Śiva works out the decay and dissolution of mineral matter, so that the astral element may once more assert itself and there may be sense perception in the mineral metamorphosed into the vegetable. The process is carried further in the animal kingdom, and the animals get a constitution in which Kâma or animal desire can manifest itself. The animals evolve themselves by death. Death frees them from the trammels of one set of experience, and carries them onwards till the human body is reached. The work of dissolution proceeds in various ways. Our sleep is partial dissolution. It is brought on by the astral attendants of Śiva. Dissolution is caused by Tamas. Tamas begets inaction, and inaction causes death and decay. There is no phenomenal change without dissolution, death or decay. There are so many material tendencies in us that they require rejection. Śiva gives us the power of rejection, as Vishnu, the power of preservation — preservation of all that is good in us. Death makes the man, where moral teachings fail, The Consort of Śiva is the Energy through Whom He guides the life process of Monads or Jivas. In the first stage of life process She is called Sâti or the Lasting. For the body of the Jiva was lasting during the period of evolution. But Her mission was to act on the Monad itself, to cause the material tendency in it by means of Tamas. In the second stage, She is the Energy of dissolution, death and phenomenal change. In the third stage, she is over and above that the Energy of rejection (of all that is evil in us.) She is the kind mother, who has been nourishing all Jivas in their course of evolution. When the Mineral form was reached by the primal elemental Jiva, the creative process had done its work and the process of dissolution was to assert itself. There was to be a revolution in the life process. Sâti gave up her own nature and became re-born in another character in the Mineral Kingdom. The creative process was materially changed. Daksha lost his original head, and he acquired the head of a goat. The goat symbolises sexual connection. All this happened during the reign of Prâchina-Barhis. The Prachetas brothers were his sons. Daksha reappeared as the son of the Prachetas brothers. The Âdityas or gods of preservation who formed Daksha were Pûshava and Bhaga. They were the preserving deities of the first stage of life process. When the next stage came in, they lost their activity. This explains the breaking of teeth and the uprooting of eyes of two of the Âdityas. The subjoined Table of correspondences taken from the 11th. Chapter of the Twelfth Skandha shews that Pûshana and Bhaga correspond to the months of Pausha (December) and Mâgha (January) when the rays of the sun are the least powerful. These Âdityas preserve Jivas in their downward course. Pûshana was a favorite god of the Aryan shepherd.