Menu was Adam, but there are seven Menus, the seventh was Noah.--SIR W. JONES, _Laws of Menu_. WILFORD.
The Babylonian empire begun 530 years after the flood, 2790 years after Adam.--RUSSELL, _Connection of Sacred History_.
Primitive history is under a veil, involved in fables; but all ancient fables have a historical base.--BAILLY, _on Atlantis_.
Before Adam God created the _Dives_ (angels) who had 72 kings or _Sol-i-man_ for 7000 years, and after them the _Peris_ govern for 2000 years.--HERBELOT, _Oriental Library_.
Noah dwelt near Cabul and Cashmir, his Ararat was in the Imalaya mountains.--SHUCKFORD, WELLS, _Sacred Geography &c._
As early as 4600 years before Christ, there was a communication between the Americans and the east by astronomical coincidences.--CARLI, _American Letters_.
Two great wars or _Mahabharat_ followed by dispersions of mankind, happened in India in 3236 and 2501 (before our era); and the Indian solar empire of _Berhut_ at Inderput now Delhi, ascends 16 generations beyond the first, at least to 3750 years B. C.--_Institutes of the Emperor_ AKBAR, _translated by_ GLADWIN.
Such are my guides. Are not those quotations sufficient?
For my rules of criticism, I have taken for guide, _Isaac Taylor's_ excellent history of the transmission of ancient books, London, 1827. They may be analysed as follows, from his own summary.
1. If the records of antiquity could be deprived of their authority, we should also be deprived of intelligence, liberty and religion!
2. Dates are of little importance; being anciently expressed by letters, they are liable to errors. The Greeks and all eastern christians reckon 5508 years from Adam to Christ.
3. Geography and natural facts are open to criticism.
4. Wonders, monsters, miracles, are not always fabulous, but doubtful. Natural phenomena if unconnected with omens, may be right.
5. Speeches and secret motives do not belong to history, they are ornaments of rhetoric or mere surmises.
6. Facts are only to be attended to, they become more certain, if corroborated by monuments, inscriptions, coins &c.
7. The silence of a historian does not invalidate the assertions of others.
8. Contradictions, exaggerations, prejudices, party spirit, national dislike, must be allowed for. The arrogance of the Greeks and Chinese, who call barbarians, nations as good as they, is shameful, and must be noticed, as well as errors arising from hiding defeats &c.