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SANSKRIT 
 
 KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
SANSKRIT 
 
 AND ITS 
 
 KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Stutiies in Comparatt&e Jls^&ot'^SS^ 
 
 BY 
 
 LAURA ELIZABETH POOR. 
 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS. 
 
 1880. 
 
Copyright, 1880, 
 By Laura Elizabeth Poor. 
 
 University Press: 
 John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 
 

 PREFACE. 
 
 This is not an encyclopaedia: therefore every 
 author will not be found in it. It is an attempt, 
 first, so to interest people in the new discoveries 
 in literature as to induce them to study for them- 
 selves ; in order to do this, only the greatest 
 writers have been mentioned, and long extracts 
 given from their works to illustrate the opinions 
 stated ; second, to put all literature upon that 
 new basis which has been created by the new 
 sciences of comparative philology and compara- 
 tive mythology. For this reason the greatest 
 space has been given to the Sanskrit literature, 
 which caused these discoveries, contains so many 
 elements of all literature, and is so much less 
 familiar. Some apology is perhaps necessary for 
 writing anything upon the Greek philosophers 
 and historians. But I was requested to add this 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 chapter. The chapter on modern literature formed 
 part of the original plan. If any should consider 
 it irrelevant to these new discoveries, I should 
 say, on the contrary, that the whole book is but 
 a leading-up to that; for modern literature is the 
 most elaborate expression of those ideas whose 
 origin and growth I have endeavored to trace. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter • Page 
 
 I. The Origin of Literature 1 
 
 II. Brahmaxism and the Maha Bharata . . 37 
 
 III. Buddhism and the Ramayana .... 80 
 
 IV. Sanskrit Philosophy, Fable, and Drama 109 
 V. The Persian Literature, — Aryan and 
 
 Semitic 143 
 
 VI. Comparative Mythology of the Greek 
 
 Poetry and Drama 172 
 
 VII. Greek Philosophy and History .... 210 
 VIII. Comparative Mythology of the Latin 
 
 AND Keltic Literatures 229 
 
 IX. Comparative Mythology of the Teutonic 
 
 Literature. — Scandinavian Families . 267 
 X. Comparative Mythology of the Teutonic 
 Literature. — Anglo-Saxon and Ger- 
 man Families 298 
 
 I XI. Medieval Hymns, and Comparative My- 
 thology OF the Medieval Ballads . . 329 
 
 XII. Comparative Mythology of Slavonic 
 
 Literature 366 
 
 XIII. The Modern Poetry of Europe .... 405 
 
 Partial List of Books Consulted 453 
 
 Index 457 
 
SANSKRIT 
 
 AOT) ITS KINDEED LITEEATUEES. 
 CHAPTEE I 
 
 THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 
 
 IPEOPOSE to write about the literature of different 
 nations and different centuries. I wish to show 
 that this literature is not many, but one ; that the same 
 leading ideas have arisen at epochs apparentl}' far 
 separated from each other ; that each nation, however 
 isolated it may seem, is, in reality, a link in the great 
 chain of development of the human mind : in other 
 words, to show the unit}- and continuit}^ of literature. 
 
 This has only been possible within a few years. To 
 the despairing school-boy of fifty years ago the histories 
 of Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Eomans, or Greeks, were 
 so man}' detached pieces of information to be fixed in the 
 memory by dreary plodding. But the moment the mind 
 realizes the might}' truth that one nation is connected 
 with all others, its history becomes delightful and 
 inspiring ; because we trace its method of reproducing 
 the ideas we had met elsewhere. And it is to the 
 Sanskrit language that we owe this entire change in our 
 standpoint. 
 
 Our subject in this chapter is the origin of literature ; 
 but before we reach it we ought to have, therefore, a 
 
 I 
 
;i';SA>^^KJ[il'r AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 general idea of the Sanskrit language, its enormous 
 importance, and its relations to modern science. Max 
 IMuller says, "The discovery of Sanskrit is in many 
 respects etjiially important, in some even more important, 
 than the revival of Greek scholarship in the fifteenth 
 century ; " that is the Renaissance. 
 
 Former] 3' Greek and Latin were the boundary of 
 knowledge in the direction of literature. Real students 
 may liuve devoted a few thoughts to the ancient Egyp- 
 tians ; but the average scholar who had conquered these 
 literatures felt a serene consciousness of having explored 
 tlie farthest domain of human thought in one line. Men 
 were even satisfied to devote a lifetime to poring over 
 one CJreek traged}' : Init within tlie last lumdred 3'ears 
 a new language with its literature has become known, 
 which has revolutionized all preconceived ideas ; created 
 two new sciences, and possibly three. These are 
 comparative philology ; that is, the stud}' of different 
 languages : comparative mytholog}', the study of differ- 
 ent religions : and Sir Henry Sumner Maine thinks that 
 another science will soon be crvstalHzed, called com- 
 parative jurisprudence, the study of the laws of different 
 nations. 
 
 A hundred years ago Sir William Jones and other 
 KnglishnuMi living in India heard of a literary language 
 of the Hindoos called Sanskrit. The name means a '* com- 
 pleted " or " perfected" dialect in distinction from the 
 Prakrit or " natural " dialect. It was a spoken language 
 at the time of Solomon, 1015 n.c, also of Alexander, 
 3-4 B. c, but for the last two thousand years it has been 
 kept alive like Latin in Kurope, by grammars and diction- 
 aries, and an educated caste of men. Thev studied this 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 
 
 3 
 
 language, "and were amazed to find that it contained many 
 words resembling those of the European languages ; for 
 example : — 
 
 English. 
 
 Sanskrit. 
 
 Zend. 
 
 Latin. 
 
 Irish ) 
 Keltic. / 
 
 Gothic. » 
 Teutonic, j 
 
 Father 
 
 pitar 
 
 patar * 
 
 pater 
 
 athair 
 
 fadar 
 
 Mother 
 
 matar 
 
 matar 
 
 mater 
 
 mathair 
 
 
 Brother 
 
 bhratar 
 
 bratar 
 
 f rater 
 
 brathair 
 
 brothar 
 
 Sister 
 
 svasar 
 
 quahar 
 
 soror 
 
 sulr 
 
 svistar 
 
 Daughter 
 
 duhitar 
 
 dughdhar 
 
 
 dear 
 
 dauhtar 
 
 Door 
 
 dvar 
 
 
 fores 
 
 dor 
 
 daur 
 
 Two 
 
 do 
 
 du 
 
 duo 
 
 
 
 Lord vis-patar or tribe father 
 
 Slavic. 
 
 weizpater. 
 
 They published a gi'ammar of the language and trans- 
 lations from the literature in 1785, 1787, 1789, 1794, 
 and thus threw open Sanskrit to the European mind. 
 Learned men of all nations eagerh^ studied and com- 
 mented upon these books. Max Muller says, " The first 
 who dared boldh* to face both the facts and conclusions 
 of Sanskrit scholarship was the German poet, Frederic 
 Schlegel. He was not a great scholar, many of his 
 statements have since been proved erroneous ; but he 
 was a man of genius, and when a new science is to be 
 created, the imagination of the poet is wanted even more 
 than the accuracy of the scholar." 
 
 Man}- minds contributed to the great- work, and the 
 new science of comparative philology was created. 
 Max Muller sa3's, " I ma}- express my conviction that 
 the science of language (comparative philology) will yet 
 enable us to withstand the extreme theories of the 
 evolutionists, and to draw a hard and fast line between 
 
4 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 spirit and matter, between man and brute." In brief 
 these are its conclusions. First : if a word is essentially 
 the same in several langua.<res, it must have existed in 
 the parent tongue from which all are descended ; there- 
 fore language is the most reliable proof of relationship 
 between nations. Second; if this be so, the whole 
 human race may be divided into four families and lan- 
 guages, with four great streams. These are, — 
 
 1 . The 'Chinese race : this language is the only relic of 
 the first forms of human speech, being made up of words 
 of one syllable, and to the student of language, the 
 philologist, it is far more interesting and valuable than 
 the completed tongues, such as Sanskrit, Greek, or 
 Latin. It shows the real character of language left to 
 develop itself in its own way. To illustrate what is 
 meant I will just indicate in the briefest way that there 
 are three stages of language : The first is monosyl- 
 labic, ''such a deed would l)e like man." The second 
 stage is agglutinative where the root remains distinct 
 from the addition "manlike. Godlike." The third 
 stage, is inflexional, where the root and inflexions are 
 so interwoven as to be no longer distinguishable, 
 "manly," "godly." The Chinese civilization was the 
 third earliest in the world. Its earliest chronicle dates 
 from ir)00 H.c. 
 
 2. The Turanian races, including most of the origuial 
 inhabitants of Asia ; tlie IMongolians in India ; the 
 ;Mantchn Tartars in China ; the Finns ; the Lapps ; the 
 Samoyedes in Northern Eur()i)e ; the Turks, Hungari- 
 ans, Bulgarians of Southern Europe, — the Hungarians 
 and 15ulgarians being the only Turanian races who have 
 embraced Chrislianilv, — the Mexicans, Peruvians, In- 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITEKATURE. 5 
 
 dians of North and Central America. Some authori- 
 ties inchide the Pelasgi in Greece, the Etruscans in Ital}', 
 but Mommsen calls them Aryan. The Eg3'ptians were 
 formerl}^ called Turanian, but now are said to have a 
 mixed nationalit}'. Their dialects are also very valu- 
 able to the philologist, as marking the second, aggluti- 
 native stage of language. The Turanian races are al- 
 wa3-s tomb builders. These tombs are sometimes 
 mounds, — especiall}' in Greece, Italy, and America. 
 From the implements found in Etruscan tombs and Pe- 
 ruvian mounds we know that the}^ used gold, silver, and 
 copper, and that the}' manufactured bronze. They wej'e, 
 indeed, more civilized than their Arj-an invaders, but 
 these latter conquered, because they knew the use of 
 iron. 
 
 3. The Semitic races include the Jews, the Arabs, 
 the Phoenicians, the Carthaginians, the Mesopotamians, 
 — probably the native inhabitants of Nineveh, Bab}'- 
 lon, and Ass3Tia. Their languages are of the third 
 stage, inflexional. The}' played an important part in 
 flie world while the Aryans were living quietly at home. 
 The Chaldeans, the Moabites, the Edomites, belong to 
 them, and perhaps parti}' the Egyptians. This Egyp- 
 tian civilization is the oldest in the world. Menes, 
 their king, dates back 5000 B.C., and their civilization 
 culminated and began to decline 3000 b.c. The Chal- 
 dean civilization was the second : its earliest chronicle 
 is 2234 B.C. 
 
 4. The conquering Aryan race, whose languages be- 
 long to the third stage, the inflexional. It includes the 
 Hindus^ with their Sanskrit language ; the Persians^ 
 with the Zend ; the Greeks ; the Romans^ with the Latin 
 
6 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 language and its six children, — The Provenyal, French, 
 Itahan, Spanish, Portuguese, and Wallachian ; the Kelts^ 
 to whom belong the Gauls of ancient France ; the 
 Britonsof ancient England, and their modern languages, 
 — the Gaelic of Scotland, the Erse of Ireland, the Kym- 
 ric of Wales ; the Bas Breton of France ; the Teutons^ 
 who include the ancient Goths, Franks, Anglo-Saxons : 
 their modern languages are Icelandic, Danish, Swedish, 
 Norwegian, German, Low Dutch, English. The Shivs^ 
 their name, which comes from sloivan^ to speak, was given 
 b}' themselves. They considered all the rest of the 
 world dumb, because it could not understand them ; 
 the race includes the Russians, Servians, Montenegrins, 
 Poles, Bohemians, Dalmatians, and all these are our 
 kindred. The dark-skinned Hindu of to-day is as much 
 our brother as the fair-haired Norwegian. AVhat was 
 the mother tongue of the Aryan families, what language 
 they spoke before the}' left their native home, and 
 separated in such widel}' scattered directions, we do not 
 know ; all that precedes this period is hopelessl}' lost to 
 us, but these just mentioned are sister tongues with 
 the family likeness plainly' to be seen. 
 
 It is our pride and glory to belong to that conquering 
 Aryan race, wliose beginnings have latel}' been made 
 known to us. In the north-western part of Asia lived 
 these shepherd tribes. The climate was far colder then 
 than now ; the winters were longer ; this we know, be- 
 cause among the words common to all the Aryan fami- 
 lies, and therefore in use in their original home, are 
 none to express great heat or plants dependent upon 
 heat. Tlicv must have lived inland, because there is no 
 common word for ocean. Yet thev must have known 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 7 
 
 something of river navigation, because all the languages 
 have boat, rudder, oar. The}^ had domesticated the 
 animals, and surrounded themselves with oxen, sheep, 
 horses, dogs ; they cultivated the gi'ound, for there are 
 words for flax, barley, wheat, and hemp. The}^ used 
 the moon to measure time, and divided the year into 
 twelve months. Incredible as it ma}^ seem, the}' could 
 count up to one hundred, and they used the same num- 
 bers which we do. We find the words, father, mother, 
 brother, sister, husband, wife : but these at first only 
 expressed the occupations of the persons spoken of; 
 bhratar^ brother, was he who helps ; swasar^ sister, she 
 who consoles and pleases ; pitar^ father, he who protects 
 and supports ; duhitar^ daughter, means a milkmaid. 
 For the cow was even then the most valuable animal. 
 In Sanskrit the patriarch is called " the lord of the 
 cattle;" the morning is the "calling of the cattle." 
 In German, the word abend, evening, means the " un- 
 binding of cattle." In Slavonic the title hospodar, their 
 title for prince, means " the protector of the cattle," 
 from gospada, the word go meaning cow. The.^lwelt in 
 well-built houses with walls around them ; they used 
 carriages with wheels over plainl}' defined roads ; they 
 were divided into families with a name. Those insti- 
 tutions for self-government, which we fondl}' suppose to 
 be the prerogative of the Teutonic famil}', originated 
 before the Aryans left their common home. At first 
 the famil}' existed, entirelj' independent of an}- ex- 
 ternal authority. Each householder united witli the 
 others to form villages, which had their own magistrates ; 
 these again formed a tribe, subject to a feudal lord, vis 
 pitar, the "people's father." These village communi- 
 
8 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ties have survived every change of dvnast}' in India, 
 and continue to this da}-. It ennobles human nature 
 that such ideas should have arisen spontaneoush'. For 
 family life implies affection, as law, respect, for others ; so 
 our ancestors were not sohtarj- savages, but five thou- 
 sand 3'ears ago the\' were living together in peace and 
 good government in happ}' families. But the words of 
 the different Ar3'an languages which exp^ss wild beasts, 
 weapons of war and of hunting, are quite different ; and, 
 since a new word marks a new condition, we know that 
 the}- separated. It has been discovered that the Khiva 
 desert, stretching between the Caspian Sea and the Sea 
 of Aral, has been foi'med by the shrinkage of these two 
 seas. Once fertile land was there, but the desert caused 
 the migrations of the Ar3-ans westward. Each branch 
 went on a different path. "Wherever it paused it con- 
 quered the native Turanian tribes, the original inhabi- 
 tants of the land, and amalgamated their language with 
 its own, until a new tongue was formed. 
 
 Such are the astonishing historical facts revealed to us 
 b}- the cgmparison of words with the Sanskrit words, — 
 facts that were undreamed of one hundred years ago, 
 and scoffed at when first proclaimed. But they are as 
 certain as a mathematical demonstration, and univcrsalh' 
 accepted to-da^'. 
 
 The inquiries awakened were pushed still further. 
 The gods and goddesses of the Sanskrit literature 
 seemed strangely like those of Greek literature. The 
 m3thologies of all the Aryan races were carefully com- 
 pared ; the revolutionary inferences were carried on till a 
 result was obtained wliich seemed at first incredible, and 
 the new science of comparative mytholog}- claimed its 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 9 
 
 place among the other sciences. It must be said that 
 its conclusions are not universalh' adopted as 3'et, but 
 the}' are fast becoming so among the most critical 
 scholars. 
 
 When the simple-hearted Aryan saw the sun go down 
 at night and disai)pear, he cried out that the sun was 
 dead, just as in French we sa}- "the fire is dead," le 
 feu est mort, instead of " the fire has gone out." When 
 the darkness settled down upon the earth, he said that 
 an enem}' had killed the sun. " Will the sun ever come 
 back to us," he cried in terror. When the dawn gradu- 
 ally drove away this darkness, and nature and man be- 
 gan a new life, he thought she was a real person who 
 awoke the world and brought back the sun. When, 
 finalh", the sun itself came up in its light and splendor, 
 it seemed to him a being of might}' power. Its beams 
 shone like spears, and its heat dried up the dew. So 
 mj'thology is called " a disease of language," and com- 
 parative mythology teaches that the gods and goddesses 
 of the Aryan races are onl}' nature personified ; its 
 powers put into human form. A few simple objects 
 were personified in as man}' ways as the unrestrained 
 imagination of these child-like people could invent, and 
 gave rise to a host of gods and goddesses. Bt/u meant 
 originally the bright shining sky ; the heaven next it 
 became the Dyaus pitar, — the heaven father, the protec- 
 tor. This is the first name given to a god, and we are 
 sure that this heaven father was worshipped before the 
 Aryans left their native home, because we find Zeus- 
 Pater in Greek, Jupiter in Latin, Zio and Tuisco in Ger- 
 man, Tyr in Norse. The course of the sun from his 
 rising to his setting became the life of some god ; he 
 
10 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 has a struggling infancy, carh' prosperitj' with a beloved 
 bride ; then the bride of his 3'outh is torn from him, and 
 he goes forth to toils and dangers undertaken for the 
 good of another. He serves beings meaner than him- 
 self; finall}', after a fierce battle with dark powers 
 which obstruct him in ever}' wa}', come rest and victory 
 and death, and reconciliation wdth his abandoned bride. 
 That is the sun struggles through the clouds which ob- 
 struct his rising ; leaves the dawn behind ; is covered by 
 dark clouds which hide him at night, as he sinks out of sight 
 and sets. The twilight darkness comes, the soft and ten- 
 der bride soothes the dying hours of her husl)and. Again 
 the sun loves the dawn, that is Apollo loves Daphne ; 
 she flies before him ; he tries to overtake her, but of 
 course the dawn must disappear before the sun, and 
 Daphne escapes Apollo. Or else the sun dries up the 
 dew ; that is Kephalos kills Procris ; when the sun's 
 scorching heat parches up earth and man, he is slay- 
 ing with his spears, that is his rays, and becomes the 
 enem}' of man. When drought comes, they call the dark 
 clouds which hang near the earth, without giving out rain, 
 a snake or dragon wlio is shutting up the rain in prison. 
 AVheu the thunder rolled, they said this hateful monster 
 was uttering riddles. "When the rain finalh' burst forth, 
 and gave relief to man and beast and the earth, the}' 
 said tlie rain had killed the serpent who was devouring 
 ever3'thing. In Sanskrit Indra slow Vritra, the great 
 serpent ; in Greek Apollo slew the Python ; in Norse 
 Sigurd slew the worm Fafuir ; in the middle ages St. 
 IMicliael conciuered the dragon. Balder, the beautiful, 
 the pride of the Norse pantheon, is the summer, he is 
 light and heat killed by the cold and darkness of winter : 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 11 
 
 the myth is exacth' reversed. The same incidents recur 
 in all the different mythologies. 
 
 Each one has numerous demigods or heroes ; all 
 have invincible weapons, which none but themselves 
 can wield ; the bow of Odysseus, the club of Herakles, 
 tlie sword of Sigurd. They are vulnerable onl}' in 
 one spot, the heel of Achilleus, the e3'es in Isfendyar ; 
 or by one weapon, the firebrand of Meleagros, the 
 thorn of Siegfried. All these heroes have fair faces 
 and golden locks flowing over their shoulders. They 
 all abandon the bride of their youth ; the}' all toil 
 and suffer for others ; they are subject to strange fits 
 of gloom and inactivity, such as the wrath of Achilleus, 
 the anger of Rustem.* In the end, the}' overcome 
 this, break forth in their earl}' cheerfulness, conquer 
 their enemies, and die on a blazing funeral pile. It 
 is again the sun ; its rays changed into golden locks, 
 into invincible spears or arrows. It leaves the dawn, 
 struggles through dark clouds, and sets hidden by flame- 
 colored clouds. These are the shirt of flame which en- 
 wrap and kill Herakles, — simply a magnificent red sun- 
 set. It is a most amusing occupation to trace these 
 numerous forms of the solar myth. Ixion bound upon 
 the burning wheel is the sun. Tantalus, from whom 
 food and drink recede, is the sun, whose beams dry up 
 the water and the fruit. Sisyphus continuing to roll the 
 stone up the hill from which it always rolls back, is the 
 sun which no sooner reaches the highest point of the 
 sky, than it is obliged to go down again. 
 
 The comparison has not onl}' been applied to the gods 
 of mythology, the heroes of epic poetry, but also to the 
 popular ballad heroes of the middle ages, and even 
 
12 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 AVilliam Tell is reduced to a solar myth ; his unerring 
 arrows to the rays of the sun, alike dangerous to friend 
 or foe. Historical investigations have proved that he 
 did not exist literall}- in the form under which we know 
 him, and now the comparative mythologist claims him 
 as the lineal descendant of Indra and Apollo and Od3-s- 
 seus : he bends the bow which none but he can wield. 
 
 Of course this is the merest sketch ; I shall allude to 
 these gods and heroes as we come to them in each liter- 
 ature, and fill out the outline. AVe may perhaps be 
 more ready to accept the conclusions of comparative 
 mytholog}' when we have studied our own English 
 poetr}', or gazed upon Guido's frescoed ceiling where 
 the dawn flies before the chariot of the sun, and the 
 bright hours follow after in human shape. In fact it is 
 the natural spontaneous utterance of the poetic mind in 
 ever}' age and country, afterwards accepted as a literal 
 fact. 
 
 The theory has been confirmed from a despised and 
 unexpected source. That the gods were changed into the 
 heroes of epics, that the}' even descended to the popular 
 ballads might be acknowledged. But how can we be- 
 lieve what is exi)ected that even the nurser}' tales of 
 the different Aryan families are but another form of the 
 solar myth? It seemed at first too absurd, but the 
 German scholar Grimm threw "off the yoke of classi- 
 cal tyranny," and asserted that the popular tale had a 
 science of its own, and a meaning worthy to be explored. 
 It is true that Jack tlie Giant Killer, the Sleeping 
 Beaut}^ and Faithful John, have found a parallel in 
 Sanskrit nursery tales told to little Hindu children; in 
 the volumes collected from old peasants by tlie broth- 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATUE. 13 
 
 ers Grimm in German}' ; in the Gaelic legends, still 
 lingering in the Highlands of Scotland ; in the Xorse 
 stories which shorten the long winter evenings in Iceland. 
 It is pleasant to find our beloved fair}- tales taking so im- 
 portant a place in literature after being- frowned down 
 b}' the stern guardians of our childhood. It is poetic 
 justice. The same properties are found everj'where. 
 The sandals of Hermes become the seven-leagued boots 
 of Jack the Giant Killer. The helmet of Hades becomes 
 the invisible cap of Fortunatus. The Hoh' Grail which 
 the bad cannot see or touch becomes the horse-shoe nailed 
 up for good luck, because the bad cannot touch it. 
 The loveh' Sleeping Beaut}', who pricks her finger with 
 a spindle, is the cai'th frozen by the sharp sudden touch 
 of winter. The many dead princes who strive to reach 
 and awaken her are the suns which rise and set in the 
 first bleak days of spring. " The fated prince with 
 golden locks " is the sun of summer. With its ardent 
 kiss it awakens the white earth from its long winter 
 sleep, and she sleeps in every land and every literature. 
 The talisman which, for one moment, opens a mountain 
 or a cave and reveals marvellous treasures within, is 
 found in Aladdin, in Tannhailser and the Breton folk- 
 tales. It is an arrow or a flower, or the name of some 
 gi'ain ; and it means the lightning which splits the rock. 
 Out of a vast number of illustrations I have taken these 
 familiar ones, but they are sufficient to explain the 
 theory. And so before the Aryans left their common 
 home, and separated, they had in their memory these 
 nursery tales which have developed into the folk-lore of 
 different Aryan families. It is quite impossible that 
 there should have been any intercourse between the 
 
14 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 tribes, and 3-et the resemblances are even more striking 
 than in mj-tholog}*, epic and ballad. Folk-lore becomes 
 a most important witness for the two sciences. 
 
 When we realize the beanng of these new ideas, and 
 the vast change the}' will produce in human thought, 
 3'ou will agree that I have not over-estimated the 
 importance of Sanskrit in its twofold branching, the 
 language and the literature. The grammatical structure 
 of the language is not connected with our subject, 
 so I will go on at once to the delightful literature. 
 
 To India avc must go for our pioneers — I had almost 
 said our masters — in every department of literature but 
 one, that of history. The Hindoo dreamed and speculated 
 and argued, but he did not observe or record the events 
 of external, every-day life. There is no literar}' or politi- 
 cal history in Sanskrit, so that the chronolog}- of every 
 work must be judged from internal evidence alone. It 
 is now fully recognized that a Inmn to a god or gods is 
 the earliest utterance of the human mind in ever}' nation. 
 ^ ccordingly in Sanskrit the first book is a general collec- 
 tion of hymns ; it is called a "Veda." The word means 
 "highest knowledge," and there are in Sanskrit four 
 Vedas. The oldest and besf of them is called the Rig or 
 praise Veda ; the word liig meaning praise. It contains 
 one thousand and seventeen hymns written in poetry- in 
 stanzas of two lines called astohas. The Aryan conquerors 
 of India were the last to leave the early home. They are 
 supposed to have entered Jndia about 3100 b. c, and the 
 oldest of the hymns of the Rig Veda are supposed by the 
 best authorities to have been written 2400 b. c, the last 
 perliaps ir)00 B.C. Each Brahman was obliged to learn 
 by heart the one thousand and se>enteen hymns during 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 15 
 
 the twelve years that he passed as a student. The}" were 
 transmitted by repetition from lather to son, — handed 
 down as sacred heirlooms in different families. This 
 seems a most astonishing power of memor3\ But even 
 at the present day there are thousands of Brahmans in 
 India who know the whole of the Rig Veda by heart, and' 
 can repeat it. Finally they were written down on palm- 
 leaves about 1000 B. c. But the four Vedas themselves 
 contain no mention of books or of writing. 
 
 The Rig Veda was sung in the Indus Valle}', the 
 country of the seven rivers, before the Aryan invaders 
 had penetrated far into India. Therefore it is our 
 authority for the earliest manners and customs of our 
 ancestors as well as for their simple and childlike^ 
 beliefs, and has a double value, — one to the historian 
 and philologist, the other to the comparative mytholo- 
 gist. Max Miiller sa3's, "The whole historj^ of the 
 world would be incomplete without this first cliapter 
 in the life of Ar3'an humanity which has been pre- 
 served to us in Vedic literature." There are different 
 stages of civilization distincth' marked. At first each 
 head of a famih' was a warrior, a poet, and a priest. 
 He raised a single altar of turf and kindled upon it 
 the sacred fire, which was kept perpetualh' burning 
 ever after. Before ever\^ meal it was his office to throw 
 upon the sacred fire some portion of the food, to pour 
 out upon the ground a part of the drink, to call upon the 
 gods to receive his offering and grant his requests. 
 
 For what then did the Hindoo Aryans pray ? Their 
 h}Tnns are the outer}' of a child to a Father for temporal 
 good. They are invading India and wish to settle 
 there, so they cry out for lands and cattle, for riches 
 
16 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 and many children, for power and a long life, for a 
 happ3' immortality after death, for victory over their 
 enemies. The h3'mns are as simple as the}' are sincere. 
 They call down curses ; they shout exulting songs of 
 victor}' ; but they ver}' seldom give an}- rules for action 
 or an}- precepts of morality. They are somewhat vague 
 and incoherent but charming nevertheless, beautiful 
 from their very simplicity. They are fresh, vigorous, and 
 poetical, and uttered with absolute, unquestioning faith. 
 "Whoever asks obtains," is tlie key-note to them all. 
 In most of them the worshipper praises and flatters the 
 god, offers him the soma juice, and calmly asks for 
 temporal blessings in return. Max Miiller says, " The 
 language of the simple prayers is more intelhgible to us 
 than anything we find in the literature of Greece or 
 Rome, and there are here and there expressions of faith 
 and devotion in which even a Christian can join without 
 irreverence." 
 
 Who then are the gods upon whom he calls? First, 
 the spirits of his dead ancestors, and therefore different 
 for every family : next the aspects of nature personified 
 with exquisite poetry, and so distinctly described that 
 they might almost be painted. But we must remember 
 that there must have been a long process of development, 
 centuries before their beliefs reached even the stage in 
 which we find them in the Rig Veda 1000 b. c. Max 
 Miiller has succeeded, in his lectures delivered in 1878, 
 in bringing vividly before us the gradual awakenings 
 which led up to even that degree of expression. The 
 Aryans called a river the " runner" or "noisy," or " the 
 mother which nourished the fields," or the " defender" 
 as forming a boundary between two countries ; we 
 
THE OKIGIN OF LITERATURE. 17 
 
 say "it rains," the}^ said "the rainer rains," "the blower 
 blows : " eveiything was active, and therefore must be a 
 person. It was almost impossible to get rid of the idea 
 of a person connected with ever3'thing active. It is 
 generall}' supposed that gender was the cause of personi- 
 fication ; on the contrary, it was the result. When the}'" 
 wished to say that a thing simply existed, then came a 
 great difficulty to these pioneers of thought and its 
 expression, which is language. " As the most general 
 act of all human beings is to breathe, the}' said things 
 breathe, when we sa}' things are. The verb as means 
 to breathe ; and in Sanskrit those who breathe, who are, 
 are called Asura, the oldest name for the living, breathing 
 gods. The same verb as exists in Norse, where the gods 
 are called ^sir : it is our English is. When the 
 word to breathe was found inconvenient, as for instance 
 if applied to a tree, they took the root bhu, to grow; 
 and called the earth, the growing one ; in English to be. 
 When something vaster was wanted, the root vas, to 
 dwell ; English, I was : they applied to those things 
 which could not breathe or grow. We say the sun is 
 there ; they said the sun breathes : we say the moon 
 exists or is ; they said the moon grows : we say the 
 earth exists ; they said the earth dwells." These were 
 called deva, or bright ; graduall}', during a thousand 
 years, one quality shared by many objects came to be 
 used as a general term for the gods : the devas, the 
 bright ones. Almost every object which is semi-tangi- 
 ble is included amongst them. Mountains and rivers ; 
 the sun, dawn, these can be seen, though not actuall}^ 
 touched. The next step embraced in the devas only 
 those which could be heard, not touched, nor seen, — 
 
18 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the thunder, the wind, the storm. Then they called the 
 sun Uke light, next the bringer of light ; the sk}-, 
 bending over and protecting the earth like a father, next 
 a lather. Now these are wholh' intangible. The}' are 
 asked to listen ; to grant favors ; to protect men, and 
 this point must have been reached before the Aryans 
 separated, since we find the name Heaven-Father in 
 ever}' Aryan language. 
 
 Fortunatel}', we are able to go more into details, 
 and see how the gods of other mythologies took shape, 
 by examining closel}' the Sanskrit devas. There is 
 some doubt about the number of them, but they are 
 usuall}' said to be twelve. If there are fewer than 
 in the other mj'thologies, it is because ideas are in an 
 elementar}' condition ; and the characteristics of the 
 gods are not so often interchanged, as in the more 
 crystallized state of Greek and Teutonic mythology. 
 They are sometimes interchanged, and each god is at 
 times represented as supreme and absolute over all the 
 others. There are no settled families. The father 
 sometimes becomes the son ; the brother becomes the 
 husband ; she who is the wife in one hymn becomes the 
 mother in another. But this very indistinctness and 
 difference show us how naturall}' and gradually all Aryan 
 mythology grew up. It was but the utterance of childish 
 minds about the world around them, feeling their way 
 towards clearness. This makes the incalculable value 
 of the Rig Veda. MUller says: '* "While Ilesiod gives 
 us a past theogony, we see in the Veda the tlieogon\- 
 itself ; the very birth and growth of the gods, that is of 
 the word for gods ; and in its later hynnis the subse- 
 quent development of these divine conceptions." In its 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 19 
 
 unsettled and growing myths we have the foundation of 
 the gay and briUiant mythology of the Greeks, as well as 
 the dark and sombre mytholog}' of the Teutons. It 
 contains those elements which have been expanded into 
 such innumerable forms, and which were never under- 
 stood until the}' were illuminated by this oldest book of 
 the world. Max Miiller says, " It is the oldest, because 
 it contains the earliest phases of thought and feeling." 
 
 It is hard to define and limit the work of each god, 
 and his personal character. Dyaus is the most ancient 
 name for the supreme god. It is derived from a root 
 which means to shine, or bright ; and becomes Daevas, 
 in Zend ; Theos, in Greek ; Deus, in Latin ; Divus, in 
 Italian ; Dieu, in French ; Devil, in Enghsh. It meant 
 at first the bright sky, the heaven above us. Among 
 the Hindus, D3'aus, the heaven, married Prithivi, the 
 earth, and the}' became the father and mother of the 
 other Hindu gods. But the sk}-, originally the bright, 
 the Hght-giver, was replaced b}' various gods who rep- 
 resented the ditferent actions of the sky, such as the 
 rain, the storm ; and the power of D3'aus is almost 
 given up to his son, Indra, the rain-bringer. Be- 
 cause the Indian land is parched up b}' the scorching 
 sun, and depends upon the rain for its fertility, the rain 
 is more grateful there than elsewhere. It pours down 
 in resistless torrents, so Indra is a strong impetuous 
 warrior-, drunk with soma juice. He drives a chariot 
 whose rolling wheels are heard far ofi" ; that is the thun- 
 der. It is drawn by pawing and champing steeds, the 
 clouds : he bears a resistless lance ; that is the lightning. 
 The lightning pierced the dark storm-clouds and set free 
 the rain, and thus put an end to the drought. There is 
 
20 SANSKKIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 another explanation of the dark storm-clouds piled up 
 into holfow cavernous forms. The Ar3'ans called the 
 sky a plain ; the bright clouds which wandered over it 
 the}' called cows, guarded by a lovel}' maiden, Sarama, 
 the dawn ; and the dark clouds the}' called a snake shut 
 up in a cave. He was said to have stolen the cows and 
 the maiden, and to have brought them into his hollow 
 cave. So Indra takes on another character. As the sky 
 shines out bright and serene, when a storm has passed 
 away, Indra next becomes the god of the clear, cloudless 
 sky. In this he usurped the character of Dyaus. So 
 the Hindus said that Indra had killed the snake 
 who had stolen treasures and a maiden. I describe 
 this second personification of dark clouds because Indra 
 in this becomes the original of every hero who delivers 
 a distressed damsel by figliting with a monster ; whetlier 
 he is Perseus in Greek ; or St. George in the Middle 
 Ages. We shall meet him many a time. As the bright 
 clear sky, Indra has golden locks and a beard which 
 flashes like gold as he hastens over the heaven. His 
 arrows have a hundred points, and are winged with a 
 thousand feathers. All this sounds so very like the 
 Greek mythology which we learned in our childliood, 
 that it is hard to realize that it grew up in India five thou- 
 sand years ago. 
 
 HYMNS TO INDRA. 
 
 " He who as soon as born is the first of the deities, who has 
 done honor to the gods by his deeds ; he at whose mi^ht 
 heaven and earth are alarmed, and who is known by the great- 
 ness of his strength : he, men, is Indra. 
 
 " He who fixed firm the moving earth, who spread the spa- 
 cious firmament : ho is Tndra. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 21 
 
 " He who, having destroyed Vritra, set free the seven rivers ; 
 who recovered the cows ; who generated fire in the clouds ; who 
 is invincible in battle : he, men, is Indra. 
 
 " He to whom heaven and earth bow down ; he at whose 
 might the mountains are appalled ; he who is drinker of the 
 soma juice ; the firm of frame ; the adamant-armed ; the 
 wielder of the thunderbolt : he, men, is Indra. May we en- 
 velop thee with acceptable praises." 
 
 " Shower er of benefits, destroyer of cities, propitiated by our 
 new songs, reward us with gratifying blessings." 
 
 " Quaff the soma juice, satiate thy appetite, and then fix thy 
 mind on the wealth that is to be given to us." 
 
 " Slayer of Vritra, ascend thy chariot , for thy horses have 
 iDeen yoked by prayer. May the sound of the stone that bruises 
 the soma attract thy mind towards us." 
 
 Inclra is accompanied b}^ the Maruts, the storm winds. 
 This is the same root as the Greek Ares, and the Latin 
 Mars ; and the Teutonic Thor Miolnir, the god of war 
 in each mytholog}^ These Maruts overturn trees and 
 destroy forests ; the}- roar like lions ; they shake the 
 mountains ; they are swift as thought ; the}^ are brothers 
 of whom no one is the elder, no one the younger : this 
 is a perfect picture of the wind ; and in this character 
 of the Maruts we see blind strength and fury without 
 judgment. 
 
 HYMN TO THE MARUTS. 
 
 " 1. For the manly host, the majestic, the w^ise, for the Ma- 
 ruts, bring thou, poet, a pure oflering. Like a workman, 
 wise in his mind and handy, I join together words which are 
 useful at sacrifices. 
 
 " 2. They are born, the tall bulls of Dyaus, the boys of Rudra, 
 the divine, the blameless, pure and bright like suns, scattering 
 raindrops of awful shape like giants. 
 
22 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 " 3. The youthful Maruts, they wlio never grow old, the 
 slayers of the demon, have growTi irresistible like luoiintains. 
 They shake with their strength all beings, even the strongest 
 on earth and in heaven. 
 
 " 4. They deck themselves with glittering ornaments for 
 show; on their chests they fix gold [chains] for beauty ; the 
 spears on their shoulders pound to pieces ; they were born to- 
 gether by themselves, the men of Dyaus. 
 
 " 5. They who confer power, the rovers, the devourers of 
 foes, they make winds and lightnings by their powers. The 
 shakers milk the seventy udders [clouds], roaming around they 
 fill the earth with milk [rain]. 
 
 "7. Mighty are you, powerful, of wonderful splendor, 
 firmly rooted like mountains ; yet lightly gliding along ; you 
 chew up forests, like elephants, when you have assumed vigor 
 among the red flames. 
 
 " 8. Like lions they roar. The far-sighted Maruts, they are 
 handsome like gazelles, the all-knowing. By night, with their 
 spotted deer [that is rain clouds] and with their spears [light- 
 nings] they rouse the companions together, they whose ire 
 through strength is like the ire of serpents. 
 
 " 9. You who march in companies, the friends of man, heroes, 
 whose ire, etc., salute heaven and earth. On the seats of your 
 chariots, Maruts, the lightning stands, visible like light." 
 
 " 12. We invoke with prayer the off'spring of Rudra, the 
 brisk, the bright, the worshipful, the active. Cling for happi- 
 ness' sake to the strong host of the Maruts ; the chasers of the 
 sky, the vigorous, the impetuous. 
 
 " 13. The mortal whom ye, Maruts, protected with your pro- 
 tection, he indeed surpasses people in strength. He carries off 
 food with his horses, treasures with his men ; he acquires hon- 
 orable strength and he prospers. 
 
 " 14. Give, O Maruts, to the worshippers strength, glorious, 
 invincible in battle, wealth-conferring, praiseworthy, known 
 to all men. Let us foster our kith and kin during a hundi-ed 
 winters. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 23 
 
 " 15. Will you then, Mariits, grant unto us wealth, dura- 
 ble, rich ill men, defying all onslaughts ? wealth a hundred 
 and a thousand fold, always increasing ? May he [you] who is 
 [are] rich in prayers [that is the company of the Maruts] come 
 early and soon ! " 
 
 But the wind has a gentler side to its character as it 
 sinks down into a faint breeze. So the Marnts in the 
 Veda ''assume again the form of new-born babes." 
 And this is exactl}^ the story told in Greek of Hermes, 
 as we shall see. 
 
 The soft music which the faint breeze makes becomes 
 the reed pipe of Pan ; the -music of the Sirens ; the 
 lyre of Orpheus, which makes the beasts and trees 
 dance ; the harp of Arion, which chaimed the fishes : 
 the marvellous pipe of the pied piper of Hamelin, in the 
 Middle Ages. The wind as a harper is one of the pri- 
 mar}^ myths, organized before the separation of the 
 Aryans, and found also in two Turanian nations, — the 
 Finns of Northern Europe and the Indians of Central 
 America. There is another office which the wdnd per- 
 forms. It wreaks its liny, uproots the trees, penetrates 
 into the most hidden corners ; then, with a low whistling 
 sound like mocking laughter, it passes on its way. This 
 also is ver}' plainly told in the Greek myth of Hermes, 
 and the peering thief is visible as Peeping Tom of 
 Coventry, who can see through a cranny. 
 
 The sun becomes in Sanskrit several persons as per- 
 forming different acts, — Mitra, Vishnu. The holiest 
 verse in the Vedas is addressed to it. " Earth, Sky, 
 Heaven ! Let us meditate on the most excellent light 
 and power of that generous, sportive, and resplendent 
 sun. May he guide our intellects ! " It does not fill so 
 
24 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 large a place in the Sanskrit as in the other mytholo- 
 gies. As Vishnu, it receives its light from another 
 power. It is called the wide-stepping, and traverses 
 the heavens in three strides. This must be the rising, 
 culminating, and setting of the sun. Vishnu comes for- 
 ward in the later Brahmanical mytholog}-, and there has 
 ten incarnations which are called Avatars. 
 
 Every mythology has its drink of the gods, but in 
 Sanskrit only does it become a person. You will notice 
 that all the h3"mns offer the soma ; it is the moon plant, 
 and its juice becomes a fermented liquor. The Hindu 
 fancied that the intoxication produced bj' it was a higher 
 state of existence than his ordinar}^ life. He felt en- 
 dowed with new powers while under its influence. It 
 seemed to him a gift worthy of the gods, and when he 
 fancied that the}' were angry, he tried to appease them 
 by pouring out libations of the precious juice. Here is 
 one of the most beautiful hymns in the Rig Veda, 
 which is addressed to Soma : — 
 
 " Where there is eternal light, in the world where the smi is 
 placed, in that immortal, imperishable world, place me, O 
 Soma. 
 
 " Where King Vaivasvata reigns, where the secret place of 
 heaven is, where these mighty waters are : there make me im- 
 mortal. 
 
 "Where life is free, in the third heaven of heavens, where the 
 worlds are radiant : there make me immortal. 
 
 " Where wishes and desires are, where tlie place of the bright 
 snn is, where there is freedom and delight : there make me 
 immortal ! 
 
 "Where there is happiness and delight, where joy and plea- 
 snre reside, wliere the desires of our desire are attained : there 
 make me immortal ! " 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 25 
 
 Agni is another god who is distinctively Hindu ; he 
 is the fire ; from the root we have the Latin ignis, the 
 EngUsh ignite ; but the word does not appear in the 
 other Ar3'au famihes as the name of a deit3\ There is 
 no folk-lore connected with him, and his person does 
 not reappear as the other Hindu deities constantl}^ do. 
 The Hindus were struck by its sudden appearing and 
 disappearing; its agile movements, and called it "the 
 quick ; " or by its crackling noise, they said : " neigh- 
 ing like a horse that is greedy for food, it steps out from 
 its strong prison." This is wonderfully descriptive. 
 The first and last hymns of the Rig Veda are addressed 
 to Agni because he was their favorite god. They con- 
 sidered him the messenger between them and heaven, 
 who carried up their offerings to Dyaus-Pitar. If the 
 flame rose bright and clear, they thought their oflTerings 
 were accepted ; if it died down in smoke, that they were 
 refused. They sacrificed clarified butter to him, think- 
 ing it to be his favorite food. Of course, any fire will 
 burn brighter if clarified butter be poured upon it. 
 Agni was the lord and protector of every household. 
 No famil}' could be established until the new-made hus- 
 band had erected an altar, and kindled upon it the 
 sacred fire, which was ever after kept perpetually^ burn- 
 ing. If b}' an}^ misfortune it was extinguished, it could 
 onl}' be lighted again by rubbing together two sticks of 
 wood, by friction ; or by a burning-glass brought down 
 from the sun ; and onl}' the husband or wife could ever 
 touch it. Everj'tliing most sacred was associated witli 
 the household fire, which was thus the bond of union of 
 the family. All this was exactly repeated, among the 
 Romans, in the worship of Vesta. 
 
26 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 • 
 
 And now we come to the loveliest and most widel}' 
 spread of all the Yedic deities, Ushas, the dawn, the 
 same root as our word usher. She was a pure and 
 white-robed being, from whose presence Qxciy darlv 
 thing fled away, night and ghosts, and wild beasts and 
 robbers. In the dawn of India, there is a peculiar 
 whiteness in the atmosphere, a delicious coolness, a 
 serene stillness, which form a refreshing prelude to the 
 heats of the day, and a contrast to the gloom of the 
 night. It is no wonder that the dawn seemed a lovel}- 
 thing to them, as she l)rought back their beloved sun. 
 You will never guess who is the favorite animal of the 
 Veda. It is the ass, because it is the first to awaken 
 and announce the coming of the lovel}' Ushas. She 
 was accompanied by the Aswins, twin horses ; these 
 are morning and evening, since the darkness comes at 
 evening as well as at morning, and these are the origi- 
 nals of the twin brothers whom we meet in ever}' lit- 
 erature like Castor and Pollux. Ushas never grows 
 old, but she makes others old. She reappears as Eos 
 in Greek, as Aurora in Latin, always the same radiant 
 being. 
 
 HYMN TO USIIAS. 
 
 " Ushas, iionrishing all, comes daily like a matron, conduct- 
 ing all transient creatures to decay. 
 
 " The divine and ancient Ushas born again and bright with 
 unchanging hues, wastes away the life ol' a mortal, like the wife 
 of a hunter cutting up the birds. 
 
 " How long is it that the Dawns have risen ? How long will 
 they rise ? 
 
 "Those mortals who beheld the pristine Ushas dawning have 
 passed away ; to us she now is visible, and they approach who 
 will behold her in after times." 
 
THE OBIGIN OF LITERATURE. 27 
 
 ANOTHER. 
 
 " She shines upon us like a young wife, rousing every living 
 being to go to his work. 
 
 " She rose up, spreading far and wide, and moving towards 
 every one. She grew in brightness, wearing her brilliant gar- 
 ment. The mother of the cows [the clouds], the leader of the 
 days, she shone gold-colored, lovely to behold. 
 
 " She, the fortunate, who brings the eye of the god, who 
 leads the white and lovely steed of the sun, the dawn was seen 
 revealed by her rays : with brilliant treasures she follows every 
 one. 
 
 " Shine for us with thy best rays, thou bright Dawn, thou 
 who lengthenest our life, thou, the love of all, who givest us 
 food, who givest us Avealth in cows, horses, and chariots. 
 
 " Thou daughter of the sky, thou high-born, give us riches, 
 high and wide." 
 
 " Thou, who art a blessing when thou art near, drive far away 
 the unfriendly, make the pastures wide, give us safety. Re- 
 move the haters, bring t:teasures ; raise up wealth to the wor- 
 shipper, thou mighty Dawn." 
 
 ANOTHER TO INDRA AND USHAS. 
 
 " This strong and manly deed also thou hast performed, 
 Indra, that thou struckest the daughter of Dyaus, a woman 
 difficult to vanquish. 
 
 " Yes, even the daughter of Dyaus, the magnified, the Dawn, 
 thou, Indra, a great hero, hast ground to pieces. 
 
 " The Dawn rushed off from her crushed car, fearing that 
 Indra, the bull, might strike her. 
 
 " This, her car, lay there, well ground to pieces. She went 
 far away." 
 
 This is the germ of the story of Daphne and of Eu- 
 ropa. The dawn is also called Dahana, and she is 
 
28 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Sarama, who guarded the cows, carried off by a monster 
 (the dark clouds), and rescued 1)3' Indra. 
 
 In Sanskrit she has another name, Ahana, and 
 reappears in Greek as Athene : in the Veda it says that 
 Ahana sprang full-born from the forehead of Dyaus, in 
 Greek that Athene sprang full-born from the forehead 
 of Zeus. The meaning is plain. The dawn is the child of 
 the sky ; as Athene, she possesses the penetrating power of 
 the light, the calm wisdom which pierces through every- 
 thing, as Athene's eyes pierce through every disguise. 
 She has another and unexpected name, — Ahana, the 
 dawn, is also Aphrodite, who springs froin the water ; that 
 is the morning often appears at the edge of the ocean 
 where it seems to join the sk}^, and Aphrodite brings 
 with her the dazzling loveliness of the early morning, 
 and of the sea-foam. There are many other applications, 
 but we have not time for them all. Urvasi is another 
 name, as such she is a nymph married to a mortal hus- 
 band whom she can never see. If she looks upon him, 
 she will vanish. Of course the dawn can never see the 
 sun : one must disappear before the other. So here, in 
 Sanskrit, is the origin of all the stories of beings who 
 cannot gaze upon each other, although united in the 
 closest love. It is Eros and Psyche in Greek ; Cupid 
 and Psyche, in Latin ; Melusina and Count Raymond, 
 of Toulouse, in the Middle Ages ; Beauty and the 
 Beast, in the nursery tale ; and a thousand more. This 
 dawn myth is another of the primar}' Aryan myths, and 
 one of the most fertile. 
 
 The work of all these gods is purely- physical ; but it 
 would be unjust to say that these are their only gods. 
 Max Mullcr says, "Heaven-Father was a better word 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 29 
 
 than fire or storm-wind ; but the Hindu soon perceived 
 that this was too human a name to give to that Infinite 
 whose presence he felt ever3'where." That part of the 
 sk}^ behind the dawn, from which she came every morn- 
 ing, from which light came back to the world, was 
 called Aditi, the boundless, the bej'ond. She was one 
 of their earliest deities ; so this idea of something infi- 
 nite, behind and be3'ond the other deities, was an earl}"" 
 conception. " The thought is so abstract that we have 
 fancied it pureh' modern. There was a visible revela- 
 tion of the infinite in that golden sea of light behind the 
 dawn, something which eluded our grasp while the dawn 
 itself came and went." As light came from the east, 
 it was looked upon as the home of the bright gods ; 
 and then came the thought that the dead had joined 
 these bright gods in their birthplace, the East. Aditi, 
 the boundless, is connected with the thought of im- 
 mortalit}' ; for one poet sang : " Who will give us back 
 to the great Aditi, that I ma}^ see father and mother?" 
 This is one of the first intimations of immortalit3\ In 
 this boundless infinite beyond, the dead must be living 
 with Aditi. 
 
 FUNEEAL HYMN. 
 
 "Approach thoii now the lap of Earth, thy mother, 
 
 The wide-extending Earth, the ever kindly : 
 A maiden soft as wool to him who comes with gifts, 
 
 She shall protect thee from destruction's bosom. 
 Open thyself, Earth, and press not heavily ; 
 
 Be easy of access and of approach to him, 
 As a mollier with her robe her child 
 
 So do thou cover him, Earth." 
 
30 SANSKftIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ANOTHER. 
 
 " Open thy arms, Earth, receive the dead 
 With gentle pressure and with loving welcome ; 
 Embrace him tenderly, e'en as a mother 
 Folds her soft vestment round the child she loves. 
 Soul of the dead, depart : take thou the path — 
 The ancient path — by which our ancestors 
 Have gone before thee . Thou shalt look upon 
 The two kings, mighty Varuna and Yama, 
 Delighting in oblations. Thou shalt meet 
 The fathers, and receive the recompense 
 Of all thy stored-up offerings, above. 
 Leave thou thy sin and imperfection here ; 
 Return unto thy home once more ; assume 
 A glorious form. By an auspicious path 
 Hasten to pass the four-eyed brindled dogs, 
 Advance to meet the fathers who, with hearts 
 Kindly disposed towards tliee, dwell in bliss 
 With Yama ; and do thou, Mighty God, 
 Intrust him to thy guards to bring him to thee. 
 And grant him health and happiness eternal." 
 
 Yama was the judge of the dead. He had a dog 
 with four e^-es and wide nostrils, whom he sent to earth 
 to collect those about to die, something like the Greek 
 dog, Kerberos, a primary myth. This idea of a judge 
 implies a distinction between right and wrong, the good 
 and the bad. Here is the manner in which it arose. 
 
 By the return of day and night, the weekly changes 
 of the moon, the successions of the seasons, gradually 
 grew up a sense of something fixed and settled ; of a 
 law pervading all nature, and as soon as they had formed 
 the thought, they put it into a word, Kita. It ex- 
 pressed at first the settled movement of the sun, the 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATUEE. 31 
 
 path of the sun, which was to them the path of Rita. 
 And so they tried to grasp this unknown power which 
 formed the order of nature, by calUng him Rita. Rita 
 was the power that settled the path of the sun. The 
 sun moved in the path of Rita. The abode of Rita was 
 in the east, and the path of Rita was every day the 
 same ; the moon and the stars also travelled m the path 
 of Pita ; finally every good thing travelled in the path of 
 Rita. Now, there is no translation of this, except the 
 straight path, the right path ; and when it was once un- 
 derstood that the sun, the moon, the dawn overcame 
 the darkness by following the path of Rita, the path of 
 right, the worshippers took their next step, and praj'ed 
 that they too might follow on the path of Rita, the 
 right path, and thus overcome sin, which was the same 
 to them as darkness, because evil-doers never cross the 
 path of Rita, it is said. AVith this came up, of course, 
 the idea of right and wrong ; of a law to be obeyed, and 
 a wrong-doing to be punished. 
 
 This conception of Rita, of right and wrong, belongs 
 to the Hindus and the Persians ; it is not a conception 
 of the undivided Aryans, so we do not find it among the 
 Greeks and Latins. This was never before so clearly 
 explained ; it is contained in Max Miiller's Lectures, 
 published in 1878. 
 
 Mr. Cox says: "There is in the noblest minds a 
 certain consciousness of sin, even without breaking any 
 positive law, and this sense of sin weighed heav}' on 
 the mind of the thoughtful Hindu." At such times he 
 addressed himself to Varuna, the All-Surrounder, that is 
 the sk}' as brooding over and covering and surrounding 
 the earth. These hymns to Varuna are most beau- 
 tiful and deepl}' religious. 
 
32 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 HYMN TO VARUNA. 
 
 " Let me not yet, Varuna, enter into the house of clay : 
 have mercy, almighty, have mercy. 
 
 " If I go along trembling like a cloud driven by the wind : 
 have mercy, almighty, have mercy ! 
 
 "Through want of strength, thou strong and bright god, 
 have I gone to the wrong shore : have mercy, almighty, have 
 mercy ! 
 
 " Thirst came upon the worshipper though he stood in the 
 midst of the waters : have mercy, almighty, have mercy ! 
 
 " Whenever we men, Varuna, commit an oll'ence before 
 the heavenly host, whenever we break the law through 
 thoughtlessness : have mercy, almighty, have mercy ! " 
 
 ANOTHER. 
 
 " However we break thy laws from day to day, men as we 
 are, O god, Varuna. 
 
 " Do not deliver us unto death, nor to the blow of tlie furi- 
 ous, nor to the wrath of the spiteful. Absolve us from the sins 
 of our fathers, and from those which we have committed with 
 our own bodies. 
 
 " Release the poet, king, like a thief who has feasted on 
 stolen cattle ; release him like a calf from the rope. It was 
 not our own doing, Varuna, it was necessity, an intoxicating 
 draught, passion, dice, thoughtlessness ! " 
 
 Varuna's cbamcteristics in the Rig Veda are perpetu- 
 ally suggesting the idea of a Divine Being, who made 
 and upholds all things. Another li^-mn says : — 
 
 " Varuna dwells in all worlds as sovereign ; indeed the three 
 worlds are embraced by him. The wind which resounds 
 through the firmament is his breath. He has placed the sun 
 in the heavens and opened a boundless path for it to traverse. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 83 
 
 He has hollowed out the channels of the rivers. It is by his 
 wise contrivance that, though all the rivers piour out their 
 waters into the sea, the sea is never filled. By his ordinance 
 the moon shines in the sky, and the stars which are visible by 
 night disappear on the approach of daylight. Neither the 
 birds flying in the air, nor the rivers in their sleepless flow, can 
 attain a knowledge of his power or his wrath. His spies be- 
 hold both worlds. He himself has a thousand eyes. He per- 
 ceives all the hidden things that have been or shall be done." 
 
 In such hymns Yaruna is plainly the supreme god, as 
 the others had been in their turn. 
 
 Graduall}' the Hindu seems to have risen to a higher 
 conception, and all these gods seemed to him but dif- 
 ferent names for one great being. One h^'mn sa3s, 
 " Wise poets make the beautiful- winged one manifold 
 by words ; though he is but one." Another sa^^s, 
 "Thou, Agni, art Indra, bountiful to the excellent; 
 thou art Vishnu, the wide- stepping ; son of strength, in 
 thee reside all the gods." 
 
 That mysterious principle of life, which is sought to- 
 da}' in protoplasm, but which eludes our keenest search, 
 our latest knowledge, becomes to the thoughtful Hindu 
 one god, high over everything ; but manifesting himself 
 in many different waj's and mingling in the affairs of 
 men. The Rig Veda contains this idea. M. Langlois 
 sa3's, "The perpetual struggle of nature, the contrast 
 of heat and cold, light and darkness, seemed to him the 
 movement of some awful mj'sterious Being. This life of 
 nature, independent of individuals, found in the vege- 
 table and animal world, changing its form, dividing itself, 
 spreading ever^'where ; found also in the spiritual world, 
 where it creates thought and religious feeling : all this 
 
34 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 animation of moving mind and matter the Arj'ans con- 
 sidered to -be a person. He is called Asoura Medhas, 
 the wise living one." Afterwards he was called Yis- 
 wakarman, the maker of all things ; then he grew to be 
 Pragapati, the one lord of all living things. Thus they 
 expressed their growing thoughts, struggling ever to a 
 higher conception. 
 
 HYMN TO ONE GOD. 
 
 " In the beginning there arose the source of golden light. 
 He was the only born lord of all that is. He established the 
 Ccirth and the sky. Who is the God to vhom we shall offer 
 our sacrifice ? 
 
 " He who gives life, He who gives strength ; whose blessing 
 all the bright gods desire ; Avhose shadow is innnortality ; 
 whose shadow is death : who is the God to whom we shall 
 offer sacrifice ? 
 
 " He who through his power is the only King of the breath- 
 ing and awakening world ; He who governs all, man and 
 beast : who is the God to whom we shall offer our sacrifice ? 
 
 " He whose power these snowy mountains, whose power the 
 sea proclaims, with the distant river ; He whose these regions 
 are, as it were, his two arms : who is the God to whom we shall 
 offer our sacrifice ? 
 
 " He through whom the sky is bright and the earth firm ; 
 He through whom the heaven was established, nay, the highest 
 heaven ; He who measured out the light in the air : who is 
 the God to whom we shall offer our sacrifice? 
 
 " He to whom heaven and earth, standing firm by his will, 
 look up, trembling inwardly ; He over whom the rising sim 
 shines forth : who is tlie God to whom we shall offer our 
 sacrifice? 
 
 " Wherever the mighty water cloud went, where they placed 
 the seed and lit the fire, thence arose He who is the only life 
 
THE ORIGIN OF LITERATURE. 35 
 
 of the bright gods : who is the God to \vhom we shall offer our 
 sacrifice ? 
 
 " He who by his might looked even over the water clouds, 
 the clouds which gave strength and lit the sacrifice, He icho is 
 God above all gods : who is the God to whom we .shall offer 
 our sacrifice ? 
 
 " May he not destroy us : He, the creator of the earth ; or 
 He, the righteous, who created the heavens ; He who also 
 created the bright and mighty waters : who is the God to 
 whom we shall ofter our sacrifice?" 
 
 At times the Hindu rose to the height of loving this 
 being without hope of reward. 
 
 " Thou, even Thou, art mother ; Thou my lather ; Thou 
 my kinsmau ; Thou my friend ; Thou art knowledge ; Thou 
 art riches ; Thou art my all, God of Gods, Thou art my 
 protector in all places. Then what fear or grief can there be 
 to me ? " 
 
 And here closes what has a universal interest for all 
 humanity. The next, period is the Hindus' alone. 
 
 We wonder, as we read, who wrote these poetical 
 powerful hymns. They were at first composed by each 
 head of a famil}' ; this is wh3'the3'are so numerous, and 
 seem a little monotonous. He uttered his hymn, he 
 burst into song, while he laid his sacrifice on the sacred 
 fire, and poured out his oblation on the sacred grass. 
 How ricl^ the earh^ Aryan nature must have been ! how 
 full of imagination and tenderness, to have produced a 
 nation of poets ! The religious bard or singer seems to 
 belong to ever}' race and every age. In the second stage 
 of civilization among the Hindus, rose a class of relig- 
 ious bards called Rishis, who wrote the hymns ; and a 
 class of priests called Brahmans, who performed the 
 
36 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 sacrifices. The sacrifice of a horse, called an Aswe- 
 medha, is mentioned in the ver}' latest h3mns of the 
 Rig Veda. It was the first step towards an organized 
 priesthood. 
 
 The Rig Veda was not translated at all until 1833. 
 Then a few h3'mns were published in a pamphlet by 
 Rosen, a German. Complete translations were made by 
 Langlois in French ; and b}' AVilson in English, from 
 1848 to 1857. But translators are still at work upon it. 
 At first the Brahmans would not teach the Sanskrit in 
 which the Vedas were written ; would scarcel}' allow for- 
 eigners to look at the books even. All the enonnous 
 influence of the East India Compan}' was brought to 
 bear upon them for 3'ears, and much mone}' spent for 
 books and teachers. Mr. Wilson devoted years of 
 stud}' to his translation of the Rig Veda. Finalh', with 
 a modest consciousness of good work well done, with 
 an honorable pride, he walked into the office of a Lon- 
 don publisher and informed him that he had a treasure 
 to offer, the Rig Veda. The publisher looked blankly 
 at him, "And pray, sir," said he, "what is the Rig 
 Veda?" I hope that we are now better informed than 
 he. 
 
BKAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 37 
 
 CHAPTER IT. 
 
 BRAHMAXISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 
 
 THERE are in Sanskrit literature four distinctly 
 marked periods. First, tlie Vedic, which we 
 have examined, — a jo3'ous age of simple pra3'ers and 
 kindh' gods and family independence. Second, the 
 Brahmanical period ; therefore we come now into a 
 new atmosphere of thought. We leave behind us the 
 gods which belong to all the Aryan race, and go on to 
 speak of those which are distinctive^ Hindu. Their new 
 gods represent one phase of the Ar^-an nature, its mys-' 
 ticism. Another phase, its energy, is displa^'ed in the 
 epic poem of the Maha Bharata. So our subject is the 
 rise of Brahmanism, and the Maha Bharata. 
 
 In our last chapter we examined the Rig Yeda, which 
 is called sometimes a sanhita. The word means a col- 
 lection, and we found the Rig Veda to be one general 
 collection of hymns and prayers. In it we saw wor- 
 shipped the sun, the sky, the dawn ; finally, one god, 
 the lord of all these, a m3'sterious self-existent person, 
 called sometimes Asoura-Medhas, the wise being ; some- 
 times Viswakarman, the maker of all things. But the 
 new religion is a denial of all these. One of the poets 
 said these gods are onl^^ names ; still he maintained 
 that there was a real god, one alone ; but, instead of 
 making him a masculine name, they now made him a 
 
38 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 neuter name. They considered neuter names to be 
 higher than either masculine or feminine. The}- wanted 
 to get as far awa}' from human nature as they could to 
 express this divine being. The}- gave him two neuter 
 names, — Atman, which belongs to philosophy, and to 
 which I shall allude in the Sanskrit metaphysics ; and 
 Brahman, which belongs to rehgion and literature. 
 The}^ are best translated by what we call the soul of 
 the world ; what the}' called the breath of the world. 
 It means the supreme self-existent spirit in repose. 
 Brahman is too vast to be understood by one single 
 mind, or to be confined to one spot. He pervades 
 everything : he has no form and no characteristics : 
 he is not a person at all. But when he moves from 
 this passive condition and begins to act, then the Hindus 
 gave him other names. First, he wished to create nature 
 and man ; then he took the name of Brahmfi, nominative 
 masculine, the creator. Next he wished to sustain 
 and support all this creation, so he took the masculine 
 name of Vishnu, the preserver. This is only enlarging 
 the Vishnu, whom we found in the Rig \^eda as a name 
 for the sun. Vishnu had ten incarnations when he 
 descended to live among men, which are called Avatars. 
 Monier Williams says, *' Vishnu is the most human and 
 humane god of the Hindu pantheon, — a kind of pro- 
 test in favor of a personal deity, as opposed to the 
 impersonal pantheism of Brahman." 
 
 Next, Brahman wished to punish all this creation, so 
 he took the character of Siva, the destroyer. This is 
 only an enlargement of Rudra in the Rig Veda, the 
 god of storm and tempest, chief of the Maruts. All 
 these are far above the old Vedic deities. Indra alone 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 39 
 
 retains any prominence. Varuna now becomes the god 
 of the waters ; and is the same as Nereus in Greek, Nep- 
 tune in Latin. Each of these gods has a heaven of his 
 own, but Brahman has no local habitation. 
 
 One writer sa^'s, "From the restlessness of false 
 religions, the gods, being subjective, change with the 
 minds of the people who created them. There are 
 endless avatars in Brahmanical mythology, reproducing 
 the drear}' monstrosities of the Hindu mind." The}' 
 showed their imagination in a curious freak. To denote 
 power they increased the bodies of their gods : Brahma 
 the creator, has four faces : Siva, the destroyer, has 
 five heads : Indra, the clear sky, has one thousand eyes : 
 all the new gods and goddesses have four arms. 
 
 Among several of the Aryan nations are traditions of 
 early ages of goodness and happiness, then a gradual 
 deterioration, like the four ages of Hesiod in Greek. 
 The Hindus had also vast periods of time, which they 
 called Yugas. They agree better with modern science 
 than the Greek periods, for a Yuga was 4,320,000 mortal 
 years : no shorter period would have filled the vast 
 imagination of the Hindu. One thousand of these Yugas 
 constituted one day of Brahma ; then the creator will 
 sleep and all nature — including the gods, Brahma, 
 Vishnu, and Siva — will become dissolved; melt away 
 into Brahman, simple being. 
 
 As a natural result, the Brahmans taught the doctrine 
 of metempsychosis. Mr. Thompson says, "It is the 
 most novel and original idea ever started in any age or 
 country ; undoubtedly, too, its place of invention is India ; 
 Egypt took it from there ; Greece took it from Egypt ; 
 Pythagoras took it in person. It implies the eternity of 
 
40 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the soul." It teaches tliat the Supreme Spirit, Brahman, 
 formed everything b}' changing himself into matter. 
 He divided himself into innumerable existences ; into 
 gods, heroes, human beings, animals, plants, even into 
 stones. All these are not onl}' emanations from Brah- 
 man, they are actually a part of him, smaller or lai'ger 
 pieces of him. That small piece of Brahman, forming a 
 man, had a bod}- which died ; then the soul passed into 
 another bod}'. If a man's deeds had been sinful, he 
 went into a lower bod}^ even as low as a stone ; if good, 
 he was born again into a higher bod}- ; but he must 
 expiate the sins done in a former body. The doctrine 
 somewhat diminished the sense of personal responsi- 
 bility ; for great talents and goodness, or great sins and 
 wickednesses, were both considered to be the result of 
 powers and habits belonging to some previous exist- 
 ences ; yet there was not supposed to be any recollection 
 of these existences in the mind. '^ Through speaking 
 ill of his preceptor a man will be born again an ass ; if 
 he reviles his preceptor, a dog ; if he envies him, an in- 
 sect." Another said, " If a man steals grain, he shall be 
 born again a mouse ; if milk, a crow ; if he steals horses, 
 he shall be afflicted with lameness in a future existence ; 
 if he steals cloth, with leprosy." What a constant ter- 
 ror to evil-doers this thought would be ! 
 
 The doctrine was particularly unpleasant to the 
 Hindus, for motion in their hot climate is often intoler- 
 able ; but it will account for the great kindness which 
 they show to animals. The soul goes on through a series 
 of transmigrations, — the various hells.but purgatories, 
 the various heavens but temporary resting-places, — 
 till it reaches the height of its capacities, its final 
 
BEAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 41 
 
 condition, absorption into Brahman. The Veda says, "As 
 the web issues from the spider, as little sparks proceed 
 from fire, So from the one sonl proceed all breathing 
 animals, all worlds, all the gods, and all beings." Next 
 it sa3-s that all these exist separate^ for a time, but at 
 length all are absorbed into their source, the Supreme 
 Spirit. "As from a blazing fire consubstantial sparks 
 proceed in a thousand waj's, so from the Imperishable 
 Spirit various living souls are produced ; and the}- return 
 to him too." So all personal life, all individuaht}', is 
 lost, as seen from the following text: "As flowing 
 rivers are resolved into the sea, losing their names and 
 forms, so the wise man, freed from name and form, 
 passes into the Divine Spirit, which is gTeater than the 
 great. He who honors that Supreme Spirit becomes 
 spirit." Such was their ideal. M. Barbier describes 
 this mj-sticism. " The ideal fife is to lose yourself in 
 the divine essence, to detach yourself from the trifling 
 interests of humanit3% to feel a contempt for all religious 
 and moral laws, and the nothingness of all creation in 
 comparison with the divine love. Little by little, b}^ 
 prayers and meditations, absolute renunciation of the 
 will, and rigorous mortification of the body,* to rise above 
 this earthl}^ life ; even above the heavenly life ; to anni- 
 hilate 3'ourself in the great whole until the believer cries 
 out, ' I am in God,' next, ' I am God.' " One text sajs 
 ' ' Thou art I ; I ain thou : of what kind is the diff'erence ? 
 Like gold and the bracelet, like water and a wave." 
 This is not at all the spiritual communion which 
 Christianity teaches ; it is absolute loss of all identity. 
 This was the goal to which they pressed forward, 
 through penance and austerities and transmigrations. 
 
42 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDEED LITERATURES. 
 
 And this Brahman in which they wished to lose them- 
 selves is not a person at all, like the gods of the Rig 
 Veda. He is the principle of life, whether 3'ou give him 
 the subjective name Atman ; the objective, Brahman. 
 Mr. Thompson says, '• Brahman has no cause, no origin, 
 is not produced b}' anything ; but he is eternal, universal, 
 single, independent, free from any characteristics, sov- 
 ereign." It is almost impossible for the human mind to 
 grasp this idea : but the Indian intellect reached it 
 without influence from an}' other nation. What we call 
 Pantheism sometimes, and sometimes Nature, comes 
 nearest to conveying the thought to us. But this doc- 
 trine of identification with the supreme principle of the 
 world is not found in the Rig Veda. No metemps}-- 
 chosis comes in there, no asceticism as steps to that 
 result. The Rig Veda distinctly teaches that the soul has 
 a personal, individual existence after death, as well as 
 that it is eternal. 
 
 Under this new religion, gradually' and naturall}', 
 societ}' separated itself into classes ; but these classes, 
 instead of being pliable like society elsewhere, hardened 
 into an iron framework, which has remained unchanged 
 for centuries. In the Veda, where caste is indicated, it 
 is quite different from what it afterwards became. 
 
 The word Brahman applied to a human being meant, 
 first, one who offered a pra^'er to the Supreme Being, 
 Brahman. Next, these prayer-offerers became the re- 
 ligious teachers of all others : ever}' one was obliged to 
 learn the Veda by heart ; but they claimed that they 
 alone had the right to teach it. Then they took the last 
 step and announced that they alone could offer sacrifices : 
 a long period must have elapsed since the father of the 
 
BEAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 43 
 
 famil}' offered his own simple pra3'er, and performed his 
 o^yn sacrifice. A form for worship and sacrifice grew 
 np, and this brought about the other three Vedas. 
 The}' are far less interesting and valuable than the Rig 
 Veda, and, whenever we say " the Veda," we mean the 
 Rig Veda. The others were formed when the Aryan 
 invaders had penetrated far into the land ; the Sama 
 and Yadjour Vedas when the}' had reached the south- 
 eastern slope of the Himalaya Mountains ; the Atharva 
 Veda upon the ver_y banks of the Ganges. 
 
 The three later Vedas are liturgies for worship and 
 rules for performing the sacrifices. The}' give rules for 
 the great public ceremonials, where three sacred fires 
 burned upon three sacred hearths, for the worship of the 
 family, and the private devotion of the individual. Not 
 merely the custom itself, but every motion and every into- 
 nation of voice was prescribed by rule ; and these motions 
 and accents were as divinely inspired as any other part 
 of the Vedas. For the Brahmans claimed that the four 
 Vedas were directly revealed to the religious bards (the 
 Rishis) , that they issued like breath from the Divine 
 Being. They were divine knowledge received through 
 the ear : not merely the thoughts but the actual words 
 were revealed. Therefore the change of a letter or an 
 accent was a sin ; and this revelation made to a class (Jf 
 holy men was transmitted by repetition in the exact form 
 in which it had been received. It is difficult to determine 
 at what time the Brahmans set up the claim that the Veda 
 was divinely revealed, and therefore infalhble. As all the 
 Hindus (except the Sudras) were obliged to learn the 
 Veda, it is plain that the Brahmans had employment 
 enough. They soon grew rich, for they received payment 
 
44 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 for teaching the Yeda, for offering pra3'ers and sacrifices : 
 one kind of sacrifice required the services of sixteen 
 diflferent classes of Brahmans. '' These Brahmans were 
 men who were intellectually superior, and the}' took 
 advantage of the strong sense of religion, which was 
 natural to the Hindu Aryan, to make themselves power- 
 ful." The}' claimed that they were born from the mouth 
 of Brahma, and, therefore, formed the first caste. 
 
 As the shepherd tribes rested from their wanderings 
 and settled upon the land, they became agriculturists. 
 They needed some one to protect them from their 
 enemies : there are always men who would rather fight 
 than till the ground, — so the second caste grew up, the 
 Kshatriyas or warriors. After a while they became 
 kings over the peaceful farmers and merchants, and were 
 called rajas. In fact the rajas were always taken from 
 the Kshatriya or warrior caste. They always had a 
 Brahman priest, however, for their adviser, like the kings 
 of the Middle Ages in Europe. 
 
 Then the quiet farmers and merchants formed them- 
 selves into a third caste called Vaisyas. The root vis 
 enters into this word : it means to enter into, sit down 
 upon, like the Latin vicus, a village, and the English 
 termination wick of the name of a town. It has a second- 
 ary meaning in vis., man of the people, vis pater^ the 
 father of the people. Sometimes, though very seldom, 
 some Vaisya would gain great wealth : then he would 
 hire Brahmans to perform his prayers and sacrifices, and 
 Kshatriyas to become liis body-guard. These three castes 
 were all noble, all obliged to learn the Veda by heart. 
 Each boy had a sacred cord tied around his waist, and 
 was then called " twice born : " this corresponds to our 
 
BRAHMA XISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 45 
 
 rite of baptism. Tlie Brahman bo}' was invested with the 
 sacred thread at eight \'ears of age ; the Kshatriya, at 
 eleven ; the Vais_ya, at twelve. 
 
 The Sudras, the fourth caste, did menial work. The}' 
 were servants but not slaves, and their condition was far 
 superior to the Helots of the Greeks, or the serfs of the 
 Middle Ages, for the}' were not attached to the soil. They 
 were not allowed to learn the Yedas, and this drew a sharp 
 line between them and the three " twice-born" castes. 
 
 At the beginning of this Brahmanical period, took 
 place the events which form the subject of the epic 
 poems, although the poems themselves were not written 
 down until after. The}' are two, — the Maha Bharata,and 
 the Ramaj'ana. They are quite old enough to be valu- 
 able, and the}' show a civihzation far beyond the primi- 
 tive simplicity of the Rig Veda. AVe find a degree of 
 civilization which will be surprising to us : palaces and 
 chariots and jewels ; fruits and flowers ; domestic love 
 and womanly freedom, in an age and country which we 
 are fond of calling heathen. Of course the pictures of 
 life and manners which they give must be faithful, since 
 the Aryans who entered India were utterly separated 
 from other Aryan nations. We cannot too often recall to 
 mind that all tlie writings of Sanskrit literature are 
 utterly uninfluenced by contact with other minds, and 
 this makes them as wonderful as they are exquisite : 
 they are the spontaneous expression of the mind of man 
 at its very first awakening, and we may well be amazed 
 to find them so interesting in thought, so charming in 
 form. Many scholars, among them Dean Milman, con- 
 sider them more beautiful than those of any other nation. 
 
 It is impossible to know when the Maha Bharata was 
 
46 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 written : the critics conflict so much. Monier "Williams 
 thinks it later than the Rama^'ana. AVheeler places it 
 much earlier : one critic fixes it at 1500 b. c. ; another at 
 200 B. c. But this ma}' be reconciled by assuming that 
 the Maha Bharata was rewritten at a later date than it 
 originated. We can but judge from the internal evidence 
 of the book itself, the onl}' guide in most Hindu chronol- 
 ogj' ; and the manners portrayed in the Maha Biiarata are 
 much earlier than those of the Ramayana, especially the 
 freedom of the women. The Rig Veda may be called 
 patriarchal : it has first the family, then the tribe, then an 
 indication of the feudal lord. But the Maha Bharata is 
 completel}' feudal. Its raja was a feudal lord, but little 
 more powerful than his vassals. The priests were advisers 
 and friends, not tyrants, and the tone of the poem is verj' 
 brave and warlike. Throughout it we are constantly 
 amazed at meeting customs which we supposed peculiar 
 to the Middle Ages of Europe ; but which must have been 
 common to the early civilization of every Ar3'an famil}-, if 
 they are found in its earliest literature. The Swayembara 
 was an institution which greatlj^ resembled the tourna- 
 ments of the ^liddle Ages. The different ^-oung noblemen 
 displayed their prowess before the raja, and the ladies of 
 the rojal famih', who then chose one of them for her hus- 
 band. The position of woman was, therefore, quite 
 different from what it afterward became in India. Tlie 
 driving of chariots was a favorite amusement and accom- 
 plishment with the ancient Kshatri\'as just as with the 
 ancient Greeks. If the raja did not himself drive, his 
 charioteer was his confidential friend and adviser. In the 
 lassitude brought on by a hot climate, gambling was 
 then, as now, a passion ; rajas played together for daNS 
 
BRAHMAN ISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 47 
 
 until one had lost eveiTthing he possessed, and was 
 driven out as an exile. The great sacrifice called an 
 Aswemedha was a high soleranit3\ The animal sacrificed 
 was a horse, and we find the same animal selected by 
 the Teutonic families : a horse was sacrificed to Odin, 
 the god of the Norsemen ; but we seldom read of a horse 
 sacrifice among the Greeks and Romans. 
 
 Wheeler, in his history of India, sa3'S that " the 
 ]\Iaha Bharata is the most voluminous, and, perhaps, the 
 most valuable epic which has hitherto been preserved in 
 any written language." And this is great praise from 
 him, as he is not at all enthusiastic. There is no com- 
 plete translation in existence, as fifteen octavo volumes 
 would be required. For the Maha Bharata is seven 
 times as long as both poems of Homer combined, and 
 twent}' times as long as the Nibelungen Lied. "In 
 India everything is on a colossal scale. Not onl}' are 
 the mountains higher, and the rivers longer, but the 
 poems also are more voluminous." M. Fauche left at 
 his death an unfinished translation in French in ten 
 volumes, but it is so diffuse that it is tedious. 
 
 The Maha Bharata is regarded with the most awful 
 reverence by the Hindus : to read it, or even to listen 
 to it, will prevent a Hindu from committing any sin 
 for that day ; will ensure prosperity in this world and 
 eternal happiness hereafter. The changes and additions 
 made to it by the Brahmans have greatl}' injured its 
 simplicitj'' and freshness ; but these can be detected, 
 and it will ever remain most noble and interesting 
 in spite of them. Extravagant stories are told : 
 billions and trillions of men are said to have been en- 
 gaged in the battles ; showers of blood to have fallen 
 
48 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 from the skies ; but all these may be traced to the wish 
 which the Brahman singer felt to glorif}' the Kshatriya 
 ancestors of the raja to whom he sang. For the Maha 
 Bharata was originally a collection of ballads sung to some 
 raja. It is naturall}- greatly wanting in unitj' : it is a vast 
 collection of Hindu mythology, legends,. and philosoph}', 
 rather than a poem with one subject. But it is our only 
 source for the histor}' of the period ; for the Hindu, it 
 will be remembered, never wrote history. Its events took 
 place when the Ar3'an invaders had penetiat( d as far as 
 the city which we call Delhi. The main action of the 
 poem, however, is the quarrel between the Kauravas and 
 the Pandavas, who were first cousins, and descendants 
 of Bharata, a great Indian hero. The word Maha 
 alwa3's means great, so Maha Bharata means the 
 great war of Bharata. Mr. Wheeler says, ''This war 
 was not a contest with a foreign invader nor a do- 
 mestic tyrant, not a crusade of religion. It was simply 
 a struggle between kinsmen for land and throne." 
 Mr. Wheeler, therefore, rejects all S3-mbolisra, and treats 
 it simpl}' as histor}-. But symbolism is as true an 
 expression of our faculties as histor}', and cannot so 
 coolly be thrust aside. According to modern interpreta- 
 tion, a deeper meaning underlies this contest ; it becomes 
 that same struggle between light and darkness which we 
 saw in the Kig Veda, and which is in reality that ever- 
 recurring strife between good and evil which we find in 
 ever}' Aryan family, and whose origin I shall refer to 
 again. The heroes of the INIaha Bliarata are plainl}' the 
 same as the gods of the Rig A'eda, and can clearly be 
 traced to that. In the Maha Bharata, then, the Pan- 
 davas are good and beautiful and strong. Their chiefs 
 
BEAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 49 
 
 are five brethren, each of whom has a distinct individu- 
 alit}'. Bliima, a giant hke the Greek Herakles, is one 
 of them : he carries a chib or mace for weapon. The 
 most interesting hero in om* e^'es is Arjuna. His name 
 means " dazzling radiance," and he possesses the quahties 
 of Indra : the god has come down to be the hero of an 
 epic : his weapon is the unerring bow and arrow, he is 
 therefore a solar m^th. But the favorite hero in the 
 Hindu's e3'es is the Raja Yudishthira, who never mani- 
 fests the slightest feeling, but shows a cold, passionless 
 stoicism. 
 
 The Kauravas are wicked and weak ; but as Hector 
 w^as noble among the wicked Trojans, so is Kama beauti- 
 ful and brave among the wicked Kauravas. He is also 
 a form of the solar m3'th : his mother was a mortal maiden ; 
 his father was the shining sun. When he was born, he 
 wore golden ear-rings, and a golden coat of mail envel- 
 oped him like a shell. In the German m^'thologj', one 
 hero is called the " horn}' Siegfried" because he wore a 
 coat of mail like horn. When Kama was born he was 
 put into a basket and floated far awa3% This same cir- 
 cumstance is told of Perseus in Greek and Scif in Anglo- 
 Saxon, and other Aryan heroes. He was picked up by 
 a wagon-driver ; brought up and educated by him. His 
 coat of mail grew with his growth : he could take it ofl[' 
 and on at pleasure, and was invincible when he wore it. 
 On a certain da}' a Swa3'amvara was held, and it was 
 announced that whoever should bend a certain enormous 
 bow and shoot the arrow into the mark, should gain the 
 hand of a lovel}' princess, Draupadi, the lotLis-e3'ed. All 
 the rajas had tried and failed ; then Kama comes forward 
 and bends the bow, and the lotus-eyed princess calls out, 
 
 4 
 
50 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 " I will not wed the base-born son of a wagon-driver," 
 so poor Kama is obliged to give up the bow. Then 
 Arjuna comes forward, bends the bow, and shoots the 
 arrow, and hits the mark, and gains the princess. The 
 practice of pohandr}' prevails, and she becomes the wife 
 to the five brethren. Then the cousins gamble together, 
 and the raja of the Pandavas gambles away his right to the 
 kingdom and his wife. So all the Pandavas are exiled 
 into the jungle, but the wife is given back to them : 
 this exile into the jungle is a favorite punishment among 
 the Hindus. When the}' became weary in their wander- 
 ings, the giant Bhima would carr}' his, fatigued brethren 
 and their afflicted wife upon his shoulders, or under his 
 arms, and walk on as before. Finally, the difficult}' is 
 settled by a grand battle of eighteen days. But the in- 
 terest lies in the single combats, and these sound like 
 the stories of the Middle Ages. Here, in this first heroic 
 poetry of the Aryan mind, is the type which recurred at 
 different ages in each Aryan race. Kama and Arjuna 
 are to settle the question by single combat ; but the 
 evening before, Kama's true mother comes to him and 
 reveals his birth to him : he is really the half-brother 
 of Arjuna, and bogs him to join the side of the Pan- 
 davas. But he refuses to desert his friends. They 
 fight, and the victory is uncertain, when Kama is slain 
 from behind, like so many other warriors in Aryan 
 poetry, — Achilleus, in Greek ; Siegfried, in German. 
 Then all the widows come to the battle-field to 
 mourn. How much freedom the women had in these 
 first ages, to come to so public a place ! They dishevel 
 their long black hair and sit by the corpses. The 
 mother of the raja said, '^ The wise and the learned 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 51 
 
 alwa^'S used to sit around this son of mine, and nearl}^ 
 all the rajas of the earth took their stations near him, 
 and prided themselves on it as a promotion ; but this 
 night the jackals alone have been his courtiers." Then 
 the widow of the raja placed her husband's head upon 
 her lap, and the mother said, "This woman whom 
 neither sun nor moon was once worthy to look upon, 
 see how she now sits here bareheaded." The bodies are 
 gathered into great heaps and burned, but each raja had 
 a funeral-pile of his own. Among the Aryan nations, 
 burning and burying were each used for the dead, — burn- 
 ing bv the wandering tribes ; bur3ing, by those who settled 
 on the land. But burning was never adopted b}^ the 
 masses ; only used for great chieftains. In the Iliad, 
 Hector's body was burned ; among the Teutons it is con- 
 stantly mentioned, as we shall find later on. 
 
 Another most touching passage is the description of 
 the dead arising at night from the waters of the Ganges 
 to revisit their friends. Mr. Wheeler thinks this one of 
 the " grandest pictures ever presented to the human eye." 
 It certainly shows that " touch of nature " which " makes 
 the whole world kin." The longing of the human heart 
 to see its dead again must be universal, if it were felt so 
 long ago, so far away, so independently of foreign 
 influence. Does it not show how natural and spontaneous 
 it is to believe in immortalit}- ; to feel that those who 
 are dead to us are living in another life ? The action 
 of the widows has a Hindu tone, but the rest is of all 
 times and all nations. 
 
 " After this, while all were talking together of the husbands, 
 and the sons, and the kinsfolk whom they had lost in the great 
 
52 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 wars of the Maha Bliarata, the Sage Yyasa appeared among 
 them and said, ' I will this day heal all your griefs. Go you all 
 to the river Ganges and bathe therein, and there each one of 
 you shall behold the kinsman for whom you have been sorrow- 
 ing.' So they all went down to the river, and chose a bathing 
 place for themselves and ftimilies, and Vyasa said to them, — 
 * You shall see this night whom you desire.' And the day 
 passed away so slowly that it seemed like a whole year to them, 
 and at last the sun went down, and they all bathed in the river 
 by command of Vyasa, and said their prayers and went and 
 stood near him ; and Yudishthira and his brethren were on 
 the side of Yyasa. and everybody else stood where places could 
 be found. Vyasa then went into the water and prayed and 
 bathed, and he then came out and stood by Yudishthira, and 
 called out the names of each of the persons who had been slain, 
 one by one. At that moment the river began,to foam and boil, 
 and a great noise was heard rising out of the water, as though 
 all the slain men were once again alive, and as though they, 
 and their elephants, and their horses, were bursting into loud 
 cries, and all the drums and trumpets and other instruments 
 of music of both armies Avere striking up together. The whole 
 assembly was astonished at this mighty tempest, and some 
 were smitten with a terrible fear when suddenly they saw 
 Bishma and Droma in full armor seated in their chariots, and 
 ascending out of the water with all their armies arrayed as they 
 were on the first day of the INlaha Bharata. Next came forth 
 Abhimanya, the heroic son of Arjuna, and the five sons ot 
 Draupadi, and the son of Bhima with his army. After him 
 came Kuna and Duryodhama and Sankivar, and the other sons 
 of Droma, all in full parade, seated upon their chariots, together 
 with many other warriors and rajas who had been slain. All 
 appeared in great glory and splendor, and more beautiful than 
 they were when all alive, and all came with their own horses 
 and chariots, and runners and arms. And every one was in per- 
 fect friendship with each other, for enmity had departed from 
 amongst them. And each one was preceded by his bards and 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 53 
 
 eulogists, who sang his praises, and very many singing men and 
 dancing girls appeared with them, singing and dancing. Now, 
 when those warriors had come out of the river their widows 
 and orphans and kinsfolk were overjoyed, and not a trace of 
 grief remained amongst them, and widows went to their hus- 
 bands, and daughters to their fathers, and mothers to their sons, 
 and sisters to their brothers, and all the fifteen years of sorrow 
 which had passed away since the war of the Maha Bharata were 
 forgotten in the ecstasy of seeing each other again. Thus the 
 night passed away in the fulness of joy; but when the morn- 
 ing had dawned all the dead mounted their chariots and horses, 
 and disappeared ; and those who had gathered to behold them 
 prepared to depart', and Vyasa the Sage said that the widows 
 who wished to rejoin their dead husbands might do so, and all 
 the widows went and bathed in the Ganges, and came out of 
 the water again and kissed every one the feet of Yudishthira 
 and his wife Gandhavi, and went and drowned themselves in 
 the river, and through the prayers of Vyasa they all went to 
 the places they wished and obtained their several desires." 
 
 The Hindus justify from the Vedas the Sati, or custom 
 of burning widows upon the funeral pile of their hus- 
 bands. But the Sati is not found in the Rig Veda : on 
 the contrar\', it is forbidden there. 
 
 Mr. Alger, in his work on " Oriental Poetr}'," calls 
 the close of the Maha Bharata ' ' the culminating point of 
 the poetry of the world." He says, "To the touched 
 hearts and impressed imaginations of the reader, Hasti- 
 napur becomes a nobler name than Tro3\" 
 
 The Pandavas conquer ; Yudishthira gains the throne, 
 but he is still unsatisfied. He feels that all who wish 
 for true happiness and rest of mind must abandon 
 worldh' things, and seek for union with the Infinite. 
 We fancy this to be a modern doctrine : it is as old as 
 
54 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the soul of cveiy Aiyan. It has been said that this was 
 added by the feeling of a later age than that which ex- 
 pressed itself in single combats and Swayamvaras ; and 
 yet this idea was more or less present to the Hindu in 
 ever}' stage of development. It was prompted b}- that 
 spiritual element which is so much stronger in the Sans- 
 krit literature than in the literatures of Greece or Rome. 
 Yudishthira tells his four brethren and their one wife, of 
 his restless yearnings, of his intention to renounce that 
 throne which had cost such blood and treasure, and go 
 forth to seek the heaven of Indra. So he takes off his 
 royal robes, and the six clothe themselves in the garb of 
 pilgrims, and wander forth together, accompanied l^y a 
 faithful dog. All gradually drop down by the wa}', ex- 
 cept the cold, stoical Yudishthira ; he reaches at length 
 the heaven of Indra. But Indra will not admit the dog : 
 Yudishthira refuses to abandon a faithful friend, and 
 Indra consents. Then Yudishthira inquires for his four 
 brethren and the tender princess Draupadi, the faithful 
 wife. Indra informs him that the}' are in hell. So he 
 refuses to stay in heaven without them, goes down to hell 
 and hears the voices of his brethren in dreadful torment. 
 The hell is even worse than Dante's ; there is a dark- 
 ness Avhich can be felt, the wicked are burning in flames 
 of fire. It is a dense wood whose leaves are sharp 
 swords ; the ground is paved with razors ; the i)ath 
 strewn with mutilated corpses. The brethren implore 
 Yudishthira not to leave them, and he promises to stay 
 and share their torments. Then Indra tells him that 
 these were all maya or illusions to try his character : 
 the four brethren, and Draupadi, tlie lotus-e^ed, are 
 really in the heaven of Indra, where they live happily 
 ever after. 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 55 
 
 In the poem there are innumerable episodes. One of 
 them relates the adventures of the playful Krishna, who 
 was married to sixteen thousand damsels, each of whom 
 thought herself his on^y wife. This really means that 
 Krishna is the sun, reflected in sixteen thousand dew- 
 drops. Another episode is met again in Keltic folk-lore : 
 it tells of a city with all its inhabitants submerged, 
 drowned for its wickedness. Here is another httle 
 touch which suggests the Middle Ages. Each hero car- 
 ries a conch-shell for a trumpet, which has a name, as 
 if personified. We are accustomed to the naming of 
 swords, but this is still more hero-like. Arjuna blew 
 his shell, called Deva-datta, ''the god-given;" the 
 words sound like Latin : Yudishthira blew his, called 
 " eternal victory." 
 
 There is another episode of the Maha Bharata, which 
 ma}^ be quoted for its beauty simpl}-, but also for the 
 close resemblance it bears to the story of Alkestis in 
 Greek literature. Like her, the heroine is vvilling to die 
 for her husband ; and these two nations unconsciously 
 worked out the same idea. Its root, therefore, must 
 have been the same ; we shall learn the meaning when 
 wx take up the Greek form of the thought. Savitri, the 
 beautiful daughter of a king, loved Satyavan, the son of 
 a hermit, but was warned b}' a seer to overcome her at- 
 tachment, as he had onl}^ one 3'ear to live. ' ' Whether his 
 years be few or man}-, be he gifted with all grace or 
 graceless, him my heart hath chosen, and it chooseth 
 not again," she replied ; and the}^ were married. The 
 bride strove to forget the ominous prophecy ; but as the 
 last day of the 3'ear approached, her anxiet}- became 
 irrepressible. She exhausted herself in prayers and 
 
56 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 penances, but dared not reveal the fatal secret to her 
 husband. At last the dreaded day arrived, and Satya- 
 van set out to cut wood in the forest. His wife asked 
 leave to accompan}- him, and walked behind with a 
 heavy heart. He soon made the wood resound with his 
 hatchet, when suddenly a thrill of agon}- shot through 
 his temples, and feeling himself falling he called out to 
 his wife to support him. 
 
 " Then she received her fainting husband in her arms and sat 
 
 herself 
 On the cold ground, and gently laid his drooping head upon 
 
 her lap. 
 
 All in an instant she beheld an awful shape 
 Standing before her, dressed in blood-red garments, with a 
 
 glittering crown 
 Upon his head ; his form, though glowing like the sun, was 
 
 yet obscure, 
 And eyes he had like flames, a noose depended from his hand ; 
 
 and he 
 Was terrible to look upon, as by her husband's side he stood 
 And gazed upon him with a fiery glance. Shuddering, she 
 
 started up 
 And laid her dying Satyavan upon the ground, and, with her 
 
 hands 
 Joined reverently, she thus with beating heart addressed the 
 
 shape, 
 'Surely thou art a god; such form as thine must more than 
 
 mortal be ! 
 Tell me, thou god-like bemg, who thou art, and wherefore thou 
 
 art here?'" 
 
 The figure replied that he was Yama, king of the dead ; 
 that her husband's time was come, and that he must 
 bind and take his spirit. 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 57 
 
 " Then from her husband's body forced he out, and firmly with 
 his cord 
 
 Bound and detained the spirit, clothed in form no larger than a 
 thumb. 
 
 Forthwith the body, reft of vital being and deprived of breath, 
 
 Lost all its grace and beauty, and became ghastly and motion- 
 less." 
 
 After binding the spirit, Yama proceeds with it to- 
 wards the place of which he is guardian ; the faith- 
 ful wife follows him closelj'. Yama bids her go home 
 and prepare the funeral rites, but she persists in follow- 
 ing, until Yama, pleased with her devotion, grants her 
 an}' boon she pleases, except her husband's life. She 
 chooses that her husband's father, who is now^ blind, msiy 
 recover his sight. Yama consents, and bids her now re- 
 turn home. Still she persists in following. Two other 
 boons are gTanted in the same wa}', and still Savitri 
 follows closel}' on the heels of the king of death. At 
 last, overcome by her constancy, Yama grants her a boon 
 without exception. The delighted Savitri exclaims, — 
 
 " Nought, mighty king, this time hast thou excepted : let my 
 
 husband live ; 
 Without him I desire not happiness, nor even heaven itself ; 
 Without him I must die. ' So be it I faithful wife,' replied 
 
 the king ; 
 Thus I release him, and with that he loosed the cord that 
 
 bound his soul." 
 
 But the most beautiful, as well as celebrated of the 
 episodes, is the stor}- of Nala and Damayanti. It has 
 been translated into man}' modern languages. I will give 
 j'ou Wheeler's prose translation. It is told in the most 
 
58 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 naive and delicions manner. Dama3'anti talks to the 
 mountains and tiees as if they were Hving beings. 
 
 There is one point in which the Indian epics are 
 different from those of every other nation. The gods 
 themselves take npon them a human form and take part 
 in the action. But I think this is an interi)olation of the 
 Brahmans, for it is contrar}- to the natural processes of 
 the human mind. Whereas, it is quite natural to lend 
 to the hero the characteristics of a god ; more fitting to 
 raise a mortal than to degrade a deity. 
 
 One trait which reveals the gods is found in other 
 poems. The Greek and Latin gods never wink. In the 
 Iliad Helen recognizes Aphrodite by her '' marble eyes." 
 They mean the full, fixed eyes of the Hindu deities, 
 which puzzled commentators, until the}' were found in 
 Sanskrit literature. 
 
 THE STORY OF NALA AND DAMAYANTI. 
 
 In ancient times there lived in Nishadha a certain raja 
 named Nala; and he was handsome, brave, majestic, and splen- 
 did, gifted with the choicest virtues, renowned for his skill in 
 archery and in taming horses, of unblemished truth, admired 
 by noble women, but loving dice exceedingly; and he was also 
 deeply read in the A'edas, and had brought every sense and 
 passion under control. Farther south, in the city Vidarbha, 
 reigned Knja Bhi'ma, terrible in strength, whose blooming and 
 slender-waisted daughter, Damayanti, was famous anumg all 
 the rajas for her radiant charms and exceeding grace. And 
 Nala, the tiger among rajas, had so often heard of the exquisite 
 loveliness of Damayanti, the pearl of maidens, that he was 
 enamored without havhig seen her ; and the soul-disturbing 
 Damayanti had, in like manner, so often been told of the god- 
 like comelinei^s and virtues of the hero Nala, that she secretly 
 desired to become his bride. 
 
- BRAffMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 59 
 
 Now, on a certain day Raja Xala wandered to a grove and 
 pondered on his deep love for Damayanti, when a flock of 
 swans with golden plumage flew iuto the grove, and he caught 
 one of the bright birds. And the bird cried out, ** SLiy me 
 not, O gentle raja, and I vrUl so pmise thee in the presence of 
 Damayanti that she shall think of no other man but thee.'* 
 So Nala set it free ; and the bird of golden wing flew away 
 with all its companions to the city Vidarbha, and enteretl the 
 garvlen of Raja Bhima. And the l»eautiful Damayanti was 
 sporting with her maidens in the garden, when they all beheld 
 a flock of swans who dropped their golden plumes; and the 
 slender-waistetl chasetl the bright biixls al»oiit the ganlen, wht- n 
 suddenly a swan turned round to Damayanti and Siiid in the 
 language of men, " O Damayanti, thou art the loveliest of 
 maidens, and Nala is the handsomest of heroes ; if the peerless 
 wed the peerless, how happy will be the union ! " Then the 
 royal maiden softly said to the bird, " Speak the same wonls 
 to Nala." And the bird fluttered its golden win^, and flew 
 away to Nishadii, and told all to Nala. 
 
