Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/380

348 BOOK

first sight of the world, the first consciousness of existence, had forever impressed and implanted in the human mind," ^ the idea of a real relation with this Unchangeable Being could be awakened in men only when they began to feel that their existence was not bounded to the span of a few score years.

Semitlc^"*^ A twofold influence, however, was at work, and it produced Mono- substantially the same results with the Semitic as with the Aryan races. Neither could be satisfied with effects while seeking for a Cause; and the many thoughts as to the nature of this Creative Power would express themselves in many names. The Vedic gods especially resolve themselves into a mere collection of terms, all denoting at first different aspects of the same idea ; and the con- sciousness of this fact is strikingly manifested by the long line of later interpreters. A monstrous overgrowth of unwieldy mythology has sprung up round these names, and done its deadly work on the minds of the common people ; but to the more thoughtful and the more truthful, Indra and Varuna, Dyaus and Vishnu, remained mere terms to denote, however inadequately, some quality of the Divine Nature.^ But the Vedic Indra and Dyaus might have a hundred epithets, and alike in the East and West, as the meaning of these epithets was either in part or wholly forgotten, each name came to denote a separate being, and suggested for him a separate mythical history. Thus the Hindu sun-god Surya was represented among the Hellenic tribes not only by HeUos and Phoibos, but by Herakles and Perseus, Theseus and Bellerophon, Kephalos, Endymion, Narkissos, Kadmos, Oidipous, Meleagros, Achilleus, Tantalos, Ixion, Sisyphos, and many more. The Vedic Dahana reappeared not only as Daphne and Athene, but as Eurydike, Eur}'phassa, lole, lokaste, Danae, Briseis, Aphrodite, Europe, Euryganeia, with other beings, for most of whom life had less to off'er of joy than of grief. But although the fortunes of these beings varied indefinitely, although some were exalted to the highest heaven and others thrust down to the nethermost hell and doomed to a fruitless toil for ever and ever, yet they were all super-human, all beings to be thought of with fear and hatred if not with love, and some of them were among the gods who did the bidding of Zeus himself, or were even mighty enough to thwart his will. Thus these names remained no longer mere appellations denoting different aspects of the character of the same being ; and from the Dyaus, Theos, and Deus, of Hindus, Greeks, and Latins, sprung the Deva, Theoi, Dii, and the plural form stereotyped the polytheism of the

• Max Muller, " Semitic Monotheism," Chips^ ii. 363.

• Colebrooke, Essays, i. 24, et seq.