BABYLON AND PERSIA

ARYAN MYTHS IN THE AVESTA. 73the meaning of the two words.In one of Mithra'sband, Myth and Allegory meet, or rather it is shownhow easily and smoothly Myth can glide into Allegory.Verethraghna, the geniusof Victory, is certainlyan allegorical personage, an abstract idea which acapital initial converts into a person ;for the wordverethragna is a common noun which means " vic¬tory."But that word itself has a mythical import,being none other than the Eranian transliteration ofthe "vritrahdn" (" Vritra-killer ") of the Rig-Veda,the title of honor given to various "fiend-smiting"deities, but most frequently to Indra, the championdemon-killer of them all. (See p. 46.) This originalmeaning must have been quite forgotten before thename changed into a common noun meaning "vic¬tory" in general, and became personified once more,no longer mythically, but allegorically.14. This tendency to close the eyes to the evervaryingplay of physical nature and turn them in¬ward, to the contemplation of high moral abstrac¬tions, till these seem almost tangible realities, is theindication of a very serious mind and the key to thetransformation which the myth-religion of the an¬cient Aryas underwent at the hands of their-sternerEranian descendants. The most notable instance ofsuch allegorical transformation is that practised onAhura-Mazda himself. The original identity withthe old sky-god once having subsided out of sight,preserved only in a few traditional and unconsciousforms of .speech, his spiritual nature became the sub¬ject of earnest and profound speculation. Theysought to express his various attributes by a variety