The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1876-03-02
The Hindu UnknowabIa.

The old Hindu Vedic ode to creation, as
translated from the Sanskrit by Max Muller,is
copied and commented op, as below, by w. j.
Potter, in the Index
Nor Nor Aught nor Naught existed; yon bright sky
above.
What covered all9 what sheltered? what con-
Was it the waters fathomless abyss?
There was not death-yet was there naught immor-
There was no confne betwixt day and night;
The only One breathed breathless by ITSELF
Other than 1t there nothing since has been
Darkness there was, and all at first was yeiled
IN IN gloom proound-an ocean without light;
1ne germ that still lay covered in the husk
pS pSast Iorth,one nature, from The fervent heat,
OF en m,nd INST came love upon 1t, the new spring
N mind-yea, poets in their hearts discerned,
Aolauering ths bond between created things
piaros pha Gsncrea5ed; Comes this spark from EARTH
Then seeds were sown and mighty powers arose
nature below, and power and will above.
Who VINO SHOWS tne secret? who proclaimed it here.
Inc gods themselves came later into being
VINO knows from whence this great creation
He from all this great creation came,
whether his will created or was mute,
Inc Most High Seer that is In highest heaven,
he KNOWS it-or perchance even he knows not"
This hymn is believed to be among the old
est portions of the Oldest Veda Perhaps it
Inough this metrical version in thought and
phrase be so sublime, it corresponds very close
ly with what are given as literal translations-
more closely than metrical renderings into
another language usually do. The most won.
derful thing about it is the mental grasp of the
poem. 1t ts full of seed-th oughts and con-
tains the kernels of nearly all the PHILOSOPHERS
That have since existed. There is a foreshad-
owing of Hegel in the first line. Another line
suggests Splnoza. Pantheism, gnosticism mys-
nPrVQdQ "a nAa nx. Es..x
OF 1t is thoroughly theistic. Yet there are por-
tlons OF it in which modern positivists and
materlallsts would recognize kindred spirit to
themselves. 1t touches the very heart Of the
problem which is agtating both the scientific
and the religious world to-day-the relation of
matter to intelligence, of nature to will, of
atoms to forces aud life. Here is the doctrine
OF the evolution Of the world from nebulous,
chaotic mass; here is protoplasm; here is the
problem dividing modern scientists (if we may
use the pig words) OF biogenesis or abiogenesis
Here is Tyndall's statement, that matter con-
talns the promise and potency of all terres-
Irial ilfe; and here, too, is the question which
Tyndall has also asked impliedly, but which
neither ne nor any other has ans wered in any
better way than it is answered here-the cues
ton whence the promise and the potency"
line unexpected tnrn of thought in the last
line, to some readers perhaps, may seem to
spoil the climax. But,ao my mind, il carries
the climax to the suDlinest height ard reveals
the grand simplicity of the true artist; for il is
not the necessary nor the most rational inter-
probation to assume that the last clause was in
tended to question whether the "Most High
Seer in highest heaven" regarded as creator Of
the world, was possessed of conscious intelli-
gence; but rather does this give the profound
hint that such creating Being, or any Deity
however wise and powerful, whom man could
conceive as creating the world, might not
reach back to the Supeme First Caase of ALL
nor know the great final secret whence he him.
snI a.
ever stretches the mysterious Unknown; be-
hind Him is It.; behind Brahma, Brahm.