The Veda also teaches the two ideas so contradictory to the human understanding, and yet so easily recon- ciled in every human heart : God has established the eternal laws of right and wrong ; he punishes sin and re- wards virtue; and yet the same God is willing to for- give ; just, yet merciful ; a judge, and yet a father (jNIiil- ler, i, 38). But there is no trace, at least not in the Veda, of metempsychosis, which has generally been sup- ])osed to be a cUstinguishing feature of the Indian rehg- ion, especially of the Vedic period. " Instead of this, we tind what is really the sine qua non of all real relig- ion, a belief in immortality, and in personal immortality . . . . passages wherein immortality of the soul, personal immortality, and personal responsibility after death are clearly proclaimed" (Midler, i, 45). Professor Roth (Jour- nal of the German Oriental Sodetij, iv, 427) says that we find in the Veda "beautiful conceptions of an im- mortality expressed in unadorned language with child- like conviction. If it were necessary, we might find hero the most powerful weapons against the view which has lately been revived and proclaimed as new, that Per- sia was the only birthplace of the idea of immortality, and that even the nations of Europe had derived it from that quarter — as if the religious spirit of ever}' gifted race v/as not able to arrive at it by its own strength." We find also in the Veda vague allusions to a place of punishment for the wicked. "In one verse it is said that the dead are rewarded for their good deeds ; that they leave or cast off all evil, and, glorified, take their new bodies. ... A pit is mentioned into which the lawless are said to be hurled down, and into which Indra casts those who offer no sacrifices. ... In one passage we read that 'those who break the commandments of Varuna, and v/ho speak lies, are born for that deep place' " (I\I id- ler, i, 47; comp. Dr. Muir, Yama, in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, p. 10).
2. " The Epic period of Hinduism is marked by a simi- lar development of the same creeds, the general features of which we have traced in the Vedic writings. The pop- ular creed strives to find a centre round which to group its imaginary gods, whereas the jihilosophical creed finds its exprt'ssidu in tlie gmuiuhvorks of the Sdnkhya, Nydya, and 1 'tilunta systems nf philosujibj'. In the for- mer, we find two gods in particular who are rising to the highest rank, Vishnu and Siva; for as to Brahman (the masculine form of Brahm), though he was looked upon now and then as superior to both, he gradually disappears, and becomes merged into the philosophical Brahma (the neuter form of the same word), which is a further evolution of the great soul of the Upanisliads. In the Rumdyana, the superiority of Vishnu is admitted without dispute; in the great epos, the jlfahdbhdrata, however, which, imlike the former epos, is the product of successive ages, there is an apparent rivalry between the claims of Vishnu and Siva to occupy the highest rank in the pantheon; but Sanscrit philology wiU first have to unravel the chronological position of the various por- tions of this work, to lay bare its groundwork, and to show the gradual additions it received, before it will be able to determine the successive formation of the legends which are the basis of classical Hindu mythology. Yet so much seems to be clear even already, that there is a predilection during this Epic period for the supremacy of Vishnu, and that the policy of incorporating rather than combating antagonistic creeds led more to a quiet admission than to a warm support of Siva's claims to the highest rank." For the character of these gods, and their relation to the Vedic and the Epic period, see be- low. " We will point, however, to one remarkable myth,
as it will illustrate the altered position of the gods dnr« ing the Epic period. In the Vedic hymns, the immor-* tality of the gods is never matter of doubt ; most of the elementary beings are invoked and described as ever- lasting, as liable neither to decay nor death. The oifer- ings they receive may add to their comfort and strength ; they may invigorate them, but it is nowhere stated that they are indispensable for their existence. It is, on the contrary, the pious sacrificer himself who, through his offerings, secures to himself long life, and, as it is some- times hyperbolically called, immortality. The same no- tion also prevails throughout the oldest Brahmanas. It is only in the latest work of this class, the Satapatha- B7-dhmana, and more especially in the Epic poems, that we find the inferior gods as mortal in the beginning, and as becoming immortal through exterior agency. In the Satapafha-J3rdh?uana, the juice of the soma plant, of- fered by the worshipper, or at another time clarified but- ter, or even animal sacrifices, impart to them this im- mortalitj^ At the Epic period, Vishnu teaches them how to obtain the Amrita, or beverage of immortality, without which they would go to destruction ; and this epic Amrita itself is merely a compound, increased by imagination, of the various substances which in the Ve- dic writings are called or likened to A mrita, i. e. a 'sub- stance that frees from death.' It is obvious, therefore, that gods like these could not strike root in the religious mind of the nation. We must look upon them more as the gods of poetry than of real life ; nor do we find that they enjoyed any of the worship which was allotted to the two principal gods, Vishnu and Siva."