384 SKETCHES OF CREATION. 



inundate heaven. The world is enveloped in darkness, and 

 the universe is reduced to one vast ocean. The breath of 

 Vishnu next becomes a strong wind by which the clouds 

 are dispersed, and the Deity then appears in the form of 

 Brahma reposing on his serpent couch upon the deejj. As 

 soon as he awakes the world is renewed, to be again de 

 stroyed and again renovated after each kalpa, or day cf 

 Brahma's existence. "For there are creations and destruc- 

 tions of worlds innumerable." At the end, however, of a 

 hundred years, each consisting of 360 kalpas, and each 

 kalpa of 4320 millions of our years, Brahma himself, and 

 all things with him, will cease to exist. 



Among the Jews there has been extant, from time im- 

 memorial, a prophecy that the world was destined to en- 

 dure 6000 years — 2000 before the Flood, 2000 under the 

 Law, and 2000 under the Messiah. This belief is cordially 

 accepted and strongly insisted upon by a majority of the 

 Christian faith. 



From the East the doctrine of periodical revolutions 

 found its way r with the migrations of men, into Europe. 

 The Persians, the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, and the Phoe- 

 nicians adopted it in Western Asia and in Africa, while the 

 " Orphic Hymns" afford us the earliest germination of the 

 Eastern faith in Greece. Orpheus and Menander, who 

 flourished in the very twilight of Greek poetry and civili- 

 zation, and who undoubtedly derived their philosojmy from 

 the Egyptians, reproduce the myth of the Annus Magnus, 

 and teach that the universe is destined to be dissolved on 

 the completion of this cycle. Like the Indians and Jews, 

 the authors of the Orphic Hymns assigned a definite dura- 

 tion to the Annus Magnus, as lias been already stated. 



In the Sibylline Books, whose origin dates back, perhaps, 

 1300 years before our era, this ancient faith is shadowed 

 forth in another guise. The world is destined to endure 



