Glory To The Sun.

CANTO CVI.: GLORY TO THE SUN.

There faint and bleeding fast, apart
Stood Rávan raging in his heart.
Then, moved with ruth for Ráma's sake,
Agastya  ^2b came and gently spake:
'Bend, Ráma, bend thy heart and ear
The everlasting truth to hear
Which all thy hopes through life will bless
And crown thine arms with full success.
The rising sun with golden rays,
Light of the worlds, adore and praise:
The universal king, the lord
By hosts of heaven and fiends adored.
He tempers all with soft control.
He is the Gods' diviner soul;
And Gods above and fiends below
And men to him their safety owe.
He Brahmá, Vishnu, S'iva, he
Each person of the glorious Three,
Is every God whose praise *?? tell,
The King of Heaven,  ^3b the Lord of Hell:  ^4b
Each God revered from times of old,
The Lord of War,  ^5b the King of Gold:  ^6b

p. 492

Mahendra, Time and Death is he,  ¹
The Moon, the Ruler of the Sea.
He hears our praise in every form,--
The manes,  ² Gods who ride the storm,  ³
The As'vins,  ⁴ Manu,  ⁵ they who stand
Round Indra,  ⁶ and the Sádhyas'  ⁷ band
He is the air, and life and fire,
The universal source and sire:
He brings the seasons at his call,
Creator, light, and nurse of all.
His heavenly course he joys to run,
Maker of Day, the golden sun.
The steeds that whirl his car are seven,  ⁸
The flaming steeds that flash through heaven.
Lord of the sky, the conqueror parts
The clouds of night with glistering darts.
He, master of the Vedas' lore,
Commands the clouds' collected store:
He is the rivers' surest friend;
He bids the rains, and they descend.
Stars, planets, constellations own
Their monarch of the golden throne.
Lord of twelve forms,  ⁹ to thee I bow,
Most glorious King of heaven art thou.
O Ráma, he who pays aright
Due worship to the Lord of Light
Shall never fall oppressed by ill,
But find a stay and comfort still.
Adore with all thy heart and mind
This God of Gods, to him resigned;
And thou his saving power shalt know
Victorious o'er thy giant foe.  ¹⁰

Footnotes

491:1b I omit Cantos CIV. and CV. in which the fight is renewed and Rávan severely reprimands his charioteer for timidity and want of confidence in his master's prowess, and orders him to charge straight at Ráma on the next occasion.

491:2b The celebrated saint who has on former occasions assisted Ráma with his gifts and counsel.

491:3b Indra.

491:4b Yama.

491:5b Kartikeva.*

491:6b Kuvera.

492:1 Varun.

492:2 The Pitris, forefathers or spirits of the dead, are of two kinds, either the spirits of the father, grandfathers and great- grandfathers of an individual or the progenitors of mankind generally, to both of whom obsequial worship is paid and oblations of food are presented.

492:3 The Maruts or Storm-Gods.

492:4 The Heavenly Twins, the Castor and Pollux of the Hindus.

492:5 The Man par excellence, the representative man and father of the human race regarded also as God.

492:6 The Vasus, a class of deities originally personifications of natural phenomena.

492:7 A class of celestial beings who dwell between the earth and the sun.

492:8 The seven horses are supposed to symbolize the seven days of the week.

492:9 One for each month in the year.

492:10 This Canto does not appear in the Bengal recension. It comes in awkwardly and may I think be considered as an interpolation, but I paraphrase a portion of it as a relief after so much fighting and carnage, and as an interesting glimpse of the monotheistic ideas which underlie the Hindu religion. The hymn does not readily lend itself to metrical translation, and I have not attempted here to give a faithful rendering of the whole. A literal version of the text and the commentary given in the Calcutta edition will be found in the Additional Notes.

A canto is here omitted. It contains fighting of the ordinary kind between Ráma and Rávan, and a description of sights and sounds of evil omen foreboding the destruction of the giant.