GENTO O LAWS, O R, ORDINATIONS OF -THE PUNDITS . F R 0 M A PERSIAN TRANSLATION, MADE FROM THE ORIGINAL, WRITTEN IN THE SHANSCRIT LANGUAGE. ✓ H ov+hcvntel HovlUed LONDON: PjinsD m the. Year m.dcc.lxxx*. >. ; , i- ,/ci" •, , • - O T . ■ } v * . ■ C •; t ' : • ' J 5a / bi }*(•<: • * » *''■ t- • ' ! \ C '/,*>'•'■ H . f\ tf • ■ • • 'A. *' A Al.v. * - f (/ . # t Hi 3 ■ — ■ — — 1 LETTER FROM WARREN HASTINGS, Escu Governor-General of Fort-William in Bengal . TO THE COURT of DIRECTORS OF THE i' United Company of Merchants of England > trading to the East-Indies. H ONOURABLE SlRS, I HAVE now the fatisfa&ion to tran fruit to you a complete arid corre&ed copy of a Translation of the Gen too Code, executed with great ability, di- ligence, and fidelity, by Mr. Halted, from a Perfian verfion of the original Shanfcrit, which was undertaken under the immediate infpe&ion of the Pundits or com- pilers of this work. I have not time to offer any obfervations upon thefe productions ; indeed they will bell fpeak for themfelves : I could have wifhed to have obtained an omiflion of a 2 amendment t It 3 amendment of fome paffages, to have rendered them more fit for the public eye ; but the Pundits, when de- fired to revife them, could not be prevailed upon to make any alterations, as they declared they had the fan&ion of their Shader, and were therefore incapable of amendments ; poffibly thefe may be confidered as ef- fential parts of the work, fince they mark the principles on which many of the laws were formed, and bear the {lamp of a very remote antiquity, in which the refine- ments of fociety were lefs known, and the manners more influenced by the natural impulfe of the pallions, I have the honour to be, with the greateft refpett, Honourable Sirs, Your moil obedient. And mofl faithful humble fervant, Fort-William, 27 A March, 1775?, Warren Haftings. LETTER t v ] LETTER To the CHAIRMAN of the Court of Directors of the United Ea ft- India Com- pany, dated at Calcutta, 6th Auguft, 1775. SIR, ' I HAVE too long ferved under Mr, Ha/lings not to be convinced, that he would never have fufFered the accompanying addrefs to go home in his inclolure ; re- duced therefore to the neceffity of eluding his know- ledge, I have taken the liberty, by this only poflible method, to exprefs my gratitude for his favours : and the peculiar circumftances of the cafe will, I hope, apo- logise to you. Sir, for the abruptnefs of this intrufion, — * I humbly requeft, that when the Code of Gen roo Laws, Preliminary Treatise, &c. fhall come to be printed, you will alfo be pleafed to permit the pub- lication of this addrefs. I am, with the greatefi: refpeft, S I R, Tour mojl obedient humble fervant , Nathaniel BraJJey Halhed. TO [ Vi ] TO THE Hon. WARREN HASTINGS, Esq. GOVERNOR-GENERAL O F T H E Britifh Settlements in the Eaft-Indies, &c. &c. Honourable Sir, B Y the publication of the colleftiort of Gentoo Laws, made under your immediate authority,* I find myfelf involuntarily held forth to the public as an author, almoft as foon as 1 have commenced to be a man. It is therefore with fome propriety that I claim to this work the continuation of your patronage, which as it at firft felected me from a number of more wor. thy competitors to undertake the talk, fo it has, by conftant affiftance and encouragement, been the entire inftrument of its completion. — Indeed, if all the lights, which at different periods have been thrown upon this fubjeft, by your happy fuggeftions, had been with- held, there would have remained for my {hare of the performance nothing but a mafs of obfcurity and con- fufion ; fo that, in your own right, the whole refult of the [ vii ] the execution is yours, as well as the entire merit of the original plan. It is my earned wifli that you may long be th^ prime adminiftrator of an eftablifhment, to which you have fo excellently paved the way ; as I am fure your extenfive general knowledge, joined to your particular experience in the affairs of India , give you advantages which can fcarcely fall to the fhare of any other fubjedt of the Britijh empire. I am, with the greateff refpect and gratitude. Honourable Sir, 1 'our mojl obliged , and mojl obedient fervant , Nathaniel Brajfey Halhed . [ * •y' , '■ rt i;,y/ * ' ' j ?. , v * • i v *• > i"i; ' If’ f ! t It)*'' ft ■' »• '• ; ' 21 a 'i, - ■ *• r\ * r- 'A. * / [ is ] THE TRANSLATOR’S PREFACE. T HE importance of the commerce of India, and the advantages of a territorial eflablifinnent in Bengal, have at length awakened the attention of the Britifh legiflature to every circumflance that may con- ciliate the affections of the natives, or enfure (lability to the acquifition. Nothing can fo favourably con- duce to thefe two points as a well-timed toleration in matters of religion, and an adoption of fuch original inftitutes of the country, as do not immediately clafli with the laws or interefls of the conquerors. To a heady puviuance of this great maxim, much of the fuccefs of the Romans may be attributed, who not only allowed to their foreign fubjeets the free ex- ercife of their own religion, and the adminillration of their own civil jurifdidion, but fometimes, by a policy Rill more flattering, even naturalized fuch parts of the mythology of the conquered, as were in any refpeft compatible w’ith their own fyffem. With a view to the fame political advantages, and in obfervance of fo llriking an example, the following compilation was fet on foot ; which mud be confidered b as. I * } as the only work of the kind, wherein the genuine principles