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He conceived progeny in himself; with his mouth he created the gods...." This account of the creation is characteristic of Hindoo thought as it passes from the frank admiration of nature, which distinguishes the Vedic period, to what more nearly approaches theosophic speculation. Yet there is no genuine break with the animism of primitive times.
When with the aid of even such austere penances and of offerings devoutly given in sacrifices, we failed to have a sight of the great Deity, how, indeed, can you expect to behold Him so easily? Narayana is a Great Being, He is the Creator of the universe. He is adorned in sacrifices with offerings of clarified butter and other food dedicated with the aid of Vedic mantras.
The article, which was significantly headed "The potency of Vedic prayers," recalled various cases in which the Vedas lay down the duty of retaliation upon "alien" oppressors. "To kill such people involves no sin, and when Kshatriyas and Vaidhyas do not come forward to kill them, Brahmans should take up arms and protect religion.
Of course, the early Vedic literature has never lost its influence as the holy and inspired source of all knowledge to the Hindu race; but we have seen how much more potential were the Brahmanas and the Upanishad philosophy drawn from the Vedas, than were those sacred oracles themselves; how the Brahmanas riveted the chains of priestcraft and caste, and how the philosophies invigorated the intellect of the people at a time when they were most in danger of sinking into the torpor of ignorance and base subserviency to ritual and sacrifice; how it gave to the better classes the courage to rise up in rebellion and throw off every yoke, and think for themselves.
The husband entering the womb of the wife cometh out himself in the form of the son. And the son that is so born unto persons cognisant of the Vedic Mantras rescueth the spirits of deceased ancestors. By a son one conquereth the three worlds. By a son's son, one enjoyeth eternity. And by a grandson's son great-grand-fathers enjoy everlasting happiness.
We may be sure that we possess not perhaps the exact words of the Vedic poets, but what were believed about 600 B.C. to be their exact words, and there is no reason to doubt that this is a substantially correct version of the hymns as recited several centuries earlier .
During the many centuries that this terrible practice prevailed, the Brahmans had appealed to a certain Vedic text for their justification, and had claimed to be rigidly fulfilling the institutes of Manu, which contain for them the interpretation of Vedic law.
"'Bhishma said, "Those who eat forbidden food without being observant of the sacrifices and vows ordained in the Vedas are regarded as wilful men. Those, on the other hand, who eat such food in the observance of Vedic sacrifices and vows and induced by the desire of fruits in the shape of heaven and children, ascend to heaven but fall down on the exhaustion of their merits."
It has been the customary and perhaps inevitable method of writers on Pantheism to trace its main idea back to the dreams of Vedic poets, the musings of Egyptian priests, and the speculations of the Greeks.
The religious ideas expressed in such compositions varied with time and place, but they show a general tendency toward a monolatrous or henotheistic point of view and toward higher ethical and spiritual feeling. Many of the Egyptian hymns seem to be substantially monotheistic, and the same thing is true of the Babylonian, the Assyrian, and the Vedic.
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