 Meanwhile the beautiful maiden grew pale and dejectetl in 
 her father's court at Vidiirbha. She could not sleep, she often 
 wept, she found no joy in banquets or in conversation, and 
 she gazed upon the sky at night-time with a look of wild dis- 
 traction; for her heart was wholly possessed with a deep love 
 for Nala. So the mai«ieus told her royal father that Dama- 
 yanti was fading away into a deep melancholy. And the Rnja 
 of Vidarbha said, '* My daughter is full-grown, and must be 
 given away in marriage." And he sent Brahmans round the 
 world to proclaim a Swayamvara; and all the rajas of the earth 
 who hail hearvl of the divine loveliness of Damayanti flocked to 
 the court of Bhima, with all the pomp of chiiriots and horses, 
 and elephants, and armies. And Bhima welcomed them all 
 with due courtesy, and entertaineil them welL 
 
 Now, at this time the holy sage Narada ascended on high to 
 the heaven of Indra. And Indra gave him honorable wel- 
 come, and said, " Where, O sage, are all the rajivs, that they 
 
60 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 come not to my abode ? " And Narada replied, " cloud- 
 compeller, all the rajas and their mighty sons have gone to 
 the Swayamvara of Damayanti ; for she, the loveliest of 
 maidens, is about to choose a husband for herself." Then the 
 gods were stricken as they heard of the transcendent beauty of 
 Damayanti, and they exclaimed, " We, too, will go to her 
 Swayamvara ! " And Indra, lord of Swarga, and Agni, god of 
 fire, and Varuna, who rules the seas, and Yama, who judges 
 the dead, called for their celestial chariots, and drove through 
 the air to the city of Vidarbha; and, as they approached the 
 earth, they beheld the hero Nala, as radiant as the sun and as 
 comely as the god of love; and they stayed their chariots in 
 the blue air, and said to the heroic one, " Nala, we pray 
 you to do our bidding." And Nala stood with folded hands, 
 and said, " Whatsoever you command, that \vill I do." So 
 Indra, sovereign of the gods, said to Nala, " Go now and tell 
 the fair daughter of Bhima that the four immortal gods have 
 come from heaven to woo her, and that she must choose from 
 amongst them whom she will." But Nala replied, " Oh ! spare 
 me this ; for I, too, am enamored with the damsel, and how 
 can I woo her for another ?" But all the gods spoke out with 
 one accord, " Have you not pledged yourself to do whatsoever 
 we command? Delay not, therefore, nor belie your word." 
 Then Nala said, " The palace of Bhima is strongly guarded, 
 and I cannot enter the presence of the maiden," But Indra 
 replied, " No man shall stop you ; only go." Then Raja 
 Nala entered the palace of Bhima, and no man hindered him ; 
 and he reached the inner apartments, and beheld the beautiful 
 damsel sitting amongst her maidens ; and, when the damsels 
 saw him, they sprang from their seats, and marvelled at his 
 wondrous beauty. And Nala smiled sweetly upon Dama- 
 yanti ; and she, with lovely eyes, smiled sweetly in return, and 
 said, " hero, how came you hither ] Have you escaped the 
 guards my father has set around u^ ?" Then Nala rei3lied, 
 " O loveliest of damsels, my name is Nala, and I am a mes- 
 senger from the gods, and through their power I have passed 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 61 
 
 the gates unseen by men. Now, the four gods desire to wed 
 you, and pray you to choose one of their number to be their 
 lord." And Damayauti bowed in reverence to the gods, and 
 then smiled again upon Nala, and said, " O raja, the language 
 of the golden-plumaged swan has kindled my soul, and I will 
 choose no other but you; and, if you spurn my love, I will 
 take poison, or plunge into the water or the fire." And Nala 
 replied, '' beautiful maiden, how can you choose a mortal 
 man in the presence of the bright gods ? How can you refuse 
 to be arrayed in heavenly raiment, and bright amaranthine 
 flowers, and all the glory of the celestials ? Where is the 
 damsel who would not wed the radiant Agni, god of fire, 
 whose mouths consume the world ? or the bright Indra, sov- 
 ereign of the gods, at whose dread sceptre all the assemblies 
 of the earth are forced to do justice and work righteousness ? 
 or the majestic Varuna, lord of waters? or the mighty Yama, 
 judge over all the dead?" But Damayanti trembled at the 
 words of Nala, and her eyes were filled with tears, and she 
 said, "I will pay due homage to all the gods; but you only 
 will I choose to be my lord." And Nala went his way, and 
 told to the expectant gods all that Damayanti had said. 
 
 2. THE SWAYAMVAEA OF DAMAYANTI. 
 
 At length the day of happy omen, the great day of the Swa- 
 yamvara, dawned upon the city of Vidarbha. And all the 
 rajas, sick with love, passed through the glittering portals and 
 the court of golden columns, and entered the Hall of State, 
 like lions entering their mountain lairs. And all the rajas 
 were adorned with fragrant garlands, and rich ear-rings of costly 
 gems were hanging from their ears. And some had long arms, 
 robust and vigorous as the ponderous battle-mace; while others 
 were as soft and delicately rounded as a smooth serpent. With 
 bright and flo^^Tng hair and arched eyebrows, their faces were 
 as radiant as the stars; and they filled th§ Hall of State, as the 
 serpents fill the under-world, or as tigers fill the caves in the 
 
62 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 mountains. But, when Damayanti entered the hall, every eye 
 was fixed, and every soul entranced at her dazzling loveliness; 
 and all the rajas gazed upon her beauty, and were stricken 
 with deep and passionate desire. Then the name of every 
 raja was proclaimed aloud, and Damayanti glanced around her 
 at the glittering crowd of suitors, and she saw in her dismay 
 that there were five Nalas in the hall, for each of the four 
 bright gods had taken upon himself the form of Nala. And 
 Damayanti trembled with fear, and after a while she folded 
 her hands in reverence to the gods, and said in sad and 
 humble tones, " Since I heard the language of the swan, I have 
 chosen Nala for my lord, and have thought of no other hus- 
 band. Therefore, gods, I pray to you that you resume your 
 own immortal forms, and reveal Nala to me, that I may choose 
 him for my lord in the presence of all." And the gods heard 
 the piteous prayer of Damaj^anti, and they wondered at her 
 steadfast truth and fervent love; and straightway they revealed 
 the tokens of their godhead. Then Damayanti saw the four 
 bright gods, and knew that they were not mortal heroes; for 
 their feet touched not the earth, and their eyes winked not, 
 and no perspiration hung upon their brows, nor dust upon 
 their raiment, and their garlands were as fresh as if the flowers 
 were just gathered. And Damayanti also saw the true Nala; 
 for he stood before her with shadow falling to the ground, 
 and twinkling eyes, and drooping garland; and moisture was 
 on his brow, and dust upon his raiment; and she knew he 
 was Nala, Then she went in all maidenly modesty to Nala, 
 and took the hem of his garment, and threwa wreath of radiant 
 flowers round his neck, and thus chose him for her lord. And 
 a sound of wild sorrow burst from all the rajas; but the gods 
 and sages cried aloud, " Well done ! " And Nala turned to the 
 slender- waisted damsel and said, "Since, maiden with the 
 eye serene, you have chosen me for your husband in the pres- 
 ence of the gods, know that I will be your faithful consort, 
 ever delighting in your words ; and so long as my soul shall 
 inhabit this body I solemnly vow to be thine, and thine alone." 
 
BKAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 63 
 
 Then the blest pair approached the gods with reverence, and 
 the gods gave rare gifts to Nala. To him Indra gave the 
 sight Avhich sees the unseen in the sacrifice, and the power to 
 go unhindered where he pleased; and Agni gave him the mas- 
 tery over fire, and power over the three worlds ; and Varuna 
 gave him the mastery over water, and the power of obtaining 
 fresh garlands at will ; and Yama gave him a subtle taste for 
 food, and eminence in every virtue. 
 
 Then Raja Bhima in his joy and pride performed the marriage 
 rites of his beautiful daughter and her chosen lord, and in due 
 time Raja Nala carried away his bride to his own city. Thus 
 the tiger among rajas obtained the pearl of maidens ; and 
 henceforth the bliss of Nala and Damayanti was equal to that 
 of the giant-slayer Indra and his beautiful Sachi. Radiant and 
 excellent as the sun, Nala ruled all the subjects of his raj 
 with a just and equal sway. He performed an Aswemedha, 
 with many rich gifts to holy men ; and Damayanti bore him 
 two children, — a handsome son named Indrasen, and a beauti- 
 ful daughter named Indrasena. 
 
 3. THE GAMBLING MATCH BETWEEN NALA AND 
 PUSHKARA. 
 
 Now, when the bright gods were returning from the Sway- 
 amvara to the heaven of Indra, they met the evil spirit 
 Kali, accompanied by Duapara. And Indra said to Kali, 
 "Whither art thou going, OKali?" And Kali repb'ed, "11/ 
 am going to the Sway am vara of Damayanti ; for I have set my/, 
 heart upon having her for my bride." And Indra laughed and 'O' 
 said, " The bridal of Damayanti is ended, for in our presence 
 she chose Raja Nala to be her lord." Then Kali was filled with 
 rage, and, bowing ^^dth reverence to the gods, he said, 
 " Since she has preferred a mortal man to the immortal gods, 
 heavy shall be her doom." But the four gods replied, " It 
 was with our consent that Damayanti chose her lord ; and what 
 maiden would not incline to one so virtuous as Nala ? And he 
 
64 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 who has read the Vedas, and constantly adores the gods -with 
 pure offerings, and is gentle to all living creatures, and true in 
 word and deed, he is equal to the immortal gods." Then the 
 gods ascended on high, but Kali said to Duapara, " I will 
 not stay my wrath, but henceforth I will keep watch on Nala, 
 and you shall abide in the dice ; and when the hour comes I 
 will enter his soul and gain the mastery over him until I have 
 cast him out of the raj and parted him from his sweet bride." 
 And from that hour the two evil spirits. Kali and Duapara, 
 dwelt in the palace of Nala. 
 
 Twelve years passed away, and none in all the world were so 
 supremely blessed as the beautiful Damayanti and her husband 
 Nala. But on a certain evening Nala failed in duty, for he 
 prayed to the gods with feet unwashen ; and Kali seized the 
 opportunity, and straightway entered into him and possessed 
 his inmost soul. And Nala had a brother named Pushkara, and 
 Kali said to Pushkara, " Go you and play at dice with Nala, 
 and I will make him the winner of his raj." And Pushkara 
 challenged Nala to a game at dice, and Nala and Pushkara 
 sat down to play in the presence of Damayanti. And they 
 played for gold and jewels and raiment, and for chariots and 
 horses ; but Nala was worsted at every throw, for Duapara 
 embodied the dice, and Kali had mastered him body and soul. 
 Then the faithful friends of Nala prayed him to throw no 
 longer ; but he was maddened with the love of play, and 
 shut his ears to all they said. And all the chief men of the 
 raj assembled at the gate of the palace to arrest the frenzy of the 
 raja. And the charioteer entered the hall and said to Damay- 
 anti, " Lo, all the city are gathered together, for they fear 
 lest some dire misfortune befall the raja." And Damayanti was 
 stricken with deep sorrow, and she entreated the raja to listen 
 to the voice of his people ; but he turned aw-ay from her beauti- 
 ful and tearful eyes, and answered not a word ; and so the play 
 went on, and the people retiirneil to their houses, saying, 
 " Surely this gambler cannot be the raja." And when Nala 
 had lost all his treasures, the sorrowing Damuvanti told her 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 65 
 
 nurse to summon the council ; and the council assembled at the 
 palace, and Damayanti announced their presence to Nala, but 
 he heeded not her words ; and she was filled with shame, and 
 left the hall and went to her own rooms. 
 
 Then Damayanti sent for the charioteer and spoke to him 
 winningly, and said, "You know what trust my lord, the 
 Eaja, has ever placed in you. Go now and harness the steeds to 
 the chariot, and take my children to my father's city and 
 leave them in my father's house ; and then dwell there, or go 
 wherever you will." And the charioteer went to the council 
 and obtained their consent ; and he took the noble boy and the 
 beautiful maiden to the city of Vidarbha, and he gave them in- 
 to the charge of Raja Bhima ; and then he went his way with 
 great sadness of heart to the city of Ayodhya and entered the 
 service of Raja Rituparna. 
 
 Meanwhile, Nala had lost all his treasures, and his chariots 
 and his horses ; and he staked his raj and the vestments 
 which he wore, and he lost all to Pushkara. And Pushkara 
 smiled and said, " Nala, you have lost your all, excepting 
 only your wife, Damayanti." At these w^ords the heart of Nala 
 was rent asunder, and he said not a word. And he took oft" all 
 his robes and raiment and looked sadly upon Pushkara, and 
 went out with but a single scanty covering, and Damayanti al- 
 so had but a single covering, and she followed him slowly be- 
 hind. 
 
 4. THE EXILE OF NALA AND DAMAYANTL 
 
 Then Pushkara proclaimed throughout the city, " Whoever 
 shall give food or shelter to Nala shall be put to death." 
 
 And for three days and three nights Nala lived on fruits 
 and roots, and his sorrowing Rani followed behind him and did 
 the same. Then Nala saw a flock of birds upon the ground and 
 he said within himself, " This day we shall have food." 
 And he threw his only garment upon the birds, but they flew 
 into the air and carried the garment with them. And the birds 
 
 5 
 
66 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 spoke in liuman language and mocked Nala in his misery, and 
 said, " O foolish Nala, we are the dice, and we came hither 
 to rob you of your covering, for whilst you had a single garment 
 left our joy was small." Then Nida was in an agony, and he 
 said to Damayanti, " "Weep not for me, but go to the house of 
 your father ; yonder lies the road, and it passes through woods 
 that have abundant fruits, and on the waj^ are many hermitages 
 of pious sages." But Damayanti burst into tears and replied, 
 " my lord, your words will break my heart ; How can I 
 leave you in this lonely wood, when you have been robbed of 
 all ? No, I will stay and soothe your weariness, for the wisest 
 physicians say that a true wife is the best balsam in every time 
 of sorrow. If I go to my kindred it must be with you, and we 
 must both go together." But Nala had not the heart to take 
 refuge in the house of his wife's father ; and he said, " I will 
 not seek refuge in your father's raj ; once I went there in joy 
 and pride, but now should I appear there I should only increase 
 my shame." 
 
 So Nala and Damayanti journeyed on together, and they made 
 one garment suffice them. And they came to a brook and Nala 
 caught two fishes and laid them before his wife and went into 
 the brook to bathe ; and Damayanti in her hunger put her hand 
 upon the fishes, but the touch of her fingers revived them like a 
 draught of soma and they sprang back into the water. And 
 when Nala returned he thought that Damayanti had eaten the 
 fishes, but he said nothing, and so they still wandered on. 
 
 Now when both Raja and the Rani were wearied with their 
 toil, and faint with tliirstand hunger they reached a little hut, 
 and there they lay and slept upon the bare ground. And 
 Damayanti was oppressed with sleep, but Nala was distraught 
 with sorrow. And Nala awoke and thought of the raj he had 
 lost, and the friends who had deserted him, and of his weary 
 wandering in the jungle ; and he grew frantic, for the evil spirit 
 of Kali was working within him; and he said within his 
 heart, " If Damayanti remains with me she must bear certain 
 son-ow, but if I leave her she niav return to her father's house: 
 
BRAHMA NISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 67 
 
 If I go, I know not which is l^etter for me, — life or death ; but 
 for her, no one will harm a wife so devoted and so beautiful." 
 Then Nala pondered how he should divide the single garment 
 between them ; and he saw a sword that lay in the cabin, and 
 he severed the garment in two, and he clothed himself with the 
 half of the garment. Then he fled into the jungle, but came 
 back again and beheld his wife sleeping, and he wept bitterly 
 and said, " My love, whom neither sua nor moon dared look 
 upon, how will she awake ? How will she wander alone 
 through the deep jungle haunted by serpents and wild beasts ? 
 May the sun god and the god of wind protect her, though her 
 virtue is her best guard." Then the mind of Nala was swayed 
 to and fro, first by love and then by despair, until at last he left 
 his wife alone in the hut, and rushed like one who is mad into 
 the depths of the jungle. 
 
 5. NALA'S DESERTION OF DAMAYANTI. 
 
 Now when the slender-waisted Damayanti awoke from her 
 deep slumber and found herself abandoned in the jungle, she 
 shrieked aloud in grief and pain, and ran about the wood 
 leaping in madness ; and she sobbed very bitterly and said, 
 " May that evil one who has caused this dreadful suffering to 
 Nala be smitten by a curse more fatal still," Thus she went 
 wailing through the forest, until suddenly there came a great 
 serpent and seized her in his grasp and coiled around her ; and 
 she cried out in great terror, and a huntsman heard her screams, 
 and shot an arrow at the serpent's face, and released her from 
 her peril Then the huntsman brought her water and food, 
 and refreshed her ; and at his bidding she told him all her 
 story, but as he gazed upon her beautiful form, which was 
 scantily covered by half a garment, a deep passion burned with- 
 in him, and he whispered words of love. Then Damayanti 
 was filled with wrath, and she cursed him in her bitterness of 
 soul, and he fell down dead like a tree that has been stricken 
 with lif'htnin''. 
 
68 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Then Damfiyanti wandered on in quest of Nala until she 
 met a caravan of merchants, with elephants and camels and 
 chariots and horses ; and when the people saw her so beautiful 
 and noble, and yet so pale and worn, they took compassion on 
 her ; and they told her they were going to the city of Chedi 
 And Damayanti went with the caravan, and when it was even- 
 ing they came to a pleasant lake fragrant with, lotus flowers, 
 and they pitched their tents and encamped there. But at 
 midnight there was a great cry, for a horde of wild elephants 
 of the jungle rushed down upon the encampment, like mount- 
 ain-tops rolling down to the valley ; and they trampled upon the 
 sleeping people, and> crushed many with their heavy tread, 
 and gored others with their fierce tusks. And the merchants 
 shrieked aloud Avith terror, and some began to fly and others 
 stood gasping, blind with sleep j whilst many struck each other 
 down, or stumbled over the rough ground, or climbed the trees, 
 or hid themselves in the holes in the earth. And, Damayanti 
 awoke amidst the dreadful turmoil ; and some said that she 
 was a woman of evil omen and had worked all the mischief ; 
 and she was filled with shame and fear, and fled once again 
 into the depths of the jungle. 
 
 After many days Damayanti entered the city of Chedi, and 
 she was famished and distressed, and broken down with sorrow. 
 And she was clad in only half a garment, and her long hair 
 was hanging dishevelled over her shoulders, and her gaze was 
 wild and distracted, and her face was emaciated from long 
 fasting. And the people of the city thought that she was mad, 
 and a crowd of boys followed her and mocked her. And, as she 
 approached the gate of the palace, the mother of the raja be- 
 held her from the terrace, and sent her waiting-woman to bring 
 the wanderer in. Damayanti entered the palace and told how 
 her husi)and was a raja, who had lost his all by dice, and how 
 she had followed him into exile through the greatness of her 
 love, but how he had left her in the jungle with only half a 
 garment. And the eyes of Damayanti were filled with tears, 
 and the gracious lady bade her take up her al)ode in the palace 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHAHATA. 69 
 
 while the servants of the household went abroad in search of 
 Nala. And Daniayanti said to the mother of the raja, " O 
 mother of heroes, I will dwell with you, but I will not eat the 
 victuals left by others, nor wash the feet of others, nor converse 
 with strange men." And the mother of the raja agreed, and 
 called her daughter Sunada, and bade her take Daniayanti to 
 be her friend. And Damayanti dwelt in the palace many days 
 as friend and companion of the princess, Sunada. 
 
 6. ADVEXTURES OF NALA. 
 
 Now when Rajah Xala left Damayanti in the hut, he beheld 
 a great fire in the forest, and he heard a voice crying, " Hasten, 
 Xala, and come hither ! " And Xala remembered that on his 
 bridal day, the god Agni had given him power over lire; and 
 he plunged into the bright flame and saw the raja of serpents 
 coiled up in a ring. And the serpent said, " I deceived the 
 sage of Xarada, and he has cursed me, that fire should surround 
 me until you save me." And the serpent shrank to the size of 
 a finger, and Xala lifted him up and carried him out of the fire. 
 Then the serpent bit Xala, and immediately the form of Xala 
 was changed into that of a deformed dwarf, so that no man 
 could know him. And the serpent said to Xala, "My 
 poison shall work on the evil spirit who has entered your soul, 
 until he leaves you free. Take now the name of Vahuka and 
 enter the service of Rituparna, Raja of Ayodhya, and you shall 
 teach him the art of taming horses, and he shall teach you 
 all the secrets of the dice ; therefore, sorrow no more, Xala ! 
 for you shall see again your wife, your childi^en, and your raj ; 
 and when you would again resume your proper form, put on 
 this change of raiment and think of me." So saying, the ser- 
 pent gave a change of raiment to Xala, and vanished away 
 from his sight. 
 
 Then Xala journeyed on to the city of Ayodhya, and ofi'ered 
 his ser\'ices to Raja Rituparna, both as a tamer of horses, and as 
 skilled in the art of cooking viands ; and the Raja engaged him, 
 
70 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 and bade him take heed that the horses were swift of foot ; and 
 he gave him Vtirshneya and Jivala to be his adjutants. Now 
 Viirshneya had been charioteer to Nala, and had driven his 
 children to the city of Vidarbha ; but Nala's form had been 
 changed by the serpent, and Varshneya knew him not. And 
 every evening Nala used to sing this single verse : — 
 
 "Where is she whom I left in the jungle, to suffer hunger, thirst 
 
 and weariness ? " 
 "Does she think of me, her foolish lord, or does she sit in the 
 
 presence of another ? " 
 
 And Jivala said to Nala, "Who is she, Vahuka! for 
 whom you are grieving?" And Nala answered, "A man 
 there was bereft of sense, who had a fiiithful wife, but in his 
 foolishness he forsook her in the wilderness ; and ever since 
 that time the man wanders to and fro in despair, for, whether 
 she lives or no, he cannot say." 
 
 7. DISCOVERY OF DAMAYANTI. 
 
 Meantime, Raja Bhima of Vidarbha had sent holy Brahmans 
 to every land in quest of his daughtei-, Damayanti, and her 
 husband, Nala ; and the joyful Brahmans, hoping for rich re- 
 wards, went through every city and every clime, but nowhere 
 could they find a trace of those they sought. At length a 
 certain Brahman, whose name was Sudeva, went to the pleasant 
 city of Chedi, and there he saw the slender-waisted Damayanti, 
 standing in the palace by the side of the princess Sunadti ; and 
 her beauty was dim, and seemed like the sunlight struggling 
 through a cloud, yet he failed not to see that she was the 
 daughter of Raja Bhima. And the Brahman spoke to her say- 
 ing, " daughter of Bhima, your father has sent me to seek 
 for you ; and both he and your mother and your brethren are 
 all well ; and so too are your little ones, who are dwelling in 
 your father's palace." 
 
 And Damayanti remembered Sudeva, and made inquiry 
 
BEAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 71 
 
 about all her friends. And the mother of the raja came in and 
 saw her talking to the Brahman ; and presently she took the 
 Brahman aside, and said, "Who is this lady to whom yon have 
 spoken? Who is her father, and who is her husband?" 
 Then the Brahman told all to the mother of the raja, and he 
 said, " I knew she was the daughter of Bhima, because of her 
 peerless beauty ; but from her birth a lovely beauty-mark was 
 to be seen between her eyebrows, and now it has passed away." 
 When the princess Sunada heard these words of the Brahman, 
 she took water and washed away the traces of tears that were 
 between the eyes of Damayanti, and the beauty-mark was 
 present to the eyes of all. Then the mother of the raja ex- 
 claimed to Damayanti, " You are the daughter of my sister ! 
 I know you by the mark, for I myself was present at your 
 birth. Lo, all I have is yours ! " And Damayanti bowed to 
 her mother's sister, and prayed that she might be sent to her 
 two children at Vidarbha. And the palanquin was prepared, 
 and a guard was ordered, and Damayanti was carried to her 
 father's palace at Vidarbha. And when she saw her children 
 her heart was filled with joy, and she passed the night in sweet 
 slumber; but in the morning she went to her mother and softly 
 said, "0 mother, if my life is dear to you, I pray you to 
 do all you can to luring back Nala." And her mother went to 
 Bhima and said, "Your daughter is mourning for her hus- 
 band, Nala." 
 
 Then Raja Bhima sent the Brahmans once again to every 
 land in search of Nala ; and, before the Brahmans departed, 
 Damayanti sent for them, and entreated them to cry aloud 
 these words in every public place, "Whither didst thou go, 
 gambler, who severed thy wife's garment, and left her in 
 the lonely forest, where she still sits sorrowing for thee 1 " So, 
 the Brahmans went forth to all lands, and they searched every- 
 where, in crowded cities and in quiet villages, and in the her- 
 mitages of holy men, and everywhere they repeated aloud the 
 words of Damayanti, but no man took heed of the question 
 respecting Nala. 
 
72 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 8. DISCOVERY OF NALA. 
 
 Now, after a while, a certain Brahman went to the great city 
 of Ayodhya, where reigned Raja Rituparna, and where Nala 
 was dwelling in the guise of a charioteer and under the name- 
 of Vahuka. And the Brahman cried aloud the question of 
 Dcimayanti in all the streets and ways and market-places in the 
 city; but no man heeded him. So he took leave of the raja 
 and prepared to depart, when Vahuka came to him, and 
 groaned in anguish and wept bitterly, and said, " Even in the 
 extremity of misery a noble woman is mistress of herself ; and, 
 even when abandoned by her husband, she will not give her 
 soul to anger." At these words the Brahman left the city of 
 Ayodhya with all speed, and hastened to the city of Vidarbha, 
 and told Damayanti all that Vahuka had said; and the eyes of 
 Damayanti overflowed with tears, for she thought that she had 
 found Nala. Then Damayanti went to her mother, and said, 
 " mother ! I must send a message to the city of Ayodhya 
 which my father Bhima must not hear; and I will deliver it in 
 your presence to Sudeva, that best of Brahmans, who found me 
 in the city of Chedi ; and as he brought your daughter to 
 her lather's house, so may he swiftly bring my royal husband 
 from the city of Ayodhya." So she sent for Sudeva, and re- 
 quested him, in the presence of her mother, to go to the city of 
 Ayodhya, and to seek out Raja Rituparna, and say to him as 
 if by chance, " Damayanti, daughter of Raja Bhima, is about 
 to choose a second husband, and all the rajas and sons of rajas 
 are hastening to Vidarbha. If you would be there, you must 
 make good speed; for to-morrow is the appointed day, and at 
 sunrise she makes her choice; for Raja Nala cannot be found, 
 and no man knows whether he be alive or dead." 
 
 And Sudeva went to the city of Ayodhya and performed 
 the bidding of Damayanti; and, when Rituparna heard the 
 tidings that Damayanti was about to choose another husband, 
 his heart burned to be there, but the way was far. Rituparna 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 73 
 
 ■went to Yahuka, his charioteer, and spoke to him with win- 
 ning words like one that asks a favor, and said, " On the mor- 
 row the daughter of Bhima will choose a second husband; I, 
 too, would seek to win her, but the city of Vidarbha is afar 
 off. Say, then, if you have horses that can reach it in a single 
 day." Then the heart of Yahuka was smitten with anguish, 
 and he wondered that the holy Damayanti should be driven to 
 a deed so unholy, and he thought within himself that he would 
 see if the tidings were true. So he folded his hands in rever- 
 ence to the raja, and said, " I promise in a single day to reach 
 the city of Yidarbha." And he went to the stables of the 
 raja, and pondered long over the horses ; and he chose four 
 that were very slender, but fleet and powerful for the road, 
 and they had broad nostrils and large jaws ; and he har- 
 nessed them to the chariot of the raja. But when Ritupama 
 saw the slenderness of the coursers, he cried out, " What steeds 
 be these ? Have they strength and wind for such a journey ? " 
 And Yahuka replied, " These horses will not fail to carry you 
 to Yidarbha, but, if you desire others, tell me which you will 
 have, and I will harness them." But the raja said, " You know 
 the horses best, and may harness what you will." 
 
 9. NALA'S DRIYE FROM AYODHYA TO YIDARBHA. 
 
 Now when the chariot was ready. Raja Ritupama took his 
 seat, and commanded Yarshneya to ascend likewise, whilst 
 Yahuka drove. Then the fiery horses began to prance and 
 paw the air; but Yahuka gathered up the reins, and cried out 
 to the horses in a soothing voice, and they sprang into the air 
 as if they would unseat their driver, and then tore along the 
 ground as swift as the wind. And the riders were wellnigh 
 blinded with speed ; but the raja marvelled and rejoiced 
 greatly at the driving of Yahuka; and Yarshneya said within 
 himself, as he felt the rattling of the chariot and beheld the 
 driving of Yahuka, " Either this Yahuka must be the charioteer 
 of India, or else he is my old master. Raja Nala." 
 
74 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Thus the chariot JBevv along, like a bird in the air, through 
 the deep forests, and over the rivers and mountains and broad 
 lakes. And the raja dropped his mantle, and prayed Nala to 
 halt a moment and pick it up ; but Nala said, " The mantle is 
 miles behind, and Ave cannot return to recover it." And they 
 passed a certain tree, and the raja said to Nala, " Mark now 
 my skill in numbers; for I know the secrets of dice and the 
 rules of calculation. On these two branches hang fifty millions 
 of leaves and two thousand and ninety-five berries." And Nala 
 descended the chariot to count the leaves and berries, and, 
 whilst the raja cried out that he could not wait, Nala per- 
 sisted, and after a while Nala found that the numbering of the 
 raja was true to a single leaf. And Nala said, " raja, teach 
 me this skill of yours, and you shall learn from me all the 
 secrets that I know in horsemanship." And the raja did so; 
 and, when Nala knew the secret of the dice, the evil spirit 
 Kali went out of him, and Kali vomited the poison of the ser- 
 pent that Avas burning Avithin him. And Nala Avould have 
 cursed Kali; but he fled aAvay and entered a tree. Thus Nala 
 Avas released from his suff"erings; but still he took not his own 
 form of Nala, but remained in that of Vahuka the charioteer. 
 
 NoAv Avhen it Avas near the setting of the sun, the chariot 
 approached the city of Vidarbha, and the heart of Nala beat 
 faster and faster ; and, Avhen they reached the city gates, the 
 Avatchmen on the Avails proclaimed the coming of Raja Ritu- 
 parna ; and the rushing of the horses and rolling of the 
 chariot-wheels Avere like the thunder Avhich heralds in the 
 coming rain ; and the peacocks on the palace Avails raised their 
 necks and clamored, and the elephants in the stables roared 
 tumultuously. And the heart of Daniayanti thrilled Avith 
 delight as she heard the old familiar sound of her husband's 
 driving, and she said, " Unless Nala comes this day, I Avill no 
 longer live, but Avill perish by the fire." 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 75 
 
 10. DAMAYAXTI EECOVERS HER HUSBAND. 
 
 Then Damayanti ascended to the terrace on the roof of the 
 palace, and looked down into the middle of the court; and she 
 saw Raja Ritnparna, and her old charioteer Yarshneya, and the 
 dwarfish and deformed Vahuka; and she beheld her father 
 Raja Bhima receive Rituparna with all courtesy, although 
 amazed at the suddenness of his coming ; and she remembered 
 Yarshneya, and thought that he had learned to drive furiously, 
 like Nala; for she knew not Ydhuka, because of his altered 
 form. But still her heart thrilled, and she pondered deeply ; 
 for she remembered what Yahuka had said to the Brahman. 
 And she called her fair-haired handmaiden, Kesini, and said to 
 her, " Go, my little maid, and speak to that chariot-driver who 
 is short of stature, and find out who he is; and do you repeat 
 to him the message which was brought to me by the Brahman, 
 and tell me what he says." So, whilst Damayanti watched 
 from the terrace, the blameless little maiden went into the 
 middle of the court to speak to Nala. 
 
 Meantime Nala had taken the chariot to the stall ; and, 
 after he had tended to his horses, he mounted the chariot and 
 sat there alone. And the fair-haired Kesini went to him and 
 said, " I salute you, charioteer ! and pray you to hear the 
 message of my mistress Damayanti. She desires to know 
 whence you came and wherefore you have come." Nala an- 
 swered, " When my master, the raja, heard that Damayanti 
 would wed again, and would choose another husband on the 
 morrow, he bade me drive him hither with all speed; and, lo ! 
 we have come this day all the way from the city of Ayodhya." 
 Then Kesini said, "And who is that other charioteer who 
 came with you ? " Nala answered, '' That is the renowned 
 Yarshneya, who was once the charioteer of Nala; and, when 
 his raja went into exile, he took service with Rituparna. And 
 I, also, serve Rituparna; for I am his charioteer, and the chief 
 of all his cooks." And Kesini said, further, "Does Yarsh- 
 
76 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 neya know aught of Nala?" Nala answered, " It was Varsh- 
 neya who brought the children of Nala to this city, and then 
 he went his way, and heard no more of his old master." And 
 Kesini said, still further, "The Brahman that lately went to 
 the city of Ayodhya was commanded by my mistress to cry 
 aloud in every place, ' Whither didst thou go, gambler ! 
 who severed thy wife's garment, and left her in the lonely 
 forest, where she still sits sorrowing for thee ? ' Now, it was 
 you who gave the Brahman his answer back; so I pray you to 
 repeat that answer again, for my mistress desires to hear it." 
 At these words of the blameless little maiden the heart of 
 Nala was wrung with a deep sorrow, and his eyes overflowed 
 with tears, and, with a voice half choking from weeping, he 
 thus repeated his reply, "Even in the extremity of misery a 
 noble woman is mistress of herself ; and, even when abandoned 
 by her husband, she will not give her soul to anger." And 
 Nala wept afresh ; and the maid went back to Damayanti, and 
 told her all that Vahuka had said, and described to her the 
 bitterness of his sorrow. 
 
 Then Damayanti was still heavy at heart, wondering 
 wliether the charioteer could possibly be Nala; and she said, 
 " Go again, Kesini, and watch this man, and observe all that 
 he does, and see that no fire or water be given to him ; and 
 Avhatsoever he does, be it human or divine, come back and tell 
 to me." And Kesini went out and watched Nala, and presently 
 she returned and said, " Damayanti, never before did I behold 
 a man so god-like; for if he approaclies a low portal he never 
 bows his head, but the portal rises above him ; and when he 
 prepared to dress the victuals for his master, the vessels were 
 filled with water directly he looked at them ; and when he had 
 washed the meat he held some blades of grass towards the set- 
 ting sun, and they blazed with fire of their own accord." And 
 Damayantf remembered the gifts which the gods had given to 
 Nala on his marriage-day, and she said with a gentle voice, 
 *' Go again, Kesinf, and bring me some of the meat which the 
 charioteer is cooking." So the little maiden went into the kit- 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 77 
 
 chen and brought some of the food to Damayanti, and Damay- 
 anti tasted'it and cried aloud, " The charioteer is Nala ! " And 
 her heart was stirred with vehement emotion, and she directed 
 her maid to carry her two children to the charioteer. And 
 when Nala beheld his son and daughter, as beautiful as the 
 children of the gods, he wound his arms around them and 
 pressed them to his bosom, and burst into a flood of tears ; and 
 he said to Kesini, " blameless maiden, the children are so like 
 my own, that I have been compelled to weep." 
 
 When Damayanti heard from her handmaid of the deep 
 affection of the charioteer, she was seized with a deep longing 
 to behold Nala, and she sent Kesini to her mother, saying, " We 
 have watched the charioteer most closely, and we suspect him 
 to be Nala, only that his form is changed. I pray you, there- 
 fore, either to permit him to be brought to you, or give me 
 leave to have him brought to me, with or without the know- 
 ledge of my father." So the mother of Damayanti told to 
 Bhima all the secret counsel of his daughter, and the raja 
 permitted Damayanti to summon the charioteer. 
 
 Then Damayanti sent for Nala, and as she saw him she 
 trembled greatly, and her hair was dishevelled about her shoul- 
 ders, and she was arrayed in a mantle of scarlet, and the eyes 
 of both Nala and Damayanti overflowed with tears. And Dam- 
 ayanti was almost overcome by her strong emotion, and she 
 said, " O Vahuka, did you ever know an upright and noble man 
 who abandoned his sleeping wife in a wood ? Who was he 
 who thus forsook a beloved and blameless wife but Eaja Nala? 
 He who was chosen by me, and for whom I rejected the gods ; 
 me, whose hand he had clasped in the presence of the immortal 
 gods ; me, to whom he had plighted his faith before the nuptial 
 lire : where is that promise now ? " 
 
 And Nala gazed upon his long-lost wife like one in a dream, 
 and he said, " I lost' my raj by the dice, but the evil was 
 wrought by Kali; I forsook you in the jungle, but the guilty 
 deed was the work of Kali. Long time has Kali dwelt within 
 me, but now he is subdued and gone, and for thy sake I made 
 
76 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 neya know aught of Nala?" Nala answered, " It was Yarsh- 
 neya who brought the children of Nala to this city, and then 
 he went his way, and heard no more of his old master." And 
 Kesini said, still further, "The Brahman that lately went to 
 the city of Ayodhya was commanded by my mistress to cry 
 aloud in every place, ' Whither didst thou go, gambler ! 
 who severed thy wife's garment, and left her in the lonely 
 forest, where she still sits sorrowing for thee ? ' Now, it was 
 you who gave the Brahman his answer back; so I pray you to 
 repeat that answer again, for my mistress desires to hear it." 
 At these words of the blameless little maiden the heart of 
 Nala was wrung with a deep sorrow, and his eyes overflowed 
 with tears, and, with a voice half choking from weeping, he 
 thus repeated his reply, " Even in the extremity of misery a 
 noble woman is mistress of herself ; and, even when abandoned 
 by her husband, she will not give her soul to anger." And 
 Nala wept afresh ; and the maid went back to Damayanti, and 
 told her all that Vahuka had said, and described to her the 
 bitterness of his sorrow. 
 
 Then Damayanti was still heavy at heart, wondering 
 whether the charioteer could possibly be Nala; and she said, 
 *' Go again, Kesini, and watch this man, and observe all that 
 he does, and see that no fire or water be given to him ; and 
 whatsoever he does, be it human or divine, come back and tell 
 to me." And Kesini went out and watched Nala, and presently 
 she returned and said, " Damayanti, never before did I behold 
 a man so god-like; for if he approaches a low portal he never 
 bows his head, but the portal rises above him ; and when he 
 prepared to dress the victuals for his master, the vessels were 
 filled with water directly he looked at them ; and when he had 
 washed the meat he held some blades of grass towards the set- 
 ting sun, and they blazed with fire of their own accord." And 
 Damayantf remembered the gifts which the gods had given to 
 Nala on his marriage-day, and she said with a gentle voice, 
 ** Go again, Kesinf, and bring me some of the meat which the 
 charioteer is cooking." So the little maiden went into the kit- 
 
BRAHMANISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 77 
 
 chen and brought some of the food to Damayanti, and Damay- 
 anti tasted'it and cried aloud, " The charioteer is Nala ! " And 
 her heart was stirred with vehement emotion, and she directed 
 her maid to carry her two children to the charioteer. And 
 when Nala beheld his son and daughter, as beautiful as the 
 children of the gods, he wound his arms around them and 
 pressed them to his bosom, and burst into a flood of tears ; and 
 he said to Kesini, " blameless maiden, the children are so like 
 my own, that I have been compelled to weep," 
 
 When Damayanti heard from her handmaid of the deep 
 affection of the charioteer, she was seized with a deep longing 
 to behold Nala, and she sent Kesini to her mother, saying, " "We 
 have watched the charioteer most closely, and we suspect him 
 to be Nala, only that his form is changed. I pray you, there- 
 fore, either to permit him to be brought to you, or give me 
 leave to have him brought to me, with or without the know- 
 ledge of my father." So the mother of Damayanti told to 
 Bhima all the secret counsel of his daughter, and the raja 
 permitted Damayanti to summon the charioteer. 
 
 Then Damayanti sent for Nala, and as she saw him she 
 trembled greatly, and her hair was dishevelled about her shoul- 
 ders, and she was arrayed in a mantle of scarlet, and the eyes 
 of both Nala and Damayanti overflowed with tears. And Dam- 
 ayanti was almost overcome by her strong emotion, and she 
 said, " Vahuka, did you ever know an upright and noble man 
 who abandoned his sleeping Avife in a wood ? Who was he 
 who thus forsook a beloved and blameless wife but Eaja Nala ? 
 He who was chosen by me, and for whom I rejected the gods ; 
 me, whose hand he had clasped in the presence of the immortal 
 gods ; me, to whom he had plighted his faith before the nuptial 
 tire : where is that promise now ? " 
 
 And Nala gazed upon his long- lost wife like one in a dream, 
 and he said, " I lost' my raj by the dice, but the evil was 
 wrought by Kali; I forsook you in the jungle, but the guilty 
 deed was the work of Kali. Long time has Kali dwelt within 
 me, but now he is subdued and gone, and for thy sake I made 
 
78 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED- LITERATURES. 
 
 haste to come hither. But how may a high-born woman 
 choose a second husband ? Yet heralds are proclaiming 
 throughout the world that the daughter of Bhima will cele- 
 brate a second Swayamvara." 
 
 At these words Damayanti trembled and said, " Do not sus- 
 pect me of such shameless guilt. The Brahman proclaimed a 
 second Swayamvara only to find thee, and to bring thee here. 
 I call on the all-seeing wind, the sun, the moon, who are the 
 three gods who govern the three worlds, to attest the truth of 
 what I say." Then the voice of the wind was heard in the air, 
 " Nala, she has neither done nor thought evil, but for three long 
 years hath treasured up her virtue in all its fulness. The 
 second Swayamvara was a plot to discover thee. Thou hast 
 met with the daughter of Bhinia, and the daughter of Bhima 
 has met thee. Take- thy own wife to thy bosom ! " 
 
 Even as the wind was speaking, the flowers fell in showers 
 from heaven, and the gods sounded sweet music ; and every 
 doubt of the blameless Damayanti passed away from the mind 
 of Nala, and he threw off his disguise and put on the garments 
 that the serpent had given him, and at once resnmed his prop- 
 er form as Raja Nala. And Damayanti shrieked aloud, and 
 embraced her husband ; and Nala, radiant as of old, clasped her 
 to his heart, and the children were brought in, and the night 
 passed away in the fulness of joy. 
 
 11. NALA RECOVERS HIS RAJ. 
 
 And when the white-robed dawn was awakening a sleeping 
 world, the sound of rejoicing ran tlirough the city of Yidarbha. 
 In every street the people exulted in the safe return of Raja 
 Nala, and adorned the houses with banners and garlands, and 
 hung chains of flowers from door to door, and strewed the road- 
 ways with leaves and blossoms. And all was gladness in the 
 palace at Yidarbha, for Raja Bhima was transported with joy 
 when he beheld the long-lost husband of his beloved daughter ; 
 and Raja Rituparna was filled with wonder and delight when 
 
BRAHISIAKISM AND THE MAHA BHARATA. 79 
 
 he knew that his fiercely driving charioteer was no other than 
 Kaja Nala. Then they took counsel together how they might 
 compel the evil-minded Pushkara to restore the raj to his 
 elder brother. And Nala had learned the whole art of throw- 
 ing dice from his old master, Raja Ritnparna, and he saw how 
 Pushkara had won the raj, and resolved to win it back in like 
 manner. So when one month had passed away and Nala was 
 perfect in the game, he set off to Nishadha, with elephants and 
 horses and chariots, and challenged his brother Pushkara to 
 another throw, in which he would stake Damayanti against the 
 raj ; and the wicked Pushkara eagerly agreed and exulted in 
 the certainty of winning the wife of Nala. But the throw was 
 against Pushkara, and thus Nala won back his raj and all his 
 treasure ; but, when Pushkara humbled himself before him, 
 Nala forgave him all, and dismissed him with many gifts to his 
 cwTi city. Then Nala returned to Vidarbha and brought away 
 his beautiful Damayanti ; and henceforth he reigned at Nish- 
 ada, as Indra reigns in heaven, and performed every holy rite 
 in honor of the gods, with all the munificence of a royal 
 devotee. 
 
80 SANSKRIT AHD ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 < 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 
 
 AS these studies are literaiy and not theological, 
 it ma}' be wondered that I allude to the two 
 religions : it is because we could not understand the 
 poems without them. The Maha Bharata, with its 
 Swa^-amvaras and single combats and feudal tone, is 
 transitional. The Brahmanical age soon became a 
 gloom}' sacerdotal period, where Brahman priests t}ran- 
 nized over the Kshatriya rajas ; and therefore we shall 
 trace next the rise of Buddhism, and the epic poem, 
 the Ramayana, which form the third period, called the 
 Buddhist period. 
 
 The Brahmans based their authority upon the Vedas, 
 which we spoke of in our last chapters, and also on 
 the laws of Manu, their great lawgiver, which is the 
 oldest code of laws after the three Yedas. They con- 
 tain old material ; but, in their present form, they are of 
 much later date than the three Vedas. They were not 
 revealed in their actual form like the laws in the three 
 Vedas ; the thought was sacred, but written down in 
 human words, and handed down by smriti, tradition, 
 instead of sruti., revelation, so that sometimes a letter 
 or a word might be changed. The word Manu is the 
 same as the Greek Minos, which also means lawgiver, 
 and has the same root as our words " mind " and " man." 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYAXA. 81 
 
 Therefore it is not probable tiiat lie was a real person. 
 The code of Manu means probabl}' the laws of a man, 
 instead of the laws revealed by the gods in the three 
 Vedas. 
 
 These laws of Manu give rules for the religious ob- 
 servances, the civil customs, and the domestic life of 
 priests and la3'men. By their commands, the Hindu 
 knows how to act towards his gods, his fellow-citizens, 
 and his famil}'. And those remarkable village commu- 
 nities, still existing in India, are governed by Mann's 
 laws. Man}' of them seem to us trivial and subser- 
 vient ; I fear we shall not admire our Hindu brethren in 
 them as much as we did in the Rig Veda and the Maha 
 Bharata. A few noble ones are scattered throughout, 
 like these : — 
 
 " The witness who speaks falsely shall be fast bound under 
 water in the cords of Varuna ; and shall be wholly deprived 
 of power to escape torment during one hundred transmigrations. 
 Let mankind therefore give no false testimon3\ The soul is its 
 own witness : offend not thy conscious soul^ the supreme inter- 
 nal witness of men." 
 
 " The sinful have said in their heart, ' None sees us'; yes, the 
 gods distinctly see them, and so does the spirit within their 
 breasts." 
 
 These laws are quite different from our idea of a code ; 
 there is no s^'stematic arrangement in them. The real 
 laws for government and civil customs, which ought to 
 form the greatest part of any code, occupy part of three 
 books. There are twelve books in all : of these, six 
 are devoted to the duties of Brahmans ; two, to the 
 duties of Kshatriyas, including rajas ; one book, to the 
 other two castes. The state of society is pure, unmixed 
 
 6 
 
82 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Brahmanism. The world evidently was created for the 
 Brahnians. The}' are the great central body around 
 which everylhing revolves. The}' are bound together 
 b}' most stringent rules, and the other three castes 
 were powerless to resist them, because the}' were for- 
 bidden to combine, by equally severe laws. These are 
 rules : — 
 
 "A Brahman, whether learned or unleameci^ is a mighty 
 divhiity ; just as fire is a mighty divinity, whether consecrated 
 or unconsecrated," 
 
 " From priority of birth, from superiority of origin (in being 
 born from the mouth of the Creator), from possession of the 
 right of teaching the llig Veda, from being the first to receive 
 the sacred thread, the Brahman is lord of all the classes." 
 
 "A raja nuist never kill a Brahman, though he be found 
 guilty of all possible crimes ; let him be expelled from the 
 kingdom unharmed in body, and intact in property. There is 
 no greater injustice on earth than killing a Brahman. The 
 raja, therefore, must not harbor a thought about putting him 
 to death." 
 
 " The superiority of the Brahman is by birth and divine 
 right ; it is as much a law of nature and divine appointment as 
 the differences between elephants, lions, and horses." 
 
 " Although the kings rule by divine right, they are expected 
 to be fathers to their people. Determination not to retreat in 
 battle, protection of ^le people, and obedience to Brahmans, are 
 the best duties of kings, and secure their felicity in heaven." 
 
 We learn that coined money was not common, from 
 the laws about interest, Avhich was allowed for borrowed 
 goods, but was always paid in kind, if fruit, grain, or 
 wool. The laws about property are very patriarchal, 
 and suggest the early tribal government of the Aryan 
 race : they did not allow the owner to make any will : 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 83 
 
 there is no such word as "will," or "testament," in 
 the Sanskrit language. In any patriarchal state of 
 societ}' all property was held in common, the head of 
 the family being the head partner. The family was a 
 corporation, and the property' could not be divided un- 
 til the father and mother were both dead : if the father 
 died first, the eldest son managed the famil}' until the 
 mother died. Women had no legal title to the propert}' ; 
 if unmarried, a share was generally given to them. 
 Married women had no property except gifts which had 
 been made them : for instance, — 
 
 " Whatever was given over the marriage fire, whatever she 
 received while being led in procession from her father's to her 
 husband's house, whatever was a gift from her husband as a 
 token of affection, or a similar gift from her mother, her brother, 
 or her father, — these were her own peculiar property." 
 
 If a man had no son, his daughters inherited, but this 
 almost never occurred. The other laws about women 
 would sound very strangelj' to the advocates of woman's 
 suffrage. These are literal quotations : — 
 
 147. " By a girl, or a young woman, or by a Avoman advanced 
 in years, nothing must be done, even in her own dwelling-place, 
 according to her mere pleasure." 
 
 148. ." In childhood a female must be dependent upon her 
 father ; in youth, on her husband ; her lord being dead, on her 
 sons ; if she have no sons, on the near kinsmen of her husband ; 
 if he have left no kinsman, on those of her father ; if she have no 
 kinsmen, on the sovereign. A woman must never seek in- 
 dependence." 
 
 150. "She must always live with a cheerful temper, with 
 good management in the affairs of the house, with great care 
 of the household furniture, and with a frugal hand in all her 
 expenses." 
 
84: SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 154. " Though a husband should l^e unobservant of approved 
 usages, or devoid of good qualities, he must constantly be revered 
 as a god by a virtuous wife." 
 
 155. "No sacrifice is allowed to women apart from their 
 husbands, no religious rite, no fasting; as far only as a wife 
 honors her husband, so far is she exalted in heaven." 
 
 156. "Women have no business with the text of the Yeda." 
 
 157. "A husband must never eat with his wife, nor look at 
 her while she is eating." 
 
 158. "The names of women should be agreeable, soft, clear, 
 captivating the fancy, auspicious, ending in long vowels, re- 
 sembling words of benediction," 
 
 When Gandhaii, a princess, heard that her future 
 husband was born blind, she from that moment showed 
 her respect for hnn by binding her own eyes with a 
 handkerchief and always remainiug blindfold in his 
 presence. She had evidently learned the spirit of Manu. 
 There are other laws wliich seem very suitable to the 
 climate of India : against cutting down green trees for 
 fuel ; against selhng a garden, or a tank of water. But 
 the law^s against selhng a wife, a child, or a cow are 
 less consonant to our ideas. 
 
 But the rules for daily life are the most curious of all. 
 There was a fixed form for Brahmans, another for rajas, 
 but the whole life of every twice-born man was marked 
 out. Before his birth even, his parents had to perform 
 certain sacrifices, without which the child could not be- 
 come a member of society, or, what was the same thing 
 with the Brahmans, a member of the church : after his 
 birth certain food must be given to him in a certain way. 
 From seven to eleven years of age his student-life began. 
 He was sent awa^- from home, and given to a master to 
 be educated ; and his education consisted in learning 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE EAMAYANA. 85 
 
 the Veclas by heart. Some students remained twelve 
 years, which was the shortest period allowed ; others, 
 forty-eight years ; others, all their lives. From nine- 
 teen to twenty-two came the second stage, — that of 
 married life. His wife must be from eight to twelve 
 3'ears of age, chosen by certain rules. Then a new 
 house must be erected, and the sacred fire kindled 
 according to a prescribed form. Then his daily life 
 began : their theor}' of life was, that man is born a 
 debtor, and he must repay this debt b}- five sacraments, 
 performed ever}' daj'. 
 
 First. Homage to his dead ancestors, b}' offering them 
 cakes of rice and meal mingled with water. There was, 
 in addition, a funeral offering to deceased ancestors, 
 montlily, on the new moon, and annualh', on the anni- 
 versary' of tlieir deaths, as far back as great-grandfatlier. 
 The familv was a corporation, consisting of father, grand- 
 father, and great-grandfather, among tlie dead ; son and 
 grandson, among the living ; and the oblation from the 
 living to the dead was the bond of union. No one 
 could go to heaven unless he had a son : the dead spirit 
 could not rest till its funeral rites had been performed 
 by a son. 
 
 Second. To all beings, by throwing rice grains on the 
 house-tops, or outside the door, for animals to devour. 
 
 Third. To the bards who received the revelation of 
 the Yedas , this was done by repeating the Vedas. The 
 twice-born man was to go in an easterl}' or northerly 
 direction, wearing the sacred thread over his shoulders. 
 Having rinsed his mouth, he was to sit down on sacred 
 Kusa grass whose points were directed towards the 
 east ; then, to draw in his breath three times, to sav 
 
86 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the sacred syllable Aiim (Om), which is the condensed 
 essence of the four Vcdas ; then, the three m3'stical 
 words, earth, air, heaven ; then, the holiest verse of the 
 Veda, " Let us meditate on the most excellent light 
 and power of that generous, sportive, and resplendent 
 Sun; ma}' He guide our intellect"; then, as many 
 more verses from the Vedas as he chose, in a low tone, 
 or even inaudibl}'. This was the most meritorious of 
 all religious acts, and made him fit for final beatitude 
 ai:^^ absorption bito Brahman, whether he performed 
 other acts or not. 
 
 Fourth. Homage to men by hosi)italit3\ Here is a 
 \Gvy pleasing encouragement to this dut}' : — 
 
 " Grass and earth to sit upon, water to wash the feet, and 
 affectionate speech, are at no time wanting in the mansions of 
 the good, although indigent. . . . No guest must be dismissed 
 in the evening by a householder: he is sent by the retiring 
 sun, and, whether he come in fit season or unseasonably, he 
 must not sojourn in the house without entertainment." 
 
 Fifth. Homage to the gods, by an offering thrown 
 on the sacred fire. I describe those five sacraments so 
 minutel}" that one ma}' have some sHght idea of the net- 
 work of forms which enveloped every moment of the 
 Hindu's day and night. The laws of Manu and the 
 Vedas say, " The man who does not perform these 
 five sacraments ever}' da}' lives not, although he ma}^ 
 breathe." As time went on, a Guru, or fomih' priest, 
 was established in every household. But he was far 
 more than a teacher, — far more, even, than a mediator 
 between the gods and man : he was the present god, 
 the actual, visible incarnation of Brahman. The re- 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 87 
 
 ligion of the Hindus, therefore, came graduall}' to con- 
 sist in performing all the ceremonies, obeying all the 
 rules, maintaining caste, and, finall}', in doing pen- 
 ances to propitiate the anger of the new gods ; for to 
 break any of these forms was a fearful sin. The J03'- 
 ous feasts of the Kshatri3'a rajas, where bards sang the 
 glories of their ancestors, were turned into gloomy 
 sacrifices and penances to appease the wrath of Siva. 
 Severe penances inflicted by the persons themselves 
 were more honorable than legal penalties inflicted by a 
 judge. Here is one penance : — 
 
 " He who says ' Hush! ' or ' Pish! ' to a Brahman, or ' thou' 
 to a superior, must immediately bathe, eat nothing for the rest 
 of the day, and appease him by clasping his feet with respect- 
 ful salutation, . .- . He who has committed a crime for the first 
 degree shall be absolved if he attend a herd of cattle for one 
 year, mortifying his organs, and continually repeating the texts, 
 living entirely upon food given by charity." 
 
 So the slightest neglect of these duties brought loss of 
 caste in this world, and eternal punishment in the next. 
 Meditations were considered especially hoi}' ; and the 
 Hindu sat nnder a tree for years meditating upon 
 Brahman. One man meditated so long that ants threw 
 up a mound as high as his waist without being dis- 
 turbed, and birds built their nests in his clotted hair. 
 One traveller saw a man standing motionless and medi- 
 tating with his face towards the sun. After sixteen 
 3'ears he revisited the spot, and found the same man in 
 the same place : he had been there ever since. To 
 appease the new gods, they also practised the most 
 dreadful austerities. During the three hottest months, 
 
88 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 April, IMay, and June, one man sat between four 
 blazing fires, with a burning sun above his head. He 
 stood on one leg, gazing at the sun ; tlien he stood 
 on his head for three liours, with liis feet in the air. 
 Out of many laws and penances, the few 1 have given 
 will bring the daily life of the Hindu before you, and 
 easil}' account for the necessity of some change. Hu- 
 man nature could bear no more. There was one relief 
 afforded by Brahmanism ; but it was applicable only to 
 one class of people, necessarily very few in number 
 When the householder among the Hindus had reared 
 up a son and a grandson, to perform the funeral 
 sacraments, he reached the third stage of that life 
 which every twice-born man wished to lead. He had 
 then done all that this world required of him, and was 
 at libert}' to begin the fourth stage. He said farewell 
 to his famih', he gave awa}' all his share in the famil}- 
 propert}', and he retired to the forest. He became 
 what we call a hermit. He meditated upon life and 
 death ; instead of performing a peculiar sacrifice to 
 free himself from transmigration and second birth, he 
 went through it mentally', and obtained the same result. 
 Then he took another step, and sought to concentrate 
 his thoughts on Brahman, to bring himself into absolute 
 communion with the eternal soul of the world. As 
 soon as he had reached this point, he could no longer 
 remain separated from his parent existence. In order 
 that he might Ihe sooner ))e absorbed into Bralmian, he 
 killed himself. Now, this fourth stage, this forest life, 
 was not exile : it was, on the contrary, the highest 
 privilege of a twice-born man. It could only be al- 
 lowed after he had passed through the other stages, — 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAM AY AN A. 89 
 
 had been a student, a father, and a grandfather. 
 Therefore this high glory was not attainable by all. 
 One would fancy that the past steps would be dis- 
 carded, and this desirable condition become the pre- 
 rogative of all ; but the great peculiarity of Brahmanism 
 is that it preserved every religious thought which had 
 been handed down ; it never outgrew anything and put 
 it away. There are still families where the son learns 
 the Vedas, the father performs the daily sacrifices, the 
 gi'andfather becomes a hermit, gives up all sacrifices, 
 and seeks absorption into Brahman. But, for the ordi- 
 nar}^ man, the innumerable penances and sacrifices, 
 the system of caste, and the dread of transmigration, 
 weighed heavier and heavier upon the priest-ridden 
 people ; and at length a religious reformer arose. 
 
 The rise of Buddhism was simply one of those reac- 
 tions which will occur when opinions have been pushed 
 too far. It brings us to the third, or Buddhist, period 
 of the literature. Max Muller sa3's that the Sanskrit 
 literature before this period is- what is really historically 
 important, — of use in tracing the development of the 
 human mind and the rise^ and growth of ideas ; and 
 adds, " AYhat would Plato and Aristotle have said if 
 the}^ had been told that in their time existed in that 
 India which Alexander had just discovered, an ancient 
 literature far richer than anything the}^ possessed in 
 Greece ? " There were ten thousand separate manu- 
 scripts in Sanskrit before Alexander conquered India. 
 Now at length we get a date. Sakya Muni was born 
 623 B. c, died 543 b. c. ; the era commenced about 500 
 B. c. Gautama was the tribe of his clan, he belonged 
 to the warrior caste, and therefore, in the ej'es of the 
 
90 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Brahmans, was utterly disqualified from ever becoming 
 a religious teacher. lie was more : he was a prince, 
 the son of a raja. He became Buddha, or " the en- 
 lightened," and he founded Buddhism. It increased so 
 much that it became the state religion of India, under 
 the Constantine of India, Asoka, 245 b. c. It was 
 carried far and wide b}- Buddhist missionaries, — to 
 Thibet, to China, to Siberia, to Ceylon. The Turanian 
 races proved peculiarly susceptible to its influence, and 
 it numbers more than one third of the human race to- 
 da}'. This account of its origin is taken from an Indian 
 book : — 
 
 " One day when the prince drove through the eastern gate 
 of the city, on his way to one of the parks, he met on the road 
 a man broken and decrepit. * Who is that man ? ' said the 
 prince to his coachman. * He is small and weak ; his flesh and 
 his blood are dried up ; his muscles stick to his skin ; his head 
 is white ; his teeth chatter; leaning on his stick he can hardly 
 walk, stumbling at every step. Is there something peculiar in 
 his family, or is his the lot of all created beings ? ' — ' Sir,' 
 said the coachman, 'that man is sinking under old age. This 
 is the appointed end of all creatures.' — * Alas ! ' said the 
 prince, * are creatures so ignorant, so weak and foolish, as to 
 be proud of the youth by which they are intoxicated ? Coach- 
 man, turn my chariot quickly. What have I, the future prey 
 of old age, to do with pleasure?' Another time the prince 
 drove through the western gate, to a pleasure garden, when he 
 perceived on the road a man sufi"ering from illness, parched 
 with fever. Having questioned his coachman and received the 
 answer he expected, the prince cried, ' Alas 1 health is the sport 
 of a dream. Who having seen this frightful spectacle could 
 think of pleasure /' A third time he was driving to a pleasure 
 garden, when he saw a dead body lying on a bier, covered with 
 a cloth. The friends stood around weeping. The prince cried 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 91 
 
 out, ' "Woe to this life, where a man remains so short a time ! 
 If there were no old age, no disease, no death ! Let us turn 
 back. I must seek how to accomplish deliverance.' Again, 
 he drove through the northern gate, to a pleasure-ground. He 
 met a devotee, a mendicant. He had renounced all pleasures, 
 all desires, and led a life of austerity. He sought to conq^uer 
 himself. ' That is well,' said the prince. ' ' The life of a dev- 
 otee will be my refuge : it will lead to real life, to happiness, 
 to immortality.' He turned his chariot, and went back to the 
 city." 
 
 There is something morbid and unhealth}' in this. 
 
 So after a day of revelry and mirth Prince Sakya 
 Muni left his father's palace at night without saying 
 farewell to his sleeping wife, and went out into the 
 world to relieve its miseries, and to seek deliverance 
 from them. He put on the yellow dress of a beggar, 
 and begged his food from door to door. He began 
 by doing charitable works : he taught the ignorant 
 Sudras ; lie fed the poor ; he nursed the sick. Since 
 old age, sickness, and the loss of friends made life onh' 
 a misfortune, Gautama felt that the good man would 
 pass his own life in trying to alleviate the miseries of 
 others. Then he meditated, sitting under a tree ; after 
 seven years he became enlightened ; then he taught his 
 doctrine. He denied that the Yedaswere revealed, and 
 were therefore infallible authority. His foUow^ers said 
 that the Brahmans established all the ceremonies, as a 
 means- of livelihood. This was one of the great points 
 of difference between Brahmanism and Buddhism. 
 Buddha denounced caste, and divided mankind into two 
 classes : la3'men, those who are still attached to the 
 world ; and ascetics, those who wish to be delivered 
 
92 SANSKKIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 from it b}^ mortif\'ing themselves and performing works 
 of charit}'. He admitted Sudras to be ascetics as well 
 as twice-born men. Now, these ascetics are not ver^' 
 unlike the hermits of the fourth stage among the 
 Brahmans ; the difference being that Buddha admitted 
 all men of any caste to this stage at once. He gave 
 them individual freedom without going through the 
 preliminary stages which the Brahmans insisted upon. 
 He denied that sacrifices would take away sins, and 
 taught that men should be pure, gentle, patient, and 
 courageous ; that they should do good deeds and show 
 sympathy to every living thing, especially to animals ; 
 that is, he taught a loveh' life, and he led such a life 
 himself. He gave five commandments to laymen, — 
 thou shalt not kill, steal, commit adultery, become 
 intoxicated, lie ; thus he gave them a pure and simple 
 religion. 
 
 All this sounds very much as a matter of course to 
 us brought up under Christianity. We must throw 
 ourselves into the life and thought which existed 
 around the Buddha before we can comprehend what an 
 immense advance he made upon Brahmanism. For the 
 ascetics Buddhism cannot receive such unqualified 
 praise. It was stern and inexorable for them ; it 
 stripped life of every illusion. The ascetic renounced 
 five things, — wife, children, property-, life, and self. 
 Instead of crushing out the passions b}- austerities, 
 Buddha said that all the objects for which men strive — 
 wealth, pleasure, power, human alfection — are but Maya 
 (vain illusions) ; that we should hush our mind into 
 dreamy contemplative repose, and cease to desire 
 an3^thing. " Not nakedness, nor platted liair," he said, 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 93 
 
 "nor dirt, nor fasting, nor hing on the earth, not rubbing 
 •with dust, nor sitting motionless, can purify a mortal 
 who has not overcome desires." This dull indifference 
 would lessen the suff"erings caused b}- the " endless vor- 
 tex of transmigration." But Buddha taught the doctrine 
 of transmigration distinctly ; that the wicked passed 
 through one hundred and thirt3--six different hells, the 
 good through as many heavens, temporary purgatories, 
 before reaching the final result. After successive births 
 in this world and others, death would become the great- 
 est of blessings, and the good man would be rewarded 
 by what? — b}^ utter disappearance. Nirvana; and the 
 better he was, the sooner he would pass through the 
 necessary transmigrations and reach this result. 
 
 There has been endless discussion about the meaning 
 of Nirvana. The latest authorities say that it is not 
 exactly annihilation, though p^acticallv it amounts to 
 the same thing. " It may rather be figured under the 
 form of the morning mist disappearing in space, — not 
 destroyed, yet not cognizable by any human sense, or 
 to be described b}' any form of words." It has been 
 the fashion of late 3'ears to glorify Buddhism ; it may 
 have been a lovelj' life, but it is a dreary creed. 
 Mr. ^Vheeler says : '' Brahmanism answers to the natu- 
 ral instincts of the human heart, that good deeds will 
 be rewarded, and bad ones punished, in a future life. 
 But Buddhism is essentially an aristocratic creed, 
 suitable only to the philosophic yearning of a rich and 
 noble class, in whom self-indulgence in every pleasure 
 had produced a surfeit. They were driven by sheer 
 satiet}' to a life of abstinence and contemplation, which 
 tended to a dreamy existence of eternal repose and 
 
94 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 undisturbed slumber, where all iudividuality was lost 
 in the oeean of Nirvana." The different authorities 
 agree that Buddhism is practicalh" atheism. It ean 
 hardly be called a religion at all, for Buddha recognized 
 no supreme god. The only god was what man himself 
 could become. Of course there was no need of sacri- 
 fice to propitiate an angry god. There was no need 
 of prayer either, lor there was no god to pra}' to. 
 Strictly speaking, a Buddhist never pra3'ed, — he onlv 
 meditated. There was no need of a priest, for there 
 was nothing for him to do. Indeed, the ascetics are 
 much more like our idea of monks, than of priests. 
 
 Buddhism spread with incredible rapidity. Convents 
 and monasteries sprang up all over India, filled with 
 monks and nuns, seeking deliverance by meditation. 
 Whenever a scorching wind blew over the plains, a 
 disgust of life seemed to seize upon all mankind, and 
 the lazy dreaming of a Buddhist convent or monastery 
 seemed to offer the speediest relief from the miseiy of 
 existence ; which ma}' account for their number. At 
 first there was no ceremonial; but since human nature 
 is prone to worship something, the\' afterward wor- 
 shipped Sakya Mum Gautama, the Buddha. His tooth 
 is still preserved in a tem[)le of Ceylon, which is, there- 
 fore, the most sacred spot of the world to all Buddhists. 
 It was shown to the Prince of Wales during his visit to 
 India, but is seldom seen by prolane eyes. There 
 were tem[)les built also ; in each of tliem was a statue of 
 the Buddha, and these rock-hewn temples, whose ruins 
 exist in India, are the admiration of architects, as well 
 as of uneducated travellers. Instead of raising a lofty 
 building upon a i)lain, as we do, the Buddhists selected 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 95 
 
 some high rock or mountain. The}' levelled a space in 
 front of it ; the}' excavated the inside and formed one 
 lofty room. They carved the face of the rock into a 
 beantifui facade, with doors and one immense window, 
 through which the light streamed into the interior, 
 which they had hollowed out. The effect is most 
 curious and beautiful. Grass and trees grow above the 
 temple front, as if some lovely building had been pushed 
 bodily inside a mountain and only its front could be seen. 
 One may wonder that they are in ruins, for they would 
 have resisted the mere attacks of time ; but finally war 
 arose in India, — a religious war between the Brahmans 
 and the Buddhists. The monasteries and temples were 
 burned : the Buddhists utterly driven out of India, to 
 Ceylon and Burmah. They have never been allowed to 
 return to the land where their religion originated. The 
 power of organization and caste proved too strong to be 
 permanently overcome : Buddhism too lost its energy 
 and simplicity ; and then arose the fourth period of 
 Sanskrit literature, — the Brahmanical revival. It is 
 put at different dates, from a. d. 300 to a. d. 800, and 
 it is still in force in India. 
 
 In these dark and troublous times of religious warfare 
 arose a poet named Valmiki. He is supposed to have 
 lived at the close of the Buddhist period, or the begin- 
 ning of the Brahmanical revival ; and he rewrote the 
 otlier epic poem of India, the Ramayana. There are 
 two other Ramayanas, but this is considered much the 
 best. He gives an account of the youth of the hero 
 Rama, and his contest with the giants and demons of 
 the island of Sanka, to recoA'er his wife Sita, whom they 
 had stolen. Valmiki must have derived his original plot 
 
96 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 from an old Vcdic tradition of a hero Rama, who drove 
 out the inhabitants of the Dekhan, or Southern India. 
 This must have been a contest between the Aryan in- 
 vaders and the Turanian aborigines. But Vahniki takes 
 a wider sweep; he had a lofty religious purpose. "He 
 wished to afford consolation to the soul," Mr. AVheeler 
 says, " when the world seemed to be going wrong, and 
 the divine government doubtful." In his i)oem Rama is 
 an incarnation of the god Vishnu ; Sita, of Vishnu's wife, 
 the goddess Lakshmi : and he is sent into the world to 
 delivi^r the Brahmans from the persecutions of the 
 Buddliists. The plot is simple, and the poem is unlike 
 the Maha Bharata ; first, because it has only one hero 
 and heroine ; and, second, because it is written b}' a 
 person whose name we know. It would form about six 
 volumes octavo : the three periods, Vedic, Brahmanical, 
 and Buddhist, are strangely mixed up in it. I think 
 there can be no question that it is later than the Maha 
 Bharata ; for a vast interval of thought separates the 
 patriarchal and feudal manners of the Maha Bharata 
 and the monarchical tone of the Ramayana, where 
 despotism is checked only by the power of the priests. 
 The Ramayana is more than religious ; it is sacerdotal : 
 this is tlie only fault of the poem : beautiful as it is, it 
 is marred b}- the fault of the Hindu character, its sub- 
 serviency to priestl}' tyrann}'. Everywhere we find in 
 it this hierarchy of priests, mediators between the gods 
 and men, forbidding any sacrifice to be offered except 
 by themselves, interfering in the famih' life ; and thus 
 exercising powers which were never allowed them in the 
 jNIaha Biiarata. Monier Williams says :" There are 
 few poems in the world's literature more charming than 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 97 
 
 the Ramayana. Its moral tone is far above that of the 
 Iliad. It teaches the hopelessness of victor\' without 
 purit}' of soul, and abnegation of self" In one thing 
 all the critics of Sanskrit epics agree, unbounded ad- 
 miration. 
 
 To a modern mind it is also a most amusing book. 
 It is so new, so different from other books, that it is 
 delightful to a reader seeking a new sensation. The 
 civilization is so unlike our own^ that we seem to be 
 living in another world, and can hardly realize that such 
 customs ever existed. It is as marvellous as a fairy 
 tale, as naive as a child's prattle : the pictures of 
 scenery are lovely, and yet it has a human element. 
 The descriptions of childhood are especially charming ; 
 the domestic hfe of Rama and Sita, most tender and 
 perfect ; and the characters, noble and lovely. The 
 friendly monkey, Hanuman, is a model of every virtue. 
 There is no female character in all Greek literature 
 so modest and loving, yet so firm and brave, as Sita, 
 who is gentle, yet high-spirited. The translation in 
 poetry by Griffith is very unsatisfactory and disagree- 
 able ; he has introduced so many episodes, and taken 
 away the naivete of the storj'. I shall use Wheeler's 
 prose translation, which has the merit of being simple 
 and unpretending. To the Hindu, the Rama3'ana be- 
 comes a deepl}' religious poem. It is regarded with the 
 most awful reverence, equally with the Maha Bharata, 
 although both belong to Smriti, tradition. It closes 
 with the promise that whoever reads or listens to the 
 Ramayana will be freed from all sin. The mere utter- 
 ance of the name of Rama (because he is an incarnation 
 of Vishnu) is equal in religious merit to giving one 
 
 7 
 
98 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 hundred ornamented cows to a Brahman, or to perform- 
 ing an Aswemedha. So, in the cool of the evening, 
 when the labors of the da}' are over, some Brahmnn 
 priest appears in an Indian village, and all crowd around 
 him with respectful attention, while he reads from palm- 
 leaves the stor}- of Rama. 
 
 The Ar^-an invaders had now reached the very centre 
 of the countr}', and established themselves with power 
 and splendor. The story opens with a description of 
 the famous city of Ayodhya, the modern Oude, — to- 
 da}' a heap of ruins, but formerl}* the most magnificent 
 city in Hindostan. It gives us the Hindu ideal, and 
 paints — 
 
 "temples richly decorated; stately palaces, with domes like 
 tops of mountains ; surrounded by pleasant gardens, full of 
 birds and flowers, and shady groA^es of trees loaded with deli, 
 cious fruits. And the tanks in the city were magnificent 
 beyond description, and covered with the white lotus. The 
 city was perfumed with flowers and incense, and decked out 
 with gorgeous banners ; and it was ever filled with the sweet 
 sounds of music, the sharp twanging of bows, and the holy 
 chanting of Vedic hymns. The city was encompassed round 
 about with very lofty walls, which were set in with variously 
 colored jewels ; and all around the walls was a moat filled 
 with water, deep and impassable. No one was poor, or wore 
 tarnished ornaments ; no one was without fine raiment and 
 perfumes, or was unclean, or fed upon unclean things, or; neg- 
 lected the sacraments, or gave less than a thousand rupees to 
 the Brahmans. No man was without learning, or practised a 
 calling that did not belong to his family or caste, or dwelt in 
 a mean habitation, or was without children and kinsmen. In- 
 specting the world by his spies, as the sun inspects it by his 
 rays, the Maharaja found no person of hostile mind ; and he 
 shone resplendent, and illuminated the whole earth." 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAM AY ANA. 99 
 
 Now this civilization, and also that described in the 
 demon's home at Lanka, are far higher than anything 
 found at Tro}' or Sparta or Ithaca. Only the allusion 
 to spies shows that it was a despotism. There were 
 no spies over the haught}' vassals in the Maha Bharata. 
 In this blissful spot Rama is born by a miraculous 
 birth ; his father being a god, his mother the Ranee, or 
 queenl I will quote part of the lovel}* description of 
 his childhood, peculiarly Hindu, as showing their great 
 fondness for children. It gives a pleasanter idea than 
 we had before of their domestic life ; though one can 
 hardl}' imagine Beaconsfield or Gladstone summoned 
 from the cares of empire to hush the cries of a little 
 prince. 
 
 '• And Rama was a very lovely babe ; and as he slept in a 
 white cot he appeared like a blue lotus floating upon the waters 
 of the Ganges, [His complexion was dark, evidently.] When 
 Rama was sufficiently grown to run about, he was the delight 
 of his mother and the Maharaja. So it happened one evening 
 the full moon arose in all its splendor, and Rama felt a very 
 strong desire to have the beautiful moon to play -with for a 
 toy. And he put out both little hands towards the moon, in 
 order to obtain it ; but his mother could not understand what 
 he wanted, and thereupon he tried^ to beat her. And she asked 
 him many times what he wished to have, and he continued to 
 point to the moon ; so that at last she came to understand what 
 it was that he wanted, and she said to him, ' Do not desire, O 
 my child, to possess the moon ; because it is a thousand miles 
 off, and it is not a plaything for children, and no child ever 
 got it. If you wish, I will bring you some jewels that are 
 brighter than the moon, and you can play with them.' So 
 saying, she brought some beautiful jewels, and placed them 
 before the little boy ; but Rama threw them away in anger, 
 and began to cry, until his eyes were red and swollen wdth 
 
100 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 weeping. Now, by this time a number of women were gath- 
 ered around him, but no one could console him. One said, 
 'Perhaps he is hungry ' ; but he refused to take any food. An- 
 other said, * Perchance he is sleepy ' ; and she took him on 
 her lap, and sung him the lullaby ; but she could not quiet 
 him, and he still continued to cry. Then one of the women 
 said, ' The goddess Susti has become unpropitious, and must 
 be propitiated with offerings of curds, plantains, and fried 
 paddy.' Another said, ' A ghost is troubling him ; so send for 
 a man who can repeat a verse and drive the ghost out.' -But 
 all these were of no effect, and Rama was still as unpacified as 
 before. So the Ranee sent for the Maharaja ; and, when the 
 Maharaja heard that Kama was ill, he came to him immedi- 
 ately, and tried his utmost to console the child ; but he could 
 do no more than those who had tried before him, and Rama 
 continued to cry, and would not be comforted. Then the 
 Maharaja sent for his chief councillor of state, and told him all 
 that had happened ; and when he heard that Rama was ciy- 
 ing for the moon, he desired those about him to bring him a 
 mirror. So a mirror was brought, and placed in the hands of 
 Rama ; and when Rama saw the image of the moon in the 
 mirror, he was fully satisfied, and left off weeping, and was 
 soon as merry as before, and the whole family were at ease." 
 
 When grown up, after various adventures, Rama 
 hears that whoever can bend an enormous bow, and 
 shoot its arrow, shall win* the loveh^ princess Sita for a 
 bride. The age of 8wa3'amvaras has passed away ; but 
 Sita willingl}' accepts Rama, who bends the bow, after 
 iiumei'ous other suitors have failed ; and they are mar- 
 ried. After a while they are banished into the jungle 
 for fourteen 3'ears, — a favorite form of punishment in 
 India. Rama is unwilling that Sita should accompany 
 him ; but she finally prevails upon him, in a speech 
 which follows : — 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE KAISIAYANA. 101 
 
 " ' beloved one, I must depart to the great forest ; and do 
 you remain here, obedient to the command of Raja Bharata, 
 and never praise me in the presence of Bharata, for a raja can- 
 not bear to hear the praises of any one beside himself.' 
 
 " Sita, angry but yet humble, replied as follows : * Eama, 
 what words are these ? A wife must share the fortunes of her 
 husband ; and if you this day depart to the forest, I must pre- 
 cede you and smooth the thorns. Wherever the husband may 
 be, the wife must dwell in the shadow of his foot. I shall live 
 in the jungle with as much ease as in my father's house, and 
 shall enjoy happiness with you in the honey-scented wood ; I 
 have no fear, and I long to roam in the forest with you, and 
 view the lakes and rivers, and the flowers and water-birds. I 
 will be no burden to you, but if you leave me I will die.' 
 
 "Then Eama, wishing to turn the mind of his wife from 
 going with him into the forest, spokft to her as follows : ' Sita, 
 the forest is not always pleasant, but I know it is always dan- 
 gerous. You are very delicate and the beloved daughter of a 
 raja ; you have never been in the sun put of your own room ; 
 how then can you brave the dangers of the wilderness 1 You 
 are surrounded and attended every day by your maids ; how 
 then can you go out into the jungle without a servant near you ? 
 Your feet are as delicate as the petals of the lily, and the peb- 
 bles and briers will affect you grievously : you are like butter 
 which will be melted away by the sun at mid-day. You will 
 have to cross many rivers, in which' there are serpents, and 
 crocodiles, and sharks. The roaring of the lions and the 
 thundering of the cataracts are fearful to hear. The roads are 
 infested with wild elephants and filled with thorns ; and the 
 jungle is covered with rank weeds, in which venomous snakes 
 lie concealed, so deadly that their breath alone will kill a man. 
 Sometimes you will have to subsist upon grass-seed ; sometimes 
 upon bitter roots and fruits ; and sometimes you will not even 
 find these things, and will have to fast for many days. At 
 times you will be athirst, and there will be no water. For 
 garments, you will have to wear the bark of trees, or the skin 
 
102 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 of an antelope ; and at night you will have to sleep upon grass, 
 or upon the bare earth. Reptiles, mosquitoes, flies, scorpions, 
 and fierce birds will bite and sting you, and afflict you in your 
 Bleep. Fearful Rakshasas infest the wilderness, and will eat 
 up a whole man at a single meal. Your beautiful locks of hair 
 will become a tangled mass, and will lose their color from want 
 of oil. Besides all this sulfering, you will be without friends ; 
 and how can this be endured by a woman ? It is my knowl- 
 edge of all that you will have to suffer that prevents my taking 
 you with me. Exposure to the heat, cold, and wind render the 
 frame lean and emaciated. What enjoyment then can you ex- 
 perience in the forest, whilst I shall be filled with distress at 
 the sight of your afflictions ? You are dearer to me than my 
 own life, and I cannot consent to your suff"ering pain on my 
 account ; so take my advice and remain at my house. Though 
 I may be travelling in distant parts, yet still you shall always 
 be present in my thoughts ; and though separated in our eyes, 
 we shall never be separated in our hearts. Moreover, separa- 
 tion often increases aff'ection, and he alone can perfectly enjoy 
 the felicity of connubial love who knows what it is to have 
 been separated from his wife. So bear all these things in your 
 mind, and relinquish your plan of accompanying me, and do 
 you determine to remain here.' 
 
 " Hearing the words of Rama, Sita was greatly distressed, and 
 her eyes were filled with tears, and she replied in a low tone 
 thus : ' Rama, I am fully aware of all the evil things that 
 have been described by you, but in your presence all that is 
 evil will be turned to good ; the fierce animals of the jungle, 
 the elephants, the lions, the tigers, and all the beasts of prey, 
 will fly when they behold you ; the grass and the seeds, the 
 roots and the fruits, will in your presence be more delightful 
 than amrita ; and if I should fail to procure these things for 
 food, I can never be deprived of the amrita of your words. As 
 for garments of bark and antelope's skin, I am not sorry to 
 wear them, for the goddess Parvati wore them for the sake of 
 her husband Siva. Sleeping with you upon a bed of grass will 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE RAMAYANA. 103 
 
 give me more delight than sleeping by myself upon a bed of 
 the softest down : without you my life is not worth preserv- 
 ing, but with you not even Indra can terrify me. my lord, 
 by following my husband through affection, I shall be faultless, 
 for the husband is the chief deity of the wife. It is written in 
 the Vedas that the woman who always attends upon her hus- 
 band, and follows him like a shadow in this life, will in like 
 manner follow him in the world of spirits, it becomes you, 
 therefore, Rama, to take me with you, that I may share in 
 your pleasures and in your pains, for the desert with all its e\dls 
 is far better in my sight than all the pleasures of this palace 
 without you.' " 
 
 The}' wander about in the jungle for ten 3'ears, and 
 describe the beautiful scenery in a most vivid manner. 
 They visit the dwellings of the most celebrated hermits ; 
 a female hermit, named Anasu3'a, talks to Sita, who tells 
 her of her birth, and sa^'s, — 
 
 " My preceptor taught me ever to reverence my mother 
 earth, and to strive to be as pure and true and brave as she, and 
 he called me Sita, because I sprung out of a furrow of the 
 ground." Anasuya says, " Thou hast indeed the courage of the 
 brave earth-mother, for thou hast not feared to face the scorch- 
 ing heat, and the biting winds, and the angry storm ; and thou 
 art as noble, too, Sita, for thou hast lavished thy beauty on 
 the sorrowful, and hast sought to make even the path of exile 
 sweet to thy beloved." 
 
 Now these hermits are Brahmans, and saints into the 
 bargain. These holy beings are disturbed in their wor- 
 ship by Ravana, a giant, and the Rakshasas, demons 
 who accompan}' him. But these are no ordinar}^ de- 
 mons ; they are worse, — Buddhists in disguise. The 
 saints beg Rama to assist them against the demons ; 
 but he refuses at first, because he is not a Brahman, 
 
104 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDKED LITERATURES. 
 
 onh' a Kshatriya. Finalh*, Ravana fills up the measure 
 of his crimes, and carries away the faithful Sita. She 
 is not, like the Grecian Helen, a willing victim ; she is 
 borne struggling through the air, to the demon's home 
 at Lanka. 
 
 "Adorned with golden ornaments, and arrayed in yellow 
 silk, Sita appeared in the air like a flash of lightning. She, 
 bright as the most burnished gold, appeared, while held by the 
 black raja of the Rakshasas, like a thread of gold round the 
 loins of an elephant. Ravana wishes to make her his wife, 
 and says, ' Cast aside your foohsh hopes of rescue, and con- 
 sent to become my chief Rani.' She replies in anger : 
 ' The day is not far off, wicked Ravana ! when your golden 
 Lanka will be a heap of ashes, and your numberless army fall 
 under the arrows of Rama. As for your bravery, you need say 
 nothing. 1 know its worth from the stealth with which you 
 carried me away. There is as much difference between you 
 and Rama as there is between a mouse and a lion ; a hedgehog 
 and an elephant ; a mosquito and a hawk ; a glow-worm and 
 the noonday sun ; a grain of sand and a precious stone ; a star 
 and the full moon ; a burnt brick and a mountain ; the river 
 Carannasa and the Ganges. Boast as long as you do not meet 
 Rama ; but the moment he is here, consider yourself and your 
 whole family as dead persons.' " 
 
 Rama rouses himself. He forms an alliance with the 
 bears and monke3's of the Dekhan, or Southern India. 
 This introduction of the bears and monkeys gives a 
 delightfully' Hindu tone to the stor}'. They continually 
 compare their heroes to animals. You remember that 
 Nala was the "tiger among rajas," and the highest 
 beaut}' attributed to a Hindu heroine is that she has 
 " the rolling gait of an elephant." The monke3's were 
 supposed to be descended from the gods, and to be 
 
BUDDHISM AND THE EAMAYANA. 105 
 
 saints and Brahmans, stronger and better than men ; 
 they have supernatural powers and talk in human speech. 
 The animals of JEsop are borrowed consciousl}', — we 
 shall see how in another chapter ; but these animals who 
 speak appear among the Xorse, and the German fami- 
 lies of the Teutonic branch : Reynard, the fox, Bruin, 
 the bear, are brothers of the good monke}-, Hanuman in 
 the Ramayana ; but they are not borrowed nor stolen. 
 They arose spontaneoush' from the Aryan feeling. Now 
 the monkeys of Southern India really are wonderfully 
 intelligent and strong. The}' swing themselves over 
 immense distances hy their long arms, and seem superior 
 to human beings : so it is not strange that the Hindus 
 deified them. These good monkeys prove to be most 
 friendh'. Hanuman takes a flying leap of sixty miles, 
 from the main-land to Lanka ; and he and the other 
 monkej's build a bridge of stoue, sixt}' miles long, 
 across the deep ocean. Actually the Buddhists had 
 been driven to Ceylon ; so it became the demon's home : 
 a chain of rocks extends now from the main-land to the 
 island of Ceylon ; so that everj- vessel to or from the 
 Ganges must circumnavigate that island. The Hindus 
 fii-ml}- believe it to be Rama's bridge : the stones which 
 crop out through Southern India are said to have been 
 dropped b}' the monkej- builders. On this bridge the 
 arm}' crosses to Lanka, and Rama engages in single com- 
 bat with the giant, Ravana. He is like the Hydra, or 
 hundred-headed serpent, whom Herakles kills in Greek 
 m^'thology ; for Ravana has ten heads, and one grows 
 again as fast as Rama cuts it off. Finally Rama is 
 roused to the last degree ; he shoots the temble arrow 
 of Brahma, the Creator, and not till then does the mon- 
 
106 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ster fall dead. Gods and demons are watching the 
 contest from the sk}^, and flowers fall down in showers 
 on the victorious hero. This lovel}' idea constantly re- 
 curs through all the Hindu literature. There are no 
 wanton cruelties on the battle-field. The victors refuse 
 to give Ravana a funeral pile ; but the generous Rama 
 said, "I am much grieved to hear these words from 
 you ; Ravana is now dead, and he is therefore no longer 
 3'our enemy, but }our elder brother, and it is proper for 
 you to perform his funeral rites." And he gives the 
 giant a splendid funcralpile ; his body is consumed by 
 fire, which is quite different from the treatment of Hec- 
 tor's dead body by Achilles. 
 
 Then Rama allows Sita to come into his presence on 
 foot, in the sight of the whole arm}'. This shows that 
 on grand occasions women were seen in public, even at 
 this late period : it was not until after the Mohammedan 
 conquest, a. d. 1000, that the}' were so entirely enslaved. 
 Joy and grief and anger divide Rama's heart : Sita was 
 carried away against all her own struggles and efforts, 
 it was true ; but as she spent so long time in the palace 
 of Ravana, Rama is not willing to receive her as his 
 wife until she has i)roved her innocence by going 
 through the ordeal of fire. This seems like a princess 
 of the INIiddle Ages, but it must be a custom of all the 
 Ar}'an families, if we find it here. 
 
 " * Agni, God of purity ! ' prayed Sita among the flames, * if 
 I am true, and clean, and bright of soul as thou, then prove 
 my innocence to Rama and all this host' Agni brings her 
 out of the fire unhurt. [The Vedic Agni reappears here.] 
 Then Rama wept, and said, * It was needful there should he 
 no speck on thy soul's whiteness, for thine own sake first, then 
 
BUDDHISINI AND THE RAMAYANA. 107 
 
 for the sake of all these here ; that they might learn that love- 
 liness of outward form cannot make vice more tolerable ; and 
 that where there is not utter reverence, there is no true 
 love.' " 
 
 Then all return in triumph to Ayodlna. But the 
 Brahmans are still unsatisfied. They banish Sita into 
 the jungle for fourteen 3'ears. She bears this trial with 
 the perfect meekness of a typical Hindu wife, and after 
 this is allowed to live happily ever after. Stripped of 
 that religious meaning which makes it sacred to the 
 Hindu, it has yet a religious meaning to us. For the 
 Rama}'ana is but one more form, one other aspect, of 
 that contest between good and evil which has gone on 
 in e^ery country- to which the Ar3'ans carried the ideas 
 they had imbibed in their common home. Even the 
 sceptical Monier "Williams acknowledges the Ramayana 
 to be a contest between good and evil. "\Ye shall meet 
 this strife in every Aryan literature which we shall take 
 up in turn. It will take on the different local coloring, 
 but it will be at heart the same, varying with the var}'- 
 ing climate. For Rama is a ver}' simple form of the 
 solar myth, more easily traced than Arjuna and Kama. 
 His birth is supernatural ; he wins his bride by bending 
 a bow ; he suffers for the good of others ; he fights with 
 the powers of evil and darkness ; he wms by a magical 
 weapon, which he alone can use. His bride is Sita, a 
 nymph of celestial birth ; the name means '^ a fun-ow "' : 
 she is therefore the earth married to the sun. In the 
 bright clime of India the conflict of nature is brief; 
 so the sun, victorious over the darkness, returns in joy- 
 ful triumph to its early home. 
 
108 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 
 
 WE have spoken of the Hindu rehgions and forms 
 of worship, — their austerities, sacrifices, and 
 meditations. There was never a nation so priest-ridden 
 as the Hindus : yet they indulged in the most unre- 
 strained freedom of thought. India is, above all others, 
 the countr}' of theology and metaphysics ; and nowhere 
 else have these taken such a hold upon a nation. INIi*. 
 Dasent sa^-s : — 
 
 " In this passive, abstract, improgressive state they have 
 remained, stiffened into castes, and tongue-tied and hand-tied 
 by absurd ceremonies. Heard of by Herodotus in dim legends ; 
 seen by Alexander ; trafficked with by imperial Rome and the 
 later Empire ; becoming fabulous in the Middle Ages ; redis- 
 covered by the Portuguese ; alternately peaceful subjects and 
 desperate rebels to England ; — they have been still the same 
 immovable and unj^rogressive philosophers, though akin to 
 Europe all the time." 
 
 Their histor}- is intellectual, not political, — a history 
 of opinions, not of actions. Greece might fade away ; 
 Rome might arise and shake the world ; Christianit}', 
 with gentle but irresistible jjower, might penetrate into 
 ever}' other country ; but India dreamed on. Not until 
 it was first conquered by the Mohammedans, a. d. 1000, 
 was India influenced hy the rest of the world ; and 
 
SA^'SKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 109 
 
 even that war was a religions war. Yet a peculiar and 
 beautiful architecture grew up there, as well as litera- 
 ture ; so there must have been a varied life of the mind : 
 this ver}- isolation and independence give an interest 
 and value to what the}' did. Left to itself, the imagina- 
 tion took an undue share of the mind. And there was 
 never a time when the Hindu did not speculate. Even 
 in the Rig Veda we find one of the original hymns 
 (that one to which I alluded in the first chapter) full 
 of ideas which would seem to imph" a long previous 
 period of metaphysical speculation. After all, is it not 
 natural that man should speculate? — should wonder 
 from whence he came and whither he is going? This 
 hymn has the conception of a state when nothing ex- 
 isted except the Supreme Spirit. Max Miiller says, 
 ' ' Man}' of its thoughts would seem to come from m3'stic 
 philosophers, rather than simple shepherds ; but there 
 the}' are, in this oldest book of the world." I should 
 prefer a prose translation, but have not been able to 
 find it. The poem is certainly one of the gi'andest in all 
 literature. The word rendered " love" by this transla- 
 tor is not at all what we mean by the samew'ord. This 
 Kama is the same thing as Eros in Greek or Wuotan 
 in German. Kama, like Eros, afterwards became the 
 god of love ; but originally, and here in this connection 
 it means the wish or desire of the mind to perform 
 some action before the will has resolved to do it. This 
 is rather metaphysical, but I think there is no clearer 
 way of stating it ; for, of course, the wish to do anything 
 precedes the will or resolution to do it. In Greek as 
 well as Hindu mythology, Kama and Eros are among 
 the oldest deities, and are self-existent. 
 
110 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 " Nor aught nor naught existed : yon bright sky 
 Was* not, nor heaven's broad roof outstretched above. 
 What covered all ? what sheltered 1 what concealed ? 
 Was it the water's fathomless" abyss ? 
 There was not death ; hence was there naught immortal. 
 There was no confine betwixt day and night. 
 The only One breathed breathless in itself ; 
 Other than it, there nothing since has been. 
 Darkness there was, and all at first was veiled 
 In gloom profound, an ocean without light. 
 The germ that still lay covered in the husk 
 Burst forth, one nature from the fervent heat. 
 Then first came Love upon it, the new spring 
 Of mind, — yea, poets in their hearts discerned, 
 Pondering, this bond between created things 
 And uncreated. Comes this spark from earth 
 Piercing and all-pervading, or from heaven ? 
 Then seeds were sown, and mighty power arose, 
 Nature below, and Power and Will above : 
 Who knows the secret ? Who proclaimed it here . 
 Whence, whence this manifold creation sprang ? 
 The gods themselves came later into being. 
 Who knows from whence this great creation sprang ? 
 He from whom all this great creation came. 
 Whether his will created or was mute, 
 The Most High Seer that is in highest heaven 
 He knows it, — or perchance e'en He knows not." 
 
 This last expression of doubt seems sad and startling, 
 after the poet had so finnh' asserted his belief in one 
 overseer and creator. Sanskrit literature has an im- 
 mense number of books upon metaphysics. There are 
 six S3'steras of philosophy ; the very thought of these is 
 appalling. Victor Cousin sa3-s, " The history of meta- 
 ph^'sics in India is an epitome of its history ever}-- 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. Ill 
 
 where." It is curious to know that tlie same problems 
 which agitate speculative minds to-da}' agitated the 
 dreaming Hindu three thousand ^^ears ago. The meta- 
 physical books which grew up in Sanskrit without the 
 slightest contact with other minds go over the same 
 ground with the mental philosophy of Greece 60O B.C., 
 or of Germany to-da}'. The books sound as if they 
 had been written 3'esterday, and no more is known on 
 the subject of metaphysics than the Hindus knew. 
 Max Mliller sa3'S : "We find in mau}^ cases a treat- 
 ment of philosophical problems which will rouse sur- 
 prise and admiration, — the whole development of philo- 
 sophic thought in a nut-shell." Mr. Thompson says : 
 " There are few countries wiiere philosoph}* has devel- 
 oped itself clearh', independentl}', and spontaneously. 
 Greece and India may be considered as the only two 
 such : the great systems of China, Persia, and Egypt 
 are a species of religious mysticism." 
 
 The rise of philosoph}' in India w^as much like tlie 
 rise of the new Brahmanical religion, and, if you have 
 followed that, you will understand this. The Aryans 
 in India always speculated ; but there was a long period 
 before their speculations crystallized into a definite s^'S- 
 tem, — a long time before the brave warriors who in- 
 ^aded and conquered this fertile land became a nation 
 of priest-ridden dreamers. 
 
 The}' gradually succumbed to the enervating climate, 
 which brought on inertia and sloth. The first system 
 of metaphysics was written by Kapila about 700 b. c. 
 It was adopted b}- a few thoughtful men of the twice- 
 born castes, whose speculations were winked at by the 
 religious teachers. They were allowed to specuLate as 
 
112 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 much as they pleased, to believe what thej' chose, if 
 the}' would faithfully observe those rules and forms of 
 worship which are described, maintain caste, the ascen- 
 dency of the Brahmans, and their exclusive right to be 
 teachers of religion and philosoph}'. " All the founders 
 of philosophy were Brahmans themselves, and probably 
 school-teachers," Mr. Thompson sa3's. The important 
 period in metaphysics is therefore the period before the 
 rise of Buddhism. Just as in the poetry, there are 
 four periods of metaphj'sics : — First, the Vedic, with 
 the hymn just quoted, not interpolated. Second, the 
 Brahmanical, — that of Kapila. Probabl}- the Hindus 
 would have been contented to dream on forever, 
 meditating under a tree, if the Brahmans had been 
 more prudent. But their 3'oke grew to be intolerable, 
 and the Buddha arose, and founded a philosophy as 
 well as a religion. It was a tremendous social revo- 
 lution also, for it opened metaphysics to the whole 
 people, as it had religion : everybod}^ speculated, 
 instead of a small knot of cultivated men. Bud- 
 dhism increased so fast and so far that the Brahmans 
 in despair felt that something must be done. So the}^ 
 very wisel}^ ceased to oppose the Buddhist philosophy. 
 They merely remarked that all these doctrines upon 
 which the Buddhist philosophers prided themselves 
 could be found in the Vedas, hinted at, if not clearly 
 expressed. Tlien they proceeded to interpolate into 
 the Vedas and the epic poems the doctrines which they 
 wished to find there. This brought about the fourth 
 period of philosophy, — the Brahmanical revival. In it 
 the Brahmanical metapliysics of Kapila took a broader 
 ground and a peculiar mysticism. It is impossible to 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 113 
 
 define what they did think, as a mystical meaning was 
 given to eveiy difficulty. The}^ claimed that the foun- 
 dation of all philosophy was found in an original part 
 of the Yedas, called the Upanishad, or mj'stical doctrine. 
 These are vague, mystical speculations about the origin 
 of the world and of man, and the character of the Su- 
 preme Being. Thej^ mean literally " sessions," — that 
 is, assemblies of pupils around a master. "They do 
 not contain a completed system of philosoph3\ They 
 are, in the true sense of the word, guesses at truth," 
 Max Miiller says. The first Brahmans alwa3^s included 
 them in their sacred code. They belong to Sruti, that 
 is,' revelation : for the philosophy of the ancient Rishis 
 was as sacred to them as their hymn of praise. As 
 everything in the Upanishads is sacred truth, all the 
 opposing S3'stems of metaphysics justif}^ themselves from 
 these. Brahmanism and Buddhism divide the six sys- 
 tems of metaph3'sics between them. And I will simpl3^ 
 mention those features which distinguish the Hindu from 
 the other metaphysics of the world. 
 
