at thy feet (Eph. i. 21; Phil. ii. 9-11), as such I worship thee. In taking refuge at thy feet, the terrors of future birth, regeneration, and death, are done away (Rom. viii. 2; 1 Cor, xv. 26; Rev. xx. 6; xxi. 4)—as such I worship thee. Thou art Brahmá, thou are Vishnu, thou art Siva, but thou art One; the universe is comprehended in thee as an ant in an elephant. Thou art the foundation of eternal bliss, thou art neither greater nor less; mankind are thy servants, thou art the lord of all." It is clear that Ráma is everything to his followers that Christ is to the Christians. It is also apparent that the mysterious doctrine of the Trinity receives its explanation, as it has doubtless had its origin, in the Hindú code. There have been, in their apprehension, many manifestations of the deity, but nevertheless his unity is ever recognized by them. And thus stood Ráma walking on earth as

the Omnipotent.

At a great assemblage Ráma wins Sítá, the daughter of the King of Mithilá, by bending the enormous bow of Siva. Sítá, like himself, is of divine extraction, being an incarnation of the goddess Lakshmi. Her reputed father Janaka was clearing the ground for a sacrifice, and turning it up with a ploughshare, when Sítá (whose name signifies a furrow) rose up from the furrow. Sítá, the bride of Ráma, is as the church, the bride of Jesus, gathered out of the earth, but yet of heavenly origin (1 Pet. i. 23; 1 John iii. 9).

Dasaratha was about to instal Ráma as heir-apparent, when Kaikeyí, his youngest wife, claimed from him the fulfilment of a promise he had made her. He had pledged himself to grant her any two boons she might demand of him, and she now requires that Ráma should be banished to the forest of Dandaka as a devotee, and that her son Bharata should be installed in his room. The father is heartbroken at the fate marked out for his favourite and noble son. Ráma is urged to resist, but he will entertain no thought but to do his father's will (Heb. x. 7). He says he will sacrifice himself rather than allow his parent to break his pledged word. "Devoted by promise to my father's commands, I will neither through covetousness nor forgetfulness, nor blind ignorance, break down the barrier of truth." He turns from the insignia of royalty prepared for him, and, as he passes on, the ancient

men, who see him, say, "May he conquer gloriously." We have him like Jesus who left his father's throne to undergo a life of privation on earth; who, being "rich," "became poor for the sake of others; who, being “equal with God,” “made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant."

Sítá resolves to accompany Ráma on his trying pilgrimage. He puts before her all the dangers and privations she will be subjected to from the sharp stones and briars in the path, the serpents and alligators, the lions and wild elephants, the want of food, of water, and of clothing, with torments of reptiles, scorpions, and fierce birds, the exposure to heat, cold, and violent winds; but she replies that she is aware of all this evil in the way, and feels that his presence will convert it into blessing. Life without him was worthless; the desert, with all its evils, she prefers to the pleasures of a palace if to be without him. Ráma yields, and adds on his part that he would not care to attain the exalted position of Brahmá if he were to be without her. "I am persuaded," says the Christian devotee, in the like spirit clinging to his ideal lord and master, “that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us." Christ and his church have to tread the thorny path together in loving union, as Ráma and Sítá are said to have done thousands of years before them.

Ráma, like Jesus, "was the expected one," on whose coming the happiness of the human race depended. The sage Bharadwaja says he had passed long years in religious contemplation and worship, and that day, when he had set eyes on him, had at length met with his reward. Another sage, Sarabhanga, had been invited to heaven by the great deity Indra, but declined to go until he had seen Ráma. Then he made his ascent, appearing as a youth "bright as the

fire." In a deserted hermitage, an old woman, Sarvari, was "detained in life to greet him." "She ministered to him, and then entering the fire, ascended to heaven." It is the position of Simeon and Anna in the temple greeting Jesus. "Lord," said the former, "now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation;" it having been "revealed unto him by the Holy Ghost, that he should not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ."

The pilgrims pass their time in devotional exercises, Ráma protecting the devotees met with on the way from the Rákshasas, who were demons and cannibals. On one occasion an army of Rakshasas seeing Ráma standing armed before them, "recoiled on one foot from fear;" just as those who came to arrest Jesus, overawed by the majesty of his presence, "went backward, and fell to the ground."

