Henry Buckley - History of Civilization in England, Vol. 1 of 3

‘The limit of life was vol. xvi. p. 456, Calcutta, 1828. 80,000 years.’ Asiatic Researches . This was likewise the estimate of the Tibetan divines, according to whom men formerly ‘parvenaient à l'âge de 80,000 ans.’ Journal Asiatique , I. série, vol. iii. p. 199, Paris, 1823.

‘Den Hindu macht dieser Widerspruch nicht verlegen, da er seine Heiligen 100,000 Jahre und länger leben lässt.’ Rhode , Relig. Bildung der Hindus , vol. i. p. 175.

In the Dabistan , vol. ii. p. 47, it is stated of the earliest inhabitants of the world, that ‘the duration of human life in this age extended to one hundred thousand common years.’

Wilford ( Asiatic Researches , vol. v. p. 242) says, ‘When the Puranics speak of the kings of ancient times, they are equally extravagant. According to them, King Yudhishthir reigned seven-and-twenty thousand years.’

‘For sixty thousand and sixty hundred years no other youthful monarch except Alarka reigned over the earth.’ Vishnu Purana , p. 408.

And sometimes more. In the Essay on Indian Chronology in Works of Sir W. Jones , vol. i. p. 325, we hear of ‘a conversation between Valmic and Vyasa, … two bards whose ages were separated by a period of 864,000 years.’ This passage is also in Asiatic Researches , vol. ii. p. 399.

‘He was the first king, first anchoret, and first saint; and is therefore entitled Prathama-Raja, Prathama Bhicshacara, Prathama Jina, and Prathama Tirthancara. At the time of his inauguration as king, his age was 2,000,000 years. He reigned 6,300,000 years, and then resigned his empire to his sons: and having employed 100,000 years in passing through the several stages of austerity and sanctity, departed from this world on the summit of a mountain named Ashtapada.’ Asiatic Researches , vol. ix. p. 305.

‘Speculationen über Zahlen sind dem Inder so geläufig, dass selbst die Sprache einen Ausdruck hat für eine Unität mit 63 Nullen, nämlich Asanke, eben weil die Berechnung der Weltperioden diese enorme Grössen nothwendig machte, denn jene einfachen 12,000 Jahre schienen einem Volke, welches so gerne die höchstmögliche Potenz auf seine Gottheit übertragen mögte, viel zu geringe zu seyn.’ Bohlen , das alte Indien , vol. ii. p. 298.

Elphinstone's History of India , p. 136, ‘a period exceeding 4,320,000 multiplied by six times seventy-one.’

Symes ( Embassy to Ava , vol. iii. p. 278) says: ‘From the mouth of the Ganges to Cape Comorin, the whole range of our continental territory, there is not a single harbour capable of affording shelter to a vessel of 500 tons burden.’ Indeed, according to Percival, there is with the exception of Bombay, no harbour, ‘either on the Coromandel or Malabar coasts, in which ships can moor in safety at all seasons of the year.’ Percival's Account of Ceylon , pp. 2, 15, 66.

‘Altogether its area is somewhat less than that of Portugal.’ Grote's History of Greece , vol. ii. p. 302; and the same remark in Thirlwall's History of Greece , vol. i. p. 2, and in Heeren's Ancient Greece , 1845, p. 16. M. Heeren says, ‘But even if we add all the islands, its square contents are a third less than those of Portugal.’

The area of Hindostan being, according to Mr. M'Culloch ( Geog. Dict. 1849, vol. i. p. 993), ‘between 1,200,000 and 1,300,000 square miles.’

In the best days of Greece, those alarming epidemics, by which the country was subsequently ravaged, were comparatively little known: see Thirlwall's History of Greece , vol. iii. p. 134, vol. viii. p. 471. This may be owing to large cosmical causes, or to the simple fact, that the different forms of pestilence had not yet been imported from the East by actual contact. On the vague accounts we possess of the earlier plagues, see Clot-Bey de la Peste , Paris, 1840. pp. 21, 46, 184. The relation even of Thucydides is more satisfactory to scholars than to pathologists.

‘Mount Guino, the highest point in Greece, and near its northern boundary, is 8,239 feet high… No mountain in Greece reaches the limit of perpetual snow.’ M'Culloch's Geog. Dict. 1849, vol. i. p. 924. Compare the table of mountains in Baker's Memoir on North Greece, in Journal of Geographical Society , vol. vii. p. 94, with Bakewell's Geology , pp. 621, 622.

‘Greece has no navigable river.’ M'Culloch's Geog. Dict. vol. i. p. 924. ‘Most of the rivers of Greece are torrents in early spring, and dry before the end of the summer.’ Grote's History of Greece , vol. ii. p. 286.

See Stevenson on The Anti-Brahmanical Religion of the Hindus , in Journal of Asiatic Society , vol. viii. pp. 331, 332, 336, 338. Mr. Wilson ( Journal , vol. iii. p. 204) says, ‘The prevailing form of the Hindu religion in the south of the peninsula was, at the commencement of the Christian era, and some time before it most probably, that of Siva.’ See also vol. v. p. 85, where it is stated that Siva ‘is the only Hindu god to whom honour is done at Ellora.’ Compare Transac. of Soc. of Bombay , vol. iii. p. 521; Heeren's Asiatic Nations , 1846, vol. ii. pp. 62, 66. On the philosophical relations between the followers of Siva and those of Vishnu, see Ritter's Hist. of Ancient Philosophy , vol. iv. pp. 334, 335; and the noticeable fact ( Buchanan's Mysore , vol. ii. p. 410), that even the Naimar caste, whose ‘proper deity’ is Vishnu, ‘wear on their foreheads the mark of Siva.’ As to the worship of Siva in the time of Alexander the Great, see Thirlwall's History of Greece , vol. vii. p. 36; and for further evidence of its extent, Bohlen , das alte Indien , vol. i. pp. 29, 147, 206, and Transac. of Asiatic Society , vol. ii. pp. 50, 294.

So it is generally stated by the Hindu theologians; but, according to Rammohun Roy, Siva had two wives. See Rammohun Roy on the Veds , p. 90.

On these attributes and representations of Siva and Doorga, see Rhode , Religiöse Bildung der Hindus , vol. ii. p. 241; Coleman's Mythology of the Hindus , pp. 63, 92; Bohlen , das alte Indien , vol. i. p. 207; Ward's Religion of the Hindoos , vol. i. pp. xxxvii. 27, 145; Transac. of Society of Bombay , vol. i. pp. 215, 221. Compare the curious account of an image supposed to represent Mahadeo, in Journal Asiatique , I. série, vol. i. p. 354, Paris, 1822.

Ward on the Religion of the Hindoos , vol. i. p. 35; Transac. of Society of Bombay , vol. i. p. 223. Compare the gloss in the Dabistan , vol. ii. p. 202.

‘The Greek gods were formed like men, with greatly increased powers and faculties, and acted as men would do if so circumstanced, but with a dignity and energy suited to their nearer approach to perfection. The Hindu gods, on the other hand, though endued with human passions, have always something monstrous in their appearance, and wild and capricious in their conduct. They are of various colours, red, yellow, and blue; some have twelve heads, and most have four hands. They are often enraged without a cause, and reconciled without a motive.’ Elphinstone's History of India , pp. 96, 97. See also Erskine on the Temple of Elephanta , in Transac. of Society of Bombay , vol. i. p. 246; and the Dabistan , vol. i. p. cxi.