234 ON THE GODS OF GREECE, 



" in all divine and human knowledge, was appointed 

 " in the prefent Calpa, by the favour of Vijhnu, the 

 M feventh Menu, furnamed Vaivafwata : but the ap- 

 " pearance of a horned fifh to the religious monarch 

 " was Maya, or delufion ; and he who fhall devoutly 

 44 hear this important allegorical narrative, will be de- 

 " livered from the bondage of fin." 



This epitome of the firft Indian hiftory that is now 

 extant, appears to me very curious and very important; 

 for the ftory, though whimfically dreffed up in the form 

 of an allegory, feems to prove a primeval tradition in 

 this country o£ the universal deluge defcribed by Moses, 

 and fixes confequently the time when the genuine Hindu 

 chronology actually begins. We find, it is true, in the 

 Purdn, from which the narrative is extracted, another 

 deluge, which happened towards the clofe of the third 

 age, when Yudhift hir was labouring under the perfecu- 

 tion of his inveterate foe Duryddhan ; and when ChriJJi- 

 na, who had recently become incarnate for the purpofe 

 of fuccouring the pious, and deftroying the wicked, 

 was performing wonders in the country of MaChurd ; 

 but the fecond flood was merely local, and intended 

 .nly to affeft the people of Vraja ; they, it feems, had 

 'tended Indra, the God of the firmament, by their 

 -nthufiaftick adoration of the wonderful child, u who 

 " lifted up the mountain Gdverdhena, as if it had been 

 " a flower; and, by flickering all the herdfmen and 

 " fhepherdeffes from the floim, cominced Indra of 

 " his fupremacy." 



That the Satya, or (if we may venture fo to call it) 

 the Saturnian age was, in truth, the age of \hz general 

 flood, will appear from a clofe examination of the ten 

 Avaidrs, or defcents of the deity, in his capacity of pre- 

 ferver ; fince of the four, which are declared to have 

 happened in the Satya yug, the three Jirjl apparently 

 relate to fome itupcndous convulfion of our globe from 



the 



