Sir William Jones, Orientalist: An Annotated Bibliography of His Works 9780824885038

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PACIFIC AREA BIBLIOGRAPHIES

SIR WILLIAM JONES, ORIENTALIST An Annotated Bibliography of His Works

Sir William

Jones

(1746-1794)

Sir William Jones ORIENTALIST An Annotated Bibliography of His Works

Garland H. Cannon, Jr.

University of Hawaii Press HO

NOLULD

Copyright, 1952, by University of Hawaii P r e s s Manufactured in Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 52-7595

PREFACE This book is intended as a survey of the writings of Sir William Jones (1746-94), pioneer English Orientalist who was vitally concerned with improving conditions in the East and with explaining Eastern culture to Europeans. It is particularly appropriate today in view of the renewed interest in Jones's writings that was stimulated by the publication of recent scholarly essays and monographs on Jones. In 1946 the bicentennial of Jones's birth was commemorated with celebrations and important publications in London, Oxford, and Calcutta. Parts One and Two of the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland w e r e d e d i cated to his m e m o r y . T h e Bulletin of theSchool of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (XI. 4) contained nine e x -

cellent articles

on Jones and his importance as a literary

f i g u r e . A pamphlet, Proceedings of the Sir William Jones

Bicen-

tenary Conference, was issued by the Royal India Society at Oxford. Professor A. J. Arberry published a monograph, Asiatic Jones: The Life and Influence of Sir William Jones

1794).

(1746-

Two publications appeared in Calcutta, 150th Jubilee

of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal (1784-1934) and the Bicentenary of Sir William Jones (1746-1946) and (in 1948) Sir William Jonest Bicentenary of His Birth CommemorationVolume, 17461946.

The establishment of India and Pakistan as separate states and the Communization of China, roughly coincident with the bicentenary celebrations, also indirectly caused renewed interest in Jones by forcing the attention of the West on the area which had been his greatest concern. He had wanted the East and West to live harmoniously, exchanging resources and respecting each other's rights; all his comparative researches pointed in this direction. Since harmonious relationships obviously do not exist today, p e r vii

haps Jones's ideas can suggest a key to future harmony between East and West. Continued research into the life and writings of Jones can also expand and help clarify comparative studies of many aspects of Anglo-Oriental relationships. It is true that Western scholarship concerning the Orient has advanced considerably since the eighteenth century; the well-versed Orientalist today goes far beyond Jones. But as the circles widen toward a greater interrelationship between East and West, attention must inevitably focus upon Jones, even if briefly, because he was the pioneer in interpreting the Orient to the West. The modern student of Eastern thought and culture must not necessarily be saturated in Jones before beginning his work, but a knowledge of Jones's basic ideas and purposes in his Oriental studies should certainly help him. This book is not intended as an interpretation or an evaluation or even a re-examination of Jones's writings; rather, its basic purpose is to help the reader find his way around in the voluminous writings and diverse subject matter treated by Jones. It should be useful especially to reference librarians (until now no comprehensive bibliography of Jones's writings has been compiled) and to scholars interested in eighteenth-century English literature and comparative Anglo-Oriental studies (literature, reiigion, linguistics, law, and philosophy). It should also be helpful to students who — convinced of the present necessity for Western appreciation of the East, its literary and cultural history, and the character of its people — would like to become familiar with the writings of a great English scholar who was able to understand the East. This book is primarily an annotated bibliography of Jones's writings in chronological and topical sequence. Each item in the survey includes the following information whenever possible: comments on the style and sources, using Jones's admission of influences when such admission exists; a statement on the organization of Jones's writings; a summary of the subject matter; a statement of Jones's impression of the purpose and importance of the writings when such an impression can be positively determined; a summary of reactions to the writings by critics, past and present; and a statement of the influence of the writings on later English writers if such an influence-can positively be viii

proven. The appendix contains an index of selected editionprintings and library locations of six of Jones's writings that went through at least two editions and or printings in English, and two bibliographies of the publications consulted in the preparation of this book. Primary sources for this book were the 1799 edition of The Works of Sir William Jones,l t h e s e c o n d edition of Memoirs of the Life, Writings and Correspondence of Sir William

Jones by Lord Teignmouth (London, 1806),2

Chalmers'

The Works of the English Poets, and " T h i r t e e n I n e d i t e d L e t t e r s

from Sir William Jones" (American Oriental Society, X, 11017, 1872). These include all of Jones's published writings except for a few minor pieces and fragments: Jones's manuscript letters, most of which are in Latin and French, can be found only in England; but translations of some of Jones's manuscript letters by Lord Teignmouth and Professor Arberry have been consulted. The standard, accepted dates of the composition and or publication of Jones's individual writings are used here; these can be found in the Cambridge Bibliographyof English Literature, the Dictionary of National Biography, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, a n d the Ency-

clopedia Americana. These four sources do not list the dates of some of Jones's writings in India, in which cases the earliest known date is given — that is, the date of publication of the essay in a volume of Asiatic Researches or a mention of the essay in one of Jones's translated letters. The spellings throughout the book, except in Jones's English titles and various quotations, are modernized, and all diacritical marks are omitted. The abbreviation for page or pages is omitted when page numbers refer to The Works of Sir William Jones.

GARLAND H. CANNON, JR. University of Hawaii January, 1952 1. See the Edition-Printing Index for information on this edition of The Works of Sir William Jones and on Teignmouth's biography of Jones. 2. Teignmouth wrote the only comprehensive biography of Jones. He translated many of Jones's manuscript letters, using them as the main body of the biography and admitting that "the narrative... may lose something in point of connection" thereby. ix

TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE

vii

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

xiii

1. POET A1TO LITERARY SCHOLAR (To 1773) Three Writings on Oriental Literature

3

Commentaries Treatise Dissertation

A Persian Grammar A Translated History A French Letter of Criticism Plan of a Tract on Education Poems (Including Two Essays on Poetry) "Arcadia" "Caissa" "The Seven Fountains" "Solima" "Laura" "The Palace of Fortune" "A Persian Song of Hafiz" "An Ode of P e t r a r c h " . . . . • "A Turkish Ode of Mesihi" "Carminum Liber" F i r s t Essay Second Essay Critics' Comments Plan of an Epic Poem

3 ? 10

11 14 16 18 18 18 19 19 20

. . . .

20

.

. . .

20 21 22 22 23 23 24 24 25

2. LAWYER, PRE-INDIA PERIOD (1773-1785) Political Writings:

Emphasis on Law

27

The Speeches of Isaeus

27

xi

Essay on Bailments A Mohammedan Law Political Writings: Emphasis on Liberty Ode to Liberty On Suppressing Riots Ode to Alcaeus Ode to Callistratus On P a r l i a m e n t a r y Reform On National Defense On Government Principles Miscellaneous P o e m s Six Occasional Poems The Moallakat

.

. . . .

.

29 32 33 33 34 34 35 36 36 37 38 38 39

3. INDIA PERIOD (1783-1794) F o r m a l Discourses and Addresses Charges to the Grand Jury Planned Essay Anniversary Discourses Other Addresses to the Royal Society of Bengal In or F r o m the Sanskrit The Seasons On Hindu L i t e r a t u r e Sanskrit Epigraphy The Hindu Lunar Year . . An Indian Grant of Land A Translated Fragment Some Translated Extracts Gitagovinda Sakuntala Hitopadesa "Enchanted F r u i t " Legal Writings Ordinances of Manu A1 Sirajiyyah Remaining Poetry Nine Hymns P e r s i a n Poems Miscellaneous Poems Inedited L e t t e r s EDITION-PRINTING INDEX BIBLIOGRAPHY xii

.

42 42 43 43 48 55 55 56 56 56 56 56 57 57 57 59 61 61 61 66 68 68 71 71 72 75 83

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH Sir William Jones was born in London on September 28,1746, of a family of c o m m o n e r s . His f a t h e r was William Jones, a t h e n - f a m o u s mathematician, and his mother was Mary Nix Jones, a virtuous and loving woman. His f a t h e r died when the boy was t h r e e y e a r s old, so that his mother b e c a m e his e a r l y t e a c h e r , leading "his mind insensibly to knowledge and exertion, by exciting his curiosity, and directing it to useful o b j e c t s " and answering his questions with "Read, and you will know."l At the age of f o u r , Jones was quoting Shakespeare and Gay's Fables. Shortly b e f o r e his enrollment at Harrow School in 1753, a childhood accident permanently i m p a i r e d h i s vision in one eye; in 1755 another accident at play confined him to h i s home f o r twelve months with a broken thigh-bone. He continued his study at home and was placed back in the s a m e c l a s s (now advanced one year) upon his r e t u r n to Harrow. Within a few months he gained the lead s c h o l a s tically in his c l a s s , winning all p r i z e s o f f e r e d f o r the b e s t e x e r c i s e s . By now he could r e a d Greek and Latin and i m i t a t e Ovid skillfully. Once he wrote out The Tempest f r o m m e m o r y . Languages r e m a i n e d h i s chief i n t e r e s t , however. At the age of ten Jones was moved to the upper school a t Harrow, w h e r e he spent h i s l e i s u r e t i m e reading, l e a r n ing F r e n c h and a r i t h m e t i c , and writing imitative v e r s e and d r a m a , r a t h e r than playing with the other children. Dr. Thackeray, H e a d m a s t e r of Harrow, maintained that by now Jones knew Greek b e t t e r than he. At the age of fifteen Jones could r e a d Arabic and the P s a l m s in the original and had a command of Italian. S t r a n g e r s , hearing of J o n e s ' s growing reputation a s the G r e a t Scholar, began to inquire at H a r r o w about the boy. 1. Teignmouth, Memoirs.

xiii

He matriculated at Oxford in 1764. His instructors, realizing that his attendance at their lectures would slow his progress, permitted him to study independently. Meanwhile, he began an intensive study of Arabic and Persian, paying a native of Aleppo to be his private tutor. In 1765 he became the tutor of Lord Althorpe. In 1766 he received an Oxford fellowship. In 1768 he was offered, but refused, a governmental position as interpreter for Eastern languages, an offer that further proved his reputation as a linguist. That same year he took his B.A. At the urging of King Christian VII of Denmark, Jones translated Nadir Shah's biography from Persian into French in 1768-69, a laborious task for which he received no money, but because of which he won an even greater reputation as a linguist. Meanwhile, Lord Althorpe was growing too old to need a tutor; and Jones, exploring possible fields for a position that would support him and give him greater public distinction, decided that there was ample opportunity in the profession of law to gratify all his ambitions. He began to study law on September 19,1770, though he did not renounce his attachment to Oriental learning at once. His friends urged him to forget Oriental literature for a time and apply himself entirely to the study of law and oratory. He did concentrate on his study of law, but he did not forget his former interests. As a matter of fact, his forensic debut was none too successful because he spoke with such oratorical confidence and studied action that his audience was convinced he thought himself Cicero. That his reputation as a scholar was now established is proved by the fact that he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society on April 30, 1772, one of his sponsors being Sir Joshua Reynolds. Then in 1773, four weeks ahead of Boswell, Jones was elected to the famous Club and soon became its president. In 1774 he was admitted to the bar. After regular attendance at Westminster Hall and the publication of various writings, he published in 1781 his most famous legal document, Essay on Bailments. About this time, with his reputation as a brilliant scholar steadily growing, he became interested in a vacant Bengal judgeship and a vacant Oxford seat in the House of Commons. He decided to stand for Parliament, but facing certain defeat because he was outspoken against the slave trade and the continuation of the American war, he withdrew his candidacy. No doubt xi v

these same liberal and unpopular political views delayed his judgeship; nevertheless, he was finally appointed in March, 1783. With the judgeship came the f u r t h e r honor of knighthood. Since he had long loved Anna Maria Shipley, an indirect r e s u l t of the new honors bestowed upon him was her hand in m a r r i a g e in April, 1783. Four days later the young couple were spending their honeymoon on the f r i g a t e Crocodile, on their way to India. On his a r r i v a l in India in September, 1783, began the most important period in J o n e s ' s life. Early in 1784 he founded and became president of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, the Society that was to inspire the founding of many similar societies in nineteenth-century Europe. He wanted the Society to develop an Oriental humanism in its work that would correspond to the neo-classical European humanism, though enlarged into universalism. Immediately, however, he realized that he had to learn Sanskrit if he expected to explore Indian religion and literature. He began studying Sanskrit comprehensively in 1785 (his twentyeighth language), all the while diligently attending to his judicial duties and to his interests a s a possible translator of Indian literature. He worked so hard that he became ill in 17Q7, and he spent his time in bed studying botany, a subject in which he had always been interested but had never had the time to study. Thereafter, he was ill i n t e r mittently, s e v e r e headaches often resulting f r o m eye-strain. Since Jones wanted India to be well ruled by the English administrators according to Indian laws and since there were no English translations, in 1788 he began the gigantic task of assembling and translating a digest of Indian laws. Meanwhile, he was superintending the publishing of the f i r s t Asiatic Researches of the Royal Society of Bengal, attending to his judicial duties, and studying Indian l i t e r a t u r e extensively. By now Jones had become the f i r s t Englishman to know Sanskrit well. He was introducing Indian literature to Europe through his superb translations of such d r a m a s a s Sakuntala, at the same time providing a strong stimulus f o r the renaissance of Indian culture; he was pioneering in the study of comparative languages and religions; and he had become one of the great influences leading to "Orientalism" in l a t e r , nineteenth-century English literature. As a pioneer in almost every branch of Indian studies in Europe, he was xv

providing the key to Western understanding and appreciation of Oriental literary and philosophical achievements. But Jones's health was steadily weakening under the strain of his long, fully scheduled days. The Indian climate also proved unhealthful for Lady Jones, who began to suffer frequent periods of indisposition. Finally she realized that she had to leave India and in December, 1793, sailed for England, Jones promising to follow as soon as the digest of Indian laws was in print. Thereafter he worked even harder. On April 20, 1794, he complained of aguish symptoms, and on April 27 he died of inflammation of the liver, a common disease in Bengal. The digest was left unfinished in his library. In memory of Sir William Jones the East India Company erected a monument in St. Paul's Cathedral, forwarding his statue to Calcutta. Two memorials were erected at Oxford, one by Flaxman, ordered by Lady Jones, and one presented by Jones's friends in Bengal. One of the greatest monuments, however, is perhaps the appreciation of the people of India. S. K. Chatterji expresses this appreciation eloquently: "a great man to whom it was given to perform a most conspicuous service to his fellow men in making our diverse national inheritances in culture One Great and Common Heritage for all men in all c l i m e s . "2 2. Suniti Kumar Chatterji, "Sir William Jones: Ì746-1794," p. 96.

SIR WILLIAM JONES, ORIENTALIST An Annotated Bibliography of His Works

Chapter One

POET AND LITERARY SCHOLAR To 1773

THREE WRITINGS ON ORIENTAL LITERATURE Commentaries

Jones wrote most of the critical materials f o r h i s Commentaries

on Asiatic Poetry, with an

Appendix (Works, II, 333-656; hereafter called Commentaries) in 1767, but he did not finish the criticism until 1769. However, stating that he felt immature mentally, he refused to publish it until 1774. It includes a proem (333-40), a summary of the six books in the work (341-46), the books themselves (347-611), and an appendix (613-56). The appendix includes a testament from the Persian (615-23), a dialogue (624-26), and some of Jones's childhood poetry in Latin and Greek (627-56). The Commentaries, in Latin, is planned after the arrangement of Reverend Robert Lowth'sDe Sacra Poesi Hebraeorum Praeleetiones

Academicae,

1753,

a s n o t e d by J o n e s

(347-49). Jones's style is rated by critics as distinctly formal, elegant, and grammatically correct. It is much like that of Cicero, even to the use of expressions coined by Cicero. Further, Jones's definition of beauty in the Commentaries admittedly comes from Edmund Burke's A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime Beautiful, 1757.

and.

In the proem Jones introduces Asiatic poetry to Europeans and dedicates his Commentaries to the honor of England and Oxford. He says, however, that now he must bid Asiatic poetry good-by because he has no time for it. He concludes on this note: "The most anxious object of my heart is, after running out my career, to retire in old age to the bestbeloved retreat of the University... to cultivate anew those studies after such an extended interruption." In the single chapter of Book One, "Most Asiatics Are 3

Greatly Devoted to P o e t r y " (347-61), Jones s t a t e s that a favorable climate and Asiatic temperament have given Asiatics a natural aptitude f o r poetry. The poetry of all Asiatic nations i s to be considered in the Commentaries, with s t r e s s on P e r s i a n , Arabian, and Turkish. The three chapters of Book Two, "Concerning the F o r m of Asiatic P o e t r y " (362-416), a r e entitled "Of Asiatic Meter," "Of Arabic Idyls," and "Of P e r s i a n Songs." Jones t r e a t s meter comprehensively and c o m p a r e s Arabic meter to Hebrew m e t e r . He makes the important point that m e t e r p r o vides the unity in Arabic poetry. Then he considers two standard f o r m s of Asiatic poetry: the Kasidah (an Arabic o r P e r s i a n near-eclogue, which he c o m p a r e s with eclogues by TTieocritus and Virgil) and amatory m a t e r i a l s (Persian love poetry i s marked by extreme polish in the f o r m , images, and diction, with Hafiz the s u p r e m e m a s t e r in Asia). The seven c h a p t e r s of Book Three, " F i g u r e s and Diction of Asiatic P o e t r y " (417-500), a r e entitled "Of Poetic Imagination," "Of Translation," "Of Comparison," "Of the Remaining F i g u r e s of Speech," "Of the Secret Meaning of P o e t r y , " "Of the Manner of Spoken Delivery," and "Of Beauty." Jones explains the five s o u r c e s of Asiatic poetic images: nature, common life, religion, history, and fable. Some Arabic metaphors a r e so violent and crude that he r e f u s e s to t r a n s l a t e them; he thinks others a r e h a r s h , but nevertheless " t r a n s l a t e s " s o m e of these by using c o m p a r i son. In general, he thinks, t r a n s l a t o r s should b e bound by the word o r d e r of the original work; a f t e r word o r d e r , they should b e bound by the euphony o r metonymy. He s a y s that Asiatic poetry i s beautified through the u s e of "fictae induetionis," then c o m p a r e s s o m e "manifold, poetically elegant libations" f r o m the Asiatics with f i g u r e s f r o m Apollonius, Callimachus, Theocritus, and Homer. He explains Asiatic f i g u r e s in detail. Refusing to take sides, Jones c o n s i d e r s the argument a s to whether o r not P e r s i a n love poetry holds s e c r e t meanings. He r e n d e r s lines f r o m Hafiz into Latin in consideration of the argument. The manner in which a poem i s delivered orally i s one means by which t e r r o r , obscurity, high-mindedness, and power a r e conveyed. He believes this to be a r u l e which Shakespeare, a s well a s the Asiatics, followed. Jones defines beauty, using passages f r o m Ibn Arabshah to illustrate the m e r i t s of the definition. The seven c h a p t e r s of Book Four, "Content of the 4

Poetry of the Asiatics" (501-86), a r e entitled "Of Heroic Poetry," "Of Funereal Poetry," "Of Moral Poetry," "Of Love Poetry," "Of P r a i s e , " "Of Vituperation," and "Of Description." These seven titles represent the chief types of subject matter in Asiatic poetry. Jones says that Asiatic heroic poetry dates back to the time of the ancient Islamites, some of whom recorded great Arabian heroic deeds, and that this poetry is surprisingly good. Tamerlane's victories, much later in time, a r e also recorded in Asiatic heroic poetry. The epic poet Firdausi resembles Homer; Rustem, his hero in Paris, is allegedly the Persian Hercules, l Asiatic funereal poetry is either a dirge or a panegyric; Jones compares examples of both to Greek and Latin funeral songs. Asiatic poetry sometimes has a casual moral, but seldom is it strongly didactic. The morals, brief and modulated, a r e conveyed in the poetry by means of contempt, taciturnity, infrequent instruction, and general situations. Jones states that all Asiatics enjoy reading love poetry, giving as an example a distinguished song of celebration by Abul Ola (surnamedAlamiforhis blindness). Then he gives examples of stinging Greek iambus and Arabic satire. He describes Firdausi 1 s vituperative masterpiece against Sultan Mahmud. There follows a short discussion on the a r t of poetical description, with illustrative verses from Hamasa, an anthology of Arabic poetry. Jones concludes the chapter with sample descriptions of flowers, gardens, pleasant situations, and human beauty. In the one chapter of Book Five, "Of Asiatic Diction," (594-611), Jones states that Asiatics use a modulated, rhythmical diction, which he examines by means of examples from rhetorical, philosophical, and historical writing. There a r e three kinds of diction: exalted, beautiful, and "slender-fine." Asiatic literature is not generally known in eighteenth-century Europe because of European critics' disparaging remarks about it; Europeans thus do .not see the Plato, Isocrates, Aristotle, and Demosthenes of Asia. Of the various materials in the appendix to Commentaries, 1. After Jones had twice read Firdausi's epic poem on the history of Persia, he decided that Rustem was not the Persian Hercules. Khosrau was. He declared Firdausi's epic poem to be as majestic and complete as the Iliad (H. F. Cary,"Sir William Jones," London Magazine, p. 635). 5

only Jones's "Ad Musam" is noteworthy.2 After studying the Commentaries, critics realized that Jones believed the classical tradition to be strangling English poetry. It was supposedly sterile; from somewhere a revitalization had to come. Jones had found the new energy in the language and imagination of the Asiatics. 3 Of course he did not expect Oriental imagery and figures of speech to replace the English neo-classical ones; he did expect them to be absorbed by English poetry in a most beneficial way. Since he knew the Commentaries to be the f i r s t real attempt to introduce Asiatic poetry to the English, Jones took every opportunity to relate the Asiatic to the European - - Hafiz to Petrarch, Firdausi to Homer, and others. The differences he did not show. Yet paradoxically, Jones did not orientalize his own English prose style. No lofty figures and florid descriptions appear in his prose; it is strictly dignified and formal, classical in the best sense. The Commentaries was f i r s t in its field because, Jones felt, the study of Asiatic literature in England had been neglected; this was so for three reasons — pride, contentment, and indolence. All three, he maintained, stemmed from ignorance. Thus his primary object in the Commentaries was to incite Englishmen, or at least English scholars, to begin the study. But the reasons Jones gives are hardly 2. "Ad Musam" was translated anonymously into English in Calcutta in 1800. The poem emphasizes the farewell to poetry Jones had already given in the proem to his Commentaries. Farewell, O Muse! sweet former of the mind! Parent of Eloquence and thought refin'd! Your pupil now deserts his lov'd pursuit, Nor wears the laurel more, nor strikes the lute! Supreme of the sweet denizens in Heaven! Whether it be to your fond votary given, To gain applause by fair Persuasion's speech, Or should strong Eloquence his words enrich, Receiv'd in youth by you, he lives in you, Beneath whose auspices the stripling grew. Hence aiming at professional renown, Let him with decency assume the Gown, Appropriate language give him to command, And.spirit firm, without a venal hand. This translation of Jones's poem is in A. J. Arberry's Asiatic Jones, pp. lOf. 3. Ibid., p. 35.

