and make lowly organisms care for their young as if they were gifted with human intelligence.  But the Creator is also the Destroyer, not in anger but by the very nature of his activity.  When the series of changes culminates in a crisis and an individual breaks up, we see death and destruction, but in reality they occur throughout the process of growth.  The egg is destroyed when the chicken is hatched:  the embryo ceases to exist when the child is born; when the man comes into being, the child is no more.  And for change, improvement and progress death is as necessary as birth.  A world of immortals would be a static world.

When once the figure of Siva has taken definite shape, attributes and epithets are lavished on it in profusion.  He is the great ascetic, for asceticism in India means power, and Siva is the personification of the powers of nature.  He may alternate strangely between austerities and wild debauch, but the sentimentality of some Krishnaite sects is alien to him.  He is a magician, the lord of troops of spirits, and thus draws into his circle all the old animistic worship.  But he is also identified with Time (Mahakala) and Death (Mrityu) and as presiding over procreation he is Ardhanaresvara, half man, half woman.  Stories are invented or adapted to account for his various attributes, and he is provided with a divine family.  He dwells on Mount Kailasa:  he has three eyes:  above the central one is the crescent of the moon and the stream of the Ganges descends from his braided hair:  his throat is blue and encircled by a serpent and a necklace of skulls.  In his hands he carries a three-pronged trident and a drum.  But the effigy or description varies, for Siva is adored under many forms.  He is Mahadeva, the Great God, Hara the Seizer, Bhairava the terrible one, Pasupati, the Lord of cattle, that is of human souls who are compared to beasts.  Local gods and heroes are identified with him.  Thus Gor Baba,[352] said to be a deified ghost of the aboriginal races, reappears as Goresvara and is counted a form of Siva, as is also Khandoba or Khande Rao, a deity connected with dogs.  Ganesa, “the Lord of Hosts,” the God who removes obstacles and is represented with an elephant’s head and accompanied by a rat, is recognized as Siva’s son.  Another son is Skanda or Kartikeya, the God of War, a great deity in Ceylon and southern India.  But more important both for the absorption of aboriginal cults and for its influence on speculation and morality is the part played by Siva’s wife or female counterpart.

The worship of goddesses, though found in many sects, is specially connected with Sivaism.  A figure analogous to the Madonna, the kind and compassionate goddess who helps and pities all, appears in later Buddhism but for some reason this train of thought has not been usual in India.  Lakshmi, Sarasvati and Sita are benevolent, but they hold no great position in popular esteem,[353] and the being who attracts millions of worshippers under such names as Kali, Durga,