 I described full3^, in the second chapter, that the Su- 
 preme Spirit, after receiving various names, was finall3^ 
 called Brahman when in a state of repose ; that he 
 divided himself into innumerable pieces, — into gods, 
 heroes, human beings, animals, plants, — even into 
 stones. Finall3', all these emanations from Brahman 
 were absorbed back into him. 
 
 " There is one only Being who exists : 
 Unmoved, yet moving swifter than the mind : 
 Who far outstrips the senses, though as goHs 
 They strive to reach him : who, himself at rest, 
 xianscends the fleetest flight of other beings : 
 8 
 
114 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Who, like the air, supports all vital action. 
 
 He moves, yet moves not ; he is far, yet near ; 
 
 He is within this universe and yet 
 
 Outside this universe : who e'er beholds 
 
 All living creatures as in him, and him, 
 
 The Universal Spirit, as in all, 
 
 Henceforth regards no creature with contempt." 
 
 Now exactl}' the same idea comes into the Brahraani- 
 cal philosoph3^ : only now the Supreme Spirit in a pas- 
 sive state is called Atman. Max Miiller says, ''The 
 conception of Atman was too transparent for poetry, 
 and therefore was handed down to philosophy-, wiiieh 
 afterwards polished and turned and watched it as the 
 medium through which all is seen, and in which all is 
 reflected." It is the same word as the Lathi animns^ 
 and it means breath or air. It is the idea of the prin- 
 ciple of life pervading everything, like the air, accom- 
 panying all beings wherever the}- go : of something 
 incessantly round us, like the atmosphere. We shall 
 meet this again in the Teutonic mythology : Tennyson 
 has the same thought when he says, — 
 
 " Closer is he than breathinn:, nearer than hands or than feet." 
 
 But Atman lost its meaning of breath very soon, and 
 took a still more abstract meaning. It became the 
 self, like our reflective pronoun, I, myself; he, himself. 
 The self is he who uses the mind and the senses, but is 
 distinct from them ; for instance, the eyes are but in- 
 struments to see with, used by some one who is the 
 seer, the self. So Atman was called the self of the 
 universe, who existed before all created things, and each 
 individual was a piece of Atman. His highest aim. 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 115 
 
 therefore, was to recognize conscious^ the Atman 
 within himself, put himself mto harmon}' and identity 
 with it, and be absorbed into it. The Upanishads 
 taught, " Know th3'self," that is, know thy own Atman, 
 and recognize that it is a piece of the great Atman, 
 that eternal self which underlies all the universe. " The 
 Atman within thee is the true Brahman, from whom 
 thou wert estranged b}' birth and death, who receives 
 thee back again as soon as thou returnest to it." 
 This was the final solution of the search after the 
 Infinite. Atman became the subjective soul of the uni- 
 verse, — utterly without form, not a person at all, — 
 even more impossible to seize than Brahman, the objec- 
 tive soul. 
 
 But the Buddhist metaphysics do not recognize any 
 supreme spirit at all : disappearance was the end of 
 each person, melting away like mist. "There is not' 
 much to choose between this and being absorbed like a 
 drop of water." The philosopln' of the Brahmans and 
 the Buddhists reached the same conclusions as their 
 religion : with the Brahmans pantheism, with the Bud- 
 dhists atheism ; but we must not forget that the Bud- 
 dhist religion taught men to lead lovel}' lives in spite of 
 its dreadful doctrmes. But both of these S3-stems are 
 mere schemes for getting rid of the evils of life by the 
 extinction of all personal existence, all individuality. 
 Buddhism is especially distinguished by its doctrine of 
 Maya, or illusion. This teaches that the world does not 
 exist ; it onlj' seems to us to exist, through the medium 
 of our own senses. If we had no eyes, there would be 
 no hght ; if we had no ears, there would be no sound ; 
 if we had no senses, there would be no ideas formed in 
 
116 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 our mind. The doctrine has since been taught b}^ 
 Spinoza and Berkeley (the ideal theor}-) ; but Buddha 
 went farther, and said, if there is no reaUt}' in all the 
 creation, of course there is no creator : and thus he 
 ignored spirit altogether. Buddha pronounced all meta- 
 ph3'sical discussion vain and useless. In one of the 
 Upanishads the soul is compared to a rider in a chariot ; 
 the body is the chariot ; the intellect is the charioteer ; 
 the passions are the horses ; the mind is the reins ; 
 the objects of sense are the roads. The unwise man 
 neglects to appl}' the reins ; in consequence of which, 
 the passions, like unrestrained yicious horses, rush about 
 hither and thither, carrj'ing the charioteer whereyer 
 they please. We ought pai-ticularh' to notice and re- 
 member this passage, because the same idea is found in 
 the most celebrated passage of Plato : but this is from 
 the very earliest metaphj'sical writings in the world. 
 We do not know who wrote the Upanishads, but we do 
 know the names of the six writers of the later meta- 
 physical books. I will spare the reader a catalogue of 
 names. 
 
 The metaphysical book best known outside of India is 
 the " Bhagavat Gita," or Song of the Diyine One. The 
 god Vishnu became incarnate as Krishna, the chariot- 
 eer of the hero Arjuna. Krishna has another name, 
 Bhagavat, and while the two armies were drawn up in 
 battle arra}' he delivered this long discourse, at a very 
 inopportune time. It was named from him "the di- 
 vine " ; in this fourth period, the Brahmanical revival, 
 it was written, and interpolated into the Alalia Bharata. 
 The author was a poet as well as a philosopher, and he 
 sought to combine all the systems together, and put 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DKAMA. 117 
 
 them under the patronage of the Brahmans, hhnself 
 being a Brahman. It was the same spirit which in- 
 duced Valiuiki the poet to rewrite the Rama3'ana. Mr. 
 Thompson says, " To unite the skilful and elegant poet 
 with the clear and S3stematic philosopher, and these two 
 with the shrewd and successful reformer, is an under- 
 taking of no small merit, and this was achieved hy the 
 author of the Bhagavat Gita." 
 
 It is almost incomprehensible : it attempts to describe 
 the supreme being Atman or Brahman, but I haA^e been 
 able to find onl3'one passage which interests the general 
 reader. Arjuna, the hero, hesitates to begin the battle, 
 and win the throne through the blood of his kindred. 
 But Krishna tells him that he must fulfil the duties of 
 his caste, however unpleasant, and throw aside all con- 
 siderations of afi'ection. He consoles him, however, b}'' 
 these thoughts : — 
 
 ' ' The wise grieve not for the departed, nor for those who yet 
 
 survive. 
 Ne'er was a time when I was no.t, nor thou, nor yonder chiefs 
 
 and ne'er 
 Shall be a time when all of us shall be not : as the embodied 
 
 soul 
 In this corporeal frame moves swiftly on through boyhood, 
 
 youth, and age. 
 So will it pass through other forms hereafter : — be not grieved 
 
 thereat. 
 Know this, — the Being that spread the universe 
 Is indestructible. Who can destroy the Indestructible ? 
 These bodies that enclose the everlasting, inscrutable, 
 Immortal soul have an end : but the soul 
 Kills not, and is not killed ; it is not born, nor doth it ever 
 
 die." 
 
118 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 So Arjuna cheerfulh' kills all bis kindred, knowing 
 they will pass through transmigrations and be born 
 again. To put the duties of caste above all others is 
 the main object of the Bhagavat Gita ; it has had great 
 influence in preserving the caste S3'stem in India, not- 
 withstanding all the efforts of the ^Mohammedan and 
 English conquerors. It belongs to the ver3' close of 
 metaphysics, and is eclectic, seeking to combine all 
 the preceding systems. It is greatly admired by the 
 Hindus; — partly on that account, parti}' because they 
 did not know what else to translate, it was chosen as 
 the first direct translation from Sanskrit into English. 
 It was published in 1785, and dedicated to AVarren 
 Hastings. 
 
 The Hindus to-day care nothing for the Vedas, 
 except the Upanishads ; but there is an immense Brah- 
 manical literature ; it is the foundation for their religion 
 and theology, but does not come within our book, which 
 is literary, and not theological. It has books of laws for 
 the priests and people, and legends about the new gods, 
 called Puranas. These Puranas are mucli studied at the 
 present time. It grew up in the fourth period, the 
 Brahmanical revival, and most of it was written about 
 300 A. D. India has but one literature accepted by all, 
 the Sanskrit. The different modern dialects have no 
 literature at all ; and the latest Sanskrit books are two 
 pla3-s, one written in 720, the other in 1100 a.d. 
 
 There is in Sanskrit an admirable and original scien- 
 tific literature. It will be remembered that the S3'stem 
 of counting b}' tens (the decimal S3'stem) was used among 
 the undivided Aryans : how long ago we cannot tell. 
 The figures which ever}' modern nation uses come from 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 119 
 
 the Hindus, and so does the game of chess. There are 
 man}' books upon arithmetic and algebra. Here is a 
 prett}' question : — 
 
 " Eight rubies, ten emeralds, and a hundred pearls, which are 
 in thy ear-ring, my beloved, were purchased by me, for thee, at 
 an equal amount; and the sum of the rates of the three sorts 
 of gems was three less than half a hundred ; tell me the rate, 
 auspicious woman? " 
 
 One of their astronomers maintained that the earth 
 moved on its own axis, which produced the alternations 
 of day and night. Is it not amazing that he should 
 have thus anticipated the Copernican system ? The idea 
 was not followed out by his countrymen, although there 
 are books about astronomy which are ver}^ valuable. 
 There are also books npon medicine and music, these 
 three sciences being alwa3s the first to arise in every 
 nation. The shepherds watch the stars and observe the 
 influence of the moon upon the tides, so astrouom}^ 
 takes form There are always sickness and death, and 
 it is the first instinctive effort of human nature to avoid 
 them, among the tribes of our ancestors, as much as 
 in our own complex civilization : so medicine naturally 
 grows into a science very early. And as to music, we 
 have already seen that a hymn to a god is the very first 
 utterance of humanity. The shepherd priest bursts into a 
 song, so his praj^er is accompanied wdth music, at first 
 simple, but soon reduced to rules. As to arithmetic, it 
 is plain that no sort of commerce, no interchange of the 
 simplest commodities, is possible without counting, and 
 we can understand the rise of arithmetic. The early 
 existence of algebra is diflacult to explain, but at any 
 rate they are all in Sanskrit literatiu^e, and, what is 
 
120 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 veiy foreign to our ideas, these scientific and meta- 
 physical books, hke the Yedas and the Code of Manu, 
 are written in poetrj', in astokas, stanzas of two lines ; 
 and consequently tiiere are books upon versification and 
 rhetoric. But there are none upon the fine arts, or the 
 mechanical arts. 
 
 .Grammar, on the contrar}^ is the ver}^ last science to 
 arise. In the decay of original thought, man}' fall to 
 discussing outside form, and Sanskrit literature is no ex- 
 ception to this rule. There are hundreds of works upon 
 grammar : the}' are mosth' commentaries upon Panini's 
 giammar, which is of portentous size, and contains 
 four thousand condensed rules. Alas for the school- 
 boy's in that countr}' ! It is considered the most origi- 
 nal product of all the Hindu has written. He regards 
 grammar as something to be loved and studied for its 
 own sake. Max Miiller sa^'s, "There are onl}- two 
 nations in the history of the world which have con- 
 ceived independently the two sciences of Logic -and 
 Grammar. Our grammatical terms come to us from 
 Greece, through Alexandria and Rome. In India its 
 histor}' is parallel, yet independent." These l)ooks are 
 less interesting than the poetical literature, but the}* 
 show us that the scientific as well as the metaphysical 
 type of mind arose in India; although, as everywhere 
 else, at a later period than the poetical type. 
 
 In Sanskrit are many stories, which are chiefly inter- 
 esting as being the foundation of some of the stories 
 of the Arabian Nights. That earliest of travellers, 
 Sindbad the Sailor, started on his journeys in India ; 
 he has gone long and far since then, and was first 
 translated into Persian. But the stories seem slight 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 121 
 
 sketches compared with the completed glories of the 
 Arabian Nights. The nurseiy tales are amazing as 
 well as charming. The good heroines are most lovely 
 and gentle ; the bad ones ver}' shrewd and clever ; and in 
 spite of the subordinate position which women are sup- 
 posed to occup3' in India, in these stories the}^ express 
 their minds with gi*eat freedom to the haughtiest rajas, 
 and bring about the success of the plot by their own 
 wit and energ3\ We find in India the cruel step-mother, 
 the haught}' elder sister, the gentle maiden whose mouth 
 drops pearls and diamonds, the sleeping beauty killed 
 b}^ a Raksha's claw, the beautiful golden dress glitter- 
 ing like the sun, and the stupid ogre, called a Raksha 
 here. There are two things that especiallj^ suggest 
 other Arj^an stories. The life of one princess is 
 bound up in a gold necklace : it is stolen, and she dies ; 
 it is brought back, and she comes to life. Another is 
 of a raja who dies ; a beautiful marble statue of him is 
 put in a little chapel, and every night he comes to life 
 for a few hours. He might be a lunar myth. The lovely 
 German storj- of Faithful John is almost word for word 
 like the Sanskrit stor}' of Rama and Lux and man. 
 In fact, in reading the folk-lore, you find yourself in a 
 familiar atmosphere, and you accept the theorj' which 
 tells us that these stories are the original inheritance of 
 ever}' Ar3'an famil}"', and a strong proof of relationship 
 between them. I copy this one because it is the shortest. 
 
 HOW THE SUN, THE MOON, AND THE WIND 
 WENT OUT TO DINNER. 
 
 One day, the Sun, the Moon, and the Wind went out to dine 
 with their uncle and aunt, the Thunder and Lightning. Their 
 
122 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 mother (one of the most distant stars you see far up in the sky) 
 waited alone for her children's return. 
 
 N ow both the Sun and the Wind were greedy and selfish. They 
 enjoyed the great feast that had been prepared for them, with- 
 out a thought of saving any of it to take home to their mother ; 
 but the gentle Moon did not iorget her. Of every dainty dish 
 that was brought around, she placed a small portion under one 
 of her beautiful long finger nails, that the star might have a 
 share in the treat. 
 
 On their return, the mother, who had kept watch for them 
 all night long with her little bright eye, said, " Well, children, 
 what have you brought home for me ? " Then the Sun (who 
 was the oldest) said, "I have brought nothing home for you. 
 I went out to enjoy myself with my friends, not to fetch a 
 dinner for my mother." And the Wind said, " Neither have I 
 brought anything home for you, mother. You could hardly 
 expect me to bring a collection of good things for you when I 
 merely went out for my own pleasure." But the Moon said, 
 "Mother, fetch a plate; see what I have brought you." And, 
 shaking her hands, she showered down such a choice dinner as 
 never was seen before. 
 
 Then the Star turned to the Sun, and spoke thus : " Because 
 you went out to amuse yourself with your friends, and feasted 
 and enjoyed yourself without any thought of your mother at 
 home, you shall be cursed. Henceforth your rays shall be ever 
 hot and scorching, and shall burn all that they touch, and men 
 shall hate you, and cover their heads when you appear." 
 
 (And this is why the Sun is so hot to this day.) 
 
 Then she turned to the Wind, and said -. " You also, who forgot 
 your mother in the midst of your selfish pleasures, hear your 
 doom. You shall always blow in the hot dry weather, and shall 
 parch and shrivel all living, things, and men shall detest and 
 avoid you from this very time." 
 
 (And that is why the Wind in the hot weather is still so 
 disagreeable.) 
 
 But to the Moon she said : " Daughter, because you remem- 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 123 
 
 bered your mother, and kept for her a share in your own enjoy- 
 ment, from henceforth you shall be ever cool, and calm, and 
 bright : no noxious glare shall accompany your pure rays, and 
 men shall always call you blessed." 
 
 (And that is why the Moon's light is so soft and cool and 
 beautiful even to this day.) 
 
 I will not apologize for reading this child's story, be- 
 cause in it you see so clearl}' how the objects in nature 
 were personified. The long finger-nails are considered 
 a great beaut}^ in India. 
 
 It is in vain to hope to escape the moralist : he ex- 
 pands into large proportions in India. We used to sup- 
 pose that ^sop the Greek invented these prett}^ stories, 
 *where animals speak, with a moral at the end which we 
 carefully skipped. But a stud}' of Sanskrit literature 
 shows that the}' originated in India long before, without 
 intercourse with any other people, — a growth indigenous 
 to the soil. There are two collections, the Panchatantra 
 and the Hitopadesa : the latter was taken as the second 
 translation from the Sanskrit, in 1787. The morals and 
 the stories of the Hitopadesa are so interwoven that you 
 must swallow them both in spite of yourself : the fables 
 are strung together, one within another, so that a new 
 one is begun before the first one is finished. The fond- 
 ness for animals which the Hindus showed arose before 
 their behef in transmigration : but it doubled after this 
 belief was estabhshed. How could one be cruel to an 
 ape, or a jackal, or an elephant ? he might be your dead 
 uncle or first-cousin. Those introduced in the fables 
 are chiefly those which surrounded the Hindu, — fishes 
 and insects rarely come into the fables. Mr. Thomp- 
 son says, '' The characters given to each — the good- 
 
124 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 natured gullibility of the elephant, the bumptious stu- 
 pidit}' of the ass, the insidious jQatter}- of the jackal, the 
 calm philosoph}' of the tortoise, and the folly of the ape 
 — are proofs of the early attempt to affirm that they 
 possessed souls." They were each true to their beast 
 nature, at first. The attempt to turn them into men 
 disguised, and make them moralize, is a secondary- 
 development. 
 
 " The fool who gives way to his anger, before knowing the 
 truth, experiences regret, like the Brahman who killed his 
 ichneumon. There was at Ayodhya a Brahman named Ma- 
 thara. His wife one day went out to bathe, leaving him to 
 take care of the baby. In the mean time the king sent for the 
 Brahman to perform a sacrament for the dead, called a Par- 
 vana Sraddha. As soon as he had received this invitation, the 
 Brahman, who was poor, said to himself, ' If I do not go there 
 very quickly another will know it, and will receive the present 
 for performing the Sraddha. When it is a question of receiv- 
 ing, of giving and performing a sacrifice, if one does not hurry, 
 time will carry away all the benefit of the work. But there is 
 nobody here to take care of the child. AVhat am I going to do 
 then ? Well, I will confide the care of my son to this ichneu- 
 mon, which I have supported for a long time, and which I 
 love as if it were m^ child ; then I will go.' The Brahman 
 did as he said, and went to the sacrifice. The ichneumon saw 
 a black snake which was coming towards the child, and killed 
 it ; when it saw the Brahman returning, it ran to meet him, 
 with its jaws and ])aws all bloody, and rolled at his feet. The 
 Brahman, seeing it in such a state, believed that it had de- 
 voured his child, and he killed it. He immediately approached 
 to look, and saw the child safe and well, and the snake dead. 
 He recognized then that the ichneumon had saved his son, and, 
 seeing what it had done, he regretted his being carried away 
 with anger, and fell into a deep melancholy." 
 
SANSKRIT THILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 125 
 
 The Welsh stoiy of the dog Gellert comes to mind. 
 The Hindus themselves claim that the}' invented teach- 
 ing by fables ; and it is quite true that these fables were 
 a secondaiy development of the beast epic, and were 
 copied by the Persians ver}' long ago. During the 
 Greek and Persian wars they were carried into Greece ; 
 there transformed again b}' ^sop. Does not this make 
 historv ver}^ living and real? Max Miiller sa^'S, " The 
 fables of the Hitopadesa and Panchatantra are excellent 
 specimens of what story-telling ought to be." 
 
 This moralizing and philosophizing tone is found 
 throughout Sanskrit literature : in the two epics, in the 
 present rewritten form, are countless moral reflections 
 and precepts ; in the poems and stories of this fourth 
 period, the hero constanth' turns aside from the plot to 
 offer a few didactic thoughts. There are many poems, 
 but the}' show the effect of a later and an artificial age ; 
 they have nothing of the freshness and naturalness of the 
 Rig Veda, nor of its universal value and interest ; they 
 have not expressed the whole origin of literature like 
 that ; but, nevertheless, it is most interesting to find these 
 different branches of literature invented spontaneously ; 
 and all show great skill in managing the difficulties of 
 Sanskrit metre and grammar. One of them, the " Cloud 
 Messenger," by Kalidasa, has a most poetical plot, and 
 lovely descriptions of nature ; a Yaksha is exiled from 
 his wife, and sends her a message by the clouds floating 
 over him : it is considered a most pure and perfect work 
 of art. The Hindus of this fourth i:)eriod wrote the 
 foUowing : — 
 
 " Now for a little while a child, and now 
 An amorous youth ; then for a season turned 
 
126 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Into the -wealthy householder ; then stripped 
 
 Of all his riches, with decrepit limbs 
 
 And wrinkled frame, man creeps towards to the end 
 
 Of life's erratic course; and like an actor 
 
 Passes behind Death's curtain out of view." 
 
 Of course one will at once think of Shakespeare's 
 " seven ages." 
 
 But when we read the drama, Sanskrit literature rises 
 to the level of every other hterature ; and I do not hesi- 
 tate to say that the Sanskrit pla3'S equal all others, 
 except those of Shakespeare. This is high praise ; but 
 1 have great authorities to support me. Mr. Fergusson 
 compares the exuberant Indian architecture to the rich 
 irregularit}' of Gothic architecture in Europe ; certainh^ 
 the Sanskrit drama ma}' be compared to the romantic 
 drama of Europe. Strange to say, in the twelfth cen- 
 tury is a play where all the characters are vices and 
 virtues personified, just like the moralit}' plays in the 
 Middle Ages ; which seems very surprising. This con- 
 test between the classic and romantic drama has en- 
 gaged so much attention of late years, that the friends 
 of the romantic drama are delighted to find such perfect 
 examples of it, arising spontaneously, in this literature, 
 hitherto unknown : it is most curicJus that this drama, 
 uninfluenced b}' other human beings, should have taken 
 such a different form from the Greek drama. There 
 will be found in the Sanskrit plays strong feeling for 
 nature and lovel}' descriptions of scenery ; characters 
 nol)le and yet natural, tragic and comic, taken from 
 high and low life, in the same play, intermingled as in 
 real life. There will be witt}' dialogues, dramatic situa- 
 tions, and an amusing plot. None of them are unmixed 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DKAMA. 127 
 
 tragedies or comedies : a little suffering is given to 
 tonch the feelings ; then a happ}' ending comes. The 
 pla3's are divided into acts ; the}' all have a prologue. 
 The ordinar}^ conversation is in prose ; but reflections, 
 and descriptions of scener}^, and bursts of feeling, are in 
 lovely poetry. There is alwa3's a buffoon, who is some- 
 times witty, alwa3's livel}' : he is a Brahman, a humble 
 friend, not a servant ; and makes an agreeable contrast 
 to the melanchoty hero. Unmarried women of good 
 family are introduced upon the stage ; married women 
 are allowed to go an3'where, and do as the}' please : all 
 these characteristics belong to the romantic drama in 
 ever3' age and countr}'. In India there are two peculiar- 
 ities. First, unmarried women are not allowed to re- 
 ply to their lover, although they ma3^ listen to him : they 
 are alwa3's accompanied b}^ a female confidant, to whom 
 the3' speak, and she answers for them. Second, — and 
 this is the great peculiarity of the Sanskrit pla3's, — 
 the different characters speak different dialects in the 
 same pla3' : the higher male characters use Sanskrit ; 
 the lower male, and the female characters, Prakrit. 
 There are but few pla3's in Sanskrit ; not more than 
 sixt3' have been discovered. One pla3' is ver3^ long ; it 
 was seldom performed more than once, and was written 
 to do honor to some high state ceremon3\ The earliest 
 and best of them were written b3' Kalidasa. - He wrote 
 onl3' three pla3's, and lived about 200 b. c, — perhaps 
 100 B. c. He was a contemporary of the poet who 
 wrote the Bhagavat Gita, and also of Valmiki, who 
 wrote the Rama3'ana ; and thus belongs to the fourth 
 period, — the Brahmanical revival. One of his pla3's is 
 the Vikramorvasi, — the dawn myth put into a dramatic 
 
128 SANSKRIT AXD ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 form. The n3'mph Urvasi is turned into a ^ine as soon 
 as she beholds her lover ; and she is the or ginal of 
 Psyche in Greek literature, of Melusina in tLa Middle 
 Ages, of Beauty in the nursery tale of Beauty and the 
 Beast, of all the beings who cannot gaze upon each other, 
 though full of the tenderest affection or united in the 
 closest ties ; for the lover is the sun : Urvasi is but an- 
 other name for the dawn, which of course never can see 
 the sun. The vine, in one version of the play, bleeds 
 and speaks when broken : it appears in this form in 
 the Greek mythology and the ballads of the Middle 
 Ages : from them it went into the poems of Tasso and 
 Spenser ; but it arose in the Sanskrit literature. For 
 all nature was peopled with living forms, small as well 
 as great : each mountain and brook was supposed to 
 be a distinct individual. Perhaps the personifications 
 are not as numerous as in the Greek and Teutonic 
 mj'thologies, but they are present. 
 
 Kalidasa's best pla}" is the charming Sakoontala, — 
 the most artless, fresh, and poetical of books. Yet the 
 characters are distincth' drawn and clearly defined, even 
 the subordinate ones : the two constables who arrest 
 the fisherman are as individual as the grave-diggers in 
 Hamlet. The characters are noble, the situations dra- 
 matic ; and one might fancy that the play was written 
 in our own centur}-, instead of almost two thousand 
 3'ears ago. This story of the ring is found in Greek 
 literature, — the ring of Polycrates ; also, in modern 
 German. It must have been one of the stories of the 
 undivided Aryans : the Germans must have copied it ; 
 but Herodotus could not. The events of the play took 
 place in the Vedic period, and were copied from an 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 129 
 
 episode of the Maha Bharata. "SVe see this from the 
 manners, especial!}' the freedom of the women. It is 
 probable that the present condition of the Hindu women 
 was copied from the Mohammedan conquerors. Sa- 
 koontala was the third direct translation from the San- 
 skrit by Sir William Jones, in 1789. It spread over 
 Europe in a very short time : Goethe read it, and 
 wrote : — 
 
 " Wouldst thou the blossoms of spring ? the autumri's fruits ? 
 
 Wouldst thou what charms and thrills ? Wouldst thou what 
 satisfies and feeds ? 
 
 Wouldst thou the heaven, the earth, in one sole word com- 
 press ? 
 
 I name Sakoontala, and so have said it aU." 
 
 SAKOONTALA; OR, THE LOST RING. 
 
 ACT I. 
 
 Scene. — A Forest. 
 
 Enter King Dushtanta, armed with a hoiv and arrow, in a chariot, 
 chasing an antelope, attended by his charioteer. 
 
 King {looking about him). 
 Charioteer, even without being told, I should have known 
 that these were the precincts of a grove consecrated to peniten- 
 tial rites. {Alighting.) Groves devoted to penance must be 
 entered in humble attire. Take these ornaments. {Delivers 
 his bow and ornaments to the charioteer.) What means this 
 throbbing of my arm 1 Hark ! I hear voices to the right of 
 yonder grove of trees. I will walk in that direction. Ah ! 
 here are the maidens of the hermitage coming this way to 
 water the shrubs, carrying watering-pots proportioned to their 
 strength. I will conceal myseK in the shade, and watch 
 them. 
 
 9 
 
180 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Enter Sakoontala, ivith two female companions; who converse, and 
 water the shrubs. 
 
 Sakoontala. 
 
 Ah ! a bee, disturbed by the sprinkling of the water, has left 
 the young jasmine, and is trying to settle on my lace. Help, 
 my dear friends ! deliver me from the attack of this trouble- 
 some insect. 
 
 Pritamvada and Anasuya. 
 
 How can we deliver you ? Call Dushyanta to your aid. 
 These sacred groves are under the King's special protection. 
 
 King {advancing hastily). 
 
 When mighty Puru's offering sways the earth. 
 
 And o'er the wayward holds his threatening rod, 
 
 Who dares molest the gentle maids that keep 
 
 Their holy vigils here in Kanwa's grove ? 
 
 [They converse. 
 
 Nay, think not I am King Dushyanta. I am only the 
 
 king's officer. [They converse. 
 
 Pritamavda and Anasuya. 
 
 Noble sir, permit us to return to the cottage. 
 
 [All rise. 
 Sakoontala. 
 A pointed blade of Kusa grass has pricked my foot, and my 
 bark mantle is caught in the branch of a Kuruvaka bush. Be 
 so good as to wait for me till I have disentangled it. 
 
 [Exit with her two companions, after making pretexts for delay that 
 she may steal glances at the King. 
 
 King. 
 
 I have no longer any desire to return to the city. Sakoon- 
 tala has taken such possession of my thoughts that I cannot 
 turn myself in any other direction. 
 
 My limbs drawn onward, leave my heart behind, 
 Like silken pennon borne against the wind. 
 
SANSKKIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 131 
 
 ACT IIL 
 
 ScEN'E. — Tlie Sacred Grove. 
 
 Enter King Dushtanta, ivith the air of one in love. Talks to him- 
 self. Walks about. 
 
 Ah ! yonder I see the beloved of my heart recliEing on a 
 rock strewn with flowers, and attended by her two friends. 
 Concealed behind the leaves, I will listen to their conversation. 
 Sakoontala and her two attendants discovered. 
 
 Peitamvada. 
 
 I have observed that Sakoontala has been indisposed ever 
 since her interview with King Dushyanta. She looks seriously 
 ill. Dear Sakoontala ! we know very little about love mat- 
 ters ; but, for all that, I cannot help suspecting your present 
 state to be something similar to that of the lovers we have read 
 about in romances. Tell us frankly what is the cause of your 
 disorder. 
 
 [They converse. 
 Sakoontala. 
 
 Know then, dear friends, that from the first moment the 
 illustrious prince who is the guardian of our sacred grove pre- 
 sented himself to my sight — 
 
 [Stops short, and appears confused. 
 
 Priyamvada and Anasuta. 
 
 Say on, dear Sakoontala, say on. 
 
 Sakoontala. 
 Ever since that happy moment my heart's affections have 
 been fixed upon him, and my energies of mind and body have 
 deserted me, as you see. 
 
 [They converse. 
 
 Priyamvada. 
 I look upon the affair as already settled. Did you not obser^^e 
 how the king betrayed his liking by the tender manner in 
 
132 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 which he gazed upon her, and how thin he has become in the 
 last few days, as if he had been lying awake thinking of her ? 
 An idea strikes me. Let Sakoontala write a love-letter. I 
 will conceal it in a flower, and drop it in the king's path. 
 
 {They converse. 
 Sakoontala. 
 Dear girls, I have thought of a verse, but I have no wTiting 
 materials at hand. 
 
 Priyamvada. 
 
 ^ Write the letters with your nail on this lotus leaf, which is 
 smooth as a parrot's breast. 
 
 Sakoontala {afler loriting). 
 
 Listen, dear friends, and tell me whether the ideas are 
 appropriately expressed : — 
 
 I know not the secret thy bosom reveals ; 
 
 Thy form is not near me to gladden my sight ; 
 But sad is the tale that my fever reveals 
 
 Of the love that consumes me by day and by night. 
 
 King {advancinrj hastily towards her). 
 Nay, Love does but warm thee, fair maiden, thy frame 
 
 Only droops like the bud in the glare of the noon ; 
 But me he consumes with a pitiless flame, 
 
 As the beams of the day-star destroy the pale moon. 
 
 Priyamvada and Anasuya. 
 Welcome, the desire of our hearts, that so speedily presents 
 itself! Deign, gentle sir, to seat yourself on the rock on which 
 our friend is reposing. 
 
 [The King sits down. Sakoontala is confused. All converse. 
 Then Priyamvada and Anasdya move away. The Ki^G and 
 Sakoontala converse. 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 133 
 
 ACT lY. 
 
 Scene. — The Garden of the Hermitage. 
 Enter Anasuya and Pritamvada, gathering flowers. 
 
 Anasuya. 
 Although, dear Priyamvada, it rejoices my heart that Sa- 
 koontala has been united to a husband every way worthy of 
 her, nevertheless I cannot help feeling somewhat uneasy in 
 my mind. You know that the pious king was gratefully dis- 
 missed by the hermits, on the termination of their sacrificial 
 rites. He has now returned to the capital, leaving Sakoontala 
 under our care, and it may be doubted whether in the society 
 of his royal consorts he will not forget all that has taken place 
 in this hermitage of ours. 
 
 Pupil ( entering joyfully ) . 
 
 Quick ! quick ! come and assist in the joyful preparations 
 for Sakoontala's departure to her husband's palace. This very 
 day, her father proposes sending her to the king's palace, 
 under charge of trusty hermits. 
 
 Pritamvada. 
 
 See, there sits Sakoontala. Let us join them : the holy 
 women of the hermitage are congratulating her and invoking 
 blessings on her head, while they present her with wedding gifts 
 
 and offerings of consecrated rice. 
 
 [They approach and converse. 
 
 Sakoontala. 
 
 Come, my two loved companions, embrace me both of you. 
 
 Priyamvada and Anasuya. 
 
 Dear Sakoontala, remember, if the king should by any 
 chance be slow in recognizing you, you have only to show him 
 this ring, on which his own name is engraved. 
 
 [They converse. Exit Sakoontala with her escort. 
 
134 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ACT V. 
 
 Scene. — A room in the Palace. The King (seated). 
 
 Chambeelain. 
 
 Victory to the king ! So please your Majesty, some hermits 
 
 have arrived here bringing certain women with them: they 
 
 have a message from the sage, Kanwa, and desire an audience. 
 
 [Thci/ converse. 
 
 Enter the Hermits leading Sakoontala attended hy a matron, Gau- 
 TAMi ; and in advance of them the Chamberlain and the Domes- 
 tic Priest. 
 
 Sakoontala [aside). 
 
 "What means this throbbing of my right eyelid ? Heaven 
 avert the evil omen ! 
 
 Hermits. 
 
 Victory to the king ! {They converse.) The venerable 
 Kanwa bids us say he feels happy in giving his sanction to the 
 marriage which your Majesty contracted with this lady, and 
 bids thee receive her into thy palace. 
 
 King. 
 
 What strange proposal is this ? 
 
 Hermit. 
 Dost thou hesitate 1 
 
 King. 
 
 Do you mean to assert that I ever married this lady ? 
 
 Gautami [to Sakoontala). 
 Be not ashamed, my daughter. Let me remove thy veil : thy 
 husband will then recognize thee. 
 
 King {mapped in thought and gazing at Sakoontala). 
 
 Holy men, I have resolved the matter in my mind, but the 
 
 more I think of it, the more I am unable to recollect that I ever 
 
 contracted an alliance with this lady. 
 
 [All converse. 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AXD DRAMA. 135 
 
 Sakooxtala. 
 
 If, then, thou really believest me to be the wife of another, 
 and thy present conduct proceeds from some cloud that obscures 
 thy recollection, I will easily convince thee by this token. 
 
 KlXG. 
 
 An excellent idea ! 
 
 Sakoontala {feeling for the ring). 
 Alas ! alas ! woe is me ! There is no ring on my finger ! 
 
 [Looks with anguish at Gautami. 
 
 Gautami. 
 The ring must have slipped off when thou wast in the act of 
 offering homage to the holy water of Sachi's sacred pool. 
 
 King (smiling). 
 People may well talk of the readiness of woman's invention ! 
 Here 's an instance of it ! 
 
 [All converse. 
 Gautami. 
 
 Speak not thus, illustrious prince : this lady was brought up 
 in a hermitage, and never learned deceit. 
 
 King. 
 Holy matron, e'en in untutored brutes, the female sex 
 Is marked by inborn subtlety, — much more 
 In beings gifted with intelligence. 
 
 Sakoontala {angrily). 
 
 Dishonorable man, thou judgest others by thine own evil 
 
 heart, thou at least art unrivalled in perfidy, and standest alone, 
 
 — a base deceiver, in the garb of virtue and religion, — like a 
 
 deep pit whose yawning mouth is concealed by smiling flowers. 
 
 [The Hermits depart and will not take Sakoontala home with them', 
 
 theKiya will not receiveher, so the Domestic Priest leads her away 
 
 with him. Then a voice behind the scenes cries, "A miracle!" 
 
 Priest {entering ivith astonishment). 
 Great prince, a stupendous prodigy has occurred. Sakoon- 
 
136 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 tala, as soon as the hermits had departed, was bewailing her 
 cruel fate, when a shining apparition in fenaale shape descended 
 from the skies and bore her up to heaven. 
 
 ACT VI. 
 Scene. — A Street. 
 
 Enter the Superixtendent of police; with him tico Coxstablks 
 dragging a poor Fisherman, loho has his hands tied behind his back. 
 
 Both the Constables {striking the prisoner). 
 Take that, for a rascally thief as you are, and now tell us, 
 sirrah, where you found this ring, — ay, the king's own signet- 
 ring. See, here is the royal name engraved in the setting of 
 the jewel. 
 
 Fisherman {ivith a gesture of alarm). 
 Mercy ! kind siis, mercy ! I did not steal it, indeed I did 
 not. 
 
 [They talk. 
 Superintendent. 
 
 Let the fellow tell his own story from the beginning. 
 
 Fisherman {makes along story). 
 One day when I was cutting open a large carp I had just 
 hooked, the sparkle of a jewel caught my eye, and what should 
 I find in that fish's maw but that ring. 
 
 [Continues to talk. 
 Superintendent. 
 
 Well the fellow emits such a fishy odor, there is little doubt 
 of his being a fisherman. Come, we '11 take him before the 
 king's household. On with you, you cut-purse! 
 
 [All move on. Exit Superintendent. 
 
 First Constable {after an interval). 
 The Superintendent is a long time away. My fingers itch to 
 strike the first blow at this victim here: we must kill him with 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 137 
 
 all the honors, you know. I long to begin binding the flowers 
 around his head. 
 
 [Pretending to strike the Fisherman. 
 
 Second Constable. 
 Here 's our Superintendent at last : see, he is coming towards 
 us with a paper in his hand. We shall soon know the king's 
 command ; so prepare, my fine fellow, either to become food for 
 vultures, or to make acquaintance with some hungry cur. 
 
 Superintendent [entering). 
 
 Ho there ! set the fisherman at liberty : his story is all correct 
 about the ring. (Constables talk.) Here, my good man, the 
 king desired me to present you with this purse : it contains a 
 sum of money equal to the value of the ring. 
 
 Fisherman [taking it and bowing). 
 His Majesty does me too great honor. 
 First Constable. 
 
 You may well say so : he might as well have taken you from 
 the gallows to seat you on his state elephant. 
 
 Second Constable. 
 
 Master, the king must value the ring very highly, or he never 
 would have sent such a sum of money to this ragamuffin. 
 
 [Looks enviously at the Fisherman. 
 
 Superintendent. 
 
 I don't think he values it as a costly jewel, so much as a 
 memorial of some person he tenderly loves : the moment it was 
 shown him, he became much agitated, though in general he 
 conceals his feelings. 
 
 Fisherman. 
 
 Here 's half the money for you, my masters. It will serve to 
 purchase the flowers you spoke of, if not to buy me your good- 
 will. 
 
138 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 First Constable. 
 Well now, that 's just as it should he. 
 
 Superintendent. 
 My good fisherman, you are an excellent fellow, and I begin 
 to feel quite a regard for you : let us seal our first friendship 
 over a glass of good liquor. 
 
 All. 
 By all means. [Exeunt. 
 
 ACT VII. 
 
 Scene. — Another Sacred Grove. 
 Charioteer. 
 Great prince, we are now in the sacred grove of the holy 
 Kasyapa: if your Majesty will rest under the shade of this 
 Asoka tree, I will announce your arrival. 
 
 King {feeling his arm throb). 
 Wherefore this causeless throbbing, O mine arm ? 
 All hope has fled forever. — Mock me not 
 With presages of good, when happiness 
 Is lost and naught but misery remains. 
 
 Enter a Child attended hy two loomen, and playing icith a lion's whelp. 
 
 Child. 
 Open your mouth, my young lion, I want to count your 
 teeth. 
 
 King. 
 Strange, my heart inclines toward the boy with almost as 
 much affection as if he were my o^^^l child. 
 
 Attendant. 
 The lioness will certainly attack you, if you do not release 
 her whelps. 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DEAISIA. 139 
 
 Child {laughing). 
 0, muth I fear her to be sure ! let her come. 
 
 \Both converse. The Child pouts his under lip in defiance. 
 
 King. 
 
 I feel an unaccountable affection for this wayward child. 
 
 How blest the virtuous parents, whose attire, 
 
 Is soiled with dust, by raising from the ground 
 
 The child that asks a refuge in their arms ! 
 
 And happy are they while, with lisping prattle, 
 
 In accents sweetly inarticulate, 
 
 He charms their ears, and with his artless smiles 
 
 Gladdens their hearts, revealing to their gaze 
 
 His tiny teeth just budding into view. 
 
 {All converse. 
 
 Attend AXT [entering with a china bird). 
 See, what a beautiful Sakoonta [bird] ! 
 
 Child. 
 My mother ! Where ? Let me go to her ! 
 
 Attendant. 
 
 He mistook the word Sakoonta for Sakoontala. The boy 
 dotes upon his mother, and she is ever uppermost in his 
 thoughts. 
 
 King (aside). 
 
 That is his mother's name, Sakoontala, but the name is com- 
 mon among women. 
 
 Attendant {in great distress). 
 Alas ! I do not see the amulet on his wrist. 
 
 King. 
 
 Don't distress yourself. Here it is : it fell off while he was 
 struggling with the lion. 
 
 [Stoops to pick it vp. 
 
140 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Both Attendants. 
 
 Hold, touch it not for your life ! How marvellous ! he has 
 actually taken it up without the slightest hesitation. 
 
 [Both gaze in astonishment. 
 
 King. 
 
 Why did you try to prevent my touching it ? 
 
 Attendant. 
 This amulet was given to the boy. Its peculiar virtue is 
 that when it falls on the ground no one except the father or 
 mother of the child can pick it up unhurt : if another person 
 touches it, it instantly becomes a serpent and bites them. 
 
 King {ivith rapture). 
 Joy, joy ! are then my dearest hopes to be fulfilled? 
 
 Enter Sakoontala in widow's apparel, her long hair twisted into a 
 single braid. 
 
 Sakoontala {gazing at the King, who is pale with remorse). 
 
 Surely this is not like my husband, yet who can it be that 
 dares pollute by the pressure of his hand my child, whose amu- 
 let ought to protect him from a strarcrpp's touch ? 
 
 King. 
 My best beloved, I have indeed treated thee most cruelly, but 
 am now once more thy fond and affectionate lover: Refuse not 
 to acknowledge me as thy husband. 
 
 [Both converse aside, the Child speaking. 
 
 Sakoontala. 
 Rise, my own husband, rise! thou wast not to blame. My 
 own evil deeds committed in a former state of being brought 
 down this judgment upon me. How else could my husband, 
 who is of compassionate disposition, have acted so unfeel- 
 ingly ? 
 
 [.4// go to the presence of the sage Kasyapa, and converse. 
 
SANSKRIT PHILOSOPHY, FABLE, AND DRAMA. 141 
 
 Kasyapa. 
 
 My son, cease to think yourself in fault : the delusion that 
 possessed thy mind was not brought about by any act of thine. 
 By my divine power of meditation I ascertained that thy re- 
 pudiation of thy poor, faithful wife had been caused entirely by 
 the curse of the angry sage Durvasas, not by thine own fault, 
 and that the spell would terminate at the discovery of the ring. 
 
 KiXG [drawing a deep breath). 
 0, what a weight is taken off my mind now that my charac- 
 ter is cleared of reproach ! 
 
 Sakoontala. 
 Joy ! joy ! my revered husband did not then reject me with- 
 out good reason, although I have no recollection of the curse 
 pronounced upon me : but probably I unconsciously brought 
 it on myself, when I was so distracted at being separated from 
 my husband so soon after our marriage. 
 
142 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 PERSIAN LITERATURE, — ARYAN AND SEMITIC. 
 
 IT is correct to write next about the Persians, the 
 second branch of that brilUant Aryan race whose 
 first appearing we have followed in India. We must 
 utterl}^ dismiss from our minds the Persian of to-daj', ef- 
 feminate, treacherous, a Mohammedan in his religion, a 
 sensualist in his hfe, and go back to a period 2234 b. c, 
 when there was Ar3'an government in Persia. "We find 
 a repetition of what occurred in India. An Aryan 
 race, of brave, warlike shepherd tribes had come in, 
 conquered the native Turanian tribes, settled in the land, 
 absorbed the native dialect to make a new idiom, which 
 is called Zend. It was an important witness in forming 
 the new science of comparative philology, as all its words 
 were like the Sanskrit, some of them identical with it. 
 
 Their sacred book is called the Avesta. It was trans- 
 lated into French in 1771, and excited much comment. 
 For a long time it was sneered at as a forgery. Even 
 the great Sir AVilliam Jones threw the weight of his 
 scholarship against it, showing that the wisest men may 
 sometimes make mistakes. This was before the period 
 of the Sanskrit translations. Not until it proved to be 
 such a valuable all}' in explaining the words as well as 
 the thoughts of Sanskrit literature, was it accepted as 
 genuine. This sacred book, the Avesta, is another illus- 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 143 
 
 tration of the first two periods of mental growth. It is 
 written in poetrj' : its oldest portion is a collection of 
 hymns ; but the Avesta contains in one volume what 
 expanded into four in India. First come the hj'mns, 
 next the prayers, next the laws ; and these three sacred 
 books formed a liturg}' which was used by the priests 
 alone, when the people were not present. Each priest 
 was obliged to repeat the three sacred books once every 
 twenty-four hours, in order to purif}^ himself; and he 
 would recite them for others, if paid for doing so. 
 
 These were all written in Zend, and it is not too 
 much to think that the hymns, which are much the old- 
 est, ma}' go back to the first Ar3'an date we have in 
 Persia, 2234 b. c. The language is older than that 
 used on the cuneiform inscriptions on the oldest monu- 
 ments : it differs essentialh' from that used b}' C^-rus, 
 559 B.C., or that of the first great struggle between 
 the Persians and Greeks, 490 b. c. ; if not later than 
 these, it must be earlier than the cuneiform inscriptions. 
 
 The fourth part of the Avesta consists of pra3'ers, 
 and confessions of sin : it formed a liturg}^ for the 
 people. A ver}' little of it is written in the Parsee lan- 
 guage, and must be very much later than the rest. But 
 the books have been so carefullj' collected and preserved 
 that there is no doubt that the}' are genuine ; and they 
 sound as if they were. 
 
 It is almost impossible to understand the Avesta. 
 The translator himself often gives up in despair. The 
 hymns, priests' prayers, and laws are very obscure, and 
 loaded down with repetitions ; they are utterly unlike 
 the simple reality of the Vedas. They are addressed 
 fii'st to Ahura Mazda ; next to seven spirits, who appear 
 
144 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 to personify the powers of nature, but treated so dif- 
 ferently from the Vedic manner that it is impossible to 
 tell who is meant. The reader will at once recognize 
 Ahura Mazda. He is often shortened into Ormazd, 
 but is plainl}' the Asoura Medhas, " the wise spirit" of 
 the Rig Veda, the one God, the mysterious^ principle 
 of life. Ahura means spiritual ; 3fazda^ maker. 
 
 The climate of Persia, then called Iran, was far more 
 severe then than now ; the winters were so long, the 
 cold so intense, the darkness so profound, that gloom 
 and suffering filled the heart. But the summers were 
 so warm and brought such blessed relief to man and 
 beast and earth, that the Ar3'ans of Iran felt there must 
 be a good god who protected them, and brought back 
 light and heat and summer. Accordingly^, Ahura Mazda 
 becomes that good god, that kind creator of life and 
 growth. But the}' considered him far above the other 
 friendl}' gods, who sank down to mere servants to do 
 his will. The kindly sun, the fertilizing rain, the pleas- 
 ant light, were sent by this Supreme Being, his sub- 
 jects, not his equals ; the}' become the seven good spiiits, 
 called Genii. Since winter and cold and darkness re- 
 turn, they are not realh' conquered hy Ahura Mazda ; 
 therefore, the}' must be gods too, so they become Devas, 
 or Devs, bad spirits. (The word Deva, however, as used 
 originally in the Rig Veda, meant simply a spirit, and 
 had nothing bad connected with it, although we derive 
 our word devil from the same root.) Here, in this 
 contest of nature, more severe in Iran than in India, 
 arises our distinction between devil and angel. Over 
 all these Divs ruled one supreme Div, called Ahriman, 
 the spirit of darkness. He is constantly thwarting 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 145 
 
 Ahura Mazda ; for instance, Ahura Mazda created a 
 beautiful warm countr}' ; then Ahriman created Azhi- 
 dahaka, the biting snake of winter. He has triple 
 jaws, three heads, six eyes, a thousand strengths 
 (that is, the strength of a thousand beings) , and is slain 
 b}^ a might}^ hero, Thraetaona. Does not this remind 
 one of Indra killing Vritra, in the Rig Veda ? He is 
 the same ; though the winter is to Persia what the 
 drought was to India, the enemy most to be dreaded. 
 But the Avesta teaches that finally Ahura Mazda will 
 conquer Ahriman forever : then perpetual summer, 
 peace, and prosperit}' will smile upon Iran. This same 
 idea will be found in Scandinavian mythology. 
 
 These h^^mns, called Gathas, and these prayers, are 
 said to have been wi'itten by different bards and priests. 
 They have an antiquit}' greater than we can know, and 
 the}' contain one thought which we found in the hymps 
 of the Rig Veda, and do not find in the other Aryan 
 languages. Max Muller, in his latest book, published 
 in 1879, says : — 
 
 "Although we look in vain for anything corresponding to the 
 word rita m the oldest Aryan languages, and cannot claim an 
 antiquity for it exceeding the first separation of the Aryan 
 races, the word and the thought existed before the Iranians, 
 whose religion is known to us in the Avesta, became finally 
 separated from the Indians. These two branches remained to- 
 gether a long time, and extended in a southeasterly direction, 
 after they had separated from the others, who went in a north- 
 westerly course. The word rita became asha in Zend ; and it 
 is used to denote the right path, the universe following the 
 law of asha. Think what it was to believe in a right order of 
 the world ; all the difference between chaos and cosmos, be- 
 tween blind chance and an intelligent providence. It was an 
 
 10 
 
146 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 intuition which, underlaid the most ancient religion, older than 
 the oldest Gatha of the Avesta, the oldest hymn of the Veda. 
 It is far more important than the stories of Ushas, Agni, Indra, 
 and the others." 
 
 The third part of the Avesta belongs to the next step 
 of civilization. It is a code of religious laws, and it was 
 ■written by a religious reformer named Zarathustra ; we 
 usually speak of him by the Greek form, Zoroaster. 
 Some of the first laws order very severe penalties for kill- 
 ing dogs ; and it was especially these which Sir William 
 Jones ridiculed. But, on the contrary, these are the very 
 things w^hich prove the antiquity of the Avesta, because 
 dogs would be especiall}^ valuable to a shepherd commu- 
 nity, living near mountains; — such a country as the Per- 
 sian Aryans actuall}' did inhabit. These laws enforce 
 the greatest purit}' of bod}' ; and also of mind, for here 
 comes in the other and deeper side of this religion. 
 The ph^'sical struggle of India becomes spiritualized in 
 Iran. Zarathustra must have had deep spiritual in- 
 sight ; for he transferred this struggle from external 
 nature to the heart of man. Asha was not the right 
 path for the universe alone, but for each person : life 
 became a contest between breaking these laws and obey- 
 ing them, therefore. This involves two ideas : first, of a 
 distinction between good and evil, which never was very 
 prominent in India ; second, of the power to choose 
 between them. Zarathustra also taught that there were 
 two spiritual worlds, to which all would return at their 
 death. Finally, Alun-a Mazda would conquer Ahrinian, 
 once and forever. Then would be a resurrection from 
 the dead, when the good would be rewarded, the bad 
 punished. He taught also another idea, which is so 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 147 
 
 beautiful that I will give it to 3-ou iu the veiy words of 
 the Avesta. 
 
 " Zarathnstra said to Ahura Mazda, ' AMiere does the soul of 
 the pure man go after his death ? ' Ahura Mazda said, ' When 
 the lapse of the third night turns itself to light, the soul of the 
 pure man goes forward : there comes to meet him the figure of 
 a maiden ; one beautiful, shining, with shining arms ; one 
 powerful, well grown, slender ; one noble, with brilliant face ; 
 one of fifteen years, as fair in her growth as the fairest creatures. 
 
 " Then to her speaks the soul of the pure man asking, 
 'What maiden art thou whom I have seen here as the fairest 
 maiden in body? ' 
 
 " Tjien replies to him the maiden, ' I am, O youth, thy 
 good thoughts, words, and deeds, thy good law; the law of thine 
 o\^Ti body. 
 
 " Thou art like me, well-speaking, well-thinking, well- 
 acting youth, devoted to the good law; thou art in greatness, 
 goodness, beauty, such as I appear to thee.' " 
 
 So Zaratbustra said that, besides the Genii, servants 
 to do the will of Ahura Mazda, each individual had an 
 attendant spirit called a Fravasbi ; not like our idea of 
 a guardian angel, but the nature of the man himself, 
 his own character, put into a spiritual body ; and this 
 Fravasbi would be made pure and beautiful, or ugly 
 and hideous, by the actions of the man himself. It 
 would be this Fravasbi which would arise for the resur- 
 rection and final judgment. 
 
 The religion of the Hindu Aryans was to dream ; the 
 religion of the Persian Arj^ans was to fight. It was 
 while the Persians were brave, hard}', and poor, that 
 the}" won their brilliant successes under C3'rus the 
 Great. 559 b. c. Perhaps the}' owed their noble char- 
 acter to their noble relijrion ; and it is curious to think 
 
148 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 what might have been, if the}' had not become cor- 
 rupted l)y prosperity. If Marathon and Salamis had 
 been gained by the Persians, the reUgion of Ahiira 
 Mazda, reformed by Zarathustra, might have over- 
 spread the heathen world. Even when conquered by 
 Alexander, 334 b. c, the Persians retained their re- 
 ligion. Not until they were conquered by the Moham- 
 medans, 641 A. D., did it lose its power. But the Per- 
 sian nobles cherished a secret love for the religion of 
 their ancestors, and kept it alive in the distant prov- 
 inces. A few of them fled to India, where the small 
 sect called Parsees exists to-da}', and still observes the 
 laws of Zarathustra. Some of the wealthiest men of 
 Bombay are Parsees, afld worship fire, as the S3'mbol 
 of the sun. Probably the caste S3'stem of India forced 
 them into a caste of their own in self-defence. In 
 the later times of Parseeism in Persia, Zarathustra's 
 idea of a god was too abstruse and philosophical for the 
 common people ; and there were splendid temples built 
 to the sun, whom the}' called Mithras. This is like 
 Mitra, one of the names of the sun in the Rig Veda, it 
 will be remembered. In these temples was an altar on 
 which burned the sacred fire perpetually. I will quote 
 the shortest and simplest hymn I can find in tlie Avesta. 
 The others are incomprehensible : the sense is so over- 
 laid with repetitions. 
 
 HYMN. 
 
 THE PRIEST SPEAKS. 
 
 " I invite and announce to the lords of the heavenly, the lords 
 of the earthly, the lords of those who live in the water, the 
 lords of those which live under heaven, the lords of the winged, 
 the lords of the wide-stepping (that is, tlie cattle), the lords of 
 the beasts with claws, the pure lords of the pure." 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 149 
 
 This means that he invites the spiritual presence 
 of Ahura Mazda and the seven good Genii, and an- 
 nounces that he is about to perform the religious cere- 
 monies. Then he drinks the Haoma juice, which is like 
 the Vedic Soma, and eats the sacred bread. Then he 
 says : — 
 
 " Good is the thought, good the spefech, good the actions, of 
 the pure Zarathustra. May the good spirits accept the hymns ! 
 Praise be to you pure song." 
 
 Here at last is the hymn : — 
 
 "1. Here praise I now Ahura- Mazda, who has created the 
 cattle ; who created purity, the water, and the good trees ; 
 
 " 2. "Who created the splendor of light, the earth, and all 
 good. 
 
 "3. To Him belongs the kingdom, the might, and the 
 power. 
 
 " 4. "We praise Him first among the adorable beings 
 
 "5. Which dwell together with the cattle." 
 
 This means the good spirits who protect the cattle, 
 and would be much venerated by shepherds and 
 fanners. 
 
 " 6. Him praise we with Ahurian name Mazda. 
 
 " 7. "With our o\vn bodies and life praise we Him. 
 
 '' 8. The Fravashis of the pure men and women we praise. 
 
 " 9. The best purity we praise ; 
 
 " 10. What is fairest, what pure, what immortal, 
 
 "11. What brilliant, *all that is good. 
 
 " 12. The good spirit we honor ; the good kingdom we 
 honor ; 
 
 " 13. And the good rule, and the good law, and the good 
 wisdom." 
 
150 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATUKES. 
 
 This one example is enough to show how much repe- 
 tition there is : also, that ideas are worshipped, instead 
 of the living, real people that crowd the Rig Veda. 
 The word Asha is also applied to the. right performance 
 of the sacrifices. It means, then, correct in the pro- 
 nunciation, or the form of sacrifice, without a mistake. 
 The pra3-er Ashem means the right, proper praj'er, the 
 good prayer. 
 
 The form of praj'er for the people is more interest- 
 ing ; it is very much later. And, certainl}^, the pra3'ers 
 and confessions of sin are very beautiful. In the lit- 
 urgies and the laws, Zarathustra is represented as con- 
 versing with Ahura Mazda. Here is a prayer : — 
 
 " 1. Zarathustra asked Ahura Mazda, 'Ahura ^lazda, Heav- 
 enly, Holiest, Creator of the corporeal world, Pure One ! wherein 
 alone is contained thy word, which expresses all good, all that 
 springs from purity 1 ' " 
 
 " 2. To him answered Ahura Mazda : ' The prayer Ashem, 
 Zarathustra. 
 
 " 3. * Whoso utters the prayer Ashem with believing mind, 
 from the memory, praises me, Ahura ^Mazda : he praises the 
 water, he praises the earth, he praises the cow, he praises the 
 trees, he praises all good things created by Mazda, which have 
 a pure origin.' 
 
 " 4. Zarathustra asked Ahura Mazda, * What is that prayer 
 Ashem which in greatness, goodness, and beauty is worth all 
 that is between heaven and earth, and this earth and those 
 li;^dits created by Mazda, which have a pure origin ? ' " 
 
 There are man}' more verses, — thirteen more; but 
 this is the last : — 
 
 " 15. To him answered Ahura Mazda : ' That prayer, pure 
 Zarathustra, when one renounces all evil thoughts, words, and 
 deeds.' " 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 151 
 
 Here is the pra^-er : — 
 
 " 1, Purity is the best good. 
 
 " 2. Happiness, happiness is to him ; 
 
 " 3. Namely, to the best pure in purity." 
 
 Then come very long confessions of sin against those 
 laws. The confession begins : — 
 
 " I praise the good thoughts, words, and deeds with thoughts, 
 words, and deeds. I curse wicked thoughts, words, and deeds 
 away from thoughts, words, and deeds. I lay hold on all 
 good thoughts, words, and deeds. I renounce all evil thoughts, 
 words, and deeds. I praise the best purity. I hunt away the 
 Divs. I confess myself a follower of Zarathustra, an opponent 
 of the Divs, devoted to the faith in Ormazd. 1 am wholly 
 without doubt in the existence of the good Mazdayacniau faith ; 
 in the coming of the resurrection and the later body ; in the 
 stepping over the bridge Chinvat ; in an invariable recompense 
 of good deeds and their reward, and of bad deeds and their pun- 
 ishment, as well as in the continuance of Paradise, and the 
 annihilation of Hell and Ahriman and the Divs ; that the god 
 Ormazd will at last be victorious, and Ahriman will perish, 
 together with the Divs and the offshoots of darkness." 
 
 Then there is a long list of sins, — pages of them. 
 Eepeating a sin without having previoush' repented of 
 the tirst commission of it made the guilt greater than 
 before. 
 
 And then the conclusion : — ■ 
 
 " In what kind soever I have sinned, against whomsoever 
 I have sinned, however I have sinned, I repent of it with 
 thoughts, words, and deeds ! Pardon !" 
 
 This is the very depth of penitence. 
 
 From a literar}' point of view, the Avesta is far below 
 
152 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the Vedas ; it has none of the lovely poetn^ which 
 breathes through every line of the Rig Veda. Morally 
 it surpasses the Rig Veda : those beautiful aspirations 
 towards goodness which occasionally are poured out 
 there become the settled principle of daily life in the 
 Avesta. Historically it is \ery valuable to all believers 
 in Christianit}^ ; for here is the source of the contest 
 between good and evil which Christianity has so glori- 
 fied. For the Avesta is the true development of the 
 Rig Veda, rather than Brahmanism ; and, in a historv 
 of thought, would come between the two. 
 
 The reader will remember that Indra and Vritra are 
 purely physical in the Rig Veda ; but in the Avesta, 
 Azhidahaka, the biting snake of winter, is called in 
 addition " the evil for the world, the wicked one, which 
 Ahriman created for slaying the purity of the world," 
 so under the later and spiritual interpretation of Zara- 
 thustra, the hero who slays him is all good fighting 
 against all evil : and this idea came into Christianit}^ in 
 two ways. First, the Jews brought it back from their 
 captivity in Bab}lon. Before that they had no idea of 
 devils or bad spirits. M. Breal says that '' Satan, in 
 Job, is meant for an angel, not a devil ; he is an angel, 
 that is, a messenger to do the bidding of the Most High. 
 In 1st Chronicles xxi. 1, Satan appears as an evil 
 spirit, and tempts David to number the people." (We 
 must remember that the Books of Chronicles were not 
 written down until long after the events described had 
 taken place, — until the Jews had come back from their 
 captivity in Babylon among the Persians.) M. Breal 
 says, " Through the Jews it came into Christianity, and 
 IB fomid very strongly expressed in the Book of Revela- 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 153 
 
 tion." Mr. James Freeman Clarke sa3's, " Such a 
 picture as that by Guido of the conflict between Michael 
 and Satan, such a poem as Goethe's Faust, or Milton's 
 Paradise Lost, would never haA^e appeared in Christen- 
 dom but for the influence of Zoroaster's religion, first on 
 Jewish, after that on Christian thought." There is 
 another idea which the Jews brought back : Yama, the 
 judge of the dead, in the Vedas, becomes Yima in the 
 Avesta : instead of living in a spiritual world he lives 
 here in a beautiful country-, an earthly paradise. The 
 souls of the good live there until the final judgment. 
 I quote from the Avesta : "In the wide rule of Yima 
 there was no cold, no heat, no old age, no death, no 
 env}^ (the creation of the Divs) . Father and son walked 
 along together, fifteen j'ears old in countenance, each of 
 the two : the eatable food was inexhaustible : men and 
 cattle were immortal : water and trees never dried up, 
 all on account of the absence of the lie, until Yima, him- 
 self untrue, began to love l^'ing speech: then when he, 
 himself untrue, began to love lying speech, his majesty 
 flew awa}' from him visibl}^ with the body of a bird." 
 Here is the conception of the fall of a good spirit 
 through haughtiness of mind : the reader will at once 
 think of the fall of Satan. This belief in an earthly 
 paradise constantl}^ recurs in the literature of the Middle 
 Ages : when we come to that, I shall refer to the second 
 wa}^ in which these ideas reached Christianit3\ 
 
 There is one thing more which we probabh- owe to 
 the Avesta and the Parsees. It will be remembered 
 that the undivided Arj^ans used the moon to measure 
 time: the words "moons" and "month" mean meas- 
 ures, and time was measured b}^ months — that is, by 
 
154 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 moons — long before it was divided into weeks. The 
 Parsees had a different Genius, or good god, for every 
 day of the month, except the 1st, 8th, 15th, and 22d, 
 ■which were sacred to Ahura INIazda. Although it is 
 not yet fuU}^ proved that we get our division of time into 
 weeks from the Ar3'ans of Persia, I think it is a fair 
 conchision, and scholars say that it is probably so. If 
 I have dwelt so long upon the A vesta, it is because its 
 historical value is so great ; it is the inner meaning, 
 the last resultant of the principles of the Rig Veda, and 
 one would be incomplete without the other. We even 
 could not understand Hterature itself without tracing its 
 ideas back to their sources, — sources unknown and un- 
 suspected one hundred years ago, despised and doubted 
 when first made known ; to have discovered them is a 
 splendid triumph of the human mind ; and to follow 
 the footsteps of these great scholars is a lofty pleasure 
 for us. 
 
 There is no literature in Zend except a religious one, 
 a few books developing the principles laid down b}' 
 Zarathustra. The Persian literature proper is compara- 
 tivel}' modern. It was well known in Europe before the 
 Avesta had been translated, or the two new sciences 
 of comparative mytholog}' and comparative philolog}' 
 formed. But Persia has a really- great poem and a true 
 .poet. The great Sultan Mahmoud, who invaded and 
 conquered India near a. d. 1000, felt that the glory of 
 empire was not enough for him : he longed to be a pa- 
 tron of literature, so he ordered the poet Firdousi to col- 
 lect and rewrite into, an harnK)nious whole the legends 
 and ballads relating to the histor}^ of Persia. Since the 
 Mohammedan conquest of Persia, two hundred and fifty 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 155 
 
 3'ears before, these legends had been kept alive by the 
 Persian nobles who had preserved in secret the faith of 
 their ancestors, the religion of Zarathustra ; but we owe 
 their present form to two Mohammedans, Mahmoud and 
 Firdousi. The poem is a true national epic, and is called 
 the Shah Xameli, or "Book of Kings." The Sultan 
 promised to pay him sixty thousand pieces of gold, one 
 thousand pieces as soon as each thousand couplets 
 should be completed ; but Firdousi preferred to receive 
 the whole amount at once, because he wished to build 
 stone ditches and drains to irrigate and improve his na- 
 tive qHj. After thirtj'-five 3'ears of toil the great poem 
 of sixty thousand couplets was completed ; but the prime 
 vizier of Mahmoud disliked Firdousi, and persuaded 
 the Sultan to send him sixty thousand pieces of silver. 
 Firdousi received them at the bath ; he was so indignant 
 that he on the spot divided the mone}^ into three parts, 
 gave one to each of the two slaves who had brought it, 
 the other to the attendant at the bath : then he wrote a 
 stinging satire upon Mahmoud and fled to his native 
 cit}', Tus. After some years Mahmoud repented, and 
 sent an elephant loaded with sixty thousand pieces of 
 gold to Tus : but at the gates the}' met the funeral pro- 
 cession of Firdousi. His daughter nobl}' refused the 
 gold, but his sister remembered the dream of Firdou- 
 si's youth : she took the gold and built the drains and 
 ditches in stone. So Firdousi became a benefactor to his 
 native city, but like others he suffered for an ungrateful 
 countr}', — like Dante, Tasso, Camoens. Ampere, the 
 French critic, calls him one of the great poets of the 
 world, and his story throws a mournful interest around 
 his poem. A magnificent French translation was begun 
 
156 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 by the French government at ninety francs a vohime, but 
 the death of M. Mohl has left it unfinished : there is a poor 
 translation in English, very much abridged, published 
 in 1832. 
 
 We find collected in the Shah Nameh the national 
 traditions for an estimated period of three thousand six 
 hundred years. This is rather apocryphal, since he 
 makes one king rule seven hundred years, and another 
 one thousand. It describes the civilization founded b}- 
 Djemschid, reformed b}^ Zarathustra, and overthrown 
 b}^ Alexander. Alexander is called Sikander, and the 
 Persians have certainl}'' a right to claim him, as he 
 adopted Persian manners. Of course it is not literal 
 histor}^, although it is carried down to the Mohammedan 
 conquest in a. d. 641 ; it is rather a picture of the man- 
 ners and the thought of the country and the time. There 
 is a want of unity in it since so many kings and heroes 
 are described ; it resembles in this respect the Maha 
 Bharata, but it has nothing of that theocratic character, 
 that government of the priests, which runs through the 
 two Sanskrit epics. It is an heroic stor3'of a brave and 
 warlike people, pure in their lives and full of simple faith ; 
 3'et it has a reUgious meaning, and represents the con- 
 test between good and evil. Iran is the principle of light, 
 and Turan of darkness ; Iran, which is Persia, being 
 constantly at war with a countr}' called Turan. From 
 this comes our word Turanian, applied afterwards to 
 all those native races which fought against all the other 
 Aryan invaders. Each new hero who arises carries on 
 the hoi}' war, and is accompanied b}' good spirits called 
 Peris and Genii. The Turanians are accompanied by 
 Divs, both directly traceable to the Avesta, of course. 
 
PERSIAN LITERATTTRE. 157 
 
 The heroes and heroines are so much aUke that one 
 becomes rather wearied with the repetition of the same 
 adventures over and over again ; but the poem is most 
 interesting as a hnk in the history of the human mind, 
 and as another proof of the brotherhood of the different 
 Ar3'an famihes. These ballads must have grown up 
 soon after the separation of the Iranians and Indians ; 
 the}' somewhat resemble the early feudal epic of their 
 Hindu brethren, but not at all the later theocratic one. 
 The literature of Greece had been well known in Persia 
 b}^ means of Zenobia and her prime minister, Longinus, 
 seven hundred years before they were collected ; 3'et the 
 ballads seem utterly uninfluenced by Greek thought. 
 Persia had been conquered b}^ the Mohammedans two 
 hundred and fifty 3'ears before their collection, yet there 
 is no trace of the Arabian mind in them. The Crusades 
 came one hundred years after they were collected, so 
 that no influence could have been exerted by the Chris- 
 tians : the}' are an original growth, a product of the soil, 
 and 3'et they are exactly like the chivalric romances 
 which arose in Europe in the Middle Ages. The same 
 brave and warlike heroes perform the most amazing feats 
 of valor, and are attended by good and evil spirits : the 
 same moon-faced heroines, with musky hair, and C3'press- 
 like forms, as much alike as a row of la3' figures, fall in 
 love at first sight. Yet the poem is most spirited, full 
 of prodigies of valor performed b3^ the diff'erent heroes, 
 and the demons fl3' about with the most delightful pro- 
 fusion and energ3'. 
 
 It is eas3^ to recognize in these heroes the ancient 
 heroes and divinities of the Rig Veda and the Avesta, 
 Avho have been made into men, and thus become the 
 
158 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 heroes of the epic poem. The gi'eatest as well as the 
 first king was Djemschid, distinguished for learning and 
 wisdom. In his reign coats of mail were invented, 
 swords and other armor ; garments of silk were woven ; 
 desert lands were cultivated ; vessels were put upon 
 the rivers and seas ; water and clay were formed into 
 bricks to build him a splendid palace. In tliis palace 
 he ever}' year assembled Genii and Divs, men and 
 beasts and birds. Over all these his empire extended. 
 Nature herself was subject to him ; for his government 
 lasted seven hundred years. Nobody died, and nobod}^ 
 was ill. Then his heart was filled with pride. He said 
 to his nobles, " Was there ever a king of such magnifi- 
 cence and power as I?" And the nobles replied, 
 " Thou art the mightiest, the most victorious : there is 
 no equal to thee." Then the just god beheld this foolish 
 pride, and cast him down into utter miser}'. Does not 
 this remind one of the story of Yima in the Avesta? 
 Eugene Burnouf, the greatest Zend scholar in the'world, 
 says that Yima reappears in Djemschid. 
 
 The first great hero of the Shah Nameh is Feridun. 
 A king named Zohak had committed dreadful -crimes, 
 assisted by a Div named Iblis. As his reward, Iblis 
 requested permission to kiss the king's shoulder, which 
 was granted. Then from the shoulder sprang two 
 dreadful serpents. Iblis told him that these must be 
 fed ever}' day with the brains of two children. So the 
 country grachuilly was becoming depopulated, as the 
 object of Iblis was to destroy the human race. Then 
 arose a youthful hero named Feridun. When yet a 
 baby, he had been abandoned by his mother, and nursed 
 by a cow. The reader will at once think of other 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 159 
 
 Aiyau heroes who have been brought np b}- some 
 frienclh' anmirJ, — Romuhis and Remus, or CEdipus. 
 Feridun had been educated b}- a mountain hermit. He 
 grew up beautiful and strong, and finally he killed the 
 serpent-king Zohak, and delivered his countr3\ Eu- 
 gene Burnouf has discovered that Zohak is the same 
 as Azhidahaka in the Avesta, — the biting snake ; 
 Feridun has been identified with Thraetaona, the hero 
 of the Avesta. And thus another hero fights with a 
 monster ; that is, good fights with evil, for the contest 
 has now become spuitualized.- The poet Firdousi uses 
 ever}' opportunity to introduce religious and moral re- 
 flections ; which are, however, both beautiful and ap- 
 propriate. He says : — 
 
 " Feridun 
 First purified the world from sin and crime : 
 Yet Feridun was not an angel ; nor 
 Composed of musk and ambergris. By justice 
 And generosity he gained his fame. 
 Do thou but exercise these princely virtues, 
 And thou wilt be renowned as Feridun." 
 
 The second and greatest hero is Rustem. He is a 
 compound of Herakles the Greek and Roland of the 
 Middle Ages, as we shall see later. His infancy is pro- 
 tected by a marvellous bird, — the Simurgh. He is 
 like the bird Garuda in Sanskrit, and develops into the 
 roc of the Arabian Nights. AYhen an infant only, 
 he performs prodigies of valor, like Herakles ; when a 
 child, he kills an elephant. When grown up, the king 
 and his army being shut up in the demon countr}' by 
 the king of Turan and his Divs, Rustem, all alone, 
 performs seven labors, and frees the king. This is 
 
160 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 again likie Herakles. But Rustem is as pious as he is 
 brave. He prays to his god before every encounter, 
 and gives thanks after every victor3^ He has a mar- 
 vellous horse, whom he loves more than wife or child. 
 These traits suggest Roland. He is in fact a perfect 
 type of the mediaeval hero, except in one thing, his 
 indifference to women : he leaves his young wife, the 
 daughter of a king, to look for his horse, which had 
 strayed awa}^, and never goes back to her, although he 
 kindl}^ sends once to inquire for her. Now, many of 
 these traits identify him at once as a solar myth. If 
 he is so much more pious than the Greek hero, it is 
 that he expresses the simple faith of the noble Persian 
 character. His marvellous strength when an infant is 
 the power of the sun, resistless even at its rising; the 
 seven labors which he performs for the good of others, 
 the demons which he slays, are the dark clouds which 
 obstruct his path. When in the middle of his life, 
 Rustem feels that his labors for others have not been 
 appreciated, and he sits apart, gloom}' and sullen, in his 
 tent, while the war goes on. This will at once suggest 
 the wrath of Achilleus. It is the dark cloud again, ob- 
 scuring the beneficent sun. The bride whom Rustem so 
 coolly leaves is the same bride whom all the other solar 
 heroes abandon, — the dawn. And at last, when Rus- 
 tem dies, he is not killed in fair fight, but in ambush, — 
 Hke Siegfiied, slain from behind. There is one cir- 
 cumstance connected with tlie solar myth as represented 
 b}' Rustem which only recurs once again in the other 
 Aryan literatures. The great hero kills his unknown 
 son, Sohrab. This comes into the old High German 
 ballad of Hildebrand and lladubrand ; and this is sim- 
 
PEESIAN LITERATURE. 161 
 
 pl}^ a reversal of the usual form. Sohrab is also a 
 solar ni3-th, — the light of one da}^ slain b}' another; 
 for Rustem never grows old. The kings of the Shah 
 Nameh pass awa}^ and die, and new ones arise ; but 
 Eustem is still the great champion. He ma}- be said 
 to have a thousand lives, like the light, which never 
 dies. Matthew Arnold's exquisite translation is so well 
 known that readers can at once refer to it for the epi- 
 sode of Sohrab and Rustem. 
 
 There is another hero in the Shah Nameh, named 
 Isfendijar, — also a solar myth, because he can be slain 
 onl}' b}^ an arrow from one particular tree, the thorn ; 
 this is the same thorn which killed Siegfried in Ger- 
 man, the mistletoe which killed Balder in Norse, the 
 thorn which pricks the sleeping beaut}^ And of course 
 Rustem, the summer, kills Isfendij-ar, the dark winter. 
 These four are the most famous heroes of the Shah 
 Nameh ; there are no women so sweet, yet so strong, 
 as Damayanti and Sita, but a totally new t3'pe is intro- 
 duced, Gurd-Afrid, an amazon who fights in armor like 
 g. man. This certainly proves the early independence 
 of the Persian women ; the later tj^pe of Persian woman 
 is Mohammedan, not Ar3'an. Until this discovery it 
 was considered that the Greek amazon, Atalanta, was 
 the original ; but the type belongs to all the Aryans, 
 not to the Greeks alone. 
 
 The Persians of this late da}' still love and reverence 
 the Shah Nameh. Many places are associated with its 
 events. The ruins of Persepolis are called the throne 
 of Djemschid. A traveller relates that, in 1830, he 
 accompanied an embassy from Persepolis to Shiraz. 
 One of the grooms began to recite verses from the Shah 
 
 11 
 
162 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Nanieh, while the}' moved along. "SThen he ceased, a 
 nobleman of the embass}' took up the passage where the 
 servant left off. Rustem is still the national hero of 
 Persia. Three hundred villages bear his name. Like 
 Roland's with the Pyrenees, his name is associated 
 with the province of Mazenderan. Stones in the desert 
 are pointed out as the tracks that Rustem's camel left 
 behind him. In the Persian wars, during the first cen- 
 turies of this era, his exploits were still sung, like the 
 exploits of Roland, sung at the battle of Hastings. 
 There are hundreds of these ballads in Persia, which 
 have been collected into Nameh, or books, but they do 
 not equal the Shah Nameh. All belong to the Aryan 
 period, pure and unmixed. 
 
 Of course, the Shah Nameh is not literal histor}' ; so 
 that 3-ou will not be amazed to find its heroes possess- 
 ing the attributes of the solar myth. But it is curious 
 that they should have also attached themselves to a 
 real historical person. There is no doubt that C3TUS 
 the Great lived, and conquered the Medes, and followed 
 the religion of Zarathustra, and was a warlike Aryan,^ 
 like all the earl}' Persians ; but the stories told of him 
 are too much like those of many another hero to be 
 quite true historicall}'. We owe our account of Cyrus 
 to Herodotus, the Greek. Before his birth it was pre- 
 dicted that he should destroy his grandfather ; so, as 
 soon as he was born, Ast3'ages ordered him to be ex- 
 posed to death on a mountain-side. He was wrapped 
 in golden and parti-colored robes, and left to die ; but 
 the kind wife of a herdsman, filled with pity, nursed 
 him and brought him up as her own child. Her name 
 was Spaca, which means a dog, and it was always said 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 163 
 
 that Cyrus was nursed b}' an animal, like the heroes 
 Feridun and Romulus. "When C^^rus grew up, he was 
 so strong and fair that the bo3's chose him to be king 
 in all their games. He acted like a king, — made laws, 
 and punished all offenders who disobe3'ed him. Then 
 one of the boj'S complained to his father, who was a 
 nobleman, and 3'oung C3TUS was brought before the 
 real king, Astyages. Then Ast\'ages recognized him 
 to be the grandson whom he had exposed to die, and 
 sent him to his father, who was a Persian. When 
 C3TUS grew older, he raised an arm}- of Persians, came 
 and conquered the Medes, and overthrew his grand- 
 father, Astyages. Thus he fulfilled the prophec}^ that 
 he should destroj^ his own grandfather. The same 
 prophec}- was made about Romulus and Perseus. It is 
 an historical fact that Cyrus did unite the Medes and 
 Persians, — those verj^ Medes and Persians whom we 
 used to meet at our Sunda3'-school lessons ; but it is 
 also true that the Aryan imagination of our Persian 
 brethren threw around him those circumstances which 
 clearh- indicate the solar m3'th, wherever found. The 
 sun often rises behind a mountain, wrapped in golden 
 and colored clouds, and the sun alwa3's destroys the 
 darkness, its father ; for here comes in the strongest 
 proof of the m3-thical element attached to C3TUS, — the 
 name of the grandfather Ast3'ages is the same word as 
 Azhidaka, the biting snake of the Avesta, and C3TUS 
 becomes another of the heroes of light fighting against 
 darkness and evil. It was not consciousl3^ composed, 
 of course, this stor3' of Cyrus, but grew up spontane- 
 ousl3^ 
 
 I came to the Shah Xameh utterly ignorant of what 
 
164 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 it was, and was amazed as well as delighted, it was 
 so unlike mj idea of Persian poetiy. But when I 
 studied the modern poetr}', I found what I had ex- 
 pected, — the luxuriance and indolence and Epicurean- 
 ism which we associate with the East, but which are not 
 found in the Sanskrit literature at all, nor in the ancient 
 literature of Persia. The modern Persian language is 
 an Ar3^an language, the child of Zend ; but the thoughts 
 are Mohammedan and Semitic. You will remember 
 that there is no modern literature in Sanskrit. There 
 is a great deal in Persian. It has been the fashion in 
 France and Germany. Goethe wrote a whole volume 
 called the " West-Easterl}' Divan," which was a won- 
 derful imitation of Hafiz. 
 
 Hafiz is the greatest of the modern Persians. He 
 lived in the fourteenth centur}^ at Shiraz. He wrote 
 songs in praise of love and wine, the rose and the night- 
 ingale, the nightingale and the rose, until one gets very 
 weary of their monotony'. The metre is verj' peculiar 
 and pleasing ; it is called a Ghazel. They .have a vague 
 m3'sticism running through them ; and some devout 
 Mohammedans use them as a devotional book, and 
 claim that they have a spiritual meaning. The love 
 poems are said to describe the soul's love of God ; but 
 I cannot think this Hafiz's own meaning. They are 
 interesting as an expression of one side of the national 
 character, although a very low side ; for Hafiz was an 
 infidel and a sensualist. He belongs to the same class 
 as Anacreon in Greek, or Catullus in Latin. Hafiz 
 is so celebrated that we cannot ignore him in a sketch 
 of the national literature ; but he will never have in 
 Europe the popularity he enjo3's in the East. The 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 165 
 
 specimens I shall quote are ver}- favorable to him. Out 
 of a whole volume, the3^ are the clearest I could find. 
 The others seem confused and stupid ; but certainlj- these 
 are ver}- pretty in their way. The rose is the national 
 emblem of Persia, the bulbul (the nightingale) is the 
 favorite bird, the cypress the favorite tree ; and when- 
 ever one meets these three in a European poet, one may 
 know that he has sat at the feet of Hafiz and Saadi. 
 
 " Without the loved one's cheek, the rose 
 
 Can charm not. 
 The spring, unless the wine-cup flows, 
 
 Can charm not. 
 The greenwood's border and the orchard's air, 
 Unless some tulip cheek be there. 
 
 Can charm not. 
 The sugar-lipped, the fair of rosy frame, 
 Whom kisses nor embrace can claim, 
 
 Can charm not. 
 The dancing cypress, the enrapturing flower, 
 If no nightingale gladden the bower. 
 
 Can charm not. 
 The painter's picture, though with genius rife, 
 W^ithout the pictiure that has life. 
 
 Can charm not. 
 Wine, flower, and bower abound in charm, yet they, 
 Lack we the friend who makes us gay. 
 
 Can charm not. 
 Thy soul, Hafiz ! 
 Is a coin that none prize ; 
 And it, though poured forth 
 Largess-wise, 
 
 Can charm not." 
 
166 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 '' 'T is a deep chami which wakes the lover's flame ; 
 Not ruby lip nor musky locks its name. 
 Beauty is not the eye, hair, cheek, or mole : 
 A thousand subtile points the heart control." 
 
 Saadi is the other great writer of modern and Mo- 
 hammedan Persia. He lived in the twelfth eentur}" of 
 our era, one hundred and fifty years before Hafiz, and 
 so was less corrupted b}' Mohammedan thought. He 
 will have in Europe some portion of the popularity he 
 enjoys among the Mohammedans. He travelled over 
 Europe and Asia, and wrote many books. The best of 
 them are the Gulistan, or " Rose Garden," and the 
 Bostan, or "Fruit Garden." Their very names show 
 the allegory of which the Semitic nations are so fond. 
 They are composed of short stories in prose, with a 
 moral in verse attached, which is supposed to be as 
 valuable and beautiful as roses and fruits. In every 
 sentence of the original, Persian and Arabic words 
 are intermixed, as if we should make a sentence with 
 English and Latin words ; jet nevertheless he writes 
 with charming ease : even through a prose translation 
 the gi'ace is felt, and the Gulistan would be accepted as 
 the masterpiece of Mohammedan Uterature. It is witty 
 and wise and shrewd. Saadi preaches and moralizes, 
 and overflows with good sense. But he has no faith, no 
 enthusiasm, no spiritualit}'. This cool, calculating self- 
 righteousness is exasperating to the last degree ; and one 
 feels inclined to say that such a goodness, which comes 
 only from prudent self-interest, is no goodness at all. 
 
 Here is one of the finest proverbs : — 
 
 " 0, square thyself for use : a stone that may 
 Fit in the wall is not left in the way." 
 
PEESIAN LITERATUEE. 167 
 
 We give an extract from the Gulistan : — 
 
 " I was sitting in a boat, in company witli some persons of 
 distinction, when a vessel near us sunk, and two brothers fell 
 into a whirlpool. One of the company promised a mariner 
 one hundred dinars if he would save both the brothers. The 
 mariner came and saved one, and the other perished. I said, 
 ' Of a truth the other had no longer to live, and therefore he 
 was taken out of the water last.' The mariner, laughing, 
 replied, ' What you say is true ; but I had also another motive 
 in saving this one in preference to the other, because once, 
 when I was tired in the desert, he mounted me on a camel, 
 and from the other I received a whipping in my childhood.' 
 I replied, ' Truly the great God is just ; so that whosoever 
 doeth good shall himself experience good, and he who com- 
 mitteth evil shall suffer evil. As far as you can avoid it, dis- 
 tress not the mind of any one ; for in the path of life there are 
 many thorns. Assist the exigencies of others, since you also 
 stand in need of many things.' " 
 
 Here is the fatalism of the Mohammedans : — 
 
 " O thou who art in want of subsistence, be confident that 
 thou shalt eat. And thou whom death hath required, flee not ; 
 for thou canst not preserve thy life. With or without your 
 exertion, Providence will bestow on you daily bread ; and if 
 thou shouldst be in the jaws of the lion, or of the tiger, they 
 could not devour you excepting on the day of your destiny." 
 
 The story of the perfumed clay is too old and fa- 
 miliar to be quoted ; but it originated in Persia. ' ' Je 
 ne suis pas la rose ; mais j'ai vecu avec elle." 
 
 There are many poets belonging to this modern period 
 in Persia, — said to be twenty-five thousand. I do not 
 know who is left to form an audience. The period ex- 
 tends from the eleventh century- (the collection of the 
 
168 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Shah Xameh) to our time. One of them, Omar Kha}-- 
 3'am, the astronomer-poet, who died in a. d. 1123, was 
 translated a few 3'ears ago. He reads like Heine, full 
 of scepticism and iron}'. " This life is but an inn," he 
 cries; "let us eat and drink and be merr}-." Mr. 
 Emerson sa3's, "The poet stands in strict relation to 
 his people ; he has the overdose of their nationalit}'." 
 It seems melanchol}' that the brave and believing Per- 
 sians should be represented by the sensualism of Hafiz, 
 and the worldl}- wisdom of Saadi ; but the Arj'an ele- 
 ment- was not quite crushed out of Persia. Because 
 Persian poetrj^ is the meeting of two distinct races, the 
 ArN'an and the Semitic, two modes of thought, the Ve- 
 dic and the Mohammedan, it has a universal interest, a 
 claim to consideration. 
 
 It burst forth first in m3'sticism, — that curious phase 
 of the Arj'an race, which breaks out in everj' famih', 
 modified b}' external surroundings, and is so prominent 
 in modern Persian poetrj' that it cannot be passed over. 
 The third great poet is Djellaleddin Roumi. His m3's- 
 tical poem, called the Mesnevi, is the third great poem 
 of Mohammedan literature. It is a fusion of the two 
 elements ; but the mj'sticism which was barelj- percepti- 
 ble in Hafiz preponderates in the Mesnevi. The doc- 
 trine is like the pantheism of Brahmanism, and it was 
 so full}' explained in the second chapter that I need 
 not repeat the account. The individual is said to be a 
 piece of the Divine Being, and finalh' to be absorbed 
 into him. The believer cries out, "I am in God"; 
 next, "I am God." There is a set of Mohammedan 
 m3'stics called Sufis, who admire and follow this poem. 
 
 We must return for a moment to the Shah Nameh. 
 
PERSIAN LITERATURE. 169 
 
 It has an interest to us far more than these three 
 poems, — far more than that of an}' mere Uterary 
 monument of a past age. It is the source of man}- of 
 our own ideas. The Persians are our brothers : they 
 were once a brave and chivakous people ; and as the 
 Avesta introduced a spiritual fight into our religion, so 
 the Shah Nameh brought it down into our nursery tales 
 and folk-lore. 
 
 The second manifestation of the Arj'an element is in 
 the popular stories of modern Persia. The reader will 
 remember that a few of them originated in India, prin- 
 cipall}' the geographical story of Sindbad the Sailor. 
 The}' were translated and enlarged in Persia. With a 
 little thought the reader can separate the Vedic and 
 Mohammedan features. They have Peris who are the 
 seven great Genii of the Avesta in reduced circum- 
 stances, and who mean the bright clouds of the Veda ; 
 they have demons who are the Divs of the Avesta, the 
 dark clouds of the Veda. They have an earthly para- 
 dise, or dark halls of Iblis, from the Shah Nameh ; mar- 
 vellous talking birds, and human beings turned into 
 beasts, again from the Shah Nameh. But the manners 
 and customs are such as Mohammedans would naturally 
 adopt, as the many wives, the seclusion of the women. 
 The signet ring of vSolomon, which gave power over 
 Genii and Divs, was Mohammedan ; but the cup of 
 Djemschid, which revealed all the secrets of creation 
 to liim who gazed in it, was from the Shah Nameh, and 
 reappears as the magic goblet in every Aryan family. 
 If Ihe Persian stories differ from the nursery tales which 
 are the common inheritance of every Aryan branch, it is 
 because they did not grow up until after the separa- 
 
170 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 tion of the families : although starting in India, they 
 received in Persia a coloring which has only lately 
 been understood. These supernatural stories, with their 
 mixed origin, influenced Europe in the Middle Ages 
 almost as much as the heroic ballads, and both have 
 come down to us from the Shah Nameh. In the chap- 
 ter upon Mediaeval Literature I shall speak of the two 
 roads which they took. 
 
 There is something else, too, which we owe to modern 
 Persia, that is, the historical novel. Strictly speaking, 
 the epic is confined to poetry. It tells a story of national 
 character, and national fortunes, and it includes national 
 ballads. In fact, it is founded upon them. But, in a 
 broader sense, an epic ma}^ be written in prose. Popu- 
 lar traditions of heroes and gods are indispensable to 
 an epic poem ; but, later on, faith in the marvellous dies 
 out, and then the story is put into plain prose. If the 
 facts are national, it becomes the historical romance ; if 
 the facts relate onl}^ to private individuals, it becomes 
 the novel. So the modern Persians could not make a 
 poetic epic, but thej' invented a prose epic, the histori- 
 cal novel. The first one was founded upon the life of 
 Alexander the Great, and called "The Tale of Is- 
 kander." Do we not owe a debt of thanks to our Per- 
 sian brethren ? 
 
 The Sanskrit literature contains no histor}'. The 
 mixed element of modern Persia has produced many val- 
 uable histories. Within a few 3'ears Persia seems to be 
 composing another Ar3'an form, regaining something of 
 its old vitality. There were never any plays in Zend, 
 or in Persian ; but some rude popular dramas b}^ un- 
 known authors are now acted. They have excited much 
 
PEKSIAN LITEEATURE. 171 
 
 interest among French scholars because the}- are so 
 very much like the M3'ster\^ plays of the Middle Ages, 
 and haA-e been translated within two 3-ears into French. 
 The}' are wholly religious in their tone, and never men- 
 tion love or daily life, which are the usual subjects of 
 plays. 
 
172 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY OF THE GREEK POETRY 
 AND DRAMA. 
 
 WE approach in this chapter the third branch of the 
 noble Ar3'an famih', — our brothers the Greeks. 
 Tlieir Uterature has been so studied and commented 
 upon, so slavishly copied, so blindly worshipped for 
 centuries, that little would remain to be added if we 
 followed the footsteps of the past. But I wish to look 
 at Greek literature in the new light which comparative 
 philology and comparative mythology' have thrown over 
 it. Of course it would be impossible, within the limits 
 of one chapter, to do more than mention the names 
 which have rendered Greek literature so famous in epic 
 poetr}^, lyric poetr}^, the drama, physics, metaphysics, 
 histor}', and political eloquence. I do not pretend to 
 exhaust the subject in one chapter. AYe shall devote 
 our attention to the comparative mytholog}' found in 
 the G?reek poetry and the Greek drama. 
 
 Every well-educated person expects to have some 
 definite knowledge of books which have been so cele- 
 brated. Undoubtedlv the}' have man}' beauties ; but it 
 is not probable that they will again rule the world as 
 the}' have done. Since these new discoveries, they take 
 a place which is quite different from their old one, but 
 perhaps it is equally important. Instead of being the 
 one standard by which every other literature must be 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETEY AND DRAMA. 173 
 
 judged, Greek becomes but one of man}' sister literatures. 
 Books are now considered worth}' of attention if they 
 are not exactly like Greek books ; and it is no longer 
 thought sacrilege to suggest that Greek literature may 
 be criticised. For these new sciences have proved that 
 it is but one of man}- links in the development of the 
 human mind ; and therefore it may be judged by its 
 intrinsic merits. 
 
 In judging the Sanskrit literature, we must not for one 
 moment forget that it was absoluteh' self-developed ; 
 that it grew up without any contact with other nations. 
 The Greek literature is not so independent a manifesta- 
 tion of human thought. It is true, that it inherited no 
 forms ; it copied no models, but it is greatl}^ indebted 
 to the mind of Egypt and Assyria. From a modern and 
 Christian stand-point it seems far less beautiful than 
 those early spontaneous writings ; for Sanskrit litera- 
 ture seems spiritual, pathetic, and noble ; while the 
 Greek seems unspiritual, artificial, and immoral. I may 
 repeat Max Muller's remarks: "The language of the 
 simple prayers of the Rig Veda is more intelhgible to 
 us than an^-thing we find in the literature of Greece or 
 Eome ; and there are, here and there, expressions of 
 faith and devotion, in which even a Christian can join 
 without irreverence." Saint Augustine, even when a 
 Pagan, never loved the Greek literature ; and Bossuet, 
 the greatest French preacher, complained of " le grand 
 creux " which he found in all classical antiquity. 
 
 The different authorities have not yet settled whether 
 the Pelasgi of Greece were Aryan or Turanian. It is 
 only a question of pushing a little farther back the Aryan 
 invasion ; for we know that the original inhabitants were 
 
174 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 a Turanian race. We do not know when the powerful 
 Aryans entered Greece, but the}- conquerd the Trojans 
 1184 B. c, and from this date the}" became masters of 
 Greece. For three centuries after, history is a blank. 
 But the Grecian Aryans developed the germs they had 
 brought with them from the common home. Uncon- 
 sciously they went through the same mental processes 
 which every other Aryan nation has gone through ; and 
 from these ideas of the undivided Aryans resulted the 
 Greek mythology. It is only a completer development 
 of these Intuitions which we have already examined in 
 the Rig Veda. But we must not for a moment think 
 it was borrowed from there. India was unknown to 
 them : even the cradle of their undivided race had long 
 been forgotten. The Greek mythology is much more 
 complex and puzzling than the Sanskrit ; it Avas never 
 understood until lately. A thousand explanations of it 
 have been made, but the new light thrown upon it by 
 the Rig Veda has given its true and final interpretation, 
 for the gods of all the Aryan mythologies are now con- 
 sidered to be nature personified. Its powers, such as 
 the sky, the sun, the wind, the dawn, become real 
 persons. In Greek mythology, each different aspect of 
 nature had many different names, because a few simple 
 elements crystallized into many different forms. This is 
 why there are so many gods and goddesses. 
 
 There are books in Greek which tell us these stories 
 of their gods and goddesses ; but there is no book like 
 the Vedas, or the Avesta, full of prayers and hymns and 
 thanksgivings, — full of a spu'itual life ; in a word, there 
 are no sacred books, and this is a sufficient comment 
 upon the Greek character. They seem to have had 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 176 
 
 originally the usual Aiyan form of worship. The}' poured 
 out libations of wine, and offered part of the food, at 
 every meal ; they sacrificed animals upon an altar ; each 
 head of a family was his own priest, and performed his 
 own sacrifice. AgamemnoQ, was priest and king himself. 
 Afterwards they erected altars ; then temples to every 
 god, — the bad as well as the good, — even to the god of 
 thieves, Hermes. But a Greek temple did not contain 
 a congregation of worshippers, like a Chi'istian church ; 
 at first, it was onl}" large enough to hold the statue and 
 altar of some god. Art has preserved to us a feature 
 of distinctiveh' Greek worship : a long procession led 
 b}' naked men, who danced and sang in honor of the 
 gods. It is true that they had solemn and dreadful 
 m3'steries in honor of Kj'bele, and Dionj'sos, which are 
 supposed to have been brought from Egypt b}' the 
 Turanian aborigines, and to have survived the Aryan 
 conquest. These horrid festivals had some In^mns and 
 poems called Orphic sayings, but the}' do not belong to 
 united Greece : they onh' represent that Turanian ele- 
 ment which was not entireh' crushed out. The oracles 
 of the gods spoke occasionall}' at the temples, but gave 
 no connected utterance. Of rehgious literature, such as 
 other nations possess, there is 'none. That sense of sin, 
 which weighed down the thoughtful Hindu, that clear 
 distinction between right and wrong which nerved the 
 Persian to spiritual struggle, can scarcel}' be said to 
 have been present to the Greek mind. 
 
 "We have seen that the first utterance of the human 
 mind is a hymn to a god ; the next, a code of religious 
 laws and duties. The Greeks seem not to have gone 
 through these two periods of mental growth : at any rate, 
 
176 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 there is no trace of them left, because the first collected 
 book in Greek is the Iliad. And what is that? Everj-- 
 bod\- knows that the Iliad is a poem which tells two 
 stories ; — of a war between the Greeks and Trojans 
 to recover a Grecian woman named Helen, who had 
 run awa}' from her lawful husband with a Trojan hero 
 named Paris, and carried a great treasure witli her ; 
 also, of the anger of Achilleus, a Grecian hero, and 
 the dreadful consequences it brought upon the Grecian 
 arm}', encamped upon the plains around Tro}'. 
 
 The latest investigations have succeeded in proving 
 that the Iliad is a collection of heroic ballads ; and that 
 there were, in early Greek literature, hundreds of these 
 heroic ballads, of which the Iliad and the Odjsse}' are 
 the onl}^ ones which have survived to us, though not 
 necessaril}' the best. There are said to have been 
 several versions of these stories ; but they were finally 
 collected by Peisistratos and Solon, GOO b. c, and in 
 this authorized form the}' have come down to us. They 
 were sung by minstrels, called" rhapsodists, at public 
 assemblies. 
 
