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 The Beginnings of Hindu Theosophy 241

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2. “Who gives life’s breath and is of strength the giver, At whose behest all gods do act obedient, Whose shadow is immortality and likewise deathm What god shall we revere with our oblation?

3.. “The king, who as it: breathes and as it shuts its eyes, The world of life alone cloth rule with might, Two-footed creatures and four~footed both controls” What god shall we revere with our oblation?

4. “Through whose great might arose these snow-capped mountains, Whose are, they say, the sea and heavenly river, Whose arms are these directions of the space” What god shall we revere with our oblation ? ”

Not until we come to the tenth stanza does this omnipotent god who so far has not betrayed his name, unless We so regard the epithet “Golden Germ ” in the ﬁrst stanza, reveal himself as Prajapati:

IO. ‘ ‘Prajapati, thou art the enemand there ’5 no other” Who dost encompass all these born entities ! Whate’er we wish while offering thee oblations, May that be ours ! May we be lords of riches ! ”

It is easy to feel both the inferiority and the greater convenience of this Creator God who lords it over everything, without exactly having estab- lished any particular mental or moral claim to his prerogatives. As compared with the sheer philo-

SOphic “ That Only,” the one thing without humanly 16