ent, yet independent in their opinions; and peace reigns in
the domestic circle.

The different works known as the Puranas are derived from the same
religious system as the two epics. They repeat the cosmogony of the poems,
and they relate more fully their mythological legends. Siva and Vischnu
are almost the sole objects of worship in the Puranas. There is a
sectarian element in their devotion to these deities which shows their
partiality, and prevents them from being authorities for Hindoo belief as
a whole.[86]

The Puranas, in their original form, belong to a period, says Mr. Wilson,
a century before the Christian era. They grew out of the conflict between
Buddhism and Brahmanism. The latter system had offered no personal gods to
the people and given them no outward worship, and the masses had been
uninterested in the abstract view of Deity held by the Brahmans.[87]

According to Mr. Wilson,[88] there are eighteen Puranas which are now read
by the common people. They are read a great deal by women. Some are very
ancient, or at least contain fragments of more ancient Puranas. The very
word signifies "antiquity." Most of them are devoted to the worship of
Vischnu. According to the Bhagavat Purana,[89] the only reasonable object
of life is to meditate on Vischnu. Brahma, who is called in one place
"the cause of causes," proclaims Vischnu to be the only pure absolute
essence, of which the universe is the manifestation. In the Vischnu
Purana, Brahma, at the head of the gods, adores Vischnu as the Supreme
Being whom he himself cannot understand.

The power of ascetic penances is highly extolled in the Puranas, as also
in the epics. In the Bhagavat it is said that Brahma, by a penitence of
sixteen thousand years, created the universe. It is even told in the
Ramayana, that a sage of a lower caste became a Brahman by dint of
austerities, in spite of the gods who considered such a confusion of
castes a breach of Hindoo etiquette.[90] To prevent him from continuing
his devotions, they sent a beautiful nymph to tempt him, and their
daughter was the famous Sakuntala. But in the end, the obstinate old
ascetic conquered the gods, and when they still refused to Brahmanize him,
he began to create new heavens and new gods, and had already made a few
stars, when the deities thought it prudent to yield, and allowed him to
become a Brahman. It is also mentioned that the Ganges, the sacred river,
in the course of her wanderings, overf