d to the character of a Friend and
Protector, gifted with mild attributes, and worshipped as the life of
Nature. By accepting the popular worship, the Brahmans were able to oppose
Buddhism with success.

We have no doubt that the Hindoo Triad came from the effort of the
Brahmans to unite all India in one worship, and it may for a time have
succeeded. Images of the Trimurtti, or three-faced God, are frequent in
India, and this is still the object of Brahmanical worship. But beside
this practical motive, the tendency of thought is always toward a triad of
law, force, or elemental substance, as the best explanation of the
universe. Hence there have been Triads in so many religions: in Egypt, of
_Osiris_ the Creator, _Typhon_ the Destroyer, and _Horus_ the Preserver;
in Persia, of _Ormazd_ the Creator, _Ahriman_ the Destroyer, and _Mithra_
the Restorer; in Buddhism, of _Buddha_ the Divine Man, _Dharmma_ the Word,
and _Sangha_ the Communion of Saints. Simple monotheism does not long
satisfy the speculative intellect, because, though it accounts for the
harmonies of creation, it leaves its discords unexplained. But a dualism
of opposing forces is found still more unsatisfactory, for the world does
not appear to be such a scene of utter warfare and discord as this. So the
mind comes to accept a Triad, in which the unities of life and growth
proceed from one element, the antagonisms from a second, and the higher
harmonies of reconciled oppositions from a third. The Brahmanical Triad
arose in the same way.[77]

Thus grew up, from amid the spiritual pantheism into which all Hindoo
religion seemed to have settled, another system, that of the Trimurtti, or
Divine Triad; the Indian Trinity of _Brahma, Vischnu_, and _Siva_. This
Triad expresses the unity of Creation, Destruction, and Restoration. A
foundation for this already existed in a Vedic saying, that the highest
being exists in three states, that of creation, continuance, and
destruction.

Neither of these three supreme deities of Brahmanism held any high rank in
the Vedas. Siva (Civa) does not appear therein at all, nor, according to
Lassen, is Brahma mentioned in the Vedic hymns, but first in a Upanishad.
Vischnu is spoken of in the Rig-Veda, but always as one of the names for
the sun. He is the Sun-God. His three steps are sunrise, noon, and sunset.
He is mentioned as one of the sons of Aditi; he is called the
"wide-stepping," "measurer of the world," "the strong," "the d