very often not sufficiently familiar with the vernacular; some of the subordinates in the court being most wretchedly paid, yield to the temptation of bribery, and these three causes combined together make the task of the judge sometimes difficult, and every instance of successful perjury naturally encourages it more. The obvious remedy, one would think, would be that if proper severe examples were made of the perjurers, instead of merely rising up the cry of untruthfulness against the whole nation, their number, if at all unusual, would soon be reduced.

The other cause of the Hindus being sometimes denounced as untruthful, is the following clauses in the Institutes of Menu.

Chap. iv., 138. "Let him say what is true, but let him say what is pleasing; let him speak no disagreeable truth, nor let him speak agreeable falsehood. This is a primeval rule."

139. "Let him say well and good', or let him say 'well' only; but let him not maintain fruitless enmity and altercation with any man." Chap. viii., 103. "In some cases, a giver of false evidence from a pious motive, even though he know the truth, shall not lose his seat in heaven such evidence wise men call the speech of the gods."

104. "Whenever the death of a man, who had not been a grievous offender, either of the servile, the commercial, the military, or the sacerdotal class, would be occasioned by true evidence, from the known rigour of the king, even though the fault arose from inadvertence or error, falsehood may be spoken: it is even preferable to truth." (The italics in all extracts from Menu are from the commentators on Menu.)

It must be remembered that these are laws for a state of society entirely different from your present one; the will or wisdom of the sovereign is the practical law of the land. I do not propose here to read a dissertation on truth, but I may simply, as parallel to the above extracts from the works of a Hindu legislator, refer to what is said by some of the European thinkers of modern times. Bentham allows, 1, falsehoods to avoid mischief, the case of misdirecting a murderer; 2, falsehoods of humanity, the case of physicians; 3, falsehoods of urbanity, an exaggerated compliment. In these cases, or at least in the first two, he says, "falsehood is a duty; in other cases it may be allowable, as in all those in which the person addressed has no right to know the truth. This would embrace most of the cases discussed by Grotius and Puffen

you

dorf." Instead of making any further quotations, I refer to an article in the Saturday Review of July 2nd, 1864, on "Lying," from which the above extract is taken.

I give in a note below extracts from the Institutes of Menu to show how highly truth and virtue are valued among the Hindus. Dr. Goldstucker kindly writes to me to say, that in Rigveda and Jagurved "the necessity of speaking truth and avoiding untruth is emphasised in the most beautiful language, but unfortunately there are as yet no translations of these texts."

Chap. iv., par. 175. Let a man continually take pleasure in truth, in justice, in laudable practices, and in purity; let him chastise those whom he may chastise, in a legal mode; let him keep in subjection his speech, his arm, and his appetite.

Par. 237. By falsehood the sacrifice becomes vain.

Par. 256. All things have their sense ascertained by speech; in speech they have their bases; and from speech they proceed; consequently, a falsifier of speech falsifies everything.

This is somewhat similar to Bentham's description of truth, in his Theory of Legislation (p. 260) : Every instant of our lives we are obliged to form judgments and to regulate our conduct according to facts, and it is only a small number of these facts which we can ascertain from our own observation. Then results an absolute necessity of trusting to the reports of others. If there is in these reports a mixture of falsehood, so far our judgments are erroneous, our motives wrong, our expectations misplaced. We live in restless distrust, and we do not know upon what to put dependence. In one word, falsehood includes the principle of every evil, because in its progress it brings on at last the dissolution of human society."

Par. 255. For he, who describes himself to worthy men, in a manner contrary to truth, is the most sinful wretch in this world: he is the worst of thieves, a stealer of minds.

Chap. vi., par. 92. Content, returning good for evil, resistance to sensual appetites, abstinence from illicit gain, purification, coercion of the organs, knowledge of Scripture, knowledge of the Supreme Spirit, veracity, and freedom from wrath, form their tenfold system of duties.

Chap. vii., 26 Holy sages consider as a fit dispenser of criminal justice, that king who invariably speaks truth, who duly considers all cases, who understands the sacred books, who knows the distinction of virtue, pleasure, and riches.

Chap. viii., par. 79. The witnesses being assembled in the middle of the court-room, in the presence of the plaintiff and the defendant, let the judge examine them, after having addressed them altogether, in the following manner :

Par. 80. What ye know to have been transacted in the matter

Mr. Crawfurd admits the commercial integrity among native merchants. Dealings in money, however, produce the greatest temptations to dishonesty, and when the commercial portion of a nation can stand this ordeal well, one would think it must tell much in favour of the general character of a people.

before us, between the parties reciprocally, declare at large and with truth, for your evidence in this cause is required.

Par. 81. A witness, who gives evidence with truth, shall attain exalted seats of beatitude above, and the highest fame here below: such testimony is revered by Brahma himself.

Par. 82. The witness who speaks falsely, shall be fast bound under water, in the snaky cords of Varuna, and be wholly deprived of power to escape torment during a hundred transmigrations: let mankind, therefore, give no false testimony.

Par. 83. By truth is a witness cleared from sin; by truth is justice advanced truth must, therefore, be spoken by witnesses of every class.

Par. 84. The soul itself is its own witness; the soul itself is its own refuge; offend not thy conscious soul, the supreme internal witness of men ?

Par. 85. The sinful have said in their hearts: "None sees us." Yes; the gods distinctly see them; and so does the spirit within their breasts.