ot the Gentoo jurifprudence are made pub- lic, with the fanclion of their mod: refpe&able Pundits, (or lawyers), and which offers a complete confutation of the belief too common in Europe, that the Hin- doos have no written laws whatever, but fuch as re- late to the ceremonious peculiarities of their fuper- llition. The profeffors of the ordinances here colle&ed, {lilt fpeak the original language in which they were corn- poled, and which is entirely unknown to the bulk of the people, who have fettled upon thoie profeffors fe- veral great endowments and benefa&ions in all parts of Hindoitan, and pay them befides a degree of per- fonal refpect little (hort of idolatry, in return for the advantages fuppofed to be derived from their ftudies. A fet of the inoff experienced of thefe lawyers was fe- lefted from every part of Bengal for the purpofe of compiling the prefent work, which they picked out fentence by fentence from various originals in the Shanfcrit language, neither adding to, nor diminifhing any part of the antient text. The articles thus coliedt- ed were next tranflated literally into Perfian, unuer the infpection of one of their own body ; and from that tranflation were rendered into Englifli with an equal attention to the clofenefs and fidelity of the verfion. Lefs ftudious of elegance than of accuracy, the tran- flator thought it more excufable to tire the reader with the flatnefs of a literal interpretation, than to mifiea'd him by a vague and devious paraphrafe ; fo that the entire order of the book, the feveral divifions of its contents, and the whole turn of the phrafe* is in every part C xi ] part the immediate produtt of the Bramins. The Englifti dialed in which it is here offered to the public, and that only, is not the performance of a Gentoo. From hence therefore may be formed a precife idea of the cuftoms and manners of thefe people, which, to their great injury, have long been mifreprefented in the Weftern world, f rom hence alfo materials may be collected towards the legal accompli fitment of a new fyfletn of government in Bengal, wherein the Britifh laws may, in fome degree, be foftened and tempered by a moderate attention to the peculiar and national prejudices of the Hindoo ; fome of whofe inftitutes, however fanciful and injudicious, may perhaps be pre- ferable to any which could be fubflituted in their room. They are interwoven with the religion of the country, and are therefore revered as of the higheft authority ; they are the conditions by -which they hold their rank in fociety. Long ufage has perfuaded them of their equity, and they will always gladly embrace the per- miffion to obey them ; to be obliged to renounce their obedience wmuld probably be efleemed among them a real hardfhip. The attention which the tranflator was forced to be- flow' upon fo uncommon a fubject, the number of in- quiries neceffary for the elucidation of almofl every fentence, and the many opportunities of moft decifive information, which the courfe of the work prefented, give him in fome meafure a right to claim the convic- tion of the world upon many dubious points, which have long eluded the niceft inveftigation. He is very far from wifhing to eftablifh his own doctrines upon the ruins of thofe which he found already erected ; and b 2 when [ xii ] when he oppofes popular opinion, or contradicts any ill-grounded affertion, it 'is with the utmoft diftruft of his own abilities, and merely in fub million to the au- thority of that truth which the candid will ever be glad to fupport even in prejudice to a fyftem of their own formation. In a traCt fo untrodden as this, many paths mull be attempted before we can hit upon the right. We owe much to every perfon, who in fo troublcfome a road hath removed a fingle obftacle, or opened the fmalleft channel for difcovery; and the more difficult the com- pletion of the adventure, the greater is the merit of each attempt. The prefent work, however, is the only one of this nature ever undertaken by authority ; the only inftance, in which the Bramins have ever been perfuaded to give up a part of their own cpnfcquence for the general benefit of the whole community : and the pen of the tranflator muff be confidered as en~ tirely the paffive inftrument, by which the laws of this fingular nation are ufhered into the world from thofe Bramins theinfelves. In this preliminary treatife it is propofed, after a few general and introductory obfervations, to attempt a fhort account of the Shanfcrit language, and an expla- nation of fuch paflages in the body of the code, as may appear by their peculiarity or repugnance to our fenti-- jnents to lie moft open to objection. Many conjectural doCtrines have been circulated by the learned and ingenious of Europe upon the mytho- logy of the Gentoos ; and they have unanimoufiy en- deavoured to conftrue the extravagant fables with which £ xiii ] which it abounds into fublime and myftical fymbols of the mod refined morality. This mode of reafoning, however common, is not quite candid or equitable, becaufe it fets out with fuppofing in thofc people a de- ficiency of faith with refpeft to the authenticity of their own fcriptures, which, although our better in- formation may convince us to be altogether falfe and erroneous, yet are by them literally efteemed as the immediate revelations of the Almighty ; and the fame confidential reliance which we put in the divine text, upon the authority of its divine infpirer himfelf, is, by their miftaken prejudices, implicitly transferred