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TIE PRACTICAL PATH. of the hymns of the Rig Veda, the existence of such knowledge, in a clear scientific way, is also an unavoidable necessity. But where shall we look for this knowledge of truth if not in Jainism, which is the only other ancient religion in India ? It follows from this that the Jaina system is really the basis of the sacred poetry of the Rig Veda, whose authors personified different functions of life as well as certain latent spiritual forces of the soul as gods and goddesses.
It might, indeed, seem to be the case that the Sankhyan metaphysics rather than any other system of religion or philosophy really lies at the back of the Rig Veda, since the vedic personifications are mostly based on a hypothesis which, if not actually Sankhyan so much resembles it in form that it might be taken to have differed but little from it. The fact, however, is that the inodern system of Sankhya belongs to a much later period than any of the Vedas. It acknowledges their authority, and could not have well preceded them in the order of time.
It would, therefore, appear that there must have been another form of religion resembling the Sankhyan system and characterised by all the vagueness' and indefiniteness of thought characteristic of mysticism. That there was such a creed is borne out by the Jaina Puranas, according to which unenlightened men began to spread all possible kinds of false and misleading doctrines even in the life-time of Shri Rishabha Deva Bhagwan, the first Tirthamkara of Jainism ; and Marichi, a grandson of the Holy Tirthamkara Himself, who, failing to conquer the different kinds of
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