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(the vital air [Footnote ref 1]). In another place Brahman is described as
being the Svayambhû (self-born) performing austerities, who offered
his own self in the creatures and the creatures in his own self,
and thus compassed supremacy, sovereignty and lordship over
all creatures [Footnote ref 2]. The conception of the supreme man (Puru@sa)
in the @Rg-Veda also supposes that the supreme man pervades the
world with only a fourth part of Himself, whereas the remaining
three parts transcend to a region beyond. He is at once the
present, past and future [Footnote ref 3].


Sacrifice; the First Rudiments of the Law of Karma.

It will however be wrong to suppose that these monotheistic
tendencies were gradually supplanting the polytheistic sacrifices.
On the other hand, the complications of ritualism were gradually
growing in their elaborate details. The direct result of this growth
contributed however to relegate the gods to a relatively unimportant
position, and to raise the dignity of the magical characteristics
of the sacrifice as an institution which could give the
desired fruits of themselves. The offerings at a sacrifice were not
dictated by a devotion with which we are familiar under Christian
or Vai@s@nava influence. The sacrifice taken as a whole is conceived
as Haug notes "to be a kind of machinery in which every
piece must tally with the other," the slightest discrepancy in the
performance of even a minute ritualistic detail, say in the pouring
of the melted butter on the fire, or the proper placing of utensils
employed in the sacrifice, or even the misplacing of a mere straw