 The Odyssey is the second book collected. It tells the 
 stor}" of a Greek warrior, Odysseus, and his wanderings 
 after Troy was captured, until he reached Ithaca, his 
 home, during ten j'ears. Both of these belong to the 
 third period of mental growth, the ballad age. It was 
 once believed that the}' were the unaided work of one 
 mighty mind, the poet called Homer ; but along with 
 the ballad tlieor}', which is now an accepted fact, comes 
 another, not yet accepted full}', — that these ballads 
 were composed by several different poets. In a few 
 years the question ^'ill be definitely settled , the most 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 177 
 
 advanced thinkers maintain the theoiy. It is from 
 these Homeric poems, these two, that we get our first 
 ideas of the Greek gods and goddesses. The^' take 
 part in the siege of Tro}' ; thej' take sides in the quarrel ; 
 they act like human beings, and ver}' weak and wicked 
 human beings too. There is nothing noble or elevated 
 in the mytholog}' of the Homeric poems. 
 
 It is a relief to turn aside from them to the poems of 
 Hesiod, where we find almost the only pure moralit}^ of 
 Greek poetr}'. Some religious feeling breaks out in the 
 poem called " Works and Days." It is an agricultural 
 poem, which tells what work in cultivating the ground 
 should be done upon certain dajs ; also which da^'s are 
 lucky or unlucky. "On the fourth day of the month 
 lead home a bride." " The first ninth da}' of a month 
 is wholly harmless to mortals ; but avoid the fifth daj's, 
 for the}' are mischievous and hurtful." Here is the. 
 finest passage of Hesiod : — 
 
 " Now the gods keep hidden for men their means of sub- 
 sistence ; else easily mightest thou in one day have wrought 
 so that thou shouldst have had enough for a year, even though 
 being idle. Badness you may easily choose ; easily in a dead 
 level is the path, and right near. But before virtue the im- 
 mortal gods have set exertion, and long and steep and rugged 
 is the way at first to it ; but when you shall have reached the 
 summit, then truly it is easy, difficult though it may have been 
 
 before And with him gods and men are indignant who 
 
 lives a sluggard's life, like in temper to stingless drones, which 
 lazily consume the labor of bees by devouring it. Now work 
 is no disgrace, but sloth is a disgrace." 
 
 The descriptions of the proper times for beginning 
 work are quite poetical. 
 
178 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 " Mark, too, when from on high out of the clouds you shall 
 have heard the voice of the crane uttering its yearly cry, which 
 brings the signal for ploughing, and points the season of rainy 
 winter ; then truly feed the crumpled-horned oxen, remaining 
 within their stalls." 
 
 " When the artichoke flowers, and the tuneful cicada, perched 
 on a tree, pom's forth a shrill song ofttimes from under his 
 wings, is the season of toilsome summer." 
 
 It is dull reading to moderns, but it is the model from 
 which many poems have been copied, the Georgics of 
 Virgil being one. Its chief importance in the histor}" of 
 ideas is, that it contains, in one of its episodes, an ac- 
 count of the origin of mankind, and thus tells us what 
 the Greeks thought on this matter. It has also that 
 idea, which we found among the Brahmans, of an carl}- 
 age of virtue ; and of the degeneracy of the race. It 
 describes four ages : first the golden ; then the silver ; 
 then the brazen, an age of heroes; then the iron, in 
 which we are living, — an age of toil. Its idea of the 
 origin of evil in the world seems too frivolous to be 
 connected with so awful a subject. It is the stor}' of 
 Pandora. These three episodes belong to the " Works 
 and Days." 
 
 It has been said, that Hesiod also means a class of 
 poets, not one man ; and it is not unlikelj', for it seems 
 impossible that the same mind which thought out the pure 
 morality of the " Works and Da3's," could have written 
 dowMi the shocking stories contained in the "Theogony." 
 It gives the Greek ideas of the origin of the universe 
 and of the gods ; — not of mankind ; that was contained 
 in the "Works and Days." It is an endeavor to make 
 a connected system, and until the Rig Veda was dis- 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 179 
 
 covered it was the fountain-head for all mytholog}'. 
 But Max Miiller saj's, "The Rig Yeda, and not the 
 poem of Hesiod, is the real theogon}' of the Ar3-an race." 
 
 We have been accustomed to speaking of the Greek 
 gods b}' their Latin names, but I shall use the Greek 
 names, because they are nearer to the Sanskrit : so the 
 connection can be more easil}' traced. There are con- 
 tradictor}^ accounts in the diiferent theogonies ; but the 
 gods described in them are a most unpleasant and dis- 
 reputable set. The genealogies are in inextricable con- 
 fusion. Brothers marry sisters, mothers many their 
 sons, and fathers eat up theii' own children ; and over 
 them all brooded a dark fate, which the gods themselves 
 were unable to avert. Xo wonder that the noblest minds 
 among the Greeks turned from these wicked and power- 
 less gods in despair. But the new science of comparative 
 m^'tholog}' comes to our aid. It enables us to take a 
 more encouraging view of the Greek natm'c, for all 
 these shocking, repulsive stories lose their bad qualities 
 when understood to be onl}' the personifications of the 
 appearances of nature. 
 
 Hesiod says that Ouranos, the surrounding heaven, 
 married Gaia, the earth ; one will recognize the San- 
 skrit Varuna, the all-surrounder. One of their sons was 
 Kronos, who ate up his children as soon as they were 
 born. Kronos is time ; our word chronolog}' comes from 
 the same root, and time devours the da3's which spring 
 from it. But Ouranos has not the prominence of Yaruna 
 in Sanskrit. He soon loses his power, and }ields his 
 characteristics to his mighty grandson, Zeus. 
 
 Zeus is the same as the Sanskrit Dyaus, and the 
 Dyaus Pitar of the undivided Aryans, the god of the 
 
180 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 bright sky. He reigns undisturbed in the cloudless 
 ether, far above storms and conflicts, the king of gods 
 and father of men. As such, the only spiritual element 
 in Greek mythology belongs to him. He represents the 
 only perception the}' had of one god ; and thus he re- 
 tains those characteristics of D3'aus Pitar which the 
 Greeks had brought with them and developed. He 
 has two characters : sometimes he is spoken of as the 
 righteous judge, who distinguishes good from evil and 
 punishes wrong-doing. Hesiod speaks of him very 
 beautifiill}' in this waj' ; and in times of extreme dis- 
 tress, the Greeks called upon him : the prayers of the 
 heart always went up to Father Zeus. But usuall}' he 
 is governed b}' most ignoble motives in his actions : he 
 cannot bear an}' comparison with the majestic deities 
 whom the Hindus and Teutons and Persians reflected 
 from their own natures and worked out from their own 
 instincts. We can have but a low idea of the Greek 
 mind, when it imagined sucli a god. Zeus is married to 
 many different wives ; when we look upon him as a 
 nature myth, and see that the bright sky must look 
 down on man}' lands, his visits to different countries 
 are explained. 
 
 Phoibos Apollo was very widely worshipped in Greece, 
 as the god of wisdom. His temples were found every- 
 where, and he had great influence in forming the Greek 
 character. Phoibos means the lord of life and light ; 
 he is therefore the sun, whose light penetrates every- 
 where, sees and knows everything, so he becomes the 
 god of wisdom. He was the child of Leto, the dark- 
 ness, the same word as Lethe, forgetfulness ; lie was 
 born in Delos, the bright land. He has another name, 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETHY AND DRAMA. 181 
 
 Apollo, the destroj-er ; he has that same UTesistible 
 weapon which appears so many times, and always marks 
 the solar myth. He slays the children of Niobe, the 
 mist ; the}' are the clouds which the sun melts away. 
 He also kills a more important person, the awful serpent, 
 the Python, which was shutting up a spring of water. 
 His meaning must be transparent b}' this time ; the sun 
 drives away the dark clouds, the rain comes down, and 
 the land is dehvered from the drought. Athene is the 
 dawn mj'th, and shares the worship paid to Apollo. 
 As the dawn, she too, has the penetrating power of the 
 light. She springs from the forehead of Zeus, hke 
 Ahana in the Rig Yeda, as the light of the dawn often 
 flashes out with a sudden splendor, at the edge of the 
 sky. Hera, the lawful wife of Zeus, is the bright air 
 of the upper regions, above the changes of the middle 
 air. The moon is Selene ; she moves across the sk}' in 
 a chariot, drawn b}' white horses, or she -^^ a huntress 
 roving over hill and dale. She comes to gaze upon the 
 sun, just as it sets, plunging apparentl}' into the deep 
 sea, or going into the unknown land of Latmos, the 
 darkness. Then the sun is called Endymion. The 
 goddess of love is Aphrodite. She is but another name 
 for the dawn, as it springs out of the sea with dazzling 
 radiance. The god of war is Ares, the same root as the 
 Maruts of the Rig Veda, the storm-winds. 
 
 There are in Greek a few h^mns, called the Homeric 
 h^'mns, addressed to the different gods ; but nobod}^ 
 knows who wrote them, or when, or where the}^ gi-ew 
 up. There is nothing spiritual in them ; therefore, they 
 are not at all what we think of when we use the word 
 Hymn. They are descriptions of the different gods, and 
 
182 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 one of them, the IlAmn to Hermes, is the most amusing 
 l)ook in Greek literature. I shall quote part of it, 
 partly' because it is not so hackne\-ed as the Iliad, but 
 chiefly because it is so perfect a description of the wind, 
 in two characters ; tirst as the harper, then as the master 
 thief of all Aryan literature. Hermes is born in a cave. 
 Before the babe is an hour old, he leaves the cradle, 
 and manufactures a harp or lyre, from which he draws 
 soft, soothing music. His strength grows rapidly ; at 
 noon he is a strong man ; he steals the cattle of Phoibos 
 because he is hungr}'. He drives them backward and 
 forward, but he covers his feet with leaves so that his 
 tracks cannot be seen. Then he reaches a forest, rubs 
 the dried branches together till he kindles a flame. At 
 daj'break he steals back again, turns himself into a 
 bab}', goes through the ke3^-hole, and lies down in his 
 cradle. "VYe can follow all this. The wind is silent at 
 morning, then makes a soft harping, then with mighty 
 strides it drives the clouds along, and strews the roads 
 with leaves and trees. It blows the boughs together, 
 till fire comes ; then, tired out, the wind sinks down 
 into a faint breeze, and penetrates through the key- 
 hole. Phoibos Apollo suspects him, and accuses him. 
 He replies : — 
 
 " ' What a speech is this ! 
 Why come you here to ask mo what is done 
 With the wild cattle, Avhoni it seems you miss ? 
 I have not seen them, nor from any one 
 Have heard a word of the whole business ; 
 If you should promise an immense reward, 
 I could not tell you more than you now have heard. 
 An ox-steal er, I should be both tall and strong, 
 And I am but a little new-born thing, 
 
IMYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 183 
 
 Who 3^et at least can think of nothing wrong. 
 
 My business is to suck and sleep and fling 
 
 The cradle clothes about me all day long, 
 
 Or, half asleep, hear my sweet mother sing ; 
 
 And to be washed in water clear and warm, 
 
 And hushed and kissed and kept secure from harm. 
 
 O, let not e'er this quarrel be averred. 
 
 The astounded gods would laugh at you, if e'er 
 
 You should allege a story so absurd 
 
 As that a new-born infant forth could fare 
 
 Out of his house, after a savage herd. 
 
 I was born j^esterday. My small feet are 
 
 Too tender for the roads so hard and rough. 
 
 And if you think that this is not enough, 
 
 I swear a great oath, by my father's head, 
 
 That I stole not your cows, and that I know 
 
 Of no one else who might, or could, or did. 
 
 I do not even know what things cows are, 
 
 For I have only heard the name.' — This said, 
 
 He winked as fast as could be ; and his brow 
 
 Was wrinkled, and a whistle loud gave he, 
 
 Like one who hears a strange absurdity. 
 
 Apollo gently smiled, and said, ' Ay, ay, 
 
 You cvmning little rascal, you will bore 
 
 Into many a rich man's house, and your array 
 
 Of thieves will lay their siege before his door, 
 
 Silent in night ; and many a day 
 
 In the wild glens rough shepherds will deplore 
 
 That you, or yours, comrades of the night, 
 
 Met -with theii' cattle, having an appetite ! 
 
 And this among the gods shall be your gift, 
 
 To be considered as the lord of those 
 
 Who swindle, house-break, sheep-steal, and shop-lift, 
 
 You are the master thief.' " 
 
 But when Hermes plays upon his sweet harp, Apollo, 
 
184 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 entranced, forgives him all his misdeeds. The}" swear 
 eternal friendship, and Apollo allows him to wear his 
 own swift sandals. He can go everywhere that Apollo 
 goes, except to the deep ocean. This means that the 
 wind cannot penetrate into the ocean, although the light 
 can. The poem closes b}' saying that Hermes loves 
 Apollo more than he loves mankind ; that is, the wind 
 will do more mischief at night, while the sun is gone. 
 Certainl}', the poem is exquisitel}' pretty, and describes 
 perfectly the wind as that harper and as that thief 
 whom we find in every Ar3'an literature. Hermes had 
 another office ; he was the Psycopompos, and carried 
 the souls of the dead to the underworld. This idea 
 comes into each mytholog3^ In Anglo-Saxon, the ex- 
 pression is used, "Beowulf curled to the clouds." The 
 smoke was supposed to be the soul of the dead ; this is 
 wh^' they burned the bod}' on a funeral pile, — that the 
 soul might more easily be set free ; and naturally the 
 wind would carr}' it awa}'. There was always a river to 
 cross. In Sanskrit it was guarded by two dogs ; the 
 unburned or unburied ghosts could not cross the river, 
 but wandered disconsolately about. Here is. the origin 
 of the superstition, that ghosts cannot cross running 
 water. The happy dead among the Greeks sought the 
 islands of the blest : this idea of Paradise recurs in 
 the Keltic mythology ; the unhappy ones were sent to 
 the dark underworld of King Hades. 
 
 Now this is just the thought of the Teutonic my- 
 tholog}'. There is no idea of the devil, or punishment, 
 connected with King Hades, an}- more than with Queen 
 Ilel ; both were persons, not i)laces, and very respect- 
 able persons, and mean darkness, the unseen, the under- 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GEEEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 185 
 
 world. King Hades is sometimes called Ploutos, as be- 
 ing the guardian of the mineral treasures underground. 
 He is connected with the purest and sweetest of all the 
 myths, which tells of Demeter mourning for her lost 
 daughter. It was repeated among the Romans, where 
 it is called Ceres and Proserpine. The lovel}^ maiden 
 is carried away b}' the dark king of the underworld, and 
 her despairing mother seeks her everywhere. The earth 
 is dried up : no gTain or fruit will flourish while Demeter 
 neglects her care of them. So Persephone is the sum- 
 mer, carried away b}' the dark winter, and Demeter, 
 the earth, will not yield fruit or flower till the summer 
 comes back. But Persephone must spend half the year 
 with King Hades ; so the summer must give half the 
 3^ear to darkness and winter. 
 
 Besides all the great divinities, every spring and river 
 had its protecting Xymph (the word means water) ; 
 every tree had its gentle Dr3'ad, which bled and spoke 
 when the tree was broken. Each production of nature 
 was a living being to them ; the earth was filled with a 
 jo3^ous and kindly life, which is the pleasantest side of 
 the Greek mytholog3^ It is not peculiar to that alone, 
 for it is found in the Sanskrit and Teutonic mythologies 
 as well. 
 
 Viewed from our standard of character, the Grecian 
 heroes are no more satisfactory than the Grecian gods. 
 In the Homeric poems they behave ver3^ much like a 
 parcel of schoolbo3's ; the king, Agamemnon, is tyranni- 
 cal and vindictive ; the great hero Achilleus sulks in his 
 tent like a child, deprived of a favorite toy. His treat- 
 ment of Hektor's dead body is simpl3^ brutal. He drags 
 it round the walls of Troy, till no shape is left to its 
 
186 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 'bruised form. Od3'ssGus uses poisoned arrows, and 
 tells lies, and stabs bis enemies bebind tbeir back. 
 Hektor, the Trojan, is the noblest character, but even 
 he countenances Helen. Hektor's wife, Andromache, 
 is pure and lovely, and the parting scene between them 
 is as fresh and beautiful to the human heart as when it 
 resounded in the ears of the Greeks. Priam's grief over 
 Hektor's dead body is most touching, and Helen's 
 lament over it is very natural and real, although her 
 grief is purel}^ selfish. vShe pities herself for losing such 
 a friend. Yet it is not strange that the Homeric poems 
 should have lived so long. The}' are full of poetry, and 
 vitalit}', and movement. It is not likel}' that the}' will 
 ever die. If they seem unsatisfactory, and unworthy of 
 their great fame to a modern and a Christian mind, there 
 is a way of looking at them in which they gain. They 
 too can be subjected to the tests of comparative my- 
 thology, and then their characters become copies of the 
 gods and goddesses, personifications of the aspects of 
 nature. 
 
 Achilleus is child of the sea goddess ; so the sun often 
 appears to rise out of the water. His bride is torn from 
 him, and he sulks in his tent ; so the sun must leave the 
 dawn and be hidden by dark clouds. He lends his 
 armor to Pati'oklos, except the spear ; none other can 
 wield the spear of Achilleus ; so no other thing can 
 equal the power of the sun's rays. His mother gives 
 him new armor ; it bears up the hero like a bird on the 
 wing ; the helmet gleams, the shield flashes like a bea- 
 con light ; but no earthly armor could produce such an 
 effect ; only the sun. Then he goes forth to battle, 
 but he fights in the cause of another ; so the sun breaks 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 187 
 
 forth from the gloomy clouds, conquers the darkness, 
 and blesses the waitmg earth. Achilleus tramples on 
 the dead body of Hektor ; but Hektor is of dark powers, 
 though noble in himself: so a blazing sunset tramples 
 down the darkness. Finally Achilleus is slain b}' an 
 arrow from a Trojan. He is \ailnerable only in the heel, 
 but the arrow finds him there. So the sun is conquered 
 by the darkness, in his turn, and disappears, a short- 
 lived brilliant thing. 
 
 A critic has said, that the "monstrous shapes and 
 strange adventures of the Odyssey differ from the prob- 
 able events of the Iliad ; it is a land of magic and gla- 
 mour." But it affords still more striking e^ddeuce as to 
 the theor}^ of the nature-mj'th. It is delightful to trace 
 the details, and to interpret them, through so rich a field. 
 Odysseus is the sun in another character, as a wanderer ; 
 and his adventures describe the general phenomena of 
 da3'-time, from the rising to the setting of the sun. He 
 leaves the bride of his 3'outh, that is the twilight, and 
 journey's in darkness and silence, that is the night, to 
 the scene of the great fight. Ten weary years go on 
 during the fight with the powers of darkness, then the 
 victor}^ comes ; that is, the night passes, and light comes 
 again. Yet the hero has fought in another's quarrel ; 
 he serves the Grecian king and arm}-, beings meaner 
 than himself; so the sun benefits others. Od3'sseus uses 
 poisoned arrows ; so the ra3's of the sun are like poison 
 in the veins on the burning plains of Troy ; but the vic- 
 tor}^ cannot be gained by any other weapon. Then he 
 journeys for ten weary j^ears, before he can return to his 
 beloved bride. That is, the sun cannot meet the twilight 
 again till the day is done. "His joui'ney is full of 
 
188 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 strange changes of happiness and miseiy, successes and 
 reverses, hke the hghts and shadows of a gloom}' day," 
 Mr. Cox sa3's. He reaches the land of the lotos-eaters, 
 that is, the clear, cloudless, deep blue heaven. Then he 
 meets the Kyklops and slaj's the one-c3'ed giant ; these 
 are the vast shapeless storm-clouds ; like all other giants 
 they are killed and outwitted b}' the keen-eyed sun. 
 Then he meets the cattle of Helios ; they were in seven 
 herds, lift}' in each herd ; his companions kill these 
 sacred cattle, and then are killed in return. Helios 
 means the sun ; his three hundred and fift}' cattle are 
 the daj's ; and the companions of Odj^sseus do not return 
 to him, because the}' wasted their time till too late, the}' 
 killed the Ciays. Twice Odysseus is brought under the 
 enchanted spell of women ; each time he breaks av^ay. 
 Now Kirke and Kah'pso are the same, — the beautiful 
 night, which veils the sun from mortal eyes in her cave, 
 flashing with jewels, which are the stars. Hermes comes 
 to deliver him ; that is, the morning wind, which blows 
 away the darkness. Then he reaches the Phaiakian 
 land, and sees with dehght their gorgeous golden towers 
 and palaces ; and the kindl}' Phaiakians give him a ship 
 which may bear him home to Ithaka. These mysteri- 
 ous vessels have neither rudder nor oar, but they know 
 the minds of man, and* go wherever he wishes. These 
 m3'sterious ships come into every mythology ; the good 
 ship Skidbladnir in Teutonic, the ship which bears 
 Arthur in Keltic mythology : they sail, and they sail 
 without rigging or tackle, and they reach their destined 
 haven. You may see them yourselves, when you look 
 up mto the sky and watch the clouds as the}- sail. Odys- 
 seus conquers all obstacles by his marvellous sagacity. 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 189 
 
 which pierces eveiy plot. Sometimes, alas ! he seems 
 full of craft and cunning. This is the sunlight peering 
 into eveiy nook, and piercing through every disguise. 
 In his earl}' home, Penelope, his wife, weaves and ravels 
 her web, till Odysseus may have time to return. The 
 suitors trouble her, and eat up her fortune. So the 
 dawn must see her gold-colored clouds scattered by 
 dark mists ; but she must weave and ravel their graceful 
 net-work over and over again ; for she is the twilight 
 as well as the dawn, and she knows that her hero must 
 return to her at night. He comes back alone in beggar's 
 rags, and the suitors jeer at him. Then he seizes the 
 mighty bow which none could bend while he was away ; 
 one b}^ one, the suitors fall before him, till the vast hall 
 swims in red blood ; it is a slaughter-hall. Then his 
 youthful vigor comes back to him, the brightness of his 
 eyes, the golden glory of his hair, and his bride recognizes 
 him, and he puts on his ro^'al robes, and he shines forth 
 in splendor. So the sun comes to its setting, wrapped 
 in dark clouds, but it bursts out in all its early glor}' , 
 and ever}' dark cloud is dispersed b}' its rays, and its 
 career closes in splendor. The bright red clouds, which 
 often surround the setting sun, and stream out in every 
 direction, to form a red sunset, are turned into the red 
 blood of the slain. I beg the reader particularly to re- 
 member this slaughter-hall, swimming in red blood, and 
 these beggar's rags. Mr. Cox says, "The victory of 
 Odysseus in his beggar's rags is the victory of the poor, 
 despised outcast over those who pride themselves on 
 their grandeur and strength." We must not be sur- 
 prised when we find him in an}' nursery tale ; he will 
 be always the sun breaking through dark clouds. 
 
190 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 The phj'sical explanation has been carried still further, 
 and applied to the siege of Tro}' itself. Professor Max 
 Muller says, " The siege of Tro}' is a repetition of the 
 daily siege of the east, by the solar powers that are 
 robbed of their brightest treasures in the west." This 
 is not quite plain ; let us go on to hear what Mr. Cox 
 sa3's : "Few will venture to den}' that the stealing 
 of the bright clouds of sunset by the dark powers of 
 night, the weary search for them through the long night, 
 the battle with the robbers, as the darkness is dri^'en 
 away b}' the advancing chariot of the lord of hght, are 
 favorite subjects with the Vedic poets." 
 
 But whether the germs of the Iliad and the Odyssey 
 exist in the Rig Veda, or not, the mythical history of 
 Greece exhibits a series of movements from the west 
 to the east, and from the east back again to the west. 
 These movements are for the purpose of recovering a 
 stolen treasure, and the heroes who have been robbed 
 return with the prize, which the}- have regained after a 
 lono- struo^o-le. Now this stolen treasure is the lioht of 
 day, carried off by the darkness, and brought back again 
 in the morning, after a long struggle. Let us apply 
 this to the siege of Troy. Helen and her treasure, 
 tliat is, the golden light of day, are carried away by 
 the Trojans, the darkness and night. The Greeks, the 
 bright powers, go after her from the west to the east. 
 The wear}^ V03'age, the ten years' siege, are the long 
 nisfht, the lono- absence of the sun. The Greeks cannot 
 conquer until Iphigeneia has been sacrificed. She is 
 the dawn, which must completely fade awa}' before the 
 day can come back. In the Odyssey, the Greeks re- 
 turn with the treasure and the woman ; so the light 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 191 
 
 journey's back from the east to the west, whence it started. 
 Mr. Cox takes another step and sa3'S : "If such a 
 war took place, it must be carried back to a time pre- 
 ceding the dispersion of the Ar3'an tribes from their 
 original home ; and the scene can be placed neither in 
 the land of the seven rivers, nor on the plains of Asiatic 
 Tro}^ ; not in Norwa}^ nor Germany nor Wales. Carry- 
 ing us back one step farther, these legends resolve them- 
 selves into phrases which once described, with force and 
 vividness never surpassed, the various phenomena of 
 the earth and heavens. These phrases furnish an inex- 
 haustible supply of themes for epic poetry ; and the 
 growth of a vast epical literature was inevitable when 
 the original meaning of the phrases was forgotten." 
 
 That the Iliad and the Odyssc}^ are taken from the 
 vast stores of m3'thical tradition common to all the 
 Ar3'an nations, may be corroborated by evidence taken 
 from other poems. 'Exen in Greek literature, there are 
 several other voyages, singularl}' resembling each other 
 in their objects and their details ; something bright is 
 taken awa}', and a collected body of chieftains go in 
 search of it. The story was first told in the vo3'age of 
 the Argonauts for the golden fleece. In Sanskrit, Indra 
 is often called a bull, who carried awa3^ Dahana, the 
 dawn. In Greek, the sun becomes a ram with a golden 
 fleece ; he carries away Phrixos and Helle, who are the 
 children of Niphele. This is the same root as Niobe, 
 as Xiblungs in Norse, and our word "nebulous"; it 
 means the mist. Phrixos and Helle are the twilight, 
 children of the darkness, who carries awa3' the golden 
 sunlight. So Jason collected a band of bright powers, 
 all chieftains ; the\^ are solar heroes, seeking for the 
 
192 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATtJEES. 
 
 light on which their life depends. The}' sail in the good 
 ship Argo, -vvhieh like Skidbladnir in Teutonic mythol- 
 og3% contracts or expands as necessity- requires. This 
 is another of those cloud-ships which we found in the 
 Od^'ssc}'. The}' have a wear}' voyage, with many dan- 
 gers. Jason is aided by the wise Medeia. She means 
 the dawn, which penetrates ever5'where, sees and knows 
 all ; for wisdom is always the attribute of the light, as 
 we saw in Phoibos and Athene. She even brings the 
 dead to life in her magic caldron. This is exactly what 
 is said in the dawn hymns of the Eig Veda. "She 
 awakens the sleeping to a new life." The myth is still 
 true to itself. Jason, the sun, conquers and gets back 
 the golden fleece. But on their journey home, hke 
 Odysseus and his companions, perils and dangers attack 
 them. Finally, he abandons Medeia, the wise woman. 
 So the sun must leave the dawn, and go on to anotlier 
 land, and a checkered career. But the wise dawn be- 
 comes also cruel, and sends to Jason's new bride, 
 Glauke, a glittering dress, which burned to her bones 
 when she put it on. It is here, that same shirt of flame 
 which enwrapped, and ate into, and killed Ilerakles, 
 — another name given to the ghttering, flame-colored 
 clouds of sunset. How strikingly this resembles the 
 Odyssey ! I will not describe the other voyages : these 
 are types of all. 
 
 There are also expeditions of single heroes who have 
 been robbed of a rightful inlieritance, and go in search 
 of it. Tliis inlieritance is the bright land where the 
 sun sinks to rest after his journey through the heaven. 
 Every city of Greece had its own hero, whose tale was 
 told in those other ballads lost to us. Let us take 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 193 
 
 Thesens, the hero of Athens, and see what features of 
 the solar myth are prominent in him. Before his biilh 
 it was foretold that he should kill his father. So he is 
 banished when born, and lives poor and unknown. 
 But he has a hero's soul, and he longs to do some great 
 work. An awful monster called the Minotaur ate up 
 every 3'ear seven 3'ouths and seven maidens, and Theseus 
 wishes to slay him, but he has no weapons. Under a 
 stone lie marvellous weapons, but all the noble youths 
 of the court have tried in vain to lift it. But Theseus 
 raises it, and puts on the sword and sandals, which are 
 of course the rays of the sun. The monster is enclosed 
 in a labyrinth ; but Ariadne gives him the clew, and he 
 penetrates within. She is the wise dawn. When he 
 has killed the monster, he abandons Ariadne. But we 
 will no longer blame the faithless Theseus : he is onty 
 fulfilling the instincts of the sun to journey on. When 
 he sails back, he forgets to put up a white sail in 
 place of the black one which always accompanied the 
 fated vessel which carried the di-eadful tribute to the 
 Minotaur, and the king, thinking he has been con- 
 quered, throws himself into the sea. Then it is dis- 
 covered that Theseus was his unknown child, and had 
 ignorantly killed his father, according to the prophec3\ 
 So the sun of one day must destroy the sun of 3'ester- 
 da}'. 
 
 But the stor}' of Perseus is the most complete and 
 the most beautiful of all. He is the hero of Argos. It 
 was foretold to the king that his daughter Danae should 
 bear a son who should destro}' him. The same storj' is 
 told of Krishna in Sanskrit, of Cyrus among the Per- 
 sians, of Romulus among the Romans. So the king 
 
 13 
 
194 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 shut up Danae in a tower. Now this is the same 
 tower which comes into the Sleeping Beaut}-, or any 
 other tale : it means the darkness of night. Danae is 
 the da\vn, and Zeus in the form of a shower of gold 
 married her ; that is the daylight streaming in. So 
 Perseus is the grandchild of the night, the child of the 
 dawn and the bright da}'. But Perseus and Jiis mother 
 were set adrift b}^ the cruel king, in a little boat. This 
 boat comes into the Anglo-Saxon stor}- of Beowulf; it 
 is the sun rising on the water. The}' are carried to a 
 new land, where Perseus grows up beautiful and strong, 
 but unknown, and living in a stranger's house. This is 
 the youth also which is given to Sigurd the Yolsung 
 in Teutonic mythology. But his mother tells him of his 
 birth, and he goes forth to seek his rightful inheritance. 
 Athene gives him weapons, the penetrating light for a 
 sword, the swift-moving light for sandals. He kills the 
 gorgon Medusa: she is simply the darkness. The 
 snakes of her hair are those same snakes which appear 
 so many times : they bit Eurydike, and she died ; 
 Medusa's snakes turn all to stone, but she is only the 
 night. In the story of Perseus, the myth is carried to 
 another stage of development. A victim is rescued, who 
 is a woman ; she can be traced back to the Rig Veda. 
 Vritra, the black snake, not only stole the cows, but 
 also the maiden Sarama, and shut them up in his cave. 
 Then came Indra, and set free the cows — that is, the 
 bright clouds — and the maiden, the dawn. Here arose 
 the distressed damsel, wherever she may reappear. So 
 the noble Perseus rescued Andromeda, the dawn, from 
 the dark monster, the night. Then with Andromeda 
 he sought the court of the king, his grandfather, who 
 
]MYTHOLOGY OF GEEEK POETRY AND DEAMA. 195 
 
 received and acknowledged him. But the prophec}- was 
 fulfilled ; for when he was shooting in the games one 
 da^', an arrow glanced aside and slew the king, his 
 grandfather, the night. 
 
 Certainh' every characteristic of the solar mj'th is 
 reproduced in the lives of Achilleus, Odj^sseus, Hera- 
 kles, Theseus, Perseus : and it explains, in a perfectly 
 satisfactory manner, as nothing else does, the charac- 
 ters and the actions which are so contrary to our stand- 
 ard of right and wrong. Whether the theory be true or 
 not, any one who has read the hero stories must long 
 ago have noticed how ver}^ much the}' resemble each 
 other : one hero is so much like another, that it would 
 be eas}' to construct a thousand of them. Yet this is 
 the ver}' strongest argument to prove that they all 
 originated in a common source. 
 
 There is another kind of poetr}' which may be consid- 
 ered the representative poetry of Greece pre-eminently ; 
 not onl}' because it arose spontaneous!}', but also be- 
 cause it reached its highest development there. The 
 Ij'ric poetr}' of Greece has been copied in every lan- 
 guage ; but it is doubtful if an}' others haA'e sung so 
 well of love as Sappho, of wine as Anakreon, of victory 
 as Pindar. For their songs were true to these poets, 
 a genuine and natural expression of a genuine feeling, 
 and they bear that stamp of reality which cannot be 
 counterfeited. The song was accompanied by the music 
 of a lyre, — thence its name ; and it expressed feeling, 
 instead of action, either of an individual or of a whole 
 nation. The greatest stress was laid upon the metre in 
 which it was written : a different measure being adopted 
 for love and for war songs. Milton says, " "Wrap me 
 
19G SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 in soft LA'dian measures " ; and the words made music, 
 even without the instrument. There were nine lyric 
 poets ; but these three were greatest. Anakreon's 
 style is so charming that for a moment one forgets how 
 utterly his poetry should be condemned ; the English 
 poet Cowley may be considered his best imitator. He 
 was born oGO b. c. Sappho, 620 b. c, has been much 
 calumniated. The German investigators say that she 
 did not throw herself from the Leukadian rock for love 
 of Phaon. The Greek comic dramatists introduced her 
 on the stage in an unfavorable character. This, and a 
 literal interpretation of her impassioned poetr}^ have 
 given her a false reputation. She was a rich and 
 respectable widow, with one child, to whom she wrote a 
 charming little ode, which I shall copy ; it is less famil- 
 iar than the Odes to Aphrodite and The Beloved. 
 
 " I have a child, a lovely one, 
 In beauty like the golden sun. 
 Or like sweet flowers of earliest bloom, 
 And Cleis is her name ; for whom 
 I Lydia's treasures, were £hey mine, 
 Would glad resign." 
 
 But Pindar's lyrics are different. They were written 
 to celebrate the victor at those four lamous games 
 which were the great national festivals of Greece. 
 There were chariot-races, and athletic games on foot, 
 and contests in music. The victor was crowned before 
 assembled Greece, but with a wreath of leaves only. 
 The heralds proclaimed his name, that of his father, 
 and his city. When he returned to his cit}', a singing 
 and dancing procession of his fellow-citizens met him, 
 and a breach was made in the walls, through which he 
 
ISIYTHOLOGY OF GEEEK POETEY AXD DEAMA. 197 
 
 entered ; he was considered to have bestowed endurins; 
 honor upon the state. These Odes of Pindar were 
 sung b}' a chorus in these processions ; but the}' are not 
 rehgious hymns : the}' are exulting songs of triumph, 
 and even through a translation their loft}' music stirs 
 one's blood. It is not that they touch the heart, but 
 they awaken a high enthusiasm and a proud love of 
 country. At first reading they are hard to understand, 
 because so disconnected. They begin with an invoca- 
 tion to some god : this is sincere and deeply felt ; for 
 Pindar was a religious man, and meant what he wrote. 
 Then mythological stories are dragged in. In Pindar's 
 time, belief in the gods and heroes had not died out. 
 He regarded the victory as the necessary result of the 
 whole previous life of the victor and his ancestors ; 
 because in Greece man was regarded not so much as an 
 individual as a part of his family or state : so Pindar 
 traced the good qualities which gained the victory, back 
 through his ancestors, to some hero of ancient Greece. 
 Or if the man came from the lower ranks, and had no 
 ancestors, he compared his good traits to those shown 
 by the ancient heroes, and thus made a relationship of 
 character instead of blood. Then again the thread 
 seems to be lost by moral reflections and precepts ; but 
 these are meant to induce others to copy the virtues 
 of the victor, because good deeds will be rewarded 
 and bad ones punished in a future existence. This 
 is so familiar a thought to us that we hardly realize how 
 original it is in Pindar. Here is the gi'eatest merit and 
 highest praise of this lofty poet. Instead of the resist- 
 less fate that runs through Greek mytholog}^ and poetry, 
 he teaches a sovereign law of right and wrong over all. 
 
198 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 He sa3's, "King of all mortal and immortal things, 
 Law establishes with an omnipotent hand the absolute 
 power of justice." Villemain says, if he sung the 
 praises of kings, it was because the}' represented to his 
 mind that idea of law and order and justice which was 
 his highest ideal ; not because they were rich and pow- 
 erful. 
 
 His life is interesting too. He was born at Thebes, 
 518 B. c. He is the sole representative of Doric litera- 
 ture : what we call, rather vaguel}', Greek literature 
 includes only that of Ionia, Athens, and, later, of Alex- 
 andria. He was educated to be a musician. He wrote 
 hymns to the gods, and funeral odes, but onl}' his 
 triumphal odes have been preserved. These made him 
 venerated throughout all Greece. A portion of the 
 people's first-fruits was laid aside for his support ; an 
 iron chair for him was erected in the very temple of 
 Phoibos Apollo. He was courted by the rulers and 
 people of other lands : wherever the Greek language 
 was known he received rich gifts and heart-felt hom- 
 age. In later times, when Thebes was captured b}' a 
 foreign foe, the house which he had inhabited was twice 
 spared by the conquerors. In one of his odes he 
 praised Athens so much that his own city, Thebes, be- 
 came jealous, and ordered him to pay a fine of ten 
 thousand drachmas. The Athenians paid back double 
 the sum, and erected a statue to him in Athens beside. 
 Poets were ro3'all3^ treated in those days. The finest 
 odes are, to my mind, the 1st, 2d, and 12th Olympic; 
 the 1st and 4th Pythian; the 7th Xemean ; and the 
 3d and 8th Isthmian. Their perfect music gives them 
 a charm even in these later days when their thoughts 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETEY AND DRAMA. 199 
 
 seem so remote. The religious feeling of Pindar can 
 never cease to make us admire and wonder, 3'et I doubt 
 if that would cause him to be read without the match- 
 less charm of his style. Matthew Arnold quotes him 
 and his best imitator, Gra}", as examples of the power 
 of mere st3'le to thrill us. Gray's Ode on the Progress 
 of Poes}' was suggested by the 1st P^'thian. 
 
 The Greek ode leads directlN' up to the Greek drama ; 
 for scholars agree that it is only a development of the 
 singing and dancing chorus so t3pical of Greece, in 
 which the ode was sung b}^ many individuals, instead of 
 one. One writer says: "Greek drama sprang from 
 the worship of Dionj'sos (Bacchus), in all probability 
 the indigenous religion of the country, and, as it 
 gathered development, absorbed the creeds of all the 
 other tribes, till the ver}^ form of tragedy, as it existed 
 in the days of Aisch3'los, had a deepl3" religious and 
 ethical signification." Then there was a dialogue be- 
 tween the chorus ; that is, it became antiphonal. Then 
 one actor was introduced. Then Aisch3'los, 521 b. c, 
 took a gi'eat step, and is therefore called the founder of 
 the drama. He introduced two actors upon the stage 
 at once, who spoke in prose, and reduced the impor- 
 tance of the chorus. It sung when one actor left the 
 stage ; but it became usuall3' a listener to the dialogue, 
 or an intermediary between the actors and the audience, 
 a running commentarv. It is supposed to express the 
 real sentiments of the author. It is sometimes an echo ; 
 and when the situations are tragic, the wails and groans 
 of the chorus are ver3^ efiective. It is onl3' fair to say, 
 that, while the nation was still full of belief and patriot- 
 ism, the choruses had noble thoughts, expressed in 
 
200 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 gi'and l3'ric poetiy. Aisch3'los was a contemporarj' of 
 Pindar. Some of his choruses are as reUgious and 
 patriotic as Pindar's odes. Also the chorus uttered 
 reflections : sometimes it is very ndioe ; its reflections 
 being fulFof worldl}' wisdom, and its anxiet3'to keep on 
 the winning side verj' apparent. 
 
 Any national, self-developed growth has a certain 
 interest which it can never lose ; but it is incompre- 
 hensible that any one who can read Shakespeare can 
 for a moment suggest the Greek drama as a model to 
 be copied. The blind reverence, the extravagant admi- 
 ration, the devotion of a hfetime, which these plaj's 
 have received, are simpl}' amazing. It must have been 
 caused by the charm of form, by tlie resounding poetry 
 of their choruses ; and this no translation can adequatel}^ 
 render. The^^ resemble our idea of poems far more 
 than of plays ; and to understand them we must put 
 awa^' every association with the word drama which we 
 have in our modern minds. The theatre was utterly 
 different. A vast space was enclosed, and a stage built 
 with scats rising from it in the shape of a semicircle ; 
 a stage not dee]) hke ours, but broad and shallow, so 
 that the actors grouped themselves like a bas-relief, 
 like statues ; all this in the open air. Imagine to your- 
 selves the blue and sunny sky of Athens above, the white 
 marble temples gleaming through the olive groves in the 
 distance ; and on the stage figures which seemed more 
 than human, pacing with a slow and stately step, speak- 
 ing in a solemn and measured voice, with a distinct 
 rhythm, which we should irreverently call sing-song. 
 There was a reason for this : the Greeks did not aim at 
 fidelity to real life ; their object was the ideal hfe. They 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETEY AXD DRAMA. 201 
 
 did not wish to draw upon the sympatli}' of the audience, 
 so much as upon their reUgious feeling. Aischj'los and 
 Sophokles really wished to make the drama a religious 
 teacher. To this end it was necessary to merge the in- 
 dividuality of the actor : a mask increased the volume 
 of his voice ; a cothurnus gave him height ; padding 
 gave him size, and the monotone in which he spoke, 
 solemnity' . Of course, he would be obliged to move 
 slowly, so that all action on the stage was impossible. 
 It took place behind a scene, and was described in long, 
 tedious speeches. There was no gradual development 
 of character as with us. The people in the play had no 
 mental struggles, the\' immediateh' proceeded to act. 
 A critic says: "Tragic representation was divorced 
 from ever^'-da}' life : so delineation of mental conflict 
 became impossible, and the dialogue was retrospective." 
 The pla3's were not divided into acts, but went on in one 
 unbroken stream of song from the chorus and prose 
 from the actors. This was because the unities must be 
 observed, of time, place, and action. The time must 
 not exceed a few hours ; the place must be always the 
 same ; the action must be performed b}^ one set of char- 
 acters alone, while in our plays there are often two or 
 thi*ee plots, each with its own set of characters. There 
 was no plot : if anj' difficulty came up, it was not re- 
 moved by the energ}- and wit of the characters, but a 
 divinity from Oh-mpos came down, and put an end to it 
 by Ms supernatural powers. The Greek drama deals 
 onlv with kings and heroes ; the lower classes are never 
 distinctly drawn, or clearl3- individualized. This ma}' 
 be because they are more conspicuous examples of that 
 idea of retribution which is the kev-note of the drama. 
 
202 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 "The prevailing idea of the Greek religion was har- 
 mon}'," one critic sa3's : "an act wrought in violation 
 of this harmony was invariabl}^ followed b^' retribution ; 
 the gods became simply the instruments of revenge." 
 This idea of a dark and dreadful fate runs through all 
 the pla3's. It hangs over some famih', — the gods 
 themselves cannot avert it ; but the sins of the fathers 
 are visited upon the innocent children ; the}' struggle in 
 vain against this relentless destiny. One play did not 
 close the theme ; there were usuall}" three, called a 
 trilogy, continuing the same subject, or the fortunes of 
 the same family. The}^ never mix tragic scenes with 
 comic, or everj'-day life scenes, as we do : one dreary 
 monotony of gloom runs through the whole plsij. It is 
 plain, therefore, how ver}^ simple and undramatic they 
 appear to a modern mind. The stories are simpl}^ 
 horrible; they were drawn from those ballads which 
 preceded the Iliad and the 0d3ssey, and which are 
 lost to us. The}^ are told over and over again b}' the 
 three great dramatic poets, and the same characters 
 reappear in the three different authors. In fact, they 
 are so horrible that the}' cease to be natural ; they seem 
 taken out of the range of all human interest. 
 
 But here again the new science of comparative my- 
 thology comes to our relief, and enables us to give to 
 these sickening stories a different tone. Of course, at 
 the close of one short chapter, I cannot examine every 
 play in detail ; but we will take up the only trilogy of 
 the vast, vague, sombre Aischylos which remains to us. 
 It tells the fortunes of the house of Pelops, sometimes 
 called the house of Atreus. Agamemnon, a descendant 
 of Pelops, returns from the siege of Troy. He is wel- 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 203 
 
 corned by his wife, Klytaimnestra, and enters his palace 
 with her. He has brought back witli him as a captive the 
 Trojan maiden Kassandre, who has the gift of prophecy. 
 As he disappears in the palace, Kassandre bursts into 
 wails of woe. She describes in magnificent poetrj^ the 
 awful deeds of the Atreidai in the past. Tantalos and 
 Th3'estes had both cut up their children, roasted them, 
 and seiTcd them at table, where they had been eaten. 
 Thj'estes unconsciousl}' had eaten up his own son. The 
 mother committed suicide ; and Th3'estes ran away 
 with his brother's wife. Then the prophetess proclaims 
 what is even now going on in this house of blood ; 
 Klytaimnestra is murdering Agamemnon in his bath ; 
 and in a moment Kl3'taimnestra herself appears, and 
 proudh' justifies the awful deed, because Agamemnon 
 had killed his own daughter, the lovel}' Iphigeneia. 
 Then she marries her husband's cousin Aigisthos, who 
 had aided in the murder. In the second pla}^ Orestes, 
 the young son of Klytaimnestra, returns from a dis- 
 tant land, whither he had been banished ; murders his 
 mother and Aigisthos ; but he is haunted b}' the awful 
 Furies with gory locks, and in the third pla}^ he seeks 
 the temple of Apollo. There b}^ rites of expiation he 
 is purified, absolved, and the curse is lifted from the 
 house ; which seems a very insuflScient atonement. But 
 we shall be much more interested in this unnatural tale 
 when we learn that Tantalos and Thyestes are only the 
 sun, which dries up with its heat the fruits of the earth. 
 Agamemnon again is the sun, who had killed the dawn, 
 Iphigeneia ; he in turn is killed by the darkness as he 
 sinks into the water. Orestes also is the sun, again 
 cominor back from the west into the east. He is one 
 
204 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 of those heroes who travel back to regain a rightful 
 heritage. He murders his mother, the dark night. He 
 is pursued b}' the Erinnj's ; now this word comes from 
 the Sanskrit Saranyu, the dawn which creeps along the 
 sky : they are therefore the light which sees and knows 
 everj'thing. Later in the development, the}' become 
 avengers, but when appeased by rites of penance and 
 expiation, the}' are gentle and kind ; then the}' are the 
 Eumenides, the gentle twilight. 
 
 The idea of fate was probably derived from the re- 
 sistless course of nature, the Kosmos ; or from time, 
 which seems hurried on by a power beyond itself. 
 The thought often occurs to a modern mind even, for 
 nature seems bound by stern necessity now as then. 
 It comes out very strongly in the tale of the house of 
 Labdakos. We will take the account which is given m 
 Sophokles's sweet and polished dramas. They are more 
 interesting to most people than those of Aischylos ; the 
 speeches are shorter, there is more dialogue, — he intro- 
 duced three actors on the stage at one time. The cho- 
 ruses are exquisitely poetical, and perfect in form, and 
 have a religious spirit. They teach that the sins of the 
 individual in addition to the curse of race brought pun- 
 ishment ; and that the gi-eat invisi])le powers will finally 
 do justice. The first play is Oidipous, the king of 
 Thebes. He came a stranger to Thebes, and found the 
 city in despair. A dreadful monster called the Sphinx 
 sat on a clifi', near the city, and shut up all access to 
 the springs of water. She roared and muttered a 
 riddle, and could only be overcome by whoever could 
 solve the riddle. Oidipous solved it ; the Sphinx threw 
 herself from the cliflfs, and the imprisoned waters 
 
JVIYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 205 
 
 gushed forth. The queen's husband had just been 
 killed, so he married the queen, lokasta. Now it had 
 been foretold long before to the queen and king, Laios, 
 that their son should destroy his father; so the babe 
 had been exposed to die on the side of a mountain. 
 One da}^ Laios was driving in his chariot, when he was 
 met and killed b}^ a youthful stranger. And by and by 
 it comes out that Oidipous was this 3'outhful stranger ; 
 still more, that he was the babe who had been exposed 
 on a mountain, nourished and brought up by a kind 
 shepherd. Horror-stricken, Oidipous discovers that he 
 has married his own mother. He puts out his eyes ; 
 she commits suicide. In the second pla}-, Oidipous 
 wanders to Kolonos, accompanied b}' the loveliest hero- 
 ine of Greek literature, Antigone, his daughter. There 
 he dies ; but he passes away in a storm, and unseen 
 by mortal e^'es. In the play of Antigone, the sweet 
 and noble heroine is condemned to die, because she per- 
 sists in giving burial to the bod}' of her brother. She bids 
 farewell to the light and life, and then the "last lone 
 scion of a kingl}^ race," she is dragged away to die in a 
 cave ; so she expiates the curse, and dies through her 
 own self-sacrificing heroism. The explanation becomes 
 plainly perceptible. The babe exposed to die on a 
 mountain is the same as Feridun and C3TUS, the sun 
 rising behind a mountain. The Sphinx is of course the 
 drought ; its mutterings, the rumbling of the thunder, 
 like Vritra in the Rig Veda ; the waters are set free, the 
 rain comes down, as the sun pierces the dark clouds. 
 Laios, his father, is the night ; lokasta, his mother, is 
 the dawn. Like other solar heroes, Oidipous has a mys- 
 terious death ; in storm and thunder he passes awa}^, — 
 
206 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the sun setting amid storm and thunder. Antigone is 
 the twiUght, the pale light which springs up opposite 
 the setting sun ; a cave alwa3's means the darkness : 
 here the twilight dies awa}' in the darkness. 
 
 Philoktetes is reall}- a most beautiful poem ; it is 
 nearer to a modern standard, because it has one com- 
 plex character, Neoptolemos, and mental struggle, and 
 so it is interesting : but it deviates from the t^'pical 
 Greek drama. When Herakles la}^ d3ing, he gave his 
 unerring bow and poisoned arrows to Philoktetes, whom 
 he loved. Philoktetes sailed for Tro}^ with seven ships 
 of his own. Landing at an island, he rashly entered 
 the sacred ground of a nj'mph, and was bitten b}' a 
 serpent. The stench of the wound and his groans 
 annoyed the Greek chieftains, and they sent him to a 
 lonely island, and left him alone in a cave. After nine 
 3'ears it was foretold that Tro}^ could not be taken 
 without Philoktetes's poisoned arrows. So Odysseus 
 and Neoptolemos, son of Achilleus, were sent to seek 
 him. The}' deceive him with fair words, and get away 
 his bow, and seek to carr}" him b}' guile to Tro}'. 
 Then Neoptolemos repents, gives him back his bow, and 
 promises to carry him to his old home, knowing that, 
 nevertheless, Troy cannot be conquered without him. 
 In all this perplexity Herakles, a deity, descends, and 
 induces Philoktetes to go to Tro}' of his own free will. 
 Thus all ends well, and Neoptolemos wins our highest 
 admiration. Now, this is a very interesting manifesta- 
 tion of the solar myth. Philoktetes is bitten by the 
 snake of darkness. During the long night he suffers ; 
 but since he is the sunlight, Tro}^ the dark power, 
 cannot be conquered till he returns and slioots his 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETRY AND DRAMA. 207 
 
 arrows of light. The two chieftains who seek him are 
 also solar powers. They too must aid, or Troy can- 
 not fall. Philoktetes dwells in a cave, for darkness 
 has overcome the bright sun. It is supposed that 
 Sophokles was influenced in composing this drama, so 
 different from his others, by the new and rising genius 
 Euripides, and the tone he introduced. 
 
 Aischj^los, born 521 b. c, fought against the Per- 
 sians in the battles of Marathon and Salamis. Sopho- 
 kles, 495 B. c, when sixteen 3'ears old, led the chorus 
 which celebrated these victories, and in middle age 
 became a general of the Athenian arm3\ But Euripi- 
 des, 480 B. c, studied with the Sophists, and learned 
 to argue on both sides of the same question. Xatu- 
 rall}' his plaj's would have a different spirit. He seems 
 prosaic and argumentative, after the vague grandeur of 
 Aisch3'los and the finished harmony of Sophokles. His 
 characters are not so noble as theirs, but he has his 
 own good points. There are realitj- and pathos in his 
 plays ; they are interesting too ; the}' have more devel- 
 opment of' character and dramatic action ; three or four 
 actors are introduced upon the stage at one time. But 
 this is directl}' opposed to the legitimate Greek drama, 
 and critics sa}^ that he was not sufficiently imbued with 
 poetry to enable his chorus to take its proper position, 
 and fill out the action b}' appropriate illustrations. In 
 Aischylos and Sophokles the choruses and the tragedy 
 were perfectly connected ; in Euripides thej^ are not, 
 although the}^ are occasionally poetical and beautiful. 
 There are man}^ plays, and they are very unequal. It 
 is becoming the fashion to praise them. One critic 
 says, " He was the fii'st to make his characters play a 
 
208 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 sustained dramatic part." And in spite of all critical 
 objections, his pla3's go straight to the heart. But 
 when we demand from him faith and reverence towards 
 the invisible powers, and in the final triumph of justice, 
 we feel his limitations. He said plainl}', that, if the 
 gods are righteous, the stories of the poets are wretched 
 falsehoods ; if the stories of the poets are true, and the 
 gods do such things as the poets ascribe to them, the}' 
 are not gods at all. He is intensel}' sceptical, and the 
 gods in his pla3s are as jealous and t3Tannical and 
 spiteful as human kings. They argue and reason like 
 sophists. 
 
 Of the plays, the Iphigeneia in Aulis is most com- 
 plex and interesting, with dramatic action and a most 
 pathetic and noble heroine. You have abead}- learned 
 frorp comparative mythology what she is. Euripides 
 is remarkable for his noble and self-sacrificing women. 
 We find another of them in the Alkestis. It is like 
 a modern pla}' : it has a comic vein and every-dav 
 life scenes. We will take up this best known and 
 lovehest of his pla3's, the Alkestis, and look at the 
 comparative mythology to be found in it. Admetos, 
 the king of Thessal3', is dying of a fever. Apollo, 
 remembering some kindness shown b3' Admetos to him, 
 says that he ma3^ recover if some one will die in his 
 stead. His aged father and mother refuse his request ; 
 but his sweet wife, Alkestis, says that she will willingl3' 
 die that he may live ; and she expires. While the 
 whole family, plunged in grief, are celebrating her fu- 
 neral rites, Hcrakles arrives. Admetos entertains him, 
 hospitabl3' trying to conceal his grief. But some ser- 
 vant tells the whole stor3' to llerakles, and he is so 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF GREEK POETliY AND DRAMA. 209 
 
 much pleased with Admetos's hospitality under such 
 trviug circumstances 'that he goes down to the kingdom 
 of Hades, and brings back Alkestis. But what can be 
 said for that poor creature, Admetos? Simph' that he 
 is a solar m3-th, the sua ; and Alkestis is the beautiful 
 twilight, who must die if he is to hve again, and glad- 
 den the world with his light. She must die too, and be 
 carried away by the dark night, if she is to live again 
 herself, and stand before her husband in her ancient 
 beauty ; for she is also the dawn, brought back from 
 the apparent death of darkness and night by the brave 
 Herakles, the triumphant sun. The story must be a 
 primitive Arj'an myth, for it is found with a little va- 
 riation in the Maha Bharata, where Yima carries away 
 the husband to die, and the wife, Savitri, follows him 
 until he restores her husband to her, on her promising 
 to die in his stead. This is the strongest proof of its 
 mythical element. 
 
 14 
 
210 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDKED LITERATURES. 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 
 
 THE gods of the poets and dramatists had ceased to 
 satisfy the thoughtful minds of Greece, and the 
 philosophers had long been endeavoring to build up 
 gods for the people. Buddha in India, before the rise 
 of the second school of philosophers in Greece, the 
 Eleatics, had pronounced all metapln'sical discussion 
 to be vain and useless: Goethe sa\'s, "Man is not 
 born to solve the masteries of existence." Mr. Lewes, 
 in his histor}' of philosophy, acknowledges that human 
 reason alone cannot solve the problems of metapli3'sics. 
 But I hope it is not presumptuous to trj' to get a few 
 distinct ideas about the principal steps the Greeks took 
 in their struggles towards clearness and precision in 
 these matters. 
 
 The philosoph}' of Greece ruled the ancient world 
 and Europe for centuries ; yet it is neither more origi- 
 nal nor more profound than the Sanskrit metaph^'sics, 
 which arose before it and existed contemporaneoush', 
 though only made known to us within the last fifty 
 3'ears. The Greeks unconsciousl}' went over the same 
 ground, and the Germans are going over it in our day, 
 and the questions are still unsettled. I want particu- 
 larly to express that we moderns divide philosophy into 
 two branches, and we are correct in doing so : meta- 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 211 
 
 physics, or the philosophy of the mind ; physics, or 
 science, the philosophy of external nature. But the 
 Greeks made no such division. It is curious that their 
 first speculations belong to what we very properl}' call 
 phA'sics. The first problem which the Greeks sought to 
 solve was the origin of the w^orld and of mankind. 
 Thales of Miletos, 600 b. c, is the father of Greek 
 philosophy, and he taught that water is the beginning 
 of all things. Some one has said: ''The schoolboy 
 wonders whj- this should be called the beginning of 
 philosophy. Because it was the first bold denial that 
 the gods had made the world, the first open protest 
 against the religion of the crowd. It had to be re- 
 peated again and again before the Greeks could be 
 convinced that such thinkers as Herakleitos and Xeno- 
 phanes had as good a right to speak of the gods as 
 Homer and the itinerant singers." The next philos- 
 opher taught that air is the beginning of all things, 
 and these philosophers wrote in poetr}', in hexameter 
 metre. Herakleitos declared that religion is a disease 
 arising from the sick heart of man (600 b. c.) ; wjjiich 
 was repeated b}' the German Feuerbach, when he said 
 that "religion is a radical evil inherent in mankind." 
 Herakleitos was the first Greek to write in prose ; he 
 s^id that fire is the beginning. Then another pro- 
 claimed the atomic theor}^, which is so fashionable to- 
 da}', — that an innumerable quantit}' of the smallest 
 atoms is the beginning. But Anaxagoras said that 
 there was something more than matter, there was mind, 
 in this creation : so he was the first to recognize a 
 Supreme Intelligence. So they struggled on : dis- 
 covered independently the sun-dial, the geographical 
 
212 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 map ; wrote books on astronom}', gcometiy, and music 
 (music being an important part of their worsliip) . Tlien 
 came the theor}' that the beginning is a kind of cha- 
 otic matter, called Infinite Substance, containing within 
 itself a motive power. Then Pythagoras, a most inter- 
 esting character, taught that this Infinite Substance is 
 one, therefore number is the beginning. 
 
 Finally Xenophanes, a rhapsodist who wandered over 
 man}' lands uttering the thought that was in him, in 
 wild, vague poetr}- proclaimed that this one of Pythago- 
 ras was God, self-existent and intelHgent ; that he was 
 far above the gods of the poets, whom Xenophanes 
 denounced. His wild and turbulent verse was devel- 
 oped by others into a S3'stem of what we- ver}^ properly 
 call metaphysics. It belongs to the idealist school 
 named the Eleatic, from the city of Elea. Then fol- 
 lowed arguments against this and the realist, or Ionic 
 school, by the Sophists. They argued eq-uall}' well on 
 both sides, and taught that we really know nothing, 
 and that there is no such thing as right or wrong b}' 
 nature, onl}- by the customs of societ\\ Mr. Lewes 
 says: "While the brilliant but dangerous Sophists 
 were winning monc}' and renown by protesting against 
 metaphysics and teaching the word -juggling which they 
 called disputation, and the impassioned insincerity they 
 called oratory, there suddenly appeared among them a 
 strange antagonist. He made truth his soul's mistress, 
 and with patient labor and untiring energy did his large 
 wise soul toil after communion with her." 
 
 Sokrates was born 4G9 u. c. His early studies were 
 devoted to science, but left him unsatisticd. He fought 
 in three battles, and served in the Senate before he 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 213 
 
 begun to teach, which was about the middle of his 
 career. He did not give lectures, nor write books ; he 
 only argued. '• He would seize on a person whom he 
 met in his walks, and by searching argument and 
 homely illustration constrain him into contact with the 
 ti'utli." His rules were: ''Before speaking or acting, 
 know what you propose. If you speak, know what 
 you speak ; if you believe, know what 3'ou believe. 
 Ascertain what 3'our own mind in verity is, and be 
 that." His method was to ask questions until the an- 
 tagonist had accurately defined what he thought ; from 
 these definitions Sokrates reasoned to a conclusion. 
 He used ver}' homeh' illustrations from every-day life. 
 In a history of philosoph}' he would be said to have 
 invented, first, abstract definitions ; second, inductive 
 reasoning ; and he owes his position in metaph^'sics 
 wholly to this invention of a method. But his peculiar 
 work lay elsewhere. He turned away from meta- 
 physics to morals, and invented what we call moral 
 philosophy, — the distinctions between right and wrong. 
 Before Sokrates, the religion of the Greeks consisted 
 in offering sacrifices to each particular god : to pro- 
 pitiate his anger or win his favor was the only needful 
 thing. But Sokrates insisted that our conduct, our 
 own actions, were the necessar}^ things to make us 
 happ3^ here or in tlie future life. To the Athenians, 
 mad in the pursuits of luxury or ambition, he pro- 
 claimed that these would be their ruin ; that truth, 
 wisdom, and temperance were the onh^ treasures. No 
 wonder that the Athenians hated the man who so boldly 
 rebuked them. He condemned the gods of the poets, 
 and taught that there was one God. Now, this was the 
 
214 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 heres}' of that da}' ; so he was accused of corrupting 
 the youth of Athens, and made to drink poison. " His 
 heroic death, his moral teachings, and his invention of 
 a method in metaphysics, are liis titles to fame," Mr. 
 Lewes sa}'S. He taught and believed that, on critical 
 occasions, he was guided b}' a daemon, who always 
 accompanied him. Probaljly he was a ver}- religious 
 man, and believed in spiritual communications. 
 
 Plato (b. c. 429) is the culminating point of all Greek 
 philosophy : its various and conflicting tendencies were 
 harmonized in his might}' mind. The two schools met 
 in him. This is an interesting summing up of them : — 
 
 The Eleatic, 
 
 
 TuE Ionic, 
 
 OR Idealist. 
 
 Plato. 
 
 OR Realist. 
 
 The One. 
 
 The One m all. 
 
 The All. 
 
 Unity. 
 
 Unity and Variety. 
 
 Variety. 
 
 Being. 
 
 Life. 
 
 Motion. 
 
 Pantheism. 
 
 Divine in Nature. 
 
 Naturalism. 
 
 Substance. 
 
 Substance and Manifestation. 
 
 Phenomena. 
 
 Plato's fame is world-wide ; but some of the ideas 
 about him are erroneous. I was amazed to find that 
 Plato is not eloquent, his style not poetical. It is 
 simply the most exact definition of what you think ; 
 then the closest reasoning, step by step. " His writ- 
 ings are dialogues where each character states his opin- 
 ions, which are refuted with sarcasm or good-natured 
 banter." His illustrations are drawn from familiar life, 
 — are ver}' homely ; the dialogues are highly dramatic, 
 therefore, and full of animation, and bring the manners 
 of Athens before us. Lewes says: ''In truth, Plato 
 is a ver}' difficult and somewhat repulsive writer. He 
 is an inveterate dialectician, a severe and abstract 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 215 
 
 thinker, a great quibbler. His metapln'sics would 
 I'rigliten awa}' an}' but the most determined student ; 
 but he is occasionally' eloquent and poetical." His 
 descriptions of natural scenery' in his first work, the 
 Phaidros, are beautiful : in that the soul is compared to 
 " a chariot, with a pair of winged horses and a driver. 
 In the souls of the gods, the horses and driver are 
 entirel}' good ; in other souls, only partially so, — one 
 horse excellent, the other vicious. So the business of 
 the driver is difficult and troublesome." His education 
 was excellent. In gymnastics he was sufficientl}' skilled 
 to contend in the Pythian and Isthmian games. He 
 first studied poetr}' ; next, philosophy with Sokrates, 
 whom he attended through his trial till his death. Then 
 he travelled, and returned to Athens to found the 
 Academe in the olive groves near Athens. Plato based 
 his argument for immortality upon the theory that ideas 
 are eternal. Humanity' has in it, mingled with much 
 that is evil, the remnants of another and better nature. 
 So he said that all our ideas are but reminiscences of 
 another existence, — an existence of which we had lost 
 all niemor}' and almost all the glorj' ; that the soul had 
 lived in another sphere, pure and undefiled ; that in the 
 transition it had lost much of its higher nature, and 
 the little left was tarnished b}' union with the bodj^ and 
 contact with this world. "But the immortal soul is 
 stung with resistless longings for the skies, and sol- 
 aced onh' b}' the reminiscences of that former state." 
 Wordsworth has this ver}' idea in his Ode to Immor- 
 tal it}' ; and Goethe saj's, "The soul of man is highly 
 endowed on its arrival, and we by no means learn 
 everything. We bring much with us." Sokrates be- 
 
216 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 lieved and taught the immortalit}^ of the soul, but Plato 
 "established the doctrine by sohd arguments." We 
 cannot take Plato for a topical heathen ; for he also 
 taught the existence of one God, with attributes much 
 like those we believe in. He made this idea the starting- 
 point of his whole S3'stem. He supported it by the 
 favorite modern doctrine that God is proved to exist 
 b}' the need we feel for him, by the very affinit} to his 
 nature which stirs within our own souls. He first used 
 the inductive method of Sokrates ; but his later dis- 
 coveries were made b}" the deductive method, which 
 assumes a theory to be true, and proves it afterwards. 
 Plato, too, tried to make men better ; but he utterl}' 
 ignored their instincts and their passions. He said, if 
 people did wrong, it was onh' because they did not 
 know what was right. We must admire his pure, clear 
 intellect, and his spiritual insight ; but there is an un- 
 pleasant side to him. He is terribly wanting in human- 
 it}'. Mr. Lewes says: "The thinker predominated 
 over the man. He was intensely melancholy ; he had 
 many admirers, but no friends. His Republic, where 
 he paints his ideal of society, is not suited to human 
 beings, onl}* to logicians." The Republic taught that 
 wives, children, and property should be held in com- 
 mon : the}' belonged to the state ; and chiklren should 
 be taken from their parents, and educated b}- the state. 
 He banished all poets, because the}' enervated the soul 
 and taught a life of pleasure : they also told fictions 
 about the gods. Here you see his dissatisfaction with 
 the Greek gods. He l)anished all musicians who were 
 phiintive and harmonious : only the Dorian music, 
 whicli was warhke, or the Phrygian, which was calm. 
 
was admitted. The most celebrated and interesting 
 dialogue is the Phaidon, on the immortalit3\of the soul. 
 The thoughts are all Plato's, the characters being sim- 
 ply mouthpieces for him, dramatis personce. This is a 
 little confusing, when one takes up Plato for the first 
 time. I have not alluded to his metaphj'sics ; for its 
 vast, vague speculations are difficult to comprehend. 
 Our chief interest is in the man who proved one God, 
 and immortality. Plato's position has been admirabl}^ 
 defined as follows : — 
 
 " The belief in immortality was ahnost unknown to the 
 Greek religion. The Iranians founded on their ethical dualism 
 a positive and intelligible theory of immortality ; a theory 
 which, passing first into Judaism, then into Christianity, has 
 played so great a part in the religious history of the world. 
 The Teutonic tribes so conceived the future as to reduce death 
 to a ' home-going,' — ' a return to the Father.' The Kelts 
 believed in a metempsychosis which made the future life 
 as active as the present. The Hindu Aryans evolved from 
 their early naturalism a religion whose distinctive character- 
 istic was the continued existence of the transmigrating soul. 
 The causes of this peculiarity in the religious development of 
 Greece are, first, the national mythology crystallized into per- 
 manent form before the national mind attained to full reli- 
 gious consciousness ; second, religious thought did not develop 
 within, but without, this mythology. The functions of religion 
 passed in Greece to poetry and philosophy. The 'poets be- 
 came the true priests of Greece, embodying, in epic or ode or 
 tragedy, the ideas of moral law and order, and judgment. The 
 philosophers became her true prophets, revealing mind in 
 nature, — the supreme Good within, above, and before man. 
 But the words God and Creator Avere not to the Greek synony- 
 mous, as to the Hebrew. Plato was the true prophet of this 
 belief to the Greeks." 
 
218 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 When we corae to Aristotle, 384 b. c, we are in a 
 different Avorlcl. He wrote metaphj'sics, and for cen- 
 turies it divided the world with that of Plato. It has 
 been said that eA'er}' man is born a disciple of Plato 
 or of Aristotle, such opposite t^pes do the}* represent. 
 But we do not now value Aristotle for his metaphysics, 
 lie may justh' bear the proud title of Father of Science. 
 (The Sanskrit scientific writings are valuable ; but they 
 have not 3'et exercised any influence over the world.) 
 He observed and wrote down the facts of external na- 
 ture. Alexander was his friend, as well as pupil ; and 
 during all his campaigns in Asia he sent to Aristotle 
 the birds, plants, and animals of different countries. 
 Besides, he gave Aristotle a sum of mone}^ equal to a 
 million dollars of our mono}' to expend upon his " His- 
 tory of Animals and Parts of Animals," and several of 
 the most astonishing discoveries of modern naturalists 
 have since been found distincth^ described b}' Aristotle. 
 Even on subtle questions in natural histor}', scientists 
 are often forced to come back to Aristotle's classifica- 
 tions. His discoveries were wonderful, and made by 
 the inductive method ; in which the facts are carefully 
 collected and studied, then a theory is reasoned out, 
 based upon these facts ; it was the method invented bj' 
 Sokrates, abandoned b}^ Plato, perfected by Aristotle. 
 Naturally, therefore, he would consider reasoning, or 
 logic, to lie at the foundation of all knowledge. He 
 invented logic, and considered it the fundamental sci- 
 ence. He also invented grammar ; and the categories 
 or principles, the fundamental forms of thought, for 
 these two sciences, have never been superseded. Mr. 
 Lewes thinks him " the greatest intellect of antiquity; 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 219 
 
 at once comprehensive and subtile patient, receptive, 
 and original." He is not an interesting writer.* Mr. 
 IMaurice says : "A student passing from the works of 
 Plato to those of Aristotle is struck with the entire 
 absence of that dramatic form, those living human 
 beings, with whom he has been familiar. But there is 
 ample compensation in the precision and dignity of the 
 style." He wrote an astonishing number of books, 
 three fourths of which have been lost. In another 
 chapter, I shall speak of the curious path by which the 
 remaining books reached us. He lectured whilst walk- 
 ing up and down a shach' grove, attended by his eager 
 listeners : so his school at Athens was called the Peri- 
 patetic, or walking school. His father was a rich and 
 eminent physician of Stagira ; but Aristotle came to 
 Athens when onl}' seventeen, that he might study with 
 Plato. He was rich enough to bu}' books, which was a 
 great advantage ; and before making up his own opin- 
 ions he faithfull}' studied those of others. 
 
 We cannot leave Greek metaph3'sics without speaking 
 of two other forms whose names are well known to us, 
 although both views have been often misunderstood. Epi- 
 kouros was born in the decay of Grecian glory, 342 b. c, 
 and founded a school at Athens. He taught in a gar- 
 den, and made a s^'stem of his own. He said the object 
 of philosophy was not to learn the truth, but simply to 
 learn how to live. Philosophy was the power by which 
 reason conducted men to happiness, and happiness was 
 the object of life. Happiness consisted in avoiding pain, 
 so it is not the enjoj^ment of the i3resent moment only 
 that we must seek, but the enjoj^ment of the whole life. 
 Therefore you must be temperate to-da}' if 3'ou would 
 
220 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 be comfortable to-morrow. But the pleasures of the 
 bod}' arre less than those of the soul ; so j'ou must be 
 virtuous if 3'ou would be happ}', because virtue gives 
 more lastiug enjoyment than ^-ice. This does not seem 
 a very elevated motive to appeal to, 3'et Epikouros led a 
 simple and modest life, and was always poor and tem- 
 perate. He despised metaphysics, because he con- 
 sidered that the}' were useless and contributed nothing 
 to happiness. But we cannot greath' admire a goodness 
 so founded upon self-interest and prudence ; and his doc- 
 trine possessed one fatal error. He taught "that a total 
 secession from public and civil business was the funda- 
 mental principle of a wisel}' regulated mode of life." 
 In a state like Athens, where every citizen had once 
 considered it his proud privilege to discuss public affairs, 
 to criticise the generals of the army, — where the act- 
 ual labor was performed by slaves, and the free citizens 
 passed most of their da}' in talking, — where the life was 
 spent out of doors, and the philosophers taught in a 
 grove or in the market-place walking about among the 
 people, — the change was radical. If they did not dis- 
 cuss government and politics, they gave up the privilege 
 of freemen, and allowed themselves to be governed by 
 demagogues. Such indifference would ruin any country, 
 and the Stoics endeavored to recall the Greeks. Mr. 
 Lewes says, "Greece was falhng to decay, and there 
 ■was nothing to counteract scepticism, indifference, and 
 Epicurean softness, except the magnificent but vague 
 works of Plato, or the vast but abstruse system of 
 Aristotle." 
 
 Alarmed at the scepticism which inevitably followed 
 metaphysics, Zeno, the Stoic, fixed his mind also upon 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 221 
 
 the art of living ; but he made \irtue, and not happi- 
 ness, to be the object of life ; and virtue was not in a life 
 of contemplation and speculation, but of activit}'. "O 
 Plato, man was not made for speculation onl}' ; wisdom 
 is not his onl^' pursuit I O Epikouros, man is not made 
 for pleasure alone ; he was made to do somewhat, and to 
 be somewhat. Philosoph}^ is a means, pleasure may be a 
 means ; but the aim is to lead a virtuous life." Now this 
 is a noble and energetic doctrine : it recalls the morals 
 of Sokrates, the manh^ energy of the earl}' daj'S of the 
 Greek histor}- ; but it assumes that man is all intellect. 
 The pleasures and pains of the bod}' are not to be toler- 
 ated ; they are to be absolutely despised. It is man's 
 duty to surmount his passions and his senses, that he 
 may be free, active, virtuous ; only the pains and pleas- 
 ures of the intellect are worthy to occupy man. There is 
 something noble in this doctrine : as a reaction against 
 the low state of society it accomplished something, 
 the noblest Greeks and Romans became Stoics : but it 
 is a one-sided doctrine, and hardens and deadens the 
 heart. The struggle was vain, moreover, and scepticism 
 settled down over the world. 
 
 Of the Aryan races, the Greeks may be said to have 
 invented history ; for the Hindus did not write it at 
 all, the Persians not until very much later. The tran- 
 scendent ability of the Greek historians has rendered 
 them the models of the civilized world for more than 
 two thousand years. The philosophical school in history 
 has outgi'own them ; but for a simple recital of actual 
 facts, they are still unsurpassed. The first in time is 
 the delightful Herodotos ; one is tempted to call him the 
 greatest. He used to be called the Father of Lies ; but 
 late discoveries have proved that his stories mostly are 
 
222 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 true. lie was born 484 b. c. He travelled far, into 
 Eg3'pt and Persia. He read his books which describe 
 the Persian wars before the assembled Greeks at the 
 013'mpic Games. What an inspiring audience for the 
 historian ! What admiring love the people must have 
 bestowed upon the man who could so well describe their 
 national glories ! His work is a faithful chronicle of 
 what he saw; very long-winded, and fall of episodes 
 and amusing gossip. He must be hard to translate, 
 because the connection is obscure. In the middle of 
 one stor^', an episode is suggested to him b}- a name ; 
 so he rambles off, and long after returns to the original 
 thread. But evcr^'thing seems real ; his personages live 
 and breathe, and seem like our own acquaintances : 
 we feel sure that the}" must be on our visiting list. 
 There is a simplicit}' and naivete in the early writings 
 of a literature which are more charming than all its 
 later glories. Herodotos is like Homer, childlike, art- 
 less, and real ; and these qualities are so rare that we 
 know how to value them when we find them. He does 
 not philosophize about causes, or argue about principles : 
 he simply tells what he has seen with the confidence of 
 a child, who is sure that you will be interested. It is 
 pleasant to find in him the stories we have always known ; 
 such as the visit of Solon to Kroisos ; the ring of Poh'- 
 krates ; the birth, life, and death of Cyrus the Great ; 
 the battles of Salamis and Thermopylai. His account 
 of Xerxes is extremely interesting, delightfully told, 
 with little na'ice touches of personal gossip. He was 
 among the first to use prose ; his is a prose epic. 
 Macaulay declares that he is and ever will be charm- 
 ing ; and Taine speaks of '" les periodes enfantines 
 d'Herodote." 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 223 
 
 There is no more enchantment when 3'ou come to the 
 pages of Thouk^'dides, 471 b. c. He is reasonable and 
 calm and nnimpassioned. The opening of his history 
 is ver}' dignified and simple : '' Thouk3-dides, the Athe- 
 nian, has written the stor}' of the war between the Pelo- 
 ponnesians and the Athenians." And with a certain 
 consciousness of power and self-respect he sa3's : — 
 
 " My relation, because quite clear of fable, may prove less de- 
 lightful to the ear ; but it wUl afford sufficient scope to those 
 who love a sincere account of past transactions, — of such as in 
 the ordinary vicissitudes of human affairs may occur again, or 
 at least be resembled ; I give it to the public as an everlasting 
 possession, and not as a contentious instrument of temporary 
 applause." 
 
 His expectations have been justified : his work has 
 indeed been ' ' an everlasting possession " ; for it is his- 
 tory that he gives us, — a recital of actual facts. Even 
 more, like a modern historian, he sifts his information ; 
 he does not blindl}' swallow it, like the delightful Ilero- 
 dotos ; and he endeavors to seek out the causes of the 
 events. We must not expect to find him as critical and 
 philosophical as modern historians ; l)ut it was a very 
 great step that he should have attempted to be either, 
 for he had no predecessor to invent a method, or even 
 teach him how to use prose ; he is so utterh' unlike 
 Herodotos that he cannot have been modelled upon him. 
 There is a tradition that, w^hen he was ver}' young, he 
 heard Herodotos read aloud his histor}' of the Persian 
 war, at the Ol3'mpic games, and wept because he could 
 not write history. Some authorities doubt the tradition. 
 Dr. Arnold speaks of the "simple sweetness of Herodo- 
 tos, the pithy conciseness of Thoukydides." His sub- 
 
224 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ject put him at a disadvantage with Herodotos. The 
 fight of Athens and Sparta for power during twent}'- 
 seven years, which he describes, is far less interesting in 
 itself than that struggle of united Greece against the Per- 
 sian invaders which Herodotos makes real to us. The 
 most interesting part of Thouk3-dides is the tale of the 
 Athenian expedition against SjTakousai in Sicil}', told 
 in the sixth and seventh books. Its defeat caused the 
 decline and fall of Athens ; 3'et Thouk3-dides is wonder- 
 fulh' impartial, and praises or blames friend and foe 
 alike. His account of the night attack where "Greek 
 met Greek," when the Spartan aUies of the Syrakousans 
 fought against the Athenians, is vivid ;in his description 
 of the last naval battle between the Greoks and Syra- 
 kousans he shows some excitement ; but when he relates 
 the parting between the retreating Greeks and their dy- 
 ing whom the}' left behind, or when he tells of the suf- 
 ferings of the Greeks sold as slaves, he writes clearl}- 
 indeed, but in the most cold-blooded manner. Thouky- 
 dides is dull, except in those brilliant orations which he 
 puts into the mouths of his characters. The most beau- 
 tiful of these is an extract from Pericles's funeral oration 
 in commemoration of those who had fallen in battle. 
 
 "They gave" their lives for their country, and gained for 
 themselves a glor^^ that can never fade, a tomb that shall stand 
 as a mark for ages. I do not mean that in which their bodies 
 lie, but that in which their renown lives after them, to be 
 remembered forever on every occasion of speech' or action 
 which calls it to mind. For the whole earth is the grave and 
 monument of heroes : it is not the mere graving upon marble 
 i'l their native land which sets fortli their deeds ; but even in 
 Imds where they were strangers, there lives an unwritten 
 record in every heart, felt though never emboched." 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 225 
 
 Thoiik^Tlides does not pretend that these speeches are 
 genuine ; they were simpl}" ornaments to the narrative ; 
 so he argues on both sides of the same question. He 
 studied rhetoric, the fashionable stud}^ of the time ; and 
 these speeches give evidence of it : for they are the 
 work of an advocate, not an enthusiastic believer. We 
 do not read Thoukydides with delight, but we must ac- 
 knowledge his great intellectual power in an unbroken 
 field. Dr. Arnold speaks of "those brief touches of a 
 master hand, b}- which ThoulnTlides has furnished matter 
 of thought for twent}' centuries." 
 
 Xenophon, 431 b. c, took up Greek histor}' where 
 Thouk3'dides left it, in the Hellenics. He wrote many 
 books, — among them an account of Sokrates's conver- 
 sations ; he was a pupil of Sokrates. His K^Topaideia 
 is a life of Cyrus the Great of Persia : it is entirely 
 different from the life which Herodotos gives ; this dis- 
 crepanc}-, puzzhng to youthful students who attack 
 Greek literature, is reconciled by discovering that Xen- 
 ophon's book is simply a treatise giving his views on 
 education : it is in fact the first historical novel ; not 
 true at all. The real C3TUS is found in Herodotos ; 3'et 
 one cannot help hoping that the beautiful stories of 
 Panthea and Abradatos, of Tigranes and the Armenian 
 princess, may be true after all. The book b}^ w^hich 
 Xenophon takes his own place as the third Greek his- 
 torian is the Anabasis. This is an account of the march 
 .and return of ten thousand Greek mercenaries, who 
 joined the younger C3'rus in his revolt against his 
 brother and king. It was not, therefore, a patriotic ex- 
 pedition on either side ; and there is no loft3' feeling to 
 ennoble the ph3'sical sufferings. The expedition lasted 
 
 15 
 
226 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 one y-ear and three months. Xenophon, at first a mere 
 follower, became at length the general who conducted 
 the retreat. He shared ever}' peril, and wrote his ac- 
 count afterwards. He describes the whole expedition 
 in a very straightforward, matter-of-fact manner, with- 
 out any comments, whether philosophical or enthusiastic. 
 Only when the Greeks reach a hill-top from which the}' 
 behold the sea, and cry out, " Thalatta ! " does he show 
 the slightest emotion. The story tells of physical 
 sufferings, endured with courage and patience by the 
 soldiers ; and of wise, persuasive speeches, models of 
 skilful oratory, made by their leader, Xenophon. By 
 them he was fvonderfuUy successful in governing the 
 minds of his soldiery. The soldiers were pious accord- 
 ing to their light : they offered sacrifices and sang the 
 paean before going into every battle : and when the wind 
 blew very hard, they offered a sacrifice to the god of 
 the wind, which soon after abated. The style of Xeno- 
 phon is good, because so simple and unpretentious ; it 
 is considered a model for e very-day familiar Greek. 
 His style is his strong point ; for Xenophon is not great, 
 like Thoukydides, nor charming, like Herodotos. It 
 is undoubtedly true that the reading of the Anaba- 
 sis inspired Alexander the Great with his design of 
 subjugating Greece, and conquering Persia, and thus 
 changing the destinies of the world. While Cyrus the 
 Younger failed, Alexander succeeded. 
 
 Among the very first writings of the Greeks were the 
 laws of Lykourgos in Sparta. INIr. Fergusson says : 
 "These are a characteristic effort of a truly Aryan 
 race, and conferred on the people who invented them 
 that power of self-government and that capacity for 
 
GREEK PHILOSOPHY AND HISTORY. 227 
 
 republican institutions which gave the Spartans such 
 stabiUty at home and such power abroad." At Athens 
 we find also a code of laws made by Solon, somewhere 
 near 600 b. c. The sti^uggles of the small states which 
 composed Greece are so frequent, and the states are so 
 ■ small, that it is difficult for an ordinary mind to keep 
 a clear recollection of them all. But when we realize 
 that they were owing to the very energy and individual- 
 ism of the Ar3'an character, we are at once interested ; 
 for we feel that the Greeks are our brothers. In the 
 second stage of every Ar3^an ci\41ization, we find codes 
 of law, and political eloquence ; and the}' grew into great 
 perfection in Greece. Among the many statesmen and 
 orators who glorified Greece, we shall mention onlj^ 
 the greatest; — Perikles, 495 b. c, as a statesman, be- 
 cause he gave his name to that astonishing literary 
 period which extended bej'ond his own actual life, when 
 Athens became the literary centre of Greece ; and 
 Demosthenes as an orator, 385 b. c, the last great 
 name of Greece as a nation. His strong orations are 
 still read and honored through the civilized world ; 
 but Philip and Alexander subjugated Greece in spite of 
 them. Demosthenes died in 322 b. c, one j^ear later 
 than Alexander : the political and literar}' glories of 
 Greece perished with them. All that Greek literature 
 which has enslaved the mind of man is the product of 
 three hundred years, from Solon to Alexander. Hence- 
 forward Greece was but a province of the Macedonian 
 empire, its nationalitj' gone. But its literar}' glor}' re- 
 vived elsewhere. 
 
 In 332 B. c. Alexander the Great founded the city of 
 Alexandria in Egypt. A splendid court grew up there. 
 
228 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDKED LITERATURES. 
 
 Greek was the language spoken. Literature was pa- 
 tronized and aided by every appliance which wealth and 
 power and peace could furnish. There were libraries 
 for poetry, which contained copies of all books. When 
 the Athenians were starving, Ptolemy Philadelphus 
 refused to send them food until they had given him 
 copies of Aisch3'los, Sophokles, and Euripides ; then, 
 in addition to food, he sent them fifteen talents of gold. 
 There were museums and perfect instruments for sci- 
 ence : her scientific instruments and discoveries are the 
 real goods of Alexandria. The mathematicians Euclid 
 and Archimedes throw a glory around this last strong- 
 hold of Paganism. Science and metaphysics lived and 
 grew in the atmosphere of a court ; but grand poetry, 
 earnest histor}', pohtical eloquence, were dumb : free- 
 dom and virtue are necessar}^ to them. 
 
 Not that there were no poets : there were manv. 
 The most original of them is Theokritos, 272 b. c. He 
 charmed the pompous court by inventing the idyl, — 
 that form of poetry which .describes, from a spectator's 
 point of view, the pleasures of a country life. And, 
 since great ladies have always loved to play at shep- 
 herdesses, Theokritos was immensely admired. lie 
 used the Doric dialect instead of the court language ; 
 and this gives him a rustic sweetness and romantic 
 simpUcity, which may be the very perfection of art, but 
 are far removed from the genuine simplicity of nature. 
 Perhaps no Greek poet has been more copied than 
 Theokritos ; for the idyl, that very artificial style, was 
 fashionable in Rome, and all over Europe after the 
 Penaissance, though no one wrote it witli the grace 
 and tenderness of Theokritos, their master. 
 
THE LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 229 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY OF THE LATIN AND 
 KELTIC LITERATURES. 
 
 WHEX we reach our Latin brethren, the begin- 
 nings are even more darkh' hidden than in 
 India, Persia, Greece ; for we cannot even find that 
 Turanian race whose remains exist elsewhere. Most 
 writers class the Etruscans as Turanians ; but Momm- 
 sen, in his historj^ of Rome, puts them positively into 
 the Ar^'an family. If the Etruscans be not Turanians, 
 there are none in Itah' ; but the question cannot be 
 regarded as settled. In all the other Aryan countries 
 are memorials of a primitive race, Turanians unques- 
 tionably ; but Italy is singularh' deficient in those 
 implements of stone or bone, those peculiarly formed 
 skeletons, which mark the primitive period. Mommsen 
 sa3's there can be no doubt that the migration of the 
 Aryans into Italy took place by land : the}^ came over 
 the Apennines ; but how or when remains a mystery still. 
 The Romans, however, conquered all their brethren, 
 Arj'ans though the}' were, and remain the representa- 
 tives of the Aryans in Italy. 
 
 They possessed some of the noblest characteristics of 
 their race, but are pecuharh' wanting in others. The 
 spirituality' of India, the gayety of Greece, are not nat- 
 ural traits of the Romans. They are a stern and serious 
 people ; but the}- had a deep reverence for moral worth 
 
230 SANSKKIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 in their carh* cla3's, which reminds us of Persia. In the 
 noblest Romans there were a manly energ}', a stern 
 simplieit}', a passionate patriotism, which kindle our 
 enthusiasm as we read of them. Their aim was to 
 conquer nations abroad, and build up a powerful state 
 at home. Their genius expressed itself in a practical 
 manner : in roads, bridges, aqueducts ; in laws for the 
 protection of life and property. The farthest forests 
 of Gaul and Britain were made accessible b}" Roman 
 roads, and habitable b}' Roman laws. 
 
 Their gods are a reflection of their own minds, — 
 useful and practical beings ; narrow and prosaic, eacli 
 with some official work to perform. The oldest of them 
 show that the Romans were originall}^ an agricultural 
 people: "The gods are of the homeliest simplicit}' ; 
 sometimes venerable, sometimes ridiculous." The act 
 of sowing becomes the god Saturnus ; field labor be- 
 comes the goddess Ops ; the ground, the god Tellus. 
 The second gods to take shape were also brought into 
 existence b}^ the habits of Roman thought. Increase of 
 riches was what the Roman desired ; not onl}' In- flocks 
 and herds, but afterwards b}' commerce and seafliring. 
 So he prayed to Mercurius, the god of traffic ; to For- 
 tuna, the goddess of good luck ; to Fides, the goddess 
 of good faith and honest\' in dealing. All these arose 
 before contact with the Greeks. The double-headed 
 Janus is the most original of their gods ; as the sky of 
 morning, he is the tutelary- spirit of all beginnings. He 
 first opened the day : next he opened all gates and 
 doors, and was invoked therefore at the bejxinnino: of 
 ever}" act, — the god of all openings. 
 
 There were man}- gods : the ruler of them was Ju- 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 231 
 
 piter, that is, the D3-aus-pitar, whom the}' brought with 
 them from their early Aryan home. No mythical tales 
 have clustered around him, as in Greece ; but he takes 
 up many different occupations. As Jupiter Pluvius, 
 he is the heaven, giving rain ; one of Indra's char- 
 acteristics, the reader will remember. As the father 
 who protected the boundaries of a nation, he is Jupi- 
 ter Terminus : his statue was set up at the termination 
 of every Roman road, and was moved as the road ex- 
 tended : to carry the statue of the god Jupiter Ter- 
 minus was one of the duties of every Roman army. 
 There is a quaint and artless side to their rehgion when 
 we know that there was also a Jupiter Pistor, whose 
 business it was to take care of bakers ! Juno is simply 
 the feminine form of D^'aus. The name was first Zeus, 
 then Zenon ; the Latin deities Janus and Diana are the 
 same word, and mean the sk}' of morning. Venus, 
 the Latin goddess of love and the patron deit}' of the 
 Romans, comes from the same root as our words ven- 
 erate and winsome. Neptune, the god who dwells in 
 the waters, is the same as the Greek Nereus. Pluto is 
 a ver}' respectable person. He is the same as the 
 Greek Hades, or Ploutos, the dweller in the dark 
 underworld ; the guardian of that hidden treasure, the 
 light of da}'. Mars, their god of war and killing, who 
 hurls the spear, comes from the root of the Maruts, the 
 storm-winds of the Rig Veda. 
 
 The most interesting discover}' is about the Latin 
 Minerva. She comes from the same root as our word 
 mind. It is therefore thought or wisdom ; the piercing, 
 penetrating power of the dawn, which sees and knows 
 all. She can be easily identified with the Sanskiit 
 
232 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Ahana and the Greek Athene, dawn goddesses ; for she 
 has another Latin name, Matiita, the same root as the 
 French matin and our matutinal. The Latins had an- 
 other dawn goddess, Aurora ; but she is less noljle. 
 She is the same root as Eos in Greek, Ushas in San- 
 skrit ; also, as auriim^ gold, and urere, to burn. This is 
 the golden color of the dawn burning along the sk}'. 
 The Latin god Vulcan, the fire, comes from the San- 
 skrit ulka, a firebrand. He reappears in Anglo-Saxon, 
 where we shall trace him further. 
 
 But the noblest as well as the most important of the 
 Latin deities was Vesta, the same as the Greek Hestia. 
 Her shrine was the sanctuary- of peace and honorable 
 dealing. Men were obliged to keep the word which 
 they had plighted on the altar of Vesta, where burned 
 the sacred fire : for everything most saci-ed was associ- 
 ated with this fire. Each town had a hall where its chief 
 men met, and the fire on this public hearth was never 
 allowed to go out. When a colony started, it carried a 
 portion of the sacred fire of Vesta with it, in order to 
 keep up the bond of union with the parent state. Vesta 
 M^as also the guardian of the family, as well as of the 
 state, among the Romans. There was a household 
 altar for each family, which could only be lighted by 
 the head of the famil3\ Our word family comes from 
 altar, — thymele in Greek, /a/wzVm in Latin; for the 
 sacred centre of fire was also the centre of the family. 
 In addition to the public gods we have just described, 
 each family worshii)pcd its own Lares and Penates, — 
 tlie spirits of its deceased ancestors. Tiiey had the 
 same form of worship which we found in the Vedas, 
 — libations poured ui)on the ground, and sacrifices 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 233 
 
 on the altar. This form, which scholars were once 
 obhged to imagine and reconstruct from hints scat- 
 tered throngh Greek and Latin books, has been so ex- 
 plained and illustrated b}' the h^-mns of the Rig Veda 
 that it is now proved to belong to each Ar3'an famil}'. 
 The family worship paid to Agni in Sanskrit is pre- 
 ciseh' what we find given to Vesta among the Romans. 
 It is acknowledged that the}' preserved most faith- 
 fully the old Ar3'an fa!nily t3'pe. AYe do not find this 
 reverence of the sacred fire so all-important among 
 the Greeks, Kelts, or Teutons. But even the Romans 
 finall}' erected temples to other gods than Vesta. In 
 this they copied the Greeks, who paid more sacrifices 
 and libations to the bad gods than to the good ones. 
 The Latin branch of the Ar3'ans had one belief which 
 we do not find among the Hindus or the Greeks. Tlie}^ 
 taught that ever\' existing thing had a tutelar}' spirit 
 called a Genius, from whom its power and success came; 
 probably we get our guardian angel from this. It is not 
 precisely the same being as the Fravashi of the Persians, 
 the Fylgia of the Norsemen ; for every plant, every na- 
 tion, even ever}' building, had its genius, which arose and 
 perished with it : so new ones were constantly arising. 
 
 The Romans have what may pass for a sacred book. 
 It is a very short chant sung by the-Arval brethren, 
 who were the twelve priests who invoked blessings 
 upon the growth of the grain. It is a hymn to Mars. 
 but is far from the exquisite poetry and spirituality of 
 the hymns of the Vedas. These early Latin chants 
 are simply incantations to call down rain, or drive 
 away lightning from the growing seed ; thus giving 
 another proof that the first thoughts of the Latins 
 
234 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 were agricultural. These chants had a peculiar metre 
 of their own, called the Saturnian, the same root as 
 the god Saturnus. The pipe was the national instru- 
 ment of the Romans, as the Ijre was of Greece. The 
 first poetry which we should call Ij^rical was the funeral 
 chant, which was sung b}' some woman accompanied 
 by a piper, who followed the bod}' to its Inirial-place. 
 
 Next came la3's in praise of .dead ancestors ; and 
 these were sung b}' bo^'s at banquets. The}^ de- 
 scended by memor}' and tradition from father to son : 
 but instead of developing into the glorious epics of In- 
 dia, Persia, Greece, Scandinavia, or Wales, these songs 
 remained barren and bare ; no c3-cle of legends grew up 
 around them ; the prosaic nature of the Romans crushed 
 down poetr}'. No national god of song arose ; and the 
 old Latin language contains no word for poet. The 
 word vates belongs to a religious ritual ; it meant a 
 leader of the singing ; when afterwards applied to po- 
 etr}", it retained the idea of divinel}^ inspired singer, 
 the priest of the Muses. The singing and dancing were 
 at first religious, both in Greece and Rome ; in Greece, 
 they remained reputable employments ; but in Rome 
 the}^ became insignificant first, disgraceful afterwards. 
 
 Yet these banquet songs, sung by the boys of the 
 clan, are all we have of old Rome. The old Roman 
 fiimilies kept them alive long after the current of thought 
 had changed, and we are indebted to them for the most 
 interesting, as well as the most original, Roman charac- 
 ters. The tales of Romulus and Remus, the Sabine 
 women, Lucretia, and Coriolanus belong to this earl}' 
 period. We shall only stop to inquire into that of 
 Ronmlus and Renuis : they are the same twin deities 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 235 
 
 whom we find in each literature, as the Aswins in San- 
 skrit, the dawn and the twilight always ; Romulus gTad- 
 ually becomes the most important, and the story told of 
 him is so like that of many other heroes that we are 
 tired of repeating it. His grandfather was warned that 
 the babe to be born would destroy him ; so the child 
 was exposed to die, nursed by a wolf, and brought up by 
 a shepherd. He grew up strong and beautiful, and was 
 discovered b}' his princeh' bearing. All unconsciously 
 he killed his parents, and himself did not die, but dis- 
 appeared in a storm. All these circumstances apply to 
 Romulus in Latin, as they did to Feridun in Persian, 
 and Oidipous in Greek. Romulus's wolf has so many 
 brothers that we see at once that Romulus is one of 
 those beings invented to account for the name of a city. 
 There is no other original Roman literature. To con- 
 quer and subdue the outside world left the Romans no 
 time for the world of the human mind. 
 
 But when, after five centuries, they had conquered 
 Greece, the}' were conquered in their turn. The Greek 
 religion and literature gained an entire ascendenc}' over 
 their minds. The young noblemen of Rome were sent 
 to Greece to be educated, and spoke Greek in preference 
 to their native Latin. Then arose a rehgion and a 
 literature that are simph' copies of Greek literature ; 
 like all copies, elegant and finished, but not fresh and 
 living. The Greek philosophers and sophists were at 
 first expelled by the Roman Senate, as corrupting the 
 morals of the 3'outh ; but as orators, artists, and ph3'si- 
 cians, the}" soon returned and ruled Rome. Cicero 
 introduced the Greek philosophy and literature to his 
 countrymen, and the ambitious young pohticians soon 
 
236 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 made use of Greek oratory and sophistr}-. The Em- 
 peror Augustus endeavored to patronize literature, and 
 gave his name to a period, the Augustan age, when 
 Virgil and Horace were personal friends of the Emperor. 
 They tried to be patriotic and write upon Roman themes, 
 in Greek metre ; but the Greek metres were not con- 
 genial to the true Roman spirit. That was, at first, rural 
 and agricultural. The old Roman loved his plough, and 
 his great dark-eyed oxen, and his fertile field ; and so 
 Virgil, with his Bucolics and Georgics, and the second 
 half of the iEneid, is the most national poet. 
 
