to the effect that the god is to be honored "by
song, by music, by dance, and by recounting the Pur[=a]nas" (xvii. 9).

Some of the epic religious ceremonies which there are barely alluded
to are here described with almost the detail of a technical handbook.
So the N[=a]nd[=i]ya (xix.) gives an elaborate account of the raising
of a _dhvaja_ or standard as a religious ceremony.[26] The legal rules
affecting morality and especially caste-intercourse[27] show a laxity
in regard to the rules as formerly preached. Even the old Puranic form
of the epic is reproduced, as when M[=a]rkandeya converses again with
Yudhistris, exactly as he does in the epic.[28] The duration of the
ages; the fruit of sacrifices, among which are still mentioned the
_r[=a]jas[=u]ya, acvamedha_, and other ancient rites;[29] the virtue
of holy-places;[30] the admixture of pure pantheism with the idea of a
personal creation[31]--these traits are again just those which have
been seen already in the epic, nor is the addition of sections on
temple-service, or other more minute details of the cult, of
particular importance in a history of religious ideas.

The Pur[=a]nas for our present purpose may all be grouped with the
remark that what is ancient in them is a more or less fugitive
resemblance to the epic style and matter;[32] what is new is the more
pronounced sectarianism with its adventitious growth of subordinate
spiritualities and exaggerated miracles. Thus for instance in the
Var[=a]ha Pur[=a]na there are eleven, in the Bh[=a]gavat Pur[=a]na
twenty (instead of the older ten) _avatars_ of Vishnu. So too the god
of love--although K[=a]ma and his dart are recognized in the late
Atharvan--as a petty spirit receives homage only in the latest
S[=u]tra (as Cupid, [=A]pastamba, ii, 2. 4. 1), and in late additions
to the epic he is a little god; whereas in the drama he is prominent,
and in the Pur[=a]nas his cult is described at length (though to-day
he has no temple). The 'mother'-fiend P[=u]tan[=a], who suckles babes
to slay them, is scarcely known to the early epic, but she is a very
real personality in the late epic and Pur[=a]nas.

The addition to the trinity of the peculiar inferior godhead that is
advocated in any one Pur[=a]na, virtually making four divinities, is
characteristic of the period.

In proportion as sectarian ardor is heightened religious tone is
lowered. The Puranic votary clinging to his one idea of god curses all
them that believe