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OF THE HINDUS.
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of the Vedas, or of the most genuine of the Pirránas.
According to what appears to be the most ancient and authentic theory of the future state of man, punctual performance of religious rites, with due attention to moral conduct, and entire belief in the holiness of the Vedas, secured for the soul after death a period of enjoyment proportioned to the quantum of moral and religionis merit of the deceased, in the heaven of Indra; a kind of Elysium. Neglect of prescribed rites and duties, irreverence for the Brahmans, and disbelief in the Vedas, incurred punishment for a given term, proportionate to the crime, in various hells, or regions of Tartarus. At the expiration of a limited period, the soul, which in either of its destinations had continued to be invested with a subtile and ethereal, but material and sensible body, returns to earth, and is born again, in union with some gross and elemental body, according to the former merits or demerits of the individual, as a reptile, a fish, a bird, a beast, a giant, a spirit, a divinity, mmtil, after sundry migrations, it ascends or descends to man, to undergo a similar career.
Now this, I may remark, is what the Hindus understand by Fate. They do not understand it to depend upon the Divine foreknowledge of what a man will be, or will do, conformably to which he must act and must be; nor is it, in tkeir opinion, an irresistible impulse given to his carcer, which he cannot choose but obey. It is the result of conduct
