sins TI in the government. Pulcheria then made a vow of eternal chastity, prevailed upon her sisters to follow her example, and gave to the Byzantine court the pu- rity which should prevail in a monastery. Some writ- ers charge that this chastity was feigned from political reasons, Pulcheria desiring to prevent the marriage of her sisters, and thus avoid controversy on the claims to the throne. By her wisdom and piety the prosperity of the empire was certainly promoted : she seemed to be its good genius. She defended zealously the purity of the Christian faith against the doctrines of Nestorius and Eutych.es, and her influence was most beneficial at the synods of Ephesus and Chalcedon. St. Cyril of Alexandria sent her his celebrated work Be Fide ad Pulcheriam. She was in correspondence with the popes, especially with Leo I. This great pope, in many letters, praises her wisdom and kindness. He entreats her, in 449, to take measures against, the heresy of Eutyches (Jaffe, Reg. Pontif. n. 203, 204, p. 37) ; rejoices at the vigor and energy of her faith (Ibid. n. 226, p. 339), and praises her activity in suppressing Eutyehianism (451 ; ibid. n. 237, p. 40). There are in all ten letters extant from Leo I to Pulcheria. The learned Theodoret, bishop of Cyrrhus, also praised her attachment to the Church, and interceded with her for his city, heavily burdened with taxes (Theod. Ep. 43 ; Baron, ad aim. 444). All her contemporaries praise her beneficent influence. She dissuaded her brother Theodosius from Nestorianism, and celebrated the victory of the orthodox creed over this heresy by building a splendid church in honor of the Virgin Mary (Niceph. //. E. xiv, 2 ; Baron, ad ami. 431). She sent valuable presents to Jerusalem, and built a number of new churches (Baron, ad ami. 439, 453). She was several times exposed to the plots of the courts, which tried to destroy her good understanding with her brother and his wife Eudocia. In 446 she retired en- tirely from the court; but her absence was soon felt. After the death of Theodosius, Pulcheria and Marcianus, who had been honored with the title of Augustus, and whom she had wedded, took the reins of the empire. She had married for the good of the empire, and with the stipulation that she should be allowed to keep her vow of virginity. After benefiting the Church in many ways as empress, and opposing Eutyehianism with the same decision as she had previously Nestorianism, she died, Sept. 11, 453. Her saintship is recognised by the Latin as well as by the Greek Church. Baronius (ad aim. 453) and the Bollandists (vol. i, Jul.) erected literary memorials to her memory. Benedict XIV permitted, by decree of the Congregation of the Kites of Jan. 31, 1752, to the regular canons of St. Augustine in Portugal, and to some houses of Jesuits, the celebration of her feast on July 7, sub ritu dupliei : soon afterwards, Feb. 11, the same year, this permission was extended to the whole company of Jesus. These decrees, with the office and mass of St. Pulcheria, are in the appendix of Benedict XIVs work Be Sanctorum Canonizatione. The oration of the feast praises the chastity of the saint, and her zeal for the purity of the faith. See Smith, Bid. of Gr. and Rom. Biog. and Mythol. s. v. ; Wetzer u. Welte, Kirchen- Lex ikon, vol. xii, s. v.; Hefele, Conciliengesch. vol. ii ; Alzog, Kirchengesch. i, 309; Milman, Hist, of Latin Christianity, ii, 243 sq. (J. H. W.)
Pulear, or Ganesha, a divinity of Indian my- thology, was the son of the wife of Siva, Parwati. She formed him, without the co-operation of her husband, by shaping into the frame of a youth what was washed away from her body during her bath. Siva thought
himself betrayed by Parwati, and in his wrath he struck off the head of the young god. When he found out his mistake, he wished to heal his victim ; but the head had been carried away by the waters of the Ganges, and had been eaten by fishes. Siva solved this difficulty by telling the son of his wife to cut off the head of the first creature he should meet and put it on his shoulders : as misfortune would have it, this creature was an ele- phant. Therefore Ganesha is always represented with an elephant's trunk. Ganesha sits astride of a mouse, which is nothing else than the metamorphosed giant Gedjemuyashurim, vanquished by him while warring against the gods. Ganesha is incredibly strong, and therefore of great use to the gods in their perpetual warfare against the daemons. He is a great eater, and would eat the whole world if he had his own way : ii is only in the sea of sugar, in which he has a floating abode, that he can, in some measure, satisf\r the crav- ings of his hunger. Being the favorite son of Siva, he is worshipped like that god himself, and invoked first before every sacrifice. The Indians believed that he could at his will accumulate or remove obstacles: all Indian books commence with a prayer to him. His image is frequently found painted on the house doors, and almost, every family has his statue in bronze, mar- ble, or clay. Pulear is his name as god of matrimony : it was the natural question of his father at his first ap- pearance in the world — Pulei-ar, i. e. Whose son? — Yollmcr, Worterb. der Mythologie, s. v.