“When we thus see the god Dyaus antiquated by Indra, and Indra himself almost denied, we might expect in India the same catastrophe which in Iceland the poets of the Edda always predicted--the twilight of the gods preceding the destruction of the world. We seem to have reached the stage when henotheism, after trying in vain to grow into an organised polytheism on the one side, or into an exclusive monotheism on the other, would by necessity end in atheism; yet atheism is not the last word of the Indian religion.”[108] What is atheism? FOOTNOTES: [72] Max Müller, _Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 231. [73] Max Müller, _Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 250. [74] _Rig-Veda_, X. 133. 6. [75] “To the ancient seers the dawn seemed to open the golden gates of another world, and while these gates were open for the sun to pass in triumph, their eyes and their minds strove in their childish way to pierce beyond the limits of this finite world.”--_Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 235. [76] _Atharva-Veda_, X. 8. 16. [77] _Rig-Veda_, I. 35. 2. [78] Max Müller’s words on the subject are as follows: “These two concepts (the infinite, and order and law), which sooner or later must be taken in and minded by every human being, were at first no more than an impulse, but their impulsive force would not rest till it had beaten into the minds of the fathers of our race the deep and indelible impression that ‘all is right,’ and filled them with a hope, and more than a hope, that ‘all will be right.’”--_Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 259. [79] _Rig-Veda_, I. 102. 2. [80] _Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 238. [81] _Rig-Veda_, I. 24. 1. [82] _Physical Religion_, p. 245. [83] _Physical Religion_, p. 127. [84] _Rig-Veda_, II. 1. 1. [85] _Ibid._, IV. 12. 4. [86] _Rig-Veda_, X. 79. 4. [87] _Ibid._, X. 2. 4, 5. [88] _Ibid._, II. 6. 1; VIII. 19. 5. [89] _Rig-Veda_, I. 189. 3. [90] _Ibid._, VII. 104. [91] _Rig-Veda_, VII. 104. [92] _Ibid._, IX. 113. 7. [93] _Rig-Veda_, I. 39. [94] _Ibid._, I. 164; X. 81. 4. [95] _Physical Religion_, pp. 183-4. [96] _Atharva_, IV. 16. [97] _Rig-Veda_, VII. 89. [98] _Rig-Veda_, X. 82. [99] _Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 223. [100] _Rig-Veda_, I. 131. 1. [101] _Rig-Veda_, I. 153; IV. 19. 2. [102] _Ibid._, VIII. 100. 3. [103] _Origin and Growth of Religion_, p. 205 note. [104] Max Müller says: “There is also a common saying or riddle in German which you may hear repeated to the present day:-- ‘O sagt mir doch wie geht es zu Dass weis die milch der rothen Kuh?’” --_Physical Religion_, p. 101. [105] Dante at one time was of this opinion. “In his _Il Volgare Eloquio_, lib. 1, cvi. p. 155, he says: ‘It was the Hebrew idiom which was uttered by the lips of the first man who ever spoke in this world!’ This idea was afterwards relinquished by him, as in the _Paradiso_ he puts these words into the mouth of Adam:--