tality and enjoyment upon the sacerdotal deities or rites.* The influence of this sacerdotalism on the development of the Hindu faith in general, and the belief in the future life of the soul in particular, must here be distinctly recognized. The question is not as to its origin, but as to its influence. Its source is psychological, and it forms an essential element in all religions -is represented in our Christian faith by the sacrifice and priesthood of Christ; but for reasons which cannot be stated here, it grew very early to portentous proportions and exercised a baneful influence among the Hindus. The Vedic religion may be described as a naturalism with a nascent sacerdotalism superinduced. In the earlier Vedic era the natural was the predominant element, but in the later the sacerdotal. When a religion is passing through such a phase of development, there runs beneath or within it a stream of what may be termed unconscious metaphysics-general tendencies understood at the time in whole by few, perhaps by none, understood in part by many, but felt by all. The new element has to assert and justify itself against the old by creating for the religion it seeks to transform a new basis, radically different from the old naturalism; and so the result is a twofold development—the Several illustrative passages will be found in Dr. Muir's "Sans. Texts," v. 14 ff. growth of religious rites on the one hand, of abstract conceptions on the other. But while the former are manifested in the general constitution and practice of the religion, the latter can appear only in particular and partial utterances. Here and there an individual gathers into himself the dim and diffused consciousness of the people, expresses it in hymn or aphorism, and the expression, a mirror to the collective mind, seems the result of Divine inspiration. Hence, while the speculative and mystical hymns in the tenth book of the Rig-Veda form, in almost every respect, contrasts to the spontaneous and objective compositions of the earlier books, they are yet only concentrated utterances of thoughts which had been throughout the whole Vedic era slowly accumulating and assuming consistency and shape. They are like early spring flowers, at once manifestations of forces at work in the earth and prophecies of what is to come. This double growth of sacerdotalism and abstract thought stands very clearly revealed in the tenth book of the Rig-Veda. The priesthood is professional, a priest necessary to worship. The sacrificial rites are numerous and minute. The value attached to prayers, hymns, sacrifices, excessive. The new sacerdotalism is superseding the old naturalism, and abstract thought is seen struggling to find a new basis and new forms for the changing religion. Creation is conceived as a sacrifice, either the self-immolation of a god, or the immolation of one god by others.* Sacrifice is the cause of human prosperity and the processes of nature. The Brahman is the son of god, sprung from divine seed.‡ The Vedic poets are the organs and offspring of deity.§ The hymns are divine, god-generated, or given, and enter into the Rishis by sacrifice. The speculative tendencies thus incline to assume sacerdotal forms. Now and then, indeed, an exceptional thinker, either above or outside priestly influence, asks and tries to answer the profoundest questions in simple but sublime words.¶ Speculation, partly the victim of the old naturalism as embalmed in language, partly the seer and exponent of the eternal truths there contained, finds in life ever emerging from death the principle that abides amid the decay and renewal of nature and man. This, indeed, is but guessed at, not explicitly developed; but the guess extends to the procession of gods and men from * R.-V., x. 81, 5; x. 130, 3. But particularly the celebrated Purusha Sukta, x. 90. See this hymn translated, explained, and illustrated at great length and on all sides in Dr. Muir's "Sans. Texts," vol. i. 8 ff.; vol. v. 367 ff. † R.-V., x. 62, 1—3, and very frequently. R.-V., vii. 33, 11–13; x. 62, 4, 5. § R.-V., x. 20, 10; x. 61, 7. || x. 71, 3; x. 125, 3; x. 88, 8; x. 61, 7. ¶ See the extraordinary hymn, R.-V., x. 129, translated under the title, "The Thinker's Question," in Professor Max Müller's "Anc. Sans. Lit.," p. 564. Also by Dr. Muir, iv. 4, and v. 356 ff.; and by Mr. Colebrooke, "Essays,” p. 17 (Williams and Norgate's edition). a common source of life. The seeds of Hindu speculation lie like the germs of Brahmanism in the later Vedic hymns. The belief in a life after death expressed in the later Vedic hymns must now be looked at in the light of these sacerdotal and speculative tendencies. Sacerdotalism held command over the future; it could reward and punish. The realms of light, the world of the righteous, the society of the fathers, a festive life with Yama, a life in the presence of the gods, immortality in a world where all the objects of gratification are attained, were in its gift. And it also knew an “abyss," a "bottomless" and " "nethermost "" darkness" for the wicked. Speculation has to seek a reason or ground for this sacerdotal power, and sees it, in a far-off sort of way, in the unity of human nature with the divine, broken by the earthly life, but restored by sacrifice. Thought had divined that unity in the source of life implied the creation and derivative immortality of the gods. It had deified the fathers, deified the rishis, and so had learned to conceive the permanent element in man as akin to the divine. On this ground pre- and post-existence become alike natural, complementary conceptions. And so Agni is implored in a funeral hymn to kindle with his heat the "unborn part" of the dead; to "give up again to the fathers him who comes R.-V., vii. 104, 3, 17; ix. 73, 8. +R.-V., x. 152, 4; x. 103, 12. offered with oblations."* To the soul of the departed it is said, "Throwing off all imperfection again go to thy home." Man has had a past, will have a future, has come from God and may to God return. And the thought has a side which indicates its ultimate anthropological form, as distinguished from its theological basis. The dead is told to "become united to a body and clothed in a shining form." The varied constituents of the body are told to go to the elements to which they are akin. § The like seeks the like. Without body or form individual life is inconceivable. And over all sacrifice presides, bringing the gods to receive the "unborn part," carrying it to the homes of Yama and the fathers. + + In these Vedic Hymns, then, the belief in a life after death changes with the change in the religion. In the older Naturalism, it was a simple belief in the continued life of the fathers; in the later embryo-sacerdotalism, it is becoming related, on its material side, to the idea of God, on its formal, to the observance of religious rites. The older faith had as its objects persons, but the later is slowly refining its objects into abstractions. Pantheism as to God, a theory of transmigration as to man, had not yet been evolved, but the seeds of both * R.-V., x. 16, 4, 5. R.-V., x. 14, 8. + R.-V., x. 14, 8. A || The only verse from the Rig-Veda ever quoted in proof of transmigration being believed when the hymns were composed is, i. 164, 32. Professor Wilson renders :-"He who has made (this state of things) |