6

philosophical; they a r e so general that they would apply to most valuable pursuits. 4 Jones's contemporaries, somewhat taken aback by comparisons of " b a r b a r i a n s " to Homer and the Romans, nevertheless immediately accepted Jones as a scholar of the Asiatics. The Asiatic Annual Register for 1799 ("Books," p. 219) praised Jones's Commentaries for its pure taste and various, extensive information. The c r i t i c i s m was Jones's choice of Latin — why not an English translation? Other c r i t i c s praised "Ad Musam" and Firdausi highly. Thus (with the possible exception of Sir Edwin Arnold) Jones became the only English scholar of Oriental l i t e r a t u r e to attain wide recognition in England before 1902.5 Modern c r i t i c s agree that Jones altered the English conception of the Eastern world. "It was left for Jones to tell us that there was poetry in Shiraz," a Western critic noted in 1942.6 But modern c r i t i c s also find Jones's Commentaries superficial. It shows m a r k s of haste and has important omissions. Inasmuch a s his list of early Asiatic poets does not even mention some m a j o r figures, h i s knowledge of Asiatic l i t e r a r y history must have been sketchy. 7 Jones makes no close analysis of general Asiatic poetic style, nor does he attempt to analyze a single poet's style.8 Modern c r i t i c s f u r t h e r agree that the Commentaries is today m o r e valuable for the extracts f r o m Asiatic poetry than f o r Jones's inadequate criticism of the extracts. But also it is doubtful that r e a d e r s today would have as fine a r e p r e s e n t a tion of the Greek Anacreon in The Oxford Book of Greek Verse in Translation if Jones had not reworked Anacreon's lines several times.s Treatise

J o n e s ' s Treatise on Oriental Poetry (Works, V, 433 503, hereafter called Treatise) was published in 1770 as an appendage to his translation of Nadir Shah's biography. It consists of seven sections in French and a final section containing some of Hafiz' odes. Many of Jones's 4. "Le Trone Enchante," p. 367. 5. Max M u l l e r , Chips from a German Workshop,

IV, 322.

6. R. M. Hewitt, "Harmonious Jones," p. 43. 7. A. S. Tritton, "The Student of Arabic," p. 696. 8. Loc. cit. 9. J. A. Stewart, "Sir William Jones' Revision of the Text of Two Poems of Anacreon," p. 672.

7

ideas in the Treatise are also expressed in his Commentaries and Dissertation on Oriental

Literature.

In Section One, "Of Oriental Poetry in General" (43347), it is observed that Oriental poetry has strong expressions, bold metaphors, fiery sentiments, and animated descriptions. Oriental genius and fecundity of imagination are explained by the beauty and fertility of the Orient, its excellent climate, the natural suitability of the languages for poetry, and the pleasant lives of its people. Because of these conditions, according to Jones, Asia has produced more young poets than all other continents. The most striking images of terror come from Arabian poets who live in shadowy forests and gloomy solitude. Oriental poetry generally treats of military virtue, sorrow, instruction, vituperation, laudation, and love. In Section Two, "About the Heroic Poetry of the Asiatic Nations" (447-56), it is stated that the Arabs have elegant histories, but not a true heroic poetry. Of the Persian heroic poetry, Firdausi's poem on Persian history is perhaps the best. His characters are less varied than Homer's, but his style is similar. In Section Three, "Of Their Love Poetry and.Odes" (456-72), it is pointed out that Asiatics write love poetry best, often dealing with a lover's sorrow after his sweetheart has departed with her nomadic camp. Amriolkais' poem (from The Moallakat) is a perfect model of the Arabian eclogue. Sometimes Arabic love odes are concerned with feasts and other pleasures. Persians excel in love odes. Jones gives prose versions of ten of Hafiz' odes, which he says resemble fragments of Greek lyrics. In Section Four, "Of Their Elegies" (472-74), it is related that there are no Persian and very few Turkish elegies (this statement is untrue; the elegy is a prominent part of Persian literature). The second book of Hamasa, a collection of Arabic poetry, contains a number of majestic court elegies on the death of a famous warrior. Arabshah wrote a beautiful elegy on the death of Tamerlane's sons. In Section Five, "Of Their Moral Poetry" (474 f.), it is observed that Oriental poets are masters at blending the agreeable and instructive. Some of their most esteemed moral works are the Pendnama of Attar and certain poems by Sadi. In Section Six, "Of Their Satire" (475-80), it is stated 8

that except for the fifth book of Hamasa, outstanding Arabian satires are few. Firdausi's satire against Sultan Mahmud is perhaps the best in Persian. In Section Seven, "Of Their Panegyrics" (480-83), mention is made of the beautiful panegyrics of Firdausi and Abul Ola. In the Treatise (447) Jones reiterates the opinion on European poetry which he gives in his Commentaries and a g a i n in t h e Persian

Grammar:

It isn't surprising that European poetry has subsisted so long on the same repetition of the same images, and the continual allusions to the same fables, from which we are obliged to fill up our own compositions, because from infancy our memory has filled itself only with the sayings we have known from the same authors and works of three thousand years.

As Jones himself admitted, his object in the Treatise was t h e s a m e a s in h i s Persian Grammar and Commentaries',

to

stimulate translation of Oriental manuscripts, with notes and explanations, so that one day English poets might enlarge their field of allusion by reference to Oriental writing. As critics realized, Jones was refuting statements of unjust, severe critics who had condemned Oriental poetry as spiritless and the product of bad taste. He found at least two advantages in Oriental poetry: the meter has facility and variety, and Asiatic veneration of poetry is so intense that individual Asiatic poets are greatly encouraged to write their best poems in the hope of gaining a reputation as .leading figures in Asiatic literature. Finally, Jones condemned as incredible and absurd, assertions that Persian love poetry contained hidden meanings (e. g., moral purposes). Thus he directly contradicted the general prejudice that the study of Oriental languages was difficult and useless; rather, he asserted that such study was easy, instructive, and entertaining. The accuracy of Jones's translations of Asiatic poetry was acknowledged by the most competent critics of the time. Not only were such literal versions difficult to make, but Jones was alleged to be the only person in England then capable of producing such a work as the Treatise.^ By mod10. Teignmouth, Memoirs, p. 42. 9

ern standards, however, Jones's translations of Asiatic poetry are considered to be only reasonably accurate. Dissertation

Jones's

Dissertation

on

Oriental

Literature

(Works ,V, 505-30; hereafter called Dissertation), like the Treatise, was printed in 1771. Also, its general purpose was the answering of criticism of Oriental languages and literature. Jones divides literature into three branches: history, philosophy, and poetry. Oriental authors transform dry, spiritless history into beautiful, charming narrative. One exception is the History of Nadir Shah, which is monotonous because it is treated as a military journal. Arabshah's history is an excellent narrative. Orientals write beautiful moral philosophy, but Europe does not need these writings because it has Newton, Leibnitz, Halley, and others. In poetry, Jones asserts, Europeans can profit from Oriental irregularities and correct their own. Amriolkais, Nizami, Hafiz, and others express the importance of passions; Sadi and Attar stress virtue; and Antara, Firdausi, and Abul Ola concentrate on heroic actions. If Persian or Arabian literature, and Latin or Greek literature were translated word for word into a useful language — without ornament or palliation, and without regard to differences in idiom, place, and customs — then the reader of both translations would not be prejudiced toward either. Jones compares odes by Hafiz and Horace. He renders two chapters by Nabi in order to illustrate Oriental taste. Jones's stated objectives in his Dissertation are to prove that European prejudices against Oriental literature a r e unfounded and to persuade European kings that Oriental manuscripts in their countries should be translated. He refutes three European prejudices. Of the first, that Orientals have no taste or spirit, Jones says that European critics are ignorant of the merits of Oriental poetry, which has all the spirit and vivacity of the Oriental nations. Of the second, that Orientals are ignorant, gross savages, that their poetry is only passion and intemperance, and that their writings are destitute of grace, delicacy, and elegance, Jones says that the germ of the same passions is in everybody, that the great differences between European and Oriental poetry come from differences in the languages, and that 10

Oriental poetry is rich and elegant. Of the third, that any possible richness of Oriental literature will not compensate for the pain- of studying three supposedly difficult, baroque languages, Jones says that the languages are actually easy, sonorous, and musical, and that the literature is rich and profitable for study. He concludes that European critics will continue to be incompetent judges of Oriental poetry until they know the languages.il A PERSIAN GRAMMAR In 1767 Jones began collecting rules for a Persian grammar

— l a t e r to b e A Grammar of the Persian Language

(Works, II, 121-332; hereafter called Persian Grammar) — to

be used by a friend who was going to India. At the time Jones states that Meninski's Persian dictionary was "perhaps the most laborious compilation that was ever undertaken .by any single man, ,rl2 but that it contained few examples of word-usages. Still collecting rules in 1769, Jones began work on a Persian dictionary. In 1770 he proposed a new edition of Meninski's dictionaryior 1773, but received no encouragement. In 1771 he finally presented his completed Persian Grammar for publication, to which W. A. J. Richardson was to add an index in 1783 to the third edition. The work includes a preface (121-33), the main text (135-246), a catalogue of valuable Persian books and some of their eighteenth-century locations (247-54), a Persian ode in three different kinds of Asiatic handwriting (254-57), Richardson's index (259-99), and a history of the Persian language (301-28). In the preface Jones admits that Baron ReviczkiW and Meninski's dictionary afforded him his knowledge of the Persian language. Ke says that he found his best examples — taken primarily from Hafiz — in General Carnac's col11. In the Dictionary

oi National

Biography

(X, 1062) it i s a s s e r t e d

that Jones's Dissertation is a defense of Oxford scholars against Anquetil du Perron's strictures. The DJV.B. writer has obviously confused the Dissertation

with Letter to Mr. A*** Du P***,

u n l e s s , of c o u r s e , one c o n -

siders the two writings part of a single publication. 12. Jones, Persian Grammar,

p. 125.

13. Jones's friend and fellow linguist. 11

lection of Persian manuscripts. He praises Oriental literature eloquently, noting that the Persian language is ancient, rich, melodious, and elegant, but that Englishmen have not studied Persian literature from an appreciative point of view. Moreover, European rulers, according to Jones, have not encouraged their talented subjects to be men of letters (i.e., through social, political, or financial gifts). Differences in alphabets, Jones asserts, are negligible even to the neophyte linguist; a man who understands Arabic, Persian, and Turkish can understand most natives from Egypt to China. Jones again states, as he had in his Commentaries, that professional studies now force him to give up his study of Oriental literature. Jones's attitude throughout the main text of the Persian Grammar is that of a scholar, not that of an appreciator. Methodically he concerns himself with the alphabet of thirtytwo characters; with pronunciation and use of consonants and vowels; with gender and case of nouns; with the common articles and plurals; with the use of adjectives, pronouns, and verbs; with tense and the thirteen classes of irregular verbs; with the three derivations of compound adjectives; and with numbers, common Persian words, and syntax. "The Gardener and the Nightingale," a moral fable, is given first in Persian prose and verse and then in the English.14 There is a short essay on versification, with explanation and illustration of the hemistich, distich, and tetrastich. Jones asserts that Persian poetry, contrary to European criticism, consists of more than lofty figures and florid descriptions. He paraphrases an ode by Hafiz and then translates it into English verse that retains the Persian measure. Thus Jones's famous translation of "A Persian Song of Hafiz" was made.15 Richardson's index is admittedly a vocabulary and "a literal alphabetical explanation and analysis of the extracts and authorities from the various writers interspersed through the Grammar." In his history of the Persian language Jones shows that the language changed considerably whenever the gov14. Some of the figures are reminiscent of English Renaissance euphuism: "Tore with the hand of confusion the collar of patience, and rent/The mantle of his heart with the piercing thorn of uneasiness." 15. See discussion of the poem later in this chapter. 12

ernment changed. He divides the history into four periods: under Caiumaras and his descendants (a rude age and a rude, lost language), under unnamed rulers (a lost language, despite "French adventurer" du Perron's assertions), under the Sassanian kings (an elegant language in an elegant nation), and under the Mohammedan dynasties (discouragement of Persian literature). Then Jones gives a chronological description of Persian poets, including Firdausi and his epic poem on Persian history, Abul Ola, Feleki and Khakani, Anveri, Sadi and his Bed of Roses, Hafiz, Jami and h i s On the Loves of Yusef and Ztdeika, and Catebi.

Of course Jones could never forget that Persian manuscripts, needing translation, were gathering dust on English book-shelves. Earlier, Voltaire had acknowledged the beauty of Persian images and sentiments, but after versifying a passage from Sadi, he had left Persian. Jones states that now English scholars could and should put Persian poems and histories into European dress. As Jones admits, his object in writing the Persian Grammar is "to facilitate the progress of this branch of literature." He calls • himself a grammarian who is opening the mine of Persian literature so that "men of taste.. .will undoubtedly be pleased to unlock the stores of native genius, and to gather the flowers of unrestrained and luxuriant fancy" (133). He tries to tempt translators with pleasing samples of Persian poetry. He says, however: "My own remarks, the disposition of the whole book, and the passages quoted in it, will sufficiently distinguish it as an original production" (127). Recognizing that a grammar is often dull reading, he gives frequent quotations from Persian verse that supposedly illustrate rules better than mere prose. Critics of the time praised the Persian Grammar as a work of real scholarship. "A Persian Song" was printed in anthologies. This one poem was almost sufficient to insure Jones a place in Chalmers' The Works of the English Poets. In the Asiatic Annual Register of 1799 ("Books," p. 218) a c r i t i c

said that Jones's preface was his most masterly, spirited, and elegant philological composition. The Persian Grammar was so popular that it went through nine London editions by 1828. As late as 1946 it was called the "veritable turning point in the history of humane studies, for it comprises the most informed and eloquent apologia pro litteria orientalibus 13

which had yet been penned, perhaps that has ever been penned.16 Jones's hopes that the gentry and nobility would translate Persian verse were never fulfilled. 17 His Persian Crammar survived; scholars find it authoritative even today.18 But fifty years after Jones's death, the Persian Grammar did convert one man to Persian literature — FitzGeraldl9 — thus making the world indebted to Jones for turning FitzGerald to Persian and indirectly to the Rubaiyat. A TRANSLATED HISTORY The History of Nadir Shah (Works, V, 1 - 4 3 2 , 533-610;

hereafter called Nadir Shah) was translated from Persian into French in twelve months, 1768-69, at the urgent request of King Christian VII. Jones never wanted to make the translation. He considered Nadir a tyrant who did not deserve a place in "perfect history"; in fact, he states that Nadir's history would have been the last manuscript in the world to translate if he had had a choice (549). He gives four reasons for r e f u s ing Christian VITs f i r s t request that an English scholar translate the history into French: (1) the length of the history, (2) the dullness of the subject, (3) the difficulty of the original style, and (4) Jones's lack of time and ability to translate something so fruitless and laborious (535). Nevertheless, when Christian VII threatened to take the manuscript to France for translation and intimated that Jones's reputation and future might be helped if he did the work, Jones reluctantly agreed. It is no surprise to find that Jones received no monetary payment for his year of labor on the translation. He published forty copies at his own expense in 1770. Jones states that the original history, in modern P e r sian dialect and in Niskhi characters, was written by Mirza Mahadi in the 1760's. Jones's publication of the history consists of brief prefaces by himself and Mahadi, three 16. 17. 18. 19.

14

Arberry, op. cit., p. 33. Hewitt, op. cit., p. 48. Arberry, op. cit., Introduction. Hewitt, op. cit., p. 48.

letters (two by Jones to Christian VII and Baron Osten, and one by Christian VII to George in in public commendation of Jones), a summary of events that preceded Nadir's r i s e to power (1-23), the history of Nadir (25-409), and an introduction in English (a preface, 533-57; an essay on Asiatic geography, 559-84; and an essay on Persian history, 585610).

Since biographies of Nadir are convenient in standard encyclopedias and other books, his life will not be summarized here. Jones divides the history into two parts. P a r t One (25-232) is in three books. Book One "From Nadir's Birth to Shah Tahmasp's Restoration in Meshed," covers the years 1688-1727 in nineteen chapters; Book Two, "From the War with the Afghan Tribes to Shah Tahmasp's Dethronement," treats the years 1728-31 in twenty-six chapters; and Book Three, "From the Coronation of Shah Abbas ID to That of Nadir Shah on the Mogan Plains," presents the years 1731-34 in fifteen chapters. Part Two (233-409) is in three books. Book Four, "From Nadir's Elevation to the Persian throne to the Capture of Kandahar," covers the years 1734-37 in seven chapters; Book Five, "Expedition to India," gives the years 1737-39 in eight chapters; and Book Six, "From Nadir Shah's Return from His Indian Expedition until His Death; and the Short Reigns of His Nephews and Little Son," devotes twenty chapters to the years 1739-48. As a help to the reader, Jones attaches two essays. The first, on Asiatic geography, discusses the empires of Persia, India, and Turkey, and the kingdoms of Tartary. The second, on Persian history, discusses the three ruling families and the Mohammedan dynasties. Jones's translation was enthusiastically received by critics and by Christian VII, who made Jones a member of the Royal Society of Copenhagen. Louis XVI is said to have complimented Jones's French: "He is a most extraordinary man! He understands the language of my people better than I d o m y s e l f ! "20 A c r i t i c

i n t h e Asiatic Annual Register

for

1799 ("Sketch," p. 59) stated that the translation was marked by grammatical correctness and pure, elegant diction, and that it was applauded by the most distinguished French critics. Other critics, however, remembered that Jones did 20. Arberry, op. cit., p. 9. 15

not write the original history. Craftsmanship the translation was, they admitted, but it was about as creative as an exercise in punctuation. A FRENCH LETTER OF CRITICISM A Letter to Mr. A*** Du P*** (Works, TV, 583-613; h e r e -

after called French Letter), written in 1771, was inspired by Anquetil du Perron's Zendavesta, three quarto volumes r e cording Perron's travels in India, Zoroaster's life, translations of manuscripts supposedly by Zoroaster, and P e r ron's disrespectful comments on Oxford and certain Englishmen. The French Letter is a biting criticism and an attempted refutation of Perron's discoveries, as well as a vigorous defense of all things English. The contents might be divided into three parts. The first part is an attempted refutation of what Jones calls "the collection of nonsense"by Zoroaster. Either Zoroaster had not good sense or else he did not write such a "tissue of puerile exclamations." If he had not good sense, then Perron should not have translated the manuscripts. But the translation itself is barbaric, Jones asserts, a poor attempt to deceive the public. The second part is a tirade against Perron's lack of style. His writing is called hard, base, inelegant, and bombastic; it seldom sticks to the subject and is never agreeable. The third part is a blast against the preface of Zendavesta, which satirized certain Oxford professors. Jones says that these professors, particularly Dr. Hunt, are distinguished, honorable men, and that Oxford is the most respectable of universities. Jones caustically satirizes Perron's knowledge of Asiatic languages, his sense of accomplishment, and his plans to translate the sacred books of the Brahmans. Obviously Jones had two purposes in the French Letter. everything English had to be defended against the rancorous allegations in Perron's preface, and Perron's supposed imposture had to be exposed. Just as obviously, Jones thought he was accomplishing these purposes. He offered "proof"that Perron's Zoroastrian manuscripts were deceptions: some of them looked new; the materials, according to Jones, were not spirited and philosophic enough to be the product of a philosopher and man of letters; Arabic 16

words were in the manuscripts, although Zoroaster did not use Arabic; and sometimes Zoroaster's ideas were curiously similar to those of Chardin. Jones even admits that he thought he had accomplished his objectives in the French Letter when he remarks in the Persian Grammar that "it is sufficient for us to have exposed his follies, detected his imposture, and resorted his invectives" (307). It is clear to the reader that Jones believed he was an acceptable spokesman for the English in correcting Perron's errors, for there had been general agreement among Oxford professors that Jones should answer Perron. Certainly the eighteenth-century disappointment in the Zendavesta found its most ferocious expression in Jones's anonymous answer.2l Even French critics, who would be more likely to support a Frenchman than an Englishman who was trying to tear a Frenchman's work to shreds during a troubled political situation, praised Jones's satire for a time. Professor Biorn Sthal, for example, noted that many Frenchmen thought the French Lettei so correct and brilliant that only a "bel esprit" of Paris could have written the French.22 Chalmers wrote that Perron "stood convicted not only of loose invective, but of absolute falsehood."23 Dr. Hunt, one of the. men whom Perron had satirized, thanked Jones in a letter on behalf of himself, Oxford, and England for Jones's fine defense. For years Jones's rejection of Perron's discoveries was echoed through most of Europe. Jones's criticism blinded many scholars and men of letters temporarily. Even Tychsen, who later supported Perron, considered the Frenchman's discoveries a deception at first. Thus Perron's translation was laid aside in England as spurious for a time, though in France it soon began to receive the general recognition it now commands. Today the French Letter is only of historic interest. Time has long since completely vindicated the translation of Z o r o a s t e r . 2 4 Twentiethcentury critics generally agree that Jones's criticism is witty but unjust, that Jones was just as wrong as he thought Perron to be. 21. 22. 23. 24.