 One of the stories in the ^neid puzzled scholars, 
 but has latel}' been explained by M. Breal, a French 
 savant ; that of Hercules and Cacus, in which Cacus, a 
 strange monster, stole the cows of Hercules, dragged 
 them backwards into a cave, and vomited forth smoke 
 and flame when Hercules tried to attack him : but Her- 
 cules killed him with his unerring "arrows. Herculus 
 was an original Latin god, — the god of fields and 
 fences ; but the Romans seem to have confounded him 
 with the Greek hero, Herakles. So Hercules, the Latin, 
 is another form of the hero who fights with a monster. 
 Cacus is the same as the snake Vritra in Sanskrit, Azhi- 
 dalaka in Zend, the Python in Greek, the worm Fanir 
 in Norse. The cows are the same bright clouds, the 
 smoke and flame are the same lightnings. Is it not 
 pleasant to meet him again among our Roman brethren? 
 Light and darkness, good and evil, are all over the 
 world. It is plain too that Virgil's ^Eneas is a distinct 
 form of the solar m3'th. His mother was a goddess, 
 the dawn ; he is parted twice from women whom he 
 loves, Creusa and Dido. He travels from land to land ; 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 237 
 
 he labors for the good of others ; finally, he does not 
 die, but disappears m3'steriously from the sight of men, 
 beneath the waters of the Numician stream, — the sun 
 setting beneath the water. 
 
 It is interesting to notice within how short a period 
 the great names of Latin literature are confined, — but 
 little more than one hundred 3'ears, — which proves that 
 the Romans were not a literar}' people. Their prose 
 stands higher, relatively, than their poetry. Yet there 
 is something fine in their literature, — the lofty patriot- 
 ism which runs through it all. The humblest soldier 
 could forget himself and die for Rome ; and the writers 
 show some spark of the same spirit. 
 
 The most fatal influence which Greek literature exer- 
 cised was through the philosophy of Epikouros. The 
 same results followed which we saw in Athens : the 
 best Romans became Stoics, and endeavored to avert 
 the ruin the}' foresaw from the neglect of public duties. 
 Marcus Aurelius the Emperor, 121 a. d., and Epictetus 
 the slave, 90 a. d., were Stoics; and taught that true 
 philosoph}' consisted in the practice of virtue, not in 
 speculation. Prompted by Alexandria, both neglected 
 their native tongue to write in Greek. Alexandria had 
 become a great commercial cit}-. The m^'steries of the 
 Eg3'ptians, the fire worship of the Persians, the theocracy 
 of the Jews, the philosophy of the Greeks, were prac- 
 tised in this cosmopolitan city. It even invented a new 
 school of metaphysics, and for a while paganism re- 
 vived and flouriehed there, and influenced Rome again. 
 
 B3'zantium is the third great literar}' centre after 
 Alexandria and Rome ; but the greatest pagan work of 
 Byzantium was the splendid code of laws which still 
 
238 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 forms the basis of the civil law of Europe. Tribonian, 
 the great lawyer, codified and formed the whole Roman 
 law. It is a true manifestation of an Aryan spirit, 
 undoubtedly the best and greatest legacy which Rome 
 has bestowed upon the world. The last gTeat pagan 
 writer was Boethius. He wrote upon the consolations 
 of philosoph}', A. D. 470, and is interesting to us be- 
 cause he was translated into Anglo-Saxon b}' Alfred 
 the Great. With him and Theodoric the Ostro-Goth 
 closes antiquity, and open the Middle Ages. But 
 before we can go on to the Middle Ages, we go back 
 to trace the rise and growth of two other pagan races, 
 our brothers still. 
 
 The next race in the development of the Aryan 
 families is the Keltic, a great primitive race which once 
 occupied all Central Europe. The Keltic tribes are 
 supposed to have been the first to leave the common 
 home, and are said to have entered Europe as earl}- as 
 1900 B. c. They came by the northern slope of the 
 Balkan and Carpathian Mountains. Conquering and 
 moving onwards, they finally made a permanent settle- 
 ment, and occupied France, where the}' were called 
 Gauls ; a small part of Spain ; and England, Scotland, 
 Ireland, and Wales, then called Britain. We meet 
 them in history ; for the Gauls attacked Rome itself, 
 390 B. c, and inhabited Britain when the Romans in- 
 vaded it. The wild Keltic tribes w^re overcome and 
 pushed back everywhere. In France they were driven 
 to the sea-coast, to what is now the province of Brit- 
 tany, with the language called Bas Breton ; in England 
 they sought the sea-coast of Cornwall and the moun- 
 tains of Wales, where their language is called Kymric ; 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 239 
 
 the Highlands of Scotland, where it is called Gaelic ; 
 Ireland, where the language is Erse ; the Isle of Man, 
 where their Manx language is still a spoken tongue. 
 Philolog}^ has taught us much of our knowledge about 
 them; for Matthew Arnold sa3'S : " Philolog}', that 
 science which in our time has had so man}' successes, 
 has not been abandoned by her good fortune in touch- 
 ing the Kelt." The word Wales means simply a foreign 
 country ; Welsh means a foreigner. The Romans ap- 
 plied these words to the Kelts and the countr}' where 
 the}' took refuge. The words Gaul, Gael, and Scot 
 are the same at bottom ; the}' mean a violent, stormy 
 people. But the discoveries to which the Erse language 
 contributed have the most general interest. The Keltic 
 races were discovered to belong to the Indo-European 
 family by two Erse words : traith^ the sea, has the same 
 root as the name of a Sanskrit deity, Tritona ; of a 
 Zend hero, Thraetaoma ; of the Greek goddess Amphi- 
 trite ; of the Latin god Triton ; — all connected with 
 the sea ; and the key to the riddle of the whole was the 
 Erse word for sea, traith. The Keltic languages are 
 still spoken, except in Cornwall. You may recognize 
 them by the two vowels coming together, and yet not 
 forming a diphthong, — Ploermel, Co^tlogen, and such 
 words. 
 
 It is curious to know that the Kelts as a race are 
 deficient in two characteristics of their Aryan race, — 
 a respect for women, and codes of well-organized law. 
 Perhaps the reason that they were pushed back and 
 crowded down by the Romans first, and the Teutons af- 
 terwards, was this very absence of organization, law, and 
 order. They have one growth which is peculiarly their 
 
240 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 own, — the wildly beautiful music of the Gaels in Scot- 
 land, and the Erse in Ireland. ''-The law forbade the 
 seizure by justice of a Gael's sword, harp, and one book ; 
 the harp and book being as precious as the sword." 
 
 But the most important thing about them is that 
 the}', among the surrounding nations who had long 
 forgotten their noble origin, preserved unchanged the 
 primitive religion the}' had brought with them, which 
 we found explained in the Rig Veda. The first knowl- 
 edge we have of them is from the testimony of educated 
 Romans, — Caesar, Strabo, and Lucan. These all agree 
 that the Keltic tribes worshipped one God, called Teu- 
 tates. This is a form of Dyaus, Zeus, Theos, Deus, 
 — the bright sky deified and personified. The word 
 was traced by a French savant^ M. Leflocq. He says : 
 " The poetic naturalism of the Veda and the Edda is 
 found in the few remains of Gaulish mythology : it is a 
 remembrance of a primitive worship, anterior to all 
 paganism." He is my authority for the meaning of the 
 word. The Romans also agree that the Kelts in Gaul 
 and in Britain taught the pre-existence and the immor- 
 tality of the soul. You may imagine what a marvel 
 this must have seemed to the Romans, who were not at 
 all certain about these things ; but to us who have 
 found them in the Rig Veda it is only natural that the 
 Kelts should believe them. They taught that a noble 
 action raised the soul to a higher condition of body, a 
 bad action made it sink to a lower ; which is simply 
 transmigration. They had priests and bards, who were 
 called Druids. Here is a song of Taliesin, their great- 
 est bard, which describes transmigration better than 
 any other poem known, and most poetically also. 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 241 
 
 *' When my creation was accomplished, I was formed by the 
 earth, by the flowers of the nettle, by the water of the ninth 
 wave. By the wisest of the wise I was marked, — I was 
 marked in the primitive world when I received existence. I 
 played in the night ; I slept in the dawn ; I was in the bark 
 with Dylan when the water, like the lances of an enemy, fell 
 from heaven into the abyss. I have been a spotted serpent 
 on the mountain ; I have been a viper in the lake ; I have 
 been a star among the chieftains ; I have been a dispenser of 
 liquids, clothed in sacred robes, bearing the cup. Much time 
 has slipped by since I Avas a shepherd. I wandered long over 
 the earth before becoming skilful in science. I have wan- 
 dered ; I have slept in a liundred isles ; I have moved in a 
 hundred circles." 
 
 The Druid priests were allowed to spend twenty 
 years in learning the sacred hj'mns ; but, as thej" never 
 committed anything to writing, the hymns are lost to 
 us. We need not regret this, since we have the Vedic 
 hymns, which are sufficient to prove all our conclu- 
 sions ; but we shall at once be reminded of the customs 
 in India. It was formerly believed that the cromlechs 
 and dolmens of Brittany and Stonehenge were the 
 Druid temples ; but the latest researches declare that 
 they were built before the Kelts left Asia. But it is 
 certain that the Kelts had altars erected in groves ; 
 which therefore became sacred, like the altar groves of 
 the Greeks and Teutons. Here originate all the en- 
 chanted forests of the Middle Ages. Oaks were sacred 
 among the Kelts, as among the Teutons. Our ideas 
 of Druids were based upon the opera of Norma ; it is 
 pleasant to find the truth about them so much more val- 
 uable and interesting. These Druids were also teachers 
 and judges and phj'sicians. Finally their power was so 
 
 16 
 
242 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 gi'eat, like the Brahraans in India, that the warriors 
 arose and reduced them to submission. But the bard 
 retained his power for centuries. Each Keltic king, 
 who was simpl}' the chief of a clan, had his domestic 
 bard attached to his petty court. The bard carried a 
 harp presented by the king, wore a gold ring presented 
 b}' the queen. His business was the same as in other 
 nations ; but these bards seem to have wandered less. 
 The}' sang the deeds of national heroes, the genealogies 
 of families, and the victories of tribes or single chief- 
 tains. Here are the laws relating to them : — 
 
 " The domestic bard shall receive from the family one heas 
 out of every spoil in which he shall be present ; and, if 
 there should be lighting, the bard shall sing in front of the 
 battle, ' His land shall be free ' ; and he shall have a horse 
 from the king, and a man's share, like every domestic. The 
 domestic bard, and the physician, shall be in the lodging of the 
 master of the family. At the table he sat below the salt, with 
 the domestic chaplain. But the great president of all the 
 bards, who has won the prize in contests, shall sit at the royal 
 table." 
 
 They exercised such power that the Romans punished 
 them, and they fled to Wales. When the Romans left 
 Britain, 426 a. d., the Kymry recovered power for a 
 short time, and the bard flourished in his greatest glor}'. 
 This was a brilliant period for the Kymr}'. The}' had in- 
 telligent princes, fond of fighting, and the songs of their 
 bards of the sixth century are full of fire, or genuine 
 pathos ; they were written in triads of three lines, in- 
 stead of four, peculiar to the Welsh bards. Then came 
 in the Saxon invasions ; and the Kelt and the Teuton 
 fouijht and hated each other for centuries. The cattle- 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 243 
 
 stealing, the border warfare, which are perpetually crop- 
 ping out in Scott's ballads, began here in the sixth 
 centur\'. It is proved by the fact, that the title Jarl is 
 frequentl}' given to the Kymric princes ; it is stolen 
 bodilj' from the Saxon invader. 
 
 This year, a chief, lavish of wine, gold pieces, hydromel, 
 and full of courage without barbarity, broke over the borders, 
 
 And followed by a swarm of lances, and his united chieftains, 
 and his brilliant nobles, all well disposed, he went to battle ; 
 
 And, mounted upon his horse, he endured the battle of 
 Menao, kindling the bardic Muse. 
 
 What abundant booty for the army ! eight times twenty 
 beasts of one color, cows and calves. 
 
 Milch cows and oxen, and riches of every kind ! 
 
 Oh, I should have ceased to be cheerful, if Urien had perished ! 
 
 He has been cut to pieces, that chieftain of a different lan- 
 guage ; trembling, shuddering, the Saxon has had his white hair 
 bathed in his blood. They carried him away on a litter, his 
 brow bloody, ill defended by the blood of his own people. 
 
 This brave and insolent warrior left his wife a widow. 
 
 I have wine from my chieftain ! I often have wine, thanks 
 to him ! It is he who inspires me, he who supports me, he 
 who guides me ; no one equals him in greatness ! 
 
 But the enemies are fighting. Keeper of the door, listen ! 
 
 What a noise ! is it the earth trembling? Is it the sea rising, 
 breaking over its habitual circle, as for the feet of men ? 
 
 If a groaning arises in the valley, is it not Urien who is 
 striking ? 
 
 If a groaning arises on the mountain, is it not Urien who 
 is conquering ? 
 
 If a groaning arises on the hill-side, is it not Urien who is 
 crushing ? 
 
244 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 If a groaning arises in the citadel, is it not Urien who 
 makes it to be uttered ? 
 
 Groaning on the road, groaning on the plain, groaning in 
 all the mountain passes ! 
 
 There is nobody who can make these groanings cease ! 
 there is no refuge against him ! 
 
 There is no famine for those who plunder in his land ! 
 
 When he tights, clothed in his armor, enamelled with daz- 
 zling blue, his blue lance is the lieutenant of death, in the 
 carnage of his enemies. 
 
 Ah ! until I lose myself, growing old, until the rude an- 
 guish of death arrives, I shall not smile unless I celebrate 
 Urien ! 
 
 This is certainly rery poetical and exciting. I trans- 
 lated it from the French collection. The ballad proyes 
 that the chiefs liyed b}" plunder, by cattle-stealing. 
 The bard congratulates himself on serving a chief who 
 can pa}' him so well. The "chieftain of a different 
 language" is not the Roman at all, but the invading 
 Saxon ; the Romans had been driyen off. These ballads 
 of the sixth century were not vn'itten down until the 
 eleventh and twelfth centuries. But there is no doubt 
 that they were composed in the sixth centur}', their 
 form, their technical part, is so much better than that 
 of the other mediaeval ballads. This correctness of 
 form proves that there had been an early period of great 
 poetical development ; and there is also a stream of 
 continuous testimon}^ from historical writers who were 
 Christian monks, to prove that this older national litera- 
 ture existed in the sixth centur}'. 
 
 I dwell so strongly upon this point, because, when 
 it is granted, unlooked for consequences will appear. 
 King Arthur, the very flower and model of chivalry, 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATUEES. 245 
 
 Arthur, the Christian knight, the blameless king, was 
 first a Keltic hero, sung b}' the Druid bards. Shall I 
 sa}^ more, or is it already guessed that Arthur, like 
 so man}^ other Aryan heros, is onl}' the sun and its 
 course personified in a human form? It is be3'ond 
 doubt that Arthur lived, a date is even fixed for him 
 at 5-42 ; but the mind of his race could not invent new 
 facts about him. Those verj^ circumstances which hap- 
 pen to each Aryan hero fasten themselves upon him, 
 with a monoton}' which would become wearisome had it 
 not a great principle h'ing underneath it. Certainl}^, if 
 the Kelts had imagined a hero, the}^ would have found 
 some new thing for him to do. That the}^ did not, 
 proves that the}' simph' formulated the thoughts which 
 lie dormant in each branch of the race, brought from 
 its home. 
 
 A cycle of ballads has grown up around him, but the 
 diflferent heroes are but reflections of Arthur. We may 
 digress for a moment to remark that each literature has 
 these secondary heroes, who are but faint reflections of 
 the glory of the chief hero. In Sanskrit, Arjuna is the 
 reflection of Krishna ; in Greek, Patroklos of Achilleus, 
 Telemachos of Odysseus ; Remus of Romulus, in Latin. 
 AVe will therefore separate Arthur from the knights 
 who surround him, and look at his story. His birth 
 was supernatural : as soon as he was born he was 
 wrapped in gold-colored glittering raiment, and taken 
 away from his mother. He was brought up b}' a kind 
 old knight, from charit}', and knew nothing of his ro3'al 
 birth. Then the king died, and all were striving for the 
 crown. The lords came into a church-3'ard, and there 
 " stood an anvil of stone, and stuck therein a fair sword, 
 
246 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 nakecl^ at the point, and letters of gold were written 
 about the stone, that said this : ' AVhoso pulleth out this " 
 sword out of this stone and anvil is rightwise born king 
 of England.' " All the great lords try, but of course 
 none can ])ull out the sword but Arthur. This is ex- 
 actl}' the stor}^ of the sword in the Volsung Saga, and 
 somewhat like that of the sword of Theseus in Greek. 
 The beard and hair of Arthur shine like gold, and the 
 nobles are forced to make the beautiful 3'outli their king. 
 Then enemies' attack the land, but Arthur draws the 
 ' ' sword that flashed in the e3'es of his enemies like 
 thirty torches," and kills them all. Finalh', in battle, 
 this sword snaps, like the sword in the Volsung Saga. 
 Then a maiden out of the water, like Thetis in Greek, 
 like Hiordis in Norse, brings him another sword : while 
 she keeps the scabbard, his life is safe ; he can neither 
 bleed nor die : Arthur thus becomes another of the 
 invulnerable heroes. He has miraculous powers over 
 nature ; an owl, a blackbird, and a stag talk to him, 
 and do his bidding ; these are the same talking animals 
 which we meet in other Arj^an literatures. Then Arthur 
 marries the queen of the Orkneys, whom he soon leaves. 
 She is the mother of Sir Mordred, who afterwards seeks 
 to kill him ; and she is his sister, although he does not 
 know it. Merlin warns him that he will be destro^'ed 
 by his sister's son, who will be born on May-da}* ; and 
 he orders all the children born on May-day to be 
 drowned. But Mordred escapes, and grows up to kill 
 his father. This brings Arthur still more closely within 
 the mythical framework. It is the old story of the 
 sun marrying the dawn, — of one day destroying the 
 day which preceded it ; and shows very clearly that 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 247 
 
 Arthur was a pagan demigod before he became a Chris- 
 tian king. 
 
 The Kelts in Wales, the K3'mry, embraced Christian- 
 it}- very earl}- from their Roman invaders, and with a 
 passionate enthusiasm which was highly edifying to the 
 Christian monks. And this Christian influence makes 
 Arthur fight against the invading Saxons, because they 
 are pagans. It is the old contest between good and evil. 
 It is most perceptible, howe^-er, in the modifications it 
 gives to the story of Lancelot and Gwennivar. Arthur 
 weds her, although Merlin tells him she is not a whole- 
 some wife for him. She brings with her a rich dowry, 
 the round table ; now this is the bardic table of the 
 Druids, the round emblem which appears so often, and 
 is always a symbol of riches ; and Gwennivar and her 
 riches play the same fatal part that Helen played in 
 Greece. She is the destroyer of her country The in- 
 vading kings ravage the land again, scarce one month 
 after Arthur is married : and he cries out like the wan- 
 derer, " Never have I had one month's rest since I be- 
 came king of the land." So Arthur's life goes on in 
 fighting ; finally Lancelot plays the part of Paris in 
 the Iliad. He makes Gwennivar untrue to her husband, 
 and a last great battle comes between the forces of the 
 two. Here the myth brings in the snake. There was 
 to be no fighting until a sword should be raised ; but 
 a snake bit one of the knights ; he raised his sword to 
 slay it, and the two armies, supposing it to be the sig- 
 nal, came to battle. His son, the traitor Sir Mordred, 
 wounded the bright king, because the scabbard of his 
 sword had been stolen. Yet Arthur cannot die till 
 the sword has been thrown into the water, for the sun 
 
248 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 must set in the waters. But Arthur is one of those 
 heroes who does not die. The three m\'stic queens, 
 like the three fates, or three furies, bear him awa}- in 
 the ship of the dead, — but he -^ill return. All Wales 
 and Brittany look for his coming. He has only gone to 
 the land of Avalon to be healed of his giievous wound. 
 Now the word Avalon means the island of apple-trees. 
 The paradise of the Kelts was always an island far over 
 the blue seas, beneath the setting sun. And if he return, 
 so will the heroes of other lands, Sebastian of Portugal, 
 or Endymion, who sleeps in his Latmian valle}^ ; the 
 sun must return when healed of the wound the dark- 
 ness had given it, for the sun cannot reall}^ die. Then 
 Gwennivar's career closes in prayer. She leaves Ar- 
 thur, as Helen left Menelaos ; but she does not follow 
 Lancelot. Her treasure, the round table, is destroyed, 
 but she seeks to atone for the wrong she has done to 
 her countr}' : unlike Helen, who coollv goes back with- 
 out the slightest consciousness of wrong-doing, carry- 
 ing her treasures with her. 
 
 And the stor}' is repeated in the tale of Tristram and 
 Iseulte, with the pagan tone remaining more visible. 
 Many single incidents are repeated in relation to the 
 knights. Sir Galahad finds his sword, just as Arthur 
 found his ; but one hero is the t^'pe of all. 
 
 Nothing can be more interesting than to trace the 
 road which these ballads took, in coming down to us. 
 Disheartened by the successes of the invading Saxons, 
 man}' Kelts fled from Wales into Brittany in the sixth 
 century, and carried their native hero, Arthur, with them. 
 For several centuries Wales and Brittan\' were practi- 
 cally one, (this intercourse of nations makes history 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 249 
 
 veiy living to us,) and Arthur Tvas their own king, 
 dearer than the other kniglits : so he became the na- 
 tional hero of Brittany' : ruins bear his name, rocks the 
 impress of his horse's feet, and the haunted forest of 
 Broceliande, where Merlin slumbers, waves its boughs 
 in the enchanted air of Brittany' too. These tales of 
 Arthur and his knights of the round table were sung 
 in Brittanj^ b}' the poor homesick exiles, and thence 
 they passed to the court of the Franks. These bold 
 Teutons had plaj-ed the same part as the Saxons in 
 England ; had invaded Gaul, and pushed the Kelts into 
 Brittany ; and in 513 a. d. the Welsh bards were singing 
 to Childebert. From his court this ballad cycle spread 
 over Europe, because bards of dffferent nationalities met 
 there ; each sang in his native tongue, and the rude 
 king made them welcome, though he could not under- 
 stand them. Several centuries went by: in 1077 Rhys 
 ap Tudor, a Welsh prince, was sent to his kindred in 
 Brittany to be educated ; when he returned to Wales, he 
 brought with him the ballad c^'cle of Arthur and the round 
 table, which had been forgotten in his native land, and 
 restored them as they had been " sung at Caerleon upon 
 Usk, at the time of the sovereignty of the Emperor 
 Arthur and the race of the K^'mr}' over the island of 
 Britain and the adjacent islands." So the Welsh bards 
 began to sing again of Arthur. There was in the 
 twelfth century another great burst of bardic poetry in 
 Wales ; but these later ballads are extremel}" stupid ; 
 they are composed according to fixed rules ; even when 
 read one at a time, they are not inspiring, like the 
 grand ballads of the sixth centuiy. The bards espoused 
 the cause of the Plantagenet kings as against the Anglo- 
 
250 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Saxons. The old hatred reawakened, and they declared 
 the Plantagenets to be the rightful possessors of the 
 crown, on account of a prophecy of Merlin, which I will 
 quote, it is so poetical. 
 
 " From Neustria [Normandy] will come a people mounted 
 upon coursers of blood, clothed with iron, who will draw ven- 
 geance down upon the wickedness of the invaders. They will 
 give back their dwellings to the former inhabitants, and will 
 ruin the strangers. They [the Anglo-Saxons] will bear the 
 yoke of an eternal slavery. With the hoe and the plough they 
 will tear up the bosom of their mother [the earth]. That day 
 the mountains of Cambria [Wales] will tremble with joy; the 
 fountains of Brittany will gush out ; the oaks of Cornwall will 
 grow green again." 
 
 So of course the Plantagenet kings honored them, 
 and Henr}' II. went to Wales expressl}' to hear them. 
 It is now said that Edward did not cause the bards to 
 be massacred when he conquered Wales in 1284 a. d. ; 
 so that Gray's splendid ode is founded upon a mis- 
 take. But the}^ were suppressed and silenced, for they 
 fostered political discontent. About a hundred years 
 ago their poetical contests, called Eisteddvods, were 
 renewed. Their ballads about Arthur were translated 
 into Latin b}- Geoffre}^ of Monmouth, a Welsh monk, 
 and he is one of the sources from whom we get the 
 ballad cycle. Without him that form of it might have 
 perished with the Welsh nationality. 
 
 But there is quite another source from which we have 
 derived our story of Arthur, flower of kings. In the 
 twelfth century, 1155 a. d., a Norman Trouvere named 
 Robert Wace found these ballads read}- made to his 
 hand. He took the same names, the same story ; but 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 251 
 
 he threw over it an utterl}' different spirit, — the spirit 
 of his age, — and as such Arthur has come down to 
 us. He was no longer a brave warrior fighting against 
 pagan Saxons ; he is the brightest expression of the 
 noble chivalric spirit, truly Christian throughout his 
 whole career ; filled with an exalted tenderness, a re- 
 fined sentiment, far removed from the Keltic demigod's 
 sensual life. Of course the Trouveres carried this ver- 
 sion everj'where. They brought it to England, to the 
 court of the Norman kings ; and it was carried back 
 again b}' their French wives to Anjou and Aquitaine, 
 to Poitou and Gu3'enne, — thus spread still further in 
 Europe. The French dwell with the greatest pride and 
 delight upon their Keltic ancestors, and have done far 
 more to make known the literature of Brittany than the 
 English for all their Keltic possessions. I am indebted 
 to the ver}' learned and careful works of M. le Vicomte 
 de la Yillemarque for tracing the movements of the 
 ballad cycle of Arthur. And I have described it so 
 minutel}' only because it explains how man}' other ideas 
 found their way into mediaeval literature. 
 
 With this ballad cycle of Arthur has been connected 
 the stor}' of the H0I3' Grail ; but it was originally 
 separate and distinct from that. Perhaps the most 
 interesting discovery of comparative mytholog}* is that 
 which connects this sublime myster}' of Christianity 
 with the earl}' pagan thought of humanit}'. The Druid 
 bards taught the existence of a great earth mother, 
 like the Demeter of the Greeks. The}- called her 
 Keridwen, and worshipped her with mysteries, and 
 taught that she had a mighty caldron or bowl contain- 
 ing a drink which inspired them to utter their songs. 
 
252 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 From the bardic songs this idea passed into the popular 
 tales of the Welsh ; their collection is the oldest of all 
 the Keltic folk stories, and is charming indeed. Mat- 
 thew Arnold sa3S : " It breathes the ver}' breath of the 
 primitive world ; it belongs to the sixth-centiny period, 
 all pagan and m3'thological. Through it shine plainlj^ 
 those old myths which wandered westward with this 
 oldest emigrant of the Aryan race." If it paints the 
 feeling of the times, it proves the brilliant civiliza- 
 tion of the Kymr}" in the sixth centur}' ; for these tales 
 were told to amuse and instruct the 3'oung chieftains. 
 The}' show si high morality, great generosit}' to friends, 
 and a strong love of literattire ; but all the marvels are 
 performed by supernatural power, and these fairy tales 
 of the Mabinogeon are the foundation of nine tenths 
 of tlie romances of the Middle Ages. It is amazing to 
 find here the familiar figures, and delightful to be able 
 to understand just how they came into Europe. Here 
 reappears the knight delivering distressed damsels from 
 monsters read}- to devour them. One character is pe- 
 culiarly Keltic : a hero kills a serpent which tormented 
 a lion, and the grateful lion follows him about like a 
 pet dog : this troul)lesome pet often comes into the 
 mediasval stories. We must be thankful to the Mabi- 
 nogeon for something more satisfactory still. We 
 owe to it Shakespeare's Cordelia, who is the lady 
 Creiddylad. King Lear is King Ludd. But we will 
 confine ourselves to one particular tale. 
 
 Peredur leaves his home to seek for a great basin or 
 caldron, which is called in Kymric a graal ; and the 
 exiled Welsh carried with them to Brittan\' the story of 
 the search for the gi-aal. Of course it lived and grew. 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITEEATURES. 253 
 
 like the ballad C3'cle. Now it is evidentl}^ the same 
 round vessel which appears, in countless forms, in each 
 literature : the cup of Djemschid in Persian ; the en- 
 chanted cup from which 0d3'sseus drinks in Kirke's 
 l)alace ; the horn of plenty of the Greeks ; the purse of 
 Fortunatus, ahvays full ; the lamp of Aladdin, which 
 bestows treasures. It is the round table which Gwen- 
 nivar brought as her dowr}', the caldron of Keridwen. 
 It is an emblem of the fertilit}^ of the earth, and it 
 always yields exhaustless riches to its possessor ; so 
 that the search for the graal is that same Y03'age for 
 treasures which appears in the Greek voyage for the 
 golden fleece. In the poetical activity of the twelfth cen- 
 tur}', a Trouvere named Chretien de Troj'es, 1160 a. d., 
 rewrote this pagan tale : he made it into a poem full of 
 the tone of chivalric Christianit3\ The San Greal could 
 cure all wounds, raise the dead to life, and suppl}^ its 
 possessors with food and drink forever, — meats more 
 delicate than mortals had ever tasted before ; but the 
 reason it could do all these miracles was because it 
 contained the blood of Christ, caught as. it dropped 
 from the cross. And then . another difference : the 
 magic graal of the pagans fed good and bad ahke ; but 
 the Hoh^ Grail yielded its delicious food onl}- to the 
 pure in heart. More, it even became a talismanic test. 
 The foul with sin could not even see it. A vision came 
 to a knight of Arthur's court. He saw a herd of black 
 bulls, — among them, two snowy white, and one white 
 spotted with black. And the interpretation was that 
 the black bulls were the knights black with sin, who 
 had not repented and confessed to a hol}^ priest ; the 
 snow-white were Sir Galahad and Sir Perceval, all pure 
 
254 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 and good ; the spotted one, Sir Lancelot, with one sin 
 marring his snow}' purity. And the fair meadow where 
 the}' fed was humility and patience, which were to be the 
 starting-point of their search for the Holy Grail. So 
 all the knights go forth to seek this heavenly treasure. 
 It would be too long to tell you of their adventures. 
 Wagner's new opera, soon to be published, '' Parsifal," 
 tells the story. The sinful knights seek in vain. Lan- 
 celot dimly sees it ; but it dashes him senseless to the 
 ground. Sir Galahad and Sir Perceval taste its deU- 
 cious food : then it is borne up into heaven. They 
 linger a little while in the cell of a holy hermit : then 
 they follow it to heaven. The lovely story is familiar 
 to us all : for that very reason we more enjoy watching 
 its development. M. de la Villemarque is my authority 
 for the meaning of the word graal. 
 
 The Keltic spirit has affected our literature indirectly 
 as well. Matthew Arnold says that it owes to the 
 Kelts its capacity for style, for poetic form, — for in 
 this the Teutons are extremely deficient, and the Welsh 
 bards pre-eminent, — its sensibility to beauty, and its 
 power of catching and rendering the charm of nature ; 
 — in a word, the dash of genius comes from the Kelt. 
 In the Mabinogeon, Math made a wife for his pupil out 
 of flowers, " and four white trefoils sprang up wherever 
 she trod." Is not this poetic? A twelfth-century bard 
 wrote : — 
 
 " See her the earth elastic tread ; 
 And where she walks with snow-white feet 
 Not even a trefoil bends its head." 
 
 Our language owes to its Keltic element some popular 
 words : basket, kick, twaddle, fudge, hitch, and muggy. 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 255 
 
 The next Keltic literature arose in Brittany. The 
 earliest written document in Bas Breton is in the ninth 
 centmy ; but there were unwritten ballads before then. 
 The Bretons have a ballad literature which is positively 
 beautiful, not relatively so : for it will bear comparison 
 with any other. These ballads have been handed down 
 from father to son, by recitation among the peasants, 
 since the tenth century. They have kept alive the 
 national faiths and glories and manners in this nook 
 of France. Some of them are distinctly historical ; 
 more so than the English Chevy Chace and the Scotch 
 Border Minstrelsy. One ballad is now repeated which 
 actually was sung at the time of William the Conqueror, 
 1066 A. D. Here is one of the historical ballads, which 
 is quite unlike anything we are accustomed to. 
 
 THE EVIL TRIBUTE OF NOM^NOE. 
 
 [Nomenoe is the Alfred of the Bretons, their deliverer from 
 the Franks, — a strictly historical personage. 871 a. d.] 
 
 FYTTE I. 
 
 " Good merchant, farer to and fro, 
 
 Hast tidings of my son, Karo ? " 
 
 " Mayhap, old chieftain of Are : 
 
 What are his kind and calling? — say." 
 
 " He is a man of heart and brains, 
 
 To Roazon [Rennes] he drove the wains ; 
 
 The wains to Roazon drove he, 
 
 Horsed Avith good horses, three by three. 
 
 That drew, fair shared among them all, 
 
 The Breton's tribute to the Gaul." 
 
 " If thy son's wains the tribute bore, 
 
 He will return to thee no more. 
 
256 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 When that the coin was brought to scale 
 
 Three pounds were lacking to the tale. 
 
 Then out spoke the Intendant straight, 
 
 ' Vassal, thy head shall make the weight.' 
 
 With that his sword forth he abrade, 
 
 And straight smote off the young man's head ; 
 
 And by the hair the head he swung, 
 
 And in the scale for make-weight flung." 
 
 The old chief, at that cruel sound. 
 
 Him seemed as he would fall in swound. 
 
 Stark on the rocks he grovelled there, 
 
 His face hid with his hoary hair ; 
 
 And, head on hand, made heavy moan, 
 
 " Karo, my son, my darling son! " 
 
 FYTTE II. 
 Then forth he fares, that aged man. 
 Followed by all his kith and clan; 
 The aged chieftain fareth straight 
 To Nomenoe's castle gate. 
 " Now tell me, tell me, thou porter bold, 
 If that thy master be in hold. 
 But be he in, or be he out, 
 God guard from harm that chieftain stout." 
 Or ever he had prayed his prayer, 
 Behold, Nomenoe was there ! 
 His quarry from the chase he bore, 
 His great hounds gambolling before ; 
 In his right hand his bow unbent, 
 A wild boar on his back uphent ; 
 On his white hand, all fresh and red 
 The blood dripped from the wild boar's head. 
 " Fair fall you, honest i»ountain clan. 
 Thee first, as chief, thou white-haired man. 
 Your news, your news, come tell to me, 
 What woidd you of Nomenoe ? " 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATUKES. 257 
 
 " We come for right : to know in brief 
 
 Hath heaven a God, Bretayne a chief." 
 
 " Heaven hath a God, I trow, old man, 
 
 Bretayne a chief, if anght I can." 
 
 " He can that will, thereof no doubt ; 
 
 And he that can the Frank drive out 
 
 Drives out the Frank, defends the land, 
 
 To avenge and still avenge doth stand, — 
 
 To avenge the living and the dead, 
 
 Me and my fair son foully sped ; 
 
 My Karo, whose brave head did fall 
 
 By hand of the accursed Gaul. 
 
 They flung his head the weights to square : 
 
 Like ripe wheat shone the golden hair." 
 
 Herewith the old man wept outright, 
 
 That tears ran down his beard so white, 
 
 Like dew-drops on a lily flower 
 
 That glitter at the sunrise hour. 
 
 When of those tears the chief was ware, 
 
 A stern and bloody oath he sware : 
 
 " I swear it by this wild boar's head, 
 
 And by the shaft that laid him dead. 
 
 Till this plague 's washed from out the land. 
 
 This blood I wash not from my hand." 
 
 FYTTE III. 
 Nomenoe hath done, I trow. 
 What never chieftain did till now, — 
 Hath sought the sea-beach, sack in hand, 
 To gather pebbles from the strand, — 
 Pebbles as tribute-toll to bring 
 The Intendant of the bald-head king. 
 Nomenoe hath done, I trow, 
 What never chieftain did till now. 
 Prince as he is, hath ta'en his way, 
 
 The tribute-toll himself to pay 
 
 17 
 
258 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 " Fling wide the gates of Koazon, 
 
 That I may enter in anon. 
 
 Noraenoe comes within your gate, 
 
 His wains all piled with silver freight." 
 
 *' Light down, my lord, into the hall, 
 
 And leave your laden wains in stall. 
 
 Leave your white horse to sc|uire and groom, 
 
 And come to sup in the dais room : 
 
 To sup, but first to wash, for lo ! 
 
 E'en now the washing horn doth blow." 
 
 " Full soon, fair sir, shall my washing be made, 
 
 When that the tribute hath been weighed." 
 
 The first sack from the wains they pight, 
 
 (I trow 'twas corded fair and tight,) — 
 
 The first sack that they brought to scale, 
 
 'T was found full weight and honest tale : 
 
 The second sack that they came to, 
 
 The weight therein was just and true : 
 
 The third sack from the wains they pight, 
 
 " How now, I trow, this sack is light ! " 
 
 The Intendent saw, and from his stand 
 
 Unto the sack he reached his hand, — 
 
 He reached his hand the sack unto, 
 
 So that the knot he might undo. 
 
 " From off the sack thy hand refrain : 
 
 My sword shall cut the knot in twain ! " 
 
 The word had scantly passed his teeth, 
 
 When flashed his bright sword from the sheath. 
 
 Through the Frank's neck the falchion went, 
 
 Sheer by his shoulders as he bent ; 
 
 It cleft the flesh and bones in twain. 
 
 And eke the links o' one balance chain. 
 
 Into the scale the head plmnped straight, 
 
 And there, I trow, was honest weight ! 
 
 Loud through the town, the cry did go : 
 
 " Hands on the slayer I Ho, Haro ! " 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 259 
 
 He gallops forth out through the night : 
 " Ha ! torches, torches ! — on his flight ! " 
 " Light up, light up, as best ye may ! 
 The night is black, and frore the way. 
 But ere ye catch me, sore I fear 
 The shoes from off your feet you '11 wear, — 
 Your shoes of gilded blue cord wain : — 
 For your scales, — you 'U ne'er need them again ! 
 Your scales of gold, you '11 need no more, 
 To weigh the stones of the Breton shore. 
 
 *ro war ! " 
 
 You will find evidence in this of that form of govern- 
 ment by clan which was once supposed to be peculiar 
 to the Highlands o*f Scotland ; but since the discovery 
 of Sanskrit hterature this clan government is found to 
 have existed among the undivided Aryans. So the 
 Kelts, who were the first to leave the common home, 
 are also those who have longest kept their original sim- 
 plicity of government. But there are other ballads, 
 spirited war-songs, tender love-songs, and touching fu- 
 neral dirges. These dirges are perhaps the most beau- 
 tiful, but it is difficult to decide when all are so lovel}^ 
 One ballad tells of a phantom army sweeping by, like 
 Odin and his warriors. It is written in triads, the Keltic 
 metre. 
 
 Here is a mythological ballad of the sixth century% 
 It contains familiar characters. The wife is the dawn 
 and the twilight ; the Corrigaun is the same wicked 
 enchantress who beguiles Odysseus, the darkness, sis- 
 ter of Kirke and Kalypso. 
 
260 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 THE LORD NANN AND THE FAIRY. 
 
 [The Corrigaun is identical with the Scandinavian elf.] 
 
 The good Lord Nann and his fair bride 
 
 "Were young when wedlock's knot was tied, 
 
 Were young when death did them divide. 
 
 But yesterday, that lady fair 
 
 Two babes as white as snow did bear : 
 
 A man-child and a girl they were. 
 
 " Now say what is thy heart's desire 
 
 For making me a man-child's sire ? 
 
 'T is thine, whate'er thou mayst require. 
 
 What food soe'er thee lists to take, 
 
 Meat of the woodcock from the lake, 
 
 Meat of the wild deer from the brake." 
 
 " O the meat of the deer is dainty food ! 
 
 To eat thereof would do me good, 
 
 But I grudge to send thee to the wood." 
 
 The Lord of Nann, when this he heard. 
 
 Hath gripped his oak spear with never a word : 
 
 His bonny black horse he hath leaped upon, 
 
 And forth to the greenwood he hath gone. 
 
 By the skirts of the wood as he did go, 
 
 He was 'ware of a hind as white as snow. 
 
 0, fast she ran, and fast he rode. 
 
 That the earth it shook where his horse hoofs trode. 
 
 O, fast he rode, and fast she ran. 
 
 That the sweat to drop from his brow began. 
 
 That the sweat on his horse's flank grew white : 
 
 So he rode, and he rode, till the fall of night, 
 
 When he came to a stream that fed a lawn 
 
 Hard by the grot of a Corrigaun. 
 
 The grass grew thick by the streamlet's brink, 
 
 And he lighted off his horse to drink. 
 
 The Corrigaun sat by the fountain fair, 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 261 
 
 A-combing lier long and yellow hair, 
 
 A-combing her hair with a comb of gold 
 
 (Not poor, I trow, are these maidens bold) : 
 
 " Now who 's the bold wight that dares come here, 
 
 To trouble my fairy fountain clear ? 
 
 Either thou shalt Aved with me, 
 
 Or pine for four long years and three. 
 
 Or dead in three days' space shalt be.'* 
 
 *' I will not wed with thee, I ween, 
 
 For wedded man a year I 've been ; 
 
 Nor yet for seven years will I pine, 
 
 Nor die in three days for spell of thine; 
 
 For spell of thine I will not die, 
 
 But when it pleaseth God on high, 
 
 But here, and now, I 'd leave my life, 
 
 Ere take a Corrigaun to wife." 
 
 " mother, mother ! for love of me 
 
 Now make my bed, and speedily, 
 
 For I am sick as a man may be. 
 
 O, never the tale to my lady tell ! 
 
 Three days, and ye '11 hear the passing-bell : 
 
 The Corrigaun hath cast her spell." 
 
 Three days they passed, three days were sped, 
 
 To her mother-in-law the lady said : 
 
 *' Now tell me, madam, now tell me pray, 
 
 Wherefore the death-bells toll to-day. 
 
 Why chant the priests in the street below. 
 
 All clad in their vestments white as snow?" 
 
 " A strange poor man, who harbored here, 
 
 He died last night, my daughter dear." 
 
 " But tell me, madam, my lord, your son, — 
 
 My husband, whither is he gone ? " 
 
 " But to the town, my child, he 's gone, 
 
 And at your side he '11 be back anon." 
 
 " What gown for my churching were 't best to wear, — 
 
 My gown of red, or of watchet fair? " 
 
262 SANSKPwIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 *' The fashion of late, my child, hath grown, 
 That women for churching black should put on." 
 As through the church-yard porch she stept, 
 She saw the grave where her husband slept. 
 " Who of our blood is lately dead, 
 That our ground is newly raked and spread 1 " 
 " The truth I may no more forbear, 
 My son, your own poor lord, lies there ! " 
 She threw herself on her knees amain, 
 And from her knees ne'er rose again. 
 That night they laid her, stiff and cold, 
 Beside her lord, beneath the mould : 
 When lo, a marvel to behold ! 
 Next morn from the grave two oak-trees fair 
 Shot lusty boughs high up in air ; 
 And in their boughs, wondrous sight ! 
 Two happy doves, all snowy white, 
 » That sang, as ever the morn did rise, 
 And then flew up — into the skies ! 
 
 This is certainl}" far the most beautiflil of all the 
 ballads which tell the story of trees and rose-bushes 
 rising from the graves of dead lovers, and Lord Nann 
 the very model of men. 
 
 There are also Breton folk-stories. One of them is 
 about a city drowned for its wickedness, — completel}' 
 submerged : this same stor}' comes into the INIaha 
 Bharata ; but there is no idea of punishment in that. 
 On Christmas night the stones of the cromlech go down 
 to the river to drink, leaving vast treasures uncovered. 
 Whoever can, ma}' seize them, but must take care to 
 get out before the stones come walking back. This is 
 like the cave of Aladdin, which opens for a moment 
 only. 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATURES. 263 
 
 Dwarfs are the special t}' of Brittany, as giants are 
 of Ireland. Every faithful reader of folk-stories -will 
 recognize an Irish giant as a familiar friend ; and the 
 huo-e cliffs on the west coast of Ireland are called the 
 Giants' Causeway. There is an immense literature in 
 the Erse language in Ireland. There are ballads and 
 stories about voyages and battles and elopements and 
 cow-spoils, and other equally exciting themes. From 
 the mere title cow-spoil, can you not see the Irish 
 chieftain eager for a fight, starting out to steal the cows 
 of his neighbor, to feed his own hungry dependents ? 
 A collection of the Erse folk-stories would be the most 
 amusing of all, if the genuine Keltic wit of the Irish 
 peasant could be preserved. The ballads in Erse re- 
 late at length the doings of the Feane, — a body of 
 men and their chieftain, Fionn : of course, our word 
 Fenian is the same. They are perpetually fighting 
 against the Norsemen and Saxons ; here is the same 
 old struggle between Kelt and Teuton. Then the Erse 
 went over to Scotland, — Ireland and Scotland were 
 practically one, — and carried their heroes with them ; 
 and the Gaelic bards, the latest of all, wandered about 
 in kilts, and sang of Fionn and his chief knight, Diar- 
 maid : a witch from Norway was the foe whom they 
 dreaded most. We have no time to go into the contro- 
 versy as to whether Ossian's poems published b}' Mac- 
 pherson are the genuine remains of the Erse and 
 Gaelic bards, or not. The latest authority says that 
 the ballads are the germs of Macpherson's Ossian, but. 
 that he has entirely altered their character. ' ' Mac- 
 pherson's Ossian is distinguished b}' a peculiar vein of 
 sentimental grandeur and melancholy ; and the popular 
 
264 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 manners of the time do not at all accord with such a 
 spirit. Short, wild, martial, stirring songs, political 
 ballads, or love-songs, would suit the taste of grim sol- 
 diers ; but a long melanchol}' epic would put them to 
 sleep." Here is a real Gaehc ballad. li, presents noth- 
 ing indistinct, but sharply drawn figures of a graceful 
 hero, and nj'mphs gazing at him (the word nymph 
 means water), and the cave of darkness read}' for him. 
 
 ODE TO THE SETTING SUN. 
 
 Hast left the blue distance of heaven, 
 Sorrowless son of the gold yellow hair ? 
 Night's doorways are ready for thee, 
 Thy pavilion of peace in the west. 
 • The billows come slowly around 
 
 To behold him of brightest hair : 
 Timidly raising their heads 
 To gaze on thee, beauteous, asleep, 
 They, witless, have fled from thy side. 
 Take thy sleep within thy cave, sun ! 
 
 Mr. Campbell thinks that the Ossianic heroes were the 
 ancient Keltic gods. Formerl}' the most ancient Scotch 
 ballad known was Sir Tristrem ; and he, like all the 
 others, slays a dragon and delivers a damsel. But Mr. 
 Campbell's researches have recently discovered another 
 character who joins the army of invulnerable heroes. 
 Diarmaid can be wounded onl}- in a mole which is on the 
 sole of his foot. He has bright golden hair. He car- 
 ries a sword, — the white sword of light, which tells its 
 own stor}'. His battle-flag was called the sunbeam. He 
 ran away with the beautiful wife of King Fionn, just as 
 Lancelot would have gone with Gwcnnivar, if the myth 
 
LATIN AND KELTIC LITERATUEES. 265 
 
 had not been Christianized, — just as Helen goes with 
 Paris. He killed a wild boar, and the king, to revenge 
 himself for the abduction of his wife, forced Diarmaid 
 to step on the boar. A bristle entered his foot and 
 killed him. This is again Adonis killed b}' a boar, — 
 the onl}' time the boar reappears in this connection. 
 The darkness kills the sun, or winter kills the sum- 
 mer. Diarmaid can be set up as the Gaelic hero, and 
 the Clan Campbell in Scotland claim to be descended 
 from him. A boar's head is their crest. The Scotch 
 ballads would be interesting to examine ; but we will 
 devote our time to a subject less familiar, the Gaelic 
 folk-stories. Mr. Campbell went about among the 
 peasants of the Scotch Highlands, just as M. de la Ville- 
 marque had done in Brittan}^ and in 1859 took down 
 from the lips of living men and women these tales. 
 He sa3's, " After working for a jear and weighing all 
 the evidence that has come in m}- way, I have come to 
 agree with those who hold that popular tales are pure 
 traditions preserv^ed in all countries and all languages 
 alike ; woven together in a net-work which seems to 
 pervade the world, and to be fastened to everj'thing 
 in it. Tradition, books, histor}^, and mjtholog}' hang 
 together." In one of the tales, impossible tasks are 
 given ; one of them, the clearing out of a stable, comes 
 into Norse folk-stories, and was one of the labors of 
 Herakles, the Greek hero. In another, a maiden mar- 
 ries a monster, who becomes a prince b}' night, and 
 loses him b}' her own curiosit}^ ; just Ps3'che over again. 
 There are several resemblances to the adventures of 
 Od3'sseus. Conall is shut up in a cave b}^ the Glashan, 
 a giant, and gets out exactty as Od^^sseus did, by tjing 
 
266 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 himself under the sheep. He induces the poor, stupid 
 Glashan to scald himself; and when his comrades re- 
 turn, and ask who did it, he sa3'S, "M3-self did it," — ■ 
 just like Poh'phemos in the Odysse}'. Conall kills a 
 giant by putting a red-hot stick through his heart. 
 
 We must not overlook dear Cinderella ; she is the 
 dawn, dark and gra}', when away from her prince, the 
 bright sun, obscured bj' envious sisters, the dark clouds ; 
 for her story is found in Gaelic also, with some witty 
 additions. When the prince asks her where she comes 
 from, she says, first, from '* Towel land" ; she has been 
 a laundr}' maid : the second time she sa3's, " from the 
 kingdom of Broken Basins " ; she is a cook. We find 
 among the heroes one with a horse who talks like the 
 horses of Achilleus in Greek. He fights with a mon- 
 ster, and sets free a distressed damsel ; but the monster 
 swims about in a Highland loch,, and his Andromeda is 
 fastened to the lake shore. 
 
 The local coloring applies also to the talking birds 
 and animals. In all the Keltic stories, fish pla}^ the 
 most important part ; salmon and otter and trout do 
 the talking in the Gaelic tales. In all the Aryan 
 stories, no animal is ever mentioned which dwells out- 
 side of any Aryan country. Apples are the magical 
 possessions most valued. There is apparently no rea- 
 son why Paris should have given an apple to the god- 
 dess, rather than a pear or a peach ; but this magic 
 apple appears in Gaelic as well as in Greek, and even 
 gives the name to the Keltic paradise, Avalon, the 
 island of apples. It is because apple was the generic 
 name for all fruits. 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 267 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY OF TEUTONIC LITERATURE. — 
 SCANDINAVIAN FAMILIES. 
 
 OUR subject in this chapter is the Edcla, the sacred 
 book of the Scandinavian branches of the Teu- 
 tonic faniil}'. The name Teuton is the Latin form of 
 Deutsch, and the historj' of the Middle Ages of Europe 
 is little more than a record of the deeds of the Teutonic 
 family ; for it includes the Goths, of different names : 
 the Moeso-Goths near the Danube ; the Visigoths in 
 Spain ; the Ostro-Goths, who culminated under The- 
 odoric in Itah- ; the Franks, whose name means "free 
 men " ; the Lombards, who founded a second king- 
 dom in Ital}' after the Ostro-Goths were driven out by 
 the Eastern Emperor ; the Saxons, whose name means 
 '* swordmen" ; the Angles ; — all whose races and lan- 
 guages have gone into other forms. It includes also 
 the Norwegians, Swedes, Danes, Icelanders, Germans, 
 Dutch, and Enghsh, whose languages are spoken to- 
 day. It Is only one hundred 3-ears ago, only since the 
 Sanskrit language was recovered, only since philology 
 has touched them with its revealing magic, that we have 
 learned how near all these nations are to us. 
 
 It is not known when the Teutonic family of the 
 Ai-yan race entered Europe. The Greeks and the 
 Latins sought the extreme South, the Kelts swarmed 
 
268 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 over the centre of Europe • but the Teutons are sup- 
 posed to have passed through Russia to the extreme 
 North ; and though it seems unaccountable to us that 
 they should have sought so cold a climate and so 
 barren a soil, we must disconnect ourselves from our 
 standard, and remember what these people wanted. 
 The explanation is simple. This family did not care 
 for cultivating the ground, but preferred hunting and 
 fishing ; and game and fish abounded in Norwa3\ 
 And, most important of all, the}' found in Sweden an 
 inexhaustible suppl}' of what were to them the first 
 necessities, — wood to make and iron to point the 
 arrows and spears with which the}' killed alike fish, or 
 beasts, or men. Many of these spears and arrows 
 would be lost in every hunt and every battle ; so more 
 wood and iron would be needed for new ones. The 
 native chmate of the Aryans was cold ; so this cold was 
 no objection to them. From there they spread south- 
 ward ; but for centuries they were unlvnown, unhke 
 the Kelts. Of the Teutons we hear nothing until 
 Tacitus, the Roman historian, found them settled in 
 Germany, in the first century of our era. In the Goths, 
 Burgundians, Franks, Lombards, who invaded the 
 Roman empire at so many different points ; the Angles 
 and Saxons, who invaded Britain ; the Norsemen, 
 who invaded France ; the Normans, who invaded Eng- 
 land and Sicily ; the Varangians, who formed the 
 body-guard of the Greek Emperors at Byzantium, — 
 we recognize them, — restless, migrating, conquering 
 Aryans. But to Iceland we must go to learn what they 
 believed and felt before they were brought into contact 
 with Christianity. 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 269 
 
 In the 3'ear 874 a. d., a boch* of people left Norway 
 because the}' would not submit to the tj-rann}- of Harold 
 Harfager, or Fair Hair, and settled in Iceland. They 
 earned with them the rehgion, the poetrj', and the laws 
 of their race ; and on this desolate volcanic island they 
 kept tiiese j-ecords unchanged for hundreds of 3'ears, 
 wliile other Teutonic nations graduall}' became affected 
 b}' their intercourse with Roman and Byzantine Chris- 
 tianit}'. In 1639, about two hundred j^ears ago, these 
 books were discovered. The first publication was in 
 1777, and thus the nature of the whole Teutonic family 
 was laid bare to us. Of course the consequences of 
 this discovery are not so universal nor so revolutionary 
 as those following the discover}' of Sanskrit ; but they 
 are exceedingly interesting in two waj's : first, this 
 literature of the Scandinavian peninsula gives a ke}' to 
 the literature of all the Teutonic families, including our 
 immediate ancestors ; second, its ideas agree so won- 
 derfully with the Sanskrit ideas, that it is another wit- 
 ness to the brotherhood of the different families of the 
 Aryan race. The word Scandinavia means the wa- ^-^ 
 ter}' land, apia being the root, and the Scandina\^an 
 peninsula has received from these discoveries in Ice- 
 land a prominence it never had before. Modern poets 
 have gone to it for their subjects ; modern musicians, 
 for their libretti ; everj'bod}' is discussing the sagas ; 
 in short, Scandinavian, like Sanskrit literature, is the 
 fashion. The ancient literature of the four nations who 
 inhabit the Scandinavian peninsula is practically one. 
 In this chapter we shall speak only of the Swedes, 
 Norwegians, Danes, and Icelanders. 
 
 In Icelandic are complete remains of . Teutonic hea- 
 
270 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 thendom. " The characters come out in full pagan 
 grandeur." As a language, the Moeso-Gothic is older, 
 but it has no pagan literature ; its onh' book is the 
 translation of the Bible by Bishop Ulphilas : so here is 
 our last glimpse of an original pagan view of this 
 world and the other. The Norsemen were converted 
 to Christianitj" so much later than an}' other European 
 nation, that their cosmogou}' and mythology have been 
 preserved to us in a perfectl}' unaltered condition. But 
 even if they were pagans, we may be proud of our 
 ancestors ; for their literature is both grand and poetic, 
 and through it all runs a vein of grim humor, (quite 
 different from the Keltic wit,) which is lacking in the 
 other Ar3'an literatures. 
 
 Their sacred books are the two Eddas, one poetic, 
 the other prose, written in that old Norse tongue M-hich 
 was once spoken by the four families throughout the 
 Scandinavian peninsula. The word Edda means great- 
 grandmother, because the poems were handed down 
 from the grandmothers by repetition. The poetic Edda, 
 which is the older of the two, is a collection of thirty- 
 seven ballads, called sagas. Some of them are reli- 
 gious, and give an account of the creation of the world, 
 of the gods, and of men ; some of them historical, tell- 
 ing of the heroes of the nation ; one of them gives a 
 series of moral maxims. But the}' are quite different 
 from the Vedas or the Avesta ; the Edda has none of 
 those praj'ers and hymns and thanksgivings which make 
 the Vedas and the Avesta so beautiful. The ballads 
 were written before the sixth centur\', but the}' were 
 collected together, in 1086 a. d., by a Christian priest 
 named Siiemund. Some scholars think Saemund was a 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 271 
 
 name given him, in reference to this, for it means the 
 mouth which scatters seeds. It is only a very small 
 book, but we look at it with reverence, for it contains 
 the thought of a whole people. The prose Edda was 
 collected about 1200 a. d. It explains the mj'thology 
 and the histor}^ of the poetic Edda, which, indeed, could 
 hardly be understood without it. It would be difficult 
 to gather a S3'stem of belief, even a connected storj-, 
 from utterances so vague, incoherent, and disjointed as 
 those of Saemund's Edda, especially the mythological 
 part : the heroic portion is more connected and compre- 
 hensible. But nevertheless there is a wonderful charm 
 about the Edda, — a vague breadth in the thought, a 
 delicious simplicit}^ in the expression. 
 
 Of course there is first the cosmogony, or creation of 
 the world ; and there is an amazing resemblance be- 
 tween this and the Greek cosmogon}' told in Hesiod. 
 The same ideas reappear in the Edda, — those ideas 
 which have been manifested by ever}^ Aryan race. 
 There are two worlds. Niflheim, the home of mist and 
 cold, — the same word as nebula^ a cloud, and our word 
 nebulous, — and Muspelheim, the home of fire ; between 
 them a vast empty abyss. 
 
 " There was in times of old 
 Nor sand nor sea, 
 Nor gelid waves ; 
 Earth existed not, 
 Nor heaven above. 
 'T was a chaotic chasm, 
 And grass nowhere." 
 
 Then the supreme ineffable Spkit willed, and a form- 
 less chaotic matter was created. This will immediately 
 
272 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 suggest that wonderful hymn of the Rig Veda, quoted 
 in the fourtli chapter, where the same thought is ex- 
 pressed more spirituall}'. From this matter gradually 
 issue all creations : first the ice giants, called Jotuns ; 
 the}' are the evil beings of Norse mythology ; the cold, 
 the frost, the mist, are devils here : they are lilie the 
 Titans of Greek cosmogon3\ Then a second race is 
 created by the Supreme Spirit, called -^sir, or gods ; 
 the singular is Asa ; it is the same root as Asura in the 
 Vedas, Ahura in the A vesta. The}' are the good powers 
 constantly warring with the Jotuns ; they conquer and 
 drive awa}^ these ice giants. For there was struggle 
 here in this wild climate, just as in Persia, — a per- 
 petual warfare between heat and cold, which were 
 good and evil to them ; a warfare unthought of in the 
 temperate climate of Greece, and totalh' reversed in the 
 burning heat of India, where the frost and cold would 
 have been welcome friends, and the heat and drought 
 were the dreaded enemies. Then the ^sir, or gods, 
 create heaven, and the earth, and the deep ocean ; they 
 make subordinate spirits of several kinds : elves, who 
 dwell in the air, and plants on the earth's surface ; 
 dwarfs, who dwell under ground and work in minerals ; 
 nixies, who dwell in the water. All these, you will un- 
 derstand, are the forces of nature working. Then when 
 all the elves, dwarfs, and nixies had worked and made 
 read}^ the earth and the sea, the u.'Esir created mankind. 
 Each creation has a world of its own. Muspelheim is 
 the highest heaven, — the home of light and warmth ; 
 Asgard, the home of the iEsir, or gods ; Midgard, the 
 middle-world, home of men ; Utgard, or Jotunheim, 
 uttermost boundary of the world, home of the Jotuns or 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 273 
 
 giants ; last, the dark Xiflheim, home of mist and cold, — 
 a frozen under- world, which corresponds to the Greek 
 Hades, that dark under-world. There was the home of 
 Queen Hel. In a bitterl}- cold place she received the 
 souls of all who died of sickness or old age ; as no 
 Norseman would wish to die, " Care was her bed, hun- 
 ger was her dish, starvation was her knife." But there 
 is no idea of punishment connected with her. She is 
 not an evil spirit, though stern and severe. She re- 
 ceived those who were unfortunate, not wicked ; those 
 who died before the}* were killed, — the cowards. There 
 are man}- more personifications, full of meaning ; and 
 we feel that the Teutonic mind was deepl3' poetical 
 to have expressed the actions and the manifestations 
 of nature in such lovely conceptions. 
 
 In Teutonic m3'tholog3^ women occup}' a more honor- 
 able place than in any other. There were three Fates, 
 just as in Greek : these are called Norns ; they govern 
 the past, present, and future. Their names are Urd, 
 Verdand, and Skuld. Our word iveird is the same as 
 Urd, and the three witches in Macbeth are unconsciousl}^ 
 expressions of the same idea. The Vala, or prophetess, 
 was supposed to possess knowledge of the past and the 
 future ; to be inspired b}' the Xorns, and to express 
 their decisions. The first poem of the Edda is the 
 "Wisdom of a Vala," called the Yoluspa Saga; and 
 from the words of this Vala comes all we know of the 
 Teutonic creation of the world. 
 
 It is curious to see how this branch has described its 
 gods and goddesses, — how expressed the mythology of 
 its race. High on a throne, above all the ^sir and 
 men, sits Odin, the father and ruler ; like D3'aus in 
 
 18 
 
274 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 vSanskrit, or Zeus in Greek, or Jupiter in Latin. Two 
 ravens sit on his shoulder, who fl}' over the world and 
 come back to tell him all that has happened. They are 
 named Hugin and Munin ; that is, thought and memor}-. 
 Two wolves sit at his feet. He is a stately figure, 
 wi'apped in a garment of cloudy blue ; this is, of course, 
 the blue sky. He often wears a broad hat, which 
 S3'mbolizes the broad expanse of the sky. He is always 
 described as having but one eye. The other he left as 
 a pledge when he went to drink at Mimir's well. Here 
 he changes his character and represents the sun, which 
 becomes one round eye only, when reflected in any well. 
 It has been difficult to trace the derivation of his name, 
 but now it is considered to come first from the word 
 Atman, another Sanskrit name for the Supreme Spn-it, 
 which we examined in the fourth chapter, which means 
 the spirit simply existing : next, from the verb wotan^ 
 which means to move. And Odhinn is one of the forms 
 of this verb. Wuotan, the German deity, is another, 
 and means the Supreme Spirit in motion, creating and 
 working, penetrating, and circulating everywhere. So 
 Odin is also the air and the wind. We meet exactly 
 this distinction in Sanskrit between Brahman and 
 Brahma. It is rather hard to understand, but becomes 
 easier if we remember that ever}' new action of a deity 
 gives him a new name. This derivation has been traced 
 b}' Grimm, and is considered a great triumph of schol- 
 arship. Odin performs man}' different actions and has 
 many names. He marries Frigg, the earth, and they 
 are parents of Thor, the thunder ; Baldur, who is some- 
 times the summer, sometimes the sun ; Hodur, the blind 
 god, who is the dark winter, or the night. But Odin 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERAT.URE. 275 
 
 marries man}^ other wives, like the Greek Zeus, and is 
 the father of Bragi, the god of eloquence and poetr}^ 
 from whom comes our word brag ; of Saga, goddess of 
 histor}^, — hence our word say ; of Tj'r, the war god, 
 whose name we have preserved in Tuesda}', originall}' 
 Tyr's day. 
 
 Odin has other warlike deities under his rule. The 
 sternly beautiful Valkeyrie are white maidens that ride 
 through the air ; dew and hail fall from the manes of 
 their horses ; these are distinctly the clouds. They 
 Adsit every battle-field and choose from the dead corpses 
 the heroes, whom they carry to Valhall, the hall of Odin's 
 palace at Asgard. Odin often accompanies them, that 
 is, the wind blows alon^ the clouds. He is sometimes 
 called Valfadir. The same root Val occurs in three 
 words ; it means to choose : Valfadir, the father who 
 chooses ; Valkepie, the choosers ; Valhall, the chosen 
 hall. But no man ever went to Valhall unless he died 
 fighting, so the Norseman d3'ing would be carried from 
 his bed to the field of battle, or leap from a rock into 
 the sea, or fall upon his own sword. And in Valhall 
 the warriors fight and get bloody wounds every da}-, 
 and feast and drink mead every evening, and wake up 
 every morning as good as new, healed of their wounds, 
 and begin the same sport over again. It is not such an 
 ignoble Paradise as the Mohammedan, certainl3\ All 
 cold was banished from Valhall: "huge logs blazed 
 and crackled for the brave and beautiful who had dared 
 to die on the gor}^ battle-field, or sunk beneath the 
 waves ; while Queen Hel ruled in her frozen regions 
 over the cowards." It has lately been discovered what 
 became of Queen Hel's subjects, — of all the other 
 
276 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Norsemen, and of all the Norse women, after the}- died 
 and sought Queen Hel's regions. Finn Magnussen 
 says: "The pagan Norsemen held, in common with 
 the Druids (Keltic priests) and the Brahmans (Hindu 
 priests), the doctrine of transmigration. The}' be- 
 lieved that, b}^ giving a child the name of a distin- 
 guished man, especiall}' of his own forefathers, the soul 
 of the name father was transferred into the child." The 
 soul would be born again, incarnated into another bod}-. 
 Perhaps from this came another idea, which suggests 
 the Persians. Each individual had a Fylgia, a spiritual 
 body, which appeared sometimes to the individual him- 
 self, sometimes to his friends. 
 
 Odin wanders about, and has many adventures : of 
 course the wind must always wander. He shows sim- 
 ply great physical strength and a keen wit, — nothing 
 disreputable, like the Greek and Latin gods. His great- 
 est benefit, however, was the invention of writing. The 
 Norse alphabet had sixteen letters, combined into sen- 
 tences called runes, which had a magical power, and 
 were carved on sword-blades, called runes of victory ; 
 on di'inking-horns, called love-runes, to make maidens 
 love the hero. Storm-runes were car^-ed on the mast 
 and rudder of vessels to make them sail safely ; herb- 
 runes, on the bark of the tree to cure diseases. Speech- 
 runes were used to defeat an enemy in the parUament 
 called the Thing ; they are described in one of the sagas 
 of the Edda, and they are constantly referred to in all 
 Norse literature. There were even strange and awful 
 runes, which could raise the dead to Ufe, when uttered 
 by a Vala. 
 
 Our word Thursday comes from the god Thor, from 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITEEATURE. 277 
 
 the same root as tender and thin and thunder. Thor 
 had originally no reference to noise ; it meant to ex- 
 tend, to stretch, — an extension of an3'thing, sound in- 
 cluded. Thor is the greatest^god after Odin, his eldest 
 son, the inheritor of his power. He is sometimes called 
 Ving Thor, the winged. He has a fiery red beard : this 
 is the lightning ; and he carries a mighty hammer, 
 Miolnir, the crusher, the pounder. With this hammer 
 he slew the frost giants, just as Indra slew the drought 
 in India. His hammer is the thunder : he is the god 
 of the rain, the thunder, the lightning, like Indra. 
 Just as Indra assumed some of the characteristics of 
 Dyaus, so does Thor take those of Odin, his mighty 
 father, and is sometimes worshipped as the Supreme 
 God. He is scarcely ever at home at Asgard among 
 the ^sir, but visits the giants, his enemies, in Jotun- 
 heim, where he has man}' amusing adventures. He 
 is girded with a belt of strength, and is a famous 
 wrestler. He is not ver}' clever, but, in spite of his 
 enormous strength, is ver}^ good-natured. He is per- 
 petually losing his hammer b}' his stupiditj', but it in- 
 variabl}' comes back to him, no matter how far he may 
 have hurled it. 
 
 THE LAY OF THEYM ; OR THE HAMMER RE- 
 COVERED. 
 
 , Wroth was Ving Thor his forehead struck, 
 
 when he awoke the son of earth 
 
 and his hammer felt all around him : 
 
 missed : 2. And first of all 
 his beard he shook, these words he uttered : 
 
278 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDKED LITERATURES. 
 
 " Hear now, Loki ! 
 
 what I say, 
 
 which no one knows 
 
 anywhere on earth 
 
 nor in heaven above, 
 
 the As's hammer is stolen! " 
 
 3. They went to the fair 
 Freyia's dwelling, 
 and he these %yord3 
 first of all said : 
 
 " Wilt thou me, Freyia, 
 thy feather garment lend, 
 that perchance my hammer 
 I may find 1 " 
 
 Freyia. 
 
 4. That would I give thee, 
 although of gold it were, 
 and trust it to thee 
 though it were of silver. 
 
 5. Flew then Loki — 
 the plumage rattled — 
 until he came beyond 
 the iEsir's dwellings, 
 and came within 
 
 the Jotuns' land. 
 
 6. On a mound sat Thrym 
 the Thursar's lord, 
 
 for his greyhounds 
 plaiting gold bands, 
 and his horses' 
 manes smoothing. 
 
 Thrym. 
 . 7. How goes it with the iEsir ? 
 How sroes it with the Alfar 
 
 Why art thou come alone 
 to Jotunheim 1 
 
 Loki. 
 
 8. Ill it goes with the ^Esir. 
 Ill it goes with the Alfar. 
 Hast thou Ving Thor's 
 hammer hidden 1 
 
 Thrym. 
 
 9. I have Ving Thor's 
 hammer hidden 
 eight rasts 
 beneath the earth : 
 it shall no man 
 get again 
 
 unless he bring me 
 Frejda to wife. 
 
 13. They went the fair 
 Freyia to find ; 
 and he these words 
 first of all said : 
 
 " Bind thee, Freyia, 
 in bridal raiment, 
 we two must drive 
 to Jotunheim." 
 
 14. Wroth then was Freyia 
 and with anger chafed, 
 all the .Fsir's hall 
 beneath her trembled ; 
 in shivers flew the famed 
 Brisinga necklace. 
 "Know me to be 
 
 of women lewdest, 
 if with thee I drive 
 ? to Jotunheim." 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATUEE. 
 
 279 
 
 15. Straight-svay went the ^six 
 all to council, 
 
 and the Asymirs 
 all to hold converse : 
 and deliberated 
 the mighty gods, 
 how they Ving Thor's 
 hammer might get back. 
 
 16. Then said Heimdall 
 of ^sir brightest : , 
 " Let us clothe Thor 
 with bridal raiment, 
 let him have the famed 
 Brisinga necklace. 
 
 17. Let by his side 
 keys jingle, 
 
 and women's weeds 
 fall round his knees, 
 but on his breast 
 place precious stones, 
 a neat coif 
 set on his head." 
 
 18. Then said Thor, 
 the mighty As : 
 
 " Me the i:sir will 
 call womanish,' 
 if I let myself be clad 
 in bridal raiment." 
 
 19. Then spake Loki, 
 Lanfey's son : 
 
 "Do thou, Thor ! refrain 
 from such Hke words ; 
 forthwith the Jotuns will 
 Asgard inhabit, 
 unless thy hammer thou 
 gettest back." 
 
 20. Then they clad Thor 
 in bridal raiment, etc. 
 
 21. Then said Loki, 
 Lanfey's son : 
 
 " I will with thee 
 as a servant go ; 
 we two will drive 
 to Jotunheim." 
 
 22. Straightwaywere the goats 
 homeward driven, 
 hurried to the traces ; 
 they had fast to run. 
 
 The rocks were shivered, 
 the earth was in a blaze. 
 Odin's son drove 
 to Jotunheim. 
 
 23. Then said Thrym 
 ^the Thursar's lord: 
 
 " Rise up, Jotuns ! 
 And the benches deck. 
 Now they bring me 
 Freyia to wife." 
 
 24. " Hither to our court let 
 
 bring 
 gold -horned cows 
 all-black oxen, 
 for the Jotuns' joy. 
 Treasiu*es I have many, 
 necklaces many, 
 Freyia alone 
 seemed to me wanting." 
 
 25. In the evening 
 they early came, 
 and for the Jotuns 
 beer was brought forth. 
 
280 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Thor alone one ox devoured, 
 
 salmons eight, 
 
 and all the sweetmeats 28. 
 
 women should have. 
 
 Sifs consort drank 
 
 three salds of mead. 
 
 26. Then said Thrym 
 the Thursar's lord : 
 
 " Where hast thou seen brides 
 
 eat more voraciously ? 
 
 I never saw brides 
 
 feed more amply, 31. 
 
 nor a maiden 
 
 drink more mead." 
 
 27. Sat the all-crafty 
 serving-maid close by, 
 who words fitting found 
 against the Jotun's speech : 32. 
 " Freyia has nothing eaten 
 
 for eight nights, 
 so eager was she 
 for Jotunheim." 
 
 28. Under her veil he stooped 
 desirous to salute her, 
 but sprang back 
 
 along the halL 
 "Why are so piercing 
 Freyia's looks ? 
 
 Methinks that fire 
 burns from her eyes." 
 Sat the all-crafty 
 serving-maid close by, 
 who words fitting found 
 against the Jotun's speech 
 " Freyia for eight nights 
 has not slept, 
 so eager was she 
 for Jotunheim." 
 
 Then said Thrym, 
 the Thursar's lord : 
 " Bring the hammer in 
 the bride to consecrate : 
 lay Miollnir 
 on the maiden's knee." 
 Laughed Ving Thor's 
 soul in his breast, 
 when the fierce-hearted 
 his hammer recognized. 
 He first slew ThrjTn 
 the Thursar's lord, 
 and the Jotuns' race 
 all crushed. 
 
 So got Odin's son 
 his hammer back. 
 
 The bad god is Loki ; he comes from the word lul'os, 
 bright, and at first he meant mild warmth, and was 
 all good. But he is a kind of fallen angel, mischiev- 
 ous rather than bad, always phiying tricks upon the 
 iEsir, like Hermes in Greek. And here comes in the 
 grim humor so characteristic of the Teutonic branch. 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 281 
 
 Thor's wife, Sif, had lovel}^ bright hair ; but Loki cut 
 it all off for mischief. Then Thor threatened to crush 
 ever}' bone m his bod}' with the hammer, if he did not 
 force the elves to make Sif a head of hair all of gold : 
 so the dwarfs made it. Sif is the uncultivated earth, her 
 hair the grass ; the fire burnt it up : then the powers of 
 nature working under ground made beautiful, bright, 
 green gi-ass spring up again. Loki becomes crafty, like 
 the creeping fires under the earth ; or devastating, 
 like the fire of the volcano. He lives under ground ; 
 his daughter is Hel, queen of the dark under- world. 
 Loki is a great eater, and is perpetually wandering 
 about in search of adventures. 
 
 But the most bright and beautiful of the ^sir is 
 Baldur. His story is well known, but has been so per- 
 fectly explained by comparative mythology that I must 
 allude to it. Every living thing has sworn never to in- 
 jure the beautiful, beloved Baldur, except the mistletoe, 
 — all plants, stones, beasts, and birds. Then the ^sir 
 were playing together and shooting at Baldur in Asgard. 
 And the blind god Hodur took a mistletoe wand, not 
 knowing what he did, which killed Baldur. This was 
 the most deplorable event which had ever happened to 
 gods or men. Now Odin had a son Vali, whose mother 
 was an obstinate princess named Rind. And when the 
 son of Odin and Rind was only one day old, unwashed 
 and uncombed, he was so mighty that he slew the blind 
 god Hodur, and avenged Baldur. Nothing could be 
 prettier than the explanation. Baldur is the summer, 
 beloved by all ; Hodur, the blind god, is the dark win- 
 ter. The mistletoe is not like other plants, which die 
 with the summer : it outlives the summer, and is green 
 
282 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 
 
 all through the winter, not killed b}^ the winter's cold. 
 The obstinate princess, Rind, means the hard-frozen 
 winter earth, the stiff outside, just what our English 
 word rind means. Her son Vali, who grows so fast 
 that he can kill Ilodur, the winter, when onlj' a day 
 old, is the bright spring day : the sudden transition of 
 the 3'ear from the winter to spring, and his miraculous 
 growth, is exactly what is told of the Maruts, or Hermes. 
 
 Of the summer, Iduna, the same story is told as of 
 Persephone in Greek. She is stolen awaj' with her ap- 
 ples, and all the JEsir mourn ; the trees shed frozen 
 tears, and the sun withdraws his face, until Loki brings 
 her back in the form of a quail. In Greek mythology 
 Delos, the brilliant birth-place of Phoibos, is also Ortj^- 
 gia, the land of the quail. Fre3'a is the goddess of 
 love and beaut}- and plenty. Her chariot is drawn by 
 cats, and also she travels far and wide. She has a 
 lovel}' necklace : this corresponds to the girdle which 
 Aphrodite wears in Greek. All these round ornaments 
 have one meaning : they are a symbol of the earth. 
 Her name comes from a root which means J03' and 
 abundance ; and the German word Frau, applied to 
 high-born women, comes from the same root. 
 
 The idea of the rainbow is poetical. It was Bif-rost, 
 the trembling path ; and it was the bridge from Mid- 
 gard, the habitation of men, to Asgard, the home of the 
 gods, over which the gods passed. One of the posses- 
 sions of the gods is the good ship Skidbladnir, which 
 can enlarge itself to cany all the ^sir, or shrink till it 
 is folded into one's hand, like the ship Argo in Greek 
 literature, which bore the Argonauts. 
 
 B}' degrees, worship became more material. Tem- 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATUEE. 283 
 
 pies were raised to Odin and Thor, and the most accept- 
 able sacrifice was a horse. The reader will remember 
 that in India the same idea existed : the Aswemedha, 
 or horse sacrifice, was the chief gift of some powerful 
 king. Each chief of a tribe, even each head of a family, 
 could perform the sacrifice among the Norsemen. Their 
 temple was at Upsala in Sweden ; the grove that sur- 
 rounded it was sacred, like the Greek and Keltic 
 groves. It was dedicated to Odin, and the bodies of 
 the slain were buried in it, for our Norse ancestors 
 went farther than other Ar^'ans : the}' sacrificed human 
 beings, even kings, in time of great calamit}'. Yarl 
 Hakon sacrificed his only son. But in spite of this 
 darkest stain, Norse mythology has a spiritual idea in 
 it, — that of the twilight of the gods, called Eagnarok. 
 Odin and the ^sir are mortal ; they will be overthrown, 
 a new heaven and a new earth will arise. The Mighty 
 One will sit in judgment, the good be rewarded, the evil 
 punished ; strife will be over, peace will prevail. And 
 in this are implied the most religious of all beliefs, — 
 the immortality of the soul, the final triumph of good, 
 and the existence of a might}' spirit, the overruling Deity 
 of the universe, too sublime to be enclosed in temples 
 made with hands, or to be represented in human form, 
 — too lofty almost to be named. The Edda saj's : — 
 
 " Then comes the mighty one 
 to the great judgment, 
 the powerful one from above 
 who rules over all. 
 He shall dooms pronounce, 
 and strifes allay, 
 holy peace estabUsh, 
 which evermore shall be.'* 
 
284 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 It would seem impossible that such an idea could 
 have originated without some Christian influence, were 
 it not that we have met something hke it in the Per- 
 sian religion. It has been said, that '' in the Norse 
 gods we lind a picture of the Norseman himself, — 
 his bravery and endurance, his dash and spirit of ad- 
 venture, his fortitude against the certain doom, — ' the 
 twilight of the gods.' " Christianity, with its teaching 
 of an ever-living God, filled them with comfort and 
 jo}', and easily supplanted their dead gods. But a 
 curious transformation took place : these did not lose 
 their power ; but, instead of being kindly and genial, 
 the}^ became powerful for ill, — mahgnant demons, just 
 as they had in Persia ; and this is the second way in 
 which evil spirits got into Christianit}'. Queen Hel, 
 for instance, became a place, and her cold, dark world 
 became a place of torment, where these demons lived. 
 
 Not only has the old Norse language its gods, but it 
 has also its heroes, — might}' men they are. The 
 greatest of them is Sigurd the Yolsung. His story 
 is told in several of the ballads of Ssemund's Edda, 
 but in so disconnected a way that we could not under- 
 stand it unless many additions had been made and 
 many gaps filled up. It is a fierce and cruel storj' ; 
 but it is the epic poem of the Teutonic branch. Wag- 
 ner has taken it for the libretto of his great trilogy, and 
 William Morris has expanded it into a long and lovely 
 poem. I think that no profane hand will venture to 
 touch it after him, but the Teutonic epic will go down 
 to posterity in the perfect form which he has given it. 
 It is a stor}' within a story, — the history of a family, 
 the Volsungs. Mr. Cox says, ''The real diflference 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 285 
 
 between the Greek and the Teutonic epics is the greater 
 compass of the Northern poems." The Iliad relates' 
 the incidents of only a single year in the Trojan war, 
 but the Volsung sagas have three distinct stories. 
 The first part is the histor}^ of Sigmund, — an awftil 
 tale of evil passions and revenge and blood, too wild 
 and horrible to have an}-^ reality about it. I shall allude 
 to only a few of its incidents. The fii'st is the miracu- 
 lous w^a}' in which he gains his sword, Hke Arthur's 
 sword, which was stuck into the anvil, or Theseus's 
 sword, hidden under a heav}' stone ; and the weapon is 
 another of those resistless swords which ever}^ hero 
 uses. 
 
 " There was a dwelling of kings ere the world was waxen old. 
 
 Dukes were the door-wards there, and the roofs were thatched 
 with gold ; 
 
 For amidst of its midmost hall floor sprang up a mighty tree. 
 
 They call that warduke's tree, that crowned stem, the Bran- 
 stock 
 
 Then into the Volsung dwelling a mighty man there strode, 
 
 One-eyed and seeing ancient, yet bright his visage glowed. 
 
 Cloud blue was the hood upon him, and the kirtle gleaming 
 gray 
 
 As the latter morning sun-dog when the storm is on the way. 
 
 So strode he to the Branstock, nor greeted any lord ; 
 
 But forth from his cloudy raiment he drew a gleaming sword, 
 
 And smote it deep in the tree bole 
 
 ' Earls of the Goths and Volsungs, abiders on the earth, 
 
 Lo there amid the Branstock a blade of plenteous worth. 
 
 Now let the man among you, whose heart and hand may shift 
 
 To pluck it from the oak-wood, e'en take it for my gift.' " 
 
 Sigmund and his son become wolves at night, and kill 
 all that cross their path, and then take on their human 
 
286 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES 
 
 forai again. The gods do this in all mythologies ; the 
 'power extended to men in man}' different legends ; the 
 were-wolf is found among the Anglo-Saxons, the Bre- 
 tons, and the Slavs. The superstition came from a 
 confusion between two words, — leuhos^ bright, and' 
 lukos, a wolf. This is shown most plainl}' in the Greek 
 mytholog}'. One of the names of Phoibos Apollo is 
 the Lykeian, the god who slew the wolves. The m3'th 
 is ver}' near its primitive form : there it is the bright 
 day overpowering the darkness, but since then has 
 come down to a very humble shape. For it is the 
 same wolf *\'hich eats up little Red Riding-Hood, — the 
 darkness eating up the red light of the day. Sigmund 
 has man}' adventures, and a long life. He marries 
 when he is old a wise and lovely woman ; but he is 
 forced to leave her and go to battle. In the thickest of 
 the fight, while he is slaying hundreds of enemies with 
 his single arm, Odin comes to him : the ann falters that 
 never faltered before : the good sword is shattered. 
 Before he dies he says to his wife : — 
 
 " Lo yonder where once I stood 
 The shards of a glaive of battle that once was the best of the 
 
 good. 
 Take them, and keep them surely. I have known full well 
 That a better one than I am shall live the tale to tell. 
 And for him shall these shards be smithied, and he shall be 
 
 my son 
 To remember what I have forgotten, and to do what I left 
 
 undone." 
 
 He dies, and his faithful queen is cared for in the house 
 of a good king, until Sigurd the Volsung is born. His 
 awful eyes are the eyes of Phoibos and of Odysseus. 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 287 
 
 "Yet he shrank in his rejoicing before the eyes of the child, 
 
 So bright were they and dreadful ; 
 
 The eyes of the child gleamed on him, till he was as one who 
 
 sees 
 The very gods arising through their carven images 
 As he hung o'er the new-born Volsung." 
 
 The queen names the good king, and Sigurd dwells 
 with his step-father, in a land that is not his. His kith 
 and kin are dead, his kingdom lost, and he has never 
 seen his great father. This is the stor}^ of Perseus, 
 whose mother married again, in Greek ; and Kama, in 
 Sanskrit ; and Romulus, in Latin ; and, having found 
 the same circumstance so many times, its meaning is 
 plain. The sun never can see its father, the sun of 
 3'esterday. Xow comes the greatest hero, Sigurd, and 
 the poem which tells us of him is lovely as a dream. 
 Long days of peace go by, while Sigurd is trained to 
 ever}' knighth' grace. Then he longs for a horse, and 
 refuses all those his good step-father offers. He goes 
 forth and gets himself a wondrous horse, called Grej'- 
 fell. 
 " Then again gat Sigurd outward, and adowTi the steep he ran, 
 
 And unto the horse-fed meadow ; but lo a gray-clad man, 
 
 One-eyed and seeing ancient, there met him by the way 
 
 Thus spake this elder of days : ' Hearken now, Sigurd, and 
 hear : 
 
 Time was when I gave thy father a gift thou shalt yet deem 
 dear, 
 
 And this horse is a gift of my giving.' 
 
 And indeed he was come from Sleipnir's blood, 
 The tireless horse of Odin : cloud-gray was he of hue, 
 And it seemed as Sigurd backed him that Sigmund's son he 
 knew." 
 
288 SA^'SKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Then Regin, the dwarf, tries to induce him to do a 
 "deed of awing." He tells him that the dwarfs had 
 collected a mighty treasure, — a heap of gold ; but it 
 had been stolen, and was guarded b}* the worm Fafnir, 
 who la^^ wallowing upon it. The dwarf's curse is upon 
 the gold because stolen, and whomever shall obtain it ; 
 but Sigurd at length promises to win it, and the coat of 
 mail and the helmet, and the ring Andvari, from which 
 drops a new ring, — all of which are part of the dwarfs 
 treasures. The dwarfs who work under ground are 
 peculiar to Keltic and Teutonic nwtholog}^ : the}' repre- 
 sent the wonderful properties of the mineral and vege- 
 table kingdoms, and the silent growing and develop- 
 ment of life. The treasure which the dwarfs had piled 
 up would be therefore the powers of vegetation, the 
 forces of nature working unseen : the ring of Andvari, 
 from which other rings dropped, is but another form of 
 the same thought, — the reproductive power of nature, 
 — and this ring appears in many other stories. The 
 worm Fafnir, who steals all this, is the same dragon 
 who stole the waters in India and Greece ; but the 
 difference of climate gives him a different form. The 
 winter and the cold are the foes to be dreaded in the 
 North, instead of the heat and drought : so the worm 
 Fafnir is simple darkness and cold, — the mere negation 
 of light and warmth and life ; he steals away the sum- 
 mer and the growing power of nature, and buries them 
 in the death-like sleep of winter. Sigurd seeks to get 
 himself a sword. Eegin makes him two swords, but 
 the}' shiver at the fii'st stroke. Sigurd exclaims that 
 the}' are untrue, like Regin and the dwarf race. So he 
 turns elsewhere, and asks from his mother his father's 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 289 
 
 sword. So his mother brings him the pieces of his fa- 
 ther's old sword, like Thetis bringing annor to her son 
 Achilleus. Regin forges the pieces, and cries : — 
 
 " Before the days of men 
 I smithied the wrath of Sigmuiid, and now it is smithied 
 again." 
 
 This sword is keen and firm ; the difference between it 
 and the swords of Regin the dwarf is just the difference 
 between the subterranean fires and workings of the 
 earth and the life-giving raj's of the sun, which alone 
 can sla}^ the worm of cold. The sword is called the 
 Wrath of Sigurd. 
 
 "Now Sigurd backeth Greyfell, on the first of the morrow 
 morn, 
 And he rideth fair and softly through the edges of the corn. 
 The Wrath to his side is girded, hut hid are its edges blue, 
 As he wendeth his way to the mountains and rideth the 
 
 meadow through. 
 His wide gray eyes are happy, and his voice is sweet and soft, 
 And amid the mead lark's singing he casteth song aloft. 
 Lo ! lo the horse and the rider. So once may be it was 
 When over the earth unpeopled the youngest god would pass. 
 But never again, meseemeth, shall such a sight betide 
 Till over a world unwrongful new-born shall Baldur ride." 
 
 He reaches the glittering heath, and finds the loath- 
 some worm Fafnir wallowing upon the gold. The hero 
 and the monster are familiar figures ; an}- differences 
 between Sigurd and the other heroes can readily be 
 explained b}' the differences of climate. So the mighty 
 Sigurd killed Fafnir, and took the gold, and the ring of 
 Andvari, and put on the coat of golden mail and the 
 
 19 
 
290 SANSKKIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 helm of awing, which dazzled whoever looked at them. 
 The sun had come out in full splendor, conquered the 
 cold, and brought back vegetation. He ate the heart 
 of Fafnir, and got possession of his wisdom ; but before 
 his death Fafnir had foretold the future to Sigurd : as 
 the Python, the serpent slain by Apollo, is connected 
 with the Delphian oracle, which foretold the future, and 
 gave wisdom. Sigurd rode away on Grey fell till he 
 came to a mountain-side where there was a wall of 
 flickering fire ; but he rode through it, and beyond 
 he saw a stately palace. No one was within it ; but 
 on a mound was extended a figure clad in armor. At 
 once, — 
 
 " He draweth the helm from the head; and lo the brow snow- 
 white, 
 
 And the smooth, imfurrowed cheeks, and the wise hps 
 breathing light, 
 
 And the face of a woman it is, the fairest that ever was bom. 
 
 And he looketh, and loveth her sore, and he longeth her 
 spirit to move, 
 
 And awaken her heart to the world, that she may behold him 
 and love. 
 
 So the edge of kis sword he setteth to the dwarf- wTought 
 battle-coat. 
 
 Where the hammered, ring-knit, collar constrain eth the wo- 
 man's throat. 
 
 Then he driveth the blue steel onward, and through the mail, 
 and out. 
 
 Till naught but the rippling linen is wrapping her about. 
 
 Then he turns about the Warflame, and rends down either 
 sleeve, 
 
 Till her arms lay white in her raiment, and a river of sun- 
 bright liair 
 
 Flows free over bosom and shoulder." 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 291 
 
 She speaks : — 
 
 " ' 0, what is the thing so mighty that my weary sleep hath 
 
 torn ? ' 
 " He said, ' The hand of Sigurd, and the sword of Sigmund's 
 
 son, 
 And the heart that the Volsungs fashioned this deed for 
 
 thee have done.' 
 But she said, ' Where, then, is Odin, that laid me here alow 1 ' 
 ' He dwelleth above,' said Sigurd, ' but I on the earth abide, 
 And I came from the glittering heath, the waves of thy fire 
 
 to ride.' " 
 
 She tells him that she is a Valkeyrie ; but for dis- 
 obedience to Odin the thorn of sleep had pierced her, 
 and she was doomed to lie there until some knight 
 should ride the flickering fire and awaken her: then 
 she would many the mortal who could ride the flicker- 
 ing fire, and cease to be a Valke3Tie. This is the same 
 story as the nursery tale of the sleeping beauty, Bryn- 
 hild, and her riches are but another form of the first 
 idea, — the earth, sleeping in winter, awakened by the 
 sun. Brynhild teaches him many wise things ; she has 
 more than mortal wisdom : they plight their troth to 
 each other. Sigurd gives her the ring of Andvari, 
 which has the curse upon it. He promises to come 
 back that they may be married ; then he rides away 
 with his treasures to the country of the Nibelungs : 
 the}^, with their dark blue garments, are the dark blue 
 storm-clouds. The queen of the Nibelungs gives him a 
 magic drink ; and he marries Gudrun, her daughter, 
 the princess of the Nibelungs. She is outwardly fair 
 and beautiful, with soft, dark eyes, and long, dark hair, 
 and wears dark blue garments. So the days of late 
 
292 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 summer are fair, "but they are near to the storms of 
 whiter, more akin to darkness than to light. Since the 
 sun must leave the spring, Sigurd leaves Brynhild ; 
 since it must wed the late summer, he marries the dark- 
 blue clad Gudrun ; since it must be covered with clouds, 
 he dwells among her kin, the swart Nibelungs. Long 
 days go by. The golden Sigurd has forgotten Br3-nhild, 
 for the spell is upon him ; and he has given himself and 
 his treasure to the Nibelungs, and he toils for others. 
 Then Gunnar, the king of the Nibelungs, desires to 
 marry the mighty wise woman Br3'nhild, and they all 
 go forth to seek her. But neither man nor horse 
 can ride the flickering fire, except the golden Sigurd. 
 Therefore he assumes the shape of Gunnar, the Nibe- 
 lung king, — that is, the sun covers itself with clouds, 
 — rides the flickering fire, and, wearing the form of 
 Gunnar, he asks her to be the wife of Gunnar. Bryn- 
 hild thinks that Sigurd has forgotten her ; and so she 
 promises to niarr}' Gunnar, and she gives to the man 
 whom she thinks to be Gunnar the ring of Andvari, 
 which Sigurd had given to her. And Sigurd keeps the 
 ring himself, instead of giving it back to Gunnar. 
 Gunnar weds Brynhild ; — he is the winter carrying 
 awa}" the spring ; like Ravana, who carried awa}' Sita ; 
 or Pluto, who carried away Proserpine ; — and Br3'n- 
 hild comes to dwell in the Nibelung palace. 
 
 The spell has passed by ; and Sigurd recognizes her, 
 and remembers the past. But the}' live on for some 
 time, till finally the two queens quarrel ; ^nd then the 
 truth is known that it was not Gunnar, but Sigurd, 
 who rode the flickering fire. Br3'nhild is full of wrath 
 at the treachery practised upon her, and so she per- 
 
SCANDIITAVIAN LITERATURE. 293 
 
 suades the Xibelungs to murder Sigiird. The Nibe- 
 lungs are jealous of him and his treasure, — they are 
 angry ; that is, the storm and cold wish to sla}' the 
 bright, beautiful sun : it is but the slaying of Baldur 
 over again. Then Brynhild, wild with misery, can live 
 no longer, now that Sigurd has left the world, and the 
 da}' is dark without him. She kills herself, and she 
 cries out : — 
 
 " I pray thee a prayer, the last word I shall speak, — 
 
 That ye bear me forth to Sigurd 
 
 The bale for the dead is builded ; it is wToiight full wide on 
 the plain ; 
 
 It is raised for the Earth's best helper, and thereon is room 
 for twain ; 
 
 Ye have hung the shields about it, and the Southland sayings 
 speak ; 
 
 There lay me ado-\vTi by Sigurd, my head beside his head. 
 Draw his Wrath from out the sheath, 
 
 And lay that light of the Branstock, that blade that frighted 
 death, 
 
 Betwixt my side and Sigurd's 
 
 How then, when the flames flare upward, may I be left 
 behind ? 
 
 How then may the road he wendeth be hard for my feet to find 1 
 
 How then in the gates of Yalhall may the door of the gleam- 
 ing ring 
 
 Clash to, on the heel of Sigurd, as I follow on my king 1 " 
 
 And she is burned on the funeral pile of her hero. It 
 is the same familiar tale of a hero torn from the bride 
 of his youth. He is more beautiful than all the sons of 
 men. He slays the serpent, and then toils for others 
 meaner than himself. He is slain by dark powers, and 
 joined on his funeral pile by the bride of his youth. Of 
 
294 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 course the resemblance cannot be accidental, any more 
 than it can have been conscioush' copied. It is but the 
 same Ar^an thought breaking out in new form. 
 
 Gudrun flees awa}', and hides from the sight of men. 
 Seven years go by, and she broods and dreams of her 
 revenge. Then the third tale, Gudrun's vengeance, 
 begins. She marries a great king ; but the Kibelung 
 brothers refuse to give up the gold which was once 
 Sigurd's, and should now be hers. Finall}^ she per- 
 suades her new husband to insist upon having the gold. 
 She sends for her brethren, and when they have come 
 to her new home she entices them all into her hus- 
 band's palace-hall, where the Nibelung brothers refuse 
 to give up the gold. Then there is an awful battle in 
 the hall : the doors are closed, and they cannot come 
 forth ; but the}' still refuse to give up the gold. The}^ 
 fight till all the Nibelungs are dead save Gunnar the 
 king, and Ilagen. Gunnar is thrown into a pit full of 
 snakes until he shall tell where the gold is. He prom- 
 ises to tell if they will bring him the heart of Hagen, 
 his brother ; for no one else knows the secret. So 
 Hagen is killed, his heart is cut out and brought to 
 Gunnar. And Gunnar laughs aloud, and cries : " Now 
 the secret shall die with me. The gold is sunk beneath 
 the water, and none knows the spot." He sings a 
 proud death-song on his harp, and the serpents pause 
 to listen. But at last the}' sting him to death, and the 
 gold is lost forever ; and all the Nibelungs are dead 
 except Gudrun, and she is revenged for Sigurd's death. 
 The husband and his nobles feast together till all are 
 asleep. Then Gudrun sets fire to the hall, and the 
 king and the nobles are burnt to death, and Gudrun 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITEEATURE. 295 
 
 is avenged for the slaughter of her kindred ; and she 
 plunges into the sea to die in the waters, to seek the 
 gold which is there. It is a gloom}' tale of love and 
 sorrow, and falsehood and revenge. The vast slaugh- 
 ter-hall swimming in blood, which no one is allowed to 
 leave, is like the slaughter-hall in the Od3'sse3' when 
 Odj'sseus shoots down his enemies. But "the fierceness 
 of the Northern tale is the fierceness of the Northern 
 climate." In the Grecian stor}^ the treasure and the 
 woman are carried back to Greece, their home, in joyful 
 triumph. In the tragic North the ending is quite un- 
 like : the treasure is sunk bej'ond recovery, — lost to 
 both sides of the quarrel. Yet the tale is nevertheless 
 the same: Mr. Cox says, "The Teutonic epics, like 
 the Greek, are the fruit of one and the same tree, which 
 has spread over all the Ar3'an lands." Here Mr. Mor- 
 ris's poem ends ; but in the Edda the story is carried 
 on to follow the fortunes of Swanhild, the daughter of 
 Sigurd and Gudrun. The waves carry Gudrun to an- 
 other country. There she marries the king, and her 
 daughter, Swanhild, grows up in the house of a kind 
 step-father. She is a solar mj^th too, and has never seen 
 her great father, Sigurd, because one day cannot see 
 the day before. Gudrun in the Edda sings : — 
 
 1. Of all my children before I gave her 
 her I loved the best. to the Gothic people. 
 Swanhild was That is to me the hardest 
 in my hall of all my woes, 
 
 as was the sunbeam " that Swanhild's beauteous 
 
 fair to behold. locks 
 
 should in the mire be trod- " 
 
 2. I with gold adorned her, den 
 
 and with fine raiment, under horses' feet. 
 
296 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Swanhild was condemned to be trampled under horses' 
 feet. She opened her bright piercing e^es, — the awful 
 eyes of Sigurd, — and the horses refused to trample 
 upon her. But she was finall}' killed. This is just the 
 stor}' of another da}', and so the saga might go on for- 
 ever, but here ends the Volsung race ; Swanhild is the 
 last. Another saga tells about Gudrun's other chil- 
 dren, who are Nibelungs, dark powers, but this will not 
 interest us. The glory has died from the world with 
 the Volsungs, and we care not for the Nibelungs. 
 
