Indian Science and Technology in the Eighteenth Century: Some Contemporary European Accounts c10.10

c10.10

I am likewise informed that the instruments are divided, but have not been told the particulars; if they have sub-divisions and numbers, they may instruct us in the ancient characters; and perhaps the dimensions of the instruments may give us information respecting the antique measures of the Hindoos; indeed every possible observation ought to be made and every particular dimension taken with the utmost accuracy, for it is with experimental observations as with given situations in geometry where the positions of a few points is sufficient to determine a multitude of lines of different species; and as a number of important conclusions may be drawn from a collection of accurate experiences and well attested facts, so every opportunity of making such ought to be embraced and attended to, if it was on no other account but to give an additional value to observations that might be made in future: For it is worthy of remark that knowledge does not increase in proportion to the number of experiments but in a much higher degree; and that a single observation which proves little or nothing when alone may have a very great effect in conjunction with others; thus, for example, a single point in geometry determines nothing; and two, only give the position of a line; yet if a couple of additional points be added; not only six right lines are thereby determined, but also the magnitude and position of four circles and a parabola; and if we add two points more (which singly would only give a line) we shall thereby determine 15 right lines; 20 circles; 15 parabolas; and 6 ellipses or hyperbolas; from where might be drawn an infinity of other conclusions of different kinds; and though the enquiry at first, might only respect some particular case (as right lines for instance in the example before us) yet from the same data all the rest are deducible; and by similar reasoning, observations made at Benares with only an astronomical view, might be applicable to commerce, to history, chronology, and most kinds of subjects.