Edward G. Browne, A Literary History of Persia, I, 49. Memoirs, p. 107. Alexander Chalmers, The Works of the English Poets, XVIII, 434. The paragraph is a summary from Browne, op. cit., I, 53-57. 17

PLAN OF A TRACT ON EDUCATION In 1770 Jones wrote the ideas for a tract on education (the ideas are given in Memoirs, pp. 87-9). He declares the primary end of liberal education to be the good of ourselves and other men, and the secondary end to be the cultivation of understanding and the acquisition of knowledge. Man must study languages in order to be able to gain the accumulated experience and wisdom of all ages and all nations. Thus, as Jones states, the immediate object of education should be to teach students the languages of celebrated nations.

POEMS

(INCLUDING TWO ESSAYS ON POETRY)

Most of the materials in Translations

Poems, Consisting Chiefly of from the Asiatick Languages (Works, IV, 397-561;

also in Chalmers, XVIII, 441-511, with additional poems; hereafter called Poems) were written earlier and revised for publication in 1772. The volume included, in addition to the poems, a dedication, a preface,- and two essays. Critics identified the general sources in Poems as Pope (for the polished couplet), Dryden and Gray (for the ode metre),25,Spenser and Addison (for the pastoral subject matter and conventions), and numerous Asiatic poems (for other subject matter). In the preface Jones discusses some of his specific sources because he wants to prove the authenticity of his Eastern originals. He explains that too many Frenchmen earlier had invented "Asiatic" poems and offered them as genuine translations. "Arcadia"

"Arcadia," written in 1762, is a pastoral admittedly suggested by Addison's allegory in the thirty-second paper of the Guardian, with Jones stating the real identity of each pastoral character. Menalcas (Theocritus), king of the shepherds, hears various shepherds play and sing as suitors of his two daughters. He chooses Tityrus (Virgil) for Daphne (elegant and polished) 25. Sir H. Sharp, "Anglo-Indian Verse," p. 98.

18

and Colin (Spenser) for Hyla (simple and unadorned). Later, Tityrus's son is Pope and Colin's son is Gay. Since then, there has been no ruling shepherd in Arcadia. (Critics have commented on the high polish of the verse in "Arcadia. " The poem is marked by eighteenth-century poetic diction.) "Caissa"

As Jones states in his preface to Poems, though the idea for "Caissa" (written in 1763) is taken from Vida's "Scacchia Ludus" and the style is imitative of Ovid, the story of Caissa and Mars (about the origin of the game of chess) and most of the descriptions are Jones's own. The primary plot deals with a chess game between Delia and Sirena, which is narrated in vigorous, imaginative language: Here furious knights on fiery coursers prance, Here archers spring, and lofty towers advance. No place remains: he sees the certain fate, And yields his throne to ruin, and Checkmate. A c r i t i c in t h e Asiatic Annual Register f o r 1799 ( " S k e t c h , "

p. 59), rating "Caissa" as one of Jones's best poems, observed that it is "drawn with the correctness of a scholar." It was so popular that it went through several editions almost at once. Of more importance to the student of eighteenthcentury English literature, however, is the fact that Pope's mock-heroic description of the game of ombre in "The Rape of the Lock" — like that of the game of chess in "Caissa" — is based upon the game of chess described in "Scacchia Ludus." A perfect opportunity is thus presented for a comparison of "Caissa" and "The Rape of the Lock" as to the cleverness and relative success of the imitations, with Jones's imitation quite easily the inferior to the earlier poem by Pope. "The Seven Fountains"

"The Seven Fountains" (written in 1767), as Jones declares, is taken from an allegory by Ebn Arabshah, upon which is grafted an episode from the Arabian Nights Tales (Story of Prince Agib, Night 57). Jones purposely imitates the style of the Persian poet Nizami. The story concerns a young prince who enjoys pleasures of the senses and who is rescued by an old man (Religion). Descriptions of the allegor19

ical senses are eloquent and evocative. An example is Jones's description of hearing-. An hundred nymphs their charming descants play'd, And melting voices died along the glade.

"Solima"

Jones tells us that "Solima" (written in 1768) is a series of figures, sentiments, and descriptions that he has united into a description of a caravansary Solima has built for travelers and pilgrims. The woman's bowers are described thus: Where every breeze sheds incense o'er the vales, And every shrub the scent of musk exhales!

(Critics have casually remarked on Solima's resemblance to Pope's benevolent Man of Ross.) "Laura"

"Laura" (an elegy written in 1769), as Jones declares, is a cento of Petrarch's sonnets.26 The poem intentionally forms a contrast between the style and subject matter of classical poetry with those of the Oriental poetry in Poems. (Like "Solima," "Laura" represents eighteenth-century English style inform, figures, andlang-

uage.27 )

"The Palace of Fortune"

According to Jones,"The Palace of Fortune" (written in 1769) is taken from "Roshanara," an Indian tale by Inatullah, to which Jones adds descriptions and episodes from other Eastern authors whom he does not name. He changes the moral of the tale so that a discontented maid — after seeing that Pleasure, Glory, Riches, and Knowledge, when granted their wishes, are destroyed by them — realizes that human wishes are empty and useless.28 26. "Solima" and "Laura" are printed in the Annual Register for 1772, pp. 196-98, and pp. 201-6. 27. Eminent Orientalists, p. 15. 28. Marie E. de Meester, in Oriental Influences in the English Literature of the Early Nineteenth Century, pp. 38f., remarks on the many s i m i -

larities between Queen Mab and Jones's poem: both poems tell of a sleeping maiden (Maia and Ianthe) who is taken up to a fairy-court by a supernatural figure (the goddess Fortune and the Queen of Spirits) and who is shown realistic visions; both Fortune and Queen Mab know all

20

"A Persian Song of Hafiz"

"A Persian Song of Hafiz," in Jones's version of 1770, is exactly one-half again as long as the original. The poem had been rendered into Latin by Meninski in 1680, by Thomas Hyde in 1767, and by Revisky in 1771,29 but Jones was the first person to turn it into English. It was immensely popular at once and continued to be popular for decades. It was printed in anthologies and in such reference collections as the Annual Register for 1772 and Chambers' Cyclopaedia of English Literature.

Horace

Walpole,

almost

alone among Jones's contemporaries, did not praise Jones's imitations of Oriental poetry; in a letter to Reverend William Mason on May 5, 1772, Walpole remarked that Jones's imitations were "not at all Oriental." Modern critics still admire "APersian Song of Hafiz," though Browne maintained, on the contrary, that it and Jones's other verses could hardly be dignified by the name of poetry.30 It is hardly a translation, for Jones expanded it and discarded the original rhyme and stanza for an octosyllabic measure;3l but as an English lyric with pleasing, unusual movement that conveys a sense of exotic charm and mystery, largely through the adroit use of Asiatic place names,32 it is one of Jones's most successful poems. Arberry calls "A Persian Song of Hafiz" Jones's most important contribution to the initiation and development of P e r sian studies.33 The poem might well be classed with Beckford's Vathek as a chief source of the Oriental dream world that haunted English poets' imaginations in the early nineteenth century. 34 "A Persian Song of Hafiz" definitely stimulated several poets. Byron undoubtedly was familiar with the poem, the thoughts ef mankind. She asserts that Shelley undoubtedly appropriated the idea for his two women in Queen Mab from Jones's poem. These and other striking similarities between the two poems in expression and thought, she explains, had been earlier discussed by E. Koeppel in Englische Studien ("Shelley's Queen Mab and Sir William Jones' 'The Palace of Fortune"') 33: 43-53. 29. Browne, op. cif., Ill, 303. 30. Ibid., III, 304. 31. Hewitt, op. cit., p. 5'2. 32. V. de Sola Pinto, "Sir William Jones and English Literature," p. 687. Hewitt also praised the magic place names. 33. Arberry, "Orient Pearls at Random Strung," p. 699. 34. Pinto, op. cit., p. 687.

21

for not only did he parody it in "The Barmaid," an unpublished poem,35 but he also included it casually in a letter of September 7, 1811. He even imitated the rhyme scheme (abcabc) in an early lyric: Remind me not, remind me not, Of those belov'd, those vanish'd hours, When all my soul was given to thee; Hours that may never be forgot, Till time unnerves our vital powers, And thou and I shall cease to be.

Swinburne, also interested in Jones's experimental rhyme scheme, perfected it in "Itylus" and "The Oblation."36 .Of course one of the most famous echoes of "A Persian Song of Hafiz" was the lovely song by Moore and Gatty, "Bendemeer's Stream." But who would not appreciate the refreshing hedonism in such lines from "A Persian Song of Hafiz" as these? Boy, let yon liquid ruby flow, And bid thy pensive heart be glad, Whate'er the frowning zealots say: Tell them, their Eden cannot show A stream so clear as Rocnabad, A bower so sweet as Mosellay.

"An Ode of Petrarch"

"An Ode of Petrarch" is Jones's English rendering of Canzone 27, a love ode. The idea of the ode is simple: when the poet dies let his ashes be put by the Fountain of Valchiusa, where he had met his beloved. In Poems Voltaire's paraphrase of the first stanza of the ode follows Jones's rendering of the complete poem. "A Turkish Ode of Mesihi," the only direct translation from an Asiatic original in Poems, offers refreshing Turkish colors and perfumes.37 A Latin version of the ode follows the English translation. "A Turkish Ode of Mesihi"

35. Meester, op. cit., p. 34. 36. Hewitt, op. cit., p. 52. 37. The ode i s printed in the Annual Register for 1772, pp. 201f.

22

"Carminum L i b e r "

"Carminum L i b e r , " a section within Poems, consists of eight of Jones's adolescent Latin poems, a poem on Firdausi's epic poetry, an Arabic elegy, a ten-line Persian tale, and "Ad Musam." Of the two essays included in Poems, "An Essay on the Poetry of the Eastern Nations" is the more important. In it Jones praises the "naturally excellent" Arabian poets, explaining that their inspiration for poetry comes in part from a warm, languid climate and a geography of extremes. Since, as Jones declares, the Arabian language is expressive, strong, sonorous, and copious, and since Arabia is a natural seat of pastoral poetry, it follows that the chief subjects of Arabian poets must be war and love to conform to what Arabs deem their most vital activities. First Essay

Certainly in the late eighteenth century Jones's essay was the most important treatment of the pastoral, for it helped begin a revival of the pastoral in English literature.38 Jones wanted his contemporaries to recognize the pastoral as a living form, chiefly through its simplicity of appeal, 39 inasmuch as Europe, he declared, had "subsisted too long on the perpetual repetition of the same images, and incessant allusions to the same f a b l e s . " If he could furnish a new set of pastoral images and similitudes from Asiatic poets, then perhaps European poets would imitate these images and similitudes. In the essay Jones also defends Persian literature in general. He remarks that Persia, as of the eighteenth century, has produced more writers than all of Europe combined, and he defends Persian style against English criticism. Jones will not agree that Persian writers use either slavish sentiments or ridiculous expressions; he does not regard frequent allusion to the sun and moon as an evidence of bad taste, and denies that the best Persian authors use a "ridiculously bombastic" style. Byron appropriated an Arabian simile from Jones's essay: "the blue eyes of a fine woman, bathed in tears" 38. Harold Mantz, "Non-Dramatic Eighteenth Century," p. 440. 39. Loc. cit.

Pastoral

in Europe

23

in the

compared to "violets dropping with dew." Byron phrased it thus: The big bright tear Came o'er that eye of blue And then methought it did appear A violet dropping dew.

Second Essay

The second essay in Poems, "On the Arts, Commonly Called Imitative," made Jones one of the f i r s t r e f u t e r s of Aristotle's maxim that "all poetry consists in imitation." Jones defines poetry as strong, animated expression of the human passions, with accompanying cadence and measure. The expression is the voice of nature, not an imitation, because the poet assumes the power of nature and so causes the same effect on the r e a d e r ' s imagination as nature itself. Further, since the passions and sympathy of all men a r e generally the same, simple, natural style must always be more delightful and sublime for the expression of passions and sympathy than gaudy style. (These ideas on poetry, nature, and simplicity a r e quite similar to some of the ones Wordsworth later used in his famous P r e f a c e to Lyrical Ballads, though there is no definite proof that Wordsworth used Jones's "On the Arts, Commonly Called Imitative" as a source.) Critics' Comments

That English critics and r e a d e r s early approved of Poems is proved by the fact that the volume went through six editions and printings by 1818 (see pp. 80f.), in addition to inclusion and expansion in Chalmers. In 1805 Jeffrey wrote that Jones was somewhat spoiled by the classical and metrical discipline of English schools, but that his poetry was very learned and elaborate.40 In 1810Chalmers wrote that Jones's v e r s ification and language were highly polished and that his subject matter was distinguished for poetical fancy, ardor, and sensibility.41 in 1832 T. Walker noted that Jones wrote much good poetry and that "he did f a r more than any other individual has done, to introduce the Eastern Muses to the acquaintance of his countrymen. "42 40. Francis Jeffrey, "Lord Teignmouth's Memoirs," pp. 331f. 41. Chalmers, op. cit., XVIII, 440. 42. T. Walker, "A Lecture on the Character and Writings of Sir William Jones," pp. 558f.

24

On the other hand, in 1821 H. F. Cary said that Jones borrowed much, seldom improved what he borrowed, and did not deserve the name of poet.43 in 1849 a critic declared that Jones's poems were "mere careless effusions" and that he would have been a more powerful poet if he had stuck to English subjects.44 These two criticisms, particularly the latter, are easy to explain. Jones, who had never been considered a major poet even in his own period, had sunk into obscurity with the r i s e of Tennyson.45 However, critics since 1850 have often praised Jones as a minor poet. In 1902 Muller's praise - - that Jones had the exceptional power of being able to assimilate the exotic beauty of Eastern poetry into English poetry46 — was published.

A c r i t i c in t h e Cambridge History of English

Literature

calls Jones the f i r s t Anglo-Indian poet.47 In 1946 Pinto wrote that Jones's Poems of 1772 was less in achievement than in intention, but that it was one of the starting points for advances in English poetry that were to continue for fifty years. Pinto adds, "Sir William Jones deserves to be r e c ognized as an English poet in his own right. "48 In 1948 Das Gupta said that Jones's verses are "a kind of imaginative complement to his purely academic pursuits" and not a product of Jones's recreation in his leisure time; further, he noted that Jones had gathered the best fruits of his Oriental learning into his verse, fruits that English writers and scholars still have not used fully.49 PLAN OF AN EPIC POEM

Jones outlined Britain Discovered (the plan of it is in Memoirs, pp. 475-89) in 1770, planning it as an epic poem of twelve books in heroic couplets. Admittedly inspired by Spenser's letter to Sir Walter Raleigh concerning Spenser's projected, unfinished poem on King Arthur's political vir43. Cary, "Sir William Jones," London Magazine, p. 637. 44. "Poems of William Jones," Southern Literary Messenger, pp. 724-26. 45. Hewitt, op. cit., p. 49. 46. Muller, Chips from a German Workshop, IV, 396.

47. XIV, 334. 48. Pinto, op. cit., pp. 688-94. 49. R. K. Das Gupta, "Sir William Jones as a Poet," pp. 162-66. 25

tues, Jones wrote a brief essay on his own anticipated style and general plot; but he did not compose the poem. Jones hoped to use allegory (character of the perfect English king) and tradition (discovery of England by Tyrian adventurers) to make a national epic such as those of Homer, Virgil, Tasso, and Camoens. The epic was also to be a poetical panegyric on the excellent English constitution. Jones intended to use rhyme and regular measure. In 1787 Jones replanned Britain Discovered in order to incorporate Hindu mythology into the machinery of the plot. Earlier, he had condemned blank verse as a vehicle; now he decided in favor of it. He still retained the broad outline of his plot, planning the marriage of Britan (royalty) to Albina (liberty), but he never composed his poem. Actually his interest in the epic form of poetry might have been but a part of the same tradition that had persisted in England from the Renaissance through the eighteenth century; the fact that he did not write his epic might well indicate that the tradition was waning in importance in England by 1787 and that he himself had never been very enthusiastic about his contemplated poem.

26

Chapter Two

LAWYER, PRE-INDIA PERIOD 1773-1783

POLITICAL WRITINGS: EMPHASIS ON LAW The Speeches of Isaeus

The Speeches of Isaeus in Causes Concerning the Law of Succession to Property at Athens (Works, IV, 1-244; h e r e a f t e r called The Speeches

of Isaeus) — concluded in December, 1776, but not published until 1778 — consists of Jones's dedicatory epistle (3-7) and prefatory discourse (9-44), the fifteen Attic laws (4548), ten speeches by Isaeus (49-171), fragments of five more speeches (172-82), and Jones's notes (183-98) and commentary (199-241) on the speeches. The chief source is the Athenian lawyer Isaeus (fourth century B.C.). Jones also'knew Sir Matthew Hale's summary of the rules that prevailed among the ancient Hebrews, Greeks, and Romans in regard to the hereditary transmission of property, but declared the summary to be "remarkably superficial and erroneous" because Hale had hardly touched the subject and had not read the authors who had preserved and explained the originals (10). Jones also knew Dionysius' treatise on Isaeus, which he declared wrong on two counts: first, Isaeus is not chiefly illustrious for having been Demosthenes' teacher, and second, Isaeus' style is not a copy of that of Lysias, except for his earliest works (15). Jones knew Alphonsus Miniatus' Latin translations of Isaeus' speeches, but he called them miserable and inaccurate (24). He professed that he knew Isaeus' speeches in the original Greek version published by Reiske of Leipzig in the 1770's. The dedicatory epistle is addressed to Earl Bathurst and Sir James Porter. In the prefatory discourse Jones gives the known facts of Isaeus' life, compares the styles of Isaeus and Lysias, and explains the Greek system of law 27

courts a s an introduction to Isaeus' speeches in English dress. The ten speeches all deal with c a s e s involving property. The argument of each speech is given in a brief p a r a graph at the beginning. As Jones notes, all figures of speech a r e strong and diverse, and in general each speech i s subtly composed because each p r e m i s e is methodically proved by argument or evidence and because Iseaus' conclusions a r e not concentrated at the end (16-18). Speech One (49-54) concerns Cleonymus' estate. Is a will legal if the owner, meaning to destroy it, dies before he can do s o ? Speech Two (55-71) concerns P y r r h u s ' Speech estate. Was Phila legitimate or illegitimate? Three (72-80) concerns Nicostratus' estate. Can f i r s t cousins break a will that gives the estate to someone who i s not related to the deceased? Speech Four (81-94) conc e r n s Dicaeogenes' estate. The c a s e involves a forged will and a broken agreement. Speech Five (95-110) concerns Philoctemon's estate. The case involves a legal or illegal adoption and a legitimate or illegitimate son. Speech Six (111-22) concerns Apollodorus' estate. Was Thrasyllus really adopted? Speech Seven (123-36) concerns Ciron's estate. Is the son of a daughter or the son of a brother entitled to the e s t a t e ? Speech Eight (137-47) concerns Astyphilus' estate. The case involves a supposedly forged will by a half-brother. Speech Nine (148-56) concerns A r i s t a r chus' estate. The c a s e involves wills and legal adoption. Speech Ten (157-71) concerns Hagnias' estate. The case involves the public prosecution of a guardian f o r injuring his ward. Jones's commentary falls logically into two p a r t s . He reviews "laws of heirship by proximity of blood" and then considers "laws of heirship by appointment." Under the second p a r t he discusses the making and remaking of wills, comparing Greek practices with those of the Arabs, Hebrews, Romans, and others. Jones thought England needed The Speeches of Isaeus because English laws needed r e f o r m . Two examples were the laws of substitutions, which Jones thought were often a "subtle doctrine of contingent and vested i n t e r e s t s , " and the laws of "technical n i c e t i e s , " which Jones said often blocked justice for y e a r s (240). He believed that hints for the improvement of English land laws were to be found in 28

the Attic laws and in Isaeus' speeches. Besides his wish to stimulate interest in English legal reforms, Jones wanted to accomplish two objectives in The Speeches of Isaeus: to refute certain statements about Isaeus and to criticize certain versions of his speeches. Chalmers wrote that Jones's translation had the applause of every judge of classical learning, for critics admired his style, research, and acute criticism, l In a letter to Jones, Burke praised the translation as an eminent exception to the rule that orators always fared badly in the hands of translators.2 Although Jones's translation was commended, it is doubtful that he really expected — and therefore he was not disappointed - - actual reform of English land laws. However, he did at least suggest the new field that came to be known as comparative law. Essay on Bailments

An Essay on the Law of Bailments

(Works,

IV, 593-684; hereafter called Essay on Bailments), published in 1781, consists of an introduction (595-97); the three major parts of the essay: analysis (598-602), history (602-76), and synthesis (677-82); a conclusion (682); and an advertisement and index to the cases used in the history (683f.). The first of Jones's two major sources was Blackstone's Commentaries, which Jones knew well, particularly three short paragraphs on bailments that did not consider "employment in commission" and that spoke "loosely and indeterminately" on "responsibility for neglect" (596). Jones expected to supply Blackstone's omissions in his Essay on

Bailments.

