paradise. In his prayers the penitent in his confession says to this day:
"I am wholly without doubt in the existence of the Mazdayaçnian faith; in the coming of the resurrection of the latter body; in the stepping over the bridge Chinvat; as well as in the continuance of paradise."
The bridge and the land are both indestructible.
Over the midst of the Moslem hell stretches the bridge Es-Sirat, "finer than a hair and sharper than the edge of a sword."
In the Lyke-Wake Dirge of the English north-country, they sang of
The Brig of Dread
Na braider than a thread."
In Borneo the passage for souls to heaven is across a long tree; it is scarcely practicable to any except those who have killed a man.
In Burmah, among the Karens, they tie strings across the rivers, for the ghosts of the dead to pass over to their graves.
In Java, a bridge leads across the abyss to the dwelling-place of the gods; the evil-doers fall into the depths below.
Among the Esquimaux the soul crosses an awful gulf over a stretched rope, until it reaches the abode of "the great female evil spirit below" (beyond?) "the sea."