52 cos »io3. 



Arians or Persiins, who had separated in diflercnt i^artii of 

 the Northern Zend, and who were originally disposed to com- 



the Indian nation, the first and most important appears to me to have* 

 been that which was exercised by the rich aspect of the country. A 

 deep sentiment for natui'e has at all times been a fundamental charac- 

 teristic of the Indian mind. Three successive epochs may be pointed 

 out in which this feeling has manifested itself. Each of these has its 

 determined character deeply implanted in the mode of life and tenden- 

 cies of the people. A few examples may therefore suffice to indicate 

 the activity of the Indian imagination, which has been evinced for 

 nearly three thousand years. The first epoch of the expression of a 

 vivid feeling for nature is manifested in the Vedas; and here we would 

 refer in the Rig- Veda to the sublime and simple descriptions of the dawn 

 of day {Rig-Veda-Sanhitd, ed. Rosen, 1838, Hymn xlvi., p. 88; Hymn 

 xiviii., p. 92; Hymn xcii., p. 184; Hymn cxiii., p. 233: see, also, H5 

 fer, Jnd. Gedichte, 1841, Lese i., s. 3) and of 'the golden-handed sun' 

 {Rig-Veda-Sanhitd, Yiyvnn xxii.,p. 31; Hymn xxxv., p. 65). The ad- 

 oration of nature which was connected here, as in other nations, with 

 an early stage of the religious belief, has in the Vedas a peculiar sig- 

 nificance, and is always brought into the most intimate coimection with 

 the external and internal life of man. The second epoch is very differ- 

 ent. In it a popular mythology was formed, and its object w^as to mold 

 the sagas contained in the Vedas into a shape more easily comprehend- 

 ed by an age far removed in character from that which had gone by, 

 and to associate them with historical events which were elevated to 

 the domain of mythology. The two great heroic poems, the Ramaya- 

 na and the Mahabharata, belong to this second epoch. The last-named 

 poem had also the additional object of rendering the Brahmins the 

 most influential of the four ancient Indian castes. The Ramayana is 

 therefore the more beautiful poem of the two: it is richer in natural 

 feeling, and has kept within the dom.ain of poetry, not having been 

 obliged to take up elements alien and almost hostile to it. In both 

 poems, nature does not, as in the Vedas, constitute the whole picture, 

 but only a part of it. Two points essentially distinguish the conception 

 of nature at the period, of the heroic poems from that which the Vedas 

 exhibit, without reference to the difference which separates the lan- 

 guage of adoration from that of narrative. One of these points is the lo- 

 calization of the descriptions, as, for instance, according to Wilhelm von 

 Schlegel, in the first book of the Ramayana or Balakanda, and in the 

 eecond, book, or Ayodhyakanda. See, also, on the differences between 

 these two great epics, Lassen, Ind. Alter thumskunde, bd. i., s. 482. 

 The next point, closely connected with the first, refers to the subject 

 which has enriched the natural description. Mythical narration, espe- 

 cially when of a historical character, necessarily gave rise to greater 

 distinctness and localization in the description of nature. All the writ- 

 ers of great epics, whether it be Valmiki, who sings the deeds of Rama, 

 or the authors of the Mahabharata, who collected the national tradi- 

 tions under the collective title of Vyasa, show themselves ovei-powered, 

 is it were, by emotions connected with their descriptions of external 

 nature. Rama's journey from Ayodhya to Dschanaka's capital, his life 

 hi the forest, his expedition to Lanka (Ceylon), where the savage Ra- 

 vana, the robber of his bride, Sita, dwells, and the hermit life of the 

 I'cuiduides, furnish the poet with the opportunity of following the orig- 

 tiial bent of the Indian mind, and of blending with ll ■=^ narration of he- 