 Wagner's libretto is not a copy pure and simple of 
 the Volsung Saga, but it is much nearer to that than to 
 the Nibelungen Lied. He has taken the names from 
 the Nibelungen, but the spirit of his libretto from the 
 Volsung : it is steeped in the two Eddas. There is 
 first an introduction, in which the gods and goddesses, 
 giants and dwarfs, and daughters of Rhine, swan-maid- 
 ens, appear. The names are German : Odin becomes 
 Wotan, Thor becomes Donnor, the thunder ; but the 
 characteristics are Norse, of the Edda. There are 
 thi'ee parts to the libretto. The stage shows the hall, 
 and the stately Branstock, and the sword fast in it. 
 Siegmund draws it forth, and, after adventures and 
 battles in which he is slain, eight Valke^'rie swarm 
 upon the stage, which must have produced a wonderful 
 effect. Brunhilde is one of them : she has disobeyed 
 Wotan, so the sleep thorn pierces her, and she falls 
 down in her armor, while the flickering fire rises up 
 about her. In the second play, Siegfried is the hero. 
 He is the child of the dead Siegmund ; gets the broken 
 pieces of his father's sword, forges them, kills the worm 
 Fafnir, rides the flickerino^ fire, and awakens Brunhilde. 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 297 
 
 In the third pla}' the three awful Xorns form the 
 chorus: thorough!}' Norse all this, — the mythology of 
 the Edda put into actual, tangible form. The names 
 are changed to those of the Nibelungen, but the plot is 
 more like the Volsung Saga. He mames Gudrun, who 
 gives him the magic drink herself, and he is slain by an 
 arrow in the back. Then Brtinhilde in full armor rides 
 proudly into the fire of his funeral pile. She is even 
 grander than in the Volsung Saga. She is ashamed 
 that she, a Yalkeyrie, should love a mortal man, and 
 struggles against the feeling. Yet this is Wotan's 
 punishment for her disobedience, and she must yield. 
 Wotan, in the opera, is the god come down to earth as 
 a wanderer. He is wi'apped in a cloak of cloud}' blue, 
 and wears the wide hat of Odin. The Siegfried of the 
 opera is rough and rude compared to the golden Sigurd 
 of the Volsung Saga and the knightly Siegfried of the 
 Nibelungen Lied. But this drawback is shght, and it 
 is wonderful that the very spirit of a past age could have 
 been brought before us so vi^^[dly. ' For actual repre- 
 sentation, the operas must have been too long, (Wotan 
 becomes intolerably tiresome,) and there is no humanity 
 about them ; they are, however, grand poetical works, 
 where the wild pagan Norseland is embodied. 
 
298 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY OF THE TEUTONIC LITERA- 
 TURE. — ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN FAMILIES. 
 
 IN our last chapter we examined the Edda and its ficti- 
 tious poems, called sagas. From them we gathered 
 some knowledge of the gods and heroes of our Teutonic 
 ancestors. "We saw the ideas which had prevailed in 
 India, Persia, Greece, expressed bj the Teuton : the 
 forces of nature personified b}' the restless energ}-, the 
 defiant individualism, the grim humor, the deep melan- 
 choly, of the Teutonic mind. Their gods and heroes 
 represented themselves. "We come now to those sagas 
 which are partly historical, or which are domestic, and 
 paint manners and customs. 
 
 My words cannot sufficiently say how fresh, vigorous, 
 and peculiar this whole literature is : the noble Viking 
 spirit is expressed in fitting words. It was poured 
 forth in abounding fulness at a time when Europe had 
 no literature, except ballads and theology in monkish 
 Latin. For five hundred 3'ears, beginning in the sixth 
 centm-y, these stout fellows wrote innumerable sagas. 
 On this remote and poverty-stricken island, uninflu- 
 enced by contact with an}- other nation, this free and 
 noble people developed the soul that was in them. A 
 love of libert}^ a proud contempt of danger, a delight 
 in labor, a joy in struggle, a consciousness of personal 
 independence, a respect for woman, a purity- of domes- 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 299" 
 
 tic life, breathe through eveiy Une. In the sagas every- 
 thing is spoken of in a figurative manner. A maiden is 
 called " the linen-folded" ; a sword, " blood-drinker" ; 
 water, "the swan's bath"; gold, the "worm's bed" 
 (this evidently comes from the story of Fafnir, the 
 worm) ; a king, " shelter of earls"; a ship, "foamy- 
 necked," " wave-traverser." Some sagas have prose 
 intermingled with their poetry. . The poetry itself is not 
 much like our idea of what poetry should be. It has 
 no rhyme, only alliteration ; but it is much more diffi- 
 cult to write than our poetry, and had strict rules for 
 its metre. It has a certain music of its own. Here is 
 a very perfect specimen of alliteration. Ragnar Lod- 
 brok is another of their heroes. He killed his serpent, 
 and delivered his maiden named Thora, like the other 
 Aryan heroes, and sang : — 
 
 Bard upon the time H was 
 When in (rothlandia going 
 To give death to the serpent : 
 Then obtained we Thova. 
 Thence have warriors called me 
 The iing-eel, since I ^aid low 
 Zodbrok : at that carnage 
 Stuck I the stealthy monster 
 "With s^eel of finest temper." 
 
 This is another one, which says that no soldier shall 
 ever marry a maiden. 
 
 *' He, who 6rand of 6attle 
 l?eareth, over weary, 
 Never love shall ^et him 
 Hold the Zinen-folded." 
 
300 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Here is poetr}' taken from a saga written in prose, 
 but with these snatches of song bursting out. Gunn- 
 laug, the worm-tongue, is the name of the hero, be- 
 cause he is so eloquent, so persuasive, that his tongue 
 shps along like a worm. The " king's walls" are cities 
 built by kings; the "war-lord's son, the wealth-free," 
 is the king, who gives him the gold. 
 
 " My ways must I he wending 
 three king's walls yet to see, 
 and yarls twain, as I promised 
 ere while to land sharers. 
 Neither will I wend me 
 back, the worm's bed lacking, 
 by war-lord's son, the wealth-free, 
 for work done, gift well given." 
 
 Gunnlaug and another fall in love with the same 
 woman. Gunnlaug sings ; then his rival sings, and 
 addresses Gunnlaug by very complimentar}- names con- 
 nected with his great bravery, calling him god of the 
 sword, glor}' of the goddess of war, a staff which causes 
 death. 
 
 " God of wound-flames' glitter, 
 glorier of fight-goddess, 
 must we fall a-fighting 
 for fairest kirtle-bearer 1 
 Death-staff ! Many such-like 
 fair as she is are there 
 in south lands, o'er sea-floods ; 
 so saith he who knoweth." 
 
 The following is a lovely song, so simple and heart- 
 felt. The maiden marries the rival, and dies ; then the 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 301 
 
 rival sings. Gold-ring's bearer is the wife, who wears 
 the gold ring. Being a sea rover, he calls himself the 
 seeker of the water ; and the water he calls the highway 
 of the fishes. 
 
 " Dead in mine arms she droopeth, 
 my dear one, gold-ring's bearer ; 
 for God hath changed the life days 
 of this lady of the linen. 
 Weary pain hath pined her ; 
 bnt unto me, the seeker 
 of hoard of fishes' highway, 
 abiding here is wearier." 
 
 There are man\' of these half-historical, half-domestic 
 sagas, and the defiant Norse nature crops out delight- 
 full}' in spite of the Christianity they had adopted. 
 They sang of battles, sea-fights, single combats, feast- 
 ings, and gifts. Ever}' wealthy house had in the middle 
 an immense hall, with benches all around it, a table in 
 the centre, an elevated place at one end, called the high 
 seat. And when the king and his wife and honored 
 guests sat on the high seat, the yarls and bonders 
 around the tables, the skalds chanted their awful 
 strains. No wonder that the "Berserker rage" fell 
 upon these stormy Norsemen. They foamed at the 
 mouth, they clashed their swords, they rushed to their 
 long, narrow ships, and sailed out to conquer the world. 
 Each great yarl, or earl, had a fleet of these ships built 
 expressly to run up the rivers, long and narrow. Some- 
 times one ship would be the only property of some bold 
 Viking. He named it with a favorite name, and talked 
 to it, and loved it as inland knights loved their horse. 
 A ship manned with rowers was a common present from 
 
302 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 one great man to another. Here is the ship belonging 
 to Frithjof the Bold. It is like the Greek ship Argo. 
 *' This wonder went with the good ship ElUda, that she 
 knew the speech of men." 80 the Norseman was sail- 
 ing, and he saw two Troll wives (witches) riding on 
 the waves. So he called out : — 
 
 " Ellida, now 
 or ever her way stop 
 shall sink the backs 
 of those asunder. 
 Ellida, sail, 
 
 leap high o'er the billows ! 
 break of the Troll wives 
 brow and teeth now." 
 
 I copy an extract from a saga which will sound very 
 familiar. The legend lived among the Norsemen ; it 
 was told about two other heroes in two other sagas, 
 which were written down somewhere between 1200 and 
 1300 ; it is told about a fourth hero, and the Turks 
 and the Mongol Tartars tell the same stor}', who are 
 Turanians. Now, the stor}^ of William Tell was not 
 written down before 1499 ; so we see that this master 
 shot, this unerring arrow, belongs to all the Ar3an 
 race, and some of the Turanian families even. The 
 idea is so true in itself, the arrow of the sun is so resist- 
 less, that the myth settles upon every hero whom a 
 grateful country wishes to honor. 
 
 *' About that time the young Egill came to the king's court. 
 Egill was the fairest of men, and this one thing he had before 
 all other men, — he shot better with the bow than any other 
 man. The king took to him well, and Egill was there a long 
 time. Finally, the king wished to try whether Egill shot so 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 303 
 
 very well or not ; so he let Egill's son, a boy of three years old, 
 be taken, and made them put an apple on his head, and bade 
 Egill shoot so that the shaft struck neither above the head, nor 
 to the left, nor to the right. The apple only was he to split. 
 But it was not forbidden him to shoot the boy, for the king 
 thought it certain that he would do that on no account. And 
 he was to shoot one arrow only, no more. So Egill takes 
 three, and strokes their feathers smooth, and fits one to his 
 string, and shoots, and hits the apple in the middle ; so that 
 the arrow took along with it half the apple and then fell to the 
 ground. This master shot has been long talked about ; and 
 the king made much of him, and he was the most famous of 
 men. Now, King Nidung asked Egill why he took out three 
 arrows, when it was settled that one only was to be shot with. 
 Then Egill answered, ' Lord, I will not lie to you : had I 
 stricken the lad with that one arrow, then I had meant these 
 two for you.' But the king took that well from him, and all 
 thought it was boldly spoken." 
 
 All the sagas, whether imaginaiy or historical, are 
 full of revenge and atonement. Life was held cheap. 
 Difficulties were settled by a hand-to-hand fight, and all 
 the relatives of the slain were bound to avenge him. 
 In the saga of Burnt Njal, a revenge was carried out 
 by shutting up the enemies in their own house, and 
 burning them alive. But through this lurid horror 
 shines one lovel}^ gleam. I copy an episode of Burnt 
 Njal. From the artless way in which it is told, it is 
 plain that the Norsemen were not conscious of doing 
 anything wrong : their Christianity was not very deep. 
 
 " Then Elosi, the burner, came back to the house, and called 
 for Njal and Bergthora, his wife. And when they came to the 
 window, he said, * Njal, thou art an old man, and I would not 
 biu-n thee in-doors. Thou shalt pass out free.' Njal answered, 
 
304 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 * I am too old to avenge my sons upon thee, but I could not 
 live in shame : I will stay with them.' Then Flosi said to 
 Bergthora, ' Do thou come out : for I would not have it on my 
 soul that I burned a woman alive.' And he entreated her. 
 But Bergthora said to him, 'I was very young when I was 
 given to Njal, and then I promised him that nothing should 
 ever part us twain. We have lived long together, and nothing 
 has ever parted us, nor ever shall.' So they went back to- 
 gether, hand in hand, into the house. And Bergthora laid her 
 head against Njal's shoulder and said, ' Husband, what shall 
 we do ? ' He kissed her tenderly, and answered, ' It is bed-time, 
 dear one, it is time to rest.' So they went into their chamber. 
 A little boy, Kari's youngest son, was lying in their bed, and 
 Bergthora went to lift him up to take him to another room ; 
 for she said to Njal, ' We cannot see the boy die before our 
 eyes.' .But the child said, ' Grandmother, I have always slept 
 with you, and I would rather die with you and Njal than live 
 afterwards.' Then they laid them down in their bed, and took 
 the boy between them ; and having signed themselves and the 
 child with the cross, and committed their. souls into God's 
 hands, Njal called to his house steward, and said, ' Mark well 
 how we lie, so that thou raayest afterwards be able to tell 
 where to look for our bones ; for we shall not stir hence for 
 any pain or smart of burning. And now take yonder ox- 
 hide from the wall, and cover us therewith.' The steward 
 took the hide, and, having spread it over them, went out. 
 That was the last that was seen or heard of Njal or Bergthora 
 alive." 
 
 Then the awful fight went on, and Njal's sons were all 
 burned alive in the house. Some da^'s after, men came 
 to search for Njal and Bergthora's bones. When thej^ 
 had digged a long time, through a great heap of ashes, 
 they came upon the ox-hide, charred and shrivelled. 
 The hide was lifted, and, — 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 305 
 
 " Lo ! the bodies of Njal and Bergthora were bright and 
 fair, and scarce the smell of fire had passed upon them. They 
 lay as though they slept, and smiled in their sleep, and the 
 child in like manner, save that one of his fingers was burnt 
 where he had stretched it forth from beneath the ox-hide." 
 
 There was another wa}^ of atonement which was some- 
 times adopted, but not considered so creditable. This 
 was by pa3ing "blood-gold," — a sum of money, the 
 amount of which was fixed hy the Thing or parliament. 
 These were local courts of justice ; once a 3'ear all the 
 3'arls and bonders met to settle the affairs of the whole 
 countr}', and to choose a king. This was called the 
 All Thing. The 3'arls were noblemen ; the bonders 
 were freemen who owned their land ; the thralls were 
 slaves, and had no voice in the government. For this 
 defiant individualism did not prevent the Norsemen 
 from submitting to laws ; onh^ the3' must be of his own 
 making. The codes of law in Norse are among the 
 most remarkable writings of their whole literature. 
 The principal one is called the Gragos, or gray goose, 
 because it was written upon goose-skin, and has been 
 translated. It was to resist tvrann3^ that the Norse- 
 men fled to Iceland, and there the3^ developed that 
 capacit3^ for self-government which is almost the noblest 
 characteristic of the Ar3'an race. The3^ preserved that 
 form which we found among the undivided Ar3^ans : 
 first the family, then the village, then the clan. Each 
 yarl was the head of his clan, and the kings were 
 chosen b3" them just as in India, in the societ3' de- 
 scribed b3^ the Maha Bharata. The king's power was 
 shght ; and when one of the kings issued an order which 
 displeased the 3'arls and bonders, nine of them threat- 
 
 20 
 
306 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ened to throw him into a marshy pool unless he should 
 retract it. So he retracted it. 
 
 The literal actual histor}^ of these kings was written 
 down by Snorre Sturleson, the same man who collected 
 the prose Edda, and it is most amusing. It is as 
 lively, and entertaining, and gossiping, as any of the 
 celebrated French memoirs. It is called the Heims- 
 kringla, or " Chronicle of the Kings of Norway," and 
 Carlyle stole it bodil}' in his " Earl^' Kings of Norwa}'." 
 This is actual histor}-, not poetr\', like the sagas which 
 we have been examining. The sturd\' old kings live 
 and move before us. There was much intercourse with 
 Russia. Every discontented Norseman went to B3'- 
 zantium to join the Varangian body-guard of the East- 
 ern Emperor, and passed through Russia on his wa}'. 
 Gudleif, a great merchant, drove a trade with Russia, 
 and went eastward in summer to Novogorod, where he 
 bought fine and " costl}' clothes, which he intended for 
 the king as a state dress, and also precious furs and 
 splendid table utensils," And a Swedish princess often 
 married some Russian king. King Olaf the Saint is 
 one of the most interesting kings of Norwa}-. 
 
 " In the autumn news was brought to King Olaf that the 
 bonders had a great feast, at which all the remembrance cups 
 to the ^sir, or old gods, were blessed according to the old 
 forms ; and it was added that cattle and horses had been slain, 
 and the altars sprinkled with their blood, and these sacrifices 
 accompanied with prayers for good seasons." 
 
 Now, King Olaf was the first Christian king, and he 
 immediatel}' made a royal progress through the country 
 to convert the nation. 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 307 
 
 " He tauglit them tlie right customs. If there were any 
 who would not leave heathen ways, he took the matter so 
 zealously that he drove some out of the country, mutilated 
 others of hands or feet, or stung their eyes out, hung up some, 
 cut doNVTi some with the sword, but let none go unpunished 
 who would not serve God." 
 
 Is not this naive ? But here is King Olaf s crowning 
 achievement during his ro3'al progress. When Gud- 
 brand heard that he was coming to hold a Thing (par- 
 liament) , he said : — 
 
 " ' A man is come to Loar who is called Olaf, and will force 
 upon us another faith than that we had before, and will break 
 in pieces all our gods. He says that he has a much greater and 
 more powerful god ; and it is wonderful that the earth does 
 not burst asunder under him, or that our god lets him go about 
 unpunished, when he dares to talk such things. I know this 
 for certain, that if we carry Thor, who has always stood by, 
 out of our temple, that is standing upon this farm, Olaf s god 
 will melt away, and he and his men will be made nothing, 
 so soon as Thor looks upon them:' Then the bonders all 
 shouted as one man : people streamed to them from all parts, 
 who did not wish to receive Christianity. The king went out 
 to meet the bonders, and hold a Thing Avith them. On that 
 day the rain fell heavily. When the Thing was seated, the 
 king stood up and said, that the people in Lesso, Loar, and 
 Vaarge had received Christianity, broken down their houses of 
 sacrifice, and believed now in the true God, who had made 
 heaven and earth, and all things. Then the king sat down, 
 and Gudbrand replied, 'We know nothing of hun whom thou 
 speakest about. Dost thou call him God, whom neither thou 
 nor any one else can see ? But we have a god who can be 
 seen out every day, although he is not out to-day because the 
 weather is wet ; and he will appear to thee terrible and very 
 grand ; and I expect that fear will mix with your very blood, 
 when he comes into the Thing.' In the evening the king asked 
 
308 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Gudbrand's son what their god was like. He replied, that he 
 bore the likeness of Thor ; had a hammer in his hand ; was of 
 great size, and hollow within ; and had a high stand upon 
 which he stood when he was out. Then they went to bed, but 
 the king watched all night in prayer. When day dawned, the 
 king went to mass, then to table, from thence to the Thing. 
 Now the bishop stood up in his choir-robes, with the bisbo[)'s 
 coif on his head, and his bishop's staff in his hand. He spoke 
 to the bonders of the true faith, told the many wonderful acts 
 of God; and concluded his speech well. Thord replied, and 
 they separated for the day. Now the king was in prayer all 
 night, beseeching God of his goodness and mercy to release 
 him- from evil. When the mass was ended and morning was 
 gray, the king went to the Thing. When he came there he saw 
 that bonders had arrived already ; and they saw a great crowd 
 coming along, and bearing among them a huge man's image, 
 gleaming with gold and silver. When the bonders wlio were 
 at the Thing saw it, they started up and bowed themselves 
 down before the ugly idol. Thereupon it was set down upon 
 the Thing-field ; and on one side of it stood the bonders, and on 
 the other, the king and hi^ people. Then Gudbrand stood up 
 and said : ' Where, O king, is now thy god 1 I think he will 
 now carry his head lower; and neither thou, nor the man with 
 the horn, whom ye call bishop, is so bold as on the former 
 days ; for now our god, who rules over everytliing, is come, 
 and looks on you with an angry eye, and I see well enough 
 that ye are terrified, and scarcely dare to raise your eyes. 
 Throw away now, all your opposition, and believe in the god 
 who has all your fate in his hands.' The king then stood up 
 and spoke : ' Turn your eyes towards the east, behold our 
 God advancing in great light.' The sun was rising and 
 all turned to look. That moment Kolbein gave their god a 
 stroke, so that the idol burst asunder, and there ran out of it 
 mice as big almost as cats, and reptiles, and adders. The 
 bonders were so terrified that they fled. Then the king ordered 
 them to be called back, and said, ' I do not understand what 
 
SCANDINAVIAN LITERATURE. 309 
 
 your noise and running mean. Ye see yourselves what your 
 god can do, — the idol ye adorned with gold and silver, and 
 brought meat and provisions to. Ye see now that the pro- 
 tecting powers who used it were the mice and adders, reptiles 
 and paddocks : and they do ill who trust to such, and will 
 not abandon this folly. Take now your gold ornaments which 
 are scattered about on the grass, and give them to your wives 
 and daughters ; but never lay them again upon stock or stone. 
 Here are now two conditions between us to choose upon, — 
 either accept Chistianity, or fight this very day, and the vic- 
 tory be to them to whom the God we worship gives it.' Then 
 Gudbrand stood up and said, 'We have sustained great damage 
 upon our god, but since he will not help us, we will believe 
 in the God thou belie vest in.' Then all received Christianity. 
 The bishop baptized Gudbrand and his son. King Olaf and 
 Bishop Sigurd left behind them leaders, and they who met as 
 enemies parted as friends ; and Gudbrand built a church in 
 the valley." 
 
 There is a realism about this, which almost makes us 
 believe in Thor too. Suorre tells us that after King 
 Olaf the Saint died, his body worked many miracles. 
 The blind, the lame, the sick, were cured by touching 
 it. People could hear a sound over his holj^ remains, 
 as if bells were ringing. All this happened in 1030. 
 Paganism had lingered until then. 
 
 But there is another kind of literature in Xorse 
 which has preserved the common traditions more faith- 
 fully even than the mythology and the saga. Baldur, 
 the beautiful, bright summer, slain by the dark winter, 
 descended into the hero of the epic poem, and became 
 the golden Sigurd. He went even further, and beoame 
 Boots, the hero of the folk tales. And these popular 
 tales have now become a study fit for grown minds, 
 
310 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 instead of being condemned bj' severe parents. The 
 Norse folk tales are many and delightful. In the "Mas- 
 ter Maid " is a horse that darts fire and flame from his 
 nostrils, like the Greek horse. In "East o' the Sun, 
 West o' the Moon," there is the same maiden wedded 
 to a monster she does not see, whom we found in San- 
 "skrit as Urvasi, in Greek as Psjx'he, in English as 
 Beaut}' and the Beast. They are separated, and the 
 maiden travels far to find her lost hero. In the Norse 
 story, the winds carr^' her upon their back ; the}' are 
 rough, but kindly fellows. The evil spirit in these 
 stories is always stupid ; he is called a Troll. He fights 
 against mankind, just as the Jotuns fought against the 
 ^sir. Here is the end of a story : — 
 
 " As they sat at supper, back came the Troll who owned the 
 cattle, and gave such a great knock at the door. As soon as 
 Peter heard that, doA\Ti he ran to the gate : ' Stop a bit, and 
 I '11 tell you how the farmer gets in his winter rye.' And so he 
 told a long story, over and over again, and he went on until 
 the sun rose, *0, do look behind you, and there you '11 see 
 such a lovely lady ! ' said Peter to the Troll. So the Troll 
 turned round ; and of course, as soon as he saw the sun, he 
 burst." 
 
 Now this little myth is very plain. The Troll, the 
 evil spirit, is the darkness, which must burst before the 
 light of the sun. Most of the stories are like Cinderella 
 reversed. There are two haughty brothers, and a third 
 brother who is despised and abused, and called Boots. 
 He goes off in disguise, and does brave and kindly 
 deeds ; and at night he comes back, and lies by tiie 
 kitchen-fire in his rags, and everybody mocks at him. 
 But at last he throws off his beggar rags and comes out 
 in his full glory. It is the sun rejoicing in his strength, 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 311 
 
 and throwing off the thick clouds which had enveloped 
 it. These few instances are enough to illustrate the 
 solar myth as found in Norse folk tales. The well- 
 known stories are told over again with infinite humor, — 
 the grim Teutonic humor : it is not so keen as the 
 Keltic wit, but it is more kindl}'. In them all, the devil 
 is spoken of in a manner very irreverent to our ideas; 
 Mr. Dasent says, " The devil has taken small hold upon 
 the mind of the Norsemen ; he constantl}' reappears in 
 a pagan aspect, is simple, and easil}^ outwitted." The 
 Norse demons are really the old Norse gods, as we 
 saw in our last chapter The}' did not lose their power 
 when Christianity was accepted, but became powerful 
 for ill. This is verj' evident in the storj' of the Wild 
 Huntsman. 
 
 " When the winds blew, and the clouds hurried along, it was 
 no longer the stately procession of Odin and the Valkeyrie and 
 the chosen heroes in triumphant progress, it was the Wild 
 Huntsman followed by fiends. In Germany it is still Wodin, 
 a demon ; in France, Le Grand Veneur ; in England, Heme 
 the hunter, whom Falstaff met." 
 
 We must stop for a moment to speak about our an- 
 cestors brought a little nearer to us, — the Angles and 
 Saxons, who invaded and conquered Britain, and drove 
 the Kelts into the remotest corners of the island, — 
 into Wales and the Highlands of Scotland. Our Anglo- 
 Saxon fathers had ballads sung by wandering minstrels 
 called Scops ; but the}' were mute indeed compared 
 with their brethren in Norway and Iceland, who poured 
 forth sagas for five hundred years, and wrote immortal 
 works. There are three ballads and two fragments in 
 
312 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Anglo-Saxon which are known to be authentic, and the 
 manuscript which contains them is the oldest original 
 manuscript of all the Teutonic families. The poems 
 are not as old as the Edda ; but the Edda was collected 
 b}' Saemund from different sources, — perhaps manu- 
 scripts, but more probably just from the very lips of 
 people ; so the manuscript of that is not original. This 
 manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon pagan ballads exists in 
 Exeter Cathedral in England, and contains runic let- 
 ters. The oldest one is the Complaint of Deor, a Scop : 
 it has the simplest forms of the Anglo-Saxon language, 
 and it introduces one important character who appears 
 in all the Teutonic families. This is the first instance 
 in which one literature has conscioush' copied the heroes 
 of another, except the Latin literature, which frankly 
 copied ever3'thing Greek. First, he describes the mis- 
 fortunes of a bard : — 
 
 " He sitteth bereaved of joy, his breast laboring with care, 
 and thinketh with himself that his portion of hardsliips is end- 
 less. Then may he reflect how the all-wise Lord worketh 
 abundant changes throughout all the world, exhibiting to many 
 among men honor and the fruit of prudence, to others the 
 portion of woe. This I may affirm from my o^ti experience. 
 Once was I Scop to the high Dane, beloved by my lord. Deor 
 was my name ; many winters had I an excellent following 
 and a faithful chieftain, until a crafty foe deprived me of the 
 freedom, the land right, which that glory of chieftains had 
 bestowed upon me." 
 
 Next, he gives an account of the misfortunes of 
 others, to console himself, and tells the same story 
 about Weland the Smith which was in the Edda. 
 Welend is Velende in the island of Ceylon, Hephaistos 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 313 
 
 in Greek, Vulcan in Latin, Voluncl in Xorse, and finally 
 as Wayland the Smith conies into the folk-stories of 
 England in the Middle Ages. The root is the verb 
 velen, to burn ; he it is who makes wonderful armor 
 for the gods and heroes ; and he means the fire, the 
 flame. He is alwa}^ lame and ugh' ; so flame comes 
 from a little spark, pun}' at its birth, but strong an.d 
 powerful afterwards. Volund is married to a Valke3'rie, 
 who is a bright cloud ; in Greek, Hephaistos married 
 Aphrodite, the dawn ; in Latin, Vulcan married Venus, 
 the dawn : this t3'pifies that the brightness of light is 
 akin to the brightness of fire. This ballad and the 
 Traveller's Song are of the seventh centurj', and both 
 are pagan. 
 
 The third pagan ballad in Anglo-Saxon is Beowulf. 
 It is a little later than the poetic Edda, written about 
 the middle of the eighth centur}' ; the Edda and the 
 Anglo-Saxon ballads being earlier than all the other 
 sagas. It is not certain where Beowulf was composed. 
 The manuscript is ver}' old, but genuine, and was dis- 
 coA'cred in 1705. It ma}' have been brought over from 
 the Continent, or composed in England ; but it shows 
 the great intercourse between the branches of the 
 Teutonic famil}'. And the Anglo-Saxon pagans fill up 
 the gap between the Xorse and German pagans. Those 
 who wandered to Britain were Christianized four cen- 
 turies sooner than the Norsemen who wandered to Ice- 
 land, carrying the two Eddas with them ; so Beowulf is 
 Christianized, and therefore of much less value. How- 
 ever, there is onl}' a very thin coating of Christianit}^, 
 and the paganism shines through so plainly that the 
 family likeness is ver}- evident. It is of course very 
 
314 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 interesting that such a poem should exist at all ; but it 
 is still more interesting that it should be simph' a coun- 
 terpart of the other Arj-an epics. The miraculous birth 
 and death of a hero come in ; but they are applied in 
 this poem to the father of the chief hero. He is borne 
 to the country floating in a boat, Uke Perseus in Greek. 
 This child in a boat is always the sun resting on the 
 water ; but he does not appear in any other of the 
 Teutonic families : the Anglo-Saxons were the only 
 ones who preserved this primary' mj'th. When the 
 father died, the}' committed his body to a ship. We 
 meet this ship of the dead in Arthur's romance, where 
 the three queens bear him awa}'. It has no oar, no 
 rudder, no rigging ; but it sails and sails, and reaches 
 its destined haven : so sail the clouds. 
 
 " Then at his fated time Scyld the strenuous departed from 
 amongst them to go into the protection of the Lord. They 
 then, his beloved followers, carried him away to the sea-shore, 
 as he himself bade, — he, the Scyldings' lord, while his words 
 had power, the "dear chief of the land. There at the harbor 
 stood the ring-stemmed vessel, glittering like ice, and ready 
 for the voyage, a prince's bark. Then they laid dowTi their 
 beloved prince, the ring-dispenser, in the bosom of the ship ; 
 by the mast they laid the famous one. Thereon was stored 
 great store of treasures, of ornaments from afar. On his bosom 
 lay a pile of treasures, which were to go far away with him 
 into the possession of the flood. Yet more, they set up high over 
 his head a golden ensign, and let the sea bear him away ; they 
 abandoned him to the ocean. Upon the sea and alone went 
 Sc}dd ; they mournfully gave the king and his treasure to the 
 deep and solemn sea, to journey none knew whither." 
 
 Then comes the second pJirt of the solar myth, — the 
 hero fighting with a monster. The first one is Grcndel, 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 315 
 
 in human form, who comes to the palace hall at night, 
 and drags out the sleepers, and sucks their blood, 
 which is just the action of the vampires who come 
 into Slavonic literature. Nothing can be more gliastl}' 
 than this awful struggle in the dark hall. When, 
 finally, Grendel is killed, his fearful mother, the devil's 
 dam, came to avenge his death ; the second struggle is 
 but a repetition of the first. But there is a peculiarit}^ 
 of Beowulf of which we must take notice. After he 
 has killed the two demons, the queen drinks his health, 
 and the Scops in the hall sing his praises, and compare 
 him to Sigmund the Waelsing. Now, this is a con- 
 fusion between Sigmund and Sigurd the Yolsung, his 
 son, who slew the worm ; but it proves that the Anglo- 
 Saxon bards were acquainted with the ballads of the 
 Edda. This is the second instance we have as yet 
 found in which one nation was conscious^ influenced by 
 another in its literature. If the same ideas reappear 
 in other epics, it is wholly unconsciously and indepen- 
 dentl}'. The Scop also sang a ballad of the battle of 
 Finnesham. It was not contained in Beowulf, but it 
 has lately been discovered in a fragment of manuscript, 
 so the episode could be introduced if thought best. 
 Beowulf succeeds to the kingdom, and when he is full 
 of 3^ears and honors another awful monster appears. 
 Beowulf goes out to attack him and deliver his people, 
 though all others falter. He says, " If I fall in the 
 fight, send to Higelac that most beautiful coat-armor 
 which guards my breast ; it is the work of Weland." 
 
 Then comes the third, last struggle, in which Beowulf 
 kills the dragon, but is himself stifled by the breath of 
 the monster, and dies. Before he dies, however, he 
 
816 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDKED LITERATUKES, 
 
 longs to look upon the gold which had belonged to the 
 dragon, and he feasts his e3'es on the treasure he had 
 won for his people. So the sun gazes upon the gold 
 and violet clouds which surround his setting. In the 
 graceful mind of the Greeks, these violet-colored clouds 
 become a lovely woman watching over the d3'ing hero, 
 as lole watches over Herakles. " In the North it is not 
 alone the barbaric splendor of gold and jewels which 
 consoles the d3'ing hero, but the thought that these 
 treasures will benefit the people for whom he died." If 
 this personification of a sunset is less beautiful, it is 
 more noble than the Greek. When Beowulf is dead, 
 his followers build a lofty funeral pile, covered with all 
 things precious, and his body is burned upon it. It 
 was in order that the smoke might carr}- up the soul ; 
 the ballad says, "The soul of Beowulf curled to the 
 clouds." 
 
 There are those who think that Beowulf was a real 
 person ; that he reigned over the Saxons in Northum- 
 bria : a lake is still called Grendelsmere. This may or 
 ma}' not be true. The Scop sang the traditions which 
 were in the mind of the people. It is of little conse- 
 quence whether he was true to fact or not ; he certainlj^ 
 was true to the Ar3'an nature, and is one of the noblest 
 characters of Ar3'an literature. Taine says of the 
 poem : " The people are not selfish and tricky, like 
 those of Homer. The}' are noble hearts, simple and 
 strong. This Beowulf is a knight before the time of 
 chivalry. The hero is truly heroic'" 
 
 These three ballads ma}- \evy properly be considered 
 an Anglo-Saxon epic. They are written in alliterative 
 poetry, full of comparisons. Beowulfs flesh is called 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 317 
 
 his "bone-house" and his " bone-locker." But for the 
 Norman conquest we should have used just such com- 
 pound words ; alhteration, instead of rh3-me, in our 
 poetiy ; inflections in our grammar. Now we adopt a 
 French or Latin word to express our meaning ; but an 
 Anglo-Saxon priest wrote the " A3'enbite of Inwyt" 
 to express the sting of conscience. He made up his 
 own word. It is a little irrelevant, but so interesting 
 that I must refer to the fact, that the Anglo-Saxon 
 grammar has some differences from ours. The Anglo- 
 Saxon adjectives, pronouns, and articles were declined. 
 It even had a definite and indefinite declension, like 
 the German ; and not only the qualifying words, but 
 the nouns themselves, were declined. Professor Whit- 
 ne}' says that " English is stripped and shorn." 
 
 There is a Christian literature in Anglo-Saxon, and 
 although this is not its proper place in the mental 
 history of Europe, it seems convenient to include it 
 in the Anglo- Saxon chapter. Their monks were the 
 onl}' ones in Europe who condescended to use the 
 native dialect of the people. They wrote the famous 
 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, beginning at the invasion of 
 Britain, and coming down to the accession of Henry 
 II., 1154 ; also, a grammar of the language ; and these 
 are veiy valuable, being our only authorities for the 
 histoiy and grammar. Cgedmon, the Saxon, put parts 
 of the Bible into alliterative poetr}'. There is one 
 characteristic touch which shows the manners of the 
 time. The invading Danes w^ould swoop down upon 
 defenceless England, and cany ofi" the inhabitants ; 
 and this was called harrowing a country. So one of 
 Csedmon's poems relates the triumphant entrance of 
 
318 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Christ into hell. It describes the rage of Lucifer, the 
 dread of fiends, the J03' of the ransomed, when Christ 
 descended into hell, and led forth the redeemed in per- 
 son. It was known in the Middle Ages as the ''Har- 
 rowing of Hell," which sounds ver}' irreverent to us, 
 but not meant to be so. This literature is not valu- 
 able, because it was borrowed from monkish theolog}', 
 not worked out from the native instincts of the pagan 
 blood. But the energy and fierce defiance of the race 
 come out, especiall}^ in Caedmon's conception of Satan. 
 He wrote an account of the temptation in the garden, 
 and the fall of man, which are most poetical and strong. 
 The poem was translated into English, and published 
 in 1685, a thousand 3'ears after ; and it is quite possible 
 that Milton ma}' have seen it. The pagan fire had not 
 quite burned out when the following lines were written. 
 There is a fierce energy* in them which is wonderful : 
 the mind is unsubdued, though fetters load the limbs. 
 
 PART OF THE SPEECH OF SATAN. 
 
 Is this the hateful place (unlike indeed 
 
 The seats we once in heaven's high kingdom knew) 
 
 To which the conqueror chains me, — never more 
 
 (Expelled by him, the Almighty One) to gain 
 
 That realm ! How hath he wronged us of our right, 
 
 Who the dread flames of this infernal gulf 
 
 Pours full upon us, and denies us heaven ! 
 
 That heaven, alas ! he destines to receive 
 
 The sons of men : 't is this that grieves me most, 
 
 That Adam, he, the earth-born, should possess 
 
 My glorious seat, — that he should live in joy 
 
 While we in hell's avenging liorrors pine. 
 
 O that my hands were free ! that I might hence 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 319 
 
 But for a time, but for a winter's day ! 
 
 Then with this host I — but that these knotted chains 
 
 Encompass, that these iron bands press on me. 
 
 Oh ! I am kingdomless ; hell's fetters cling 
 
 Hard on each limb ; above, beneath, the flame 
 
 Fierce rages ; sight more horrible mine eyes 
 
 Ne'er yet have witnessed. O'er these scorching deeps 
 
 The fire no respite knows ; the strong-forged chain. 
 
 With ever-biting links, forbids my course. 
 
 In order to understand the foundation of the German 
 language, we must go back to a time long gone b}", 
 though mentioned in the preceding chapter. Of all 
 the invading Teutons who left their Northern strong- 
 holds and swarmed over Europe, the Moeso-Goths 
 approached nearest to Byzantium. Ulphilas became 
 converted to Christianity (the Arian fonii), and w^as 
 sent as Bishop to his countrymen. He must have 
 been a man of thought and courage, for he " dared to 
 translate the Bible into the language of the despised 
 barbarians ; as if foreseeing, with prophetic eye, the 
 destiny of those Teutonic tribes to become the life- 
 spring of the Gospel, after Greek and Latin had died 
 away." It is the only book in the Gothic language ; 
 the language itself is dead. But the book was adopted 
 by the Germans when they became converted ; and 
 though the language is not German, it is the principal 
 element of it, and helped to identify the Germans as 
 Ar3'ans. The Goths were the first Teutons to be con- 
 verted, and Ulphilas anticipated the work of Luther by 
 a thousand years, in giving them the Bible in their own 
 tongue, in 355 a. d. He really is connected with the By- 
 zantine civihzation, in point of time ; but it seems better 
 to include him among the Germans, in point of family. 
 
320 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 We have heard the last echo of paganism in Beo- 
 wulf, which was onl}- half pagan. Xow we must turn 
 to the Germans. They have no sacred books ; we must 
 go to an outside source, for we know nothing more 
 of their religion than Tacitus has told us : that they 
 worshipped in groves, and offered human sacrifices, 
 and had a god named Tuisco, and another named Tin, 
 or Zio, which are both forms of the name Dj^aus, and 
 have been traced. Max Muller sa3's, "The Heaven- 
 Father was invoked in the dark forests of Germany a 
 thousand years. Then his old name was heard for 
 th£ last time." Another god was called Wuotan, or 
 Wodin, which is the same as Odin. Slight as this 
 knowledge is, the philologist is grateful for it : these 
 names identify the relationship between the Germans 
 and the other Aryan families. The earliest sacred 
 poem known in German is the "Weissenbrun H3mn, 
 probably of the eighth centur}', and therefore Christian- 
 ized ; for the Germans were converted in 755. It is 
 not worth while to allude to the Christian literature of 
 German. I onlv copy the "Weissenbrun Hymn because 
 the beginning of it is so much like the Edda. 
 
 " This have I heard from men, 
 the chief of the elder sages, 
 that originally there existed 
 no heaven above, 
 nor tree, nor mountain, 
 nor was there .... 
 nor any star. 
 No sun shone forth, 
 nor did the moon give her light ; 
 neither the vast sea. 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GEKMAN LITERATURE. 321 
 
 Then there was naught 
 from end to end ; 
 but then existed the one 
 Almighty God, 
 most merciful to man, 
 and with him also were many- 
 godlike spirits. 
 Holy God, 
 
 Almighty ! the heaven 
 and the earth thou hast wrought, 
 and for men 
 
 thou providest so many blessings. 
 Do thou bestow on me, in thy grace, 
 a right faith, 
 and a good will, 
 wisdom and good speed, 
 to withstand the craft of the de\dl, 
 and to eschew evil, 
 and thy will to work." 
 
 But if the}^ have not gods like the man}- grand forms 
 of Norse mj'tholog}', the}^ have heroes, whose names 
 and high deeds are dulj' set forth in ballads. The old- 
 est is the Hlldebrand Lied ; and this is only a muti- 
 lated fragment of what may once have been a German 
 epic. It is very simple and strong, like all the genuine 
 poetry of the people. It is as old as the eighth centur}-, 
 — as Beowulf, for instance, — and it tells another of 
 the tales common to the Arj-an race, gives another form 
 to the solar myth. Hildebrand, a brave warrior, left 
 behind him a wife and an infant son, and went off to 
 fight the Huns. After thirt}' years he returned, and 
 a brave 3'oung German warrior, thinking him to be a 
 Hun, challenged him to combat. But Hildebrand rec- 
 
 21 
 
322 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ognizecl his own son, declared himself, and offered his 
 golden bracelets as a token. The son refused to be- 
 lieve him, saying that his father was dead, and insisted 
 upon fighting. The}- fought ; the son was conquered : 
 both finally returned alive to the wife. This is the sun- 
 light of one day struggling with the sun-light of the new 
 da}', and is the same myth which was so beautifull}' 
 elaborated in Sohrab and Rustem, in Persia. Yet there 
 could have been no influence exercised, for the Persians 
 did not even know of the existence of the Germans, 
 in their remote forests. The Hildebrand Lied is written 
 in alliterative poetr}-. It is almost as majestic as the 
 Edda. I quote part of Hildebrand's speech to his son, 
 it is so simple and pathetic 
 
 " Well-a-day now, governing God ! 
 Woe worth shall happen ! 
 Summers full sixty, 
 and winters, I wander, 
 ever called with the crowd 
 of shooters of spears : 
 nor in mine own household 
 delayed, as the dead. . 
 Now shall the child of me 
 smite me with sword, 
 bite me with broad steel, 
 or I he his slayer." 
 
 The figurative expressions, too, prove its kinship. 
 Another of the old ballads tells of the horny Siegfried, 
 a hero who was born covered with a coat of horn : and 
 in the Maha Bharata occurs the same thing. The hero 
 Kama has a coating, like shell, which he, howe^-er, puts 
 on and off at pleasure. These were written in Old 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 323 
 
 High-German, which is veiy much like Anglo-Saxon. 
 But the most celebrated of the old ballads of the peo- 
 ple is the Nibelungen Lied, or song of the children of 
 the mist ; Nibelung being from the same root as Nifl- 
 heim and nebula. It was originalh^ a series of ballads, 
 springing up among the people, no one knows when or 
 where ; for the German bards did not write down their 
 songs. Finally", these were collected and rewritten by 
 one person, about the middle of the twelfth century-, 
 in the form which the}' now bear, in Middle High-Ger- 
 man, whicli resembles modern High-German more than 
 Chaucer's English resembles modern English, and can 
 more easih' be read without a translation ; but they 
 were lost for many years, and utterly forgotten. About 
 a hundred 3'ears ago, in 1757, the}' were discovered in 
 manuscript, in the library of an ancient noble family. 
 Several other copies were found after diligent search, 
 and all closed with the words, " Here endeth the Nibe- 
 lungen Lied." It has been translated into modern 
 German, and man}' foreign languages, and the Ger- 
 mans overflowed with pride at the thought that they too 
 had a national epic. But on a close comparison with 
 the Volsung Saga, which is included in the Eddas, and 
 is the Norse epic, such a remarkable resemblance was 
 found, that it is now acknowledged that the Nibelungen 
 Lied is simply a reproduction of the Yolsung Saga, 
 but unconsciously so. This is perfectly natural, since 
 the Norsemen and Germans are brothers, of the same 
 Teutonic branch of the great Aryan race, and once may 
 all have lived together on the shores of the Baltic Sea. 
 The story is just the same ; the names, even, are but 
 little changed ; but the spirit is utterly different. The 
 
324: SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 wild, strong, daring Norsemen — the men and the 
 women of heroic proportions, tall and bright as gods 
 and goddesses — have been converted into mild, church- 
 going knights, who gain their ends b}- craft rather than 
 b}' frankness and courage. So I think the Volsung Saga 
 the finer of the two, as well as the more original. It is 
 nearer to the primitive form of the solar myth ; thus the 
 connection of the Teutonic with the other Ar3an epics 
 is more easily traced in it. William Morris has put the 
 stor}' into such loveh' melod}' that his poem will be 
 accepted as the standard version of the two Teutonic 
 epics. There is no good poetical translation of the 
 Nibelungen. I do not feel that it is needed since Mor- 
 ris's poem. An appreciative account of it was writ- 
 ten by Mr. Carl3'le, in the Westminster Review, 1831. 
 But all these new discoveries in comparative mythology 
 have been applied to the Nibelungen since then ; so his 
 account is not enough, sympathetic as it is. As I re- 
 lated the storj' so full}' in the last chapter, in speaking of 
 the Volsung Saga, I shall onl}' mention the differences. 
 The hero is Siegfried, or Sifrit. There were three 
 parts in the Volsung Saga, and this is like Wagner's 
 opera, where the first one tells the storv of the hero's 
 family and father. The Nibelungen begins at the sec- 
 ond part. The hero himself, Siegfried, kills a dragon, 
 and bathes in its blood, and thus becomes invincible ; 
 but, while bathing, a leaf from a linden-tree fell be- 
 tween his shoulders, and stayed there, so that one little 
 spot was not touched by the dragon's blood, and he can 
 be wounded there, — like Achilleus vulnerable in one 
 spot alone, the heel. Siegfried then gains the treas- 
 ures of the dwarfs, and a cloud mantle or cloak, which 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 325 
 
 gives him the strength of twelve men and makes him 
 invisible. This is the same invisible garment which 
 so many heroes have worn, — like Fortunatiis's cap, for 
 instance, — and is the mist or fog which hides the 
 sun in the spring sometimes. All that lovely story 
 about the awakening of Brynhild does not come into 
 the Nibelungeu. The Brunhilde of the Nibelungen has 
 physical force ; but she has not the wisdom and the 
 spiritual power of the Brynhild in the Volsung Saga. 
 Gunther, the king, desires to wed the strong woman, 
 Briinhilde. She comes forth carrying a mighty spear, 
 and hurls a stone w^hich four men could not lift. But 
 Siegfried wins the Briinhilde of the Nibelungen by 
 throwing stones and spears, and by wrestling till this 
 amazon is tripped and thrown to the ground. This is 
 much less poetical, and also much less dangerous, than 
 riding through the flickering fire. He does it under 
 his invisible cloak, while Gunther, the king, stands by, 
 and makes all the gestures ; there is something undig- 
 nified, almost laughable, in this. Siegfried takes off 
 the ring and the girdle of Brunhilde, and gives them to 
 his own wife. She is named Kriemhild in the Nibe- 
 lungen ; but she is the sister of the king, and corre- 
 sponds to the Gudrun of the original story. The crisis 
 is brought on, just as in the Volsung Saga, by the quar- 
 rels of the two queens. But the revenge is different. 
 In the Volsung Saga it is prompted by the love and 
 jealous}' of Brj-nhild, and then, when the hero is dead, 
 her heart breaks too. She forgives him, but she dies 
 with him. The treasure is not thought of. In the 
 Nibelungen Lied, Brunhilde does not love Siegfried ; 
 she is simpl}' angr}' because he is a more distinguished 
 
326 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 man than her own husband, and lives on ver}- com- 
 fortably after his death. We hear no more of her. 
 Her anger prompts her to work upon the avarice of 
 Hagen, whose name means prickl}' thorn ; and he 
 promises to kill Siegfried b}' strategy, because he de- 
 sires to have the gold, the Nibelungen hoard. While 
 they are on a hunting excursion, Siegfried stoops to 
 drink at a spring of water, and Hagen, standing behind 
 the mighty hero, pierces him with a spear just in that 
 one spot between the shoulders where he is vulnerable. 
 This is the manner of the death in Wagner's opera. So 
 the thorn of winter kills the summer ; the thorn of 
 darkness kills the bright sun. There are man}' stories 
 in which the death of the hero is connected with water. 
 It means the setting sun sinking below the water. The 
 second part of the Nibelungen is the revenge of Kriem- 
 hild, Siegfried's wife. It is the stor}- which we met in 
 the Volsung Saga. She marries a foreign king, entices 
 her brethren to come to visit her, and then kills them 
 all in that vast slaughter-hall. Little is said about the 
 gold, the Nibelungen hoard, in the Volsung Saga ; but 
 it plays a ver}- important part in the Nibelungen. In 
 the Volsung Saga, the revenge of Gudrun was the real 
 motive; the gold, only a bait held out to Gudrun's 
 new husband : in the Nibelungen, Kriemhild cares 
 quite as much for the gold as for revenging her slaugh- 
 tered hero. But the ending is the same. The gold is 
 drowned beneath the water ; neither side can possess it. 
 In the Nibelungen Lied, the tale of the revenge is 
 tedious, as well as sickening : thousands of warriors 
 fall : new heroes are introduced only to be killed, and 
 the agon}' is prolonged. One hero, Volker, is a har})cr. 
 
ANGLO-SAXON AND GERMAN LITERATURE. 327 
 
 This is like Phemios, the harper in the Od^'ssey. An 
 effort has been made to give historical names to the 
 cliaracters, and prove that the}' realh' lived. Kriem- 
 hild's second husband, Etzel, is called Attila, king of 
 the Huns ; but his character is entirel}' different from 
 that of the real Attila, and I think there is nothing to 
 warrant such a supposition. The names and characters 
 resemble those of the other epic poems far more than 
 the}' do any living, actual people. It is only because 
 there are mediaeval manners and ideas in the Nibe- 
 lungen Lied that such an explanation came up. 
 
 It is precisely this mediaeval spirit which makes the 
 Kibelungen Lied less beautiful than the Volsung Saga. 
 It is near and real ; the characters and the motives 
 which actuate them might really be ; the only super- 
 naturalism, the invisible cloak, is found in a hundred 
 mediaeval tales. But the Volsung Saga is remote and 
 shadowy and vast. The gods themselves come down 
 and dwell with men, and no men ever lived so mighty 
 as those heroes ; even the swart, blue-clad Niflungs are 
 great and grand to see. The women are beautiful and 
 wise and loving as goddesses. The motives are bold 
 and clear, the plot is simple and contains but few 
 subordinate characters, and the very soul of poetry 
 breathes thi'ough it all. It is as free and wild and 
 daring as the Norsemen who gave it birth. 
 
 I wiU copy a passage I met after I had written this 
 chapter. Matthew Arnold says : " There is a fire, a 
 style, a distinction, in Icelandic poetry, which German 
 poetry has not. The fatal humdrum and want of style 
 of the Germans have marred their way of telling this 
 magnificent tradition of the Nibelungen, and taken half 
 
328 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 its grandeur and power out of it ; while in the Icelandic 
 poems which deal with this tradition, its grandeur and 
 power are much more fulh^ visible." The dark, tragical 
 element, " the sorrow after jo}'," which Carlyle felt, but 
 could not understand, which runs through both poems, 
 has been explained to us by the comparative mj'tholo- 
 gist. It comes from the perpetual warfare, the stern 
 aspect, of the physical nature of the North. However 
 beautiful the summer may be, there is alwa3's the 
 consciousness that the darkness and cold will return. 
 The Persian and the Teutonic epics end in gloom ; 
 the Indian and Grecian, in joy and triumph. Rama 
 brings back Sita, stolen by dark powers ; the Greeks 
 carr}^ back Helen and her gold ; Odysseus lives in hap- 
 piness with his beloved bride. Yet this was worked 
 out unconsciousl3\ Naturall}' and independentl}' these 
 different nations expressed the thought that was in 
 them. They brought out different results from these 
 same original germs. It is onlv lately, since all litera- 
 tures have been traced back to their ver}- origin, — the 
 phenomena of nature, — that we have understood the 
 deep undertone of melancholy, " the pathetic minor," 
 which runs through every manifestation of the Teutonic 
 mind, — its art, its music, j 
 is part of our inheritance. 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 329 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 MEDIEVAL HYMNS, AND COIMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY 
 OF THE MEDLEVAL BALLADS. 
 
 OUR subject is Mediaeval Literature, — a most in- 
 teresting one, for in its unformed condition lies 
 modern Christian Europe. The languages, as well as 
 the society, are in a chaotic condition ; and yet this 
 apparent confusion can be made clear by reducing the 
 whole ci\dhzation of the period into two elements. All 
 literature was divided between minstrels and monks, — 
 two classes of people. It is very seldom that so sharp 
 a distinction can be made ; but in the Middle Ages we 
 find the hopeless yearning of the monk, the rough jo}'- 
 ousness of the minstrel : everj'thing is decidedl}' sub- 
 jective or objective. 
 
 We followed the classic pagan Latin till it died out 
 in Boethius, 525 a. d. But, amidst the corruptions of 
 society, the gloomy thoughts and bombastic language 
 of the last classic Latin, a new spirit arose from an 
 unexpected source. The histories and commentaries 
 of the Fathers of the Church, the hymns of the Chris- 
 tians, are full of noble thoughts in a noble language — 
 what is called Mediaeval Latin, as distinct from the 
 classic Latin. It is not the Latin of Cicero and Taci- 
 tus ; but it became the language of the pulpit and the 
 school, and from it have proceeded our modern Ian- 
 
330 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 giiages. It was used for all literature, whieh was 
 composed b^' two distinct tj'pes of mind. Tlie clear- 
 headed, ambitious man of intellect saw in the church 
 and the monaster}' his surest path to power, and wrote 
 volumes of tlieological controversy'. The enthusiast, 
 to whom this world was but an abode lying in wicked- 
 ness, and the heavenly city his home, sang in exulting 
 strains of the New Jerusalem, the true home of the 
 spirit. Or some gentle soul, wounded and wearied 
 with the turmoil of Europe, where society was break- 
 ing up, sought the shelter of the cloister. Ilis sor- 
 row, his hopeless yearning for earthh' happiness, found 
 voice in passionate hymns, which express the love of 
 the heart for God. They were the outburst of souls 
 which had resigned all earthly happiness, and loved 
 God as other men loved their own families. Mat- 
 thew Arnold says: "The}' are the masterpieces of 
 spiritual work of the Aryan mind, taking pure religious 
 sentiment as their basis. The}' clothed themselves in 
 Middle- Age Latin, which is not the genuine native 
 voice of any European nation," — but are characteristic, 
 nevertheless. Another critic sa3's : *' Ten thousand 
 years separate the monastic poets from the last poet of 
 lieathen Rome. He had no thought of individual, per- 
 sonal goodness, or reformation ; while the ke3'-note of 
 the monastic hymns is the overpowering sense of sin." 
 
 Gradually the monasteries absorbed all the learning : 
 scholars, even if they felt no religious vocation, became 
 monks, that the}' might enjo}' the libraries of manu- 
 scripts which were collected b}' the studious among 
 the monks. Not onl}' the learning, but the architec- 
 ture, the art, the music, and the agriculture of the 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 331 
 
 period centred in the monastery. The monks cop- 
 ied and illuminated the manuscripts, sang the chants 
 of Ambrose and Gregory-, erected beautiful buildings ; 
 and, more important still, the}' cultivated the ground, 
 the}' cut down the forests, and drained the swamps, 
 and raised acres of grain and fruit and flowers, while 
 everybody else was fighting, and the land had become 
 a desert. It is hard to over-estimate the rough, hard 
 work they did toward clearing the forests and rendering 
 productive the land. Villemain says: "The civiliza- 
 tion of the Church is a kind of intermediate world be- 
 tween ancient and modern history." Montalembert 
 says, "The Church formed a kind of neutral ground 
 where Romans and barbarians could meet." You can 
 trace the progress of Christianity through Europe by 
 seeing the monks spring up in succession. 
 
 We must go back a httle to speak of the Fathers of 
 the Church, though we can only allude to the greatest 
 of them. We must turn our minds, and see the rise 
 of another literary centre. I have alluded elsewhere 
 to the greatest names of Byzantium, — Ulphilas and 
 Tribonian. The civilization which had been trans- 
 planted from Rome to Byzantium was modified by the 
 Greek literature. The Fathers of the Eastern Church 
 admired and studied Plato and Demosthenes. St. John 
 (347-407), surnamed Chrysostom, the golden-mouthed, 
 because he was so eloquent, is as great among Christian 
 orators as Demosthenes among pagan. The Christian 
 literature of Byzantium is wholly theological. Such 
 questions were to Byzantium what politics are to us. 
 The partisans of Arius and Athanasius frequently came 
 to blows about the divinity of Christ and the nature of 
 
332 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the Virgin Maiy. Surrounded b}^ the Greek drama as 
 they were, the Christians were inspired by its beautiful 
 choruses. The echoing measures which had celebrated 
 heathen deities were used to sound the praises of the 
 God of the Christians. The Greek hymns are not so 
 well known as the Latin, but are beautiful, especially 
 " Art thou weary, art thou languid?" 
 
 HYMN BY ST. ANATOLIUS (a.d. 458), 
 
 FOR THOSE AT SEA. 
 
 Fierce was the wild billow, 
 
 Dark was the night, 
 Oars labored heavily, 
 
 Foam glimmered white ; 
 Mariners trembled, 
 
 Peril was nigh ; 
 Then said the God of God, 
 
 "Peace! It is I." 
 
 Eidge of the mountain wave. 
 
 Lower thy crest ; 
 Wail of Euroklydon, 
 
 Be thou at rest : 
 Peril can never be. 
 
 Sorrow must fly, 
 Where saith the Light of Light, 
 
 " Peace ! It is I." 
 
 Jesu, Deliverer, 
 
 Come Thou to me ; 
 Soothe Thou my voyaging 
 
 Over life's sea : 
 Thou, when the storm of death 
 
 Roars, sweeping by, 
 Whisper, Truth ot' Truth, 
 
 " Peace ! It is I." 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 333 
 
 At the city of Milan, the Christians had bcTcome so 
 powerful, that Ambrose, the bishop, (340-397,) even 
 dared to rebuke the gi-eat Emperor Theodosius for or- 
 dering a massacre at Thessalonica. He forbade him to 
 enter the church, telling him that his presence would 
 pollute the holy building. Theodosius repented, did 
 penance, and thanked St. Ambrose for his faithful 
 boldness. Quarrels were constantl}^ coming up, and 
 a band of soldiers was finalty sent to carry Ambrose 
 to prison. and to exile. He and his friends barricaded 
 themselves in the church, and there remained all night ; 
 and, to rouse their enthusiasm and sustain their cour- 
 age, the}" sang the Latin h^^mns which Ambrose had 
 composed, in imitation of the Eastern Church. The 
 soldiers were withdrawn, and he was allowed to remain 
 and preach in Milan. We remember him, not for his 
 seiTHons and commentaries, but for his hj-mns. The 
 most famous are the Easter song, "This is the very 
 day of God " ; the evening song, ' ' O God ! creation's 
 secret force"; the Christmas song, "Come, Redeemer 
 of the nations " ; and the hymn to the Trinity which 
 Luther copied and translated. Indeed, they are the 
 models which inspired Luther's h^Tuns. Ambrose was 
 the first in the Western, Latin Church to realize the 
 immense power which might be exercised b}^ music in 
 subduing the barbarians, and spreading the conquests 
 of the Church as an organization. He was the first 
 to put sacred music into definite form. He introduced 
 chanting ; and his manner of singing the ser\ice is still 
 called the Ambrosian chant. It is a lineal descendant 
 of the antiphonal Greek chorus. We must remember 
 that Ambrose's h3'mns are not written in rhyme. 
 
334 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 HYMN FOR ADVENT. 
 
 Hark ! a thrilling voice is sounding : 
 
 " Christ is nigh," it seems to say ; 
 " Cast away the dreams of darkness, 
 
 O, ye children of the day ! " 
 Wakened by the solemn warning, 
 
 Let the earth-born soul arise ; 
 Christ, her sun, all ill dispelling, 
 
 Shines upon the morning skies. 
 Lo ! the Lamb, so long expected, 
 
 Comes wdth pardon down from heaven : 
 Let us haste, with tears of sorrow, 
 
 One and all, to be forgiven. 
 That when next he comes with glory. 
 
 And the world is ^vrapped in fear, 
 With his mercy he may shield us. 
 
 And with words of love draw near. 
 Honor, gloiy, might, and blessing 
 
 To the Father and the Son, 
 With the everlasting Spirit, 
 
 While eternal ages run. Amen. 
 
 To m}' mind, this is the most interesting, because the 
 most spiritual, of Ambrose's hymns. Usually they are 
 doctrinal, putting some great doctrine into poetical 
 form. They sound like a paraphrase of Scripture. 
 The theological thought contained seems to be enough 
 for Ambrose ; the resurrection to another life seems to 
 him matter enough for celebration ; and he does not 
 make a spiritual ai)plication of it to the soul of the 
 individual in this present life. 
 
 Prudentius was a layman, but has left most beautiful 
 hymns, full of an enthusiasm inspired by that certainty 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 835 
 
 of immortalit}' which Christiauit}' taught, and which was 
 such a contrast to paganism. 
 
 FUNERAL HYMN BY PRUDENTIUS. 
 
 (a. D. 348.) 
 
 Each sorrowful mourner, he silent ! 
 Fond mothers, give over your weeping! 
 None grieve for these pledges as perished ; 
 This dying is life's reparation. 
 Now take him, O earth, to thy keeping, 
 And give him soft rest in thy hosom. 
 I lend thee the frame of a Christian, 
 I intrust thee the generous fragments, 
 Thou holily guard the deposit ; 
 He will well, He will surely require it, 
 Who, forming it, made its creation 
 The type of His image and likeness. 
 But until the resolvahle hody 
 Thou recallest, God, and reformest, 
 What regions unkno\^ni to the mortal 
 Dost thou will the pure soul to inhabit ? 
 It shall rest upon Abraham's bosom, 
 As the spirit of blessed Eleazar, 
 Whom, afar in that Paradise, Dives 
 Beholds from the flames of his torments. 
 We follow thy saying. Redeemer, 
 Whereby, as on death thou wast trampling, 
 The thief, thy companion, thou willedst 
 To tread in thy footsteps and triumph. 
 To the faithful the bright way is open. 
 Henceforward, to Paradise leading ; 
 And to that blest grove we have access. 
 Whereof man was bereaved by the serpent. 
 Thou Leader and Guide of thy people, 
 
336 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Give command that the soul of thy servant 
 Llay have holy repose in the country 
 Whence exile and erring he wandered. 
 We will honor the place of his resting 
 With violets and garlands of flowers, 
 And will sprinkle inscription and marble 
 With odors of costliest fragrance : 
 For what mean the tombs that we quarry, 
 What the art that our monuments boast in, 
 But that this which we trust to their keeping 
 Is not dead, but reposing iii slumber? 
 
 It is hard for us to realize that the northern coast of 
 Africa was once the seat of the highest civilization of 
 the period. Saint Augustine was born near Carthage, 
 A. D. 354. His mother, Monica, had been converted 
 to Christianit}' ; but he was a pagan, and passed his 
 early life in dissipation first, in stud}' afterwards. Fi- 
 nally- he became a Christian, through the praj'ers of 
 his mother and the teaching?; of Ambrose, the brave 
 Bishop of Milan. He was made Bishop of Hippo, in 
 Africa, near Carthagfe, and is probably the greatest 
 theologian the world has ever seen. The doctrines 
 which we call Calvinism are found in his writings : but 
 the dr}' hard statements of Calvin lose their most repul- 
 sive features in the spiritual and eloquent expositions 
 of Augustine ; for he united the passionate heart of 
 Africa to a clear and logical brain. His controversial 
 writings are not of universal interest ; but two of his 
 works have been admired and loved for centuries, and 
 can never be forgotten. The first is his Confessions ; 
 the stor}' of a soul wandering and confused, but coming 
 at length into peace and rest b}' knowing and loving 
 God. It is one of the few great devotional books of the 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 337 
 
 world. B}' Confessions, he means rather a different idea 
 from that which we attach to the word. There is no long 
 list of actual crimes : instead, it is an anahsis of a soul 
 and an intellect, which loved this world and its own 
 opinions better than God. It is the confession of 
 wrong thoughts and affections, not of wrong actions. 
 Yet Saint Augustine was a verj' good man, according to 
 the pagan standard ; but when he has once caught sight 
 of God's purity, a crushing sense of sin overwhelms 
 him. His self-abasement seems almost unnatural. But 
 Augustine loves God so much that he longs to resemble 
 Him ; and his own natm-e looks dark to him, in com- 
 parison with that awful purity. The word acknowledg- 
 ment would express our idea of the second thought of 
 the book. It is an acknowledgment of God's incom- 
 parable beautj^ and goodness. Saint Augustine not only 
 believes in God with his head, he loves him with his 
 heart. He exclaims, " Not with doubting, but with as- 
 sured consciousness, do I love Thee, O Lord ! " And 
 he wishes to confess him before men. There is an 
 absolute realit}^ in the book. His spiritual life was 
 his chief concern, — an actual, real thing to him. He 
 knew God as clearly and as nearty as we know our 
 living friends. And yet there is an exquisitelj^ human 
 touch in the beautiful description he gives of his last 
 conversation with his mother, Monica, as the}^ stopped 
 at Ostia, on their return from Africa, and of her death. 
 This is a small part of it : — 
 
 " It chanced that she and I stood alone, leaning in a certain 
 window which looked into the garden of the house where we 
 now lay, at Ostia ; where, removed from the din of men, we 
 were recruiting from the fatigues of a long journey. We were 
 
 22 
 
338 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 discoursing then together alone, very sweetly : and forgetting 
 those things which are behind, and reaching forth to those 
 which are before, we were inquiring between, ourselves, in the 
 presence of the Truth which Thou art, of what sort the eternal 
 life of the saints was to be. Scarce five days after, she fell sick 
 of a fever. Looking on me and my brother, standing by her, 
 * There,' said she, ' shall you bury your mother.' I held my 
 peace and refrained weeping, but my brother spake something ; 
 •wishing for her, as the happier lot, that she might die, not in a 
 strange place, but in her own land. Whereat she with anxious 
 look, checking him with her eyes, for that he still savored such 
 things; and then looking upon me, 'Behold what he saith'; 
 and soon after to us both, ' Lay,' she saith, ' this body anywhere, 
 let not the care for that anyway disquiet you ; this only I 
 request, that you would remember me at the Lord's altar, 
 wherever you be.' But I, considering Thy gifts. Thou unseen 
 God, which Thou instillest into the hearts of Thy faithful ones, 
 whence wondrous fruits do spring, did rejoice and give thanks 
 to Thee, recalling what I knew before, — how careful and 
 anxious she had ever been, as to her place of burial, which 
 she provided and prepared for herself, by the body of her 
 husband." 
 
 Lovers of music in church will be glad to know what 
 St. Augustine thought about that. 
 
 " Sometimes I err in too great strictness, and to that degree 
 as to wish the whole melody of sweet music which is used to 
 Da\dd's Psalter banished from my ears, and the Church's too. 
 And yet, again, when I remember the tears I shed at the 
 psalmody of Thy Church, in the beginning of my recovered 
 •faith, and how at this time I am moved, not with the singing, 
 but the things sung, when tliey are sung with a clear voice and 
 modulation most suital)le, I acknowledge the use of this in- 
 stitution. Thus I fluctuate between peril of pleasure and 
 approved wholesomeness ; inclined the rather, though not pro- 
 nouncing an irrevocable opinion, to ajiprove of the usage of 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 839 
 
 singing in church, that so by the delight of the ears the weaker 
 minds may rise to the feeling of devotion." 
 
 St. Augustine's other popular work is called " The 
 City of God." It is the Christian model of a city, as 
 compared with Plato's model state of socletj'. It has 
 twenty-two books : the first ten confute pagan reli- 
 gion and practices ; the last twelve set forth Chris- 
 tian doctrine, under the form of two cities, — the city 
 of the world and the city of God ; and it prophesies the 
 futm-e triumphs of the gospel, in exulting strains. One 
 critic sa3-s, " The world has set the Cit}^ of God among 
 the few gi'eatest books of all time." It has abstract 
 thought in popular language. It deserves to be classed 
 among the great epics of the world ; 3'et, grand as it is, 
 it has not that personal feeling which makes the Con- 
 fessions so unrivalled. 
 
 With the death of Boethius, 525, and the great king 
 of the Ostro-Goths, Theodoric, open the Middle Ages. 
 He learned to read, and invited learned men to his 
 court, and embraced the Arian form of Christianity. 
 (The Moeso-Goths had already been converted, in 355, 
 under Byzantine influence.) The next Teutons to 
 embrace Christianitj- were the Franks. Radegonda, 
 the Christian wife of a Frankish king, obtained permis- 
 sion from her husband to found a convent at Poitiers, 
 in the country which is now France. The Abbess 
 Agnes and herself passed their time in literary con- 
 versation and writing poetr3^ They were visited by a 
 learned Italian, Venantius Fortunatus, 530-609. Tliis 
 is the same Fortunatus who met Welsh bards at the 
 court of the Frankish kings. He first put h3'mns into 
 rhj'me ; they have been preserved till this da}'. One 
 
340 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 of them is the Vexilla Regis, "The royal banners 
 forward go," which deserves to live, it is so musical. 
 This is the only cultivated society we read of in the 
 interval of utter darkness from Theodoric to Alfred. 
 We must seek another country ; yet not quite another, 
 for the Latin language and the monasteries gave unity 
 to Europe in this period. 
 
 The bus}' monks kept a Latin diary of the events of 
 every day. From these chronicles we obtain the facts 
 of mediaeval histor3\ To these narrow-minded monks 
 there was no proportion in events. The visit of a 
 foreign brother to their monaster}^, or the earliest fruit 
 of the season upon their table, was as important to 
 them as the death of some powerful king, and are all 
 jumbled together op one page of a chronicle. The 
 proverb says, " dull as a monkish chronicle" ; but they 
 are sometimes interesting from their very naivete. 
 These monkish chronicles were lent, and copied, from 
 the monasteries of Britain to those of Rome. The 
 earliest of them are found among the Kelts inhabiting 
 Britain, who had been converted to Christianity in the 
 first centur}' b^^ the Romans, as we saw in the Keltic 
 / chapter. Gildas at Dumbarton in Scotland, and Nen- 
 "* nius at Bangor in Wales, in the sixth century wrote 
 Latin histories of the Britons. These Keltic monks 
 seem the most poetical and interesting. Their ardent 
 natures embraced Christianity with enthusiasm. 
 
 " St. Cadoc made all his scholars learn Virgil by heart, and 
 once he began to weep at the thought that Virgil, whom he 
 loved so much, might even then be in hell. St. Cadoc doubted 
 if he were ; but his friend Gildas was sure that Virgil was 
 damned. St. Cadoc fell asleep, and heard a voice saying, 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 341 
 
 * Pray for me ! pray for me ! never be weary of praying for me. 
 I shall yet sing eternally the mercy of the Lord.' So St. 
 Cadoc was consoled." 
 
 Then St. Brandan, a Welsh monk, felt pity for 
 perishing souls, and he set sail for Ireland to found 
 a monaster}^ there. All the bees from the Welsh 
 monastery followed ; so he turned back, but the bees 
 turned also. Then he started again for Ireland, and 
 the bees swarmed in his ship, and would not leave it. 
 So he took that blessing to Ireland, where the}' had 
 been before unknown. When the good St. Brandan 
 had founded man}' monasteries, then he sailed again 
 into the ocean to seek new souls to convert. But he 
 was carried to the earthly paradise, which was an island 
 distinctly visible from the west coast of Ireland, and he 
 returned no more. Now these delightful creatures are 
 living figures. But a cold recital of actual facts tells 
 us that really Ireland was in the seventh century the 
 most cultivated country in Western Europe : three thou- 
 sand students attended the school at Armagh*. War 
 and religion w^ere the two passions of the Irish. Ire- 
 land swarmed with monks, who were at first the clans 
 reorganized under a religious form, and some monas- 
 teries had a bard attached to them. The reader will 
 remember that Ireland and Scotland had incessant in- 
 tercourse ; so he will not be surprised that St. Columba 
 went from^ Ireland to lona in Scotland. He and his 
 followers converted the Angles north of the Tees ; and 
 finally, coming from lona to Lindisfarne and Whitby, 
 they assisted in bringing Christianity to the Anglo- 
 Saxons in England. So the Kelts returned good for 
 evil to the Saxons who had driven them away. 
 
342 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 The Anglo-Saxon monks had their chronicles written 
 in Latin. The most famous of them is the " Histor^^ 
 of the Anglo-Saxon Church, by the Venerable Bede," 
 which is realh' a first-class book. " He was the first 
 barbarian to win a place among the Fathers of the 
 Church." (672-735.) In another chapter I spoke of 
 their writings in their native tongue. The^' were the 
 onl}' monks in Europe who condescended to use their 
 vernacular. The great and good King Alfred endeav- 
 ored to form a literar}^ societ}'. He learned to read, and 
 himself translated Bede's histor^^ into Anglo-Saxon. 
 
 We find another of the human links which bind 
 society in examining the rise of the German monks. 
 The restless Angles and Saxons who had invaded Eng- 
 land had gone unconsciously to meet their destin}'. 
 AYhen converted, the}^ thought of theh' brethren in Ger- 
 many, and the brave Boniface went over and converted 
 the Saxons who had remained at home, 755 a. d. 
 They translated the Gospels and Psalms into German, 
 and adopted the Bible of Bishop Ulphilas, 355 a. d., 
 which was suflSciently near their language to answer 
 ever}' purpose. Their Latin literature is not worth 
 alluding to. The}' have left nothing to compare with 
 the admirable chronicles of Keltic and Anglo-Saxon 
 monks, or the theological and m3'stical and poetical 
 works of the French monks. 
 
 Then comes the great Charlemagne, "742-814. His 
 friend and tutor, "the learned Alcuin, that large- 
 browed clerk," was a Saxon monk ; for Charlemagne 
 brought back Christianity from his wars witli the 
 Saxons. He himself composed the hj-mn Veni Crea- 
 tor Spu'itus, " Come, Holy Ghost, Creator, come, In- 
 
MEDIAEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 343 
 
 spire these souls of thine," which is so veiy familiar 
 to all. He founded schools called scholce^ — our word 
 scholasticism comes from it, — and gave the teaching 
 into the hands of the monks. These French monks are 
 the lineal descendants of Augustine ; the}^ are remark- 
 able for their theological writings and their scholastic 
 philosoplw, which ruled Europe from the eighth to the 
 fifteenth century. There was no other serious study in 
 Europe, — no science, no political econoni}' ; the clergy 
 absorbed everything, partly because they alone had 
 time for study. There was but one learned layman in 
 Europe for six centuries ; and he was a Kelt, John 
 Scotus Erigena. He went from Ireland to France to 
 study, and wrote in Latin of course. Mr. Leck}^ sa3's : 
 "His thoughts were far in advance of his age: even 
 modern thinkers have not gone much beyond him." 
 He was persecuted by the Church, and his works con- 
 demned as pantheistic. He denied the Romish doc- 
 trine of transubstantiation, and taught what Protestants 
 believe, — that the Lord's supper is simpl}' a commem- 
 orative rite ; so naturall}^ he w^ould be persecuted. 
 
 The extraordinary empire of scholasticism over the 
 minds of men was based upon the writings of Aristotle. 
 These were received into Europe in two ways. I allude 
 particularly to these as showing how curiousl}' nations 
 are connected. His works on logic — that is, on the 
 proper wa}' to reason — had been translated into Latin 
 by Boethius, in the sixth centur}^, and so had circulated 
 from one monastery to another. His works upon sci- 
 ence had been translated from Greek into the Syriac lan- 
 guage, in the fifth centur}^, by the Nestorian Christians 
 who fled from Byzantium into Persia. In the seventh 
 
344 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 centuiy Persia was conquered b}^ the MohammedaQ Ara- 
 bians. The}' were so mucli pleased with Aristotle that 
 the}^ translated his writings into Arabic, and carried 
 them to Spain. They furnished the Mohammedans in 
 Spain with part of their knowledge of science, and from 
 Spain the}^ easily spread through Europe. From the 
 Arabic the}' were made into a very poor translation in 
 Latin ; after so many different bodies, but little of their 
 original spirit could have been left. I hope this expla- 
 nation will not seem unnecessar3\ In the next chapter 
 the reader will understand why it was made ; and Aris- 
 totle, mangled and ill understood as he was, became 
 the absolute authorit}' in all matters of reasoning and 
 of science, as the Bible was in all matters of faith. It 
 was an intellectual despotism. The services to human- 
 ity of the first monks scared}' counterbalance the follies 
 of scholasticism. It is hardl}' worth while to discuss 
 their opinions, forgotten now : we will onl}' speak of 
 the most interesting topic they discussed, and the two 
 most interesting personages, — Abelard, 1079-1142, 
 and St. Bernard of Clairvaux, 1071-1153, — the two 
 names which stand out to represent the period. 
 
 Abelard has been called the "patriarch of modern 
 rationalism." He marks a new epoch in thought. He, 
 first, undertook to appl}' logic to theolog}', — to bring 
 logic as an independent power to aid in proving the 
 truths of religion. That is, he sought to prove the 
 dogmas of the Church b}- reason, instead of blindl}- 
 accepting them through faith. He uttered the opinion, 
 then very audacious, that all theological dogmas should 
 be presented in such a way as to appeal to the reason. 
 He did not question then- truth, but he wished that 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 345 
 
 they should be examined and tested by reasoning. 
 Mr. Lewes saj'S,* " Logic played like lalnbent flame 
 around the most sacred subjects, under the plausible 
 aspect of seeking for truth." Abelard represents the 
 spirit of free inquiiy, and was therefore the forerun- 
 ner of Luther and Protestantism. His brilliant elo- 
 quence and his innumerable hearers awoke all the 
 thunders of the Chm-ch, and St. Bernard of Clair- 
 vaux, a stern controversialist, came to the rescue. 
 With great ability he asserted the doctrine of the 
 Church ; which is, that faith is the source of all light, — 
 of all science, metaphj'sics, and human knowledge, — 
 and that this faith is taught b}' the Church alone. The 
 Church is the supreme authorit}' in matters of science, 
 as well as of religion. Abelard was overwhelmed, and 
 recanted his ideas. 
 
 These theological discussions ma}' seem ver}- dull to 
 us ; but they did not, evidentl}', to the people of that 
 time, for thirty thousand attended the lectures of one 
 man alone. I onl}' dwell upon •these names to show 
 how barren was the mind of those days ; to emphasize 
 the fact, that all serious literature took a theological 
 impress. Yet man's spiritual nature can never be 
 utterl}' crushed down ; and as a reaction from the end- 
 less discussions of Abelard and St. Bernard rose U2), 
 from an unknown source, the most devotional of all 
 books, — the m^'stic writings called by the name of 
 Thomas a Kempis. Some gentle monk, shut out by his 
 own choice from the activities of this present world, 
 lost himself in contemplating the future hfe, and annihi- 
 lated his own existence in the Divine existence. This 
 mysticism we have found in India and Persia, and shall 
 
346 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 find in Germany, in the fourteenth centmy, in Tauler, a 
 monk. It is common to the Ar3'an faiiiilies. It teaches 
 the nothingness of all creation, in comparison with the 
 love of God, and the joy of communion with him. 
 It expressed itself also in poetry ; hymns appeared 
 again in great number. In this second period, Latin 
 hymns reached their perfection. They were alwa3-s 
 long ; so that, in tmnslating, we divide them into several 
 different hymns. The four which are the most cele- 
 brated, because the greatest, express the mental phases 
 of the epoch. The awful Dies Iroe, " Day of Wrath," 
 (thirteenth century,) paints the final judgment, which 
 the Church suspended over the guilty sinner, and thus 
 wielded a tremendous power over men's fears and 
 terrors. The pathetic Stabat Mater (thirteenth cen- 
 tury),— 
 
 " By the cross her station keeping 
 Stood the mournful mother, weeping," — 
 
 appealed to their tenderest emotions of love and pit}', 
 at the sight of one dying for them. The triumphant 
 Jerusalem the Golden (twelfth century) oflcred conso- 
 lation for the sutferings of this world. 
 
 " Brief life is here our portion, 
 Brief toil, unending care," — 
 has been made into a separate hymn in our translation ; 
 and thus the unity of Bernard of Cluny's thought has 
 been destroyed. The four hymns marked 490, 491, 
 492, 493, should be read as one. Finally, the personal 
 experience of the individual soul was expressed in the 
 passionate Jesu Dulcis Memoria : — 
 
 " Jesus, the very thought of thee 
 With sweetness fills my breast." 
 
MEDLEY AL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 347 
 
 It was the stem controversialist, Bernard of Clair- 
 vaux, who wrote this most m^'stic and subjective of all 
 the Latin hymns (twelfth century). This one is less 
 known : — 
 
 HEAVEN. 
 By Hildebert, Archbishop of Tours (1057-1134). 
 
 Mine be Zion's habitation, 
 Zion, David's sure foundation ; 
 Formed of old by hght's Creator, 
 Keached by Him, the Mediator. 
 An apostle guards the portal, 
 Habited by forms immortal: 
 On a jasper pavement builded, 
 By its Monarch's radiance gilded, 
 Peace there dwelleth uninvaded, 
 Spring perpetual, light unfaded : 
 Odors rise with airy lightness ; 
 Harpers strike their harps of brightness ; 
 None one sigh for pleasure sendeth ; 
 None can err, and none offendeth ; 
 All, partakers of one nature. 
 Grow in Christ to equal stature. 
 Home celestial ! Home eternal ! 
 Home upreared by power supernal ! 
 Home no change nor loss that fearest I 
 Erom afar my soul thou cheerest ; 
 But the gladness of thy nation. 
 But their fulness of salvation, 
 Vainly mortals strive to show it : 
 They, and they alone, can know it, — 
 They, redeemed from sin and peril. 
 They who walk thy streets of beryl ! 
 Grant me, Saviour, with thy blessed, 
 Of thy rest to be possessed ! 
 
348 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Mediaeval Latin hymns are a genuine production, 
 and deserve to stand on their own merits. (The medi- 
 aeval Latin prose is not so good.) In them the form is 
 as beautiful as the thought. Rhyme was a new element 
 of poetr}'. The Latin hymns invented it, introduced 
 fixed laws for it, and finally, after six centuries, it 
 reached the perfection of the following lines, which are 
 certainly perfect music in themselves. The}'^ are quite 
 as worth}^ to be praised and copied as the Greek un- 
 rhymed metres. 
 
 " Stant Sion atria conjubilantia, martyre plena, 
 Give micantia, Principe stantia, luce serena : 
 Est ibi pascua mitibus afflua, praestita Sanctis, 
 Regis ibi thronus, agminis et sonus est epulantis. 
 Geus duce splendida, concio Candida vestibus altis, 
 Sunt sine fletibus in Sion sedibiis, sedibus almis ; 
 Sunt sine crimine, sunt sine turbine, sunt sine lite 
 In Sion tedibus editoribus Israelitae." 
 
 "They stand, those walls of Sion," is the equivalent. 
 Here is another, with a rhyme in the middle of the 
 
 line : — 
 
 " Felix Anna, ex te manna 
 Mundo datur, quo poscatur 
 
 In deserto populus : 
 Hoc dulcore, hoc sapore 
 Sustentatur, procreatur, 
 
 Ex manna vermiculus." 
 
 The English monks exercised but little influence 
 compared with the French monks, w^hose scholasticism 
 ruled Europe for several centuries ; but they have left 
 some good Latin chronicles. Geoffrey of Monmouth 
 tells the story of Arthur ; and William of Mahnesbury 
 
MEDIiEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 349 
 
 wrote a histoiy of the English kings, from the Norman 
 conquest, 106G, to 1142. His book has been trans- 
 lated ; it is most delightful, — so gossiping and naive 
 and full of wonders and miracles. It is well to read it 
 and learn how William Rufus was shot ; how Henry 
 and Stephen quarrelled with their barons ; how the 
 gTcat bishop, Roger le Poer, built cathedrals and cas- 
 tles. So here, in these monkish chronicles of all lands, 
 history begins. 
 
 If the monk, in his two forms, either a keen logician 
 or a devout m3'stic, is the representative of the Middle 
 Ages, there was another tj'pe which could no longer 
 be repressed. The men who lived and loved and 
 fought in this present world, and cared little about the 
 next, began to assert themselves. To please them, the 
 monks took an important step. It is to the latter 
 we owe what, at first glance, seems ver}' remote from 
 them, — the drama. The whole modern drama can be 
 distincth' traced to the Miracle pla3's, which the clergy 
 used to represent in the churches. The fathers of the 
 Church had extinguished the theatres ever3'where ; but 
 in B^-zantium the Greek love of the drama persistently" 
 lingered. The Bishop of Constantinople composed 
 plays on Christ's passion, to supersede the dramas of 
 Sophokles and Euripides. The}' were first performed 
 in Constantinople, and the returning Crusaders brought 
 them back. These plays were first acted in Latin, 
 probabh' in the twelfth century ; afterwards they were 
 written in the dialect of the country, whether Italy, 
 France, German}^, or England. They gave scenes from 
 the life of the Saviour, or the lives of the saints : the 
 action took place on a middle stage ; below, devils were 
 
350 SANSKKIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 writhing in flames ; above, God the Father on the judg- 
 ment seat was sitting. Later came the Moralit}' plays, 
 where the vices and virtues were represented as human 
 beings. Onl}^ the clergy were allowed to act in these 
 dramas, which formed the book of the common people, 
 in those da3's. Certainh^, they seem very shocking and 
 irreverent to us ; but where else were the poor, igno- 
 rant people to learn about Mary and Joseph and Herod, 
 — about Abraham, and Isaac's sacrifice, — and all the 
 other characters of the Bible? There was one other 
 source ; the statues on the porches, the painted glass 
 in the windows of cathedrals. This poem was written 
 later, but it so describes the spirit of this period that it 
 may come in here. It is very lovely. 
 
 PRAYER TO THE VIRGIN, 
 By Francois Villox, a Trouvere (14th century). 
 
 Queen of the skies, and Regent of the earth, 
 
 Empress of all that dwells beneath ! 
 Receive me, poor and low, of little worth, 
 
 Among thy chosen after death. 
 Nothing I bring with me, nothing I have ; 
 
 But yet thy mercy, Lady, is as great 
 As all my sum of sins. Beyond the grave, 
 
 Without thy mercy, none can ask of fate 
 To enter heaven ; and without guile or lie 
 
 I in thy faith will faithful live and die. 
 Only a woman, humble, poor, and old ; 
 
 Letters I read not, nothing know, 
 But see in church, with painted flames of gold, 
 
 That Hell where all the wicked go; 
 And, joyous with glad hai-ps, God's Paradise. 
 
 One fills my heart with fear, one with delight ; 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 351 
 
 For sinners all may turn repentant eyes 
 To thee, O Lady, merciful and bright. 
 
 With faith down laden : — without guile or lie 
 I in thy faith will faithful live and die. 
 
 But the minstrels, who represent the objective side 
 of Europe, had been constantly gaining ground. They 
 were numerous and powerful, and constantly waged 
 war upon the monks. So these latter took another 
 step to gain the favor of the lait}^, and endeavored to 
 reach a higher class of people. They wrote tales which 
 the}' called gesta^ from a Latin word which means ac- 
 tions. These monkish gesta are a curious mixture of 
 legends from the lives of the saints, from classic history, 
 done into a barbarous, mixed Latin. They would be 
 read aloud in the lons^ winter evenings, when the monk 
 and his guests would be seated around the refector}^ 
 fire. From some returned Crusader, some wandering 
 minstrel, these stories must have derived their la}^ 
 element. 
 
 For the power of the minstrels could no longer be 
 checked. Popular poetr}^, crushed under scholastic 
 theology, lived in the hearts of the people. Low-born 
 minstrels, called Jongleurs, — our w^ord juggler comes 
 from this, — wandered from castle to castle of the igno- 
 rant nobles (who did nothing but fight) , and sang those 
 ballads which afterwards expanded into the literature 
 of modern Europe. The languages which they used 
 were as chaotic as the thoughts, — a compound of the 
 native dialect of Kelt and Teuton with the monkish 
 Latin, different in each different countr3\ These in- 
 numerable ballads may be grouped into four divisions, 
 which literary men call cycles. We have already seen 
 
352 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 two of these cycles arise ; for the same cycles were car- 
 ried into each different country of Europe by the Jon- 
 gleurs. The first cycle to arise was the Keltic, — that 
 of Arthur and the round-table knights ; to it was after- 
 wards added their search for the H0I3' Grail, which was 
 originall}^ a separate stor3\ The next cycle to take 
 form and spread were the ballads of the Gothic, Frank- 
 ish, and Burgundian pagans, that is the Nibelungen 
 Lied. These warriors all belonged to the Teutonic fam- 
 ily. Charlemagne was German at heart : in his Saxon 
 wars he collected these old ballads ; the}" were sung 
 probably at his court, and there received their Christian 
 modifications, — there the wild Norse sea-rovers were 
 tamed into Chi'istian knights. The}' are not'mj'stic 
 and spiritual, so that we know the}' were untouched 
 by the religious spirit which transformed the Keltic 
 cj'cle. The third cj'cle was that of Charlemagne and 
 his twelve peers, and with this is connected the Spanish 
 cycle of the Cid : all these heroes fight against the 
 Saracens. It was not composed, of course, until one 
 or two centuries had elapsed, and allowed Charlemagne 
 and Roland to assume heroic proportions. This is the 
 cycle which is typical of the Middle Ages. 
 
 It is now known from what source the chivalric spirit 
 came into the mind of Europe. It was in a curious, 
 roundabout way. Nationalities had become so mixed 
 and fused together that a perfectly distinct type — Uke 
 Arthur among the Kelts, Siegfried among the Teutons 
 — could hardly be reproduced. The mixed nations 
 could not have a genuine native voice ; still, their tone 
 of mind was the same, — it was chivalric. And this 
 they adopted from a new people. The reader will 
 
MEDLEY AL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 353 
 
 remember how Aristotle came into Em-ope. The Mo- 
 hammedan Arabs conquered the Persians ; adopted 
 from them the science of Aristotle, the figures which 
 we use, the game of chess (the Persians took these two 
 from the Hindus) ; also, the chivalric tone of mind. 
 Thej' carried them to the Mohammedans living in 
 Spain, called Moors ; and the latter taught them to 
 the Spaniards. The Spanish cj^cle of the Cid caught 
 the precise tone of the event it described, which was the 
 perpetual fight of the Christians with the Pagans in 
 Spain ; but the loft}' courtes}' of the Moors gave man- 
 ners to this warfare which made it quite unlike -the 
 brutal fights of Romans and Barbarians elsewhere. 
 The earlier wars in Europe had been merel}' for ag- 
 grandizement of territory and power ; but these barba- 
 rians, once Christianized, fought for a religious motive, 
 and therefore the t3'pical hero of the Middle Ages is 
 a Christian fighting with a Saracen. Long before the 
 Crusades the holy war began, — first in Spain. Here 
 it took on the chivalric manners of the gallant and 
 gi-aceful Moors, which soon spread over Europe. The 
 Spanish ballads of the Cid are purely chivalric. This 
 is owing to their passing through Moorish influence, 
 which took out the wonderful or supernatural in them. 
 So I shall not dwell upon them, fine and stirring as 
 they are. 
 
 The "Song of Roland," which is the finest of the 
 Charlemagne cycle, on the contrary, has' a very large 
 share of the supernatural, thus pro\ing its Ar^-an ori- 
 gin : it is not purely chivalric. This is why it is so 
 beautiful : it unites a childlike faith in the marvellous 
 to the most noble and manly traits of character. Ro- 
 
 23 
 
354 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 land is the true knight of the Middle Ages. He has an 
 exalted resi^ect for woman, an honor towards his foe ; 
 a spirit of patriotic self-sacrifice towards his countr}', 
 but also a devout faith in Christianit}*. He is armed 
 bj- faith and love of God. These sentiments must have 
 found a response in the hearts of old feudal France, 
 among its original people, for the ballads grew up spon- 
 taneousl}' ; their author is unknown, but they breathe 
 the perfume of reality. The French ma}' well be proud 
 of them; "The Song of Roland" ought to be their 
 national epic. It was sung at the battle of Hastings, 
 when the Normans conquered England, in 1066. It 
 was written in the old Frankish dialect, translated into 
 Latin by the monks, then back again into the old 
 French in which we now have it, which is easier to 
 understand than old English, — Chaucer's, for instance. 
 It has latel}' been put into modern French. You will 
 find a new tone in the stor}', very unlike that of the 
 other epics ; no paganism is here. The Moorish king of 
 Spain, who was a Mohammedan, sends to Charlemagne 
 to ask for peace, after Charlemagne had been fighting 
 against him for seven j'ears. Ganelon, the traitor, tells 
 Charlemagne that the Moorish king will submit, if 
 Charlemagne will withdraw his arm}', and march out of 
 Spain. So Charlemagne marches away, leaving the 
 rear-guard of the French army under command of Ro- 
 land. There are but twenty thousand men, and the 
 false Moor falls upon them while they are passing 
 through the mountain pass of Roncevaux, or Ronces- 
 valles in Spanish. His friends beg Roland to sound 
 his horn, knowing that Charlemagne will at once return 
 if he hears this cr}- of distress: But Roland scornfully 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 355 
 
 refuses. The Saracens attack the French, and finally 
 kill every man of the tweutj^ thousand, except Eoland. 
 He has been performing prodigies of valor, and slaying 
 hundreds of men with his own arm and his own sword, 
 Durandal. Finall}' his head splits open at the temple, 
 and he feels that his death is near. So he sounds the 
 horn at last, to call Charlemagne, though too late. 
 Then, at the last moment, four hundred Saracens at- 
 tack him at once. His bod}^ does not receive the least 
 scratch, but his head splits more and more ; 3'et he 
 repulses the four hundred till they flee. Then he stag- 
 gers to a rock rising out of the plain, and strikes his 
 sword Durandal against it. He wishes to break Duran- 
 dal, so that no paynim Saracen may get possession of 
 it; but the good sword will not break. Now I will 
 give a hteral translation. He sa3's : — 
 
 " Durandal, my darling, thou art shining and white ; 
 All the rays of the sun are reflected by thee. 
 One day the king was in the valley of Mauriveine, 
 When an angel came to him from the Lord, 
 And told him to give thee to a brave and valiant knight. 
 Then Charles the Great girded thee on my side. 
 Go die, good sword, and do not fall into the hands of any 
 
 paynim. 
 May God save France from any such dishonor ! " 
 
 " On a dark rock he struck the sword with fury, and he made 
 an enormous breach in the side of the rock. The blade sprang 
 back, and sparkled in the air. The Count saw that nothing 
 could break his sword, and with a dying voice he repeated his 
 complamt : ' My beloved Durandal, as beautiful as you are 
 holy, your golden hilt contains relics of great value : a lock of 
 hair of St. Denis, the blood of St. Basil, a tooth of St. Peter, 
 
356 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 a piece of the Virgin Mary's dress. Such an arm is not made 
 for paynims. No, no ! you must have a Christian master.' 
 Then, feeling death nearer and nearer, he lies down under a 
 pine-tree, and he hides his horn and his sword under his body. 
 He turns his face towards the host of the infidels. He wishes, 
 glorious Count, that Charles and his army, returning, shall 
 find him here, and declare that he died victorion?. He con- 
 fesses all the sins lie can remember, then he offers his glove to 
 God. [This was the sign of submission from a vassal to a feudal 
 lord.] ' True Father,' said he, ' who never liest to anybody, 
 through whom the dead Lazarus opened his eyes in heaven, 
 and who didst know how to preserve Daniel from the lions, 
 save me from danger, and pardon my soul from the punish- 
 ments which thy justice might claim.' Saying this, he held 
 out his right-hand glove. The angel Gabriel received it fi'om 
 his hand. Then God sent Michael, and the two carried the 
 soul of the Count to paradise." 
 
 There are a simplicity' and faith in this which are the 
 best characteristics of the Middle Ages. Roland is nofc 
 the t^'pe which afterwards was fastened upon Arthur 
 and Galahad, the Christian monk. He is a man in this 
 world fighting a brave fight ; but a Christian still, and 
 hoping for paradise. He reminds one of Eustem in the 
 Shah Nameh, constantly;; and, like his, Roland's name 
 is attached to the valley in Spain where he died. But 
 the supernatural traits of Roland show him to be more 
 tlian a mere picture of the manners and thoughts of his 
 age. Roland has the characteristics of the solar m3'th. 
 True, he may have really lived ; but no real man, no 
 real weapon, could ever have performed the prodigies 
 of valor which Roland and his good sword did. The 
 sword, too, was brought to him in a miraculous way. 
 It is not the pagan way in which Perseus and Sigurd 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 357 
 
 got their swords. It is the Christian way, which per- 
 formed all the other miracles of the Middle Ages. And 
 the Song of Roland is so delightful because it has this 
 new tone, and because it sustains this tone so perfectly 
 throughout ; all the prodigies are impressed with it. 
 Still the}' are prodigies, not natural acts. No hero 
 could, single-handed, kill four hundred men at a stroke, 
 after his skull was split open. But if 3'ou look at Ro- 
 land as a solar hero, the work would be eas}' indeed for 
 the iiTesistible power of the sun. Roland's death, too, 
 is supernatural. He has not one scratch on his bod}', 
 though his armor is pierced with a thousand darts. His 
 skull splits open from excessive toil ; his brains ooze 
 slowly out. With his death his sword must go too. 
 Ko other can wield it. With the death of the sun, its 
 rays no longer shoot across the sky. Roland has an- 
 other characteristic of the solar myth. He had been 
 betrothed to a lovely princess, named Aude, when .he 
 went forth to fight for others. When the great king 
 came back, Aude asked news of her hero. AVhen they 
 told her that he was dead, " she cried not, nor uttered 
 sound ; the color faded from her face, and straightway 
 she fell dead at the king's feet. God is kind : he takes 
 the broken-hearted home." 
 
 Another hero of the Charlemagne cycle is Olger the 
 Dane, the national hero of Denmark ; and he represents 
 many other features of the solar myth. In the first 
 place, he is one of the fatal children who kill their 
 mother, the dawn. There is a little touch about his 
 birth which is too beautiful to be overlooked. " There 
 appeared about the bed of the new-born babe six fairies, 
 whose beauty was so wonderful and awful that none 
 
358 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 but a child might gaze upon them without fear." Olger 
 grows up beautiful and strong, but is sent as a hostage 
 to the court of Charlemagne. Here he labors for 
 others, like the other solar heroes, and fights for beings 
 meaner than himself, under the following circumstances. 
 There is a delicious confusion in the geography, which 
 could onl}' be found in the Middle Ages. These were 
 the places familiar to its mind. A messenger appears 
 at court, and sa3's : " The Sultan and the Grand Turk, 
 and Caraheu, Emperor of India, have taken Rome by 
 assault. The Pope and the cardinals and the legates 
 have fled ; the churches are destro^'ed ; the hoi}' relics 
 lost, — all save the body of St. Peter ; and the Chris- 
 tians are put to the sword ! Wherefore the Holy Fa- 
 ther charges you as a Christian king to march to the 
 succor of the Church." Olger does most of the fight- 
 ing ; he engages with Caraheu, Emperor of India, in 
 single combat, and conquers him : Caraheu and his 
 bride are baptized in Rome, and return as Christians to 
 rule over India. Then a Saracen giant appears, and 
 Olger kills him. Then the emperor does him a wrong ; 
 and his anger, like the wrath of Achilleus and of Rus- 
 tem, makes itself felt. He goes out into the world as 
 a wanderer, and travels far and wide, like Odysseus. 
 Finall}', he longs to see his land again, and sets sail ; 
 but the ship is wrecked. The waves bear him to a 
 strange land, where a stately palace stands. This is 
 like the palace on Kirke's enchanted isle. At morning 
 he finds himself in a flower}' vale ; and Morgan le Fay 
 comes to him, and welcomes him to Avalon, and takes 
 him to the palace, where he finds Arthur healed of his 
 wound. Then Morgan gives him a wreath of forgetful- 
 
MEDIEVAL HYI^INS AND BALLADS. 359 
 
 ness for his forehead, and an enchanted ring for his 
 hand ; while he wears these, he never gi'ows old. By 
 and by the wreath slips from his forehead, and he re- 
 members Charlemagne, and longs to go back and fight 
 the Saracen. So he reappears, like the Seven Sleepers 
 of Ephesns, or Rip Van AYinkle. That is, the sun 
 comes back, after being carried away by the darkness. 
 Morgan le Fa}' had given him a torch, which is the 
 measure of his days, like the firebrand of Meleagros in 
 Greek. While it burns, he can never die. He fights 
 as bravely as before, though the world has changed ; 
 for hundreds of years have gone b}' w^hile he was gone 
 in Avalon. "When he is about to wed the Empress of 
 France, Morgan le Fay appears, and bears him away. 
 But the torch is still burning in an abbey crypt, and 
 therefore he is expected to return ; like Sebastian of 
 Portugal, and Frederick Barbarossa, and Arthur of 
 Brittany. When Denmark is in danger, then the Dan- 
 ish peasants are sure that Holger Danske will return. 
 
