Page:Life in India or Madras, the Neilgherries, and Calcutta.djvu/412

360 conscious, becomes Brahma, the unconscious. He sleeps; again he awakes and creates; and again he returns with all creation to unconsciousness. This work of creation and retraction, according to the Purannas, goes on for one hundred years of Brahma's existence, or the unspeakable term of 311,040,000,000,000 years!

At the end of this unimaginable period, Brahma, with all beings celestial and terrestrial, relapses into Brahm, and the universe ceases to exist. According to one theory, the one (spirit) only remains; according to the other, the two, (spirit and matter.) Nor is this the end. Again the same process goes on, and again it is undone, until wearied with the effort to follow these vain flights of an insane imagination, the mind of the Christian sinks down, pained and amazed at the depth of the folly to which those blindly rush who turn from the word of God to frame for themselves a system of belief.

But it will be asked, Who and what are the gods of the Hindus? Where is their place in this vast system? To this, one Puranna will give one reply, and another, another. The greater part of them will tell you that from