His other major source was Pothier, the French lawyer (1699-1772). Jones said that he would be satisfied if his Essay on Bailments did nothing but introduce Pothier to Englishmen (616). He praised and imitated Pothier f r e quently in his essay, giving "invincible reasons" for the rejection of all systems except that of Pothier (619). According to Vesey-FitzGerald, Jones attempts, in the essay, to ascertain the law in regard to liability for loss in all cases concerning the possession or custody of 1. Chalmers, The Works of the English Poets, XVIII, 435. 2. Arberry, Asiatic Jones, p. 12. 29

property as a result of an express or implied agreement. 3 Lawyers assert that the essay as a whole is a penetrating work which draws upon a great knowledge of English law and its history. Chalmers considered the essay almost a scientific discussion of bailments, for the object of all Jones's legal discussions, Chalmers believed, was to advance law to the status of a science.4 In the introduction to the Essay on Bailments Jones precisely states his object in the essay, the specific points he will consider, and the method and order of his approach to the subject matter. In part one, analysis, Jones discusses the degrees of diligence which the bailee must use in caring for property under varying situations. He develops two principles: a man should naturally be as careful of someone else's property as "every person of common prudence and capable of governing a family takes of his own concerns," and a man is negligent if he does not give such care to the property. In part two, history, Jones discusses the major Roman and English decisions on bailments. He asserts that the Justinian Code is no longer admired by the English. He says that the Roman constitution was excellent until Octavius turned the laws into tyrannous ordinances. He discusses two laws of Domitius Ulpian (from his work on Sabinus and his tract on the Edict), from "whence all the decisions of civilians on . . . [bailments] must be derived." Jones criticizes Le Brun's "Essay on Responsibility for Neglect," alleging that Le Brun's system had gained little support in France. In regard to English decisions on bailments, Jones pronounces Sir John Holt's division of bailments into six sorts to be wrong because the fifth sort is part of the third. Jones discusses the general law for the five sorts: Deposition, Mandatum,

Commodatum,

Pignori Acceptum,

and

Locatum.

Among other English laws, Jones believes that the law is wrong which demands that the hirer take extraordinary care of the goods hired, because Jones asserts that the hirer actually does not have to use more than ordinary diligence. The error in the law, Jones declares, comes from Holt's mistranslation of the Latin word diligentissimus as 3. S. G. Vesey-FitzGerald, "Sir William Jones, the Jurist," p. 813. 4. Chalmers, op. cit., XVIII, 436.

30

extremely

careful i n s t e a d of a s ordinarily

diligent.

P a r t three, synthesis, consists of concise generalizations that a r e a kind of reference dictionary for all phases of bailments. There a r e eleven definitions, eleven rules ("axioms flowing from natural reason, good morals, and sound policy"), twelve propositions, seven exceptions, and a general corollary and remark. In the conclusion Jones gives his plans to discuss "every

branch

of English

l a w , civil a n d criminal, private

and

publick." He says that English jurisprudence consists of many subordinate systems, all well linked. Law employs reason and memory; its object is the good of mankind. In regard to the need for the Essay on Bailments, Jones says: "I could not but observe with surprise, that a title in our English law, which seems the most generally interesting, should be the least generally understood, and the least precisely ascertained" (595). Bailments, one of the principal contracts of civil society, had "produced more contradictions and confusion, more diversity of opinion and inconsistency of argument, than any other part, perhaps, of judicial learning" (596). Jones's object was clear: to clarify f i r s t and last all questions and answers concerning bailments in a convenient manner for the use of lawyers and juries henceforth, and, to a lesser extent, to fill in the blanks in Blackstone's Commentaries, to introduce Pothier to the English, and to correct e r r o r s in decisions by Holt and others. The Essay on Bailments was one of the m o s t important

treatises on law of the eighteenth century. It was used by English and American lawyers and jurymen for years. It went through four separate London editions, besides several pirated editions and printings in America. For example, an American critic 5 wrote as late as 1817: What remained to give perfect symmetry and connexion to all the parts of that system, and to refer it to its principles, has been accomplished in our times by the incomparable essay of Sir William Jones . . . Had he never written anything but his Essay on Bailments, he would have left a name unrivalled in the common law, for philosophical accuracy, elegant learning, and finished analysis.

Another American critic, Walker, wrote in 1832 that the 5. "David Hoffman's A Course of Legal Study,;" p. 46. 31

Essay on Bailments was "by general consent, the most beautiful specimen of legal analysis to be found in our books of law." 6 An anonymous reviewer in 1833 asserted that Jones had simply resorted to "forced and daring interpretation of clear passages, almost unequalled in the history of criticism, even in the works of Anthony Faber" in order to make the law of bailments conform to his preconceived theory. ^ The reviewer said that the Justinian Code required the hirer to indemnify his worker for any accident which was not inevitable; therefore, Jones was wrong when he wrote that only ordinary diligence was required of the hirer.8 Later, Judge Joseph Story agreed with Jones on this point in his Commentaries on the Law of Bailments, a work partly inspired by the Essay on Bailments, but a work that today is generally considered to be superior to Jones's essay. By the late nineteenth century the Essay on Bailments was more valuable as a literary than as a legal production^ the works of Justice Story, Maine, and other lawyers had long since replaced Jones's essay as key references on bailments. Nevertheless, Story's Commentaries and Maine's Ancient Law definitely took many points from Jones, who was never to realize his ambitious plan to write essays on all four branches of English law.10 A Mohammedan Law

The Mahomedan Law of Succession to the Property of Intestates (Works, III,

469-506; hereafter called The Mohammedan Law of Succession), published in 1782, consists of Jones's preface (469-72), the Law in Roman characters (473-88), the Law in the original Arabic (inserted plates 1-11), and the Law in Jones's English translation (491-504). Jones says that his translation is "line for line, and word for word, with a fidelity almost religiously scrupulous" from an Arabian manuscript collected by Pocock at 6. Walker, "A Lecture on the Character and Writings of Sir William Jones," p. 556. 7. "DavidHoffman's A Lecture, Being the Ninth of a Series of Lectures," pp. 408f. 8. Loc. cit. 9. Allibone's Dictionary of Authors, I, 992. 10. Arberry, op. cit., p. 16.

32

Aleppo (471). The original, written in 1312, belonged to the Shafi school and epitomized the system of Zaid. It was the book of authority in all Moslem courts. In the preface Jones discusses the need for the translation, his objects, and the original manuscript and author. The main text is a summary of inheritance laws in loose meter and occasional rhyme. Everything is in numbered order, almost in the form of lists, with brief, often technical, elaborations of the individual items. For instance, the causes of inheritance are three: wedlock, collateral relation, and descent; and the incapacities for inheritance are three: servitude, homicide, and difference of faith. There are ten kinds of men and seven kinds of women who can inherit. Inheritance is of two sorts: share and heirship. In regard to the need for The Mohammedan Law of Succession, Jones explains that English judges in India heretofore had had to rely on native lawyers for information about Mohammedan inheritance laws. Thus judgments were based on the reports of other men rather than on the individual cases before the judges. The Mohammedan Law of Succession would, according to humanist and libertarian Jones, give English judges summary references in the English language on inheritance laws for the first time. Also, it would "habituate the student of eastern languages to the reading of old Arabian manuscripts." Vesey-FitzGerald criticizes the work adversely because of the many mistakes in the details. Ten years after publication of the work Jones himself admitted many mistakes and mistranslations of technical terms that he could not find in any dictionary. But at least he caught the spirit of The Mohammedan Law oi Succession, and "there is little to set right in his general ideas."11 POLITICAL WRITINGS: EMPHASIS ON LIBERTY Ode to Liberty

"Latin Ode to Liberty," (Works, IV, 57782), written in Latin Alcaics, was published in 1780 under the pseudonym of Julius Melesigonus. Some stanzas, critics agreed, are liberal translations of Collins* "Ode to Liberty," and the movement and general 11. A. S. Tritton, "The Student of Arabic," p. 698. 33

effect are like those of Cowper's "Boadicea."l2 In the poem Jones, opposed to the war with America, states the justice of the American position. It is clear that he speaks as a humanist; he uses restrained, neo-classical diction. Critics of the time admired the ode as a polished expression of desire for liberty. Politicians in general grudgingly admitted the polish but felt that Jones's ideas were too liberal. This single poem, more than any other cause, probably delayed Jones's appointment as an Indian judge. 13 On Suppressing Riots

"An Inquiry into the Legal Mode of Suppressing Riots" (Worfcs, VI, 685712) was written less than a month after Jones had indignantly witnessed the London riots of June, 1780, during which military forces suppressed with bloodshed demonstrations in support of a petition calling for repeal of the recent Roman Catholic Act. The essay has one proposition: "the common, and statute, laws of the realm, in force at this day, give the civil state in every country a power, which, if it were perfectly understood and continually prepared, would effectually quell any riot or insurrection, without assistance from the military, and even without the modern riot-act." Jones presents a six-point plan as the best way of "restoring our laws to their full vigour and energy, and of providing for our future defence." Muller called the plan "the basis of personal security and public peace."14 Nevertheless, several years passed before the principle of Jones's plan was adopted advantageously. 15 Ode to Alcaeus

As Jones declares, the idea for "An Ode in Imitation of Alcaeus" (Wor/cs. IV, 571 f.), a thirty-two line ode written on March 31, 1781, came from a five-line verse by the patriot and poet Alcaeus, whom Aristides quoted. The peculiar, effective meter, 12. Pinto, "Sir William Jones and English Literature," p. 690. 13. Annabel Gray, "Sir William Jones," p. 282. 14. Eminent 15. Memoirs,

34

Orientalists, p. 9. p. 186.

according to Pinto, is probably from Mark Akenside's "Ode to the Honourable Charles Townshend."i6 Teignmouth said that the ode is in the genuine spirit of Alcaeus.17 In a letter to H. A. Schultens in June, 1781, Jones remarks that the ode "will clearly prove my detestation of tyranny, my zeal and exertions in the cause of liberty. "18 In the ode Jones writes of "High-minded MEN" who know that their duties and rights constitute a state, men who "crush the tyrant while they rend the chain." "Alcaeus" was generally well received by critics, then and now.19 Among modern critics, Pinto compliments the dignity and solidity of the ode; he says that it deserves a permanent place in the standard English anthologies and that Emily Bronte immortalized Jones's stanza form in her "No Coward Soul Is Mine."20 Arberry notes that the ode "has been described as one of the finest political poems in the English language,"21 and a critic in the Cambridge History of English Literature22. asserts that it is fixed in literary history. 23 Ode to Callistratus

As Jones declares, the idea for "An Ode in Imitation of Callistratus" (Works, IV,' 573-76), a forty-eight line ode written on May 14, 1782, came from a sentence in Lowth's De Sacra Poesi Hebraeorum

Praelectiones

Academicae.

In t h e o d e J o n e s p r a i s e s

the patriots who overthrew the Greek tyrant Hipparchus and gave peace to Athens. It concludes with a four-line praise of Britannia that might well remind the reader of James Thomson's "Rule, Britannia!" 16. Pinto, op. cit., p. 691. 17. Memoirs,

pp. 195f.

18. The letter is printed in Memoirs, p. 202. 19. There were a few protests against "Alcaeus" later. Robert Bland and o t h e r s ,

in Collections from the Creek Anthology

(as quoted in

Blackwood's, June, 1833, 33: 887), condemn Jones for having given "a long leaf of tinsel, in place of the solid gold" by Alcaeus. Jones's first twelve lines are called "animated commonplaces." With the exception of one line from "A Persian Song," Jones's poetry is alleged to be as weak as whey. 20. Pinto, op. cit., pp. 691f. 21. Arberry, op. cit., p. 15. 22. XI, 180. 23. "Alcaeus" is printed in Chambers' Cyclopaedia (p. 616) and in Hewitt's "Harmonious Jones" (p. 55).

35

Rise, BRITANNIA, dauntless rise! Cheer'd with triple Harmony, Monarch good, and Nobles wise, People valiant, firm, and FREE!

On Parliamentary Reform

"A Speech on the Reformation of Parliament" (Works, VI, 713-

24) was delivered at London Tavern on May, 1782. The thesis, "that the spirit of our constitution requires a representation of the people, nearly equal and nearly universal" (718f.), is directly from a passage by Blackstone, "that the spirit of our constitution is in favour of a more complete representation of the people" (723). Jones, in addition to explaining his thesis, refutes one argument against change in the people's parliamentary representation: that "a constitution, which has stood for ages, ought not to be altered." Jones says that the spirit of the constitution should not be changed, but that the form of the constitution might well be changed. He says that in 1782, according to the spirit of the constitution, an elector of Surrey or Middlesex should not be disqualified, even if the elector's freehold did not have an annual value of twenty pounds. Jones's speech was so well received that he let it be published in an unrevised state. The speech itself clearly shows his enthusiastic veneration for the principles of the English constitution. On National Defense

Jones presented his "Plan of National Defence" (Worics, VI, 725-30) on May 14, 1782, under the nom de plume of "a Company of Loyal Englishmen." First he quotes the governmental plan of defense as proposed by Lord Shelburne. Then he presents his own plan, which he admits generally agrees with Shelburne's plan except for certain of Shelburne's details that are "innovating, harsh, unconstitutional, and big with alarming consequences." Jones, for example, prefers to have officers' rank determined by the amount of their contributions to the local defense fund, rather than by the size of their land-holdings or bank accounts; he prefers to have the Adjutant or Town-Major of each town elected by the officers of the town, rather than to have the official appointed by the king. (A modern critic suggests that Jones was 36

envisaging a body of volunteers such as those Lord Charlemont raised and commanded in Ireland. 24) On Government Principles

"The Principles of Government, in a Dialogue between a Gentleman and a Farmer" (Works, IV, 569-76; hereafter called "The Principles of Government"), an anonymous dialogue, was published in 1782. In it a gentleman convinces a farmer that the farmer's club in the village is actually a weak, small, free state, and that the only free men are members of such a state. Since the other members of the farmer's club would fight a single member or a few members who tried to seize permanent, unrepresentative control of the club, so should the farmer fight, armed with his musket, if a similar situation developed in his state. Vesey-FitzGerald notes that the signs in "The Principles of Government"and in Jones's other political pamphlets — particularly the idea that the object of government is happiness for the greatest number — indicate Jones's knowledge and acceptance of Bentham's Fragment on Government.25 Jones himself declares his political doctrines to be "Not only just and rational

b u t constitutional

and

salutary"

(569). In the advertisement to a later edition of "The Principles of Government," he replies to the "injurious epithets" of critics who have called the pamphlet "seditious, treasonable, and diabolical." Later, when the Dean of St. Asaph was indicted for publishing the pamphlet, Jones wrote a letter to Lord Kenyon in which he admitted authorship of the pamphlet and maintained that every proposition in it was strictly conformable to the laws and constitution of England.26 Jones was not prosecuted for writing the pamphlet. Certainly it is clear that "The Principles of Government" was intended as a liberal "jeu d'esprit." In 1804 a critic in the Christian Observer wrote that the pamphlet proved the danger of forming theories about government when one was young and just learning about principles of l i b e r t y . 27 Vesey-FitzGerald asserts that the pamphlet shows Jones's 24. Vesey-FitzGerald, op. cit., p. 810. 25. Ibid., p. 811. 26. Gray, op. cit., p. 283.

27. "Teignmouth's Memoirs," Christian Observer, pp. 698-700.

37

belief in three ideals: universal equality, manhood suffrage, and a body of volunteers.28 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS Six Occasional Poems

Jones wrote six occasional poems during the period of 1773-83 (all a r e printed in Chalmers, XVIII; only "The Muse Recalled" is in Works, IV, 563-70). The f i r s t three are titled "On Seeing Miss*** Ride by Him, Without Knowing Her" (1780), "To Lady Jones" (1783, from the Arabic), and "Extempore Opinion on Native Talent, in Answer to Lines from a Friend." The fourth poem, "A Chinese Ode," is given in both paraphrased and literal translations. The poem "Written for a Fete Champetre in Wales" shows Jones in a holiday mood. A critic in the Penny Magazine said that the poem exhibits "a happy wit and fine imagination, tempered by the chastity of his mind and the elegance of his language."29 Pinto states that it is the "only survivor of many [poems] which Jones apparently wrote to be set to popular contemporary tunes."30 Four lines will indicate the tone and poetic quality of the poem: No longer then pore over dark gothic pages, To cull a rude gibberish from Neatheam or Brooke; Leave year-books and parchments to gray-bearded sages; Be nature and love, and fair woman, our book.

Jones states that the sixth poem, "The Muse Recalled; an Ode on the Nuptials of Lord Viscount Althorp, and Miss Lavinia Bingham,"was written within a few hours on March 6, 1781. After having printed the ode at his Strawberry Hill P r e s s , Horace Walpole wrote the Earl of Strafford on August 31, 1781, that he thought the ode "uncommonly good for the occasion. "31 Certainly it is clear that the ode is a capable, though perhaps mechanical, occasional poem. 28. Vesey-FitzGerald, op. cit., p. 811. 29. "Sir William Jones," Penny Magazine,

p. 122.

30. Pinto, op. cit., p. 692. 31. The Letters of Horace Walpole (edited by Mrs. Paget Toynbee), Xn, 43f. 38

The Moallakat

The Moallakat, or Seven Arabian Poems, Which Were Suspended on the Temple at Mecca; with a Translation and Arguments {Works, IV, 2 4 3 - 3 9 8 ; h e r e a f t e r

called The Moallakat) was written in the winter of 1780-81 but not published until early in 1783. It consists of Jones's advertisement (245f.), a chart of the genealogy of the seven Arabian poets, Jones's arguments and translations of the seven poems (247-335), and the Arabian poems in Roman characters (337-95). The original Arabian poems of The Moallakat, as Jones explains, were presented at the annual assembly at Mecca, where critics, selecting the best poems of the year, permitted seven poets to hang their poems on the gate of the Mecca Temple. Jones translated the seven poems, inserting an argument at the head of each poem that gives a brief paraphrase and Jones's thoughts about the circumstances under which the poem was composed. The f i r s t is "The Poem of Amriolkais" (247-57). A dramatic pastoral (only in the sense of the poet's narration of three of his adventures in a pastoral setting), it is in the so-called "long verse." The poet, sorrowing for Onaiza, tells his friends how he once sat on her clothes while she was swimming until she had to present herself naked before him, how he had dangerous amours with a girl of an enemy tribe, and how he once had a long chase and feast in the forest. The second is "The Poem of Tarafa" (258-72), in the same meter as that of the first poem. In the poem .Tarafa, after grieving over his lost beloved, defends himself against the condemnations of his brother Mabed and his cousin Malec, who accuse him of negligence in letting an enemy tribe steal the camels of Mabed and Tarafa. Tarafa, a hedonist, speaks for wine ("drink tawny wine, which sparkles and froths when the clear stream is poured into it"), heroic action ("when a warrior, encircled by foes, implores my aid, to bend towards him my prancing charger, fierce as a wolf among the Gadha-trees"), and women ("shorten a cloudy day, a day astonishingly dark, by toying with a lovely delicate girl under a tent supported by pillars"). The third is "The Poem of Zohair" (273-82), in the same meter as that of the f i r s t two poems. The elderly poet imagines that he sees a company of maidens on a journey, including his long-lost mistress. After delivering 39

a panegyric on Hareth and Harem, he discusses war and its miseries in highly figurative language, concluding with maxims (not unlike the best proverbs of Solomon, Jones asserts). An example: "He, indeed, who rejects the blunt end of the lance, which is presented as a token oi peace, must yield to the sharpness of the point, with which every tall javelin is armed." The fourth is "The Poem of Lebeid" (283-96), in iambic meter. The first part is a love elegy, in which the poet laments his fruitless love for Nawara. He describes his camel in sensuous figures (that are similar to the longtailed similes of the Greek and Roman poets, according to Jones). Then after praising his own hospitality, he ends with a panegyric on his tribe's virtues. The fifth is "The Poem of Antara" (297-308), also in iambic meter. Like the previous four, the poem begins with the poet's grief over the loss of his beloved. The poet praises his own virtues and deeds, particularly his military deeds: "Many a consort of a fair one, whose beauty required no ornaments, have I left prostrate on the ground; and the life-blood has run sounding from his veins, opened by my javelin like the mouth of a camel with a divided lip." The sixth is "The Poem of Amru" (309-23). Jones says that this poem is "arrogant beyond all imagination." The youthful poet, displeased about the coming departure of his mistress, passionately describes her body. Then he boasts about the generosity, prowess, goodness, possessions, ships, and women of his tribe. Jones calls both the sixth and seventh poems a kind of battle dance, for each poet is quite nationalistic, composing a poem that will be read before a neighboring (and enemy) tribe. The seventh is "The Poem of Hareth" (324-35), in "light verse." Hareth convinces the judge of the poetical battle to decide in favor of Hareth's tribe. He begins by calmly stating the problems between the two tribes, but losing his temper as he proceeds, he concludes with a harangue. He refers to battles which his tribe has won against Amru's tribe. As Jones says, "The rest of his harangue consists of sharp expostulations, and bitter sarcasm, not without much sound reasoning." The Moallakat indicated clearly to critics that Jones still believed that the English nation needed the best of Arabian poetical expression and images as stimuli to fresh 40

expression, in order to be released from the trite, sterile figures and thoughts of neo-classical poetry. In introducing The Moallakat to the English, he thought he was serving this purpose better than he or other translators had done up to that time. In his advertisement to the seven poems he even asks critics of Eastern poetry to write strictures and annotations on the edition in order to make it perfect, since - - as he admits - - h e had been forced to consult several Arabian commentaries in manuscript while translating the difficult poems. Jones's translation, accepted by critics of the time, raised his reputation as a poet and scholar higher than ever. The studies of later periods have shown, however, that Jones's modest fears for his accomplishment were well founded. A. S. Tritton has recently pointed out errors in the translation, calling the edition in Roman characters a curiosity and the system "sadly imperfect," for Jones apparently transcribed every consonant as such, regardless of its function in the original.32 As to grace of translation, Wilfrid Scawen Blunt's Golden Odes is considered far better than Jones's translation.33 The Moallakat found one particularly worthy reader, Tennyson, who not only quoted Jones in several footnotes to early verses in Poems by Two Brothers, but also supposedly based "Locksley Hall" largely on The MoallakatM Too, Southey, although writing no verse which shows traces of expression possibly derived from The Moallakat, nevertheless mentioned it in his notes. Finally, the idea of kismet, the recurrent motif of all seven poems, roused many echoes in later English poetry. 3 5 32. 33. 34. 35.

