to a monotheistic god of light:  “Ye make the lightning flash, ye send the rain; ye hide the sky in cloud and rain” (ib.).  In the hymn preceding we read:  “Ye make firm heaven and earth, ye give growth to plants, milk to cows; O ye that give rain, pour down rain!” In the same group another short hymn declares:  “They are universal kings, who have ghee (rain) in their laps; they are lords of the rain” (v. 68).  In the next hymn:  “Your clouds (cows) give nourishment, your streams are sweet.”  Thus the twain keep the order of the seasons (i. 2. 7-8) and protect men by the regular return of the rainy season.  Their weapons are always lightning (above, i. 152. 2, and elsewhere).  A short invocation in a family-book gives this prayer:  “O Mitra-Varuna, wet our meadows with ghee; wet all places with the sweet drink” (iii. 62. 16).

The interpretation given above of the office of Varuna as regards the sun’s path, is supported by a verse where is made an allusion to the time “when they release the sun’s horses,” i.e., when after two or three months of rain the sun shines again (v. 62. 1).  In another verse one reads:  “Ye direct the waters, sustenance of earth and heaven, richly let come your rains” (viii. 25. 6).

Now there is nothing startling in this view.  In opposition to the unsatisfactory attempts of modern scholars, it is the traditional interpretation of Mitra and Varuna that Mitra was god of day (i.e., the sun), and Varuna the god of night (i.e., covering),[85] while native belief regularly attributes to him the lordship of water[86].  The ‘thousand eyes’ of Varuna are the result of this view.  The other light-side of Varuna as special lord of day (excluding the all-heaven idea with the sun as his ‘eye’) is elsewhere scarcely referred to, save in late hymns and VIII. 41.[87] In conjunction with the storm-god, Indra, the wrath-side of Varuna is further developed.  The prayer for release is from ‘long darkness,’ i.e., from death; in other words, may the light of life be restored (II. 27. 14-15; II. 28. 7).  Grassmann, who believes that in Varuna there is an early monotheistic deity, enumerates all his offices and omits the giving of rain from the list;[88] while Ludwig derives his name from var (= velle) and defines him as the lofty god who wills!

Varuna’s highest development ushers in the middle period of the Rig Veda; before the rise of the later All-father, and even before the great elevation of Indra.  But when S[=u]rya and Dawn were chief, then Varuna was chiefest.  There is no monotheism in the worship of a god who is regularly associated as one of a pair with another god.  Nor is there in Varuna any religious grandeur which, so far as it exceeds that of other divinities, is not evolved from his old physical side.  One cannot personify heaven and write a descriptive poem about him without becoming elevated in style, as compared with the tone of one that praises a rain-cloud or even the more confined