So much of India being known in our days, we have the facility of trying the veracity and correctness of the Dabistán concerning this country. Its account will be found, I dare say, rather incomplete in the small compass in which so extensive a subject was inclosed, but not inaccurate in the greatest part of its various statements. Sir W. Jones[146] bears Mohsan Fani the testimony, “that his information concerning the Hindus is wonderfully correct.” Let us compare the account given by him with all that has been published about India by the best instructed Europeans before the foundation of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and we shall regret that the Dabistán was brought into notice so late. Whatever it be, the particular views of a Persian, through a medium of education, religion, and custom, so different from that through which we consider India, can but interest us by their novelty, and by themselves add something to our information about the character of Asiatics. [124] According to Manetho, a high-priest of Heliopolis, the Egyptians counted 53,525 years; they saw twice the sun set where he now rises――they saw (as well as the Chaldeans) the ecliptic perpendicular upon the equator before 39,710 years. Herodotus (lib. II) attributes to them, more moderately, 15,882 historical years. [125] The history of Joseph, Pharaoh, Moses in Egypt, is often referred to by Muhammed and his followers; they state that the Egyptian king professed a religion unlike that mentioned by Greek authors, with whom the Bible also disagrees. In general, monotheism is adverse to the examination of polytheistical systems, and seldom accurate in the representation of their tenets. [126] Quoted by Diogenes Laertius, _Prœm._, p. 6. [127] Lib. II. p. 113. edit. Wossel. [128] Vita Apol. c. 6. [129] _Chron. lib. post._, n. 400. [130] _Mémoires de Littérature de l’Académie royale des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres_, tome XXXI. [131] Works, vol. III. p. 41. [132] Ibid., pp. 111. 134. [133] Such is the Jog-Vasishta, mentioned (vol. II. pp. 28 and 256) as a very ancient book. Sir W. Jones calls it one of the finest compositions on the philosophy of the Vedanta school; it contains the instructions of the great Vasishta to his pupil Rama. Lord Teignmouth says, that several Persian versions of this work exist, and quotes some passages of them, which, compared with the original Sanscrit, were found substantially accurate. [134] See the detailed table of it, vol. II. p. 122. [135] Vol. II. pp. 91-92. [136] See _Bhagavad-gita_, vv. 16. 23. 28. 29. Schlegel’s ed. [137] vol. II. p. 24. [138] See vol. II. pp. 150-151. [139] That which sir W. Jones quotes (see Works, vol. XIII. p. 367) is, perhaps, most to be depended upon.