But such a system as this must necessarily lead also to idolatry.  There is in the human mind a tendency to worship, and men must worship something.  But they believe in one Being, the absolute Spirit, the supreme and only God,—­Para Brahm; him they cannot worship, for he is literally an unknown God.  He has no qualities; no attributes, no activity.  He is neither the object of hope, fear, love, nor aversion.  Since there is nothing in the universe but spirit and illusive appearances, and they cannot worship spirit because it is absolutely unknown, they must worship these appearances, which are at any rate divine appearances, and which do possess some traits, qualities, character; are objects of hope and fear.  But they cannot worship them as appearances, they must worship them as persons.  But if they have an inward personality or soul, they become real beings, and also beings independent of Brahm, whose appearances they are.  They must therefore have an outward personality; in other words, a body, a shape, emblematical and characteristic; that is to say, they become idols.

Accordingly idol-worship is universal in India.  The most horrible and grotesque images are carved in the stone of the grottos, stand in rude, block-like statues in the temple, or are coarsely painted on the walls.  Figures of men with heads of elephants or of other animals, or with six or seven human heads,—­sometimes growing in a pyramid, one out of the other, sometimes with six hands coming from one shoulder,—­grisly and uncouth monsters, like nothing in nature, yet too grotesque for symbols,—­such are the objects of the Hindoo worship.

Sec. 3.  Helps from Comparative Philology.  The Aryans in Central Asia.

We have seen how hopeless the task has appeared of getting any definite light on Hindoo chronology or history.  To the ancient Egyptians events were so important that the most trivial incidents of daily life were written on stone and the imperishable records of the land, covering the tombs and obelisks, have patiently waited during long centuries, till their decipherer should come to read them.  To the Hindoos, on the other hand, all events were equally unimportant.  The most unhistoric people on earth, they cared more for the minutiae of grammar, or the subtilties of metaphysics, than for the whole of their past.  The only date which has emerged from this vague antiquity is that of Chandragupta, a contemporary of Alexander, and called by the Greek historians Sandracottus.  He became king B.C. 315, and as, at his accession, Buddha had been dead (by Hindoo statement) one hundred and sixty-two years, Buddha may have died B.C. 477.  We can thus import a single date from Greek history into that of India.  This is the whole.