It is very remarkable that the early Aryans looked upon disease, deformity, and weakness in the same light that we are apt to regard the depraved and vicious. Health was the first and greatest boon, the gift they supplicated most earnestly from heaven. Health first, then immortality. They seemed to loathe consumption and scrofula, and many of their most energetic prayers are supplications to the Deity to be preserved "from this hateful indwelling sin," as they termed it. Their laws for the happy treatment of women, especially in certain conditions of health, of which I shall treat in the chapter on their domestic life, is full of that reverence for her health and happiness, as well as those of her offspring, which is seen to penetrate the whole life of the Fire-worshipper, passing as it did in the course of time into a rigid etiquette. Stern as it is, it is infinitely better than the careless indifference with which the mother, "the transmitter of human life," is so often regarded among us. In the Zend-Avesta we find a moral code almost as perfect as our own, with rather a singular account of the creation. In one of the books, called "Desater," it would seem all animals being created except man, the dog was dreadfully lonely, and that man was created only out of compassion for him; and no sooner was man formed than all the animals, save the dog, broke out into open rebellion against the Great Spirit for having favored man with speech, reason, and immortality. As in Genesis, so in the Desater, the Great Spirit brought the animals to Gelshadèng and made them subject to him, and he it was who divided them into seven classes. There is a curious dialogue that passed between the seven great sages of Persia and the seven different animals, and the reasons given why some are made fierce, others harmless, and yet others beneficent. In some passages great veneration is expressed for the cow, and great aversion to some animals, and to the human corpse; this is not permitted either to find a resting-place in the earth or in the fire, because of the sacredness of both these elements; and it is commanded that it be abandoned to birds of prey or to absorption by the air in enclosures set apart for the purpose. However, in spite of many things that seem childish and absurd in their books (the unprejudiced student is not always certain that the right meaning of the text has been rendered, for the language is full of difficulties), yet so much is clear: that the "Gâthas" are very beautiful hymns and full of true religious feeling. They are addressed to the household fire, to the sun, moon, and stars, to the spirit of the hills, mountains, trees, birds, and flowers, to the earth, air, and sea. The earth is often called the "infinite, the all-nourishing cow," and the sun is consequently, by the same figure, designated "the fiery-winged one, the immortal bull."