"In the character of Destroyer also, we may look upon this Indian deity as corresponding with the Stygian Jove, or Pluto; especially since Cali or Time in the feminine gender, is a name of his consort, who will appear hereafter to be Proserpine."

"There is another attribute of Mahadeva, or Siva, by which he is too visibly* distinguished in the temples and drawings in Bengal," and it may be added in every part of India. "To destroy according to

the Vedantiis of India, the Susis of Persia, and many philosophers of European schools, is only to generate and reproduce in another form. Hence the god of destruction is supposed in India to preside over generation, as a symbol of which he rides on a white bull. Can we doubt that the loves and feats of Jupiter Genitor (not forgetting the white bull of Europa) and his extraordinary title of Lapis,+ for which no satisfac

* Meaning, we presume, the emblems of the genital

parts.

+ Various explanations are to be found for this name,

the da

C

tory reason is commonly given, have a connexion with the Indian philosophy and mythology."

In the Jupiter Marinus, or Neptune, Sir

or epithet, given by the Romans to Jupiter; but, as Sir William Jones observes, none that can be considered satisfactory. The Romans believed that an oath made in the name of Jupiter Lapis, was the most sacred of all oaths: Cicero calls it, Jovem Lapidem Jurare. It is supposed to have been derived from the stone presented to Saturn by his consort Ops, as a substitute for Jupiter. Saturn had promised to his elder brother Titan, to destroy all males that should be born to him, provided Titan should leave him in the undisturbed possession of his crown. On the birth of Jupiter, his mother Ops, Cybele, Rhea, or the elder Vesta (for it is presumed that they are only distinctive names for the same personage) deceived her husband by presenting a stone to him, and thus saved the boy, whom she concealed in a cavern on mount Ida. The mode of taking the Roman oath was said to be as follows:-The person to whom it was administered, holding a flint-stone in his hand, said, "If knowingly I deceive, so let Diespiter, saving the city and the capitol, cast me away from all that is good, as I cast away this stone.” It would be worthy of enquiry whether the Hindus have any similar mode of swearing.-Eusebius says that a sovereign, named Lapis, reigned in Crete.

William Jones finds a resemblance with Mahadeva in another of his characters. The identity of the Trisula and the Trident, the former a weapon of Siva in this character, the other the distinctive sceptre of Neptune, seems to establish the analogy; —“ and the veneration paid all over India to the large Buccinum, especially when it can be found with the spiral line and mouth turned from left to right, brings to our mind the music of Triton."* Mahadeva's consort Bhavani may be compared with the Venus Marina, their attributes being similar: and the Rembha of Indra's court, seems to correspond with the popular Venus, or goddess of beauty; this last sprung from the sea-foam, and Rembha was produced, according to the Indian fabulists, from the froth of the churned

ocean.

The way of considering the gods as individual substances, but as distinct

persons in distinct characters, is common to the Euro

* Jones.

pean and Indian systems; as well as the custom of giving the highest of them the greatest number of names; hence, not to repeat what has been said of Jupiter, came the triple capacity of Diana, and hence her petition in the poet Callimachus,* that she might be polyonymous, or many-titled."

"The Romans had many Jupiters, one of whom was only the firmament personified, as the poet Ennius clearly expresses it:

Aspice hoc sublime candens, quam invocant
Omnes Jovem.

This Jupiter, or Diespiter, answers to the Indian god of the visible heavens, Indra, or the King;+ who has also the character

* Named also Battiades, said to have been born at Cyrene, in Africa. All that has been preserved of his works, was published at Paris, in 1675, in one vol. in 4to. with notes by Mademoiselle Lefevre, afterwards the celebrated Madame Dacier; and republished at Leyden, in 1761, with additional notes, by different authors, in 2 vols. 8vo. A new edition, with a selection of notes, has just been edited from the Cambridge Press, in one vol. 8vo.

+ Indra was chief of the inferior deities, but the

of the Roman Genius, or chief of the good spirits. His consort is named Sachi; his celestial city, is Amaravati; his palace* Vaijayanta; his garden, Nandana; his chief elephant, Airavat; his charioteer, Matali; and his weapon, Vajra, or the thunderbolt: he is the regent of winds and showers, and though the East is peculiarly under his care, yet his residence is Meru, or the North Pole, allegorically represented as a mountain of gold and gems. But with all his power he is considered as a subordinate deity, far inferior to the Triad, Brahma, Vishnu, and Mahadeva, or Siva, who are but three forms of one and the same God-head; thus the principal divinity of the Greeks and Latins, whom they called Zeus and Jupiter, with irregular inflexions Dios and Jovis, was not merely Fulminator, the Thunderer, but like the destroying power of India, Magnus Divus,

word, I am assured by those versed in the Sanscrit language, does not express king.

* For palace read banner.