But, without loitering in these shifting sands, let us go direct to clear and reliable sources. We possess, in the sacred and secret books of India, of which we know only an infinitesimal part, a cosmogony which no European conception has ever surpassed. It would not be correct to say that it attained, at the first endeavour, the ultimate limits beyond which the mind of man could not venture without dissolving in the infinite, for it was the work of centuries of which we do not know the tale; but it indisputably preceded all the others, its birth was earlier than anything that we know and, at the beginning of all things, it exceeded in grandeur all that we have learnt and all that we can imagine. It was the first, for instance, long before our historic periods, to give us a dizzy yet concrete idea of the infinity of time. The Book of Manu teaches us that twelve thousand years of mortals are but a day and a night to the gods; their year, therefore, consisting of three hundred and sixty days, numbers 4,320,000 years. A thousand years of the gods make but one of Brahma’s days, that is to say, 4,320,000,000 human years, representing the total life of our globe; and Brahma’s night is of equal duration. Three hundred and sixty of these days and nights make one of this god’s years; and a hundred of these years constitute one of his lives, that is to say, the duration of the universe, which is represented by the formidable figure of 311,090,000,000,000 years. After this he begins a new life. At present we have not yet attained the noon of Brahma’s actual day nor half the life-time of our terrestrial globe. To complete this outline of the stupendous chronology of the Vedas, I continue to profit by some notes received from my war-time godson, who has a thorough knowledge of this unduly neglected science. For the rest, it will be seen that chronology and cosmogony are here in intimate connection: “The day of Brahma (4,320,000,000 years) is divided into fourteen lives of Manu, consisting alternately of seven Manvantaras and seven Pralayas. The word Manvantara signifies the interval between two Manus: one of these appears in the dawn and the other in the twilight of this period of terrestrial activity. The morning Manu gives the Manvantara its name and the evening Manu presides over the Pralaya, that is to say, the period of dissolution, or negative _status quo_, death, sleep, or inertia, as the case may be, which divides two waves of life.