Page:On the education of the people of India (IA oneducationofpeo00trevrich).pdf/198

184 effect. The plan which appears to me best calculated to answer every purpose, is, for the Government to attach a Sanskrit professor, with several native assistants, to the establishment of the Asiatic Society. These persons, selected on account of their eminent attainments and known love of science, and undisturbed by any other pursuit, might devote themselves to the investigation of the history, antiquities, philosophy, and literature of the East, recording the result of their researches in the most lasting and available forms. India is undoubtedly at the threshold of a new era; and it seems to be no less incumbent on us at this period to gather up the recollections of the past, than to provide matter of national improvement for the future. The Hindu system of learning has formed the character of the people up to the present point; and it must still be studied, to account for daily occurring phenomena of habits and manners. Whatever mental cultivation, whatever taste for scientific and literary pursuits has survived among the Hindus, is owing to it: they were a literary people when we were barbarians; and, after centuries of revolution, and anarchy, and subjection to foreign rule, they are still a literary people, now that we have arrived at the highest existing point of civilisation. That the system