A. S. Tritton, op. cit., p. 695. Hewitt, "Harmonious Jones," p. 42. Hallam Tennyson, Tennyson, a Memoir, I, 195. Satyendra Nath Ray, "Sir William Jones's Poetry," p. 154.

41

Chapter Three

INDIA PERIOD 1783-1794

FORMAL DISCOURSES AND ADDRESSES Charges to the Grand Jury

Jones delivered six charges to the grand jury in Calcutta in the months of June and December, 1783-92, in the strict, conscientious discharge of his duty {Works, III, 1-50). They reflect social and political conditions in Calcutta and philosophize on slavery, duty to the Oath, and punishment for criminals. (Muller commented that they are "replete with wise and valuable thoughts. "1) On December 4, 1783 (1-5), Jones states the two objects of the Calcutta courts: to cover British subjects in India by British laws and to protect Indian customs and prejudices. The supreme executive and judicial powers in Bengal should work harmoniously. (Teignmouth wrote that the public agreed that Jones's f i r s t charge was "elegant, concise, and appropriate" and that it fulfilled everyone's high expectation. 2) On June 10, 1785 (7-15), Jones appeals for "good laws duly administered in settled peace." He attacks slavery and perjured Mohammedan witnesses, asking the jury to "look on the crime and example with the eye of severity, but on the criminal, as far as possible, with the eye of compassion." On June 10, 1787 (17-23), he condemns murderers, venders of liquor and drugs, perjured witnesses (who should be punished severely), and the too infrequent sessions of the grand jury. On December 4, 1788 (25-34), Jones speaks against perjured witnesses (a perjured Christian witness should be imprisoned for six months and, standing against the pillory, should have both 1. Eminent Orientalists, p. 8. 2. Memoirs, p. 233.

42

ears nailed to the pillory),3 the dangers on Calcutta streets at night, cheats and monopolists, homicide, and theft. On June 10, 1790 (35-46), Jones discusses what he says had never before been discussed in any discourse — the general form of Oath taken by the eighteenth-century jurist in India. The Oath had four divisions. The f i r s t dealt with i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s of the words diligently inquire and the subjects

of inquiry, the second with secrecy about the jurist's own acts or opinions or those of fellow jurists, the third with necessity for complete lack of bias in administering the law, and the fourth on a just accusation of the accused ("true presentment"). On June 9, 1792 (47-50), Jones charges that "no penal case, how insignificant soever in itself, is below the serious attention of a grand inquest." Jurists must not let the supreme executive powers in Bengal gain any arbitrary power over them, for Jones maintains that such power begins slowly and eventually enslaves jurists. Planned Essay

"A Prefatory Discourse to an Essay on the History of the Turks" (Memoirs, Appendix B, pp. 491-513) gives the background for an essay that Jones never wrote. Jones says that the essay will dispel the ridiculous European notion that the Turks a r e necessarily rude or savage or ignorant. He asserts that Mohammed encouraged, not discouraged, scholarship among his people. Anniversary Discourses

Jones delivered a discourse each February from 1784 to 1794, eleven in all (Works, I, 1-174), to celebrate the founding of the Royal Society of Bengal in January, 1784. They give a deep insight into Indian culture and a comprehensive knowledge of Indian literature and philosophy.4 Jones admits that the discourses have no one or two major sources, because he used all of the principal works in all 3. Jones, ever the humanitarian, intensely disliked those Englishmen (and other Europeans) who came to India in order to exploit the native people. It is not inconsistent, therefore, for him to want to make examples out of such Europeans who perjured themselves while under oath: if the native people could not trust the word and integrity of those men who had come from Europe to govern them and to trade with them, then why should the native people be expected to tell the truth when under oath ? 4. Eminent Orientalists, p. 11. 43

fields of knowledge covered in his discourses. In "A Discourse on the Institution of a Society for Inquiring into the History, Civil and Natural, the Antiquities, Arts, Sciences, and Literature of Asia" (1-7), Jones gives an optimistic prospect of the future career of the Royal Society of Bengal (a prospect that he was to see fulfilled). He sketches the limits (Asia), the objects ("MAN and Nature"), and the procedure (no rules at first) of the Society. In "The Second Anniversary Discourse" (9-18) Jones outlines the various discoveries in Oriental history, sciences, and art which the Society might justly expect to make: in botany to help diet and medicine, in chemistry to improve manufactures, and in Hindu and Moslem architectural remains to give English architects new ideas. He remarks also that the Society should gradually complete a catalogue of Oriental books. The next seven discourses, according to Jones, solve the common origin of the five principal Asiatic nations: India, Arabia, Tartary, Persia, and China (2If.). Jones discusses the people, their origin and time of origin, their present locations, and the advantages Europeans may gain from such knowledge. His media of investigation are (1) languages and letters, (2) philosophy and religion, (3) actual remains of old sculpture and architecture, and (4) written memorials of the sciences and arts. Jones calls "The Third Anniversary Discourse" (1934) a comprehensive, concise elaboration of the outline given in his first two discourses. The principal source for his discourse is Jacob Bryant's Analysis of Ancient Mythology, which, Jones asserts, "has the best claim to the praise [that it is] deep erudition ingeniously applied," but which is based on doubtful etymologies and the wrong method (synthesis).5 While discussing India (26), Jones makes 5. Jones's praise of Jacob Bryant's history was sometimes criticized, as it perhaps deserved to be, but no criticism was more unfair and vicious than one in 1832: "Jacob Bryant was a miserable writer... He was guilty of a gross absurdity in attempting such a work as his principal one without any Oriental learning, which he did not even profess. Yet Sir William Jones called him the principal writer of his time. This opinion quite takes away the value of Sir William's critical judgment." (From "Sir James Mackintosh,"North American Review, 35: 499.) Such an exaggeration, in the face of Jones's qualifications about Bryant's history, does not need refutation.

44

one of his most important statements: The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than thG Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and in the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists.

Thus was born "modern comparative grammar," for no one before had explained similarities in terms of a hypothetical earlier language.6 Later scholars, following Jones's suggestion, were to conclude that human speech could be grouped in families and that members of these families came from a common archetype. Of course linguistic relationships had been pointed out by Sassetti in 1585, Coeurdoux in 1768, Paulinus in 1786, and probably others.7 But it was another twenty years.after Jones's statement before the book was published that set European scholarship fairly in motion on the question ~ Friedrich Von Schlegel's Language and Philosophy of the Indians. However, Schlegel erroneously maintained that Sanskrit was the direct ancestor of Greek, Latin, and German, a pitfall that Jones had avoided simply by refusing to commit himself on the point. 8 Then fifty years after Jones had broached the idea of lingual relationships, Bopp confirmed and established it. 9 Still later, Max Muller amplified and popularized it. 10 An indirect influence of the third discourse has been that Pythagoras' dependence upon Indian conceptions has been generally recognized since the time of Jones and Colebrookeii (Jones's great follower in Oriental scholarship), for Jones mentioned the possibility of this dependence (33). In "The Fourth Anniversary Discourse" (35-50) Jones gives a philological and philosophical discussion of Arabia and Arabian culture before the Mohammedan intrusions. 6. Franklin" Edgerton, "Sir William Jones," p. 232. 7. Alfred Master, "The Influence of Sir William Jones upon Sanskrit Studies," p. 804. 8. "Max Muller's Lectures on the Science of Language," p. 400. 9. Herbert Gowen, A History of Indian Literature, p. 39.

10. Loc. cit. 11. Gowen, op. cit., p. 138.

45

He observes that the Arabian language is unlike Sanskrit. The learned Arabs were pure theists, but the morals of the nation were depraved. Few monuments of their antiquity have been preserved. Their only a r t s were poetry and rhetoric. Perhaps Arabs were not acquainted with any s c i ences. In "The Fifth Anniversary Discourse" (51-71) Jones discusses Tartary, where there was a deplorable void in languages and letters. On the whole, no Indian rites or superstitions or poetical mythology can be found in Tartary. There a r e no more traces of philosophy than in ancient Arabia, nor many great monuments of antiquity. Perhaps the T a r t a r s had no early proficiency in the a r t s and s c i ences. In "The Sixth Discourse; on the P e r s i a n s " (73-94) Jones reaches important conclusions: (1) there was a powerful Hindu monarchy in P e r s i a long before the Assyrian government; (2) the language used was the mother of Sanskrit; (3) P e r s i a was the true center of population, knowledge, language, and a r t s before other Oriental nations were formed; and (4) the people who were to f o r m the nations of India, Arabia, and Tartary migrated out of P e r s i a originally. Jones admittedly relies on Mohsan's .Daiusfan (the School of Manners), a Persian treatise on twelve Eastern religions, for the bases of some of his reasoning. In a letter to Teignmouth on June 24, 1787, he calls the Dabistan "the most . . . instructive book I ever read in Persian. "12 Jones's r e m a r k s about the Dabistan caused a vogue for it in the West.13 Later, Browne, an excellent scholar, alleged that the Dabistan made many preposterous claims.14 In "The Seventh Anniversary Discourse" (95-111) Jones denies three theories about the origin of the Chinese and tries to prove the fourth — the Brahman theory.15 He 12. Memoirs, p. 293.

13. Ibid., p. 511. 14. Browne, A Literary History of Persia, I, 53-55. Browne based much of his reasoning on De Sacy's attack on the "futile pretensions" of the Dabistan in the Journal des Savants for January and February, 1821;

but Browne, however, did list a number of Jones's errors in regard to the ancient history and languages of Persia. 15. T. C. Fan ("William Jones's Chinese Studies," p. 311) notes that Jones's principal source for the seventh discourse was G. Buhler's The Law of Manu,

46

thinks that the Chinese were originally Hindus of the Kshatriya (military) caste who wandered into the area now called China and united it; the Chinese, like the Hindus and Japanese, came from an ancient people in Persia. T. C. Fan charged that Jones, while trying to prove the Brahman theory that the Chinese people were originally Hindus of the Kshatriya caste, refutes some of his important statements made in "On the Second Classical Book of the Chinese" (see p. 54) and also shows his meager knowledge of China. As partial proof of the latter charge Fan offered the facts that Jones states Fohi (the legendary emperor of China) to be Budha of the Indian Pur anas, and that Jones draws flimsy parallels between Hindu and Chinese ceremonies and popular superstitions. 16 But Jones admittedly had little time for Chinese linguistic studies; as Arthur Waley observes, no one's reputation was hurt by Jones's seventh discourse, not even his own. 17 In "The Eighth Anniversary Discourse" (113-27) Jones discusses the borderers, mountaineers, and islanders of Asia. All races mentioned in the discourse have Indian or Arabian pedigrees. In "Discourse the Ninth, on the Origin and Families of Nations" (129-42), Jones gives the result of the whole inquiry of the previous six discourses (133): "Thus then have we proved, that the inhabitants of Asia, and consequently, as it might be proved, of the whole earth, sprang from three branches of one stem." He believes the stem to be the human beings preserved after the Deluge in Persia. From there they branched out into the Indian, Arabian, and Tartarian races, which in turn branched out into other races. A c r i t i c in t h e Asiatic Annual Register

f o r 1799 ( " B o o k s , "

pp. 214f.) asserted that Jones, endeavoring to prove that all races came from Persia, makes his ninth discourse his most ingenious. In "The Tenth Anniversary Discourse" (143-58) Jones describes the particular advantages to be derived from the Society's concurrent researches. He says that advantages come from studying Asiatic civil history (practical principles of action and hints for man's prosperity), natural his16. ibid., pp. 31 If. 17. A. D. Waley, "Sir William Jones as Sinologue," p. 842. 47

tory (sketches of Asiatic plants yet to be done in the Linnaean style and method, and translation of the best Sanskrit chemistry books), and medicine (perhaps the discovery of useful arts of which Europeans did not know). In "Discourse the Eleventh, on the Philosophy of the Asiaticks" (159-74), Jones discusses what he says are the five divisions of Asiatic philosophy: (1) physiology and medicine (there are no original Asiatic treatises on medicine that are scientific); (2) metaphysics and logic (many valuable Asiatic tracts have been preserved on these subjects); (3) ethics and jurisprudence (some of the most popular teachings of moral wisdom are to be found in Asiatic poetry); (4) natural philosophy and mathematics (the whole of Newton's theology and part of his philosophy are to be found in the Vedas; there are many excellent Sanskrit books on geometry and arithmetic); and (5) religion of nature (the supremacy of an over-all God is stated more piously and sublimely in Arabic, Persian, and Sanskrit, especially in the Koran, than in any other language). In the Asiatic Annual Register f o r 1799 ("Books," p. 215)

Jones's eleven discourses were called his most valuable writings. His style was praised as easy, flowing, perspicuous, and highly [neo-] classical. Teignmouth said: "In the eleven discourses... he has discussed the subjects which he professed to explain, with a perspicuity which delights and instructs, and in a style which never ceases to please, where his arguments may not always convince."18 Other Addresses to the Royal Society of Bengal

On Indian chronology. Jones wrote two essays on the subject of Indian chronology: "On the Chronology of the Hindus," written in January, 1788 (Works, I, 281-313); and "A Supplement to the Essay on Indian Chronology," written ca. 1790 (I, 315-29). In the opening sentences of "On the Chronology of the Hindus" Jones remarks that Europeans had long been debating on the supposedly great antiquity of the Hindus and that no authority had yet written a concise account of Indian chronology. Then he intimates that Hindu chronology, "embellished and obscured by the fancy of [Indian] poets and the riddles of their astronomers," is the same as Eur18. Memoirs, p. 377.

48

opean chronology. He suggests that "the hypothesis, that government was first established, laws enacted, and agriculture encouraged in India by Rama about three thousand eight hun-

dred years ago, agrees with the received account of Noah's death, and the previous settlement of his immediate descendants" (300). He refutes the accepted opinions about the antiquity of Hindu chronology: (1) the first three ages of the Hindus are chiefly mythological, and (2) the fourth age cannot be traced back earlier than 2000 B.C. The Brahmans, in other words, "have designedly raised their antiquity beyond the truth" (312). According

to

the Asiatic Annual Register f o r

1799

("Books," p. 217), Jones leaves no part of this subject unexplored; moreover, he has an extensive and accurate knowledge of astronomy. Actually, of course, Jones was leaving much of the subject unexplored, inasmuch as he depended exclusively on "Genesis" for European versions of the cosmic scheme. He, like other conservative Europeans of the time, was not ready to admit the new "geological" and "biological" discoveries. After seeing a certain Sanskrit passage soon afterward, Jones took a long step toward comparative religion in "A Supplement to the Essay on Indian Chronology" (326f.): . . .we may safely conclude, that the Mosaic and Indian chronologies are perfectly consistent; that Menu, son of Brahma', was the A'dima, or first, created mortal, and consequently our Adam; that Menu, child of the Sun, was preserved with seven others, in a bahitra, or capacious ark, from an universal deluge, and must, therefore, be our Noah; that Hiranyacasipu, the giant with a ¿olden axe, and Vali or Bali, were impious and arrogant monarchs, and, most probably, our Nimrod and Be/us; . . . and that the dawn of true Indian history appears only three or four centuries before the Christian era, the preceding ages being clouded by allegory or fable.

On elephantiasis. Jones's essay of 1785, "On the Cure of the Elephantiasis" (Worfe, I, 549-51), is an introduction to his translation in 1785 of a Hindu essay, "On the Cure of the Elephantiasis, and Other Disorders of the Blood" (I, 553-58). Jones explains that black leprosy, commonly called elephantiasis, is one of the most horrible diseases known. Peculiar to hot climates, it rarely appears in Europe. Jones's translation gives a proven Hindu prescription for the disease, with crystalline arsenic the principal ingredient. He thinks the prescription should be tried in Eur49

ope if elephantiasis ever w e r e to become s e r i o u s t h e r e . On zoology. In the f i r s t of t h r e e e s s a y s on zoology, "On the Pangolin of B a h a r , " written ca. 1789 (Dorics, I, 54547), Jones r e s t a t e s one of the principal objects of the Society: to d e s c r i b e perfectly Indian plants and animals that have been poorly or not at all d e s c r i b e d by European n a t u r a l i s t s . 19 The second e s s a y is a t r a n s l a t e d description, "On t h e B a y a , or Indian G r o s s - b e a k , " written ca. 1790 (I, 543f.). The third, "On the L o r i s , or Slowpaced L e m u r , " written ca. 1794 (I, 544-48), c o n s i s t s of r e m a r k s on the f o r m , habits, name, and country of the l o r i s , with a s t a t e m e n t that Buff o n ' s s h o r t account of the l o r i s in h i s Natural History is unsatisfactory. On botany. J o n e s ' s f i r s t of s i x e s s a y s on botany i s "The Design of a T r e a t i s e on the P l a n t s of India," written ca. 1790 (Works, II, 1-8). In it Jones d i s c u s s e s plans f o r a p r o j e c t e d valuable work on Indian plants. The name of the plant will be given in Roman and Sanskrit c h a r a c t e r s ; the plant will be c l a s s i f i e d and d e s c r i b e d ; and its known u s e s in medicine, diet, and manufacturing will be given. In "On the Spikenard of the Ancients," written ca. 1790 (II, 9-21), Jones concludes that the t r u e n a r d in India is a g r a s s or r e e d . In "Additional R e m a r k s on the Spikenard of the Anc i e n t s , " composed about four y e a r s l a t e r (II, 23-32), Jones, a f t e r r e f u t i n g s o m e of Dr. B l a n e ' s r e m a r k s on the s p i k e n a r d in Philosophical Transactions, concludes that what is known a s the Indian spikenard is actually the whole plant when it is gathered f o r u s e and that the t r u e n a r d is a s p e c i e s of Valeriana which grows on many Indian hills. In "On the F r u i t of the M e l l o r i , " written ca. 1794 (II, 37f.), Jones maintains that this highly nutritious f r u i t could end f a m i n e in India if it w e r e introduced extensively throughout India. F o r "BotanicalObservations on Select Indian P l a n t s , " dated about 1794 (II, 47-118), Jones admittedly combed the popul a r and s a c r e d poems of the ancient Hindus, their medical and law t r a c t s , and even the Vedas to find mention of plants which w e r e novel, beautiful, poetically f a m o u s , and u s e f u l in medicine or religious p r a c t i c e s . Seventy-eight plants a r e fully d e s c r i b e d . "ACatalogue of Indian P l a n t s , " written ca. 1794 (II, 39-46), is a kind of index to "Botanical O b s e r 19. Matthew Leslie sent Jones the pangolin, an edentate mammal akin to an anteater, which Jones describes in the essay. 50

vations on Select Indian Plants." Jones lists more than four-hundred plants in his catalogue, also listing the generic names — if any — which Karl von Linne (Linnaeus) had earlier given them. Jones himself had begun studying botany about 1787, while convalescing from an illness. In a letter to Dr. Patrick Russel on September 22, 1787, he calls a work entitled Philosophia

Botanica,

t h e g r a m m a r a n d a n o t h e r , Genera et

Spe-

cies, the dictionary of botany. 20 These were apparently the two major sources for his botanical writings. On geography. In "Remarks on the Island of Hinzuan or Johanna" of 1783 (Works, I, 485-513), Jones "expatiates with rapture on his approach to it, delineates with the skill of an artist the beauties of the scenery, and sketches with the discriminating pen of a philosopher, the characters and manners of the unpolished but hospitable natives. "21 He describes the geography of Johanna and condemns the slave trade. Jones's two other essays on geography are "A Conversation with Abram, an Abyssinian, Concerning the City of Gwender and the Sources of the Nile," dated ca. 1789 (I, 515-18), and "On the Course of the Nile," written about 1789 (I, 519f.). On other subjects. Jones, the pioneer in Western study of Hindu m u s i c , 22 discusses the choice and variation of Hindu musical modes in "On the Musical Modes of the Hindus" (Works, I, 413-23), written in 1784 and later much enlarged. Hindus, ignorant of the complicated English harmony, have eighty-four modes, but they use only thirty-six. Their whole system is enforced by the association of ideas and by the mutilation of the regular scales, each mode being used for a particular attitude of the mind. Both the English and Hindu systems could profit immensely from a f r e e communication of musical discoveries, Jones concludes. Jones, seeing that no complete system had yet appeared which expressed Asiatic languages in European characters "so that each original sound may be rendered invariably by one appropriated symbol, conformably to the natural order of articulation, and with a due regard to the 20. Memoirs,

p. 298.

