The same means that helped Mahomet with the Arabians, have been, in latter times, very serviceable to the Jesuits, in China. How would these cunning fathers have obtained admission for their religion among the Chinese, had they not referred to Confucius, in aid of their doctrines? These are only instances of changes in religion; but the case is precisely the same in other things. In the eastern nations, no improvement is adopted, be it of what kind it may, merely because it is an improvement. The Chinese are acquainted with the use of glass; yet their mirrors are always made of metal, and their windows of oyster-shells. Mechanical watches have been for ages used at the court of Pekin; but the bulk of the nation depend upon fire and water. {v} It is evident from the above, that the Gipseys, by reason of their eastern origin, and consequent way of thinking, are not easily made to change their principles and habits. When we further consider the circumstances under which these people have hitherto existed, we want nothing more to make us comprehend why they have remained, to the present time, what they were at their first arrival in Europe. Figure to yourself a person, in whom custom, and deep-rooted affections, are the only, and at the same time strong, impulses to action; in whose soul no new unwonted thoughts arise, in consequence of his own reflections, nor find easy admittance when proposed by others:—leave this man entirely to himself; do not permit any of those means to be used which are requisite to give a new turn to his ideas, and deep-rooted prejudices:—he must necessarily remain the same; and his latest posterity will continue like him: this is exactly the case with the Gipseys. Unused to reflect, fettered by habits, they arrived in our quarter of the globe. No state has, hitherto, done any thing for the express purpose of instructing or reforming them; except the Empress Theresa, by her regulations, which were never put in execution. On their first arrival, they procured passports, and free quarters, by their holy lies. They dispersed, begged, deceived the common people, by fortune telling: they stole: and for a long time no attention was paid to them. At last the evil grew too enormous; the complaints against them became so loud, that government was constrained to take official notice of them. Exemplary punishments were judged necessary: hanging and beheading were not sufficiently efficacious; and it was then thought expedient to banish them;—a proceeding more likely to render them worse than better, and even in other respects liable to many objections; still the custom has prevailed, down to the latest times. The neighbour, to whom these unpolished guests were sent, sooner or later, followed the same method of disengaging the evil, till, in the end, they were persecuted by almost all kingdoms and governments. Many states afterwards relaxing in their severity, the Gipseys were suffered to creep in, a few at a time, and