Page:The Land of the Veda.djvu/96

86 Vishnu, and Shiva, as typified by the mystical syllable Om, although, according to high Brahminical authority, the Trimurti was the first element in the faith of the Hindoos, and the second was the Linga.

The deities mentioned in the Vedas are numerous, and of different sexes. The leading ones are Indra, Agni, and Surya; and the female deities are Ushas, Saraswati, Sinivali, etc. “The wives of the gods” are spoken of as a large number, and are often invoked. The operations and powers of nature are deified, as the Murats, the winds; the Aswins, the sons of the sun; and even the cows are invoked in a special Sukta.—Vol. iii, p. 440. In fact, the deities, inferior and superior, of the Vedas may be counted by the dozen, and the work is manifestly polytheistic to the core in its teaching and tendencies. The evidence of this is on every page.

For the general reader, the mystery that covered the Vedas is a mystery no longer; all that they contain stands out for public view in the common light of day. Except as to grammatical construction and translation into modern words, we are far abler to discover and understand what story these ancient documents tell than is any of the Pundits. For, in ascertaining their sense, we have to deal with questions of race, of language, of history, of chronology, and external influences; questions unknown, and therefore unintelligible, to the Hindoo mind. Forbidden to the Sudras, inaccessible from their rarity and high price to most of the Brahmins, for that very reason they are the objects of a more profound and superstitious veneration; and, if any thing can be supposed, a priori, to startle and excite all Hindustan, it is surely the announcement that the Vedas have become public property, and that Sudra and Mlechcha (barbarian) may read them at his will.

It was almost entirely from such writings as these that European scholars had to undertake the compilation of a true chronology and history for India. The task was certainly not an easy one. It was like this: Given the Psalms of David, to discover from these alone the manners, customs, religions, arts, sciences, history, chronology, and origin of the Jewish nation; to classify the hymns too,