_Brahma_ is represented as a man with four visages, because the world consists of four parts; and he rides on a swan, because the earth floats on water. _Vishnu_ reclines on a leaf of the water-lily, _nymphæa_, which is the symbol of water. _Shiva_ holds in his hand a ray of lightning, in order to shew that he represents fire. One needs only to cast a look at the figures of these deities to be immediately able to discover the meaning of the allegory concealed under them. They assume sometimes a male and sometimes a female appearance; and act their part sometimes as the husbands, sometimes as the children, and sometimes as the brothers of the goddess _Bhagavani_; in the same manner as the Juno of the Romans was represented to be the wife, mother, and sister of Jupiter. They are, however, different from each other; but together form the monstrous trinity, the _Trimurti_ of the Indians, which is shut up in the trunk of a tree, and cannot be separated. In this manner they are represented in the ancient temple in the island of Elephanta, an engraving of which has been given by _Niebuhr_ in the second part of his Travels. _Tri_ signifies three, and _Murti_ a body; _Punya Murti_, a sacred body; _Vishnu Murti_, the body or image of _Vishnu_. The word _Trimurti_ signifies, therefore, not three gods, or three distinct powers, but three visible bodies, which were produced by the goddess _Bhavani_, and united together in one trunk. In this sense the word occurs both in the _Mahabhàrada_ and _Sambhava_, and in the dictionaries of Fathers Hanxleden and Pimentel. These three gods were in the egg created by _Paramèshvara_; and, according to the book _Ciandròdeya_, will perish by death at the end of the world[186]. The word _Brahma_ signifies, in the Samscred, both the science of law, and, as Father Hanxleden says in his dictionary, the god _Brahma_, the creator, who, according to the doctrine of the Vishnuvites, arose from the _nymphæa_ which sprang from the navel of _Vishnu_. As creator he is with propriety styled the science of law, because he arranged the whole creation according to the laws of nature. The _Veda_, which he holds in his hand, is nothing else than the book of nature, where he found instructions how to order every thing, according to the laws of necessity, by weight and by measure. Sometimes he is represented as a man sitting on an egg, from which he created all other things.