"Let us be blessed in thy service, O Varuna, for we always think of thee and praise thee, greeting thee day by day, like the fires lighted on the altar, at the approach of the rich dawns." 2.
"O Varuna, our guide, let us stand in thy keeping, thou who art rich in heroes and praised far and wide! And you, unconquered sons of Aditi, deign to accept us as your friends, O gods!" 3.
"Âditya, the ruler, sent forth these rivers; they follow the law of Varuna. They tire not, they cease not; like birds they fly quickly everywhere." 4.
"Take from me my sin, like a fetter, and we shall increase, O Varuna, the spring of thy law. Let not the thread be cut while I weave my song! Let not the form of the workman break before the time! 5.
"Take far away from me this terror, O Varuna; Thou, O righteous king, have mercy on me! Like as a rope from a calf, remove from me my sin; for away from thee I am not master even of the twinkling of an eye." 6.
"Do not strike us, Varuna, with weapons which at thy will hurt the evil-doer. Let us not go where the light has vanished! Scatter our enemies, that we may live." 7.
"We did formerly, O Varuna, and do now, and shall in future also, sing praises to thee, O mighty one! For on thee, unconquerable hero, rest all statutes, immovable, as if established on a rock." 8.
"Move far away from me all self-committed guilt, and may I not, O king, suffer for what others have committed! Many dawns have not yet dawned; grant us to live in them, O Varuna." 9.
You may have observed that in several verses of this hymn Varuna was called Âditya, or son of Aditi. Now Aditi means infinitude, from dita, bound, and a, not, that is, not bound, not limited, absolute, infinite. Aditi itself is now and then invoked in the Veda, as the Beyond, as what is beyond the earth and the sky, and the sun and the dawn—a most surprising conception in that early period of religious thought. More frequently, however, than Aditi, we meet with the Âdityas, literally the sons of Aditi, or the gods beyond the visible earth and sky—in one sense, the infinite gods. One of them is Varuna, others Mitra and Aryaman (Bhaga, Daksha, Amsa), most of them abstract names, though pointing to heaven and the solar light of heaven as their first, though almost forgotten source.
When Mitra and Varuna are invoked together, we can still perceive dimly that they were meant originally for day and night, light and darkness. But in their more personal and so to say dramatic aspect, day and night appear in the Vedic mythology as the two Asvins, the two horsemen.