the Institutes of Menu will convey the
Oriental conclusion: "This universe existed only in the first divine
idea, yet unexpanded, as if involved in darkness; imperceptible,
undefinable, undiscoverable by reason, and undiscovered by revelation,
as if it were wholly immersed in sleep. Then the sole self-existing
power, himself undiscerned, but making this world discernible, with five
elements and other principles of nature, appeared with undiminished
glory, expanding his idea, or dispelling the gloom. He whom the mind
alone can perceive, whose essence eludes the external organs, who has no
visible parts, who exists from eternity--even He, the soul of all
beings, whom no being can comprehend, shone forth in person. He, having
willed to produce various beings from his own divine substance, first
with a thought created the waters. The waters are so called (nara)
because they were the production of _Nara_, or the spirit of God; and,
since they were his first _ayana_ or place of motion, he thence is named
Narayana, or moving on the waters. From that which is the first cause,
not the object of sense existing everywhere in substance, not existing
to our perception, without beginning or end, was produced the divine
male. He framed the heaven above, the earth beneath, and in the midst
placed the subtle ether, the light regions, and the permanent receptacle
of waters. He framed all creatures. He gave being to time and the
divisions of time--to the stars also and the planets. For the sake of
distinguishing actions, he made a total difference between right and
wrong. He whose powers are incomprehensible, having created this
universe, was again absorbed in the spirit, changing the time of energy
for the time of repose."

[Sidenote: Illustrations of the origins, duration, and absorption of the
world.]

From such extracts from the sacred writings of the Hindus we might turn
to their poets, and find the same conceptions of the emanation,
manifestation, and absorption of the world illustrated. "The Infinite
being is like the clear crystal, which receives into itself all the
colours and emits them again, yet its transparency or purity is not
thereby injured or impaired." "He is like the diamond, which absorbs the
light surrounding it, and glows in the dark from the emanation thereof."
In similes of a less noble nature they sought to convey their idea to
the illiterate "Thou hast seen the spider spin his web, thou hast seen
its excellent