from the descriptions of their various personal appearance, such as given in the mantras, arthavadas, &c.  Terms such as ‘Indra’ rest on the connexion (of some particular being) with some particular place, analogously to terms such as ‘army-leader;’ hence, whoever occupies that particular place is called by that particular name.—­The origination of the world from the ‘word’ is not to be understood in that sense, that the word constitutes the material cause of the world, as Brahman does; but while there exist the everlasting words, whose essence is the power of denotation in connexion with their eternal sense (i.e. the ak/r/itis denoted), the accomplishment of such individual things as are capable of having those words applied to them is called an origination from those words.

How then is it known that the world originates from the word?—­’From perception and inference.’  Perception here denotes Scripture which, in order to be authoritative, is independent (of anything else).  ‘Inference’ denotes Sm/r/iti which, in order to be authoritative, depends on something else (viz.  Scripture).  These two declare that creation is preceded by the word.  Thus a scriptural passage says, ’At the word these Prajapati created the gods; at the words were poured out he created men; at the word drops he created the fathers; at the words through the filter he created the Soma cups; at the words the swift ones he created the stotra; at the words to all he created the sastra; at the word blessings he created the other beings.’  And another passage says, ’He with his mind united himself with speech (i.e. the word of the Veda.—­B/ri/.  Up.  I, 2, 4).  Thus Scripture declares in different places that the word precedes the creation.—­Sm/r/ti also delivers itself as follows, ’In the beginning a divine voice, eternal, without beginning or end, formed of the Vedas was uttered by Svayambhu, from which all activities proceeded.’  By the ‘uttering’ of the voice we have here to understand the starting of the oral tradition (of the Veda), because of a voice without beginning or end ‘uttering’ in any other sense cannot be predicated.—­Again, we read, ’In the beginning Mahe/s/vara shaped from the words of the Veda the names and forms of all beings and the procedure of all actions.’  And again, ’The several names, actions, and conditions of all things he shaped in the beginning from the words of the Veda’ (Manu I, 21).  Moreover, we all know from observation that any one when setting about some thing which he wishes to accomplish first remembers the word denoting the thing, and after that sets to work.  We therefore conclude that before the creation the Vedic words became manifest in the mind of Prajapati the creator, and that after that he created the things conesponding to those words.  Scripture also, where it says (Taitt.  Bra.  II, 2, 4, 2) ‘uttering bhur he created the earth,’ &c., shows that the worlds such as the earth, &c. became manifest, i.e. were created from the words bhur, &c. which had become manifest in the mind (of Prajapati).