14, S[=u]rya is the son of the sky, but he is evidently one with Savitar, who in V. 82. 4, removes bad dreams, as in X. 100. 8, he removes sickness. Men are rendered 'sinless' by the sun (IV. 54. 3; X. 37. 9) exactly as they are by the other gods, Indra, Varuna, etc. In a passage that refers to the important triad of sun, wind and fire, X. 158. I ff., the sun is invoked to 'save from the sky,' _i.e._ from all evils that may come from the upper regions; while in the same book the sun, like Indra, is represented as the slayer of demons _(asuras)_ and dragons; as the slayer, also, of the poet's rivals; as giving long life to the worshipper, and as himself drinking sweet _soma_. This is one of the poems that seem to be at once late and of a forced and artificial character (X. 170). Although S[=u]rya is differentiated explicitly from Savitar (V. 81. 4, "Savitar, thou joyest in S[=u]a's rays"), yet do many of the hymns make no distinction between them. The Enlivener is naturally extolled in fitting phrase, to tally with his title: "The shining-god, the Enlivener, is ascended to enliven the world"; "He gives protection, wealth and children" (II. 38.1; IV. 53. 6-7). The later hymns seem, as one might expect, to show greater confusion between the attributes of the physical and spiritual sun. But what higher power under either name is ascribed to the sun in the later hymns is not due to a higher or more developed homage of the sun as such. On the contrary, as with many other deities, the more the praise the less the individual worship. It is as something more than the sun that the god later receives more fulsome devotion. And, in fact, paradoxical as it seems, it is a decline in sun-worship proper that is here registered. The altar-fire becomes more important, and is revered in the sun, whose hymns, at most, are few, and in part mechanical. Bergaigne in his great work, _La Religion Védique_, has laid much stress on sexual antithesis as an element in Vedic worship. It seems to us that this has been much exaggerated. The sun is masculine; the dawn, feminine. But there is no indication of a primitive antithesis of male and female in their relations. What occurs appears to be of adventitious character. For though sun and dawn are often connected, the latter is represented first as his mother and afterwards as his 'wife' or mistress. Even in the later hymns, where the marital relation is recognized, it is not insisted upon. But Bergaigne[15] is right in saying that in the Rig Veda the sun does not play the part of an evil power, and it is a good illustration of the difference between Rik and Atharvan, when Ehni cites, to prove that the sun is like death, only passages from the Atharvan and the later Brahmanic literature.[16]