As the allotted period was drawing to a close, the great demon god Rávana, tempted by Sítá's charms, in Ráma's temporary absence, carries her off through the air to his dominions in Lanká (Ceylon). "All nature shuddered, various prodigies occurred, the sun's disk paled, darkness overspread the heavens. It was the short-lived triumph of evil over good. Even the great creator Brahmá roused himself, and exclaimed, Sin is consummated." " It is as when mankind incurred sin and fell into the hands of the wicked one, "the prince of the power of the air," from whom Christ redeems them. And thus also Ráma enters the dominions of the evil one, overthrows Rávana, and recovers Sítá.

Then the question occurs of Sitá's purification.

She has

been in a place of defilement, in the possession of one other

than her husband.

The fire is to "try every

"The trial of their faith

And she must be brought out pure. She is passed through flames, when the god Agni takes her by the hand and presents her spotless to Ráma. It is just so as between Christ and the Church. man's work of what sort it is." being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire," is in the end to "be found unto praise, and honour, and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ." Ráma explains that he had consented to the ordeal only that he might establish his wife's innocence in the eyes of the

world.

And thus also Christ "cleanses" his church, "that he may present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.”

Ráma having triumphed over the enemy, and the period of his pilgrimage being over, returns to Ayodhya, where he and Sitá are raised to the throne long vacant by the death of his father. As they take their seat celestial music is heard in the sky, and the gods shower down flowers upon the hero's head. The sufferings, as in the instance of Christ, are succeeded by glory, and the wife is raised to share the husband's throne (1 Pet. i. 11; 2 Tim. ii. 12; Rev. iii. 21).

After a prosperous reign of more than millennial length, Ráma is at length invited by Brahmá to resume his proper place in the celestial regions. To this he consents, and his brethren and all his subjects elect to accompany him. They one and all desire to leave the existing world to be with him in the heavenly dwelling-places. With abundant manifestations of his divine being, he, with all his followers, enters into glory, and Brahmá appoints to his people, at his intercession, celestial mansions. The God, as in the instance of Krishna's parallel with Christ, lays down his own life, no man taking it from him; and his people are as the people of the Christian leader, who are ever ready "to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better."

Such are the three latest avatáras of Vishnu, in Ráma, Krishna, and Buddha, each affording very striking figurations of Christ, and there is an advent still to come which is called the Kalki Avatára, at the close of the present Kali age. Vishnu is to be displayed in human form, incarnate as a Bráhman, seated on a white horse, for the destruction of the wicked. According to one account, he is armed with a blazing scimitar, and according to another with a sickle. It is just as Christ is figured in the book of Revelation at the opening of the first seal, and when "the harvest of the earth is ripe," and the reaper, seated on a cloud, "thrust in his sickle on the earth; and the earth was reaped" (Rev. xiv. 15, 16). The heavens and the earth, in the Hindú as well as in the Christian imagery, are to be consumed by fire, and in the renovated creation everlasting righteousness is to be established; and

thus concludes the drama (Wilson, Vishnu Purána, 484, 632; As. Res. I. 236; Hardwick, Christ and other Masters, II. 111, 162).

Such are these faiths of the Hindú and of the Christian. They idealize the great power of the Omnipotent, and bring it near to the perceptions and uses of the worshipers in human form; and both races equally reverence the records conveying to them these legendary histories. "Blessed," says the Christian scripture, "is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book." "Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the word of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.” "Blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it." Equally are the Hindús satisfied of the blessedness of dwelling upon the tales they have of their divine deliverers Ráma and Krishna. "He who reads and repeats this holy life-giving Rámayana is liberated from all his sins, and exalted with all his posterity to the highest heaven.' "As long as the mountains and rivers shall continue on the surface of the earth, so long shall the story of the Rámáyana be current in the world." "If a man reads the Mahábbárata, and has faith in its doctrines, he becomes free from all sin, and ascends to heaven after death," (M. Williams Ind. Ep. Poet, 16 and note; T. Wheeler, Hist. of Ind., I. 455).