though rarely, to add some new facts
that seemed essential for the purpose of establishing what I wished to
prove, yet in the main they have been left as they were originally
published. I have added to each the dates when they were written,
these dates ranging over the last fifteen years, and I must beg my
readers to bear these dates in mind when judging both of the form and
the matter of these contributions towards a better knowledge of the
creeds and prayers, the legends and customs of the ancient world.

M. M.

PARKS END, OXFORD:

_October_, 1867.

CONTENTS OF FIRST VOLUME.

I. LECTURE ON THE VEDAS OR THE SACRED BOOKS OF THE BRAHMANS,
DELIVERED AT LEEDS, 1865

II. CHRIST AND OTHER MASTERS, 1858

III. THE VEDA AND ZEND-AVESTA, 1853

IV. THE AITAREYA-BRAHMANA, 1864

V. ON THE STUDY OF THE ZEND-AVESTA IN INDIA, 1862

VI. PROGRESS OF ZEND SCHOLARSHIP, 1865

VII. GENESIS AND THE ZEND-AVESTA, 1864

VIII. THE MODERN PARSIS, 1862

IX. BUDDHISM, 1862

X. BUDDHIST PILGRIMS, 1857

XI. THE MEANING OF NIRVANA, 1857

XII. CHINESE TRANSLATIONS OF SANSKRIT TEXTS, 1861

XIII. THE WORKS OF CONFUCIUS, 1861

XIV. POPOL VUH, 1862

XV. SEMITIC MONOTHEISM, 1860

* * * * *

I.

LECTURE ON THE VEDAS

OR THE

SACRED BOOKS OF THE BRAHMANS,[8]

DELIVERED AT THE

PHILOSOPHICAL INSTITUTION, LEEDS, MARCH, 1865.

I have brought with me one volume of my edition of the Veda, and I
should not wonder if it were the first copy of the work which has ever
reached this busy town of Leeds. Nay, I confess I have some misgivings
whether I have not undertaken a hopeless task, and I begin to doubt
whether I shall succeed in explaining to you the interest which I feel
for this ancient collection of sacred hymns, an interest which has
never failed me while devoting to the publication of this voluminous
work the best twenty years of my life. Many times have I been asked,
But what is the Veda? Why should it be published? What are we likely
to learn from a book composed nearly four thousand years ago, and
intended from the beginning for an uncultivated race of mere heathens
and savages,--a book which the natives of India have never published
themselves, although, to the present day, they profess to regard it as
the highest authority for their religion, morals, and philosophy? Are
we, the people of England or of Euro