Page:On the education of the people of India (IA oneducationofpeo00trevrich).pdf/52

34 language with all that, in that age of the world, could be imported from abroad.

It is a curious fact that an intellectual revolution similar to that which is now in progress in India, actually took place among the Romans. At an early period, the Etruscan was, as Livy tells us, the language which the young Romans studied. No patrician was considered as liberally educated who had not learned in the sacred books of the augurs of and, how to quarter the heavens, what was meant by the appearance of a vulture on the left hand, and what rites were to be performed on a spot which had been smitten by thunder. This sort of knowledge very analagous to the knowledge which is contained in the Sanskrit books, was considered as the most valuable learning, until an increased acquaintance with the Greek language produced a complete change. Profound speculations on morals, legislation, and government; lively pictures of human life and manners; pure and energetic models of political eloquence, drove out the jargon of a doting superstition. If we knew more minutely the history of that change, we should probably find that it was vehemently resisted by very distinguished Etruscan scholars, and that all sorts of fearful consequences were represented as inevit-