CHAPTER VII.

RELIGION AND LITERATURE OF INDOSTAN.

The Supreme Deity.-The Hindoo Triad.-Inferior Divini ties.-Female Deities.-Terrestrial Gods.-Giants and Raksasas.—Animal and Inanimate Objects of Worship.-A Future Life, and Transmigration of Souls.-Temples.—Observances.-Religious Suicide.-Boodhism, &c.-The Vedas. —Purananas.—Mahabarat and Raminjana.—Amorous Poetry.-History-The Abstract Sciences.-Astronomy.

THE impressions, which suggest to man the existence of invisible and superior beings, and of a future state of existence, appear to be the deepest and most powerful with which his mind can be affected. The impulse by which it is carried towards them, begins to be felt in its utmost force, long before reason has been sufficiently improved to be able to point out the proper objects to which it ought to be directed. Hence the religion of rude nations, who are strangers to the light of revelation, presents an endless variety of absurd and superstitious observances. These to the sceptic offered an inexhaustible subject of ridicule, while to the rational observer they prove

the deep rooted nature of that principle, which can thus sanctify, by association with itself, every thing from which the human mind would otherwise have most deeply revolted.

These observations apply to no part of the world so strongly as to India, which may be considered almost as the seat and centre of superstition. That principle there, does not content itself with governing the opinions of men, or prescribing for itself an appropriate ritual. It regulates all the concerns of public and private life, all the distinctions of rank, and all the forms of society; it presides even over every amusement. Priests are the sages and nobles of India, and are viewed with a reverence, of which that paid to the nobility and men of letters in Europe, can give only a faint idea. In forming an estimate, therefore, of what the Hindoos are, the basis can only be laid in a view of their religious belief and observances.

Mr Paterson, who appears to have deeply studied the subject, expresses an opinion, that the religion of India was at one time reformed upon a philosophical model, to which the various superstitions now prevalent have been gradually superadded. Whatever we may think upon this subject, it is certain that it contains a basis of very abstruse and lofty principles, so strikingly similar to those of the Grecian schools of Pythagoras

and Plato, as apparently to indicate a common origin. The foundation consists in the belief of one Supreme Mind, or Brahme, the attributes of which are described in the loftiest terms. Such are those employed in the Gayatri, or holiest text of the Vedas, accounted the most sacred words that pass the lips of a Hindoo. These are as follows: "Let us adore the supremacy of that divine sun, "the godhead, who illuminates all, who recreates "all, from whom all proceed, to whom all must "return; whom we invoke to direct our under"standings aright in our progress towards his

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holy seat. What the sun and light are to this " visible world, that are the supreme good and "truth to the intellectual and invisible universe; "and as our corporeal eyes have a distant con"ception of objects enlightened by the sun, thus "our souls acquire certain knowledge, by medi66 tating on the light of truth, which emanates "from the Being of beings. This is the light by "which alone our minds can be directed in the

path of beatitude." It is added, "Without "hand or foot he runs rapidly, and grasps firmly; "without eyes he sees, without ears he hears all; "he knows whatever can be known, but there is "none who knows him. Him the wise call the

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great, supreme, pervading Spirit." The following paraphrase of this text is also of high authority: "Perfect truth, perfect happiness,

"without equal, immortal, absolute unity, whom "neither speech can describe, nor mind compre"hend; all pervading, all transcending; delight"ed with his own boundless intelligence; not "limited by space or time; without feet moving "swiftly, without hands grasping all worlds; "without eyes all surveying; without ears all hearing; without an intelligent guide, understanding all; without cause, the first of all

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; all ruling, all powerful; the creator, preserver, and transformer of all things; such "is the Great One."

These, and similar passages interspersed through the sacred books of the Hindoos, discover the lofty ideas of the Supreme Mind which have been formed by the Indian sages. Their views, however, were so far imperfect, that they did not consider him as the active Governor of the universe, but viewed him as a Being fixed in perpetual repose. The living world was formed by his emitting portions of his essence, which uniting themselves with matter, formed the existing race of gods and men. Hence all the moving and active members of the Hindoo mythology are endowed with a visible form, subject to all human passions and frailties, and their story, embellished by the prurient fancy of the poets, presents a series of adventures still more extravagant and indecent than those which characterize

the mythology of Greece and Rome. Many striking features of resemblance may even be traced between the two systems, which has led Sir William Jones, and other learned men, to suppose that they only presented the same divinities. under different names. I confess that I see little which may not be accounted for by the common operation of human passions, fears, and fancies. That the sun, the earth, and the waters, should have their appropriate deities; that a deity should preside over love, over war, and over all the useful arts, arises naturally from the propensity to deify whatever is beneficial, striking, or terrible. The identity of Ganesa with Janus, on which Sir William Jones lays such peculiar stress, appears to me to reside solely in the slight similarity of name. Janus is represented with two human heads; Ganesa with one only, which is that of an elephant. He is attended by a rat, and by other appendages which bear no resemblance to those of the Roman prototype. Without pursuing this inquiry, we shall now enter on such a rapid sketch of the Hindoo pantheon, as our limits will admit.

The most illustrious members, and those first produced from the Supreme Mind, are the Hindoo Triad, Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, supposed to be respectively personifications of the creating, the preserving, and the destroying power of the