quoted in Jain, S., & Jain, M. (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts. New Delhi: Ocean Books. vol 4. Introduction
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A significant section of early Englishmen in India also found in Indian culture “a deep and appealing wisdom.” John Z. Holwell (1711-1798), in his Interesting Historical Events, relative to the Provinces of Bengal and the Empire of Indostan (1767), declared that “the world does not now contain annals of more indisputable antiquity than those delivered down by the ancient Brahmins.” He avowed that the people “from the earliest times have been an ornament to the creation if so much can with propriety be said of any known people upon earth.”

— John Zephaniah Holwell

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "A significant section of early Englishmen in India also found in Indian culture “a deep and appealing wisdom.” John Z. Holwell (1711-1798), in his Interesting Historical Events, relative to the Provinces of Bengal and the Empire of Indostan (1767), declared that “the world does not now contain annals of more indisputable antiquity than those delivered down by the ancient Brahmins.” He avowed that the people “from the earliest times have been an ornament to the creation if so much can with propriety be said of any known people upon earth.”" in the context of "quoted in Jain, S., & Jain, M. (2011). The India they saw: Foreign accounts. New Delhi: Ocean Books. vol 4. Introduction" to mean that wisdom is timeless.

Source: Wikiquote: "John Zephaniah Holwell" (Quotes) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
John Zephaniah Holwell

About John Zephaniah Holwell

John Zephaniah Holwell FRS (17 September 1711 – 5 November 1798) was a surgeon, an employee of the British East India Company, and a temporary Governor of Bengal (1760). He was also one of the first Europeans to study Indian antiquities.