21. Ibid., p. 230.

22. A r b e r r y , Asiatic Jones, p. 38.

51

primitive power of the Roman alphabet," wrote "A Dissertation on the Orthography of Asiatick Words" (Works, I, 175228) in 1786. Thus, Jones asserts, much of the great confusion in history and geography which had resulted from poor orthography would be cleared up by his essay. Before introducing his system, Jones explains the disadvantages of the two systems that had been used generally until 1786; then he uses the Devanagari alphabet23 as the standard for his own observations on Asiatic characters. He presents a detailed account of his system of orthography (187-205) and samples of Oriental writing in which his method is used. Soon after "A Dissertation on the Orthography of Asiatick Words" was published, Jones's system was adopted for use in grammars and dictionaries, though it was not adopted for use in general publications. Shortly afterward, Dr. John Gilchrist devised an alphabet that, H. T. Prinsep maintained, was simpler and more natural than Jones's alphabet. 24 in 1822 it was decided that all land tenures in India should be recorded in English. The systems of Jones and Gilchrist were weighed, and that of Gilchrist was adopted, though with some s i m p l i f i c a t i o n . 25 By 1834 the Indian government was using the Gilchrist system for its correspondence,26 but C. E. Trevelyan and the Journal oi the Asiatic Society of Bengal^ tried to reintroduce Jones's rejected system in that year, Trevelyan maintaining that . . . it is essential and imperative in the present widely diffused cultivation of the learned languages of India, to adhere to that notation which can alone command general acquiescence throughout Europe, and which is in fact the system followed in the great majority of the Dictionaries, Grammars, and transcribed works not only of our learned societies, but even of our colleges and schools.

Trevelyan declared that Jones's system had £ scheme of vowels that was closer to the originals, that it was used for Latin and its derivations, that it had a simple character for 23. The Devanagari alphabet is that which is usually employed today in writing Sanskrit. 24. H. T. Prinsep, "On the Adaptation of the Roman Alphabet to the Orthography of Oriental Languages," p. 283. 25. Ibid., p. 284. 26. Ibid., p. 283. 27. C. E. Trevelyan, "Defence of Sir William Jones' System of Oriental Orthography," p. 413. 52

every simple sound, that it had no arbitrary characters (Gilchrist's system had three), and that there were only five elementary signs to learn (Gilchrist's system had nine). Today it is clear that comparative studies would have been almost impossible without a scientific system of transliteration into Roman characters of the various languages involved.28 Jones's system may not have been perfect, but at least it was practical. And improvements on it have been made according to his principles better than he himself carried them out. 29 Oriental scholars at Calcutta wanted to be the first to uncover the valuable literature which presumably lay hidden in the sacred literature of the Brahmans. Jones, having written in 1784 his soon-to-be-famous address, "On the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India" (Worfc, I, 229-80), refused to have it printed until 1786 in order to have time to revise it. (Muller, a competent scholar, intimated that Jones gave his address an earlier date in order to be one of the first Orientalists to have studied the sacred literature of the Brahmans.30) Continuing his comparative studies between Asiatic and the Greek and Roman nations, Jones decides in "On the Gods of Greece, Italy, and India" that their mythology is common to all three: " . . . when features of resemblance, too strong to have been accidental, are observable in different systems of polytheism, without fancy or prejudice to color them and improve the likeness, we can scarce help believing, that some connection has immemorially subsisted between the several nations, who have adopted them" (229). After making introductory remarks on the four chief sources of all mythology, Jones draws broad comparisons (Janus with Ganesa, Saturnus with Satyavrata, the Deluge as described by Moses with that in Indian history, and Ceres with Lakshmi) before proceeding to his major comparison — the Hindu Triad with the Platonic Triad and the Christian Trinity.3l Here Jones finds striking resem28. Master, op. cit., p. 805. 29. Loc. cit.

30. Muller, Chipstrom a German Workshop, V, 99.

31. Jones's opinion on these resemblances is worth all other opinions, concluded a reviewer in the North American Review (June, 1819), p. 43. 53

blances in the three roles of Jupiter and the Hindu God: both the European and Indian systems give the highest gods the greatest number of names; the gods actually are parts of one or two chief gods. He finds no evidence, however, as to which system was the original. Jones, always the conservative scholar, refuses to call Hindus Christians because "the tenet of our church cannot without profaneness be compared with that of the Hindus, which has only an apparent resemblance to it, but a very different meaning" (278). (Later, Muller called Jones's address a superficial comparison of mythology without any scientific value. 32) Between 1785 and 1788 Jones wrote "On the Second Classical Book of the Chinese" (Works, I, 365-73), which purportedly gives a succinct account of the Shi King with remarks of Confucius on its significance.33 Jones translates literally, as well as paraphrases, one of the odes from the Shi King . Good judges of the time said that the translation was competent.34 The modern critic Fan declares that the translation conveys the idea of the poem. 35 Thus "with the endeavours of Sir William Jones as an O r i e n t a l i s t . . . sinology as such in English may be said to have begun. "36 Jones became the worthy precursor of Marshman, Morrison, Medhurst, and other British sinologues of the nineteenth century.37 In "On the Indian Game of Chess" (Works, I, 521-27), written about 1790, Jones maintains that the game "was 32. Jones, alter presenting the address and leaving scholars greatly interested, soon turned elsewhere; and Lieutenant Wilford, Jones's contemporary at Calcutta, became determined to solve the question that had by then excited world-wide interest. Wilford engaged pundits to find the originals of Greek and Roman mythology and Old Testament history in Sanskrit. Finally the pundits began finding a wealth of coincidences, which Wilford published year after year in the Asiatic Researches. Jones himself checked and admitted the accuracy of the discoveries and Wilford's opinions. But then Wilford learned that the. pundits, impressed by his insistence on their finding coincidences, had simply rendered all they had heard about Adam and Abraham into correct Sanskrit verse. Even today, however, some scholars of ancient religion quote Wilford. (This summary is taken from Muller's Chips from a German Workshop, V, 104-9.) 33. Fan, op. cit., p. 309. 34. Edgerton, op. cit., p. 233. 35. Fan, op. cit., p. 310. 36. Ibid., p. 304. 37. Ibid., p. 314.

54

invented by one effort of some great genius." His address describes an ancient game which was more complex and modern than that of the eighteenth century and which probably was the ancestor of European chess. In "On the Antiquity of the Indian Zodiac" (Works, I, 333-48), written ca. 1790, Jones refutes Montucla's opinion that the Indian zodiac was borrowed from the Greeks or Arabs. Rather, he believes that it was probably invented by the first progenitors of the Hindu race before their dispersion. He gives several reasons for his refutation: (1) the Brahmans were too proud to borrow their sciences; (2) the Indian signs vary too much from the Greek to be a mere copy; (3) the names and forms of the lunar constellations differ entirely from those of the Arabian system; and (4) no communication between the Hindus and Arabs on any subject of literature or science had yet been proved. Actually, however, Jones was wrong when he argued that the zodiac originated independently in India. 38 In "On the Mystical Poetry of the Persians and Hindus" (Wor*s,I, 445-62), written about 1792, Jones first lists the similarities between the mystical, religious allegories of Vedantism and Sufism. He then explains the general characteristics of the thousands of metaphors and figures which abound in Persian and Hindu sacred poetry and which have love and religious beliefs as their source. Hafiz' poems are said to be usually religious in bent.

IN OR FROM THE SANSKRIT The Seasons

Jones says that The Seasons: a Descriptive Poem, published in 1792, was the first book ever to be printed in Sanskrit. He collated four copies of Kalidasa's poem in order to choose what he says is the clearest and most natural version. The Sanskrit poem is in couplets and exhibits an Indian landscape, as Jones explains in t h e a d v e r t i s e m e n t to t h e book. 39 38. Edgerton, op. cit., p. 233. 39. Only the cover sheet and advertisement to The Seasons are printed in Works (VI, 43If.), probably because most readers of Works could not be expected to be able to read Sanskrit. 55

On Hindu Literature

In Jones's translation of "On the Literature of the Hindus" {Works, I, 349-63), written ca. 1786, he discusses the parts of true knowledge in Hindu literature. The first four parts ~ or perhaps three — are the immortal Vedas (the ancient, sacred scriptures of the Hindus), which were evidently revealed by God. The other parts are the four Upavedas, the six Angas, and the four Upangas. Jones also discusses the body of Hindu law, which consists of eighteen books, and the writings of Buddha and six atheistical systems of philosophy. Jones concludes with the hope that the English can give Europeans the first accurate knowledge of Sanskrit and Sanskrit works. Sanskrit Epigraphy

In "Inscriptions on the Staff Shah" (Works, I, 539-42), about 1789, Jones gives literal versions of the five tions on a monument near Delhi. Thus he became neer in Indian epigraphy, being the first European Sanskrit inscriptions.40

of Firuz written inscripthe pioto study

The Hindu Lunar Year

In "The Lunar Year of the Hindus" (Works, I, 375-411), dated ca. 1792, Jones outlines in calendar form (after checking the entries with two Sanskrit almanacs and other works) a curious tract of Raghunandana "containing a full account of all the rites and ceremonies in the lunar year." Jones says that the calendar (379-411) can be compared with calendars of Greek, Roman, Persian, Egyptian, and Gothic festivals, and that striking resemblances can be found; an attentive comparison might even throw a great light on the religion and history of the primitive world (411). An Indian Grant of Land

Jones's literal translation of "An Indian Grant of Land in Y. C. 1018" (Works, I, 529-38) is dated about 1794. The original Sanskrit document is reproduced on an inserted plate. A Translated Fragment

"The Ignorant Instructed", (Works, VI, 428-30), a fragment, is a translation of twelve didactic prose-measures. 40. Eminent Orientalists, p. 45.

56

Some Translated Extracts

Jones translated some extracts from theVedas in 1793 or 1794 (Works, VI, 413-27) for a projected discourse that he never wrote, "On the Primitive Religion of the Hindus." One of the extracts is "A Hymn to the Night," a beautiful, didactic description of the night (427). Gitagovinda

When Jones translated Gitagovinda: or, The Songs of Jayadeva (Works, I, 463-84) in 1789, jie thought it was an allegory of the human soul, which is f i r s t attracted by worldly delights and then finally is freed from all sensuous distractions through heavenly love. 41 Perhaps he was not able to transfuse the exquisite lyrical form of the original into his version; 42 anyway, he used prose. In the plot Radha is abandoned by Hari, who sports with herdsmen's daughters. Hari laments that he has thereby lost her forever. He asks her to come to his bower, but she is too weak from despair to go. Finally Radha accepts Hari's apologies and does go to him. They resume their interrupted nights of passion. Jones was the first of several scholars to translate Gitagovinda. He declares that he translated it word for word, adding no idea or image, but omitting passages that he thought were too florid or bold for European taste.43 Schlegel, disagreeing, said that Jones wanted an epitome (which allegedly turned out to be a feeble copy of the original), not a literal rendition.44 Sakuntala

K a l i d a s a ' S Sakuntala; or, The Fatal Ring: an Indian

Drama (Works, VI, 200-312; hereafter called Sakuntala), the most esteemed drama in India, was f i r s t literally translated by Jones into Latin. Then he translated it word for word into English, publishing the English version in 1789 with the following remark: "I now present [it] to the Publick as a most pleasing and authentic picture of old Hindu manners, and one of the greatest curiosities that the literature of Asia has yet brought to light." The work includes Jones's preface (203-8), list of characters (209), 41. Gowen, op. cit., p. 421. 120.

42. Frederick von Schlegel, Lectures on the History ot Literature, p.

43. "On the Mystical Poetry of the Persians and Hindus." 44. Schlegel, op. cit., p. 120. 57

prologue (211f.), and the drama itself (213-312). In the preface Jones discusses Kalidasa (his time and writings) and the theater in ancient India. Jones thinks that Kalidasa should have condensed acts two, three, five, and six into two acts. The prologue consists of a brief dialogue between the manager of the production and an actress who sings an appropriate introduction. The play itself revolves about the love of Dushyanta, emperor of India, for Sakuntala. While hunting antelope he sees her in a holy grove of hospitality, and they fall in love. After a short courtship he marries her; he leaves her pregnant when he returns to business at the court. When she follows him to take her place as one of his queens, he does not recognize her, and since she has lost his ring she cannot prove her claims. Thereupon she is taken into the air by spirits, and a deep mourning pervades the land, particularly after Dushyanta receives the ring from a fisherman and remembers his marriage to Sakuntala. Madhavya, his buffoon, is also taken into the air by spirits, being r e leased only when Dushyanta promises to subdue an enemy race for Indra, the God of the Firmament. Finally, in the domains of Kasyapa, the Father of Immortals, Dushyanta finds and is reconciled with Sakuntala and his son, who is destined to have extensive sovereignty. He learns that he had forgotten his marriage to Sakuntala because of a curse. Jones, the first European to discover the ancient Hindu dramas,45 was also the first person to translate Sakuntala into a Western language. Calling Kalidasa the Shakespeare of India in the preface to Sakuntala,46 Jones urges other men to learn Sanskrit and to translate the rest of Kalidasa's writings into English. French and Italian translations were promptly made from Jones's version of Sakuntala. Translations into other Continental languages were made from the original Sanskrit manuscript, the drama becoming immediately popular in Europe. When an English version was printed in London in 45. "Monier Williams's Translation of Sakoontata," Edinburgh Review, p. 257. 46. In "Sacontala" (Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 1820), p. 418, a

critic refuted Jones's statement: it is "Not a very philosophical opinion, for neither the human mind nor human life did ever so exist in India, as to create such kind of faculties as those of Shakespeare."

58

1790, English critics agreed that Sakuntala was a wild, beautiful composition but of doubtful authenticity (they were not yet convinced that the Hindus had any ancient dramas). Jones, contemptuous of such criticism, refused to answer these doubters. In 1793 Wilkins, a contemporary Orientalist, translated Sakuntala into English. By this time Jones's translation had excited more general interest in Europe than perhaps any similar Oriental translation, except for t h e Arabian Nights and Pilpay.47

it had inspired Goethe's

"Vorspiel" to Faust.. James Robertson, the famous Orientalist, said that "it deserves an attentive perusal; as well on account of its poetical beauties, as because it gives, what we believe to be, a faithful representation of Hindoo manners almost two thousand y e a r s ago. "48 in 1901 the Calcutta Society for the Resuscitation of Indian Literature reprinted Jones's English translation. In 1946 the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal decided to make a variorum edition of the drama. Thus Jones not only introduced Sanskrit literature to European scholars with his translation of Sakuntala; he also became the founder of the modern science of Indology. Hitopadesa

The Hitopadesa of Vishnusarman

(Works,

VI, 1 -

176; hereafter called Hitopadesa) was so useful to Jones for studying Sanskrit that he translated it into English in 1785-86. It was not published until after his death, in 1799. Jones had commented on it in "The Third Anniversary Discourse": " . . . the Fables of Vishnusarman, whom we ridiculously call Pilpay, a r e the most beautiful, if not the most ancient, collection of apologues in the w o r l d . . . but their original title is Hitopadesa, or Amicable Instruction." In- Book One, "Mitralaba, or the Acquisition of Friends" (5-50), Vishnusarman (a famous story-teller) presents the framework of all four books, as well as several fables: he will tell the wicked sons of a prince a s e r i e s of fables in order to teach them morality. (One of the best in Book One is the story of how a crow, antelope, and rat, performing great actions together without supernatural powers or wealth, saved a captured tortoise.) The 47. "Monier Williams's Translation of Sakoontala," p. 257. 48. Biographia Dramatics, III, 234f. 59

general moral of Book One is: "Attach thyself to a virtuous friend, and bring down the goddess of abundance on thy country. Let kings nourish and protect the world; constantly fixed in the path of justice: let virtue be wedded to you" (50). In Book Two, "Suhridbheda, or the Breach of Friendship" (51-99), Vishnusarman narrates, among others, the fable of how an artful jackal broke up a great friendship between a lion and a bull in order to regain his former high position with the lion. The general moral of Book Two is: "May a breach of friendship be in the mansion of the enemies; and may every wicked adviser, detected in time, be dragged continually to perdition; but may every man of virtue enjoy all prosperity; and may everybody delight in pleasing and useful instruction" (99). In Book Three, "On War" (100-143), Vishnusarman tells, among others, the fable of a war between the geese and peacocks, with the geese being slain because they confided in crow-spies. The general moral of Book Three is: "May you, when you reign, fight not always with elephants, with horsemen, and with infantry! but may your enemies, overthrown by the winds of wise counsels, be driven for protection to the mountains" (143). In Book Four, "On Peace" (144-76), Vishnusarman tells, among others, the fable of how a peace was made by two ministers, a vulture and a chacra, after a long war had exhausted both their kingdoms. The peace was founded on friendship between good men. The general moral of Book Four is: "Let all kings make peace when they have gained a victory; and may their joy be perpetual! May the virtuous live without misfortune! and may the celebrity of those who have performed good actions, continue for ever increasing" (176). Thereupon, the sons of the prince, after having heard the four major fables and many shorter fables, say that they now understand the perfect system of royal duties. Edgerton asserts that in Hitopadesa Jones's language is choice and vigorous, but that his command of Sanskrit is not as good as in his later translations of other Sanskrit works.49 On the other hand, Schlegel said that the transla49. Edgerton, op. cit., p. 237.

60

tion has almost verbal fidelity to the original. 50 Regardless of the complete accuracy of the translation, however, it is certain that no definite influences on other writers can be proved from Jones's efforts here, for Hitopadesa was translated many times before and after Jones translated it. "Enchanted Fruit"

In 1785 Jones wrote "The Enchanted Fruit; or, the Hindu Wife: an Antediluvian Tale" {Works, VI, 177-200, and Chalmers, XVIH, 495500), a poem in couplets. He admittedly took the plot from the Mahabharata. The poem concerns an enchanted fruit that is shot off a tree by one of five brothers. Therefore, the brothers and their wife-in-common must confess their worst crimes or faults. After the brothers confess to revenge, rage, intemperance, avarice, and pride, the fruit rises to within ten cubits of its natal bough. Their wife, Draupadi, confesses to vanity and the fruit rises eight cubits. Blushing, she confesses that she once let her Brahman teacher kiss her on the cheek. The fruit rejoins the bough as her husbands stare at her. LEGAL WRITINGS Ordinances of Manu

The Institutes of Hindu Law: or, the Or-

dinances of Menu, According to the Gloss

of CuIIuca (Works; HI, 51-466; hereafter called The Institutes of Hindu

Law).

