1760.

Book III. Mahrattas had advanced a considerable way from their works; when he rushed upon them with so much rapidity as left them hardly any time for using their cannon. The Bhaow was killed early in the action; confusion soon pervaded the army, and a dreadful carnage ensued. The field was floated with blood. Twenty-two thousand men and women were taken prisoners. Of those who escaped from the field of battle, the greater part were butchered by the people of the country, who had suffered from their depredations. Of an army of 140,000 horse, commanded by the most celebrated generals of the nation, only three chiefs of any rank, and a mere residue of the troops, found their way to Deccan. The Dooranee Shah made but little use of this prodigious victory. Shah Aulum After remaining a few months at Delhi, he recognized Alee Gohur, as Emperor, by the title of Shah Aulum the Second; and entrusting Nujeeb ad Dowlah with the superintendance of affairs, till his master should return from Bengal, he marched back to his capital of Cabul in the end of the year 1760. With Aulumgeer the Second, the empire of the Moguls may be justly considered as having arrived at its close. The unhappy Prince who now received the name of Emperor, and who after a life of misery and disaster, ended his days a pensioner of English merchants, never possessed a sufficient degree of power to consider himself for one moment as master of the throne.*

II.

*The events of Aulumgeer's and the preceding reign are found in considerable detail in the Seer Mutakhareen (iii. 62—192), which is abridged by Scott, Hist. of Aurungzebe's Successors, p. 224-246. The principal facts are noticed, but in certain respects somewhat differently, by Francklin, Life of Shah Aulum, p. 7-27.

CHAP. V.

A Comparison of the State of Civilization among the Mahomedan Conquerors of India with the State of Civilization among the Hindus.

AFTER this display of the transactions to which the Mahomedan nations have CHAP. V. given birth in Hindustan, it is necessary to ascertain, as exactly as possible, the Progress of particular stage of civilization at which these nations had arrived. Beside the civilization importance of this inquiry, as a great portion of the history of the human mind, and among the a leading fact in the history of India; it is requisite, for the purpose of ascertain- conquerors of ing whether the civilization of the Hindus received advancement or depression, from the ascendancy over them which the Mahomedans acquired.

We have seen, in the comparisons adduced to illustrate the state of civilization among the Hindus, that the nations, in the western parts of Asia; the Persians, the Arabians, and even the Turks; possessed an order of intellectual faculties rather higher than the nations situated beyond them toward the East; were rather less deeply involved in the absurdities and weaknesses of a rude state of society; had in fact attained a stage of civilization, in some little degree, higher than the other inhabitants of that quarter of the globe.

This is a statistical fact, to which it is not probable that much contradiction will hereafter be applied. It is chiefly of importance, for the present inquiry, to show; that the people who actually invaded Hindustan, and assumed the government over so large a portion of its inhabitants, were perfectly on a level with the Arabians and Persians, in the highest state of their civilization.

The Mahomedans, who established their dominion in Hindustan, were principally derived from the eastern portions of that great country which was contained within the limits of the Persian empire in its greatest extent.

These eastern provinces of the great Persian empire; Bactria, and Transoxiana, with the contiguous regions; at the time when those men were formed who established the Mahomedan dominion in Hindustan, were remarkable rather for exceeding than falling short of the other parts of that empire, in the attainments of civilized life. The language of Balk was reckoned the most elegant dialect of the Persian tongue; and when God speaks mildly and gently to the cherubim surrounding his throne, this, according to the Mahomedans, is the 4 L

VOL. I.'

Mahomedan

Hindustan.

BOOK III. language he employs. A large proportion of the men who have been most distinguished in all the different walks of Persian literature, have been natives of Balk; of whom it may suffice to mention Mahomed Ebn, Emir Khowând Shah, better known to Europeans under the name of Mirkhond, the author of a great historical work, to which Europeans have been indebted for much of their knowledge of Persian history; Rashîd, a celebrated poet; and Anwari, famous both as a poet and astronomer. So greatly was Balk distinguished during the reigns of the immediate successors of Gingis Khan, that it was denominated Kobbat al Islâm, the metropolis of Islamism. Bokhara was one of the greatest seats of learning in the East. Students flocked from all parts to the celebrated university of Bokhara. In the Mogul language, Bokhâr, we are told, is a common appellation for a learned man. Among the celebrated men who have made illustrious the studies of Bokhara, is found a name, ranked high among his contemporaries in all the quarters of the globe, Ebn Sîna, or Avicenna, who wrote above one hundred volumes, and died in 1036, at the early age of fifty-eight.

