'Who has seen the first-born? Where was the life, the blood, the soul of the world? Who went to ask this from any that knew it? (Rv. I. 164, 4).[24]
Or again, Rv. X. 81, 4: 'What was the forest, what was the tree out of which they shaped heaven and earth? Wise men, ask this indeed in your mind, on what he stood when he held the worlds?'
I now come to a more important subject. We find in the Veda, what few would have expected to find there, the two ideas, so contradictory to the human understanding, and yet so easily reconciled in every human heart: God has established the eternal laws of right and wrong, he punishes sin and rewards virtue, and yet the same God is willing to forgive; just, yet merciful; a judge, and yet a father. Consider, for instance, the following lines, Rv. I. 41, 4: 'His path is easy and without thorns, who does what is right.'
And again, Rv. I. 41, 9: 'Let man fear Him who holds the four (dice), before he throws them down (i. e. God who holds the destinies of men in his hand); let no man delight in evil words!'
And then consider the following hymns, and imagine the feelings which alone could have prompted them:
Hymn to Varuna (Rv. VII. 89).
1. Let me not yet, O Varuna, enter into the house of clay; have mercy, almighty, have mercy!
2. If I go along trembling, like a cloud driven by the wind; have mercy, almighty, have mercy!
3. Through want of strength, thou strong and bright god, have I gone wrong; have mercy, almighty, have mercy!