In WorAs (III, 73-83, 471) are five letters relating to Jones's projected digest of Indian laws. In the first Jones considers the need and possibility of such a digest. In the fifth he states that, he will formally resign his judgeship (when he finishes the digest, either in 1795 or in 1796). Then he plans to return to England to spend his life "in studious retirement." Before considering the part of the digest that Jones completed or the need for it, however, the general situation of English administration of Indian laws in 1786 must be sketched, and the work which preceded Jones's endeavors must be described. English policy was to govern India by Indian laws whenever they were consonant with the English constitution, but unfortunately these laws were in Sanskrit 50. Schlegel, op. cit., p. 120. 61

and Arabic, languages which few administrators knew. As a result, native lawyers and scholars usually had to furnish opinions and interpretations, which English administrators could not verify. Warren Hastings, perceiving the problem, had extracts from representative native works on law arranged into The Code of Gentoo Laws in 1776.51 But, as Jones observed years later, a more ample repertory of Hindu laws was needed, especially on the twelve different contracts (Works, III, 76). The code was translated literally into P e r sian; the translation was "a loose injudicious epitome of the original Sanskrit," according to Jones (77). Then Nathaniel Halhed translated the code competently into English; the difficulty, according to Jones, was that the original manuscripts from which Halhed worked were swarming with e r r o r s . Charles Wilkins rendered one-third of the Ordinances of Manu into E n g l i s h , 5 2 leaving the rest to Jones to complete. In 1786 Jones planned the digest of Indian laws with one chief object in mind: to make the administration of justice and government in India conform to the manners and opinions of the Indians (53). Jones approached the projected task selflessly, for as he says in a letter on May 6, 1786, "I am conscious of desiring no advantage, but the pleasure of doing general g o o d . "53 in the same letter he notes that he is modeling the digest after the Justinian Code; however, it is clear that he did not think of himself as the potential Justinian of India. He did not reject or accept the superhuman origin of the Ordinances of Manu; rather, he began to translate them faithfully because they contained much of Indian law. In 1788 Jones was given legal permission - - and government funds - - t o begin the digest. He never finished it, though he did publish The Institutes of Hindu Law in 1794 a s

preparatory to the copious digest which he expected to finish shortly. The Institutes of Hindu Law comprises the Indian system of duties, both religious and civil, and was translated literally from original Sanskrit manuscripts which learned natives brought Jones. It consists of his preface 51. Master, op. cit., p. 800. 52. Arberry, op. cit., p. 21. 53. Memoirs, p. 276. 62

(53-63), twelve translated chapters (65-462), and his general notes (463-66). In the preface Jones discusses his object in making the digest of Indian laws: he asserts that the Ordinances of Manu, written about 1280 B.C., constituted the chief laws for millions of Hindus in eighteenth-century India. (The statement is unfortunately not quite true. Jones, like other English administrators in India, erred in this belief, but at least he was endeavoring to help the native population.) Chapter One, "On the Creation; with a Summary of the Contents" (65-81), has 119 numbered paragraphs of one sentence each (paragraphs in all chapters are one sentence each). Manu describes the Creation: the Universe was compacted from minute portions of seven divine, active principles — the great soul, consciousness, and the five perceptions. Brahma then caused the Brahman (the highest, or sacerdotal caste), the Kshatriya (the governing and military caste), the Vaisya (the mercantile and agricultural caste), and the Sudra (the lowest of the four Hindu castes) to proceed from his mouth, arm, thigh, and foot respectively. He delegated Brahman to be chief of the whole Creation. (Thus the scale of legal and social position for Hindus is determined, with the laws for each caste described in the following chapters.) Chapter Two, "On Education; or on the Sacerdotal Class, and the First Order" (83-117), has 249 paragraphs. Students of theology must have special clothing and staffs, ask for food in certain ways, perform certain duties, and subdue their passions. The Brahman communicates sacred learning to them. Chapter Three, "On Marriage; or, on the Second Order" (119-59), has 286 paragraphs. A student of the Vedas may marry only certain women. There are eight different nuptial ceremonies. The five sacraments which the housekeeper must daily perform a r e explained. Chapter Four, "On Economicks; and Private Morals" (161-97), has 260 paragraphs. A Brahman who keeps house must subsist according to a certain mode. A Brahman can acquire property only to keep himself alive, is never to teach for pay, and should seldom accept gifts. Chapter Five, "On Diet, Purification, and Women" (199-223), has 169 paragraphs. Brahmans destroy themselves by not following approved usages, by not reading the 63

Vedas, by being remiss in performing holy rites, and by eating certain foods. Rules are given for eating and for purifying the dead and inanimate things. Laws concerning women are given. Chapter Six, "On Devotion; or on the Third and Fourth Orders" (225-39), has 97 paragraphs. The general law for devotion by anchorites with subdued minds is explained. A grandfather, as well as a twice-born man who has completed his studentship, should take refuge in a forest and live according to prescribed rules. There is a fourfold regulation for the Brahman caste. Chapter Seven, "On Government, and Publick Law; or on the Military Class" (241-73), has 226 paragraphs. It discusses the purpose of kings, the rules of strict justice which they must follow, and their duties. A king should try to reduce his enemy through negotiation, well-applied gifts, and creation of division within the enemy's ranks before risking a decisive battle. Chapter Eight, "On Judicature; and on Law, Private and Criminal" (275-334), has 420 paragraphs. The king should daily decide causes under the eighteen principal titles of law. Some men are prohibited from being witnesses. The names of weights used in business are explained, as well as the law for non-payment of wages, broken promises, contests arising from the fault of cattleowners and herdsmen, defamatory words, assault and battery, and theft. Chapter Nine, "On the Same; and on the Commercial and Servile Classes" (335-81), has 336 paragraphs. Man and woman have certain immemorial duties. Expiations redeem sins. Laws are explained concerning children, women without children by their husbands, inheritance, and games of chance. Rules for the conduct of a military man and for commercial and servile classes are given. Chapter Ten, "On the Mixed Classes; and on Times of Distress" (383-401), has 131 paragraphs. Members of the other three classes must study the Vedas, but only the Brahman may explain it. Impure classes are formed in three different ways. A Brahman may subsist as a soldier if not as a priest, and as a commercial man if not as a priest or soldier. He may receive gifts from anyone if he falls into distress. Chapter Eleven, "On Penance and Expiation" (40364

41), has 266 paragraphs. Every man who fails to do a prescribed act or does a forbidden act or is guilty of excessive gratification of the senses must perform expiatory penance. The various degrees of crime are described, as well as the penances for open and secret crimes. Chapter Twelve, "On Transmigration and Final Beatitude" (443-66), has 126 paragraphs. The triple system of transmigration, in which each class has three orders according to the three kinds of actions, is described: souls endued with goodness attain the state of deities; those with ambitious passions attain the condition of men; and those immersed in darkness attain the nature of beasts. The system of punishments for evil deeds is given. Certain acts of a Brahman lead to eternal bliss. The Calcutta printing of The Institutes of Hindu Law in

1794 was well received. It was reprinted in London in 1796 and translated into German by J. C. Huttner in 1797. There was a third edition in Madras in 1863,54 which was followed by a fourth Madras edition in 1880. Meanwhile, after Jones's death, Henry Colebrooke had finished translating the digest of Indian laws and had published it. The digest established his reputation after 1797 as the leading Sanskrit scholar. 55 Colebrooke, however, had no high opinion of the work. 56 Writers

in t h e Edinburgh Review in 1810 and 1883 h a d

unkind words for Jones's translation of The Institutes of Hindu Law. His method was called injudicious because he had used Indian instead of European assistants; the result was alleged to be barbarous confusion and nonsense devoid of every quality of guidance for the administration of justice. 57 Further, subsequent research assigned a much later date of composition to Manu1 s Ordinances than 1280 B.C.58 Thus modern, careful inquiry was alleged not only to have exploded the notion of the indefinite antiquity of the Ordinances, but also to have exploded the notion of the superhuman origin of the compilation (the writer in the Edinburgh 54. Edgerton, op. cit., p. 232. 55. Arberry, op. cit., p. 25. 56. Sir T. E. Colebrooke, Miscellaneous Essays (London: Trubner and Company, 1873), pp. 74ff. 57. "Strictures on the Present Government, Civil, Military, and Political, of the British Possessions in India," p. 157. 58. "Dissertations on Early Law and Custom and Asiatic Studies.," p. 334.

65

Review considered it the work of many minds).59 Yet in 1952 the Ordinances of Manu — though technically not a part of official Hindu scriptures — are still deeply revered by Brahmans. Thus the caste system in India remains strong today, although the Indian Constituent Assembly outlawed Untouchability in 1947. Sir Henry Maine used The Institutes of Hindu Law for his Ancient Law. Indeed, his career might have been entirely different if he had not known Jones's translation, for his interest in Indian ideas in Ancient Law led to his appointment to the Governor-General's Court.60 Maine, like Jones, believing that the law of Jones's day in India rested mainly on Manu's Ordinances, repeated the e r r o r in Ancient Law and again in "Village Communities. "61 Colebrooke, in his digest of Indian laws, corrected Jones's mistaken idea; but, even in 1946, lawyers referring to Manu unanimously preferred Jones's translation over all later ones.62 Thus Jones was again a pioneer, this time in the field of historical and comparative English legal philosophy.63 He had become the f i r s t of many interpreters of the Brahmanic code. A1 Sirajiyyah

A1 Sirajiyyah: or, the Mohammedan heritance: with aCommentary{Works,

Law oi In111,505-92;

hereafter called A1 Sirajiyyah) was not completely translated and condensed by Jones until 1792. It consists of Jones's preface (507-14); the summary-translation (517-54); Jones's commentary, which explains the summary-translation (555-92); and reproduced plates of the original document. Jones, criticizing the Persian translation of compositions on Mohammedan inheritance by Shaikh Sirajuddin and Sayyad Sharif, explains that he studied both compositions three times. Then he condensed the translation of six-hundred "tediously perspicuous" pages (Hastings had authorized this translation) into hardly more than fifty pages, allegedly omitting no important materials. Jones says that he translated A1 Sirajiyyah because he thought it would solve any 59; 60. 61. 62. 63. 66

Loc. cit. Vesey-FitzGerald, "Sir William Jones, the Jurist," p. 807. Ibid., p. 814. Loc. cit. Ibid., p. 807.

future questions on Mohammedan law of succession (510). He states his object again in a letter to Dr. Price on September 14, 1790: "We have twenty millions (I speak with good information) of Indian subjects, whose laws I am now compiling and arranging, in the hope of securing their property to themselves and their heirs. They are pleased with the work. "64 As a matter of fact, a digest of the Shia law was completed under Jones's general direction in four volumes; but little of the digest ever saw print, and the few sections of Mohammedan law relating to commercial transactions that JohnBaillie translated in 1797 are rare today. 65 Jones's summary-translation is so concise and the titles of each part so descriptive that only the titles will be given. The commentary will not be described because it simply explains the points in the summary-translation. The titles are as follows: "The Introduction" (a magistrate's four duties upon someone's death), "On Impediments to Succession," "On the Doctrine of Shares, and the Persons Entitled to Them," "On Women," "OnResiduaries," "On Exclusion," "On the Divisors of Shares," "On the Increase," "On the Equality, Proportion, Agreement, and Diference of Two Numbers," "On Arrangement," "Section," "On the Division of the Property Left Among Heirs and Among Creditors," "On Subtraction," "On the Return," "On the Division of the Paternal Grandfather," "On Succession to Vested Interests," "On Distant Kindred," "On the First Class," "A Section," "On the Second Class," "On the Third Class," "On the Fourth Class," "On Their Children, and the Rules Concerning Them," "On Hermaphrodites," "On Pregnancy," "On a Lost Person," "On an Apostate," "On a Captive," and "On Persons Drowned, or Burned, or Overwhelmed in Ruin." Thus Jones brought his writings on Mohammedan property laws to a conclusion, A1 Sirajiyyah being so excellent that there was no particular need for later efforts in the same field. 66 in 1946 it was still the basis for all judicial interpretation of this branch of the law in lndia.67 it was recognized as the work of a finished scholar who was 64. Memoirs, p. 340.

65. Vesey-FitzGerald, op. cit., p. 814. 66. Loc. cit. 67. Loc. cit. 67

master of his subject.,68 Today Jones's reputation as a jurist rests chiefly on works such as A1 Sirajiyyah and the impetus which they gave to exact scholarship in the field. 69 REMAINING POETRY Nine Hymns

Jones wrote nine Hymns between 1783 and 1794, publishing the first six in the Asiatic Miscellany of 1785. Later, all nine were included with their prose arguments in the editions of Jones's poetry of 1810, 1816, and 1818. They were also included in Chalmers, XVm, 473-91, and in Works, VI, 313-92. Since Jones was not translating, but composing, he admittedly took subject matter and sometimes meter from such diverse sources as Indian mythology and religion, Plato, Pindar, the Bible, Milton, Pope, and Gray. Thus any poetic value in the Hymns belongs strictly to Jones. The Hymns to Durga (Works, VI, 317-32) and Bhavani (333-35), Jones says, use the measures of the first and second Nemean Odes, while the subject matter of the former Hymn comes from Kalidasa's Kumara Sambhava. Durga (the Indian Isis, meaning "of difficult access"), after paying no tribute to love, is finally reconciled with Siva, her lover, in a mystic wood. The second Hymn honors Bhavani (another character of the Indian Isis, meaning "power of fecundity"), who, Jones says, has such mild, mysterious power that even river-dragons feel their iron bosoms melt with passion. (It is clear that in the "Hymn to Bhavani," as well as in some of the other Hymns, Jones is using what eighteenthcentury Englishmen called an "Oriental richness of style.") In "A Hymn to Surya" (345-54) Jones pays tribute to the sun god, using many of his nearly fifty Sanskrit names. Jones himself Draws orient knowledge from its fountains pure, Through caves obstructed long, and paths too long obscure.

In "A Hymn to Sarasvati" (375-82) Jones dramatizes the "wond'rous arts" of the Hindu Minerva Musica. Some 68. A. S. Tritton, "The Student of Arabic," p. 698. 69. Vesey-FitzGerald, op. cit., p. 813.

68

of them are her inventions of the "sev'n sprightly notes" (the Necklace of Musical Modes) and the sciences. In "A Hymn to Ganga" (383-92) Jones admits that he uses a stanza form borrowed partly from Gray. He describes Ganga's fabulous birth, her loves, wanderings,- and nuptials with Brahma's son. In "A Hymn to Indra" (337-44), written early in 1785, Jones uses the same stanza form he used in "A Hymn to Ganga," "but with variations, on a principle entirely new in modern lyrick poetry" (338). In a vision the poet sees Indra (king of Immortals) and his "empyreal t r a i n . . . mounted on the sun's bright beam," and he sings of Indra's wonders. (Shelley later used the "Champak" odors derived from the Hymn for his "Indian Serenade. "70) Critics, eighteenth-century and modern, agree that "A Hymn to Kamdeo" (313-16), written in 1787, is excellent poetry. Jones says that it was the only correct specimen of Hindu mythology that had yet appeared in general translations.71 In the prose argument he praises the strikingly new and beautiful allegories of the Indian Cupid. In the Hymn Jones describes Kamdeo's bow of sugar cane or flowers, with its string of bees, and his five arrows that are pointed with Indian blossoms of a heating quality. Jones also describes Kamdeo's attempt to wound Mahadeo, for which he was reduced to a mental essence. (Shelley's "planet-crested shape" of Love with "the lightning braided pinions" in Prometheus Unbound is much like Jones's "starrycrown'd"' Kamdeo with "locks in braids ethereal streaming. "72) "A Hymn to Lakshmi" (355-65), Jones asserts, allegorizes the gods prevailing in Indian religion in 1788 (356). He calls Lakshmi, the Goddess of Abundance and the preserving power of nature, the world's great mother. "A Hymn to Narayena" (367-73), written in 1794, is probably Jones's best-known Hymn. In the first stanza Jones describes the most divine attributes of the Supreme Being and His three clearest forms. In the second he describes the Indian and Egyptian doctrines of the Divine Essence and Archetypal Ideas. The third and fourth are 70. Pinto, "Sir William Jones and English Literature," p. 693. 71. Memoirs,

p. 245.

72. Pinto, op. cit., p. 693. 69

concerned with Manu and Vyasa. In the fifth Jones gives Narayena's chief epithets. In the last two Jones discusses the perception of primary and secondary qualities. (The form of the Hymn led Shelley to the style and measure of "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty."73 Jones's description of the remote, primeval deity may have been the inspiration for Keats's opening lines in Hyperion J 4) Jones admittedly composed the Hymns for amusement. Thus, as Teignmouth declared, Jones shows his taste and genius and supplies the reader with a fund of novel, curious information.75 i n the Hymns the poet stands out over the s c h o l a r . 7 6 The Hymns were highly praised by critics of the time, who called them Jones's best poems. Critics since 1794 have continued to praise them, though Jones today is considered a very minor poet. Pinto in 1946 said that these nine odes were probably the most successful of their kind in England between Gray and Wordsworth.77 However, in 1948 the Indian scholar Chatterji called them mere exerc i s e s . 78 A c r i t i c in t h e Cambridge History of English

Literature

says that the Hymns are aflame with enthusiasm and knowledge, though they might not be of the highest order of poetry.79 Inasmuch as Jones was first and foremost in the movement to make interesting Oriental works known in late eighteenth-century Europe, his translations - - and Hymns — were read by most literary men of the time.80 His possible influence on Keats has been noted in "A Hymn toNarayena." But Jones, through his Hymns, exerted by far his greatest influence on Shelley. Pinto says that there is little doubt that Shelley's transition from his early atheistic materialism to the mystical pantheism of his mature works was largely due to a study of Jones's writings.8l 73. Hewitt, "Harmonious Jones," p. 57. 74. Sir H. Sharp, "Anglo-Indian Verse," p. 100. 75. Memoirs, p. 266. 76. Gowen, op. cit., p. 532. 77. Pinto, op. cit., p. 692. 78. S. K. Chatterji, "Sir William Jones: 1746-1794," p. 85. 79. XIV, 334. 80. Meester, Oriental Influences in the English Literature of the Early Nineteenth Century, p. 10. 81. Pinto, op. cit., p. 694.

70

Persian Poems

"On Parent Knees," a literal translation from the Persian in 1784, has been praised so highly that it is proper to include it here. On parent knees, a naked, new-born child Weeping thou sat'st, while all around thee smil'd: So live, that, sinking in thy last long sleep, Calm thou may'st smile, when all around thee weep.

In Qie Cambridge History of English Literature the quatrain is called a fixture in literary history, a truly literary v e r s e . 82 It is printed in The Oxford Book of Eighteenth Century English Verse

(p.

545), The Oxford Book of English Verse (p. 554), Cyclopaedia (p. 616), Claude Field's Dictionary of Oriental Quotations, a n d Memoirs (p. 266). Laili Majnun, a Persian Poem of Hatifi (Jones's preface only is in Works, VI, 433-40) was, according to Jones, the

Chambers'

most correct Persian version of the story that had been published by 1788. Though incomplete, the version was allegedly an accurate impression of the Persian manuscript that Jones possessed. In the preface he gives his two principal objects (the manuscript would be made available to most people, and the proceeds from his edition would go "in trust for the miserable persons under execution for debt in Calcutta"), his comments on the story and author, two translations of a verse (one in the original measure and one with a bare transposition of accents, both versions of which are in Chalmers, p. 461), and the statement that he would never again edit or translate any Persian book. "A Song from the Persian" (Chalmers, p. 501, and Memoirs, pp. 519f.) consists of six verses of two couplets each, in what Jones says is the Persian form and measure. "An Ode of Jami" (Chalmers, p. 465, and Memoirs, p. 519) is a rambling love-lay. (It was the first English specimen of the "ghazel," a Persian ode of from five to fifteen couplets. 83) Miscellaneous poems

"The First Nemean Ode" (Works, VI, 393-97) was written about 1785. Jones says that it is as close as possible to the original 82. XI, 180. 83. Hewitt, op. cit., p. 53.

71

measure and diction in order to show the style and manner of Pindar, whose measure Jones used in his Hymns to Durga and Bhavani. "Song" (Chalmers, p. 502, and Memoirs, pp. 526f.) is a twenty-four line poem on the coming of spring. "Plassey-Plain" (Chalmers, p. 501, and Memoirs, pp. 521-23) is a ballad that Jones addressed to his wife on August 3, 1784, after she had been exposed to an unnamed danger on an evening walk. INEDITED LETTERS "Thirteen Inedited Letters from Sir William Jones to Mr. Charles Wilkins"84 contains ten letters that Jones wrote in 1784-85 and three that he wrote in 1787, 1789, and 1793. He says in the fourth that "life is too short and my necessary business too long for me to think at my age of acquiring a new language" (Sanskrit). He mentions several of his Hymns. In the thirteenth letter he says that Lady Jones has planned to leave for Europe in 1793 and that he will follow her as soon as he finishes his digest of Indian laws, probably in two or three years. 84. These letters are printed in American Oriented Society, 1872, 10:

110-17.

72

APPENDIX

EDITION-PRINTING INDEX Since most of Jones's writings were published in but one edition and subsequently in Works, copies of the individual writings are relatively scarce today. This index, therefore, includes only the compiled Works and the important writings which went through several editions or printings. Information as to library locations was obtained from the Union Catalog Service of the Library of Congress, library indexes, and individual libraries. Information as to editions and printings came chiefly from the Library of Congress Catalog oi Printed Cards, British Museum Catalogue oi Printed Books, and the Catalogue General des Livres Imprimes de la Bibliotheque

Nationals, though some information also came from the various supplements and subject-author catalogues of the Library of Congress; additional information also came from personal examination of editions of individual writings.