The Moguls were not perfectly barbarous when they advanced upon the countries of the West. It is sufficiently proved that they had the use of letters; they had an alphabet of their own, in no degree corresponding with the troublesome characters of the Chinese, but as ingenious and simple as that of the Romans. The degree in which they approximated to the mental capacity of the most enlightened nations of Asia, is abundantly proved, not only by that power of combined action which enabled them to effect their conquests, but by the skill with which they regulated the government of China, as well as that of Persia and Transoxiana, to which they subsequently advanced. It appears not that the government in those several countries was more skilfully conducted in any hands, than in those of the immediate successors of Gingis. The Moguls, at the time of their conquests, were so fully prepared for a new step in civilization, that they assimilated themselves with wonderful rapidity, both in China and Persia, to the more cultivated people among whom they had arrived; and, in a short time, were to be distinguished from them rather by slight shades of character and manners, than any difference in point of civilization. In their new acquisitions in Persia and Transoxiana, they were celebrated for prosecuting the sciences with great ardour; and, in particular, for having laid astronomy, geography, and the mathematical sciences, under great obligations. In the city of Samarcand, the seat of government of one of the sons of Gingis and his successors, "the academy of sciences," to use the words of the writer in the Universal History, " was one of the most eminent to be found among the Mahomedans, who resorted thither to study from all the neighbouring countries." Abulfeda mentions two

decisive marks of a considerable degree of civilization. In his time the streets CHAP. V. were paved, and water was conveyed into the city by leaden pipes. The silkpaper made here was the most beautiful in Asia; and in great request over all the East.*

Mahmood, of Ghizni, the founder of the first Mahomedan dynasty in Hindustan, was the most accomplished Prince in Asia. His court contained an assemblage of learned men. The greatest poet of Asia wrote in his capital, and was fostered by his bounty. He and his nobles adorned Ghizni with an architecture which rendered it the finest city in the East. He there erected an university, which he richly endowed, and made it one of the principal seats of learning in that quarter of the globe.†

Under Mahmood of Ghizni, the great sovereign of Persia, who combined in his service all the finest spirits that Persian civilization could produce, the Hindus could not be said to be over-run, or held in subjection by a people less civilized than themselves. As little could this be said under the descendants of Mahmood, who, though inferior to him in personal qualities, were themselves formed, and served by men who were formed, under the full influence of Persian arts and knowledge. The same was undoubtedly the case with the princes of the Gaurian dynasty. They, and the leaders by whom they were principally served, were, in respect of training and knowledge, in rcality Persians. It will not be denied, that the Moguls, the last of the Mahomedan dynasties of Hindustan, had remained a sufficient time in Transoxiana and Persia, to have acquired all the civilization of these two countries, long before they attempted to perform conquests in India. The Persian language was the language they used; the Persian laws, and the Persian religion, were the laws and religion they had espoused; it was the Persian literature to which they were devoted; and they carried along with them the full benefit of the Persian arts and knowledge, when they established themselves in Hindustan.

whether the

The question, therefore, is, whether by a government, moulded and conducted Question, agreeably to the properties of Persian civilization, instead of a government Hindus were moulded and conducted agreeably to the properties of Hindu civilization, the benefited, or injured by the Hindu population of India lost or won: For the aversion to a government, Mahomedan because in the hands of foreigners; that is, of men who are called by one rather

*For these facts, the reader will find the original authors faithfully quoted and extracted, in the Universal History, ii. 352, 354; iv. 309, 393; v. 123. Modern Part, 8vo. Ed. In exploring the Persian and Arabian Authorities, the authors of the Universal History are not the worst of our guides.

conquest.

+ Vide supra, p. 491.

Book III. than some other name, without regard to the qualities of the government, whether better or worse; is a prejudice of which reason is ashamed. As India was not governed by the Moguls, in the character of a detached province, valued only as it could be rendered useful to another state, which is the proper idea of foreign conquest; but became the sole residence and sole dominion of the Mogul government, which thereby found its interest as closely united to that of India, as it is possible for the interest of a despotical government to be united with that of its people, the Mogul government was, to all the effects of interest, and thence of behaviour, not a foreign, but a native government. With these considerations before the inquirer, it will not admit of any long dispute, that human nature in India gained, and gained very considerably, by passing from a Hindu to a Mahomedan government. Of this, without descending to particulars, the situation of human nature, under the Hindu governments which we have seen; that of the Mahrattas, for example; that of Nepaul; that of Mysore, before the time of Hyder Ali; or that of Travancore; affords a very satisfactory proof. The defects of Mahomedan rule, enormous as they justly deserve to be held, can by no means be regarded as equal to those which universally distinguish the government of Hindus.

Classification and distri

The same minute analysis might here be instituted of the grand circumstances which constitute the marks of civilization among the Mahomedans of India, as has been already executed in regard to the Hindus. But it is by no means necessary. The state of civilization among the Hindus was mysterious, and little known. With the state of civilization in Persia the instructed part of European readers are pretty familiar. Besides; in analysing the circumstances which constitute the marks of civilization among the Hindus, such comparisons, for the sake of illustration, were made with the corresponding circumstances among the Persians, as served to throw some light upon the state of civilization among the latter people, and to show in what position they stood as compared with the Hindus. A few short reflections under each of the heads will therefore suffice.

I. CLASSIFICATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE PEOPLE. In this grand bution of the particular, the superiority of the order of things among the Mahomedans, people. over that among the Hindus, was inexpressibly great. The Mahomedans were exempt from the institution of caste; that institution which stands a more effectual barrier against the good of human nature than any other institution which the workings of caprice and of selfishness have ever produced. Under the Mahomedan despotisms of the East, nearly as much