to the Beids of the Shaffer. Hence we are not juftified in grounding the ftandard and criterion of our examina- tion of the Hindoo religion upon the known and in- fallible truth of our own ; becaufe the oppofite party would either deny the firlt principles of our argument, or infifl upon an equal right on their fide to fuppofe the veracity of their own fcriptures uncontrovertible. Ir may pofiibly be owing to this vanity of recon- ciling every other mode oi worfhip to feme kind of conformity with our own, that allegorical conduc- tions, and forced allufions to a myftic morality, have been conftantly foifted in upon the plain and literal context of every pagan mythology. But we fhould confider, that the inftitution of a religion has been in every country the firtl ftep towards an emerfion from favage barbarifm, and the eftablifhment of civil fociety ; that the human mind at that period, when reafon is juft beginning to dawn, and fcience is yet below the horizon, has by no means acquired that facility of in- vention, and thefe profound habits of thinking, which are [ xiv 3 are neccflary to ftrike out, to arrange, and to complete a conne&ed, confident chain of abltrufe allegory. The vulgar and illiterate have always underftood the mythology of their country in its mod fimple and li- teral fenfe ; and there was a time to every nation, ■when the highed rank in it was equally vulgar and illiterate with the lowed. Surely then, we have no right to fufpedt in them a greater propenfity to, or capability of the compofition of fuch fubtile myderies in thofe ages of ignorance, than we find to exid in their legitimate fucceffors, the modem vulgar and illi- terate at this day. W e have fecn frequent and unfuccefsful attempts among ourfelves to fublimate into allufive and fymbo- lical meanings the Mofaic account of the creation : fuch erratic fydems have rifen but to be exploded ; and their mutual difagreement with each other, in thefe fanciful interpretations, is to us an additional argument for the literal veracity of the infpired penman. The faith of a Gentoo, (mifguided as it is, and groundlefs as it may be), is equally implicit with that of a Chri- flian, and his allegiance to his own fuppofed revela- tions of the divine will altogether as firm. He there* fore efteems the adonifhing miracles attributed to a Brihma, a Rail m r or a Kifhen, as facts of the mod in- dubitable authenticity, and the relation of them as mod driflly hidorical. But not to interfere with fuch parts of the Hindoo mythology as have not been revealed or explained to him, the tranflator can pofitively affirm, that the doc- trine of the creation, as let forth in the prefatory dif- courfc C « 3 courfe to this code, is there delivered as fimple and plain matter of fa£t, and as a fundamental article in every pious Gentoo’s creed ; that it was l'o meant and underdood by the compilers of this work unaniinoufly, who bore the firft characters in Bengal, both for their natural and acquired abilities ; and that their accounts have been corroborated by the information of many other learned Bramins in the courfe of a wide and la- borious inquiry ; nor can it be otherwife, unlefs the progrefs of fcience, inftead of being flow and gradual, were quick and indantaneous ; unlefs men could dart up at once into divines and philofophers from the very cradle of civilization, or could deter the protedion of any religion at all, until progredive centuries had ripen- ed them into a fitnefs for the mod abdracted fpecula- tionSi Yet it may fairly be prefumed, that when the man- ners of a people become polilhed, and their ideas en- lightened, attempts will be made to revife and refit their religious creed into a conformity with the red of their improvements ; and that thofe doctrines, which the ig- norant ancedor received with reverence and conviction, as the literal expofition of undoubted fact, the philofo- phic defeendant will drive to glofs over by a pq/leriori conductions of his own ; and, in the fury of fyrnbol and allegory, obfeure and didort that text which the fimplicity of its author never fufpeCted as liable to the poflibility of fuch mutilation. — Thefe innovations, how. ever, have always been fereened, with the mod ferupu- lous attention, from the general view of mankind ; and rf a hardy fage hath at anytime ventured to remove the veil, his opinions have ufually been received with de- tedation. C svi ] legation, and his perfon hath frequently paid the forfeit of his temerity. The real intention and fubject of the Eleufinian my- fleries are now well known ; but it cannot, with much plaufibility, be pretended, that thofe mylteries were coeval with the mythology to whofe difproval they owed their eflablifhment : probably the inflitution was formed at a more advanced period of fcience, when the minds of the learned were eager to pierce through the obfcu- rity of fuperflition, and when the vanity of fuperior pe- netration made them afhamed literally to believe thofe tenets, which popular prejudice would not fuffer them utterly to renounce. Instances in fupport of this argument might per- haps, without a drain, be drawn even from fome parts of the Holy Scriptures : and here the account of the fcape-goat, in the laws of Mofes, offers itfelf for tha. purpofe with the greater propriety, as it is not altoget ther difiimilar to a particular inftitute of the Gentoos. The infpired author, after defcribing the preliminary ceremonies of this facrifice, proceeds thus : “ And Aaron fhall lay both his hands upon the head