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RELIGIOUS PRACTICES AND OPINIONS
sons and things, yet none can be cited affirmative of the converse of the proposition, or sanctioning the doctrine that any one of the inferior divinities is Brahma.
The doctrine of Pantheism-the identification of God and the universe-is another principle which the Puráñas most unequivocally and resolutely maintain. Vishnu, Śiva, or Sakti, whatever individual they undertake to glorify, is not only the remote and efficient, but the proximate and substantial cause of the world. Thus, in the Linga Purána, Brahmná addresses Śiva, "Glory to thee, whose form is the universe." In the Vishnu Purána, "This world was produced from Vishnu; it exists in him; he is the cause of its continuance and cessation; he is the world." In the Káliká Purána, the goddess Kálí is said to be identical with the universe, as well as distinct from it; and in the Brahma Vaivartta, even Rádhá is eulogized as "the mother of the world, and the world itself; as one with primæval nature-with universal nature, and with all created forms; with all cause, and with all effect." Expressions of this tenor occur in every page of the Puránas; and although something may be ascribed to the exaggerations of panegyric, and the obscurities of mysticism, yet the declarations are too positive and reiterated to admit of reasonable doubt. And it cannot be questioned that these writers confound the creature with the Creator, and
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[Wilson, Vishnu Pur., p. 6.]