 This is substantially the stor}^ told in Germany, 
 later, of Tannhauser. Venus carries him awa}' into the 
 middle of a hill, called Horselberg. There he lives in 
 forgetfulness ; but he longs at length to return to a life 
 of virtue, and goes out of the hill. He meets a priest 
 and confesses his sin ; but the horror-stricken priest 
 tells him that his own oaken staff ma}- as soon bud and 
 blossom into roses as his sin be absolved. So the poor 
 Tannhauser goes back to the enchantress. Eight days 
 after, the staff does bud and blossom into roses ; and 
 all the people expect Tannhauser to reappear. In Scot- 
 land, exactly the same story is told of True Thomas of 
 Ercildoune, earned into a hill b}' the Fairy Queen, com- 
 
360 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ing back to the world ; then again carried awa3\ Both 
 are the same enchantress who carried awa}' Od3'sseus ; 
 wlierever she carries awa}' mortal men to dwell with 
 unseen beings beneath the earth, she is the darkness 
 carrying awa}^ the sun. 
 
 The Charlemagne C3'cle arose before the Crusades ; 
 we have it in its primitive form. It prepared the mind 
 for the Crusades. To the bold baron who had listened 
 in his own hall, to the jongleur who sang the strife be- 
 tween the Pagan and the Christian in Spain and France, 
 tlie next step would be to seek the paj'nim on his own 
 territor\\ In the Crusades he sought the Saracen one 
 step farther awav, that was all. The fourth C3X'le has 
 been hard to explain, — the classical ballads. Europe 
 was full of them : the jongleur sang of Alexander, and 
 the tale of Trov, as often as of Arthur, Siegfried, and Ro- 
 land. It has often been wondered whence Shakespeare 
 drew his classical knowledge. From these classical 
 ballads : the Greeks and the Trojans in Troilus and 
 Cressida seem like knights of the Middle Ages. But 
 the3' did not arise until after the Crusades ; the3' were, 
 therefore, brought back In' the returning Crusaders. 
 And the3' must have learned them from the Saracens 
 whom the3' met in the intervals of fighting. One step 
 more takes us back to Persia ; for the Arabs learned 
 them from that stor3' of Iskander which formed part of 
 the Shah Nameh. The tale of Tro3' the Crusaders 
 must have learned in Constantinople, as the3' passed 
 tlwrough. So all the nations are linked together. The 
 Crusader brought back, too, much of the supernatural 
 element in the Middle Ages, when the supernatural was 
 all in all. Saints were Christian : heroes were Ar3'an : 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 361 
 
 good and evil spirits, genii and divs, marvellous birds 
 called griffins, were Persian. It is interesting to sep- 
 arate the other features of the stories. A tame lion, 
 following about a hero like a pet dog, is Keltic, — 
 from the Mabinogeon ; a sea-fight is Teutonic ; and 
 so on. 
 
 There were fictions of a later age, made up consciousl}^ 
 b}' writers, instead of being the genuine growth of pop- 
 ular tradition. I will take Guy of Warwick as the 
 type of these later fictions, because the spirit of the pe- 
 riod is so artlessly and touchingly expressed It will 
 explain all the other stories of pilgrims to the Hoi}' 
 Land, and show how the solar myth takes on a local 
 coloring. In Guy of Warwick, the sun appears as a 
 hero slaying monsters ; afterwards as a wanderer. He 
 is born poor, the son of a servant ; but he dares to love 
 the princess, Felice. So he goes out into the world to 
 do great deeds that he maj- win her. He kills many 
 bad gentlemen, who are false knights ; he sets free dis- 
 tressed damsels ; finall}', he goes to the Crusades. An 
 emperor gives him his daughter in marriage ; at the 
 ver}' altar Gu}' remembers his earh' love, and turns 
 awa}' (like the sun wedding other brides) . He sees a 
 lion and a dragon in fight ; he kills this dragon, and the 
 grateful lion follows him about like a pet dog. Then 
 he comes back to England and slays his second dragon, 
 — the black- winged one which was devastating Nor- 
 thumberland, and is still spoken of there. The Percy 
 family claim to be descended from Gu}' ; the fight be- 
 tween him and the dragon is sculptured on Warwick 
 Castle. After all this, the proud Felice becomes his. 
 But the doom of the wanderer is upon him. Forty 
 
362 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 da3's after they were wed he said to his wife, "How 
 many men I have slain, how many battles I have fought, 
 all for a woman's love, and not one single deed done 
 for my God ! I will go on a pilgrimage for the sake of 
 the Holy Cross." So ,he wended his way to Jeru- 
 salem. (Are you not reminded of Odysseus?) There 
 he shrived him of his sins : then he travelled many 
 5'ears as a pilgrim, and slew a fierce Ethiopian giant, 
 who was oppressing pilgrims. There is again delight- 
 ful confusion in geography. Guy visits Spain and 
 Constantinople within a few hours' time. The Sara- 
 cens themselves are said to have stolen awa}' his son. 
 How the Saracens got into England, and reached War- 
 wick Castle in Northumberland, is another of those 
 charming inconsistencies with which the land of ro- 
 mance abounds. Years went b}^ : like Odysseus, Guy 
 still wandered. The king of England was besieged by 
 a Danish army who had a Danish giant for their cham- 
 pion. Old and worn. Sir Guy came back in the robes 
 of a palmer from the H0I3' Land, like Odysseus in his 
 beggar-robes. He said he would fight for ' ' the need of 
 a people beset with enemies." He conquered the Dan- 
 ish giant, but no one knew that he was the gi-eat Sir 
 Guy. He went to his own castle hall, and there his 
 wife was feeding the beggars, and nursing the sick and 
 weary travellers, and she bathed his feet and said, 
 " Hol}^ palmer, in all your travels, have 3'ou seen my 
 lord, Sir Guy?" But he feared to break in upon her 
 holy life, and went and lived in a cell near there. Here 
 comes in the spirit of monasticism and asceticism which 
 prevailed, and would not allow him to live happily with 
 this Penelope of the Middle Ages. And when his end 
 
MEDI.-EVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 863 
 
 drew near, he sent his ring to Felice, and she came to 
 him, and soothed his d3'ing hours. The wear}^ wanderer 
 had found his rest, — the sun had sunk. But the twi- 
 hght could not hnger long behind. " Fifteen weary da3's 
 Felice lingered sore in grief; then God's angel came 
 and closed her e3^es." Like Roland and Aude ; like 
 Lord Nann and his wife. 
 
 But the myth has appeared in another form, also, in 
 England. After the Norman conquest, the cowed and 
 trembling Saxons fled to the marshes and the green- 
 wood, and there the}^ sang of the bold spirits who 
 showed a remnant of the old Norse courage. There is 
 a ballad cycle, familiar to exevy child who loves to pore 
 over these splendid old songs. It tells of the brave 
 Robin Hood, — the Cid of England, the hero of the 
 people. The foes are no longer the distant Saracens ; 
 they are the usurping Normans, vdth their laws against 
 kilhng the red deer ; with their haught}' priests, who 
 wring the last penn}' from the jooor peasants. Robin 
 Hood's foes are the sheriff of Nottingham, watching 
 over the deer, or the Archbishop upon his palfrey. To 
 the poor and helpless he is ever kind and noble, and he 
 devoutl}^ worships the Virgin Mary. Here the Chris- 
 tian spirit comes in. For however much substratum 
 of historical truth lies beneath these marvellous deeds 
 of Robin Hood, the solar m3^th must claim a large share 
 of the credit. A grateful countr3' has placed him among 
 its heroes, but the unerring bow, and the arrows which 
 never miss their mark, show plainl3' enough that the 
 real man has been covered by the early m3'tholog3^ The 
 latest authorities agree in sa3'ing that he is the same 
 unerring archer whom we found in the other mytholo- 
 
364 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 gies ; that he was brought over b}' the invading Angles, 
 Saxons, and Danes ; for in Yorkshire as man}' might}^ 
 fabulous actions are attributed to him as to King Arthur 
 in Cornwall. We ma}' accept this, because outside of the 
 Robin Hood c3-cle is another fine old ballad, called 
 *'Adam Bell, Cl3'm of the Clough, and William of 
 Cloudeslee," which tells the familiar story of an apple 
 shot from the head of a blooming youth. We found it 
 in the Norse sfor}' of Egil. If the one was imported, 
 why not the other ? William saj's : — 
 
 " I have a soune, seven years old, 
 Hee is to me full deare : 
 I will tye him to a stake, — 
 All shall see him that be here, — 
 And lay an apple upon his head 
 And goe six paces him free, 
 And I myself with a broad arrowe 
 Shall cleave the apple in towe." 
 
 We cannot leave these delightful Middle Ages without 
 explaining one more of their original thoughts. This 
 one is an instinct which belongs to several Ar3'an fami- 
 lies ; especially the Hindus and Teutons. It prompted 
 the beast epic. Reynard the Fox is the longest beast 
 story in existence. Grimm saj's : "Side b}' side with 
 those books which tell the relations of man to man 
 appeared, from the earliest times, those which tell the 
 relations of animals to animals. The poetry which 
 treats of them is neither sarcastic nor didactic, origi- 
 nally, but is simply intensely natural. It is an epic, 
 springing out of that deep love of nature, and observa- 
 tion of animals, which belong to an early and simple 
 state of society." Re3'nard the Fox first appeared 
 
MEDIEVAL HYMNS AND BALLADS. 365 
 
 among the Franks in the fourth or fifth centmy, and 
 was rewritten by the Germans, about the tenth century. 
 But in this first form of the stor}', the animals appear 
 in their own proper character, each one is true to the 
 beast nature, and therefore verj- charming and inter- 
 esting. That beast story, where the animals are turned 
 into human beings disguised as beasts, with all the 
 characters of human nature, is a much later form, — a 
 state of degeneracy and deca}^, such as 'we find in the 
 Fables of ^sop the Greek, of La Fontaine the French- 
 man ; but such as we do not find among the nature-lov- 
 ing, kindly Ar^'ans, of a primitive age. 
 
366 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 COMPARATIVE MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 
 
 WE must turn aside from the continuous develop- 
 ment of literature in Europe, where each branch 
 of the race has brought something to modern thought, 
 to speak of a famil}' which contributed nothing to the 
 gathering current until very lately. The Slavs are an 
 interruption, wherever we may introduce them in the 
 history of literature ; but since the new sciences of 
 comparative philology and comparative m3'tholog3' have 
 crystallized, the}' have gained a value to the world which 
 the}' never had before." The information about them 
 was scanty and inaccessible, till recent events made the 
 Slav the bugbear of Europe ; but the dream of a Pan- . 
 Slavic empire has at least served the useful purpose of 
 turning the labors of the Slavonic savants upon their 
 own philology, and their own scientific position as mem- 
 bers of the Aryan family ; and the results of their in- 
 vestigations have been published and translated. 
 
 It is not known when the Slavs entered Europe, or 
 how. They came last of all the Aryan families, and 
 sat down behind the Teutons. They have never con- 
 solidated into a powerful and influential family for sev- 
 eral reasons. First, they preserved the original Aryan 
 form of government for an unusually long period : the 
 several tribes were bound together by language, cus- 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 367 
 
 toms, and traditions ; but the}" had no political unit}'. 
 CouiTiere sa3's : ' ' Tire predominance of the patriarchal 
 and famih' rule prevented these tribes from ever reach- 
 ing federation, and forming a powerful state. They 
 were subdued b}' more compact peoples." Had they 
 occupied a remote and inaccessible corner of Europe, 
 the}' might have found rest and peace, and therefore 
 time for consolidation. But they never pushed beyond 
 the frontier : exposed to every inroad of an invading 
 foe, they had scarcely time to take breath after one 
 attack, before another was upon them. Christianity, 
 which united other pagan families, only served to di- 
 ^ide them. It was brought in from Byzantium in the 
 ninth century, by Cyril, a second Ulphilas. He trans- 
 lated the Bible into Slavon, their most important dia- 
 lect; invented an alphabet, called the Cyrillic ; and 
 taught the faith and ceremonies of the Greek Church. 
 This alphabet and Slavon language are used to-day by 
 sixty millions of people, either Mohammedans, or be- 
 longing to the Greek Catholic Church. It is an eccle- 
 siastical language, like Latin among us ; it is learned by 
 every educated Slav at the present time, and it was the 
 language used for high literature until the eighteenth 
 century. 
 
 In the ninth century, the Slavs were homogeneous ; 
 but a portion of them adopted the Roman Catholic 
 form of Christianity, and the Latin language and alpha- 
 bet, which divided them more and more, and by the 
 fourteenth century the separation was complete. Differ- 
 ent nations had arisen, each with a dialect of its own, 
 and political unity was no longer possible. Nineteen 
 milUons of Slavs use the Latin language and alphabet 
 
368 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 at the present time, and belong to the Roman Cath- 
 olic or Protestant Church. We need scarcel}" won- 
 der, therefore, that they have made themselves so little 
 felt. The Slavs occupy the space enclosed between 
 the Elbe, the Alps, and the Adriatic Sea, on the west ; 
 the iEgean and Black Seas, on the south ; the mouths 
 of the Dnieper and the sources of the Don, on the east ; 
 Lake Ilmen and the Baltic Sea, on the north. They 
 form the small independent nationality of Montenegro ; 
 the predominating element of the Russian empire ; and 
 are so intermingled with the Turkish and Austrian em- 
 pires, that it is hopeless to tr}^ to disentangle them, or 
 define their ever varying political status. They are 
 certainly a very picturesque people, and we know that 
 they are our brothers, first, b}^ their language. Fire is 
 agni in Sanskrit, ignis in Latin, agon in Russ. Family 
 names are ver}' similar; as, matka^ mother; sestra, sis- 
 ter ; brat, brother ; sgn, son. The parts of the body, 
 as 710S, nose ; the actions of people, as sidiet, to sit ; 
 the farm implements, as ploug, plough ; parts of dwell- 
 ings, as dom, house, dvor, court-3'ard, — resemble each 
 other in the Slavonic languages, and resemble all 
 Ar3'an words. 
 
 A second proof of the identity of the Slavs is to be 
 found in their literatures, which have developed without 
 reciprocal influence. As the comparative mytholog}' is 
 what we are seeking, I shall describe only the pagan 
 and semi-pagan literatures ; and shall not speak of the 
 modern literatures which have grown up since the Sla- 
 von was confined to ecclesiastical purposes. For in- 
 stance, Poland has a brilliant literature, but it is alto- 
 gether modern, reflecting Latin, French, and German 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 369 
 
 thought. Poor Bohemia, on the contrary, tortured by 
 Jesuits and Germans, watered b}' the martjT blood of 
 Huss, has a delightful pagan past, but nothing of gen- 
 eral interest in modern literature. Still, we must not 
 for a moment imagine that the Slavonic poetr}' can bear 
 any comparison with the spiritual and beautiful 'poems 
 of the Rig Yeda, or with the A'ague, grand hints of the 
 older Edda ; it is heroic, not rehgious. But it is fortu- 
 nate that it should exist at all, and we must be thankful 
 for its incidental references to Slav beliefs. 
 
 Through all the literatures runs the same mythology- ; 
 but there is verj^ little information to be gathered from 
 them all combined. We discover that the Slavs wor- 
 shipped, first, their dead ancestors ; next, the powers of 
 nature, like the other Ar^an peoples. They offered sac- 
 rifices under an oak, and at first there were no temples 
 nor priests ; the head of the famil}' was his own priest. 
 The forms of their deities are very indistinct and shad- 
 owy. The Slavs kept alwa3's ver}' near to nature ; they 
 remained in that early stage of mj'tholog}' whose traces 
 are found in the Rig Veda, but which had alread}' past 
 by when that was collected. They never emerged even 
 into the clear personifications of the Rig Yeda, much 
 less into the anthropomorphism of the Greeks. This 
 gives their mytholog}' an interest of its own, since it 
 has preserved better than an}- other of the Aryan liter- 
 atures a certain stage of thought, — that earliest poetic 
 naturalism, where rivers and mountains, the grass and 
 the earth, are personified, but without being as jet wor- 
 shipped as gods. This will be particularly evident in 
 the Russian literature. 
 
 Still the Slavs did pass on to the next stage ; they 
 24 
 
370 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 evolved a chief deity called Bog : our words hogy and 
 puck come from the same root. He was also called 
 Swarog : the name has been traced to a root meaning 
 the all-surrounding sk}-, like Varuna. He has chil- 
 dren : the sun, called Dazh-Bog, the day god ; Stri- 
 Bog, the god of the winds ; Ogon, the fire. But all 
 these gradually fell into neglect, and Perun, the thunder 
 god, took their power, and most of their characteristics. 
 That the Slavs paid great attention to agriculture is evi- 
 dent to whoever reads their poetr}- ; the peasants alwa3's 
 say the "sacred corn"; so Perun, who had the rain 
 under his control, soon became the god most important 
 to them, and he was worshipped by each Slavonic na- 
 tion. He is the only deit}' who has a distinct form ; 
 the traditions describe him as tall and well shaped, with 
 a long golden beard. He rides in a flaming car, and 
 grasps in his left hand a quiver full of arrows ; in his 
 right, a fier}- bow. In the spring he goes forth in this 
 fier}^ car, and crushes with his arrows the demons whose 
 blood streams forth. This is the counterpart of Indra's 
 work : the lightning piercing the dark clouds, and caus- 
 ing them to send forth rain. Sometimes Perun's arrow 
 becomes a golden ke}', with which he unlocks a cave, 
 and brings gems and hidden treasures to light. That is 
 the lightning, which rends open the frozen winter earth, 
 and brings back the light and warmth of summer, and 
 lets loose the frozen brooks ; then he takes the charac- 
 teristics of the sun in other mythologies. The Slavs 
 thought that the lightning could see ; at that flash of 
 summer lightning, gone before one can catch its gleam, 
 they cried out that Perun was winking. The oak-tree 
 was sacred to him ; even when the Slavs accepted 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITEEATUKE. 371 
 
 Christianit}', and gave up their idols, the}^ would not 
 allow their sacred oaks to be cut down. Lada is the 
 goddess of spring, and of love ; the counterpart of 
 Fre3'ia in the Xorse m3-tholog3' ; the word means luxu- 
 riance, union, harmon}'. 
 
 The Slavs never had that spiritual instinct which told 
 them of a future state where ' ' wickedness should be 
 punished, \drtue rewarded, wrongs redressed, and griefs 
 assuaged." The}' had onh' that idea of another world 
 which is found among children and childlike peoples. 
 That the dead are living still, but that their hfe is sim- 
 ply a continuance of the one the}' have left behind, is 
 alwaj's the first conception of immortalit}'. The chief- 
 tain remains a chieftain ; the slave, a slave. Therefore 
 the}' gave to the dead everything that he would need in 
 another life, — horses, armor, even a partner for eternity. 
 If a man died unmarried, they killed some woman upon 
 his grave, so dreary would his lot be without a wife. It 
 is a decided fact, that, as late as one thousand years 
 ago only, widows killed themselves among the Slavs to 
 accompany their dead husbands ; the rite of Sati, burn- 
 ing on a funeral pile, prevailed there, as in India. It is 
 undecided whether the Slavs had invariably burned or 
 buried their dead ; but it is certain that they never sent 
 them afloat on an actual ocean like the Norsemen. They 
 beheved in a road which led to the other world ; it was 
 both the rainbow and the milky way ; and, since the 
 journey was long, they put in boots, (for it was made 
 on foot,) and coins to pay the ferrying across a wide 
 sea : this suggests Charon in Greek. There is a tradi- 
 tion wliich suggests the dogs of Yama in Sanskrit : as 
 soon as a man died in Ruthenia, a hole was made in the 
 
372 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 roof; a black dog was passed through it, that he might 
 free the soul from the bod}'. The abode of the dead 
 was the home of the sun, a warm fertile laud, the isle 
 Buj-an. There were collected all the forms of tempest 
 also; "there lies the lightning-snake, and broods the 
 tempest-bird [the raven] ; there swarm the thunder-bees, 
 who bless the longing earth with the honej' of rain." This 
 expression is one of the primitive Aryan thoughts : in 
 the period before the Rig Veda was written down, everj' 
 good and pleasant thing was called hone}' ; they pra^'ed, 
 " Bless us with the hone}' of sleep," in India. 
 
 It is possible that we may soon be able to make an 
 important addition to our knowledge of Slavonic my- 
 thology. It is an accepted fact that the Bulgarians 
 were originally Turanians. They were called into Eu- 
 rope by the Huns : having spread terror through the 
 Eastern lands, they finally settled at the foot of the 
 Balkan Mountains, conquered the Slavonic tribes whom 
 they found there, and in the ninth century they em- 
 brace^ Greek Christianity and the Cyrillic alphabet. 
 This completed the fusion of the races ; they adopted 
 the Slavonic customs, and are practically Slavs at this 
 time. Obeying the impulse given to Slavonic studies, 
 savants have collected their popular poetry. Within the 
 last few years, M. Verkovicz, living at Serres, near 
 Salonica, published in 1874 the most remarkable of 
 these collections. He gave it the pretentious title of 
 the Veda Slovena, " Slavonic Veda." It contains 
 the songs of Mt. Rhodope : these songs were floating 
 about among the Mohammedan Bulgarians, but M. 
 Verkovicz claims to have traced them to an ancient 
 monastery on Mt. Rhodope in Thrace. A great outcry 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 3T3 
 
 has been made : some Slavonic savants consider them 
 genuine ; others, a forgery. 
 
 If the Veda Slovena be a forgerj^ Bohemia possesses 
 the primitive poetr}' of the Slavonic famil3\ In 1818 
 was found in the library of the castle of Zelenehora an 
 ancient manuscript, which is proved to be authentic. 
 It contains "The Judgment of Libussa, the A\lse." 
 The events described took place at the beginning of the 
 eighth centur}', and the poem is exceedingly valuable as 
 showing the manners and ideas of the time. Patri- 
 archal government still prevailed, but the hatred be- 
 tween Slav and German had even then arisen. The 
 wise Libussa is a gi\and figure gleaming through the 
 mists of centuries, — a heroine who would do honor to 
 an}" nation. Prophetess and Vala though she be, she 
 proves herself to be also a woman. It is impossible to 
 find the whole legend, but its fragments are enough to 
 make us long for more. When th| king of Bohemia 
 died, the kingdom was given to his youngest daughter, 
 Libussa ; for she was skilled in all knowledge, and had 
 the gift of reading the future. Hearing of her wisdom, 
 two brothers came to ask her what should be done with 
 their father's kingdom. So the wise Libussa appointed^ 
 a da}' when she would give judgment, and convoked a 
 tribunal of the nobles of the land in her great castle 
 hall. The}' came by classes ; and a fist is given, like 
 H'omer's catalogue of the Greeks. 
 
 " When all were seated, the wise Libussa entered the hall, 
 clothed in white raiment, and sat down on her father's throne. 
 Beside her stood two young girls skilful in divination : one of 
 them held the tables of the law ; the other, the sword which 
 dispensed justice. Before them was the fire which witnesses 
 the truth ; at their feet, the miraculous water." 
 
374 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Those must have beeii the S3'mbols of the ordeal by 
 fire and b^' water, which belongs to each Arj'an family ; 
 they are called in the poem the "judgment of God." 
 Libussa divided the kingdom between the two sons, 
 according to the Slav custom. 
 
 " Then Crondoch, from the shores of winding Ottava, arises ; 
 anger has entire possession of him ; all his limbs tremble with 
 rage ; he brandishes his fist, and roars like a bull : ' Woe to the 
 brood where the serpent penetrates ! Woe to the man governed 
 by a woman ! It is for a man to rule over men. It is to the 
 oldest that the inheritance must be given ! ' Libussa rises from 
 her throne and says : ' Kmets, Lekhs, and Vlaclykas, you hear 
 how I am insulted; judge yourselves what the law may be. 
 Henceforth I will no longer judge your c^uarrels. Choose a 
 man, one of your equals, who shall govern with a sceptre of 
 iron : the hand of a virgin is too feeble.' " 
 
 Then another of the nobles arises, and declares that 
 Libussa's decision is right, and according to the Slav 
 customs. 
 
 " Here every one is master of his family : the men work in 
 the field ; the women make the clothing ; when the head of the 
 family dies, all the children possess his property in common : 
 they choose a vladyka from the family ; he goes to the glori- 
 ous assembly for the good of the people, and walks with the 
 three ranks into the hall." 
 
 So Libussa's judgment is accepted, and the German- 
 izing tendenc}' put down. Soon after, a peasant comes 
 to consult Libussa. She reads in the future that he is 
 to become her husband ; but when he comes the next 
 day for her answer, the awkwardness of the situation 
 impels her to tell him that he must come again, till she 
 is sure that she has read the future aright. Then she 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 375 
 
 marries him, for her foresight has taught her that he is 
 the worthiest man in her kingdom ; and their dj'nasty 
 rule Bohemia for five centuries. It is a simple and 
 stately poem. 
 
 The second manuscript is called that of Kralove- 
 Dvor (the queen's court) , and contains six hero ballads 
 and eight I^tIc poems. It was found in a monastery 
 in 1817, is much later than the Judgment of Libussa, 
 and extends from the ninth to the fourteenth century. 
 The first poem is the most interesting, as showing how 
 the Bohemians struggled against Christianit}' ; how they 
 regarded what we consider an unmixed blessing ; and 
 also what was the worship they paid to their heathen 
 divinities. Zaboi, who commands half the Bohemians, 
 consults Slavoi, who commands the other half. They 
 summon their armies to the secret recesses of the for- 
 ests, and sing them the following inspiring song : — 
 
 " Brave men, and brothers with fiery glances, 
 I sing to you from the lowest valley : 
 This song takes rise in my heart, 
 My heart phmged in dark sadness. 
 The father has gone to rejoin his father: 
 He left his children and his companions an inheritance, 
 And to no one did he say, 
 * Brother, address brotherly words to them ! ' 
 But the stranger has come by force into the inheritance, 
 And commands in foreign words 
 That which is practised in foreign countries : 
 Our wives and children must do it ; 
 And we can have only one wife 
 Through all our life, from youth till death. 
 They have driven all the hawks from the forest ; 
 And those gods which the strangers possess, 
 
376 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 We must adore them, and make offerings to them. 
 
 We dare no longer prostrate ourselves before our gods, 
 
 Nor give them food at twilight. 
 
 There, where our fathers brought food to them 
 
 And went to sing their praises. 
 
 The strangers have cut down all the trees. 
 
 O Zaboi, you sing from the heart to the heart 
 
 A song full of sadness. 
 
 Like Luimir, whose words fired all the country, 
 
 So hast thou touched us, me and my brethren. 
 
 The gods love the noble bard. 
 
 Sing ! they have given thee power to touch our hearts." 
 
 Finally Zaboi and Ludiek, the chief of the German 
 invaders, settle the question by the original Ar3'an 
 mode, — single combat. The fight is described in a 
 most animated manner, and Ludiek is slain ; then Za- 
 boi sings a triumphant song of victory. The souls of 
 the dead were disposed of in the following way b^' the 
 pagan Bohemians. "The blood came out from the 
 strong hero, and ran across the grass into the damp 
 ground ; his soul came out from his warm lips, fluttered 
 from tree to tree, here and there, until his corpse was 
 burned." 
 
 The other ballads are later, and gradually become 
 Christianized, till they cease to have an}- especial in- 
 terest for us ; although the}' are fine hero ballads, and 
 furnish material for a Bohemian epic. 
 
 The Russian literature is peculiarly rich in certain 
 directions, and the Russians themselves are the most 
 important members of their family. The constant inter- 
 course between Scandinavia and Byzantium, by wa}- of 
 Russia, brought about a definite result. Rurik, the 
 chief of a baud of Varangians, on his wa}' to Byzan- 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATUKE. 377 
 
 tium paused, conquered the Slavonic tribes whom he 
 met, and founded a kingdom at KiefF. Some of the 
 band went on, embraced Greek Christianity, and 
 brought back the faith and worship of the Greek Catho- 
 lic Church, which the}' forced upon the Norsemen and 
 Slavs at Kieff, in the ninth centur}'. Christianity ex- 
 isted under sufferance ; finalh', it was made tlie state 
 religion by Vladimir, the Charlemagne of Russia, who 
 ascended the throne about 980 a. d. He himself over- 
 threw the statue of Perun, which had a golden beard ; 
 founded monasteries, churches, and schools ; used C}'- 
 ril's translation of the Bible into Slavon, and the C3Tillic 
 alphabet ; and proved himself to be a great and wise 
 ruler. He took the name of Wassily at his baptism, 
 and has been turned into St. Basil b}' the Russo-Greek 
 Church. A whole cycle of hero-ballads has collected 
 about him, just as about Charlemagne ; all the old 
 pagan beliefs can be traced in these ballads, which must 
 have wandered long on the Russian soil before they 
 took shape under the fostering care of the great Vladi- 
 mir. They tell us part of what we know definitely 
 about the Russian mythology, for there are no sacred 
 books. A few ritual songs have been preserved b}- the 
 peasantry', which celebrate the agricultural changes of 
 the seasons ; but they have been so frowned upon by 
 the priests, that the}- preserve little of their original 
 meaning. The death of winter is still celebrated : the 
 peasants build a bonfire, dance around it, and sing 
 songs to Lada, the goddess of spring and fertiUt}^, and 
 for a week the childi-en shoot with bows and arrows. 
 The priests have transferred this festival to Butter 
 Week, the Russian carnival, and it takes place if the 
 
378 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 weather be cold or warm. The burial of Kupalo, the 
 summer, is celebrated in the autumn : a straw figure is 
 actuall}- buried, a bonfire is made, and a Kolo is danced 
 by the 3'oung men and women. These can be nothing 
 less than the survival of the pagan m3'thology. Perun 
 was the god who received the chief worship of the Rus- 
 sians. But in hero ballads Russia has developed un- 
 expected richness and variety ; for until the beginning of 
 this centur}' no one imagined that she could boast a na- 
 tional epic. These ballads have been gathered together 
 with the greatest difficulty. In 1859 M. Ruibnikoff began 
 a series of long and dangerous journe3's, with the object 
 of collecting them : he went into distant provinces of 
 the empire, and lived among the peasants, at the actual 
 risk of his life. His account of his adventures is really 
 thrilling ; and from the lips of the peasant reciters he 
 took down the bylinas, which have been recently pub- 
 lished in Russ. They have been analyzed and de- 
 scribed in French b}' M. Rambaud, but not translated. 
 No account of them has been given in English, though 
 Mr. Ralston has promised a volume upon them. 
 
 There are two classes of these b3'linas or hero ballads ; 
 the first, legendar}', which descended b^- oral tradition 
 from the eleventh centur}^ the time of Vladimir ; the 
 second historical, which have been preserved in writing. 
 I shall speak first of those most interesting and valu- 
 able for our purpose, the legendary ballads, which are 
 much more ancient, and take us back to an epoch when 
 the genius of the common people was not onl}' strong, 
 but still predominant. AYe see the ver^' beginnings 
 of pagan Russia, and watch the Russian imagination 
 struggling to give its own impress to those hero t3'pes 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 379 
 
 and those demigods who are universal to the Arj-an 
 race. These last are but sUghtl}' sketched, though 
 they have gigantic stature and superhuman powers, 
 and scarce!}* emerge from the natural forces which they 
 typify : the}' are Titans who cannot direct themselves. 
 The first of them is Volga. A mortal maiden was his 
 mother, a serpent his father ; as soon as born, his voice 
 resounded like thunder, and he grew to boy's stature 
 in a few months. Volga is like Proteus in Greek, in 
 his power of changing himself into different forms, such 
 as a bird, a mouse, or an ermine : the last animal 
 gives a local coloring to the myth, which shows the 
 variableness of nature, and means the sun covered by 
 clouds of different shape. A soothsayer told him that 
 he would be killed by his horse. So he ordered the 
 animal to be slaughtered, and long after he mounted its 
 fleshless skeleton. But a serpent came out of its 
 whitened skull, and stung the hero to death : this is 
 quite a new form of the miraculous death and the ser- 
 pent of darkness. Sviatogor reminds one immediately 
 of the Norse mythology : he is the strong man whom 
 mother earth can scarcely bear up, but crumbles beneath 
 him. He is wearied and burdened with his own weight : 
 he cannot walk on the plains of Russia ; only on the 
 mountains and massive rocks. Utterly wearied out, he 
 finally pauses on one mountain, and there remains till 
 this day. He is a delightful and novel addition to the 
 family of giants. 
 
 So now the world is ready for its heroes, and they 
 first appear grouped around Vladimir as he holds high 
 revel in the halls of Kieff. There are many of them ; 
 but we have time only for one, although each presents 
 
880 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 some feature of the solar myth. Ilia de Mourom is a 
 first-class hero, and he takes his place worthilj' beside 
 Rustcm, Achilleus, Sigurd, or Roland. The early b^'- 
 linas which tell of him are semi-pagan ; and much the 
 more satisfactory, for the personifications are nearer to 
 nature. The monsters which oppose him are vague 
 and formless, hardl}- to be separated from the cloud or 
 fog which the}' typif}'. The world is still primeval : 
 the gods, the heroes, the animals, live on the most 
 familiar terms ; the rivers become persons ; serpents, 
 horses, and birds talk. Vladimir is not 3'et a tzar : he 
 is onl}^ a feudal monarch. There are no guards, no 
 courtiers : he is simplj- the father of his people, who 
 enter without restraint into the hall where he sits to 
 give audience to admiring strangers, or listen to foreign 
 minstrels. In the later bylinas. Ilia de Mourom be- 
 comes a Christian knight, who founds churches ; the 
 celestial mountains, which were onl}- clouds, the celes- 
 tial sea, which was onl}' the vast blue sk}', become real 
 mountains, real seas ; the dragon monsters, which were 
 onl}' storm clouds, become real Tartars. And these 
 events settle upon an historical personage, who attended 
 the court of an historical king. In all the bylinas, 
 however, just as Achilleus is subject to Agamemnon, 
 Olger the Dane to Charlemagne, so the great hero Ilia 
 de Mourom is subject to King Vladimir, — Fair Sun, as 
 he is always called ; and when the need of the people is 
 sorest, it is Ilia who toils for them. Unlike any otlier 
 epic, the Russian shows that it arose from the people, 
 by choosing its hero from among them ; Ilia is the son 
 of a peasant. Until he is thirty years old, he is para- 
 lyzed and useless ; then two divine beings come to him, 
 
IMYTHOLOGY OF SLAVOmC LITERATURE. 381 
 
 bring him the water of Ufe, and he is immediately en- 
 dowed with enormous strength. The}' sa}' to him : 
 " Ilia, you will be a great hero ; you will never die in 
 battle. Give battle, then, to all heroes or heroines ; 
 but take care not to attack Volga : it is not his 
 strength which renders him invincible, it is his cunning. 
 Do not attack Sviatogor ; damp mother earth herself 
 can scared}' support his weight." The first use which 
 Ilia makes of his new strength shows the feature which 
 the Russians have added to the type. He cultivates 
 the soil of •• holy Russia" ; while his parents sleep, the 
 good son does their agricultural work. They had been 
 striving to cut down a forest ; with one turn of his 
 hand he tears up all the oaks, and throws them into 
 the river. Then he departs to kill dragons, robbers, 
 and heathen ; he is a free peasant, who seizes the 
 sword to rid his native land of every foe. He gets 
 himself a magic steed, which is at first dark-colored 
 and stupid ; but for three nights Ilia bathes him in the 
 dew : then he becomes powerful and light-colored ; he 
 clears lakes, rivers, and forests at a bound, as Ilia 
 prances along to the halls of Vladimir, Fair Sun. On 
 his way he meets the brigand Solovei, — a new variety 
 of the incA-itable monster, who is a gigantic bird, called 
 the nightingale. He had built his nest on seven oaks, 
 and his claws extended for seven versts over the coun- 
 try, which he had infested for thirty years. He roared 
 like a wild beast, howled like a dog. whistled like a 
 nightingale. At this awful whistling Ilia's horse fell on 
 his knees with fear ; but Ilia scornfully reproved him, 
 dragged him up, and let fly an arrow, which hit Solovei 
 in the right eye. He fell from his lofty nest ; Ilia 
 
382 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 attached him to the saddle, and rode off. Then the 
 wife and children of Solovei followed after, and talked 
 to Ilia, offering him three cups full of gold, silver, and 
 pearls. Unlike the greedy heroes who seek the Nibe- 
 lung hoard, the disinterested Ilia refuses the treasure, 
 and hastens on that he may reach the court of Vladi- 
 mir, Fair Sun, at Easter. The prince welcomes him : 
 " Art thou a tzar, or the son of a tzar?" The peasant 
 makes no disguise, but declares his name and condi- 
 tion, and presents his prize. Vladimir requests Solovei 
 to roar, howl, and whistle ; but he declines. ''I do 
 not eat your bread ; I am not your servant ; it is not 
 3'ou whom I will obey." (A verj' feudal touch.) Ilia 
 then orders him to roar, howl, and whistle with half his 
 strength onl3'. The gracious prince pours out with his 
 own hand a cup of wine holding fifteen pints. The 
 mischievous Solovei drains it at a draft, then roars, 
 howls, and whistles with all his fury. The roof of the 
 palace falls off; the courtiers drop dead with fear; 
 Ilia puts the prince under one arm, the princess under 
 the other, to protect them. This reminds us of the fun 
 when Herakles the Greek brought the dog Kerberos to 
 King Eurystheus. Ilia, indignant, cuts the bird Solo- 
 vei into little pieces, which he scatters over the fields. 
 Then, of course, he enters the service of Vladimir, Fair 
 Sun, to fight against the foes of his country. One day 
 arrives a polenitza, a powerful amazon on horseback : 
 Ilia fights with her, conquers her ; but she refuses to 
 tellher name. She turns out to be his own daughter, 
 w^hose mother was a polenitza also, conquered and 
 abandoned b}' Ilia. This is the story of Sohrab and Rus- 
 tem in Persian, Ilildebrand and Iladubrand in German, 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 383 
 
 and well understood by this time. Ilia never blusters 
 nor boasts : he protects the weak ; he frees his prison- 
 ers without an}^ ransom ; he spares a defenceless enem}- ; 
 he thinks sadly of all the blood he has been obliged to 
 shed ; he is gentle, and even full of humor. When 
 brigands attack him, he tries to get rid of them by a 
 little mild sarcasm : " What ! forty brigands against an 
 old fellow like me ! M3' caftan is not worth sixty rou- 
 bles ; m}' arrows, five ; I ma}' have forty roubles of ready 
 money about me." The brigands are delighted at such 
 an innocent : they attack him ; with one arrow he splits 
 an oak into splinters, and they lie motionless with fright 
 for five hours. The peasant hero never forgets his 
 class : like all peasants in Russia, Ilia is a great drinker ; 
 after one battle he drank so much that he slept for 
 twelve days. On his aAvaking, he entered the palace 
 hall, and found Vladimir surrounded by nobles only. 
 He rebuked the king, who threw him into a dungeon, 
 where he la}' for three years, unfed by Vladimir. Kieff 
 was assailed by Tartars, and Vladimir was in despair. 
 Trembling, he sent down to the dungeon, expecting 
 to find only a skeleton ; but the king's daughter had 
 sent him food every day for three years, — like Olger 
 the Dane, fed by a princess. Vladimir threw himself at 
 his feet, and begged his assistance. He forgave more 
 readily than Achilleus and Olger, and immediately went 
 out to fight for '' holy Russia." Rambaud says, " Ilia 
 can bear a favorable comparison with the noblest pala- 
 din of the Middle Ages." 
 
 M. Rambaud also says: "There must always be a 
 prodigious catastrophe when all the demigods and he- 
 roes disappear at one fell swoop. In the Roman 
 
384 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 legends it is the battle of Lake Regillus ; in the Odys- 
 sey, Volsnng Saga, and Nibelungen, the slaughter-hall; 
 in the Song of Roland, the vallej' of Roncevaux." So 
 all the lieiocs and heroines grouped around Vladimir 
 follow the same law. They had just annihilated an 
 arm}' of Tartars ; filled with pride, they cried out, 
 "Our shoulders are not wearied, our swords are not 
 hacked ; let a supernatural army oppose itself to us : 
 we could conquer an army which was not of this world." 
 Immediatel}' two unknown warriors appeared. Alexis 
 charged them, cut them in two : at once four heroes 
 began to fight ; Alexis cut them all in two, and the 
 eight began to fight ; then the sixteen whom Alexis 
 had created. Then Ilia came to the rescue, but the 
 same process went on : all day long the heroes fought 
 against an army which doubled at ever}' stroke. At 
 last, terrified, the}' fled towards a cave in the moun- 
 tains, where the}' were all changed into rocks. A pre- 
 cisely similar tradition exists in Sanskrit, and is a very 
 agreeable variety of the inevitable event. 
 
 Students of mythology can easily decipher the career 
 of Ilia. He is paralyzed and immovable during the 
 winter ; two strangers, passing clouds, bring the spring 
 rain, which awakens the energies of nature, and Ilia arises 
 just in the spring at Easter time. The monster has in- 
 fested the country just thirty years, as long as the sun, 
 Ilia, had slept. And his whistling, howling, roaring, are 
 the best descriptions we meet anywhere of the noise of 
 the tempest. In the nest of Solovei Ilia finds treasures, 
 just as under the worm Fafnir ; hght and warmth they 
 are. And Ilia cuts up the bird that his blood may fat- 
 ten the fields : the sun scatters the clouds that the rain 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATUEE. 385 
 
 may fertilize the earth. The polenitza is the sun of 
 yesterday ; her mother is the dawn, whom Ilia leaves 
 behind ; the fort}' brigands are clouds ; they fall to the 
 ground, and the oak is spUntered, after a gleam of sun- 
 light. The dungeon into which Ilia is plunged is the 
 darkness, or night, from which he emerges into another 
 day. Finally, if he be turned to stone at his death, it is 
 because winter imprisons the summer in stony slumber. 
 The women of the Russian b3dinas offer excellent 
 examples of the hero-woman. They are not valas, 
 prophetesses with something sacred about them, like 
 the wise Libussa ; the}' are amazons, like Gurd Afrid in 
 the Shah Nameh, Brunhilde in the Nibelungen Lied, 
 Atalanta in Greek ; and the}' all lose their power when 
 they are married, and become humble and submissive. 
 One day Dobryna was riding along, when he met a 
 polenitza, and gave her a blow on the back of her head : 
 she did not even turn her head. "It must be that I 
 have lost my usual strength," said the hero to himself. 
 "With his club he struck an enormous oak which flew 
 into splinters. Reassured, he returned and gave another 
 terrible blow to the polenitza, with the same result. 
 The hero doubted his strength, and tried it on a rock, 
 which flew into splinters also. At the third blow, the 
 polenitza turned around and said, "I thought some 
 gnats were stinging me, and lo, it is a Russian hero who 
 moves his hands." She seized him by his blond curls, 
 and put him into her pocket, on horseback as he was. 
 Her own giant horse trembled, and spoke out to com- 
 plain of the increased load. So Nastasia said, "If 
 the nobleman is old, I will cut off his head ; if he is 
 young, I will keep him a prisoner : if he suits my fancy, 
 
 25 
 
886 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 I will marry him." She drew him out of her pocket, 
 married hiin, and became an affectionate and dutiful 
 wife. Afterwards she became almost a Russian Pe- 
 nelope, and a-waited his return from abroad for twelve 
 3'ears. Then she consented to many another, but Do- 
 bryna returned in season, and upbraided her, saying, ' ' I 
 do not wonder that 3'ou have fallen ; women have long 
 hair, and short wit." 
 
 We come now into another atmosphere, and reach 
 the historical epic. Russia has a true national epic, 
 more correct historically than most of the other epics 
 of the world. The " Song of Igor" was written in the 
 twelfth century-, shortl}' after the events it celebrates, 
 which took place in 1185 a. d. The manuscript is of 
 the fourteenth or fifteenth centur}', and was discovered 
 in a monaster}' in 1795. Igor, a prince of ^S^ovgorod, 
 his son, brother, and nephew, make an expedition 
 against a nomad tribe of mixed Finns and Tartars. 
 The account is written hy one poet whose name is un- 
 known to us, but who was evidentl}' an educated man, 
 trained in the learning of B^'zantium : poetry has ceased 
 to be, therefore, of and for the people ; the Song of Igor 
 was written down for an aristocratic class. The le- 
 gendary world is left behind : no more demigods and 
 heroes walk the earth, embodying the ancient pagan di- 
 vinities, in slightl}' varied forms ; the personages of the 
 Song of Igor are simple mortals, — princes and nobles 
 and soldiers. Tlie ancient divinities are introduced 
 from a resi)ectable distance. ' The Russians are the pos- 
 terity oT Dazh-Bog ; the poets, children of Volos ; the 
 winds, sons of Stri-Bog; just as we speak of Apollo 
 and the Muses as part of the furniture of an epic, but 
 
INIYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATUKE. 387 
 
 not with the simple confidence in their actual presence 
 of an earlier age. The goddess Discord is introduced ; 
 but she is evidently borrowed from the Greek epics, 
 which the poet might have studied at Constantino[)le. 
 The poem is Christian ; but, as not more than two cen- 
 turies had gone b}', Christianity had not struck root 
 very deepl}'. M. Rambaud sa3's, "It is a recognized 
 law that the chief gods in a destro^'ed religion are 
 sooner forgotten than the secondar}' ones, — those which 
 are interwoven with the dail}' life and old associations." 
 This is ver}' evident in the folk-songs ; and it comes 
 out in the Song of Igor, in that poetic naturalism Avhicli 
 I spoke of as the chief characteristic of Slavonic poetr3\ 
 The Song of Igor shows, not onlv a passionate love of 
 nature, but an intimate s^'mpath}' between it and man- 
 kind : nature responds to his external conditions, as 
 well as to his feelings. Igor leads his warriors in per- 
 son : an -eclipse of the sun takes place on the first da}^, 
 and the earth trembles beneath the tread of his army. 
 It is his mother earth, who tries to warn him. But 
 Igor persists ; he crosses the vast steppes, and plunges 
 into the river. "Land of Russia," he cries, " 3'ou are 
 far awa3', 3'ou have hidden 3'ourself behind the mounds." 
 (These are the tumuli which break the monoton3' of the 
 plains of Russia.) Meantime his wife is left behind. 
 
 " The Jaroslavna (daughter of Jaroslaf) lainents on the city 
 wall at morning : 3-ou would say it was the lament of the 
 cuckoo. ' Avind, terrible wind ! wh}^, my lord, blow so hard ? 
 Why, on your light wings, do you carry the arrows of the Khan 
 against the warriors of my hero ? Is it not enough for you to 
 blow up there in the clouds ? to rock the vessels on the blue 
 sea ? Why, my lord, do you throw my jo}^ down on the grass 
 
388 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 of the steppe?' The Jaroslaviia laments at morning on the 
 city wall: ' O haughty Dnieper ! you break a path for yourself 
 between the rocky mountains of the Polovtzi's country ! You 
 lulled on your waves the barks of Sviatoslof when he buckled 
 on his armor against the warriors of Kobak. O my lord ! 
 bring back my spouse to me. No longer let me send him my 
 tears every morning, by my messenger, the sea.' The Jaro- 
 slavna at morning laments on the city wall : ' Brilliant sun ! 
 trebly brilliant, you warm us all, you shine for all ! Why, my 
 lord, dart your burning rays on the warriors of my spouse? 
 Why do you dry np their bows in their hands, in that desert 
 without water? Why do you add weight to the quivers on 
 their shoulders by the torments of thirst ?'" 
 
 In all pagan literature there is no more loveh' exam- 
 ple of that earl}' stage of personification. Far awa}', 
 Igor fights for three days ; then he is defeated and 
 taken prisoner because he nobh^ refuses to fl}* and aban- 
 don his people. At length. he makes up his mind to 
 escape ; not for his own sake, but that he ma}" preserve 
 his people at home, who are a prey to wandering tribes. 
 His friends at home had been endeavoring to arouse 
 the other princes to go to his rescue ; and they promise 
 to unite in this holy war against the invading Tartar. 
 Then the poet breaks out in a lament over the lack of 
 national feeling at the time he is wanting, and urges the 
 princes to form a united Russia, solid against the Tartar 
 tribes, like the princes of the earlier day, and to forget 
 their fratricidal wars. The Tartar is now to Russia 
 what the Moor was to the Cid, the Saracen to Roland ; 
 the principle of evil fighting against good, of light 
 figliting against darkness. When Igor tries to escape, 
 pitfalls open undtM* his feet ; it is the soil of the enemy 
 trying to hold him back, and the grass whispers it to 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATUEE. 389 
 
 eveiT passer-by ; but be at last reaches the friendly 
 shores of the river Donetz ; he talks with it, and com- 
 plains of the cruel Stronga which broke his ships, and 
 drowned the young prince, Ivan, his friend : the river 
 answers him with kind!}' greetings, and wafts him gently 
 over to his own shore. The poet intended to write the 
 history of Russja, but gives us onl}' one episode : yet 
 this disastrous stor}' is but a t3'pe of the misfortunes 
 which overwhelmed all Russia, kept her for two centu- 
 ries crushed under the rule of the Tartars, and pre- 
 vented all intellectual development. 
 
 The Russian folk-songs have been translated by 
 Ralston, but are not especiall}^ interesting in them- 
 selves, or as furnishing material for comparative studj^ ; 
 but the folk-tales are both extremeh' charming and 
 valuable. Ralston has given us a critical and rehable 
 collection, translated from many volumes. The}^ are 
 told in a A^er^^ animated and dramatic manner ; they 
 are considered to take the next place to the Hindu 
 folk-lore ; the Slavonic peasant is tenacious, and the 
 primitive, patriarchal life and thoughts have lingered 
 in his memory. The earh^ stage of naturalism to which 
 I have alluded is delightfull}^ expressed in the following 
 tale. 
 
 VAZUZA AND VOLGA. 
 
 Yaziiza and Volga had a long dispute as to which was the 
 wiser, the stronger, and the more worthy of high respect. 
 They wrangled and wrangled, but neither could gain the mas- 
 tery in the dispute, so they decided upon the following course. 
 
 " Let us lie dowTi together to sleep," they said, " and which- 
 ever of us is the first to rise, and the quickest to reach the 
 Caspian Sea, she shall be held the wiser of the two, and 
 the stronger, and the worthier of respect." 
 
890 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDEED LITEBATUEES. 
 
 So Volga lay down to sleep ; down lay Vaziiza also. But 
 during the night, Vazuza rose silently, fled away from Volga, 
 chose the nearest and straightest line, and flowed away. When 
 Volga arose she set off, neither slowly nor hurriedly, but with 
 just befitting speed. At Zubtsof she came up with Vazuza. 
 So threatening was her mien that Vazuza was frightened, 
 declared herself to be Volga's younger sister, and besought 
 Volga to take her in her arms, and bear her to the Cas- 
 pian Sea. And so to this day Vazuza is the first to awake 
 in the spring, and then she arouses Volga from her wintry 
 sleep. 
 
 The evil beings, the dark powers of Slavonic my- 
 thology, are better depicted in the Russian folk-tales 
 than in an}' branch of Slavonic literature. The peasant 
 still preserves these awful creatures, and gives us the 
 usual form, and some new varieties. Of course, dark- 
 ness is still the man3--hcaded snake ; and here comes in 
 the destined hero. " Once there was an old couple who 
 had three sons. Two of them had their wits about 
 them, but the third, Ivan, was a simpleton. Now in the 
 land in which Ivan lived there was never any da}', but 
 always night. This was a snake's doing. Well, Ivan 
 undertook to kill that snake." Then came a third 
 snake with twelve heads. Ivan killed it, and destroyed 
 the heads ; and immediately there was bright light 
 throughout the whole land. The myth is pushed on, 
 and there is also the monster who devours maidens, 
 called a "Norka" ; and Perun takes the work of Indra 
 and Saint George, enters the castle (dark clouds), and 
 rescues her. But the dark i)ower takes a distinctive 
 Russian a[)pearance, in the awful figure of Koshchei, 
 the deathless, — a fleshless skeleton who squeezes heroes 
 to death in his bon}' arms. He carries olf a princess ; 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 391 
 
 after seven 3-ears (the winter months) the hero reaches 
 his under-ground palace and is hidden ; but Koshchei 
 returns and cries out, " Xo Russian bone can the ear 
 hear, or the e^'e see ; but there is a smell of Russia here," 
 — like the giant "Fee, faw, fo, fum," terror of our child- 
 hood. He really typifies the winter ; the name means 
 to make hard as a bone, a figurative expression for 
 to freeze. There is a frightful witch, called the Baba 
 Yaga, who flies over land and sea, doing all the mischief 
 she can, but always stops at her own cottage, on the 
 edge of a forest. She is plainl}* the wind, which ceases 
 blowing when it comes to a thick forest. And there 
 are the usual secondarv evil spirits, who live in the 
 waters or the woods. The Rousalka is a female water 
 spirit : she has long green liair ; if it becomes dry, she 
 "will die ; so she never travels from home without her 
 comb. By passing this through her locks, she can pro- 
 duce a flood ; which explains the comb of all mermaids. 
 Besides all these dreadful beings to be avoicled, each 
 man's ill-luck is personified. 
 
 WOE. 
 
 "Woe followed a merchant persistently, till his patience was 
 quite gone. So the merchant said, " Let us go into the yard 
 and play at hide and seek." "Woe liked the idea immensely. 
 Out they went into the yard, and the merchant hid himself. 
 Woe found him immediately; then it was his turn to hide. 
 *' Now, then," said Woe, " you won't find me in a hurry. 
 There is n't a chink I can't get into." " Get along with you," 
 answered the merchant ; " you could not creep into that wheel 
 there, and yet you talk about chinks." " Could n't I creep 
 into that wheel there? You'll see!" So Woe stepped into 
 the wheel. The merchant caught up the wedge, and drove it 
 
392 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 into the axle-box from the other side. Then he seized the 
 wheel, and flung it, with "Woe in it, into the river. Woe was 
 drowned, and the merchant lived happily again, as he had 
 been used to. z 
 
 The Werewolf appears in gi'eat force in Russian 
 tales : but the Vampire is the most repulsive form of 
 the evil power, and he is original in Slavonic thought. 
 In him, the evil spirit enters into a corpse, revisits 
 " the glimpses of the moon," kills the living, and sucks 
 the blood of the dead. The horrible Glam in the Norse 
 tale of Grettir the Strong belongs to this famih- ; the 
 modern Greek word for vampire is of Slavonic origin. 
 He can be killed b}' chopping off his head bv a grave- 
 digger's shovel. Even modern legends teach that the 
 bod}^ of a suicide will be taken possession of by the fiend, 
 and turned into a vampire. The Slavonian peasants, 
 therefore, drive an ashen stake once through the heart 
 of ever}' suicide : even in England the law insisted up- 
 on this until 4 George IV. c. 52. Until this is done, 
 the poor vampire must wander uneasil}' about. His 
 victims can be recognized by a small wound directly- 
 over the heart. There can be no doubt that the vam- 
 pire is a nature myth ; sucking the blood of the sleepers, 
 or of the dead, is drawing rain from the storm clouds ; 
 or it ma}' be setting free the frozen brooks and rivers, 
 killed by the cold of winter. 
 
 In ancient times, all pagans believed that any person 
 could oiler up a prayer which should atfect the weather ; 
 next, the}' came to think that only certain persons had 
 this power ; and these people, like the Norse Valas, 
 were regarded with the greatest reverence. But Chris- 
 tianity turned them into evil beings, and they then 
 
]MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 893 
 
 became the witches and wizards whom we find in the 
 modern folk-lore : the}^ inlierited terror and horror, in- 
 stead of the reverence originally paid them, as repre- 
 sentatives of the deities the}' invoked. 
 
 All these witch stories have latel}' been looked at in a 
 new wa}', and explained by a new theory, which we may 
 accept or not, — it is not fixed, — but which is more 
 agreeable than to believe, as T^'lor's "Primitive Culture" 
 tells us, that witchcraft is part of every savage life, 
 and that we once shared such beliefs ourselves. Com- 
 parative mythologists tr}^ to account for them, b}^ con- 
 sidering them as survivals of the ancient thoughts of the 
 Aryans about nature. These witches and wizards now 
 perform the acts attributed to the forces of nature 
 themselves at first ; and by slow degrees, which we have 
 just traced, the}^ arrived at this power. Let us exam- 
 ine their acts, and see what they do. The}' look into 
 the future with clear and piercing eyes, just as Athene 
 does in Greek, or the Vala in Norse ; which is alwa^'s 
 the gift of the dawn-light. Their most important work, 
 however, is to control the weather. The}' steal and hide 
 away the moon and the stars, which is of small conse- 
 quence ; but they also steal the rain and the dew, and 
 this cannot be overlooked or pardoned. They hoard the 
 dew and rain, and give it forth at their own caprices. 
 "Not long ago, in Russia, one of them hid away so 
 much rain in her cottage, that not a drop fell all sum- 
 mer long. One day she went out, and gave strict orders 
 to the servant girl in charge, not to meddle with the 
 pitcher which stood in the corner. But no sooner had 
 she got out of sight, than the maid lifted the cover of 
 the pitcher and looked in. Nothing was to be seen ; but 
 
894 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 a voice from inside said, ' Now there will be rain.' 
 The girl, frightened out of her wits, ran to the door, 
 and the rain was coming down, 'just as if it were rush- 
 ing out of a tub.' The witch came running home, 
 covered up the pitcher, and the rain ceased. If the 
 pitcher had stood uncovered a little longer, all the vil- 
 lage would have been drowned." The witch also can 
 direct the whirlwind, which is attributed to the wild 
 dancing of the devil, who is celebrating his marriage 
 with a witch : this is onh' another interpretation of the 
 stately procession of Odin sweeping over the sk}-, or of 
 the phantom armies of Brittany and Scotland, which 
 appear in their ballads. The witches themselves fly 
 through the air on shovels or brooms, — articles con- 
 nected with fire and the domestic hearth, — and they 
 hold meetings on hill-tops. But they make themselves 
 especiall}' obnoxious by milking the cows of others, 
 even from any distance ; a witch just sticks a knife into 
 a plough, or a post, and the millv trickles along the edge 
 of it, till the cow is dr3\ The witches are either old 
 hags, or young maidens, but always clothed in loose 
 floating garments ; the wizards wear long white beards. 
 Now could any description better appl}' to the actions 
 and appearances of the clouds ? The}' are blown by the 
 whirlwind ; the}' hover near the earth, and glide over its 
 surface ; the3r spin and weave varying outlines ; they 
 cluster on the tops of mountains : the}' draw up the dew ; 
 they pour down the rain, that is, (the Rig Veda says,) 
 they milk the cows. It seems hardly possible to doubt 
 that, as these actions were once attributed to unseen 
 persons, they should at last have been fastened upon 
 actual, living people. 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 395 
 
 To protect themselves, the Russian peasants make 
 use of spells. The}' belong to the same category as the 
 runes of Xorse mytholog}' ; and were at first uttered in 
 a loud, clear voice, but now are whispered. These 
 Russian spells are full of poetr}', and expand into much 
 greater dimensions than the simple Norse runes. They 
 are addressed to the powers of nature, either in their 
 elementary forms, or personified in a thousand different 
 characters ; and we- must believe that the}' are but the 
 survival of those prayers with which our far-off an- 
 cestors sought protection in the cradle of their race, in 
 their common home in Asia. How are the mighty 
 faUen ! 
 
 A SPELL 
 
 AGAINST GRIEF AT PARTING FROM A DEARLY BELOVED CHILD. 
 
 I have sobbed away the day, — I, his own mother, the ser- 
 vant of God, — in the lofty parental terem. [upper chamber], 
 from the red morning da-wn looking out into the open field to- 
 ward the setting of my red sun, my never-enough-to-be-gazed-on 
 child. There I remained sitting till the late evening glow, till 
 the damp dews, in longing and in woe. But at length I grew 
 weary of grieving; so I considered by what spells I could 
 charm away that evil, funereal grief. 
 
 I went out into the open field, I carried with me the mar- 
 riage cup, I took out the betrothal taper, I fetched the wedding 
 kerchief, I drew water from the well beyond the mountains, I 
 stood in the midst of a thick forest, I traced an unseen line, 
 and I began to cry with a piercing voice : — 
 
 "I charm my never-enough-to-be-gazed-on child, over the 
 marriage cup, over the fresh water, over the nuptial kerchief, 
 over the betrothal taper. I bathe my child's pure face with 
 the nuptial kerchief. I wipe his sweet lips, his bright eyes, 
 his thoughtful brow, his rosy cheeks. AVith the betrothal 
 
S96 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 taper I light up his long kaftan, his sable cap, his figured 
 girdle, his stitched shoes, his ruddy curls, his youthful face, his 
 rapid gait. 
 
 " Be thou, my never-enough-to-be-gazed-on child, brighter 
 than the brilliant sun, softer than a spring day, clearer than 
 fountain water, whiter than virgin wax, firmer than the fiery 
 stone Alatnir. 
 
 " I avert from thee the terrible devil, I drive away the fierce 
 whirlwind, I keep away from thee the one-ej^ed Lycshy [wood 
 demon], the stranger Domovoy, the Vodyany [water demon], 
 the witch of Kieff, the beckoning Kusalka, the thrice-accursed 
 Baba Yaga, and the flying fiery snake. I wave away from 
 thee the prophetic raven and the croaking crow. I screen, 
 thee from Koshchei the deathless, from the spell-weaving 
 wizard, from the daring magician, from the blind soothsayer, 
 from the hoary witch. 
 
 " And thou, my child, at night and at mfdnight, through all 
 hours and half-hours, on the highway and the byw\ay, when 
 sleeping and waking, be thou concealed by my abiding words 
 from hostile powers and from unclean spirits, preserved from 
 untimely death and from misfortune and from woe, saved from 
 drowning on the water, and kept from burning when amid the 
 flames. 
 
 " And should the hour of death arrive, do thou, my child, 
 remember our caressing love, our unsparing bread and salt, and 
 turn towards thy well-beloved birthplace, bend thy brow to the 
 ground before it, with seven times seven salutations take leave 
 of thy kith and kin, and fall into a sweet, unbroken slumber. 
 
 " And may my words be stronger than water, higher than 
 the mountains, heavier than gold, firmer than the fiery stone, 
 more powerful than heroes. 
 
 " And may he who tries to beguile or to cast a spell over my 
 child, — may he be shut up beyond the mountains of Ararat, 
 in the lowest gulfs of hell, in boiling pitch and burning flame ! 
 And may his spells be for him no spells, his deceit be no de- 
 ceit, and his guile no beguiling ! " 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 39T 
 
 There are great tenderness and pathos in this, and a 
 nntive poetr}'. One's blood quite runs cold at the cata- 
 logue of evil spirits and possible dangers. There is 
 still another spell, — that for raising the dead, who 
 almost alwaj-s come back for ji friendlj' purpose, — to 
 assist a relative or child in distress. Ad is the Russian 
 name for the dark, under-ground world, "where evil 
 spirits and sinful souls dwell." This is evidentl}' the 
 Greek Hades, and has been brought in by Christian- 
 ity ; the pagan conception was different, and the pagans 
 sometimes taught that the dead were living in their 
 tombs or coffins. We find this idea in the Hindu folk- 
 tale of Puuchkin, and the German Ashenputtel. 
 
 so:n^g to call back the dead. 
 
 From the side of the East 
 
 Have risen the wild winds, 
 
 With the roaring thunders 
 
 And the fiery lightnings. 
 
 All on my father's grave 
 
 A star has fallen, — has fallen from heaven. 
 
 Split open, O dart of the thunder, 
 
 The moist Mother Earth ! 
 
 Do thou fall to pieces, Mother Earth, 
 
 On all four sides ! 
 
 Split open, coffin planks ! 
 
 Unfold, white ehroud ! 
 
 Fall away, white hands, 
 
 From over the bold heart ! 
 
 And do ye become parted, ye sweet lips ! 
 
 Turn thyself, my own father. 
 
 Into a bright, a swift-winged falcon ! 
 
 Fly away to the blue sea, — 
 
398 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 To the blue sea, the Caspian. 
 
 Wash off, my own father, 
 
 From thy white face the mould ; 
 
 Come flying, my father, 
 
 To thy own home, to the lofty terem ! 
 
 Listen, my father, 
 
 To our songs of sadness ! 
 
 From this feeling that the dead returned and watched 
 over their children, there was a belief that the souls of 
 dead ancestors were always present ; that they were not 
 only worshipped In' the sacred fire which burned on the 
 hearth, but were actualh' present in it. This worship, 
 which belonged to ever}' Ar3'an famil}' and culminated 
 in the majestic service of the Roman Vesta, has sur- 
 vived to tlie present day with the Russian peasant. 
 Agni is now the Domovo}', or household spirit. The 
 customs connected with him are so numerous and strik- 
 ing, that I shall select him to describe, rather than the 
 Robin Goodfellow or Brownie of English folk-lore. 
 
 The Domovoy of Russia now lives in the stove. He 
 comes out everj- night, and eats the food wliich the 
 family takes care to provide for him ; for he is very 
 angr}' if he fancies himself neglected. The customs 
 connected with building a new house are especially curi- 
 ous : it is supposed that whichever member of the 
 family enters the new house first will be the first to die ; 
 so some animal is killed, and laid in one corner. In 
 that corner will be placed the table where the famil}'" 
 eats its daily meal, because the dead ancestors, includ- 
 ing even little children who have died, are supposed to 
 be present at the meal. Their images once stood in 
 the corner ; but since Christianit}' was introduced, an 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 399 
 
 ikon, or sacred picture, has taken their place. When 
 the house is finished, and the famil}' wish to remove 
 into it, everything movable is taken awa}' from the old 
 house. Then the oldest woman lights a fire in the 
 stove for the last time, and waits until mid-day. Pre- 
 cisel}' at mid-da}' she rakes the burning embers into a 
 clean jar, covers them with a new, white napkin, throws 
 open the house door, and says, "Welcome, grand- 
 father, to our new home ! " She then carries the jar 
 containing the fire to the court-yard of the new dwell- 
 ing ; there she finds the master and mistress, who have 
 come to offer bread and salt to the Domovo}'. The 
 old woman strikes the door-posts, saying, "Are the 
 visitors welcome?" The master and mistress reply, 
 "Welcome, grandfather, to the new spot!" After 
 that the old woman enters the house, the master pre- 
 ceding with bread and salt, places the jar on the stove, 
 takes ofi the napkin, shakes it to the four corners, and 
 then empties the burning embers into the new stove. 
 The jar is broken ; its fragments are buried under the 
 sacred corner of the house. If the distance is too 
 great when the peasant ma}' be emigrating to a new 
 countr}', a fire shovel and all the fire implements are 
 taken. Such is the present representative of the sacred 
 fire which the haught}' Roman colonist carried to every 
 new cit}'. Yet we must not despise the degraded form ; 
 for without the one, we might not have known how to 
 understand the other. The Domovoys of different fam- 
 ilies sometimes quarrel with each other ; and when a 
 death is near, the poor Domovoy is heard lamenting, 
 like the Keltic Banshee. 
 
 We are apt to forget that the riddles which are child's 
 
400 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 play to us were once supposed to be oracular utter- 
 ances, made by superhuman beings, and worthy of the 
 most serious attention. Oidipous gained a throne b^' 
 guessing a riddle, and through these Russian enigmas 
 gleam nature myths, more carefuU}' preserved than in 
 more pretentious forms. " A fair maiden went roam- 
 ing through the forest, and dropped her ke^-s. The 
 moon saw them, but said nothing ; the sun saw them, 
 and lifted them up." The keys are the dew ; the 
 maiden the dawn. " A golden ship sails across the 
 heavenly sea ; it breaks into fragments, which neither 
 princes nor people can put together again." The moon 
 breaking up into the stars. 
 
 Christianity could not destroy these beliefs,, inter- 
 woven into the peasants' innermost fibres. It could 
 only direct them somewhat. The traits of the Slav 
 deities were transferred to the saints of the Russo- 
 Greek Church. Rerun, the thunder god, took the name 
 of the prophet Elijah, and is turned into Ilya. He is 
 said to destro}^ the devils with stone hammers, like 
 Thor ; or with lances, like Indra. On Ilya's dav the 
 peasants offer him a roasted animal, which is cut up, 
 and scattered over the fields. St. George becomes 
 Yegor}' the Brave, and is accompanied by a wolf, the 
 characteristic animal of Russia. 
 
 But the most peculiar personification is that of the 
 days of the week. AVednesda}', Friday, and Sunday 
 are stately women, who were worshipped in pagan 
 times. Friday takes its name from an ancient Slavonic 
 goddess corresponding to Fre3'ia and \^enus, from whom 
 the French got Vendredi. JMother Frida}' wiuiders 
 about Irom house to house, and is offended if certain 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATUEE. 401 
 
 work is going on. She dislikes spinning and weaving 
 in a woman, twining cord or platting shoes in a man, 
 because the dust gets into her e3-es. So an}^ work 
 done on that da}^ is sure to be unlucky. Wednesda}' 
 shares the same feelings. I cop}' this story because it 
 is more prettify told than the Friday- story. 
 
 WEDNESDAY. 
 
 A young housewife was spinning late one evening. It was 
 during the night between a Tuesday and a Wednesday. She 
 had been left alone for a long time ; and after midnight, when 
 the first cock crew, she began to think about going to bed, only 
 she would have liked to finish spinning what she had in hand. 
 "Well," thinks she, "I'll get up a bit earlier in the morning, 
 but just now I want to go to sleep." So she laid down her 
 hatchel, but without crossing herself, and said, " Now then, 
 Mother Wednesday, lend me thy aid, that I may get up early 
 in the morning, and finish my spimiing." And then she went 
 to sleep. 
 
 Wednesday, very early in the morning, before it was hght, 
 she heard some one nioving, bustling about the room. She 
 opened her eyes, and looked. The room was lighted up. A 
 splinter of fir was burning in the cresset, and the fire was 
 lighted in the stove. A woman no longer young, wearing a 
 white towel by way of head-dress, was moving about in the 
 cottage, going to and fro, supplying the stove with firewood, 
 getting everything ready. Presently she came up to the young 
 woman and roused her, saying, " Get up." 
 
 The young woman, full of wonder, got up, and said, " But 
 who art thou? What hast thou come here for?" 
 
 " I am she on whom thou didst call. I have come to thy 
 aid." 
 
 " But who art thou ? On whom did I call? " 
 
 " I am Wednesday. On Wednesday surely thou didst call. 
 26 
 
402 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 See ! I have spun thy linen, and Avoven thy web : now let us 
 bleach it, and set it in the oven. The oven is heated, and the 
 irons are ready. Do thou go down to the brook, and draw 
 water." 
 
 The woman was frightened, and thought, "How can that 
 be?" But Wednesday glared at her angrily : her eyes just 
 did sparkle ! 
 
 So the woman took a couple of pails, and went for water. 
 As soon as she was outside the door, she thought, " May n't 
 something terrible happen to me ? I 'd better go to my neigh- 
 bors', instead of fetching the water." So she set off. The 
 night was dark. In the village all were still asleep. She 
 reached a neighbor's house, and rapped away at the window 
 until at last she made herself heard. An aged woman let her in. 
 
 " Why, child," said the old crone, " whatever hast thou got 
 up so early for ? What 's the matter ? " 
 
 " granny, this is how it is ! Wednesday has come to me, 
 and has sent me for water to buck my linen with." 
 
 " That does n't look well," said the old woman. " On that 
 linen she will either strangle thee or scald thee." 
 
 The old woman was evidently well acquainted with Wed- 
 nesday's ways. 
 
 " What am I to do ? " said the young woman. *' How can I 
 escape from this danger ? " 
 
 " Well, this is what thou must do. Go and beat thy pails 
 together in front of the house, and cry out, ' Wednesday's chil- 
 dren have been burnt at sea ! ' She will run out of the house, 
 and do thou be sure to seize the opportunity to get into it be- 
 fore she comes back, and immediately sLim the door to, and 
 make the sign of the cross over it. Then don't let her in, 
 however much she may threaten you or implore you ; but sign 
 a cross with your hands, and draw one with a piece of chalk, 
 and utter a prayer. The unclean spirit will have to disappear." 
 
 Well, the young woman ran home, beat the pails together, 
 and cried out before the window, " Wednesday's children have 
 been burnt at sea ! " 
 
MYTHOLOGY OF SLAVONIC LITERATURE. 403 
 
 Wednesday rushed out of the house, and ran to look ; and 
 the woman sprang inside, shut the door, and. marked a cross on 
 it. Wednesday came running back, and cried out, '' Let me 
 in, my dear ! I hav^e spun thy linen ; now I will bleach it." 
 But the woman would not listen to her, so Wednesday went 
 on knocking at the door until cock-crow. As soon as the cocks 
 crew, she uttered a shrill cry, and disappeared. But the linen 
 remained where it was. 
 
 Mother Sunda}' rules the animals, and she collects 
 her subjects together b}' pla3ing on a magic flute. A 
 Hindu storj' exactly reverses the Russian myth, where 
 Mother Sunday is to be dreaded. The former warns all 
 from touching a certain tree, for misfortune abides in it ; 
 but on Sunday it may be touched, for then Lakshmi, 
 Good Luck, inhabits the tree. 
 
 The Servians are of pure Slavonic blood ; in the 
 tenth centur\^ they embraced Greek Christianit}^ the 
 CjTillic alphabet, and the Slavon language, which was 
 also their literary language. The Turks entered Eu- 
 rope, 1355, fought w^ith the Serbians in many battles, 
 and finall}^ through treacher}^, conquered at the battle 
 of Kossovo, 1389. The unfortunate Serbs who refused 
 to embrace Mohammedanism were reduced to the level 
 of mere peasants, their laws and liberties overthrown. 
 Nothing remained but their popular poetr}', which was 
 histor}' of the past and inspiration for the future to the 
 Serbs, and has prevented them from ever sinking so 
 low as the Bulgarians have done. Their pure blood 
 kept the poetic instincts of their race alive in them : for 
 Servia is called the " nightingale of the Slavonic race." 
 It alone has more popular poetry than all the other 
 Slavonic nations put together. The songs are heroic 
 
404 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 and domestic, not religious. One date is burned into 
 their brain, — tlie defeat of Kossovo, 1389; and the 
 most beautiful of their poems is the heroic poem of the 
 battle of Kossovo. It describes the marriage of Tzar 
 Lazar ; the challenge of Sultan Mourad ; the departure 
 of the Servian army for the field ; the exploit of Mi- 
 losch, who penetrates into the tent of Sultan Mourad, 
 and puts him to death ; the treachery of Vouk, who 
 went over to the enemy on the field of battle ; the de- 
 feat ; and the glorification of Tzar Lazar. It is very 
 spirited, and pathetic also ; what makes one charm is 
 the intermingling of Turkish with Christian customs 
 and titles. As the poem is Christian, it does not come 
 within our subject. But there is another poem which 
 we ma}^ describe ; since it tells of Marko, the national 
 hero. He is a compound of Roland and Rustem. He 
 has a talking horse, who lived a hundred and fift}' years. 
 He himself lived three hundred years ; finallv he took 
 refuge from the Turk in a cavern, where he still sleeps ; 
 but he will return, like Arthur, or Frederick Barbarossa, 
 or Holger Danske, when his country needs him most. 
 
 Montenegro was peopled by Serbs flying from the 
 defeat at Kossovo. These glorious people have been 
 three times invaded by the Turks since then, but never 
 conquered. Their national hero is named Ivo : he too 
 is now sleeping in a grotto, but he will awaken when 
 the Turk is to be finally- conquered. Soon be the day 
 when the poetic Slavs ma}- take their place among the 
 foremost peoples of the earth ! 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 405 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 
 
 WE have followed the Teutonic and Latin languages 
 till the}' broke up into their modern forms ; and 
 in this chapter we shall trace their seven contemporary 
 literatures, and thus understand the spirit of modern 
 Europe, the action and reaction which one language 
 and literature haA^e exercised over the others. Of 
 course, with such a plan, I can speak onl}' of the great- 
 est names ; but, by treating them as contemporaries, 
 we shall obtain a much clearer idea of the development 
 of the human mind, the real growth of thought, than by 
 taking one literature at a time. 
 
 Modern literature arises with the modern languages, 
 and the glor}- of heading it belongs to France, in the 
 eleventh centurj'. We saw in the preceding chapters its 
 formless beginnings ; but ballads, fresh, vigorous, and 
 charming as thc}^ are, do not constitute a literature. 
 Poetry is always the first branch to arise, springing 
 from the universal heart of humanit}' and the simple 
 strength of the people ; and therefore Provencal poetry 
 is the beginning of the modern literature of Europe. 
 
 The earliest popular dialect to crj'stallize into form 
 was the French in its two forms. The " Langue d'Oc," 
 where "yes" was expressed by " oc," was spoken in 
 Provence, a district of Southern France. It spread to 
 
406 SANSKEIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Southern Spain and Northern Ital}', and gives the pres- 
 ent name Languedoc to the countr}' which was formerly 
 Provence. It was used by minstrels called Trouba- 
 dours, so called from trobar^ to find. No longer poor 
 and wandering jongleurs, these Troubadour minstrels 
 were sometimes kings, — Richard Coeur de Lion was 
 one of them, — and always rose to be honored and 
 powerful, even if the}- had been born among the people : 
 thus tlic}' were the first to assert the dignity of intellect. 
 The}' sang of love and ladies, and the beauties of nature, 
 — nothing more ; and if these songs seem monotonous 
 to us, we must remember that they express the spirit 
 of the age. Besides, they are beautiful in themselves. 
 They sprang into being with a perfection of language, 
 of rhyme and melody, which is amazing to us, but was 
 derived from the Latin h3'mns. These Troubadours 
 introduced curious customs, which prevailed over Eu- 
 rope, and were even carried to the camp of the Cru- 
 sader. One of these was a Court of Love, in which 
 questions were argued and decided such as these : 
 ' ' Does ever}' lover grow pale at the sight of the beloved 
 one?" " Is love never the same? is it alwa3'S increas- 
 ing or else diminishing?" " Can one woman be loved 
 by two men ? " These were all decided in the affirma- 
 tive, and every Troubadour was bound to accept these 
 decisions as final. There were also floral games, at 
 which each Troubadour wore the flower of his lady love 
 and sang. The victor was rewarded with a golden 
 violet. Every Troubadour was obliged to select some 
 one lad}', whose beauty and vii'tues he celebrated. She 
 was never his wife ; but sometimes some powerful 
 queen, his friend and patron. It was therefore a love 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 407 
 
 which could not end in marriage. And their songs 
 express just such a Iiopeless and imaginar}' passion, de- 
 fined b}' the absence of the beloved one : it was the 
 love of the rose for the nightingale, of the low-born 
 minstrel for the noble chatelaine^ of the lonel}' monk 
 for the statety Queen of Heaven. For this Troubadour 
 i^oetr}', apparently such a new creation, was in reality 
 only a degradation, — an application to actual people 
 of that same sentiment which inspired the Latin hymns. 
 Thus each age inherits from the past, and nothing 
 stands disconnected. In spite of its follies and abuses, 
 the Provencal poetry rendered a service to humanity, 
 because it lifted woman from the degraded position she 
 had held among the Latin families, where she was little 
 better than a slave. The songs were adapted for dif- 
 ferent occasions : our word serenade comes from the / 
 Troubadour's evening song ; and he had also auhades^ / 
 or morning songs. This lovely poetrj' was a brief blaze 
 of glory. It was utterly- crushed out in the religious 
 persecutions of the Roman Church. It died, and left 
 no following. 
 
 In the north of France, where the Keltic Gauls had 
 been conquered b}^ Teutonic Franks and Norsemen, a 
 stronger dialect arose, called the " Langue d'Oil," be- 
 cause "3^es" was expressed b}' "oil." Its minstrels 
 were called Trouveres, from trouver^ to find. They 
 sang of love and war ; but they used those ballads 
 which they inherited from the Middle Ages, and did not 
 originate a literature at first. The}' sang of Arthur 
 and the Hoh^ Grail, which the}' impressed with a mystic 
 tone ; of Roland and the Cid fighting against the Sara- 
 cens, warlike and chivalrous ballads ; of Alexander, 
 
408 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 and the tale of Tro}^ classical ballads ; — all of which 
 we examined in the medi£eval chapter. But the Trou- 
 veres were far from understanding what we ourselves 
 have just learned, — that these ballad stories which they 
 inherited were personifications of tJie powers of nature ; 
 and as they grew away from the simplicitv of the 
 Middle Ages, the stories seemed to them absurd : so 
 thc}^ put a hidden meaning into them. The living 
 spring of poetr}^ which existed in the Middle Ages was 
 turned into dull allegories, like the Komance of the 
 Rose, where virtues and vices were personified. Or 
 knowledge of the world brought satire ; and the Trou- 
 veres took the simple beast epic of Germanv, Re3'nard 
 the Fox, and turned it into a satire upon the clergy : it 
 spread all over Europe, and is the origin of modern 
 satirical poetr3'. Finally they wrote little stories, called 
 Fabliaux, which satirized the customs of societ}' : these 
 are the most original work of the Trouveres, and they 
 give us the daily life of the common people. The 
 Trouveres went everywhere, — to the second and third 
 crusades, to the courts of Constantinople and England ; 
 and this earl}' influence of France is far more creditable 
 than that she afterwards exerted. It is only within a 
 few years that we have understood this first blossoming, 
 — have realized that these Trouvere ballads are the 
 source of the modern poetr}' of Europe, and also the 
 true glor}- of French literature. The " Langue d'Oil" 
 was rough, but strong. It was much less beautiful 
 than the '' Langue d'Oc," spoken b}' the Troubadours; 
 but it lived, and is the foundation of the French of 
 to-da}'. The last Trouveres were Charles, Duke of 
 Orleans, a ro^'al prince, and Villon, the son of a shoe- 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE 409 
 
 maker, who has been TNnthdra\yi from obscurit}' by the 
 pre-Raphaehte artists and poets of England lately. 
 
 In the twelfth centur}', the Minnesingers arose in 
 Germany, inspired by Provengal poetry. They sang not 
 only of love and ladies, but also of green fields and 
 singing birds, — of nature. "Walther von der Yogel- 
 weide is their greatest name ; but Tannhauser, the hero 
 of Wagner's opera, was also a Minnesinger. In the 
 following centur}', the thirteenth, they copied the bal- 
 lads of the Trouveres : their poem Parseval, to be the 
 libretto of Wagner's future opera, is simply copied from 
 the Arthurian C3'cle. Max Miiller sajs, " The Minne- 
 singers had an ideal element, an aspiration, a vague 
 melanchol}', sorrow after jo}'," in their poetr}-. They 
 were thus quite different from the joj'ousness and healthy 
 objectivity of the Trouveres ; but we know where this 
 Teutonic spirit came from. In the fourteenth century 
 poetr}' passed from the nobles to the homes of burghers 
 and artisans, and the Meistersingers arose in Germany. 
 Each trade had a guild, or association of its members, 
 who chose a chief singer ; and the chief singers of the 
 different guilds used to meet in poetical contests. The 
 victor would be rewarded by wearing a silver chain and 
 wreath, the propert}* of the guild. The Meistersingers 
 flourished and wrote for two hundred 5^ears continu- 
 oush\ The}' are characteristic of the sturdy middle 
 classes of the Teutonic race. The}' express that grim 
 humor which we found breaking out in the Edda, which 
 comes out also in the architecture ; as inborn an ele- 
 ment as the vague melanchol}' and the idealit}^ of the 
 Minnesingers. 
 
 The second great burst of original poetry was in. 
 
410 SANSKKIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Italy. Italian literature proper begins with Dante 
 (1235-1321) and the fourteenth centur3'. The Trouba- 
 dours and Trouveres are the natural result of the h^mns 
 and ballads of the preceding ages. Dante is singu- 
 larl}' uninfluenced b}' them. He is rather the product 
 of the drama of the Middle Ages ; for his great poem 
 in its form resembles the miracle plaj'S. It is divided 
 into three parts, Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso ; 
 and he called it a comed}^, because it has a cheerful 
 ending ; also because it was written in the dialect of the 
 people, — less dignified than the language for tragedy, 
 the Latin. Later, the people called it the "Divine," 
 and gave to Dante the supreme name of poet. No 
 Christian had borne the title before. 
 
 Dante visits the Inferno and the Purgatorio under the 
 guidance of Virgil, who was immensel}' admired and 
 studied, and symbolizes human learning and wisdom. 
 Dante's knowloge of him is owing to the fact, that the 
 profane Latin literature had been revived in the twelfth 
 centur}' ; and Dante also knew Aristotle through the 
 Latin translation. Dante describes the persons and the 
 scenes in the Inferno with a terrific realism ; but the 
 glories and splendors of the Paradiso are just as strongly 
 depicted by his boundless imagination. The very exact- 
 ness of these descriptions shows more imagination than 
 a vague suggestion would. Few persons get bc3-ond 
 the Inferno, in reading Dante ; but the whole Paradiso 
 is a blaze of light and glorj-, and uplifts one to its own 
 heights. I should advise all readers to begin with the 
 Paradiso, where tlie mystic religion of mcdiievalism 
 paints the final beatitude of the good. Dante's deepl}' re- 
 ligious nature revealed the spiritual worlds more clearly 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 411 
 
 to him than to an}' other human being. He seems to 
 rise so far above all other poets, as to be more than 
 human. Taine places him among the four immortals, 
 — Shakespeare, Michael Angelo, and Beethoven being 
 the others. And I do not hesitate to consider the Divina 
 Commedia as the greatest poem which has ever been 
 written b}' mprtal man. 
 
 The Inferno is not onl}^ horrible, but hopeless : in 
 the Purgatorio, a ra}' of hope lights up the gloom ; puri- 
 fication through pain is its key-note ; in the Paradiso, 
 completed victor}^ brings exultation too great to be 
 expressed in words. Light, music, and motion make 
 up the Paradiso. What we call angels, Dante calls 
 lights ; and describes them as spiritual bodies, pene- 
 trated through and through with light. The}' move in 
 vast circles to the sound of music, so sweet that it 
 cannot* be described. 
 
 "And I beheld the glorious wheel move round, 
 And render voice to voice, in modulation 
 And sweetness that cannot be comprehended 
 Excepting there where joy is made eternal." 
 
 As increase of happiness is expressed on earth b}' a 
 smile, it is expressed in Paradise by an increase of 
 hght: — 
 
 " Through joy, effulgence is acquired above, 
 As here a smile ; but down below, the shade 
 Outwardly darkens, as the mind is sad." 
 
 As the angels increase in goodness they approach 
 nearer to God, and move continually faster, spurred 
 on through burning love. In the highest point of all, 
 Dante's dazzled e3'es are opeiied b}' praj'er, and he sees 
 
412 SANSKRIT AXD ITS KTXDEED LITERATURES. 
 
 the form of a vast white rose. Its leaves are made up 
 b}' row upon row of bright beings, who are men re- 
 deemed from sin. In the centre is a point of Hght ; as 
 Dante gazes upon it, he sees it unfold into a triple rain- 
 bow. Upon the second bow is impressed an image 
 like a human form, — the union of the human and 
 divine in Christ. And then he sees no more ; he has 
 reached the limit of human capacit}" to see or to de- 
 scribe. His guide through Paradiso had been the spirit 
 of Beatrice, — a woman whom he had loved on earth: 
 no other poem has ever placed woman so high. 
 
 Dante's life helps to explain his poem, though it does 
 not account for its superhuman ability. The love for 
 Beatrice was his earliest inspiration ; she was only nine 
 3'ears old when he saw her first. She died 3'oung, and 
 married to another ; but he wrote a poem to her, though 
 he married a noble lad}' of his own city. Tlien he 
 plunged into politics and civil war : exiled and poor, 
 he passed 3'ears in wandering ; a burning patriotism 
 glowed in his heart, and made another inspiration for 
 him. The abuses and encroachments of the Roman 
 Church filled him with indignation ; and his satire is 
 directed against the foes of a pure Christianity, as well 
 as against the foes of his country. He was singularl}^ 
 progressive in this, — far in advance of his age. 
 
 But these motives were secondary. He was a great 
 preacher ; he wanted to make men better ; and with 
 this end in view, when he was old, he told them his 
 theory of life. It is not only the story of a single soul 
 that he gives, it is the elevation of humanity that he 
 strives for. He wishes to show that there is a God ; 
 that he judges all men ; that this world is but a prepa- 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 413 
 
 ration for the next ; that the spiritual world is just as 
 real as this ; that it completes and explains this. He 
 puts into the Inferno men who were still alive upon this 
 earth. It was because he knew the truth of the Apos- 
 tle's words, "He that liveth in pleasure is dead while 
 he liveth." If the soul had died, to Dante's pure 
 vision, the man had died too, even if his body remained 
 hving. Finally', he saj's that both these worlds are 
 parts of one whole. It is to make them both real, that 
 he puts in such a mass of detail : all the art, science, 
 politics, theolog}^, societj^, of the period, are expressed ; 
 but the}^ are the illustrations, not the main idea, — that 
 is, to turn men from their sins by holding up God's 
 judgments. It is a plan, vast in its idea, comprehen- 
 sive in its detail,, and carried out without failure, — 
 great in design and execution. Dante's words are most 
 musical and well selected, and he fixed the forms of 
 the Italian language, which was an unsettled dialect 
 until he came. 
 
 Petrarca (1304-13 74) is the second gi-eat Italian poet. 
 His sonnets to Laura ring ever}^ change of a lover's heart. 
 He prided himself on his Latin poems ; but is remem- 
 bered only b}^ those sonnets and canzone, written in a 
 ver}' finished and scholarly Italian, full of Latin words, 
 not so musical nor expressive as the popular Italian of 
 Dante. He wrote nearly three hundred love poems ; 
 and, for four hundred yescrs after, all love poems were 
 only repetitions of his. The best, because simplest, 
 of the Canzone is "Clear, fresh, and dulcet streams" 
 (XIV.) , which has been charmingly translated by Leigh 
 Hunt. And the best of the sonnets are numbers LXIX., 
 CXXYL, XXIV., LIL, to my taste. He may be called 
 
414 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 the last of the Troubadours ; for we must throw our- 
 selves into the spirit of the age before we can under- 
 stand how Petrarca expended all this devotion upon 
 a hopeless love : also how a perfectly' estimable married 
 woman could allow herself to encourage it ; which is 
 just the Troubadour spirit. In reading Petrarca to-day 
 he seems to have more imagination and flow of language 
 than real passion. He does not wring the heart, like 
 poor Tasso. The affection that he paints is almost 
 Platonic ; a love of the beautiful, rather than of one 
 individual. 
 
 And now arises, in the same great century, — the 
 fourteenth, — the third great modern poet. In England 
 Geoffre}' Chaucer was born (1328-1400). No visions 
 of heavenly splendor, like Dante's, no lover's wasting 
 melancholy, like Petrarca's, are his. Health}', happy 
 external hfe, the pomp of courts, -the stimulus of travel, 
 the activit}' of a successful politician, filled up his out- 
 ward life, and are reflected in his verse. Yet these are 
 so clearl}' and heartily given back, that his pictures of 
 contemporar}' life will never be forgotten nor obsolete. 
 He was a master spirit of his own kind. The Anglo- 
 Saxon ballads of Robin Hood lived among the people 
 in England, and the Norman-French ballads of the 
 Trouveres, at court. Chaucer is, at first, the last of 
 the Trouveres ; for his earliest writings are merely 
 translations from these ballads. " Troilus and Cres- 
 sida " is from a classical ballad ; ' ' The Romance of the 
 Rose,'* "The Flower and the Leaf," from the Trouvere 
 allegories of the same name, — and are all too full of 
 allegory to be satisfactory. The legend of Griselda he 
 found in Italy, where it was read to him by Petrarca. 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 415 
 
 Think what the meeting of these two poets must have 
 been ! 
 
 But at sixt}' 3'ears of age, after a long and eventful 
 life, he wrote what he himself had observed, and painted 
 about thirty distinct figiu'es, all pilgrims, who are bound 
 to Canterburj^, and tell tales as they wend on their ^ay. 
 It is true that this is all objective : he does not portray 
 character, nor motives of action ; but he makes us feel 
 the beauty of nature, and see the appearance of the 
 people of the period, so well that we cannot but be 
 delighted. His language is interesting, as being the 
 first English, — the resultant of Kelt, Angle, Saxon, and 
 Norman, — but ver}' different from our English, while 
 Dante and Peti-arca are like modern Italian. Chaucer 
 is a nominal son of the Church, though not a ver}' spirit- 
 ual or devout one. These three great poets are pre- 
 eminentl}; Chi'istian ; the faith of the Middle Ages still 
 clung to them. They believed and worshipped God, 
 and the Virgin Mar}^, and the saints, with sinceritv and 
 earnestness. But their splendid burst of poetr}' had no 
 immediate results : for more than one hundred jears 
 there was not one great poet in Europe. When poetry 
 blossomed again, it was under new conditions. 
 
 We must go forward to Italy, to the Renaissance ; that 
 is, — to the revival of classical languages, hteratm-e, art, 
 and philosophy, — to the admiration for everything 
 Greek, the contempt for everything mediaeval, — for 
 Dante's poetry and for Gothic architecture. This spirit 
 impressed itself upon Europe : for Ital}' became its 
 centre, — the school to which every 3'oung nobleman 
 from France, England, Spain, eagerly pressed at the 
 close of the fifteenth century. In 1453, the Turks 
 
' 416 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 conquered Constantinople and threw open its libraries. 
 The banished Greeks fled to Ital}' with the wntings of 
 Greek authors, which were eagerl}' welcomed, studied, 
 and adopted. It is not so much one poet we think of 
 now, but rather a whole society of authors, artists, 
 architects, and philosophers, and a new tone of thought. 
 The princely houses of the Estes at Ferrara, the Medici 
 at Florence, and Pope Leo X. at Rome, vied with each 
 other in encouraging art and literature. The greatest of 
 them was Lorenzo de' Medici (1448-1492), who wrote 
 poetr}' himself, and quite good poetry too, for a prince. 
 The second poet of the Renaissance was Ariosto 
 (1474-1533). He lived at Ferrara, and wrote the Or- 
 lando Furioso. This is our old friend Roland of the 
 ballads, who reappears with Charlemagne and Christian 
 knights fighting against the Moors of Africa and Spain. 
 The name comes from the stor}^ that Roland has been 
 driven insane b}' love of the beautiful Angelica, who 
 marries a private soldier, after refusing Roland and 
 man}' other celebrated knights. But the real hero of 
 the poem is Rogero, the ancestor of the house of Este ; 
 and Ariosto probabh' chose this subject to glorify his 
 patron, the Duke of Ferrara. Everything in Ariosto is 
 borrowed ; first, from the old ballads of the Trouveres ; 
 then, from the Greek and Latin epics ; then, from con- 
 temporary poetry. So he begins in the middle of the 
 stor}- ; he introduces many characters, and jumps from 
 one to another so often that it is impossible to keep 
 the diflferent plots distinct. Each knight has adventures 
 with giants and pagans, so that the poem never halts 
 for want of action ; but the same adventures become 
 tiresome at last, as the}' happen to all the knights. For 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 417 
 
 instance, two distressed damsels are tied to rocks, and 
 rescued b}' knights on flying horses. The influence of 
 the Renaissance is shown in the sorceress Alcina and 
 her beasts, borrowed from Kirke's enchanted island 
 in the Odysse}' : the two amazons, Bradamante the 
 Christian, and Marphisa the pagan, copied from Vir- 
 gil's Camilla. It is the most elaborate setting forth of 
 the grand old ballads, but it utterlj' lacks their sim- 
 plicity and freshness. Pretending to be a chivalric 
 poem, it should contain nothing but love, war, and 
 religion ; and in Ariosto the most important element is 
 utterly lacking. It is, technical!}' speaking, a Christian 
 poem, because the subject is Christian ; but there is 
 nothing in it of that genuine love of God, and simple 
 faith, which entered into the characters, and therefore 
 the poems, of the Middle Ages. The Orlando Furioso 
 is too long and too disconnected ; the personages are 
 not noble, and the poem is coarse. Yet there must be 
 something to account for its reputation, and that some- 
 thing may be found in the grace of the st3'le, and the 
 overflowing vitality which pervades it. You feel that 
 Ariosto was unexhausted ; he might easih' have written 
 fortj'-six cantos more. 
 
 The most original part of the poem is that where 
 Astolpho visits the moon, and sees there all things 
 which have been lost on earth ; such as time spent in 
 pleasure, lover's sighs, wishes. Among these he finds 
 Orlando's lost reason, and carries it back to him. He 
 had been deprived of it as a punishment for loving a 
 pagan maid. He found also the Decretals of Charle- 
 magne ; these were the titles which gave certain pri\d- 
 leges to the Popes, but which he shrewdly suspected to 
 
 27 
 
418 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 have existed onl}' in the mind of the Popes, and to have 
 been falsel}' claimed as presents from the great Em- 
 peror. This sly sarcasm is the product of the age. It 
 was not the loft}' religious earnestness of Dante, but 
 the mocking sph'it of the Renaissance, which prompted 
 Ariosto. 
 
 Yet he is a poet, and a greater one than the next 
 Italian singer of the Renaissance, — Torquato Tasso 
 (1544-1595). We do not find in him the robustness 
 of Ariosto, but if we knew nothing of his life we could 
 recognize his delicate and beautiful nature from read- 
 ing his poem. He took for his subject the last da3's of 
 the first Crusade, — Jerusalem delivered from the pa- 
 gans ; and this is the same idea which runs through 
 the mediaeval ballads, — the struggle of Christianity 
 with Paganism, of light with darkness. In Tasso's day 
 another Crusade was actually talked of, for the Turk 
 was then the bugbear of Europe : so the subject was 
 well timed, although at first sight it does not appear 
 so to us. It certainly was an eminently poetical one ; 
 it admitted of strange adventures, as well as of v»'arlike 
 contests, in that far-oflf, romantic land ; and through 
 them all ran the motive which sanctified every effort, — 
 the freeing of Christ's sepulchre from the paynims, — 
 so that every requisite of a chivalric poem was there. 
 Tasso has hardly equalled his theme ; but it is a Chris- 
 tian poem in its spirit, as well as its i)lot. The charac- 
 ters are very noble, especially that of the general in 
 chief, Godfre}^ of Bouillon. And it is pleasant to know 
 that history agrees with the poet in his estimate of 
 Godfrey. AVhen the other Crusaders fall into sin, they 
 repent and do better: they pra}' to God for guidance, 
 
THE MODERN POETKY OF EUROPE. 419 
 
 and are possessed with an enthusiasm for their cause. 
 Tasso shows the taint of the Renaissance in the form of 
 his poem. It begins like the JEneid : it has an amazon, 
 borrowed from Camilla ; a sorceress, Armida, borrowed 
 from Kirke, — a fury, Alecto, who rouses hatred and re- 
 venge, — an enchanted forest, where the trees bleed and 
 speak when broken, — all three copied from the Greek. 
 We are rid of Mars, and Mercurj- , and the other classic 
 deities ; it is the devil who aids the Pagans, Saint Mi- 
 chael the Christians, and God who rules both ; but this 
 very mixture gives an unrealit}- and a made-up effect 
 to its Christianit3\ The poem is complete, the action 
 is confined to a few daj's, the episodes are connected 
 with the plot, unlike Ariosto's rambling stories. But the 
 real greatness of Tasso is in the transcendent power with 
 which he paints his lovers and their conflicts of feeling. 
 It is not in battles nor in pra3'ers that he reaches the 
 height of his abilities. It is in the anal3'sis of feeling, 
 in sentiment, tenderness, delicac3\ There are three love 
 stories, w^hich are most delicately and naturallj^ told : so 
 in the poem feeling predominates over action. He is 
 pre-eminentty the poet of love, and from his tempera- 
 ment we can understand his life, and that unfortunate 
 love for the Princess Lenore d' Este, which made him 
 pine for years in a dungeon, while Europe was ringing 
 with the Jerusalem Delivered. Gondoliers in Venice 
 still sing its strains as they row. 
 