Par. 89. Whatever places of torture have been prepared for the slayer of a priest, for the murderer of a woman or of a child, for the injurer of a friend, and for an ungrateful man, those places are ordained for a witness who gives false evidence.

Par. 90. The fruit of every virtuous act, which thou hast done, O good man, since thy birth, shall depart from thee to dogs, if thou deviate in speech from the truth.

Par. 91. O friend of virtue, that supreme spirit, which thou believest one and the same with thyself, resides in thy bosom perpetually, and is an all-knowing inspector of thy goodness or of thy wickedness.

Par. 92. If thou beest not at variance, by speaking falsely, with Yama, or the subduer of all, with Vaivaswata, or the punisher, with that great divinity who dwells in thy breast, go not on a pilgrimage to the river Gangà, nor to the plains of Curu, for thou hast no need of expiation.

Par. 93. Naked and shorn, tormented with hunger and thirst, and deprived of sight, shall the man, who gives false evidence, go with a potsherd to beg food at the door of an enemy.

Par. 94. Headlong, in utter darkness, shall the impious wretch tumble into hell, who, being interrogated in a judicial inquiry, answers one question falsely.

Par. 95. He, who in a court of justice gives an imperfect account of any transaction, or asserts a fact of which he was no eye-witness, shall receive pain instead of pleasure, and resemble a man who eats fish with eagerness, and swallows the sharp bones.

Mr. Crawfurd denies integrity even to the educated classes. I do not hesitate to give a direct contradiction to this statement. From my actual acquaintance and experience of the educated natives in the Bombay Presidency, I can with confidence assert, in Mr. Crawfurd's own words, that integrity is most prevalent among them as among the educated in Europe. This mistake about the integrity of the educated is also like that about the capacity for education. There are many youths who know how to speak and write English. without being educated, and Englishmen often confound them with the educated.

Par. 96. The gods are acquainted with no better mortal in this world, than the man of whom the intelligent spirit, which pervades his body, has no distrust, when he prepares to give evidence.

Par. 97. Hear, honest man, from a just enumeration in order, how many kinsmen, in evidence of different sorts, a false witness kills, or incurs the guilt of killing.

Par. 193. That man who, by false pretences, gets into his hands the goods of another, shall, together with his accomplices, be punished by various degrees of whipping or mutilation, or even by death.

Par. 257. Veracious witnesses, who give evidence as the law requires, are absolved from their sins; but such as give it unjustly, shall each be fined two hundred panas.

Chap. x., par. 93. Avoiding all injury to animated beings, veracity, abstaining from theft, and from unjust seizure of property, cleanliness, and command over the bodily organs, form the compendious system of duty which Menu has ordained for the four classes.

Chap iv., par. 170. Even here below an unjust man attains no felicity; nor he whose wealth proceeds from giving false evidence; nor he who constantly takes delight in mischief.

Chap. v., par. 109. Bodies are cleansed by water; the mind is purified by truth; the vital spirit, by theology and devotion; the understanding, by clear knowledge.

Chap. ii., par. 97. To a man contaminated with sensuality, neither the Vedas, nor liberality, nor sacrifices, nor strict observances, nor pious austerities, ever procure felicity.

Chap. vii., par. 13. Let the king prepare a just compensation for the good, and a just punishment for the bad : the rule of strict justice let him never transgress.

Chap. viii., par. 111. Let no man of sense take an oath in vain, that is, not in a court of justice, on a trifling occasion; for the man who takes an oath in vain, shall be punished in this life and in the next.

Par. 86. The guardian deities of the firmament, of the earth, of the waters, of the human heart, of the moon, of the sun, and of fire, of punishment after death, of the winds, of night, of both twilights, and of justice, perfectly know the state of all spirits clothed with bodies.

B

Polygamy. The Parsees are strictly monogamists. The old and young, the most bigoted orthodox and the most liberal, all agree in their abhorrence of bigamy. They prevailed with government to make bigamy criminal among them. I am not able to refer to the books, but I have a strong impression that there is nothing in the religious literature of the Old Persians indicative of the prevalence or sanction of polygamy among them. It is the most universal belief among the modern Parsees that they have always been monogamists, and they consider concubinage, also, a sin. Greek testimony, however, is against the Persians in this matter. But at the same time, the Greek best authority lays the blame upon the Greeks themselves, for Herodotus tells us, as soon as they (Persians) hear of any luxury they instantly make it their own, and hence, among other novelties, they have learnt unnatural lust from the Greeks. Each of them has several wives and a still larger number of concubines." It appears, then, that we have to thank our good friends, the European Greeks, for this unnatural lust. The magi of the Medes are charged with worse institutions than polygamy by some Greek authorities, but Mr. Rawlinson says, "whether it had any real foundation in fact is very uncertain."*

The Desatir, which in some parts is, according to some, of great antiquity, and according to others only a work about three hundred years old, but, withal, the work of an Asiatic, says, Marry only one woman, and do not look with a wicked eye on or cohabit with any other woman." This fact deserves much consideration. Had the Persians been originally polygamists, it is strange that, during their residence in India for 1200 years in the midst of the Hindus and Mohammedans, who are more or less polygamists, they should have so strictly preserved their monogamic character.

I asked Professor Spiegel to point out any texts in the religious literature of the Parsees for or against polygamy.

*Vol. iii., p. 131.