Page:The Religion of the Veda.djvu/245

 The Beginnings of Hindu Theosophy :22

record of any period of Hindu thought of which we can say deﬁnitely that it was wanting in the highest: and most strenuous thought, from the time of the riddle-hymn of Dirghntnmas and the creatiomhymn,‘ to the modern Vodnntins and liurmnnhansns of the type of Ramakrishna. and Vivekananda.

To begin With, negatively speaking, there are at a. very early time traces of scepticism. The old myth ologicul gods in strong flesh tints are just the least bit disconcerting. There are those who begin to say of the gods : “They are not,” and, doubtless, there is a growing number of those who begin to weaken in that faith (grade/ta) which means monotonously sacriﬁce, and gifts to the Brahmans. The way in which the Veda, insists upon this faith shows that it could not always be taken for granted. Especially the god Indra who is a. good deel of a Bombastes Furioso must have presented himself to the eye of

the more enlightened as a brummagern god, tricky, braggart, drunken, and immoral. Indra, like Zeus, will have his ﬂing. There is a. story about himself and a. lady by the name of Ahalyét in which he assumes the outer form of that lady’s august priestly husband for his own purposes, and this as well as other treacherous acts are a fruitful source of moral“ ising in the later Veda. Even in the RigN’eda, if

‘ Rig—Veda 1. 164 and 10. 129.