fashion, is not only hinted at as occurring here and there even before the epic, but in the epic these forms are all recognized as equally approved:  “When a man dies he is burned or buried or exposed” (nik[r.][s.]yate)[31] it is said in i. 90. 17; and the narrator goes on to explain that the “hell on earth,” of which the auditor “has never heard” (vs. 6) is re-birth in low bodies, speaking of it as a new doctrine.  “As if in a dream remaining conscious the spirit enters another form”; the bad becoming insects and worms; the good going to heaven by means of the “seven gates,” viz., penance, liberality, quietism, self-control, modesty, rectitude, and mercy.  This is a union of two views, and it is evidently the popular view, that, namely, the good go to heaven while the bad go to new existence in a low form, as opposed to the more logical conception that both alike enter new forms, one good, the other bad.  Then the established stadia, the pupil, the old teaching (upanishad) of the householders, and the wood-dwellers are described, with the remark that there is no uniformity of opinion in regard to them; but the ancient view crops out again in the statement that one who dies as a forest-hermit “establishes in bliss” ten ancestors and ten descendants.  In this part of the epic the Punj[=a]b is still near the theatre of events, the ‘centre region’ being between the Ganges and Jumna (I. 87. 5); although the later additions to the poems show acquaintance with all countries, known and unknown, and with peoples from all the world.  Significant in xii. 61. 1, 2 is the name of the third order bh[=a]ikshyacaryam ‘beggarhood’ (before the forest-hermit and after the householder).

It was said above that the departed Fathers could assume a mortal form.  In the formal classification of these demigods seven kinds of Manes are enumerated, the title of one subdivision being ’those embodied.’  Brahm[=a] is identified with the Father-god in connection with the Manes:  “All the Manes worship Praj[=a]pati Brahm[=a],” in the paradise of Praj[=a]pati, where, by the way, are Civa and Vishnu (II. 11. 45, 50, 52; 8. 30).  According to this description ’kings and sinners,’ together with the Manes, are found in Yama’s home, as well as “those that die at the solstice” (II. 7 ff.; 8. 31).  Constantly the reader is impressed with the fact that the characters of the epic are acting and thinking in a way not conformable to the idea one might form of the Hindu from the law.  We have animadverted upon this point elsewhere in connection with another matter.  It is this factor that makes the study of the epic so invaluable as an offset to the verisimilitude of belief, even as belief is taught (not practiced) in the law.  There is a very old rule, for instance, against slaughtering animals and eating meat; while to eat beef is a monstrous crime.  Yet is it plain from the epic that meat-eating was customary, and Vedic texts are cited (_ iti crutis_)