Page:The Hindu Pantheon.djvu/35

Rh sions, and often contradict one another and themselves. They confess, however unanimously, that the Sun is an emblem or image of their great deities, jointly and individually; that is, of, or the Supreme One, who alone exists really and absolutely: the three male divinities themselves, being only Maya, or delusion. The body. of the sun they consider as Maya; but since he is the most glorious and active emblem of God, they respect him as an object of high veneration. All this must appear very mysterious; but it flows from the principal tenet of the Vedantis: that the only being, which has absolute and real existence, is the Divine Spirit, infinitely wise, infinitely benign, and infinitely powerful, expanded through the universe; not merely as the soul of the world, but as the provident ruler of it; sending forth rays or emanations from his own essence which are the pure vital souls of all animated creatures, whether moveable or immovsable—that is, (as we should express ourselves,) both animals and vegetables; and which he calls back to himself, according to certain laws established by his unlimited wisdom; Though be neuter in the cliaracter of the Most High One, yet,’ in that of supreme ruler, he is named PARAMESWARA; but, through the infinite veneration to which he is entitled, the Hindus meditate on him with silent adoration, and offer prayers and sacrifices only to the higher emanations from him. In a mode, incomprehensible to inferiorcreatures, they.are involved at first in the gloom of Maya, and subject to various taints from attachment to• ‘worldly affections; but they can never he reunited to their source, until they dispel the illusion by self-denial, renunciation of the world, and intellectual abstraction; and until they remove the impurities which they have contracted, by repentance, mortification, and successive passages through the forms of animals or vegetables, according to their demerits In such a reunion consists their flnil beatitude; and to effect it by the best possible means, is the object of their supreme ruler; who, in order to reclaim the vicious; to punish the incorrigible; to protect the oppressed; to destroy the oppressor; to encourage and reward the good; and to show all spirits the path to their ultimate happiness, has been pleased (say the Brahnums) to manifest himself in a variety of ways,. from age to age, in all parts of the habitable world. When he acts immediately, without assuming a shape, or sending forth a new emanation ; or when a divine• sound is heard from the sky, that manifestation of himself is called Acasavani, or an elliereal voice. When the sound proceeds from a meteor, or a flame, it is said to be Agnipuri, or formed offire; but an Avatara, is a descent of the Deity, in the shape of a mortal; and an Avantara, is a.similar incarnation of an inferior. a a a a.