Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 145

CORRUPTION OF MODERN BRAHM1NISM 105 their scrupulous abstinence, not only from meat and all forms of living food, but even from anything with which superstition or prejudice may have connected any idea of pollution. The religious system of the Brahmins and the absurd theogony which they have propagated in India seem to be the points on which they have gone most astray from the I cannot believe that the teachings of their predecessors. original lawgivers of the Hindus intended to introduce a creed so abominable and palpably absurd as that which Their mythology origin- at present exists amongst them. ally consisted of allegories made intelligible by means of visible and material objects, so that religious knowledge should not die out of the minds of men who appeared to be little influenced by anything that failed to make a direct But a coarse, ignorant, in- impression on their senses. dolent, and superstitious race soon forgot the spirit of its creed, and ended by believing solely in the forms and emblems which had been employed so that, before long, they quite lost sight of the spiritual beings of which these emblems were only symbolical. But I shall have occasion to refer to this question again, and so shall merely state here that the long tissue of fables on which the present religion of the Hindus is founded is not, to my mind, very Although ancient at least, the greater part of it is not. ; ; some authors think differently, nothing will persuade me that their mythology is much older than that of the Greeks. The primitive creed of the ancient Brahmins seems to have been utterly corrupted by their successors. The first form of idolatry into which all nations fall, after forgetting traditions concerning the unity of God and the absolute and exclusive worship He expects from all His creatures, is the adoration of the stars and conspicuous Apparently the elements, such as earth, fire, and water. first Brahmins practised the purer cult, but afterwards their descendants reached the lowest stage of idolatry by adoring images and statues, which were intended only as It was when the emblems of the objects of their worship. this came to pass that India and the greater part of Asia probably split up into the two beliefs which still exist, their E 3