OF THE HINDUS. 105 



The Supreme^eing resides in Vailcuntha, invested with ineffable splendour, 

 and with garb, ornaments, and perfumes of celestial origin, being the husband 

 also of Lakslimt, or glory, BJmmi, the earth, and Nild, understood to mean Dem, 

 or Durgd, or personified matter. In his primary form, no known qualities can 

 be predicated of him, but when he pleases to associate with Maya, which is 

 properly his desire, or wish, the three attributes of purity, passion, or igno- 

 rance, or the Satwa, Raja and Tama Gunas, are manifested, as Vishnu, Brahma, 

 and Siva, for the creation, protection, and destruction of the world. These 

 deities, again, perform their respective functions through their union with the 

 same delusive principle to which they owed their individual manifestation. 

 This account is clearly allegorical, although the want of some tangible objects 

 of worship has converted the shadows into realities, and the allegory, when 

 adapted to the apprehensions of ordinary intellects, has been converted into 

 the legend known to the followers of Kahir, of the Supreme, be getting the 

 Hindu Triad by Maya, and her subsequent union with her sons.* Other 



* Colonel MacKenzie, in his account of the sect, gives this legend in a different and rather 

 unusual form, and one that indicates some relation to the Saiva sects. It is not, however, admitted 

 as orthodox by those members of the sect whom I have encountered, nor do any traces of it appear 

 in the works consulted. 



" The Lord of the Creation, by whose supremacy the world is illuminated, and who is infinitely 

 powerful, creating and destroying many worlds in a moment, that Almighty Spirit, in his mind, con- 

 templating the creation of a world for his pleasure, from his. wishes sprung a goddess, named Itcha 

 Sacktee ; at her request, he directed her to create this world. Ti^en the Sacktee, by the authority 

 of God, immediately created three divine persons, generally called' by Hindus, the Moortee-trium, 

 by their several names of Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, committing to them, separately, their respective 

 charges in the expected world ; Surstee, Sthutee, and Sayom, or the power of creating, nourishing, 

 and destroying. When she had made these three lords, she requested of one after the other, that 

 they might be her consort ; but Brahma and Vishnu, disapproving of her request, she cons umed them 

 with the fire of her third eye, and proposed the same thing to Siva ; then Sadaseevu, considering in 

 his mind that her demands were not agreeable to the divine law, replied that he could not be her 

 consort, unless she granted her third eye to him. The goddess was pleased with his prudence, and 

 adorned him with her third eye. So soon as Siva was possessed of that, he immediately destroyed 



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