disappoint their employer, had little difficulty
in discovering, or forging, or interpolating, whatever might
suit his purpose. The honest candour with which Wilford, a
man of the strictest integrity, made the open and humiliating
confession of the deceptions which had been practised upon
him, ought for ever to preserve his memory from disrespect.
The fictions to which he had given currency, only retained,
and still we are ashamed to say retain, their ground in
histories of the Bible and works of a certain school of
theology, from which no criticism can exorcise an error once
established: still, however, with sensible men, a kind of
suspicion was thrown over the study itself; and the cool and
sagacious researches of men, probably better acquainted with
their own language than some of the Brahmins themselves, were
implicated in the fate of the fantastic and, though
profoundly learned, ever injudicious reveries of Wilford.

Now, however, that we may depend on the genuineness of our
documents, it is curious to examine the Indian version or
versions of the universal tradition of the Deluge; for,
besides this extract from the Mahabharata, Sir W. Jones had
extracted from the Bhagavata Purana another, and, in some
respects, very different legend. Both of these versions are
strongly impregnated with the mythological extravagance of
India; but the Purana, one of the Talmudic books of Indian
tradition, as M. Bopp observes, is evidently of a much later
date than the ruder and simpler fable of the old Epic. It
belongs to a less ancient school of poetry, and a less
ancient system of religion. While it is much more exuberant
in its fiction, it nevertheless betrays a sort of
apprehension lest it shall shock the less easy faith of a
more incredulous reader; it is manifestly from the religious
school of the follower of Vishnu, and, indeed, seems to have
some reference to one of the philosophic systems. Yet the
outline of the story is the same. In the Mahabharatic
version, Manu, like Noah, stands alone in an age of universal
depravity. His virtues, however, are of the Indian cast--the
most severe and excruciating penance by which he extorts, as
it were, the favour of the deity[158].

THE DELUGE.

Vivaswata's son, a raja--and a sage of mighty fame,
King of men, the first