HYMN TO THE SUN (Rig Veda, I. 50).

  Aloft this all-wise[22] shining god
  His beams of light are bearing now,
  That every one the sun may see.

  Apart, as were they thieves, yon stars,
  Together with the night[23], withdraw
  Before the sun, who seeth all.

  His beams of light have been beheld
  Afar, among [all] creatures; rays
  Splendid as were they [blazing] fires,

  Impetuous-swift, beheld of all,
  Of light the maker, thou, O Sun,
  Thou all the gleaming [sky] illum’st.

  Before the folk of shining gods
  Thou risest up, and men before,
  ’Fore all—­to be as light beheld;

  [To be] thine eye, O pure bright Heaven,
  Wherewith amid [all] creatures born
  Thou gazest down on busy [man].

  Thou goest across the sky’s broad place,
  Meting with rays, O Sun, the days,
  And watching generations pass.

  The steeds are seven that at thy car
  Bear up the god whose hair is flame
  O shining god, O Sun far-seen!

  Yoked hath he now his seven fair steeds,
  The daughters of the sun-god’s car,
  Yoked but by him[24]; with these he comes.

For some thousands of years these verses have been the daily prayer of the Hindu.  They have been incorporated into the ritual in this form.  They are rubricated, and the nine stanzas form part of a prescribed service.  But, surely, it were a literary hysteron-proteron to conclude for this reason that they were made only to fill a part in an established ceremony.

The praise is neither perfunctory nor lacking in a really religious tone.  It has a directness and a simplicity, without affectation, which would incline one to believe that it was not made mechanically, but composed with a devotional spirit that gave voice to genuine feeling.

We will now translate another poem (carefully preserving all the tautological phraseology), a hymn

  To DAWN (Rig Veda VI. 64).

  Aloft the lights of Dawn, for beauty gleaming,
  Have risen resplendent, like to waves of water;
  She makes fair paths, (makes) all accessible;
  And good is she, munificent and kindly.

  Thou lovely lookest, through wide spaces shin’st thou,
  Up fly thy fiery shining beams to heaven;
  Thy bosom thou reveals’t, thyself adorning,
  Aurora, goddess gleaming bright in greatness.

  The ruddy kine (the clouds) resplendent bear her,
  The blessed One, who far and wide extendeth. 
  As routs his foes a hero armed with arrows,
  As driver swift, so she compels the darkness.

  Thy ways are fair; thy paths, upon the mountains;
  In calm, self-shining one, thou cross’st the waters. 
  O thou whose paths are wide, to us, thou lofty
  Daughter of Heaven, bring wealth for our subsistence.

  Bring (wealth), thou Dawn, who, with the kine, untroubled
  Dost bring us good commensurate with pleasure,
  Daughter of Heaven, who, though thou art a goddess,
  Didst aye at morning-call come bright and early.