country of western Asia, to conquer India. This Bacchus then, who ever he may have been, knew, that at the extremity of our continent, there was a country far preferable to his own. Necessity leads to robbery and plunder. They only invaded India because she was rich; and, assuredly, a rich people were united in society, and civilized and enlightened, long before a people, who live by robbery and plunder.

That which strikes me the most forcibly, in India, is, the ancient opinion of the transmigration of souls; which, in the course of time, extended to China and Europe. It was not that the Indians had any just, or regularly defined, ideas of the soul; but, they imagined that this principle, whether aërial or igneous, successively animated other

bodies. Let us observe, attentively, the effect, which this system of philosophy produced, on the manners of the people. The perverse and wicked had a great dread of being condemned by Visnou, and Brama, to become the most vile and pitiful of animals. We shall soon see, that the superior people had an idea of another life; although they possessed different notions. The doctrine of the immortality of the soul, seems to have been established among the whole of the ancient empires of the world, with the exception of the Chinese. Their first legislators promulgated only moral laws; they thought it sufficient to exhort men to virtue; and, to enforce it, by a strict and severe policy.

In embracing the doctrine of Metempsychosis, the Indians were still further restrained, by the fear of killing their fathers or mothers, in killing men, or animals; and this inspired them with a great horror of the crime of murder, and violence, of any kind; which, among them, became a kind of feeling of second nature. Thus, the Indians, whose families are not allied to the Arabians, or Tartars, are, at the present day, the most meek and gentle of all people. Their religion, and the temperature of their climate, render these people, in every respect, similar to those harmless animals which we lock up in our sheep-cotes and pigeonhouses, to slaughter at our convenience. All those barbarous nations which invaded this country, from

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