BABYLON AND PERSIA

ARYAN MYTHS. 43ber seven. It has always been the object of a pecul¬iarly fervent and, if one may say so, endearing wor¬ship, as the friend of man, who sits on his hearth,assists in his tasks, the substitute for the light ofday, for the warmth of the sun, the conqueror anddisperser of all evil things that lurk in darkness, ofphantoms and bad dreams,lastly as the messengerbetween the two worids, whose flames, leaping aloft,carry up to Heaven the prayers and offerings ofmen.II. In its original celestial form, as Lightning,Fire, the Son of Heaven, plays a prominent part inthe war which the bright Devas, the givers of light,life, and plenty, are forever waging with the demonsof Darkness and Drought, and the battle-ground ofwhich is the intermediate region between heaven andearth, the Atmosphere. It is in the poetical descriptionsof this warfare that the Aryan race displayedall its gifts of imagery, its exuberant epic genius. Theeternal conflict which to us is a series of meteoro¬logical phenomena, spiritualized only in rare poeticalmoods, and always consciou.sly, was to the eariyAryas, the most impressionable and imaginative ofraces, a thrilling drama carried on by living, super¬human beings, mighty for good or for evil. Orrather two distinct dramas, with two different pro¬tagonists. The two supreme goods, which give allthe others, are Light and Rain. The arch-enemiesof mankind are those powers that rob them of thesetreasures. Now the war with the fiends of Darknessand Night is comparatively a simple affair, which isnaturally left entirely to the Sun. Still, the inexhaug-