‘The travels of Sig. Pietro della Valle, a noble Roman, into East-India and Arabia Deserta. In which, the several countries, together with the customs, manners, traffique, and rites both religious and civil, of those Oriental princes and nations, are faithfully described: In familiar letters to his friend Signior Mario Schipano. Whereunto is added a relation of Sir Thomas Roe’s voyage into the East-Indies’ [‎439] (460/508)

A Voyage ft? E A S T-IN D I-A, &c.
Mu,
God, as they ought to know him 5 and they have no learning
amongft them, but as much as enables them to write and to read
what they have written, and they having no infight into the
reafons and caufes of things (I meaij the ruder fort, both of the
Mahometans and Gentiles) when they obferve things which are
not very ordinary, as when they fee any Eclipfes, but elpeci-
allyof the Moon (haply fome of them facrificing to her, and
calling her the Queen of Heaven, as thofe Idolaters did,
jfer. 44.18.) they make a very great ftir and noile, bemoaning
her much, which helps (as they conceive) to free, and bring
her out of it. Juvenal obferving that cuftom ("which appears
to be very ancient among the Heathens) reproves a very braw
ling clamorous Woman in his fixthSatyre thus,
Vna* labormti potefit faecurrere Luna^
that (he made noife enough to deliver the Moon out of an
Eclipfe.
Their ignorance in this, as in many-many other things, is
much to be pitied : as the knowledg and learning of many
others, which (^by their not improving of it) is to them as the
Letters which fometimes carried againft himfelf 5 it con-
dcftiHs the bearer.
' But though the Hindoos, or Heathens there, have no learn
ing 5 yet they want not opinions: for their divided hearts are
there dlftraded into foiir-fcore, and four feveral Seds, each dif
fering from others, very much in opinion about their irreligion 5
which might fill a man, even full of wonder, that doth not con-^
iider, how that Satan, who is the author divifion, is the feducer
of them all*
Thofe many Seds (as I conceive among them ) confift of
people there of feveral Trades, Occupations, and Conditions
of Life ^ which feveral forts of people (as before I obferved)
fiiftfry into their own Tribes 5 and fo unite and keep together
amongft themfelves, that they have not much correfpondency
with any other people. Thefe without doubt have (everal ways
of worfhip within themfelves, which makes them fo leparate
from others, as that they will not eat with any, but thofe of
their own Tribes.
The illiterate Priefts of all that people for the generality of
them are called Brdmins^ who derive themfelves from
whom (they lay) was one of the firft men that inhabited the
World \ and, after the fin of that firft World brought the
Flood, the race of that Bramon (whofe very name they highly
reverence) was continued in Brewaw, who (as they fay) o 1111 "'
lived that deluge, and is honoured by them likewile as one 01
their great Prophets and Law-givers.
Thofe Bramins (as I conceive) are they, which the ancient
(lories call Brachmans , but with this difference, that thole
Brachmans
11
God,
>