The Works of Sir William Jones

1. London: G. G. and J. Robinson, 1799. 6 vols. Edited by Anna Maria Jones. Two supplementary volumes published in 1801 contain the f i r s t five volumes of Asiatic Researches , minus those writings already in Wor/cs. Copies at: American Oriental Society (Yale University), Bibliotheque Nationale (minus the supplements), British Museum (two copies), Emory University Library, Harvard University Library, Huntington Library (San Marino), Library of Congress, Library of the Linnean Society (London) (minus the supplements), Northwestern University Library, University of Hawaii Library, University of Texas Library, Yale University Library. 75

2. London: J. Stockdale, 1807. 13 vols. Another edition, with all of Jones's writings f r o m the 1799 edition and Memoirs included h e r e . Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, Cleveland Public Library, Harvard University L i b r a r y , Union Theological Seminary (New York), U. S. Military Academy L i b r a r y , University of Illinois L i b r a r y , University of Texas Library. Memoirs of the Life, Writings and Correspondence of Sir William Jones. Lord Teignmouth. 1. London: J. Hatchard, 1804. 531 pp. Copies at: British Museum (two copies), Harvard University L i b r a r y , Library of Congress, Oberlin College L i b r a r y , University of South Carolina L i b r a r y . 2. Philadelphia: Wm. Poyntell and Company, 1805. 419 pp. F r o m the Classic P r e s s . No appendix and index to J o n e s ' s correspondence. Copies at: American Antiquarian Society (Worcester, Mass.), Boston Public L i b r a r y , British Museum (two copies), Harvard University L i b r a r y , Library of Congress, Ohio State University Library, Princeton University L i b r a r y , Stanford University Library, Union Theological Seminary, University of Hawaii L i b r a r y , University of Pennsylvania Library. 3. London: J. Brettell, 1806. 2 vols. Copies at: British Museum, Library of Congress, Peabody Institute (Baltimore), U.S. Department of State Library, University of Texas Library. 4. London: John Hatchard, 1806. 531 pp., 122 pp. appendix. Second edition. Includes index to correspondence. P r e f a c e has footnote on Captain Wilford's essay. Almost identical with f i r s t edition otherwise. (This edition is used for all r e f e r e n c e s to Memoirs in this book.) Copies at: American Oriental Society (Yale University), British Museum, Library of Congress, Peabody Institute, Public Library of Cleveland, University of Hawaii L i b r a r y , University of Rochester Library, Yale University Library. 5. London: J. Hatchard, 1807. New edition. 636 pp., p o r t r a i t and facsimile. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, British Museum, 76

Library of Congress, New York City Public Library, Princeton University Library, Western Reserve University Library. 6. London: J. Hatchard, 1815. Sixth edition. 636 pp. Copies at: British Museum, Harvard Medical School Library, Newberry Library (Chicago), New York City Public Library, Union Theological Seminary Library. 7. London: J. W. Parker, 1835. 2 vols. With the life of Lord Teignmouth, selections from Jones's work, and occasional notes by S. C. Wilks. Copies at: British Museum, Newberry Library, New York City Public Library, Princeton University Library. An Essay on the Law of Bailments

1. London: C. Dilly, 1781. 131 pp. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, British Museum (four copies), Hunterian Museum (University of Glasgow), New York City Public Library, Yale University Library. 2. Dublin: printed by Graisberry and Campbell for H. Watts, 1790. 100 pp. 10 pp. appendix. Copies at: Harvard University Library, Library of Congress. 3. Boston: press of Samuel Etheridge for John West, 1796. 178 pp. Copies at: American Antiquarian Society, Boston Public Library, Bowdoin College Library, Duke University Library, Harvard Law School Library, Library of Congress, Western Reserve University Library, William L. Clements Library of American History (University of Michigan). 4. London: printed by A. Strahan for C. Dilly, 1798. Second edition. 123 pp. (i.e., 217). With introductory r e marks and notes, comprising the most modern authorities, by John Balmanno. Copies at: British Museum, Library of Congress. 5. Philadelphia: reprinted for P. Byrne, 1804. 123 pp. (i.e., 217). From the second London edition. Copies at: Boston Public Library, Cornell University Library, Duke University Library, Library of Congress, Yale University Library. 6. Albany: Backus and Whiting, 1806. 132 pp. (i.e., 144). From last London edition. Copies at: Arkansas University Library, Boston Pub77

lie Library, Burton Historical Collection, Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit Public Library), Duke University Library, Harvard Law School Library, Huntington Library, Library of Congress, University of Missouri Library, Western Reserve Historical Society (Cleveland). 7. Brattleboro, Vermont: William Fessenden, 1807. 144 pp. From last London edition by Balmanno. Copies at: American Antiquarian Society, Biddle Law Library (University of Pennsylvania), British Museum, Library of Congress, New York City Public Library, University of Illinois Library, Yale University Library. 8. Brattleborough: W. Fessenden, 1813. 144 pp. From last London edition by Balmanno. Copies at: American Antiquarian Society, Duke University Library, Library of Congress, Massachusetts Historical Society (Boston), Rutgers University Library, University of Pennsylvania Library, Vermont State Library (Montpelier). 9. London: printed for the Associated Law Booksellers and sold by S. Sweet, 1823. Third edition. 123 pp. (i.e., 207). With notes and references on carriers, innkeepers, warehousemen, and other bailees, by William Nichols. Copy at: Library of Congress. 10. New York: O. Halsted, 1828. 123 pp. (i.e., 222). From third London edition. With notes and references by William Nichols and additional notes and references to American decisions, by William Halsted, Jr. Copies at: Library of Congress, Ohio Wesleyan University Library, Stanford University Law Library, University of Texas Library. 11. London: S. Sweet, 1833. Fourth edition. 123 pp. With notes on the law relating to carriers, innkeepers, warehousemen, and other bailees, and an essay on the law of coach proprietors and carriers, by William Theobald. Copies at: Harvard University Library, Library of Congress, Stanford University Law Library. 12. Philadelphia: Hogan and Thompson, 1836. 126 pp. From the last London edition, with notes and an appendix. Copies at: Duke University Library, Library of Congress, Princeton University Library, University of Texas Library. 78

A Grammar of the Persian Language

1. London: W. A. J. Richardson, 1771. 153 pp. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, British Museum, University of Michigan Library, Yale University Library. 2. London: Richardson, 1785. Second edition. 148 PPCopy at: Public Library of Cleveland. 3. London: J. Murray, 1783. Third edition. 152 pp. With an index. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, Princeton University Library, Yale University Library. 4. London: 1797. Fourth edition. With index by J. Richardson. Copy at: British Museum. 5. London: J. Murray and S. Highley, 1801. Fifth edition. 147 pp. Copies at: Boston Public Library, Harvard University Library, Hebrew Union College Library (Cincinnati), Princeton University Library, Public Library of Cleveland, Tufts College Library, Yale University Library. 6. London: Lackington, Allen, and Company. 1804. Sixth edition. 198 pp. With additions by Dr. Charles Wilkins. Copy at: British Museum. 7. London: printed by W. Bulmer and Company for Lackington, Allen, and Company, 1809. Seventh edition. 198 pp. With additions and alleged improvements. Copies at: Boston Public Library, British Museum, Hebrew Union College Library, Library of Congress, Yale University Library. 8. London: W. Nicol, 1823. Eighth edition. 212 pp. With additions by Samuel Lee. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, Boston Public Library, British Museum (two copies), Georgia Historical Society (Savannah), Harvard University Library, Library of Congress, Library of the Royal Asiatic Society (London), New York City Public Library, University of Michigan Library, Yale University Library. 9. London: printed by W. Nicol for Parbury, Allen, and Company, 1828. Ninth edition. 283 pp. With additions and alleged improvements, and specimens of Persian and Arabic hand writing by Reverend Samuel Lee. Copies at: Boston Public Library, British Museum, 79

Library of Congress, Library of the Royal Asiatic Society, Miami University Library (Oxford, Ohio), New York City Public Library, Yale University Library. 10. Londres: T. Cadell, 1772. 161 pp. Traduite de l'anglois de Jones, revue et corrigée par l'auteur. Copies at: Bibliothèque Nationale, British Museum. 11. Paris: Impr. Royale, 1845. Seconde edition française. 129 pp. Revue, corrigée et augmentee, par M. Garcin de Tassy. Copies at: Bibliothèque Nationale, British Museum. Collected Poems 1. Poems, Consisting Chiefly of Translations from the Asiatick Languages. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1772. 217 pp.

Copies at: Boston Public Library, British Museum, Harvard University Library, Princeton University Library, Public Library of Cleveland, University of Chicago Library, University of Illinois Library, University of Michigan Library, University of Wisconsin Library, Yale University Library. 2. Poems, atick Languages.

Consisting Chiefly oi Translations

from the Asi-

London: W. Bowyer and J. Nichols, 1777. 217 pp. With the addition of Jones's two

Second edition. essays on poetry. Copies at: Bibliothèque Nationale, British Museum (three copies), Lehigh University Library, Mulla Feroze Library (Bombay), Newberry Library (Chicago), Public Library of Cleveland, University of Illinois Library, University of North Carolina Library. 3. The Poetical Works of Sir William Jones. London: J. Sharpe, 1808. 2 vols, in 1. Collated with the best editions, by Thomas Park, in The Works of the British Poets. Copies at: British Museum, Library of Congress, Public Library of Cleveland. 4. The Poetical Works of Sir William jones. London: 1810. 2 vols. Poems of 1772 reprinted, with additions of the plan of the epic poem Britain Discovered and Jones's critical essays and Teignmouth's life of Jones, as well as all nine Hymns. Copies at: Boston Public Library, British Museum, Duke University Library, Harvard University Library, 80

Public Library of Cleveland, University of Illinois Library, Yale University Library. 5. "The Poems of Sir William Jones," in Chalmers, The Works of the English Poets.

VIE, 425-511.

London: C.

Whittingham, 1810. Almost a complete collection of Jones's poems. Copies at: British Museum, Library of Congress, Stanford University Library, University of Hawaii Library, University of Texas Library. 6.

The Poetical Works oi Sir William Jones .1816.

Poetical

Works of 1810 reprinted in one volume.

7. The Poetical Works oi Sir William Jones. London: Sut-

taby, Evance, and Fox, 1818.

271 pp.

Poetical Works of

1810 reprinted. Copy at: Stanford University Library.

8. Author .

Select Poems of Sir William Jones: with a Life of the In The Works of the British Poets, XXXV. P h i l a -

delphia: 1819-1823. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, British Museum. 9.

The Poems of Sir William Jones.

In The British Poets

LXXIV. Chiswick: C. Whittingham, 1822. Copies at: Bibliotheque Nationale, British Museum. Dialogue on the Principles of Government 1.

The Principles of Government, in a Dialogue between a

Scholar and a Peasant. London:

1782.

7 pp. Written by a

member of the Society for Constitutional Information. A free pamphlet. Copies at: British Museum, Library of Congress, Western Reserve Historical Society. 2.

The Principles of Government; in a Dialogue between a

Scholar and a Peasant. London: Society for Constitutional Information, 1783. 8 pp. Written by Sir William Jones, a member of the Society. Copies at: Library of Congress, Newberry Library (n.p., 1780). 3.

The Principles oi Government, in a Dialogue between a

Gentleman and a Farmer. Norwich: J. March, 1797. Secoi/d edition. 65 pp. Much enlarged, with notes and historical elucidations by T. S. Norgate. Notes and elucidations cover pp. 17-65. 81

Copies at: British Museum, John Crerar Library (Chicago), Library of Congress. 4. The Principles of Government, in a Dialogue between

* Gentleman and a Peasant. London: 1800. Another edition. Copies at: British Museum (two copies). 5. The Principles of Government, in a Dialogue

between

a Gentleman and a Peasant. London: 1818. Another edition. 8 pp. Copies at: British Museum, Princeton University Library, Yale University Library.

82

BIBLIOGRAPHY PUBLISHED 1800 TO 1849 Asiatic Annual Register for 1799. London: The Oriental P r e s s

at Wild Court, 1800. "Characters," pp. 57-64 ("Sketch of the Life and Character of Sir William Jones"), "Miscellaneous Tracts," pp. 166-70 ("An Extract from a Dissertation on the Primitive Religion of the Hindus"), and " T h e Works of Sir William Jones," pp. 209-24.

Cary, Henry Francis. "Sir William Jones," London Magazine, 4: 626-38 (December, 1821). "Life of Sir William Jones," Port Folio and New York

Monthly Magazine, 1: 444-57 (January, 1822). A reprint of Cary's "Sir William Jones," in the London Magazine. Lives of English Poets.

London:

H. G. Bohn, 1846.

The chapter on Jones is taken from Cary's "Sir William Jones." J e f f r e y , F r a n c i s . "Memoirs of the Life, Writings, and Correspondence oi SirWilliam Jones," Edinburgh Magazine, 5:329-46

(January, 1805).

"Poems of Sir William Jones," Southern Literary Messenger, 15: 724-26 (December, 1849). Prinsep, H. T. "On the Adaptation of the Roman Alphabet to the Orthography of Oriental Languages," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 3: 281-88 (June, 1834).

"Sir William Jones," Penny Magazine, 8: 121-23 1839). 83

(April,

Teignmouth, Lord (John Shore). Memoirs of the Life, Writings and Correspondence of Sir William Jones.

Hatchard, 1806. 531 pp.

London: John

"Teignmouth'S Memoirs," Christian Observer, 3: 621-29, 693-

707 (October/November, 1804).

Trevelyan, C. C. "Defence of Sir William Jones' System of Oriental Orthography," Journal of the Asiatic Society of

Bengal, 3: 413-17 (August, 1834). Walker, T.

"A Lecture on the Character and Writings of

Sir William J o n e s , " Illinois Monthly Magazine, 2: 550-67

(September, 1832).

PUBLISHED 1850 TO 1934 Allibone's Dictionary of Authors.

Philadelphia:

cott Company, 1886-98. Vol. I.

J. B. Lippin-

Bayley, A. R. "Sir William Jones and the Representation of Oxford University in Parliament," Notes and Queries, 2: 3f. (July 2, 1910). Beveridge, H. "Sir William Jones's 'On Parent Knees' Quatrain," Notes and Queries , 6: 21f. (July 3, 1912). Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford Press, 1921-22. Vol. X. Eminent Orientalists.

Madras:

University

G. A. Natesan, 1922. 378 pp.

Essays in honor of Max Muller.

Gray, Annabel. "Sir William Jones," Tinsleys' Magazine, 39: 280-85 (July, 1886). Hatfield, J. T. "To an'Albumblatt' of Uhland," Modern Language Notes, 49: 301f. (May, 1934).

Schaeffer, Aaron. "Eugene Manuel Uhland and Sir William Jones,"Modern Language Notes, 49: 562 (December, 1934).

84

PUBLISHED 1935 TO 1948 Arberry, Arthur John. Asiatic Jones: The Lite and Influence of Sir William Jones (1746-1794). London: Longmans, Green, and Company, Ltd., 1946. 40 pp. "Persian Jones," Asiatic Review, 40: 186-96 (April, 1944). Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, XI. 4 (1946).

Arberry, Arthur John. "New Light on Sir William Jones," pp. 673-85. "Orient Pearls at Random Strung," pp. 699-712. Master, Alfred. "The Influence of Sir William Jones upon Sanskrit Studies," pp. 798-806. Pinto, V. De Sola. "Sir William Jones and English Literature," pp. 686-94. Powell, L. F. "Sir William Jones and The Club," pp. 818-22.

Stewart, J. A. "Sir William Jones' Revision of the Text of Two Poems of Anacreon," pp. 669-72. Tritton, A. S. "The Student of Arabic," pp. 695-98. Vesey-FitzGerald, S. C. "Sir William Jones, the Jurist," pp. 807-17. Waley, A. D. "Sir William Jones as Sinologue," p. 842. Edgerton, Franklin.

"Sir William Jones:

1746-1794,"

American Oriental Society, 66.3: 230-39 (July, 1946).

Fan, T. C.

"William Jones' Chinese Studies," Review of

English Studies, 22: 304-14 (October, 1946).

Hewitt, R. M.

"Harmonious Jones," Essays and Studies by Members of the English Association, 28: 42-59 (1942).

150thi Jubilee of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal (1784-1934) and the Bicentenary of Sir William Jones (1746-1946). Cal-

cutta: Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1946. 28 pp.

Proceedings of the Sir William Jones Bicentenary Conference (Uni-

versity College, Oxford, September 2-6, 1946). London: Royal India Society, 1946. 63 pp. 85

Sir William Jones-. Bicentenary of His Birth Commemoration

Vol-

ume,1746-1946. Calcutta: Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1948. 173 pp.

Chatterji, Suniti Kumar. "Sir William Jones: 17461794," pp. 81-96. Chattopadhyay, Kshetresachandra. "The Sakuntala Problem," p. 167. Das Gupta, R. K. "Sir William Jones as a Poet," pp. 162-66.

Ray, Satyendra Nath. "Sir William Jones's Poetry," pp. 152-57. Sen, Priyaranjan. "Sir William Jones," pp. 158-61. SUPPLEMENTARY BIBLIOGRAPHY The essays and books listed below have also been checked in connection with the preparation of this book. None of them devotes an exclusive section or an entire essay or chapter to a consideration of Jones, unlike the entries in the Bibliography; therefore, each is listed separately here. Some of them contain interesting anecdotes and allusions. Arberry, Arthur John. British Orientalists. London: William Collins, 1943. 47 pp. Has a good chronological index of British Orientalists. Browne, Edward G. A Literary History of Persia. Cambridge,

England: University Press, 1929. 4 vols.

Cambridge History of English Literature, The.

London: XIV.

Chambers.

New

York

and

G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1907-17. Vols. XI, XH, Cyclopaedia of English Literature.

Philadelphia

and London: W. and R. Chambers, Ltd., 1902.

Clark, Blake. Oriental England. Shanghai: Kelly and Walsh, Ltd., 1939. 200 pp. Collins, J . C. "The Works of Lord Byron," The Quarterly Re-

view, 202: 429-57 (April, 1905). 86

" D a v i d H o f f m a n ' s A Course of Legal Study," North American Re-

view, 6: 45-77 (November, 1817).

"David H o f f m a n ' s A Lecture, Being the Ninth of a Series of Lectures," North American Review, 36: 395-418 (April, 1833). "Dissertations on Early Law and Custom by Sir Henry Maine and Asiatic Studies by Sir A l f r e d L y a l l , " Edinburgh Review,

158: 333-54 (October, 1883).

E v e r e t t , John.

"Le Trone Enchante," North American Review,

12: 365-71 (April, 1821).

Go wen, H e r b e r t H. A History of Indian Literature.

New York

and London: D. Appleton and Company, 1931. 593 pp.

Hill, G. B. Johnsonian Miscellanies. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1897. 2 vols. Mantz, Harold.

"Non-Dramatic Pastoral in Europe in the

Eighteenth C e n t u r y , " Publications of the Modern Language

Association of America, 16: 421-47 (1916).

" M a x M u l l e r ' s Lectures on the Science of Language," The Quar-

terly Review, 119: 394-435 (April, 1866).

M e e s t e r , M a r i e E. de. Oriental Influences in the English Literature of the Early Nineteenth Century. University of Heid-

elberg: 1915. 80 pp.

"Monier Williams's Translation of Sakoontala," Edinburgh Review, 108: 253-70 (July, 1858). Muller, F r i e d r i c h Max. Chips from a German Workshop.

York: Scribner, 1902-1910. Vols. I, H, IV, V.

New

"Sacontala," Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine 6: 417-30 (Jan-

uary, 1820). Schlegel, F r e d e r i c k von. Lectures on the History of Language.

London: G. B. and Sons, 1885. 420 pp. of Schlegel's Lectures of 1812.

A translation 87

Sharp, Sir H. "Anglo-Indian V e r s e , "

16: 93-116 (1937).

Essays by Divers Hands,

"Sir James Mackintosh," North American Review, 35: 43372 (October, 1832). "Strictures on the Present Government, Civil, Military and Political, of the British Possessions in India," Edinburgh Review, 16:

127-57 (April, 1810).

PRODUCTION NOTE The roman text for this book has been composed in 14 pt. Bookface on an IBM proportionalspacing typewriter by the University of Hawaii Press. Italics have been set in 12 pt. Linotype Bookman and the display type in various sizes of Garamond by the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Ltd., Honolulu. Quoted matter, footnotes, and superior numbers have been typed in 14 pt. Bookface and, with Bookman italics pasted in, reduced 17% before being made up into pages by the University of Hawaii Press. Pages have been reduced 20% and reproduced by offset lithography on substance 60 Hammermill Offset, white wove; the cover has been reproduced by offset lithography on International Paper Co. Ticonderoga Text coverweight, india laid. Reproduction and binding have been done by the Advertiser Publishing Co., Ltd., Honolulu, Hawaii. The book was designed by William S. Ellis, Jr. 88

Sharp, Sir H. "Anglo-Indian V e r s e , "

16: 93-116 (1937).

Essays by Divers Hands,

"Sir James Mackintosh," North American Review, 35: 43372 (October, 1832). "Strictures on the Present Government, Civil, Military and Political, of the British Possessions in India," Edinburgh Review, 16:

127-57 (April, 1810).

PRODUCTION NOTE The roman text for this book has been composed in 14 pt. Bookface on an IBM proportionalspacing typewriter by the University of Hawaii Press. Italics have been set in 12 pt. Linotype Bookman and the display type in various sizes of Garamond by the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Ltd., Honolulu. Quoted matter, footnotes, and superior numbers have been typed in 14 pt. Bookface and, with Bookman italics pasted in, reduced 17% before being made up into pages by the University of Hawaii Press. Pages have been reduced 20% and reproduced by offset lithography on substance 60 Hammermill Offset, white wove; the cover has been reproduced by offset lithography on International Paper Co. Ticonderoga Text coverweight, india laid. Reproduction and binding have been done by the Advertiser Publishing Co., Ltd., Honolulu, Hawaii. The book was designed by William S. Ellis, Jr. 88