 Tasso wrote one verj^ perfect love poem, Aminta, a 
 pastoral, which was copied from Theokritos and Virgil. 
 It is not read, as the Jerusalem Delivered still con- 
 tinues to be, and its importance is not understood. It 
 set that fashion for pastoral poetry which raged in 
 
420 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Europe for three centuries. Although every poet con- 
 sidered it indispensable that he should write a pasto- 
 ral in imitation of Theokritos, he got his inspiration at 
 second-hand, through Ital}' and Tasso's Aminta. 
 
 In this brilliant Italian socict}' many women were 
 prominent ; but the best as well as gi'eatest of them was 
 V/ Vittoria Colonna (1490-1547). She w^as a princess, 
 " married at seventeen to a husband whom she adored. 
 He died from wounds in battle ; he was the Marquis of 
 Pescara, commander-in-chief at the battle of Pavia : 
 and she devoted the rest of her life to writing sonnets 
 and religious poems, which are reall^^ beautiful. In 
 addition to her own beaut}- and rank, and genius and de- 
 votion, she has another claim to our interest. She was 
 the friend of Michael Angelo (1475-1564). Nothing 
 more than friend, yet the inspirer of some of his best 
 sonnets. For that wonderful genius deserves to be 
 classed among the poets of the Renaissance, though he 
 wrote but little. 
 
 In France the Renaissance opened half a century 
 later than in Ital}' , — at the beginning of the sixteenth 
 century ; and we associate a powerful prince with it 
 there also. Francis I. (1515), — a picturesque figure 
 himself, and a real lover of learning, — established the 
 College de France, with chairs for Greek, Latin, and 
 Hebrew, and invited learned foreigners to his court. 
 But no great poet gilds his reign. 
 
 Even poor little Portugal surpassed her ; for, inspired 
 by the activity of the age, she produced one poet who 
 will live, — her onl}- poet, Camoens (1524-1571)). He 
 wrote beautiful sonnets and elegies ; but his great work 
 is an epic poem, the Lusiads. He wished to be the 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 421 
 
 Homer and Virgil of Portugal, to recount the achieve- 
 ments of its great men ; so there are numerous episodes 
 which tell about the different heroes. But the thread 
 which binds them together is the voyage of Vasco da 
 Gama. Other poets had written of the vo\'ages of 
 Ulysses and ^neas. In Camoens's e3"es Vasco da 
 Gama was as great as the}' ; and he Was quite right. 
 A new route to India was the dream of Europe ; it was 
 that which urged Columbus on his weary wa}'. The 
 Portuguese were the nation most distinguished in Eu- 
 rope for their maritime discoveries : Diaz in 1487 dis- 
 covered the Cape of Good Hope, which he called the 
 "cape tormented b}' storms"; and in 1497 Vasco da 
 Gama passed around and beyond this cape into un- 
 known oceans, and sailed on until he reached India. 
 It was one of those commercial ^ictories which are 
 nobler than the greatest triumphs of war ; its interest 
 extends far beyond Portugal, and Camoens ver}' justly 
 considered it the most brilliant event in Portuguese 
 histor}'. 
 
 The charm of this trul}' beautiful poem lies not only 
 in its noble sentiments, but in its style. That is alwa3's 
 simple and natural ; sometimes most pathetic and true, 
 as in the farewells between the men who accompany 
 Vasco and the friends the}^ leave behind them, and in 
 the episode of Inez da Castro ; sometimes ver}' poet- 
 ical, as in the description of the spirit of the stormy 
 cape, the giant Adamastor ; and every heart must re- 
 spond to the self-sacrificing patriotism and lofty gener- 
 osity which Vasco expresses. The poem is not too 
 long, and the episodes are perfectly connected with the 
 main story. It was written in India, after Ariosto, but 
 
422 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 before Tasso ; he borrowed the eight-line stanza of the 
 ItaUans, and he settled the Portuguese language into 
 its present forms. 
 
 But Camoens could not escape the influence of the 
 Renaissance. There is an odd mixture in the poem of 
 Portuguese Christians and Latin gods and goddesses, 
 Jupiter, Bacchus, and Venus. To spread the Chris- 
 tian religion is one motive of the expedition to India ; 
 and Vasco offers up prajers to Providence, -which are 
 answered by Venus. The Portuguese are protected by . 
 Venus, and opposed by Bacchus ; first, because the}^ 
 are a temperate people ; and, second, because they are 
 trying to conquer India, his native countr}'. Of the 
 four poets developed b}' the Renaissance, I should put 
 Camoens unquestionabl}^ first. Hef has outgrown the 
 age of chivalry ; yet he has its vigor and heroism and 
 patriotism, added to the luxm-iance of Ariosto and 
 Spenser, and the sentiment of Tasso, — a strong and 
 man3^-sided nature. 
 
 The poet himself led a very adventurous and unfor- 
 tunate life. He went to India, and was shipwrecked in 
 a fearful storm. He swam ashore, holding his precious 
 poem, which was all that he saved. His name became 
 known throughout Portugal and Spain ; but a faithful 
 slave, who had accompanied him from India, begged in 
 the streets of Lisbon his master's dailj' bread. Camo- 
 ens died in a hospital ; his ver}' winding-sheet was 
 given him b}' charit}'. Ungrateful Portugal ! 
 
 And now we pass to England, where the Renaissance 
 opened half a centur}' later than France, a whole cen- 
 tury later than Italy, in the middle of the sixteenth 
 centur}'. Its splendid day was heralded by SuiTey 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 423 
 
 (1516-1547) and Sidney (1554-1586), two brilliant 
 noblemen and soldiers who had studied in Ital3\ Eng- 
 lish Petrarchs the^^ might both be called, since they 
 wrote sonnets, and were the first in England to do so. 
 Then come a crowd of poets, grouped around a reigning 
 sovereign, for Ehzabeth belongs to the Renaissance in 
 England : I have no time to mention even their names. 
 The exuberant vitality of the time overflowed into a 
 thousand channels ; and poetry, which had been re- 
 pressed since Chaucer, one hundred and fifty 3'ears be- 
 fore, shared the new life. 
 
 Edmund Spenser (1533-1599), the second great poet 
 of England, would have been suflflcient of himself- to 
 form an era. Chaucer had copied the Trouvtres, and 
 Spenser copied Chaucer in using the form of allegor}^, 
 which was the fashionable form for aU poetr}', except 
 the sonnet. Spenser's first poem was " The Shepherd's 
 Calendar," in which the gentlemen of the court were 
 transformed into artless shepherds ; and this poem was 
 undoubtedly' inspired by Tasso's Aminta, quite as much 
 as by Virgil, which had only just been translated b}' 
 Surre}'. In his second poem, " The Faerie Queene," the 
 men who surrounded Spenser were turned into knights 
 of the age of chivalry. But, as bare tales of chivalry 
 had long ago ceased to satisfj^the mind, a hidden moral 
 was put into ever}' character. The allegorj' was to 
 have been explained in the twelfth book ; but, as Spen- 
 ser only wi'ote eight books, he was forced to explain it 
 in a prose preface, which is a great defect in the art of 
 the poem. 
 
 Prince Arthur falls in love with the Faerie Queene, 
 and sets out to seek her in Faerie Land. She is hold- 
 
424 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ing an annual feast for twelve days, during which 
 twelve adventures are achieved b}' twelve knights, who 
 represent different virtues. The Red-cross Kniglit is 
 Holiness ; Sir Guyon is Temperance ; Britomart, a lad}'" 
 knight, is Chastity ; and so on. The object of the 
 allegory is to " fashion a gentleman in virtuous and 
 gentle discipline '•' ; in plainer words, to make a perfect 
 cliaracter. The unit}' of the poem is therefore allegori- 
 cal ; it is the unity of a character : these virtues and 
 vices are but parts of it ; the completed character is the 
 perfect whole. Life, according to Spenser, is a battle- 
 field, — a perpetual struggle between a man's virtues 
 and vices, a fight against all that is mean and base in 
 himself and others. Its final aim is — a character. I 
 think we ma}' claim that Spenser has nobly expressed 
 this noble conception ; for, with all the faults of the 
 poem, such a spirit breathes through it that we are both 
 shamed and inspired as we read. We long to reach 
 such a standard ourselves ; it seems impossible to do 
 anything unworthy or low after we have known the 
 Red-cross Knight and the faire Una. 
 
 Mr. Church says, " The power of ordering a long 
 and complicated plan was not one of vSpenser's gifts." 
 If he did not wholly succeed, it was that he was embar- 
 rassed b}' his own richness. The allegory is plain for a 
 time ; but it is soon lost in a crowd of new characters. 
 It was so eas}' for Spenser to invent them, that he sur- 
 rendered himself to his own boundless imagination. 
 The poem is too long : it is finally tiresome and con- 
 fusing, amid the cloying richness of its beautiful de- 
 scriptions. His verse, which lie himself invented, is 
 most musical. The language was unsettled, and he bent 
 
THE MODEKN POETRY OF EUEOPE. 425 
 
 spelling and pronunciation to his own metre. There is 
 a courtly stateliness about the stanza of nine lines, which 
 is typical of the courtl}' age for which he wrote. 
 
 Spenser borrowed immensel}' : he is steeped in xiri- 
 osto and Tasso ; from Ariosto he imbibes his coarse- 
 ness, quite as much as from Chaucer. Through Ariosto 
 and Tasso he gets two personages of classical m3-thol- 
 ogy : his enchantress, with her bower of bliss, and his 
 amazon Britomart. The adventures can be traced back 
 to medieval ballads, through Chaucer, for we recognize 
 the material we are accustomed to : the distressed dam- 
 sel, the man3'-headed dragon slain by a brave knight, 
 whom we found first in India. The shield of Prince 
 Arthur, which slays all who gaze upon it, we have seen 
 in the hands of Pallas Athene, the dawn, and of Per- 
 seus, the sun : it is the hght. The trees which bleed 
 and speak when broken came from Greece, through 
 Tasso : we have indicated their first appearing in India. 
 
 But Spenser has his own poetic gift, and this was to 
 paint pictures of the scener}' and the bodies which his 
 mind's eye has perceived. He does not analyze mo- 
 tives nor feelings ; there are no characters which Uve 
 and move, but all the bodies are alive. The virtues 
 and the ^ices — Faith, Hope, and Charity, Despair, 
 Envy, and Avarice — might be put upon canvas : more 
 wonderful even are the figures which symbolize the 
 months and the seasons. And he creates so many 
 different bodies that one is lost in wonder : he has truly 
 the imagination of the poet. Nothing can be farther 
 from everj^-day life than the Faerie Queene : it has 
 been called " the poem for poets," and people now-a- 
 days complain that it is long and dull. But it will 
 
426 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ever remain a gallery of pictures and a lofty ideal of 
 character. 
 
 The drama is undoubtedly the most characteristic 
 expression* of the Renaissance. Graduall}- companies 
 of lajmen usurped the privilege of acting. As earl}' as 
 1400, the Brotherhood of the Passion bought land in 
 Paris, and built a theatre, where they acted the mystery 
 of the Passion, and also some morality plays. Later, 
 Les Enfants-sans-Souci played farces ; and the same 
 circumstances existed all over Europe. We do not 
 find the name of any great author, though there are 
 single pla3-s which are ver}' good. From this confusion 
 England was the first to emerge. Tlie drama expressed 
 itself there with such vigor and splendor that it never 
 has been equalled in an}- countr}-, or an^^ age of the 
 world. It forms a literary epoch greater than those of 
 Greece or Ital3\ 
 
 Everybody wrote a pla}', either a traged}' or a comedy : 
 among the writers are many names, which singly- were 
 great enough to have thrown lustre over an}^ country, — 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, Ford and Massinger, "rare 
 Ben Jonson." But the}^ all pale before Shakespeare: 
 the}^ are so infinitel}' below him, that they hardly seem to 
 belong to the same race. And 3'et this brilliant flower 
 sprang into being aU at once. There is no hidden 
 growth long enough to account for such a perfect devel- 
 opment. Like Provencal poetr}' in the eleventh, like 
 Dante's poetry- in the fourteenth century-, it was born 
 full grown. AVe have seen that Shakespeare drew his 
 plots from the classic ballads and from old stories ; 
 but where did he learn to make so man}' characters, 
 each one of whom would be sufficient for an ordinary 
 
THE MODEKN POETRY OF EUROPE. 427 
 
 wiiter, — to pierce the motives of eveiy action, — to 
 create living beings ? 
 
 In German}' there is no Renaissance period. Some- 
 thing else arose there, equall}' a product of th'e Renais- 
 sance. The foundation of the Universities in Ger- 
 man}' put education within the reach of the poorest ; 
 the rise of the commercial cities created a powerful and 
 thoughtful middle class ; finall}', the vices and habits 
 brought in bj' the Renaissance created such an impres- 
 sion upon the mind of Luther when he visited Ital}', that 
 "the Reformation was born side by side with the Renais- 
 sance." The power exercised b}^ the hj-mns of Luther 
 (1483-1546) and his followers cannot be ignored in a 
 history of literature. His hj'mns were inspired by the 
 Latin h3'mns of the Middle Ages ; next him, the best 
 hymnologist is Hans Sachs, the sturdy- shoemaker of 
 Kuremberg, the last of the Meistersingers. He was 
 well educated, knew Petrarca and the Latin authors : 
 he wandered about as a journe3'man cobbler, and settled 
 at Nuremberg when twent3'-two years of age, and wrote 
 over six thousand poems. The sturdj' independence, 
 the keen sarcasm, the grim humor, the moral earnest- 
 ness of the Teutonic family, speak out in them. These 
 noble and useful qualities atone for the lack of poetry 
 and ideaht}' in Hans Sachs, and at that period proba- 
 bh' helped on the world more. That the Meistersinger 
 poetr\' should have flourished so continuousl}' and so 
 long, shows that it expressed the mind of the people. 
 And the Renaissance made not the slightest impression 
 upon German jDoetr}'. There was but one stj'le of 
 poetry : everj'body wrote h^'mns. The people suffered 
 so frightfully by the Thirty Years' War, in the next cen- 
 
428 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDKED LITERATURES. 
 
 tiny, that religious poetiy was their only consolation. 
 The German hymns are the only poetry that the nation 
 produced for five centuries ; in fact, the first origi- 
 nal poetry that she produced at all. From AValther 
 von der ^'ogelwcide to Lessing, not one great poet arose 
 in German}' ; though the h^'mn literature lingered as 
 long as the Meistersinger poetr}' had done. Hans 
 Sachs fairly represents the sixteenth century in Ger- 
 many, while Ariosto, Tasso, Spenser, and Shakespeare 
 were the product of Italy and England. 
 
 But the Reformation had its poet, — one who united 
 the religious earnestness, the perception of moral beauty, 
 the close reasoning of the Reformation, to the exu- 
 berance and splendor and learning of the Renaissance. 
 John Milton in the seventeenth century (1G08-1G74) 
 had every advantage which the times could afford. His 
 education comprehended everything : his generous Pu- 
 ritan father gave him masters who taught him Greek, 
 Latin, and Italian, and the glorious poctr}' of his own 
 land, from which Spenser and Shakespeare had just 
 passed awaj'. They taught him, too, Hebrew and theol- 
 ogy and music. He travelled in Ital}', where he was 
 taken for an Italian, because he spoke the language so 
 well, and w-rote Latin and Italian prose and poetr\'. 
 His early writings show the influence of Italy and the 
 Renaissance. " L' Allegro," " II Penseroso," and the 
 exquisite " Comus," which is his masterpiece, have a 
 perfection of form which must have been assisted b}' 
 the study of the Greek metres. His sonnets were 
 taught him by Italy. 
 
 Later on in life, religious and political controversies 
 absorbed him : he wrote prose, with occasionally some 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 429 
 
 noble sonnets. In his old age, abandoned b}' the world, 
 he tried to paint the glories of heaven ; but he gives us, 
 instead, a theological treatise. Milton was undeniably 
 a great poet, but his imagination is limited as compared 
 with Dante, or Shakespeare, or Spenser. He does not 
 create heavenl}' splendors like Dante, nor souls like 
 Shakespeare, nor bodies hke Spenser ; he describes 
 theological thoughts.- His genius is l^'ric, not dramatic ; 
 his verse rolls on with a might}' music and a loft}' en- 
 thusiasm. His language is the \evy pomp of poetr}^, 
 sublime or beautiful as suits the theme, and stately 
 always. But all his personages argue and reason, from 
 the Heavenh' Father down to the lowest fiend ; and this 
 is both unpoetical and unspiritual. His Satan alone is 
 a creation, magnificently drawn, but strikingh' like the 
 Satan of Caedmon the Saxon. His wars of the angels 
 are grand and stirring ; but the}' are not spiritual. 
 His services to freedom and his powerful prose can 
 never be too much praised. Xo writer ever summed up 
 in himself a more perfect picture of the time. Taine 
 saj's, "The exuberant, poetic England dies in him; 
 the liberty-loving England is predicted and foreshad- 
 owed b}' him." 
 
 But more than a centur}' had to pass b}' before Mil- 
 ton's legitimate ideas were expressed again in poetry : 
 along, dark period had to be passed through, — that 
 included in the Queen Anne period. To understand 
 this, we must go to other countries, — first, to Spain. 
 Spain is one of the four nations which have an original 
 drama, — India, Greece, England, being the other three. 
 AVhen we read the Spanish di'ama, we find all the plots 
 and situations which we have met in Italian opera, or 
 
430 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 French comech' ever since. It was not influenced by 
 the Renaissance, but remained mediieval and Romantic. 
 Lope de Vega (1562-1G31) wrote amusing and thor- 
 oughl}' national comedies, which describe the manners 
 and dress of tlie period, and therefore are called 
 pla3's of "cloak and sword." The}- are poetical, but 
 one is exactly like another, and there are fifteen hundred 
 of them. Part of them have been collected, and fill 
 twenty-three large volumes. 
 
 The greatest play-writer, Calderon (1600-1681), 
 was first a soldier, then a priest. He wrote one hun- 
 dred and twent}" profane plays, both tragedies and 
 comedies ; one hundred autos, which .were preceded by 
 long prologues ; so that the quantity he wrote was sim- 
 pl}' enormous. They are founded upon history, Greek 
 m3thology, and dail}' life, being then "pla3-s of cloak 
 and sword " ; thus the field he covered was wide. In 
 Calderon we do not find thought, profound philosophy, 
 development of character, as in Shakespeare. The plot 
 is everything, and the people are but single passions 
 embodied, not characters slowl}- evolving ; so that in his 
 plays we see the surface of life, not its moving springs. 
 His comedies are ver^' elegant and amusing, his trage- 
 dies terrific ; but they are so from the situations, not 
 the personages. 
 
 But the autos are the most original and peculiar of 
 his plays, — those by which we distinguish him from 
 all other play-writers. They are strangely beautiful 
 always, with a mixture of ghastly terror in their poetry 
 and charm. They were written to be acted upon the 
 festivals of the Church ; they are, therefore, religious 
 and moral allegories, like the miracle plays of the Mid- 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 431 
 
 die Ages. Undoubtedl}' the}' are the most finished form 
 of those plan's ; and we can at once be transported into 
 the spirit of the Middle Ages Iw surrendering ourselves 
 to the enchantment of Calderon's exquisite poetr}'. In 
 " The Sorceries of Sin," the old story of Od^'sseus and 
 Kirke is used. The senses are put into human form : 
 they leave the man and follow Sin, till. the}' are turned 
 into beasts, and come upon the stage in that shape. 
 The man hesitates long, but finally yields, and follows 
 Sin. He is brought back by the Understanding and 
 Penance, actually embodied. All the dramatis personcB 
 are carried away from the island, in a ship which is 
 the Church, the symbolism being preserved throughout. 
 The most popular auto is ' ' The Wonder-working Magi- 
 cian." Cyprian sells his soul to the devil, in order that 
 he may marry Justina. The devil tries to bring her to 
 him in person, but has no power over her, because she 
 is a Christian, and calls on God to help her. Cyprian 
 then becomes a Christian, and both are martyred at 
 Antioch, a. d. 290. This is a form of the mediaeval 
 legend of Faust. In these plays Calderon rises to be a 
 Christian in its broad sense, as portraying man over- 
 coming sin by divine help : usually he is merely a 
 Roman Catholic, and merits the title he has received, 
 "the poet of the Inquisition." The play, "The De- 
 votion of the Cross," shows him in his worst light ; 
 a murderer and villain is immediately pardoned, by 
 kneeling before the cross. "The Purgatory of Saint 
 Patrick " contains very fine poetry, and was much ad- 
 mired by Shelley. "The Steadfast Prince" is most 
 touching. The Infante of Portugal is taken prisoner by 
 the Moors of Africa : he dies a slave rather than sur- 
 
432 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 render to the Mohammedans the citj' of Ceuta, which is 
 his ransom. AVe shrink from criticising the patient, 
 sufFering h(.'ro. 
 
 The principal importance of the Spanish drama in 
 the growth of literature is that it influenced Corneille, 
 the father of French tragedy (1606-1684). At one 
 bound Corneille outstepped all his predecessors. His 
 first great work was the romantic drama of the Cid. 
 The subject was taken from Spanish histor}', and the 
 pla}' is not onl}' a fine one, it is realh' interesting. The 
 Cid kills the father of his lad^'-love so that the situa- 
 tion of Chimene is trying as well as dramatic, and the 
 struggles of her mind are expressed with the greatest 
 naturalness. The plot is so ingenious that she can at 
 length justify herself, in our ej^es and her own, in doing 
 what she wishes, — marrying the Cid. But the critics 
 reproached him, although the plaj' was a masterpiece ; 
 so he studied Greek and Latin authors, and originated 
 the French classic drama. The plays were written in 
 rhyming couplets of twelve feet each ; no action was 
 seen upon the stage, but long speeches were addressed 
 to a confidant. It was not an actual reproduction of 
 the Greek drama ; for there was no chorus to come be- 
 tween author and audience and illustrate the situation ; 
 " it was comi^osed according to a set of arbitrary rules 
 founded upon a misconception of a passage in Aris- 
 totle." Generalh' speaking, it had not the religious 
 meaning of the Greek drama, although in two plays 
 there is an attempt to i)ut a Christian spirit into the 
 Greek form, — the "Polycucte" of Corneille and the 
 " Athalic" of Eaeine. In the latter is a chorus, which 
 enforces the religious lesson of the play, in perfect ver- 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 433 
 
 sification. I admire Corneille. It is trae that liis char- 
 acters are somewhat unreal, that his verse is somewhat 
 rough ; but he is very noble and strong. It is not life 
 that he gives us ; it is some virtue or some passion in- 
 corporated in a human form. But he lifts one into a 
 loft}' ideal world, which was yet a real world to him. 
 His native vigor frets against the rules of classical t}T- 
 anny ; but Racine (1639-1699) willingl}' accepted them. 
 
 He showed no traces of Spain ; he wrote one comedy 
 like the earh' French farces. His characters are meant 
 to be perfectly copied from antique models. The}" are 
 really French courtiers of the pompous and artificial 
 court of Louis XIV. The subject was called Greek : 
 it was really but the court intrigues of an idle nobil- 
 ity. The verse is exquisitely smooth, but nothing can 
 be duller than Racine's tragedies. Heine says that 
 the great French noblesse are punished in hell by being 
 obliged to listen to them. Rachel's genius revived them 
 for a time ; but they will always remain the most arti- 
 ficial product of the most artificial age of the world, — 
 the period of Louis XIV. Towards the close of his life 
 Racine became very religious, and wrote only on sacred 
 themes. He composed " Esther" and " Athahe," which 
 latter the French consider the masterpiece of their 
 drama. He really was religious ; yet he died of a 
 broken heart because the king, while passing through 
 the throng of courtiers, did not speak to him. 
 
 But the age produced one great and original drama- 
 tist, Mohere (1622-1673). At first he was much influ- 
 enced by Spain, and also showed the Renaissance spirit 
 by occasionally imitating Terence and Plautus, although 
 he never satu'ized government as they did. Very soon 
 
 2S 
 
434 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 he stood on his own feet, and copied no man. It is 
 contemporary society that he gives us, its vices and 
 folUes that he paints. Yet "L'Avare" will always re- 
 main a t3'pe of the miser ; " Le Tartuffe," of the hypo- 
 crite ; '' Le Misantrope," of the cynic : these are as old 
 and as new as human nature itself. His language is 
 wondcrfulh' true, — elegant or boorish, as the character 
 demands ; his wit and naturalness are inimitable. He 
 has left us several distinct t3'pes, yet none that are very 
 lovable or noble. There is no description of nature in 
 his plays, and no poetic spirit. 
 
 The Renaissance culminated in this stately literature 
 of the age of Louis XIV. Its spirit was called Chris- 
 tian : for it was an attempt to imbue Greek form with 
 such a spirit. Its poets were Boileau, who was not in 
 the least a poet, and La Fontaine, who was trul}' such, 
 although he wrote only fables. His Renaissance studies 
 gave him onh^ the framework. He is really pervaded 
 bj' the spirit of the French medii:eval writers : iEsop's 
 fables seem very simple compared with the dramatic 
 action, the character-painting, the delicate satire, and 
 the delicious st3'le of La Fontaine. Within the limits 
 of one short fable, he will give distinct and life-like char- 
 acters, — the great lord and lady, the rich parvenu, the 
 poor peasant (a mere beast of burden), — with a good- 
 natured hit at their faults and follies, and such a feeling 
 for nature that it is brought before us in all its freshness. 
 No other French author brings nature so near to us. 
 His style is absolute^ untranslatable, for ever}' word is 
 full of subtle meanings, which could only be translated 
 by using several words, and its grace hides its power. 
 AlthouGfh La Fontaine describes the habits of his ani- 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 435 
 
 mals with such loving fidelity, they are not real beasts 
 at all : they are human beings, — le grand monde veiled 
 under the beast form, and pla3'fully satirized. It must 
 be acknowledged that his moralit}^ is not elevated : 
 good-sense, wit, and success are his gods : and he is 
 never earnest. But he exemplifies the best traits of 
 French literature : nobody but a Frenchman could have 
 written these inimitable fables. 
 
 Boileau (1636-1711) has no charm; but he wrote 
 ver}^ correct poetry, according to the rules of Horace, 
 whose Ars Poetica he translated. He was the great 
 critic of his era, and established rules for poetr}^ and 
 exercised an influence which we find it hard to under- 
 stand. He was, however, a high-minded man when 
 ever^'bod}' else was a fawning courtier. He introduced 
 into poetry the heroic measure, which was universally 
 adopted in Europe for a hundred years after, where 
 two lines rhyme, like Virgil ; and his arbitrar}" rules 
 took away all freshness and spontaneit}' from French 
 poetry. 
 
 Not French poetr}^ alone was injured b}' him ; for, 
 France being the model of the seventeenth centmy, his 
 rules were strictly followed in England, where this pe- 
 riod extended, and is called the Queen Anne period. 
 Strictl}' speaking, it began before her, and followed 
 after her ; but, broadl}', it should be embraced under 
 her name. If we now go back to England, we shall 
 understand the situation there. With the restoration of 
 the Stuarts, 1660, came back French morals and man- 
 ners and poetr3\ Graceful, witt}^, wicked courtiers 
 mocked at old, bUnd Milton, and wrote light love-songs. 
 John Dryden (1630-1700) is confessedly the strongest 
 
436 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 writer of the period ; yet everything is imitated, except 
 his " Ode for St. Cecilia's Day," whicbis really splen- 
 did, full of poetry and inspiration. He translated the 
 iEneid into the heroic measure taught by Boileau, and 
 put Chaucer into stilted English ; but these are forgot- 
 ten, as well as his political and satirical poetr}-. 
 
 We find a crowd of poets : everybody wrote poetry, 
 even the great prose- writers. Swift, Addison, John- 
 son, and Goldsmith. Thej^ called it poetry : it does 
 not seem so to us, for all sounds as if ground from a 
 machine, the rhymes are so true, the number of feet so 
 correct, the antitheses so well balanced ; but there is no 
 imagination, no soul. 
 
 All these poets so called culminated in Alexander 
 Pope (1G88-1744) . He lacked the poetic fire of ''glo- 
 rious John " Dryden ; but he carried the heroic verse to 
 its greatest perfection, and usually wrote the second 
 line of a couplet before the first. He translated the 
 Iliad into pompous lines, utterly unlike the simplicity 
 of the Homeric poems. His " Messiah" would sound 
 grand to us, if we could for a moment feel that he felt 
 it himself, or forget that it was copied from Virgil's 
 Pollio. 
 
 Gray's Odes (1716-1771) have a stately swing to 
 their measures, which comes nearer to Pindar than any 
 other poetr}'. He is the most successful copyist of the 
 Greek metres, and he never fails to stir us b}' the mere 
 power of style. 
 
 In the Queen Anne drama, inmioral and vulgar dram- 
 atists are a disgrace to the nation. They were in- 
 numerable, but they are deservedly forgotten. The 
 tragedies are slavish copies of French models. Dryden, 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 437 
 
 Addison, and Johnson wrote dull tragedies. But there 
 are three exceptions. Otway wrote a pathetic romantic 
 drama, " Venice Preserved," which was severel}' blamed 
 b3^the critics. Dear old Goldsmith (1728-1774) painted 
 English contemporar}' society in a charming comedy, 
 " She Stoops to Conquer." Sheridan (1751-1816), who 
 lived somewhat later, but belongs to the period, tried 
 to copy Moliere in " The School for Scandal." It seems 
 vulgar beside " Le Misantrope." 
 
 The true successor of Moliere was found in Itaty 
 in the eighteenth century, — Goldoni (1707-1793). He 
 is almost as fertile a writer as Lope de Vega. It is 
 character comed}' that he gives, — few incidents, no 
 nature, no poetical spirit, but livel}^ conversations and 
 amusing situations. And the opera, which had been 
 born in Italy (1579), was continued by Metastasio (1782), 
 who wrote innumerable libretti. 
 
 But great ideas were fermenting in France. In the 
 earl}' part of the eighteenth century, Voltaire (1694- 
 1778) visited England. He studied the metaph3'sics of 
 Hobbes and Locke, the physics of Newton, and intro- 
 duced them into France. Then England became, in the 
 eighteenth centur}', the literar}' centre of Europe. Vol- 
 taire is the very sceptic of all sceptics in this most 
 irreligious centur}' ; yet he is the greatest French poet 
 of the age. He wrote dramas, poems, and an epic, but 
 we remember him b}' his metaphysics. Voltaire's epic, 
 "La Henriade," is simply ridiculous. The time of 
 Henry IV. is so near our own that the supernatural 
 machinery^ seems utterl}' absurd. But Voltaire's dramas 
 have a merit of their own ; they touch the feelings. 
 They belong to an age of decadence : they are neither 
 
438 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 classic, like Racine, nor romantic, like Victor Hugo ; 
 they have a mixed style. Like Lluripides in Greek, 
 the}' attempt to unite the merits of two opposite 
 schools. The princes preach the most extreme doc- 
 trines of liberty, equality, and fraternitj' ; and- the hero- 
 ines have a liberty of conduct which was never allowed 
 in the Greek or French classic drama. The effect pro- 
 duced on the mind is confusing : they lack the unity of a 
 perfect work of art. Yet they are interesting, especially 
 Zaire ; and are written in beautiful French. His "Poe- 
 sies Legeres " are models of grace and lightness. 
 
 Beaumarchais (1732-1799) wrote two very amusing 
 comedies, " The Barber of Seville," and "The Marriage 
 of Figaro," suggested by Moliere, which exposed the 
 wickedness and frivolit}' of the great nobles. There was 
 never a time when literary men exercised such power. 
 It is not too much to say that Beaumarchais' s comedies, 
 Rousseau's novels, and English thought as interpreted 
 by the French philosophers, brought about the French 
 Revolution, 1789. 
 
 The French Revolution has a touching and noble 
 figure connected with it, — the young poet, Andre Che- 
 nier (1762-1794). He was the first to turn away from 
 the arbitrary rules established by Boileau ; and he broke 
 out into a lyric measure of his own, full of music, and 
 behind it fresh and pathetic thoughts. His "Young 
 Captive " is trul}' beautiful and poetic ; it expresses the 
 feelings of a young girl, his fellow-prisoner, dragged 
 away to die. He had been thrown into prison through 
 his generous endeavors to save his brother ; and might 
 have lived had he disclosed the mistake. He died on 
 the scaffold, two days before the close of Robespierre's 
 
THE MODEKN POETRY OF EUROPE. 439 
 
 reign of terror. One of his fellow-sufferers cried out, 
 "You, virtuous youth! are they taking 3'ou to death, 
 bright with genius and hope?" " I have done nothing 
 for posterity," sighed Chenier : then, touching his fore- 
 head, he said, " Yet I had something there ! " 
 
 Germau}' also felt the influence of England : first, 
 the}' studied Shakespeare with enthusiasm and intelli- 
 gence ; next, the ballads of the Edda, lateh' discovered 
 at Copenhagen, and of the Nibelungen Lied, discovered 
 in German}'. A literary movement arose, called the 
 Romantic school. It had two branches : one historical, 
 which wi'ote ballads about the Middle Ages, or dramas 
 from German histor}' ; the other philosophical, which 
 described feelings, anal3'zed motives, depicted dail}^ 
 life, or wrote about the effect produced on the soul by 
 external nature. But there was somacthing more than 
 mere choice of subjects in this new school of thought. 
 A critic says, ''The writings of the Romantic school 
 mark a transition, not so much from the pagan to the 
 mediaeval ideal, as from a lower to a higher degree of 
 passion in literature." 
 
 The drama was the first to awake. Lesslng (1729- 
 1778) was the first to write national drama. He dis- 
 covered that the men about him were as interesting as 
 those of Greece and Rome ; and he wrote tragedies and 
 comedies based upon Enghsh models. " Emilia Galotti " 
 is a powerful tragedy ; " Xathan the Wise," a lesson of 
 religious toleration ; "Minna von Barnhelm," an amusing 
 picture of daily life. Bayard Taylor says, " Criticism 
 was Lessing's true work ; his poems and plays are 
 wantins; in that warm imao-inative element which welds 
 thought and passion into one inseparable body." 
 
440 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 Then came Scliiller (1759-1805) iri the Romantic 
 drama : he and Lessing wrote it from conviction ; 
 Goethe (1749-1831), from the fancy of the moment. 
 Schiller was truh' patriotic, and his " AVallenstein " is a 
 noble monument of German poetr}'. His ballads, too, 
 are very full of the modern spirit. The}' honor woman, 
 and domestic life, and labor ; and if the}' copy Greek 
 subjects, they put a Christian tone into them. In the 
 "Cranes of Ibycus," he shows that the Greek Nemesis 
 is our own conscience ; ' ' that a man's moral destiny is 
 the result and evolution of his own character." 
 
 The first great poets in Germany, — the only poets 
 for five centuries, — were these three, at the very close 
 of the eighteenth century, and who were not understood 
 till the nineteenth. Germany's blossoming was late, 
 but glorious : in the nineteenth century she rules Eu- 
 rope. For I suppose nobody will deny that Goethe is 
 the greatest poet since Dante, — one of the few great 
 poets of the world. As a man, we cannot admire 
 Goethe ; he resolutely shut himself out from the tremen- 
 dous political and patriotic questions of the day, and 
 retired to his study to imitate Persian poetry. He TVTote 
 everything, — lyric poems, ballads, dramas, romances. 
 I wish to speak of him in this chapter especially in 
 connection with the Classic and Romantic schools. For 
 no other poet ever succeeded as he did in both these 
 forms ; and he was equally successful in the diflicult 
 and peculiar metre of modern Persian poetry. It is 
 perhaps a moral deficiency that he was so ; it may 
 show a lack of convictions, — of a genuine outgrowth 
 from an inner development. 
 
 His mastery of two opposite forms is most strikingly 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 441 
 
 shown in the three episodes of the second part of Faust, 
 which are so disconnected from the main stor}' that they 
 may be treated separatel^'o They are symbolic of the 
 growth of Goethe's mind, which began, as we saw, by 
 a(;lhering to the Romantic school. The first episode is 
 purely Romantic in its character, therefore. A carnival 
 masquerade gives, in an allegorv, a picture of the classes 
 which compose societ}', — a picture of human life. Then 
 Goethe visited Italy, and was intoxicated b}' Greek art. 
 Matthew Arnold sa3'S : " His admiration of style caused 
 the immense importance to him of the productions of 
 Greek and Latin genius, where st3'le so eminenth" mani- 
 fests its power. With his fine critical perception, he 
 saw the power of st^de, and the lack of it in the litera- 
 ture of his own countr}'." The second episode is called 
 the classical "AValpurgis Night." Mr. Bayard Taylor 
 sa^'S : ' ' Through it blows a breeze of poetr}' fresh from 
 the mountains and seas and isles of Greece ; it is full 
 of Tritons and Sirens, Fates and Furies, Greek philoso- 
 phers and gods. It s^^mbolizes ideal beauty." The third 
 episode, the "Helena," is a perfect poem in itself; it was 
 published as such in 1827, though written in 1800. Its 
 meaning is ver}- plain : it seeks to reconcile, and fuse 
 into one, the Classic and Romantic schools of thought. 
 It is symbolic ; Faust being the type of the romantic, 
 Helena of the classic spirit. The}^ marr}^, and their 
 child, Euphorbion, symbolizes poetr}' ; Goethe thus pro- 
 claiming his belief, that the highest and newest poetry 
 is the product of all the past, — is beyond the narrow 
 bounds of race or period, — unites human life to ideal 
 beauty, fuses them into one. 
 
 Even without its symbolism, the " Helena" is a fine 
 
442 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 poem. The first part of it is in classic form, with 
 a chorus ; then the scene changes to a castle of the 
 Middle Ages, with knights and banners ; and the metre 
 of the poem changes also, from the Greek unrhjmed 
 measure to the mediaeval rh3'ming measure. In the 
 dialogue, Helena uses the Greek, Faust the mediaeval 
 metre. The episodes of the second part of Faust are 
 not reall}' necessary to the poem, and they seem to be 
 written from the very fulness of Goethe's powers. He 
 takes delight in his command over words. Their inter- 
 est is pureh^ literar}', and to us the contest between the 
 Classic and Romantic schools of writing seems hardly 
 a suflicient subject to expend so much exuberant poetry 
 upon : it appears far away from the realities of life ; 
 thus the episodes possess perfect language, but not 
 much feeling. 
 
 Everybod}' is sufficient^ familiar with Goethe's works 
 to separate them into their own schools. There is no 
 question about Faust. It is written in the form of a 
 drama, but really should be classed among epic poems. 
 It is essentially the epic of this subjective nineteenth 
 century-, because it shows the struggle of a soul against 
 inward temptations, where older epics paint the struggle 
 of a bod}^ against external circumstances. It may be 
 called a Christian epic, not onlv from its spirit, but 
 from its form, which is that of the miracle play. It is 
 thoroughly Romantic, — a perfect picture of the life 
 and belief of the Middle Ages. The heavenly charac- 
 ters are treated as in the miracle i)lays ; that is, they 
 are real persons, TN'alking about and talking ; and this 
 means nothing irreverent, although it strikes us so un- 
 pleasantl}' when we read it. Faust is uninteresting as 
 
THE MODEEN POETEY OF EUEOPE. 443 
 
 an individual, and only becomes so when we regard 
 him as the t3'pe of humanity. In the first part, we 
 have simph' the life of an obscure person who longs for 
 the good things of this life ; and since he has not ob- 
 tained them, he has an intelligible motive of discontent. 
 In the second part of Faust, we find a far higher 
 style of character. The poem is not so universallj^ 
 known, but is a ver}- grand one ; most noble in its 
 plan, crowded with beautiful detail, and overflowing 
 with wonderful poetr}'. In reading it for the first time, 
 we feel overwhelmed with the mass of material. The 
 overflowing creative power of the author lavishes itself 
 in a poetic richness of thought and language which 
 amazes us, and the unity of the work is hard to trace 
 among the bewildering details. Innumerable charac- 
 ters are introduced, who express themselves in most 
 appropriate language, whether it is keen sarcasm or 
 beautiful poetry. They are not only perfect in form, 
 but they have a hidden meaning lying under them : 
 thev symbohze some individual, or some idea of Goe- 
 the's own about society, science, and art, and there 
 are symbols within symbols, also. There is a mis- 
 taken idea that it was written in Goethe's old age. On 
 the contrar}-, Mr. Bayard Taylor says, " It was the 
 conception of Goethe's prime, entirely planned and 
 parti}' written before the appearance of the first part." 
 It was sketched in 1800, the fifth act written then ; the 
 gaps were filled up, and the whole concluded in 1831^ 
 his eightj'-second 3'ear. This will account for the differ- 
 ences of style and of thought which constanth' annoy 
 us in the poem. Some parts are prosaic, others won- 
 derfully poetical. Mr. Taylor says, " The acquisitions 
 
444 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 of thirty years formed a crust over the lambent poetical 
 element in his nature ; but it broke through clearl}' and 
 joyously." The second part of Faust is composed of 
 two distinct allegories ; one of which is contained in the 
 three episodes, which are ver}' slightly connected with 
 the stor}' itself. 
 
 The main story exhibits the struggle of man towards 
 immortality, — the development of character to a higher 
 plane through temptations. The first part was a life of 
 the senses ; the second begins with the life of the intel- 
 lect. Faust awakens to a new sense of existence : he 
 forgets the past and Margaret, and goes on to new 
 adventures. He still keeps his compact with Mephis- 
 topheles, who gets him a place at court. But, wearied 
 with politics, he turns to the pursuit of the beautiful, 
 who is symbolized b}' Helena the Greek. Faust's love 
 for her symbolizes the love of the artist or poet for his 
 ideal, — the yearning for the beautiful. But even this 
 at length becomes unsatisfactor}-. Then he is attracted 
 by the war of the elements against man ; and he deter- 
 mines to enter into conflict with nature, and bend it to 
 the human will. He devotes himself to a great indus- 
 trial undertaking, but solely from intelligent human 
 ambition. The king whom he had served gives him a 
 wide waste of land on the sea-shore; he resolves to 
 redeem it from the destruction of the ocean. Mepliis- 
 topheles derides all such hard, honest work, and pro- 
 poses to Faust to build a splendid palace, with every 
 appliance for pleasure and luxur}-, instead of dams and 
 sluices. But Faust scorns him, and labors on despite 
 sneers and scoffs. He succeeds ; and, as he gazes on 
 his completed work, a higher thought comes to him. 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 445 
 
 His clearer spiritual vision sees that it is to become a 
 blessing to his race. On this rescued soil his prophetic 
 eye beholds a free people blessed with good govern- 
 ment. He experiences one moment of supreme bliss ; 
 he calls upon time to sta}'. But his compact with 
 Mephistopheles is thus fulfilled, and he must die. I-Ie 
 reached his moment of happiness in spite of the fiend ; 
 3'et not through the senses, nor the pure love of the 
 beautiful ; not through political power nor congenial 
 labor, but through unselfish working for the good of 
 others. 
 
 If the episodes of the story are perfect Greek, the 
 close is purelj^ romantic : it is more, it is filled wdth a 
 lofty spirit of the purest Christianit3\ Again, Goethe 
 adopts the machinery of a miracle play. On the stage 
 the jaws of hell are open, and demons are seen l^o 
 arise from them. But also angels descend from above 
 to claim the soul of Faust. The Eternal Love sends 
 them : thej' bear it aloft, and sing : — 
 
 " Rescued is the noble member 
 Of the spirit world from evil : 
 Who ever aspiring exerts himself. 
 Him can we redeem." 
 
 Mephistopheles cannot comprehend that he has actu- 
 ally lost Faust ; that a soul can be redeemed through 
 love of God and beneficent labor for others. He stands 
 stupidly staring, while the angels gradually disappear, 
 carrying the rescued soul away with them. Then comes 
 a beatific vision of Paradise, where loving souls are ever 
 aspiring towards the Highest. Margaret appears as 
 the spii'itual guide of Faust; she leads him ever up- 
 
446 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 ward through ranks of adoring intelUgences, till he, 
 pervaded with penitence and love, is permitted to reach 
 the upper sphere. But the Highest is not visible to his 
 eyes : the Virgin Mar^' is the only manifestation he 
 sees. 
 
 The saint of the Middle Ages was a monk. Monta- 
 lembert frankl}' says, "The monastic life is the perfec- 
 tion of Christian life " : the saint of to-da}' goes out into 
 the world and seeks to make it better, instead of flying 
 from it. The hero of the Middle Ages was a soldier ; 
 the hero of the nineteenth centur}' is a peaceful artisan, 
 like Watt and Stephenson, who endeavors to help his 
 fellow-men, instead of kilUng them ; who labors to con- 
 quer nature and make it useful to the human race, 
 rather than to conquer and degrade man. Great indus- 
 trial works are the t3'pical works of this centurj'. Mr. 
 Lecke}^ sa3's, " You cannot lay down a railway without 
 creating an intellectual influence : it is probable that 
 Watt and Stephenson will eventually modify the opin- 
 ions of mankind quite as much as Luther or Voltaire." 
 That Faust should have toiled in an industrial work, 
 should have tried to give honest labor and good govern- 
 ment to his fellow-beings, is pre-eminentl}' the spirit of 
 to-da}' ; and that Goethe's prophetic mind felt this noble 
 thought shows him to be a true prophet and guide. 
 Goethe is usually a pagan ; here he is not only Chris- 
 tian, but essentially modern. 
 
 The Romantic school was first followed in England. 
 We must go back a little : in the stagnation at the close 
 of the Queen Anne period a real poet appeared ; his 
 first volume was published in 1780. Even before the 
 French Revolution had proclaimed aloud that idea which 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 447 
 
 was stirring in the heart of the world, Robert Burns 
 (1759-1796) had expressed it. Its essence was found 
 in his first volume, however often literal critics may 
 remind us that it was not until 1795 that he used the 
 actual words, — 
 
 " The rank is but the guinea's stamp, 
 The man 's the gowd for a' that ! " 
 
 And his songs appeal to the universal heart of hu- 
 manit3\ Mankind is greater than a class ; queens and 
 nobles are but men and women ; love and jo}^, sorrow 
 and death, can never cease to be, — the}^ are as real in 
 the cottage as in the palace ; and Burns sang of these, 
 till every creature that was capable of feeling wept or 
 smiled over his words. His life was sad, partly from 
 himself, mostly from his surroundings. France was 
 ripe for him, England was not ; but his genius is more 
 valued as time goes on. 
 
 Then comes another real poet, — poor Cowper (1731- 
 1800). If Burns expresses the human passion, the 
 courageous manliness, of the time, Cowper gives voice 
 to its religious aspirations, its delicate sensibility, its 
 nervous introspection. Human love made Burns a 
 poet ; a love of God as passionate as that of the Latin 
 hymns made Cowper such. The anguish of his tor- 
 tured soul, the jo}^ of his reconciled heart, found vent 
 in genuine poetr}^, which burst all arbitrary' rules for 
 versification. Cowper's simple and realistic poetr}' cre- 
 ates an epoch ; his importance has not been properly 
 acknowledged. It was he and Burns who founded the 
 Romantic school. Both of them show a heart-felt love 
 of nature, and a feeling for the charm of domestic life, 
 
448 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 which were unknown qualities in the poetiy of England 
 then. The}' brought back passion to poetiy, and thus 
 restored the period of EUzabeth. 
 
 But before the tone of thought was definitel}' adopted, 
 foreign influences came in, — the French Revolution, 
 then Germany. The historical branch of the school 
 was eagerly welcomed and spontaneousl}' adopted by 
 Scott. When a bo}^ he had loved and studied the wild 
 and beautiful Border minstrels}' of his. own countr}', 
 and the German ballads and dramas were thoroughh^ 
 congenial to him. It was a labor of love for him to 
 translate them. But Southej' followed the school con- 
 sciousl}'. Burns and Cowper had spontaneousl}' ex- 
 pressed the philosophical branch of the school. It was 
 adopted conscioush' by Coleridge, "Wordsworth, Shel- 
 ley, spontaneous!}' by Byron. 
 
 In France the Romantic school was brought in by 
 Madame de Stael's critical history of the literature of 
 Germany. She introduced the two nations: they had 
 never known each other, for FtTitice had always despised 
 Germany. The Bourbons brought back English litera- 
 ture and ideas (1814). Philosophical poetry came with 
 Goethe ; historical, with Schiller and Scott. France 
 eagerly seized these new ideas, and a tremendous liter- 
 ary revolution was accomplished. It was aided by a 
 writer who is not, technically speaking, of the Romantic 
 school, yet in a broad sense should be included in it, 
 because he introduced into French poetry a new form, 
 and a true love of liberty. 
 
 For one hundred years versification had been exactly 
 what Boileau had made it, — rhyming couplets of twelve 
 feet each : even Andre Clic'nier could not break it up. 
 
THE MODEEN POETEY OF EUEOPE. 449 
 
 Poetry was supposed to be confined to one form. Be- 
 ranger (1780-1857) began to write witt}', pointed, 
 gi'aceful songs, first about his own life, then about poli- 
 tics. He adored Napoleon, and detested the Bourbons ; 
 he was imprisoned b}- them. Fiuall}', ''le petit bour- 
 geois " woke up to find himself a political power, the 
 best song- writer of his country ; one of her original, 
 t^'pical poets. His range is narrow, and his morality 
 ver}' low ; but his stjde is charming, and his love of the 
 people is genuine. 
 
 The earliest Romantic writer was Lamartine (1790- 
 1869), who represents the philosophical branch. The 
 melod}' of his poetr}' is exquisite, and the thoughts are 
 alwaj'S noble and pure. He is at times sentimental 
 bej'ond the point of healthiness ; but his best poems 
 have an irresistible pathos. Nothing can be more 
 touching than the lines on the death of his only child, a 
 daughter. ' ' LTsolement " and ' ' Le Lac " are exqui- 
 sitely lovel}'. He has a wonderful feeling for nature, 
 not only its beaut}', but its soothing power over a suffer- 
 ing soul. But life means something more than to feel, 
 to suffer, to weep. His own life has had action, but 
 his poetry has none. It is so much like our own poetry 
 that we forget how very different it is from the French 
 poetry-, — what an immense advance it is upon the di- 
 dactic, descriptive couplets, which are all we can find 
 unless we go back to the witt}' or wicked Trouveres. 
 His longest poem, " Jocelyn," was considered to be a 
 protest against the celibacy of the clergy. Lamartine 
 disavowed an}^ such intention, in the second edition. 
 He was not onl}^ a religious man, but he begun hfe as a 
 roj'ahst and an aristocrat, being born in that class. 
 
 29 
 
450 SANSKRIT AND ITS KINDRED LITERATURES. 
 
 A much greater writer, Victor Hugo (1802), showed 
 preciscl}' this spirit in his earl^' writings ; but both of 
 these poets became true lovers of liberty and sincere 
 friends of the people. Victor Hugo has faith in the 
 future, as well as reverence for what is worth}' in the 
 past. Both branches of the school, therefore, meet in 
 him ; his historical novel, " Notre Dame de Paris," and 
 his ballads, paint the Middle Ages with tremendous 
 realism, the mind as well as the external life are given. 
 He strips off the veil of enchantment, and shows their 
 faults as well as their virtues : he looks at the past 
 with the mind of to-day. In his novels of modern life 
 he always takes the side of the oppressed, and strives 
 to elevate and reform societ}'. They are painful from 
 their vivid descriptions of sinning and sorrowful human 
 beings ; but they are written with a purpose. There- 
 fore he gives us t3'pes which are too absolutel}^ noble 
 to be natural, but which hold up before us the loftiest 
 ideal of character. We find in his writings the strong- 
 est shadows, the highest lights, and too many antith- 
 eses : in the hand of an ordinar}' writer these would 
 become tiresome ; the}' onl}' render Victor Hugo more 
 powerful and poetical. 
 
 He is equall}' great as critic and dramatist : his prose 
 preface to the drama of "Cromwell" (1829) gave the 
 reasons and fixed the epoch of the Romantic school ; 
 and his grand dramas broke forever the chains of 
 French classic drama. Everybody believes in him now ; 
 but he has worked an absolute revolution in French lit- 
 erature, and met with unstinted abuse at first. 
 
 His earhest writings are in verse, — odes and ballads, 
 some of them written at sixteen vears of age. Rela- 
 
THE MODERN POETRY OF EUROPE. 451 
 
 tivel}' the}' do not stand so high as his dramas, (which 
 were his second productions,) or his novels. Yet his 
 love-poems and pictures of domestic life are verj' pure 
 and sweet, and nobody has ever painted children more 
 charmingly than he. Whether in prose or verse, Victor 
 Hugo's children must live forever. His life has been 
 as noble as his writings ; and the French maj' well be 
 proud of Victor Hugo, the head of that romantic school 
 under which w^e are livinsf. 
 
PARTIAL LIST OF BOOKS CONSULTED, 
 
 GIVING THE TRANSLATION ONLY WHERE 
 THERE ARE SEVERAL. 
 
 Chips from a German Workshop. Max Miiller 
 
 Life and Growth of Language. Whitney. 
 
 Science of Language. Max Miiller. 
 
 Oriental and Linguistic Studies. Whitney. 
 
 The Dawn of History. The Brothers Keary of the British 
 
 Museum. 
 The Ancient City. Fustel de Coulanges. 
 The Mythology of the Aryan Nations. G. W. Cox. 
 Origin of Fairy Tales. J. Thackeray Bunce. 
 Myths and Mythmakers. John Fiske. 
 History of Architecture. Fergusson. 
 History of Sanskrit Literature. Max Miiller. 
 Influence of India on Modern Thought. Sir Henry Maine. 
 Translation of the Rig Veda. H. H. Wilson. 
 
 Max Miiller. 
 M. Langlois. 
 History of India. Vols. I., II., III. Talboys Wheeler. 
 Nala and Damayanti. Milman's Poetical Works. Vol. HI. 
 The Ihad of the East. Miss Richardson. 
 Rehgious and Moral Texts from Sanskrit Writers. Muir. 
 Sacred Anthology. Conway. 
 Indian Wisdom. Monier Williams. 
 Bhagavad Gita. Thompson. 
 The Hindu Drama. Vols. I., II. H. H. Wilson. 
 The Origin and Growth of Religion as Illustrated by the Religion 
 
 of India. 1878. Max Muller. 
 Sakoontala. Monier Williams. 
 Westminster Review. October, 1848. 
 
454 PARTIAL LIST OF BOOKS CONSULTED. 
 
 Oriental Poetry. W. R. Alger. 
 
 The Light of Asia. Edwin Arnold. 
 
 Old Deccan Days. Miss Frere. 
 
 The Avesta. Bleeck, from Spiegel's German Translation. 
 
 The Shah Nameh. Atkinson. 
 
 La Poesie en Perse. M. Barbier. 
 
 Le Theatre Moderne en Perse. M. Barbier. 
 
 Tales of Ancient Greece. G. W. Cox. 
 
 Studies in Greek Poetry. Symonds. 
 
 Pindare et la Poesie Lyrique. Villemain. 
 
 Aischylos. Preface to Translation, Plumptre. 
 
 Sophokles. Preface to Translation. Plumptre. 
 
 Study on Euripides. Mahaffy. 
 
 History of Philosophy. Lewes. 
 
 History of the Drama. Schlegel. 
 
 Origin of the Homeric Poems. Packard's Translation. 
 
 Translation of Plato's Phasdo. Church. 
 
 History of Rome. Vol. I. Mommsen. 
 
 Preface to Lays of Ancient Rome. Macaulay. 
 
 Latin Literature. Thomas Arnold. 
 
 La Mythologie Gauloise. M. Lefloq. 
 
 Keltic Literature. Matthew Arnold. 
 
 Les Bardes Bretons au 6eme Siecle. De la Villemarque. 
 
 " " " 12eme " 
 
 Translation of Breton Ballads. Tom Taylor. 
 The Mabinogeon. Lady Charlotte Guest. 
 Le Foyer Breton. M. Souvestre. 
 Tales of the West Highlands. Campbell. 
 Teutonic Mythology. Grimm. 
 Translation of the Edda. Thorpe. 
 Northern Mythology. Thorpe. 
 Yarl Hakon. Oehlenschlager. 
 Popular Tales from the Norse. Dasent. 
 Translation of the Heimskringla. Laing. 
 Sigurd the Volsung. William Morris. 
 Grettir tlie Strong. Morris and Magniissen. 
 Gunnlaug the Worm-tongue. Morris and Magniissen. 
 Burnt Njal. Dasent. 
 Tales from Teutonic Lands. Cox and Jones. 
 
PABTIAL LIST OF BOOKS CONSULTED. 455 
 
 Frithiof the Bold. Anderson. 
 
 Anglo-Saxon Literature. Conybeare. 
 
 Beowulf. Late Prose Translation. 
 
 Studies in German Literature. Bayard Taylor. 
 
 Early English AVriters. Morley. 
 
 Intellectual Development of Europe. Draper. 
 
 History of Rationalism. Lecky. 
 
 Les Peres de I'Eglise. Villemain. 
 
 Les Moines de I'Occident. Moutalembert. 
 
 Translation of Latin Hymns. Neale. 
 
 Life of St. Bernard. 
 
 Popular Romances of the Middle Ages. G. "W. Cox. 
 
 Middle Ages. Wright. 
 
 La Chanson de Roland. Republication of Old French form. 
 
 The Lytell Geste of Robyn Hood. Ballad Book. 
 
 Early French Poetry. Besant. 
 
 The Troubadours. John Rutherford. 
 
 Study on Dante. Church. 
 
 Study on Spenser. Church. 
 
 Translation of Calderon. McCarthy. 
 
 Trench. 
 Study on Calderon. Lewes. 
 Loves of the Poets. Mrs. Jameson. 
 La Fontaine et ses Fables. Taine. 
 La Litterature Anglaise. Taine. 
 Curious Myths of the Middle Ages. Baring-Gould. 
 La Litterature chez les Slavs. Courriere. 
 La Litterature en Russie. Courriere. 
 Songs of Servia. Owen Meredith. 
 La Russie Epique. Alfred Rambaud. 
 La Litterature du Nord au Moyenage. Eichoflf. 
 Russian Folk Tales. Ralston. 
 Songs of the Russian People. Ralston. 
 The Ottoman Turks in Europe. Freeman. 
 Theology in the English Poets. Stopford Brooke. 
 German Thought. Karl Hillebrant. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 Abelard, the patriarch of modern 
 rationalism, 344. 
 
 Achilleus, story of, 186. 
 
 Aditi, one of the earliest names used 
 by Hindus for the Infinite, 29. 
 
 ^neid, explanation of one of the 
 stories in, 236. 
 
 ^sir, the good gods of Norse my- 
 thology, 272. 
 
 iEsop, animals of, 105 ; fables of, 
 originated in India, 123. 
 
 Asni, the fire, Hindu worship of, 
 ^25. 
 
 Ahana, the dawTi, in Sanskrit, equiv- 
 alents of, 28. 
 
 Ahriman, Persian spirit of dark- 
 ness, 144. 
 
 Ahura Mazda, the Supreme Being 
 of the Persians, 144. 
 
 Aischylos, Greek dramatist, 207; 
 examination of a trilooy by, 
 202-204. 
 
 Alexandria, in Egypt, city of, 227. 
 
 Algebra, early existence of, among 
 Hindus, 119. 
 
 Alger, Mr., 53. 
 
 Ambrose, a Christian bishop of 
 Medifeval Historv, 333 ; hymn 
 for Advent by, 334. 
 
 Ampere, M., 155. 
 
 Anatolius, Saint, hymn by, 332. 
 
 Anaxagoras, the first to recognize 
 a Supreme Intelligence, 211. 
 
 Anglo-Saxon monks, chronicles of 
 the, 342. 
 
 Anglo-Saxons, pagan ballads of the. 
 
 311; how influenced by Norse 
 literature, 315; interesting fact 
 concerning their grammar, 317 ; 
 Christian literature of, ib. 
 
 Arabian Nights, source of some of 
 its stories found in Sanskrit, 
 120. 
 
 Ariosto, a poet of the Renaissance, 
 description of his gi-eatest poem, 
 416. 
 
 Aristotle, his system of metaphys- 
 ics and discoveries in science, 
 218; writings of, how received 
 into Europe, 343. 
 
 Arithmetic, question in, translated 
 from Sanskrit, 119. 
 
 Arjuna, hero of " Bhagavat Gita," 
 116. * 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, 161, 199, 223, 
 225, 239, 252, 254, 327, 330, 
 441. 
 
 Arthur, King, 244 ; the cycle of 
 ballads surrounding, 245 ; a look 
 at his story, 245 et seq. ; ballads 
 of, traced down to present time, 
 248-251. 
 
 Aryan race, what it includes, 5 ; 
 interesting facts concerning its 
 languages, its customs, and its 
 homes, 6-8 ; comparison of its 
 mythologies, 8 et seq. ; the gods 
 of its earliest mythology, 16 ^^ 
 seq. 
 
 Asha, meaning of, in Zend, 145 ; 
 another meaning, 150. 
 
 Asoui'a Medhas, 34. 
 
458 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Ass, favorite animal of the Veda, 26. 
 
 Aswemedha, what it is, 36, 47. 
 
 Aswiiis, twin horses of the dawn, 
 equivalents of, 26. 
 
 Atman, subjective name for Deity 
 used by llindus, 38 ; meaning of 
 the word, 114. 
 
 Atomic theory, found in Greek 
 philosophy, 211. 
 
 Augustine, Saint, 173 ; doetrines 
 and writings of, 336; extract 
 from one of his books, 337 ; what 
 he thought of music in church, 
 338. 
 
 Aurelius, Marcus, a Roman empe- 
 ror and philosopher, 237. 
 
 Avatars, incarnations of Vishnu, 
 38, 39. 
 
 Avesta, sacred book of the Per- 
 sians, facts concerning, 142 ; dilR- 
 culty of understanding, 143 ; 
 words of, expressing the thought 
 of innnortality, 147 ; a hymn 
 from, 148; a prayer, 150; a 
 confession of sins, 151 ; literary, 
 moral, and historical value of, 
 152, 154. 
 
 Balduk, story of, in Norse my- 
 thology, 281. 
 
 Barbier, M., 41. 
 
 Beaumarchais, French dramatist, 
 writings of, 438. 
 
 Beowulf, an Anglo-Saxon pagan 
 ballad, 313 ; description of, 314. 
 
 Beranger, French poet, poetry of, 
 449. 
 
 Bernard of Clairvaux, Saint, his 
 discussions with Abclard, 345 ; 
 hymn written by, 347. 
 
 Bernard of Clnny, 346. 
 
 Bhagavat Gita, best known meta- 
 physical work of the Hindus, 
 facts concerning, 116; a passage 
 from, 117; main object of, 118; 
 when first translated and pub- 
 lished in English, ib. 
 
 Bharata, a great Indian hero, 48. 
 Boethius, last great pagan writer, 
 
 238. 
 Bogy, root of the word, 370. 
 Boileau, French poet, his influence 
 
 upon French poetry, 435. 
 Boots, a hero of Norse folk-tales, 
 309, 310. 
 
 Bossuet, 173. 
 
 Brag, origin of the word, 275. 
 
 Brahman, objective name for Deity 
 used by Hindus, 38; different 
 characters and atti-ibutes of, ib. 
 
 Brahmanical revival, date of, 95; 
 literature of, 118. 
 
 Brahmanism, rise of, 37 ; points of 
 dilference between Buddhism and, 
 
 . 91, 93. 
 
 Brahmans, what they were and 
 what they taught, 42-44. 
 
 Brandan, Saint, a "Welsh monk, 
 story of, 341. 
 
 Brcal, M., 152, 236. 
 
 Bietons, ballad literature of the, 
 255 ; folk-stories of, 2^2. 
 
 Buddha, See Sakya :Muni. The 
 five commandments of, 92. 
 
 Buddhism, rise of, 89 ; account of 
 its origin taken from an Indian 
 book, 90 ; points of difference 
 between Brahmanism and, 91, 
 93 ; asceticism of, 92 ; atheism 
 of, ib. ; spread of, ib. ; decline of, 
 95 ; by what it is especially dis- 
 tinguished, 115. 
 
 Bulgarians, fusion of, with the 
 Slavs, 372. 
 
 Burns, Kobert, poetry of, 447. 
 
 Burnt Njal, an episode of, illustrat- 
 ing some characteristic elements 
 of Norse poetry, 303. 
 
 Byzantium, splendid code of laws 
 of, 237. 
 
 C^DMON, a Saxon poet, 317 ; part 
 of a speech of Satan's translated 
 from his poems, 318. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 459 
 
 Calderon, great Spanish dramatist, 
 Avritinsjs of, 430. 
 
 Calvin, doctrines of, where found, 
 336. 
 
 Camoens, only Portugnese poet of 
 the Renaissance, his epic poem, 
 420 ; its charm, 421 ; his fate, 
 422. 
 
 Campbell, Mr., 264, 265. 
 
 Carlyle, 306, 324, 328. 
 
 Ceremonies among the Hindus, 
 86. 
 
 Charlemagne, influence of, on Me- 
 diaeval literature, 342. 
 
 Chaucer, Geoflrey, earliest wi-itings 
 of, 414 ; the Canterbury Tales, 
 415. 
 
 Chenier, Andre, poet of the French 
 Revolution, writings of, 438. 
 
 Chess, game of, comes from Hindus, 
 119. 
 
 Chinese race, its language and civ- 
 ilization, 4. 
 
 Chivalrv, source of the spirit of, 
 352.' 
 
 Christianity, how the idea of the 
 conflict between good and evil 
 came into, 152. 
 
 Cinderella, story of, its mythologi- 
 cal interpretation, 266. 
 
 Civilization, Chinese, 4 ; Egyptian, 
 5 ; Chaldean, ib. ; different stages 
 of, in Yedic literature, 15. 
 
 Church, Mr., 424. 
 
 Clan, government by, evidence of it 
 among the Bretons, 259. 
 
 Clarke, James Freeman, 153. 
 
 Colonna, Vittoria, a poetess of the 
 Renaissance, 420. 
 
 Copernican system, anticipated by 
 a Hindu astronomer, 119. 
 
 Corneille, the Father of French 
 tragedy, his great work and 
 character of his writings, 432. 
 
 Couriere, 367. 
 
 Cousin, Victor, 110. 
 
 Cowley, 196. 
 
 Cowper, poetiy of, 447. 
 
 Cox, Mr., 31, 188, 189, 191, 284, 
 
 295. 
 Crusades, the, 360. 
 Cyril, the Luther of the Slavs, 367. 
 Cyrus, the Great, account of, 162. 
 
 Dahana, the dawn, 27. 
 
 Dante, description of his great po- 
 em, 410 ; motives which prompted 
 it, 412. 
 
 Dasent, Mr., 108, 311. 
 
 Da-vvn, the, different names in Ary- 
 an mythology for, 27 ; one of the 
 most fertile of Aiyan myths, 28. 
 
 Demosthenes, 227. 
 
 " Deor, the Complaint of," an An- 
 glo-Sason pagan baUad, descrip- 
 tion of, 312. 
 
 De Stael, Madame, her critical his- 
 tory of the literature of Germany, 
 448. 
 
 Devas, origin and meaning of the 
 term, 17 : number and attributes 
 of, 18 ; as used by the Persians, 
 144. 
 
 Diaz, discovery of Cape of Good 
 Hope by, 421. 
 
 Divine Being, the Hindu's concep- 
 tion of, 33 ; various names for, 
 34. 
 
 Djellaleddin Roumi, great mystical 
 poet of Persia, 168. 
 
 Domovoy, the household spirit of 
 Russia, description of, 398. 
 
 Doric literature, sole representative 
 of, 198. 
 
 Drama, the, during the Renaissance, 
 426 ; the four nations in which 
 it is original, 429 ; the modern, 
 to what it can be traced, 349. 
 
 Druids, the, interesting facts con- 
 cerning, 241. 
 
 Dryden, John, poetry of, 435. 
 
 Dwarfs, the, of Breton folk stories, 
 263 ; in Teutonic mythology, 
 288. 
 
460 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Dyans, most ancient name for the 
 Supreme God, equivalents of, 
 19. 
 
 Eddas, the, sacred books of the 
 
 Norsemen, 270. 
 Egyptians, the, 5. 
 Eisteddvods, poetical contests among 
 
 the Welsh, 250. 
 Eleatics, the, what they are, 210. 
 Emerson, Mr., 168. 
 England, opening of Renaissance 
 
 in, its poets, 422, 423. 
 English monks, influence of, on 
 
 Mediaeval literature, 348. 
 Epictetus, philosophy of, 237. 
 Epikouros, philosophy of, 219. 
 Erigena, John Scotus, the only 
 
 learned layman in Europe for six 
 
 centuries, 343. 
 Erse language, discoveries in phi- 
 lology contributed by, 239 ; an 
 
 immense literature in, 263. 
 Euripides, Greek dramatist, his 
 
 plays, 207 ; description of one, 
 
 the Alkestis, 208. 
 
 Fairy tales, their important place 
 in literature, 13 ; those belonging 
 to Sanskrit language, 121. 
 
 Fable, translated from Sanskrit, 
 124; invention of teaching by, 
 claimed by Hindus, 125. 
 
 Fate, the idea of, in Greek drama, 
 illustration of, 204. 
 
 Fathers of the Church, the, 331. 
 
 Fauche, M., 47. 
 
 "Faust," story of the drama, with a 
 critical examination of, 442, et 
 seq. 
 
 Fenian, source of the word, 263. 
 
 Fergusson, Mr., 126, 226. 
 
 Figures, decimal, come from Hin- 
 dus, 118. 
 
 Firdonsi, author of the Persian na- 
 tional epic, 154 ; story of the 
 poem, 155 ; quotation from, 159. 
 
 Fortunatus, Venantius, a learned 
 
 Italian, 339. 
 France, influence of, upon modern 
 
 literature, 405 ; opening of the 
 
 Renaissance in, 420. 
 Francis I., influence of, on the Re- 
 
 nai.ssance, 420. 
 Fran, root of the word, 282. 
 Fravashi, an attendant spirit, in 
 
 Persian mythology, 147. 
 French language, the first popular 
 
 dialect to crystallize into form, 
 
 405. 
 French literature, entrance of the 
 
 Romantic school into, 448 
 French monks. Mediaeval writings 
 
 of, 343. 
 French Revolution, by what brought 
 
 about, 438. 
 Funeral hymns of the Hindus, 
 
 translation of two, 29, 80. 
 
 Gaelic, translation of a ballad from 
 the, 264 ; character of ballads 
 in general, 264 et seq. 
 
 Gama, Vasco da, voyage of, found- 
 ation of the Portuguese epic, 421. 
 
 Gathas, Persian hyums, 145. 
 
 Gender, what the result of, 17. 
 
 Geoffrey of ]Monmouth, a Welsh 
 monk, 250. 
 
 Germans, interesting facts concern- 
 ing the ancient, 320; their he- 
 roes and ballads, 321 et seq. 
 
 Germany, no Renaissance period in, 
 foundation of the Universities, 
 427. 
 
 German language, foundation of, 
 319; earliest sacred poem known 
 in, 320. 
 
 German literature, rise of the Ro- 
 mantic school in, 439. 
 
 German monks, rise of the, 342. 
 
 German poetry, 427. 
 
 Gesta, monkish tales, 351. 
 
 Ghosts, origin of a superstition 
 conceniing, 184. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 461 
 
 Giants, the specialty of Irish folk- 
 stories, 263. 
 
 Goethe, 129, 164, 210, 215 ; writ- 
 ings of, 440 ; his mastery of the 
 two opposite schools of writing, 
 440 et seq. 
 
 Goldoni, an Italian dramatist, writ- 
 ings of, 437. 
 
 Graii; Holy, story of the, 251; 
 mythologically examined, 253. 
 
 Grammar, science of, among the 
 Hindus, 120. 
 
 Gray, 199, 250 ; his " Odes," 436. 
 
 Greece, original inhabitants of, 173 ; 
 the mythical history of, 190 ; 
 her lyric poetry and the various 
 poets, 195, 196 ; her statesmen 
 and orators, 227. 
 
 Greeks, the, 172; character of, as 
 exemplified by their literatui'e, 
 175. 
 
 Greek and Latin, 2. 
 
 Greek drama, growth of, 199 ; 
 character of, 200 et seq. ; the chief 
 writers of, 207. 
 
 Greek gods, the character of, their 
 significance and equivalents, 179 
 et seq. 
 
 Greek heroes, the, character of, 
 185. 
 
 Greek history, and the various 
 writers of, 221 et seq. 
 
 Greek Literature, considered in the 
 new light of comparative philol- 
 ogy and mythology, 172 ; as an 
 independent manifestation of hu- 
 man thought, 173; no sacred 
 books in, 174. 
 
 Greek mythology, true and final 
 interpretation of, 174; thepleas- 
 antest side of, 185. 
 
 Greek philosophy, 210 ; first prob- 
 lem of, 211 ; the various philos- 
 ophers, what they taught, 211 
 et seq.; summing up of the vari- 
 ous schools, 214. 
 
 Griffith, 97. 
 
 Grimm, 12, 364. 
 
 Guru, a family priest among the 
 
 Hindus, 86. 
 Guy of Warwick, story of, 361. 
 
 Hafiz, greatest of modern Per- 
 sians, his poems, 164 ; transla- 
 tion of one, 165. 
 
 Haoma juice, Persian di'ink of the 
 Gods, 149. 
 
 " Heaven," a Mediaeval Latin 
 hymn, by Hildebert, archbishop 
 of Tours, 347. 
 
 Heine, 168, 433. 
 
 Herakleitos, first Greek prose 
 writer, 211. 
 
 Hermes, the hymn to, description 
 of, and extracts from, 182 ei 
 seq. 
 
 Herodotos, a Greek historian, ac- 
 count of, 221. 
 
 Hesiod, poems of, 177 ; passage 
 from one, ib. ; chiaf importance 
 of, in history of ideas, 178 ; his 
 " Theogony," ib. 
 
 Hildebrand, a German hero, story 
 of, 321. 
 
 Hindus, freedom of thought among 
 the, 108 ; character of their his- 
 tory, ib. 
 
 Hitopadesa, a collection of Sans- 
 krit fables, 123. 
 
 Homeric hymns, the, 181. 
 
 Homeric poems, character of the, 
 176 ; evidences as to the theory 
 of the Nature-myth furnished 
 by, 187 ; evidence as to the 
 source from which they come, 
 191. 
 
 " How the Sun, the Moon, and the 
 Wind Went Out to Dinner," a 
 fairy tale translated from the 
 Sanskrit, 121. 
 
 Hugo, Victor, writings of, 450. 
 
 Iceland, settlement of the Teu- 
 tons in, 270. 
 
462 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Iduna, story of, in Norse mythol- 
 ogy, 282. 
 
 Iliad,' the, 176. 
 
 Immortality, one of the first inti- 
 mations of, 29. 
 
 India, its relation to literatnre, 14 ; 
 the epics of, one point in which 
 they differ fi-om those of other 
 nations, 58 ; theology and meta- 
 physics of, 108. 
 
 Indra, the rain hringer, ancient 
 Aryan god, 19 ; hymns to, 20, 
 27. 
 
 Infinite, doctrine of the, not a 
 modern one, 53. 
 
 Iran, once the name for Persia, 
 144. 
 
 Ireland, in the seventh century, 341. 
 
 Italian literature, 410. 
 
 Jones, Sir William, 2, 129, 142, 
 146. 
 
 Jotuns, evil beings of Norse my- 
 thology, 272. 
 
 *' Judgment of Libussa, the Wise," 
 an ancient manuscript of Slavonic 
 literature, description of, 373. 
 
 Juggler, source of the word, 351, 
 
 Jurisprudence, comparative, 2. 
 
 Kalidasa, a Sanskrit dramatist, 
 127 ; what the author of, 128. 
 
 Kama, a Sanskrit word, significance 
 and equivalents of, 109. 
 
 Kapila, a Sanskrit philosopher. 111. 
 
 Kelts, early history of the, 238 ; 
 the various languages spoken hy, 
 238, 239 ; important chai-acter- 
 istics of, 239 ; religion of, 240 ; 
 translation of one of their songs 
 describing transmigration, 241 ; 
 literature of, 244 elseq. ; poeti- 
 cal metre of, 259. 
 
 Khiva desert, how formed, 8. 
 
 Kralove-Dvor, an ancient manu- 
 sci-ipt of Slavonic literature, de- 
 scription of, 376. 
 
 Kshatriya, the second caste among 
 
 the Hindus, 44. 
 Kymry, name of the Kelts in 
 
 Wales, facts concerning, 242 ; 
 
 brilliant civilization of, in sixth 
 
 century, 252. 
 
 La Fontaine, fables of, 434. 
 Lamartine, French poet, poetry of 
 
 449. 
 Langlois, 33, 36. 
 
 Language, 3 ; the three stages of, 4. 
 Language, English, words which it 
 
 owes to its Keltic element, 
 
 254. 
 Latin hymns of Mediaeval litera- 
 ture, the four most celebrated) 
 
 346 ; ai-e a genuine production, 
 
 348. 
 " Lay of Thrym ; or the Hammer 
 
 Recovered," ti'anslation of an old 
 
 Norse ballad, 277. 
 Lecky, Mr., 343, 446. 
 Leflocq, M., 240. 
 Lessing, German poet, writings of, 
 
 439. 
 Lewes, Mr., 210, 212, 214, 216, 
 
 217, 220, 345. 
 Life, daily, among the Hindus, 84 ; 
 
 theory of, the five sacraments, 
 
 85 ; relief from consequences of, 
 
 88. 
 Literature, unity and continuity of, 
 
 1 ; origin of, id. ; what it owes 
 
 to India, 14; modern, the rise 
 
 of, 405. 
 Literature, English, what it owes to 
 
 the Keltic spirit, 254 ; the Ro- 
 mantic school in, 446. 
 Loki, bad gods of Norse mythology, 
 
 story of the, 280. 
 " Lord Nann and the Fairy," a 
 
 mythological ballad of the sixth 
 
 century, 260. 
 Louis XIV., the literature of the 
 
 age of, 434. 
 Luther, hymns of, 427. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 463 
 
 Lykourgos, the laws of, in Sparta, 
 226. 
 
 Macaulay, 222. 
 
 Maguussen, Finu, 276. 
 
 Maha Bharata, earliest epic poem 
 of the Brahmanical period, 45 ; 
 when written and other facts con- 
 cerning it, 46, 47 ; heroes of, 
 48 ; interesting description of its 
 action, 48, et seq. ; passage from, 
 showing how natural is belief in 
 immortality, 51 ; an episode of, 
 what it resembles, 55. 
 
 Mahmoud, Sultan, a great Moham- 
 medan conqueror, what litera- 
 ture OAves to, 154. 
 
 Maine, Sir Henry Sumner, 2. 
 
 Mann, laws of, 80 ; extracts from, 
 81, 82. 
 
 Maruts, the storm winds, equiva- 
 lents of, 21 ; hymn to the, id. 
 
 Maurice, Mr., 219. 
 
 Maya, doctrine of, what it teaches, 
 115 ; what it resembles, 116. 
 
 Max Miiller, 2, 3, 15, 16, 18, 19, 28, 
 31, 89, 109,111, 113, 114,120, 
 125,145,173,179,190,320,409. 
 
 Mediaeval Latin, as distinct from 
 Classic Latin, 329. 
 
 Mediaeval literature, divided into 
 two classes, 329. 
 
 Medici, Lorenzo de, first poet of 
 Renaissance, 416. 
 
 Meistersingers, German minstrels, 
 account of, 409. 
 
 " Menao, The Battle of," translation 
 of a Keltic ballad. 243. 
 
 Metaphysics. See Philosophy. 
 
 Metempsychosis, doctrine of, how 
 taught by Brahmans, 39. 
 
 Middle Ages, foundation of many 
 of the romances of the, 252 ; 
 opening of, 339. 
 
 Milton, John, 195 ; the poet of the 
 Refoi'mation, 428 ; his great 
 poem, 429. 
 
 Mind, human, the earliest utterance 
 of, 14. 
 
 Minerva, interesting discovery con- 
 cerning, 231. 
 
 Minnesingers, German minstrels, 
 description of, 409. 
 
 Minstrels, rise of the, 351 ; the 
 four divisions into which their 
 ballads are grouped, id. 
 
 Miracle plays of the Middle Ages, 
 I 349 
 
 Mistletoe, story of the, in Norse 
 mythology, 281. 
 
 Mithras, the Persian's name for the 
 sun, 148. 
 
 Mohammedans, fatalism of, an ex- 
 tract in illustration of, 167. 
 
 Mohl, M., 156. 
 
 Moliere, a great French dramatist, 
 charactei* and quality of his wri- 
 tings, 433. 
 
 ]Mommsen, 229. 
 
 Monks, during the Middle Ages, 
 330 ; the chronicles of, 340 et seq. 
 
 Monkeys, how considered by the 
 Hindus, 104, 105. 
 
 :\Iontalembert, 331, 446. 
 
 Morality plays of the ^[iddle Ages, 
 350. * . 
 
 Morris, William, 284, 824. 
 
 Mourom, Ilia de, a Russian hero, 
 story of, 380. 
 
 Mythology, comparative, 2; conclu- 
 sions of, 3 ; what it teaches, 9 ; 
 theory of, confirmed, 12 ; most 
 interesting discovery of, 251. 
 
 " Nala and Damayanti, the 
 Story of," translated from the 
 Sanskrit, 58. 
 
 Nibelungen Lied, most celebrated of 
 old German ballads, its resem- 
 blance to the Volsung Saga, 323; 
 the differences between, 324 et 
 seq. 
 
 Nirvana, meaning of, 93. 
 
 " Nomenoe, the Evil Tribute of," a 
 
464 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Breton ballad, translation of, 
 255. 
 
 Norse alphabet, 276. 
 
 Norsemen, the sacred books of, 
 270 ; their codes of law and gov- 
 ernment, 305. 
 
 Norse folk -tales, 309. 
 
 Norse Kings, the, 306. 
 
 Norse mythology, cosmogony of, 
 271 ; place occupied by women 
 in, 273 ; gods and goddesses of, 
 273 et seq. ; most acceptable sac- 
 rifice of, 283 ; human sacrifice 
 in, ib. ; spiritual idea in, ib. 
 
 Nymph, meaning of the word, 264. 
 
 " Ode to the Setting Sun," a Gaelic 
 ballad, translation of, 264. 
 
 Odin, Father and Ruler of Norse 
 mythology, story of, 273 et seq. 
 
 Odysseus, a Greek hero, story of, 
 187. 
 
 Odyssey, the, 176. 
 
 Olaf, the Saint, a Norse King, his 
 methods of religious conversion, 
 306-309. 
 
 Olger, the national hero of Den- 
 mark, story of, 357. 
 
 Omar Khayyam, \\ie. modern as- 
 tronomer-poet of Persia, char- 
 acter of his writings, 168, 
 
 Oue God, origin of the conception 
 of, 33 ; hymn to the, 34. 
 
 Ormazd, a Persian name for the 
 Divine Being, 144. 
 
 Ossian's poems, published by Mac- 
 pherson, latest authority con- 
 cerniag, 263. 
 
 Panchatantra, a collection of 
 
 Sanskrit fabks, 123. 
 Paradise, earthly, Persian belief in, 
 
 153. 
 Parsecs, the sect of, 147. 
 Perikles, a Greek statesman, 227. 
 Perseus, story of, 193. 
 Persia, literature of, 154 ; modern 
 
 literature of, 164; modem poets 
 of, 167 ; popular stones of mod- 
 ern, 169; the historical novel 
 said to be derived from modern, 
 170 ; valuable histories of mod- 
 ern, ib. 
 
 Persians, the, 142 ; the various 
 gods of, 144 ; their idea of im- 
 mortality as beautifully expressed 
 by words of the Avesta, 147 ; 
 their religion, its efiect upon 
 them, 147, 148 ; division of time 
 into weeks probably derived from, 
 154. 
 
 Petrarca, an Italian poet, poems 
 of, 413. 
 
 Philoktetes, a Greek poem, descrip- 
 tion of, 206. 
 
 Philology, comparative, 2. 
 
 Philosophy, Sanskrit, the six sys- 
 tems of, 110 ; rise of. 111 ; first 
 system of, when written, and by 
 whom, ib. ; four periods of, 112 ; 
 distinguishing features of, 113. 
 
 Pindar, the Odes of, 197; brief 
 account of his life, 198. 
 
 Plantagenets, ancient Welsh proph- 
 ecy concerning the, 250. 
 
 Plato, a Greek philosopher, ac- 
 count of him and his philosophy, 
 214. 
 
 Poetvy, scientific and metaphysical 
 books of Hindus written in, 120. 
 
 Pope, Alexander, poetry of, 436. 
 
 Pragapati, a Sanskrit name for the 
 Divine Being, 34. 
 
 " Prayer to the Virgin," a poem by 
 Francois Villon, a Trouvere, 350. 
 
 Property, Hindu customs coucern- 
 ing, 83. 
 
 Pi-ndentius, a layman of the Mid- 
 dle Aecs, funeral hvmu bv, 
 335. 
 
 Puck, root of the word, 370. 
 
 Puranas, what they are, 118. 
 
 Pythagoras, a Greek philosopher, 
 what he taught, 212. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 465 
 
 Queen Axne, the period of, its 
 literature, 435 ; poets, 436 ; the 
 drama and di-aniatists, ib. 
 
 Racine, French dramatist, char- 
 acter and quality of his writings, 
 433. 
 
 Rainbow, idea of the, in Norse 
 mvtholosv, 282. 
 
 Ralston, Mr., 378, 389. 
 
 Rama, hero of the " Ramayana," 
 95 ; story of, 101 et seq. 
 
 Ramayana, an epic poem of India, 
 by whom re-written, 95 ; plot 
 and character of, 96; opening 
 description of city of Ayodhya, 
 98 ; is but another expression of 
 the universal contest between 
 good and evil, 107. 
 
 Rambaud, M., 378, 383, 387. 
 
 Ragnarok, twilight of the gods in 
 Norse mythology, 283. 
 
 Red Riding Hood, source of the 
 fable of, 286. 
 
 Renaissance, the, 415 ; most char- 
 acteristic expression of, 426 ; 
 dramatists of, ib. 
 
 Reynard the Fox, story of, 364. 
 
 Rhyme, as an element of poetry, 
 how invented, 348. 
 
 Riddles, their place in ancient my- 
 thology, 399, 400. 
 
 Rig Veda, the, hymns of, 14, 35 ; 
 incalculable value of, 15, 18; 
 translation and publication of, 
 36 ; what sometimes called, 37 ; 
 translation of original hymn 
 from, 110. 
 
 Right and wrong, distinction be- 
 tween, how it arose, 30. 
 
 Rishis, religious bards of Hindus, 
 35. 
 
 Rita,* name among the Hindus for 
 the Divine Being, origin and 
 meaning of the name, 30. 
 
 Robin Hood, significance of story 
 of, 363. 
 
 " Roland, the Song of," described 
 and examined, 353 et seq. 
 
 Romans, the, characteristics of, 
 229 ; proof that they were not 
 a literary people, 237 ; most fa- 
 tal influence of Greek literature 
 upon, ib. 
 
 Roman gods, the, 230 ; form of 
 worship of, 232 ; the Genius, or 
 tutelary spirit, 233. 
 
 Roman literature, character of 
 early, 233 et seq. ; influence of 
 conquest of Greece upon, 235. 
 
 Ruibnikoff", M., 378. 
 
 Russian epic, peculiarity of the, 380. 
 
 Russian folk-tales, 389 ; the evil 
 beings of, 390. 
 
 Russian hero ballads, two classes 
 of, 378 ; the women of, 385. 
 
 Russian literature, particular char- 
 acteristic of, 369 ; richness of, 
 376 ; mythology of, 377. 
 
 Saadi, a great modern Persian 
 writer, works of, 166; extracts 
 from, 167. 
 
 Sachs, Hans, hymns of, 427. 
 
 Ssemund, sacred ballads of the 
 Norsemen collected by, 270, 312. 
 
 " Sakoontala ; or The Lost Ring," a 
 play translated from Sanskrit, 
 129-141. 
 
 Sakya Muni, 89, 94 ; the name of 
 Buddha, dates of his birth and 
 death, 89 ; how he became Buddha, 
 90. 
 
 Sanhita, a name for the Rig Veda, 
 37. 
 
 Sanskrit language, what is due to, 
 1 ; importance of, 2 ; discovery 
 of, and important facts concern- 
 ing, 2, 3 ; astonishing facts re- 
 vealed by, 6. 
 
 Sanskrit literature, four distinct pe- 
 riods in, 37 ; important fact con- 
 cerning, 45 ; spiritual element in, 
 54 ; date of latest books in, 118 ; 
 
 30 
 
466 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 its relation to science, ib. ; the 
 drama in, 126 ; number of plays 
 discovered, 127 ; no historical 
 element in, 170. 
 
 Saranay, Aryan name for the dawn, 
 20. 
 
 Satan, fall of, conception of Per- 
 sians bearing striking resemblance 
 to, 153. 
 
 Sati, the, a custom among the Hin- 
 dus of burning widows, 53 ; 
 prevalent among the Slavs, 871. 
 
 Say, source of the word, 275. 
 
 Scandinavian literature, when dis- 
 covered, and its importance, 269 ; 
 noble qualities of, 298 ; poetry 
 of, 299 et seq. 
 
 Schiller, writings of, 440. 
 
 Schlcgcl, Frederic, his study of 
 Sanskrit, 3. 
 
 Scholasticism, origin of the word, 
 343 ; extraordinary empire of, 
 during' Middle Ages, ib. 
 
 Sciences, those which first arise in 
 every nation, 119. 
 
 Scops, Anglo-Saxon minstrels, 811. 
 
 Scott, poetry of, 448. 
 
 Semitic races, what they include, 5. 
 
 Serenade, origin of the word, 407. 
 
 Servians, the, 403 ; poetry of, ib. 
 
 Shah Nameh, name of the Persian 
 national epic, 155 ; character of 
 the poem, 156 ; its ballads, 157; 
 its heroes and heroines, and their 
 significance, 158 et seq. ; Persian 
 love and reverence for, 161 ; cu- 
 rious fact concerning its heroes, 
 162 ; its infiuence on our nursery 
 talcs, 169. 
 
 Shakespeare, 126, 426 ; fragment 
 from Sanskrit resembling his 
 "Seven Ages," 125, 126 ; founda- 
 tion of his character of Cordelia, 
 252 ; whence he drew his classical 
 knowledge, 360. 
 
 Siegfried, hero of the Nibelungen 
 Lied, story of, 324 et seq. 
 
 Sigmimd, a Norse hero, story of, 
 285. 
 
 Sigurd the Volsung, the greatest 
 
 .^ Norse hero, 284 ; story of, 286 
 et seq. 
 
 Sita, wife of Rama, 100 ; passages 
 from the Ramayana, and other 
 interesting matter concerning, 
 101 et seq. 
 
 Siva, the destroyer, a character 
 taken by Brahman, 38. 
 
 Skidbladnir, ship of the gods, in 
 Norse mythology, 282. 
 
 Slavonic literature, 368 ; mythology 
 of, 369 et seq. 
 
 Slavs, origin of their name, 6 ; their 
 relation to European literature, 
 366 ; reasons why they have no 
 political unity, ib. ; most impor- 
 tant dialect of, 367 ; other facts 
 concerning, 368 ; absence of the 
 spiritual instinct among, 371. 
 
 Sleeping beauty, soui-ce of the nur- 
 sery tale of the, 291. 
 
 Smitri, meaning of, 80. 
 
 Suorre Sturleson, a collector of 
 Norse literature and history, 
 306. 
 
 Sokrates, Greek philosopher, ac- 
 count of him and his philosophy, 
 212. 
 
 Solar myth, the, in Sanskrit, 23 ; 
 as seen in the Hindu mythology, 
 107 ; in Persian mythology, 
 160; in Greek mythology, 186 
 et seq. : in Roman mythology, 
 236 ; in Keltic mythology, 245; 
 in Norse mythology, 287, 302 ; 
 in Norse folk-talcs, 310; among 
 the Anglo-Saxons, 314; among 
 the Germans, 321, 324, 359; 
 among the French, 356 ; among 
 the Danes, 357 ; among the 
 Scotch, 359 ; among the Eng- 
 lish, 361, 363 ; among the Slavs, 
 370 ; among the Russians, 379. 
 
 Somar, the Hindu's drink for the 
 
INDEX. 
 
 467 
 
 gods ; its personification, 24 ; 
 
 hymn to, ib. 
 " Song of Igor," the Russian national 
 
 epic, description of, 386, 
 " Song to Call Back the Dead," from 
 
 the Russian mythology, 397. 
 Sophists, the, 212. 
 Sophokles, a Greek dramatist, 207. 
 Soul, the, compared to a rider in a 
 
 chariot, 116, 215. 
 Spanish drama, 429. 
 " Spell Against Grief at Parting 
 
 From a Dearly Beloved Child," 
 
 from Russian mythology, 395. 
 Spenser, Edmund, his poems, 423 ; 
 
 his characteristics as a poet, 425. 
 Sruti, meaning of, 80. 
 Stoics, the, 237. 
 Sudras, fourth caste among the 
 
 Hindus, 45. 
 Sun, the, personification of. See 
 
 Solar Myth. 
 Swanhild, a solar myth of Norse 
 
 mythology, stoiy of, 295. 
 
 Tacitus, 268. 
 
 Taine, 222, 316, 411, 429. 
 
 Tannhauser, story of, 359. 
 
 Tasso, Torquato, poet of the Re- 
 naissance, analysis of his great 
 poem, " Jerusalem Delivered," 
 418 ; his poem " Aminta," 419. 
 
 Taylor, Bayard, 439, 441, 443. 
 
 Tell, William, story of, as found 
 among the Norsemen, 302 ; as 
 found in an old English ballad, 
 364. 
 
 Tennyson, 114. 
 
 Teutonic epic, real diff"erence be- 
 tween it and the Greek, 284. 
 
 Teutonic family, what it includes, 
 267 ; its first entrance into Eu- 
 rope, 268 ; its settlement in Ice- 
 land, 269 ; evidence of the grim 
 humor characteristic of, 280. 
 
 Teutonic heathendom, complete re- 
 mains of, 269. 
 
 Teutonic mythology, the idea of 
 
 paradise in, 184. 
 Thales of Miletos, father of Greek 
 
 philosophy, 211. 
 Theokritos, a Greek poet, account 
 
 of, 228. 
 Theseus, a Greek hero, story of, 193. 
 Thomas a Kempis, the mystic writ- 
 ings called by name of, 345. 
 Thompson, Mr., 39, 42, 111, 112, 
 
 117, 123. 
 Thor, a God in Norse mythology, 
 
 story of, 277. 
 Thoukydides, a Greek historian, 
 
 account of, 223 ; extract from' 
 
 his funeral oration on Perikles, 
 
 224. 
 Thursday, origin of the name, 276. 
 Transmigration, doctrine of, taught 
 
 by Buddha, 93 ; as held by the 
 
 Norsemen, 276. 
 Tribonian, the great Roman lawyer 
 
 238. 
 Troubadours, French minstrels, 
 
 account of, 406 ; their poetry, 
 
 407. 
 Trouveres, French minstrels, ac- 
 count of, 407. 
 Troves, Chretien de, his story of 
 
 the Holy Grail, 253. 
 True, Thomas, Scottish story of, 
 
 359. 
 Tuesday, origin of the name, 275. 
 Turanian raqes, what they include, 
 
 and other facts concerning, 4 ; 
 
 origin of their name, 156. 
 Tylor's " Primitive Culture," 393. 
 
 Ulphilas, Bishop, his translation 
 
 of the Bible into Moeso-Gothic, 
 
 270, 319, 342. 
 Upanishads, mystical doctrines of 
 
 the Brahmans, what they are. 
 
 113. 
 Urvasi, a name for the dawn, 28. 
 Ushas, the dawn, loveliest of Vedic 
 
 deities, 26 ; hymns to, 26, 27. 
 
468 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Vaisyas, the, tMrd caste among the 
 
 Hindus, 44. 
 Valniiki, re-wrote the Ramayana, 
 
 95. 
 Vampire, the, in Russian folk-talcs, 
 
 392. 
 Varuna, the All-Surroundcr, 31; 
 
 hymns to, 32. 
 " Vazuza and Volga," a Russian 
 
 folk -tale, 389. 
 Veda Slavona, a collection of popu- 
 lar poetry of the Slavs, 372. 
 Vcdas, meaning of the word, 14 ; 
 
 distinction between " Rig Veda " 
 
 and the three later ones, 43. 
 Vega, Lope de, a Spanish dramatist, 
 
 430. 
 Verkovicz, M., 372. 
 Vesta, noblest and most important 
 
 of Latin deities, 232. 
 Villemain, 198, 331. 
 Villemarque, M. Le Vicomte de la, 
 
 251, 254, 265. 
 Vishnu, most human of Hindu 
 
 gods, 38. 
 Viswakarman, a Sanskrit name for 
 
 the Divine Being, 34. 
 Vladimir, the Charlemagne of Rus- 
 sia, 377. 
 Vogelweide, Walther von der, 
 
 greatest German poet of the 
 
 twelfth century, 409. 
 Volga, a Russian hero, story of> 
 
 379. 
 Voltaire, writings of, 437. 
 
 "Wage, Robert, his story of King 
 Arthur, 250. 
 
 "Wagner, 254, 284 ; his trilogy of 
 the Volsungs examined histori- 
 cally, 296. 
 
 Wednesday, story of, in Russian 
 mythology, 401. 
 
 "Week, days of the, their personifi- 
 cation in Russian mythology, 
 400. 
 
 Weird, source of the word, 273. 
 
 Weissenbrun Hymn, earliest sacred 
 poem in Gennan, translation of, 
 320. 
 
 Wheeler, Mr., 46, 47, 48, 51, 57, 
 93, 96, 97. 
 
 Whitney, Professor, 317. 
 
 Williams, Monier, 38, 96, 107. 
 
 Wilson, Mr., 36. 
 
 Wind, personification of the, 23. 
 
 Witch stories, theory in explana- 
 tion of, 393. 
 
 " Woe," a Russian folk-tale, 391. 
 
 Women, Hindu laws about, 83 ; 
 seclusion of, amongst the Hindus, 
 when it commenced, 106. 
 
 Wordsworth, 215. 
 
 Xenophanes, a Greek philoso- 
 
 phcr, 212. 
 Xcnophon, Greek historian and 
 
 general, account of, 225. 
 
 Yama, judge of the dead, a Hindu 
 
 god, 30. 
 Yugas, Hindu name for vast period 
 
 of time, 39. 
 
 Zarathustra, religious reformer 
 
 among Persians, laws of, 146. 
 Zend, language of Persians, 142, 
 
 its literature, 154. 
 Zeno, the stoic, philosophy of, 
 
 220. 
 Zoroaster, Greek form of Zarathus- 
 
 tra, 146. 
 
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