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the public station you have so long graced, may your private life be gilded with all the happiness and comforts that a long life, a green old age, and the satisfaction of seeing your country safe from the storms of a convulsed age, can render you.

I have the honour to be,

Your Lordship's obliged

and very obedient servant,

JAMES ELMES.

29, Charlotte Street, Portland Place, August 12th, 1821.

ADVERTISEMENT.

In preparing that course of Lectures on Architecture, which I delivered last winter at the Russel and Surrey Institutions of London, and this spring at the Philosophical Society of Birmingham, the architecture and antiquities of India naturally came under my investigation; and led me to consult, among other writings, the voluminous and philosophical works of Sir William Jones. Perceiving in these interesting and delightful volumes, gems of the rarest kind, scattered among discussions of the severest nature, I was led to wish a selection of his Discourses and lighter works, separated from those connected with law, jurisprudence, physiology and other graver and more important investigations. This selection I proposed to my Publisher, and the result of our discussions and agreement are the two volumes which I have now the happiness of presenting to the Public, conjointly with him. These volumes will, I trust, be accepted as an addition of no common order, to the lighter and more elegant specimens of English literature.

With the lately collected Letters of the same eminent character, with the beautiful Discourses of Sir

Joshua Reynolds, and with other elegant English classical works recently published, of the same size, will these Discourses and Papers be suitable companions.

I originally intended to have written a brief life of this illustrious man, but it is done so well by Lord Teignmouth in the complete collection of his works, that I preferred referring the reader of this selection to that memoir, and substituting, in its stead, his Lordship's eloquent Discourse* on the Name, Character, and Talents of Sir William Jones, which rivals for beauty of composition, and truth of statement, any of the beautiful eloges of the French, to that of intruding any thing of my own.

The unbounded pleasure which I have received in the selection and compilation of these two volumes, and the satisfaction which I feel in presenting their elegant and profound contents to my countrymen, are rewards that infinitely compensate whatever labour they have required of me.

London, Aug. 12, 1821.

See Vol. II. pp. 55, 56, et seq.

J. E.

SIR WILLIAM JONES'S

DISCOURSES.

DISCOURSE I.

Delivered at the Opening of the Asiatic Society, FEBRUARY 24, 1784.

Importance of Asia in the history of mankind -Advantages to be derived from cultivating its history, antiquities, &c.— Hints for the foundation of the Society's objects and future views.

GENTLEMEN,

WHEN I was at sea last August, on my voyage to this country, which I had long and ardently desired to visit, I found one evening, on inspecting the observations of the day, that India lay before us, and Persia on our left, whilst a breeze from Arabia blew nearly on our stern. A situation so pleasing in itself, and to me so new, could not fail to awaken a train of reflections in a mind which had early been accustomed to contemplate with delight the eventful histories and agreeable fictions of this eastern world. It gave me inexpressible pleasure

B

to find myself in the midst of so noble an amphitheatre, almost encircled by the vast regions of Asia, which has ever been esteemed the nurse of sciences, the inventress of delightful and useful arts, the scene of glorious actions, fertile in the productions of human genius, abounding in natural wonders, and infinitely diversified in the forms of religion and government, in the laws, manners, customs, and languages, as well as in the features and complexions of men. I could not help remarking how important and extensive a field was yet unexplored, and how many solid advantages unimproved: and when I considered, with pain, that, in this fluctuating, imperfect, and limited condition of life, such inquiries and improvements could only be made by the united efforts of many, who are not easily brought, without some pressing inducement or strong impulse, to converge in a common point, I consoled myself with a hope, founded on opinions, which it might have the appearance of flattery to mention, that, if in any country or community such an union could be effected, it was among my countrymen in Bengal; with some of whom I already had, and with most was desirous of having, the pleasure of being intimately acquainted.

You have realized that hope, gentlemen, and even anticipated a declaration of my wishes, by your alacrity in laying the foundation of a Society for inquiring into the History and Antiquities, the Natural Productions, Arts, Sciences, and Literature of Asia. I may confidently foretell, that an institution so likely to afford entertainment, and convey knowledge to mankind, will advance to maturity by slow, yet certain, degrees; as the Royal Society, which,

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