evident if one contrast
the statements of the different tracts not only with those of other
writings of the same sort, but even with other statements in the same
Upanishads. Thus the Mundaka teaches first that Brahm[=a], the
personal creator, made the world and explained _brahma_ (1. 1. 1). It
then defines _brahma_ as the Imperishable, which, like a spider, sends
out a web of being and draws it in again (_ib_. 6, 7). It states with
all distinctness that the (neuter) _brahma_ comes from The (masculine)

One who is all-wise, all-knowing (_ib_. 9). This heavenly Person is
the imperishable ego; it is without form; higher than the imperishable
(1. 2. 10 ff.; 2. 1. 2); greater than the great (3. 2. 8). Against
this is then set (2. 2. 9) the great being _brahma_, without passions
or parts, _i.
e_., without intelligence such as was predicated of the
_[=a]tm[=a]_; and (3. 1. 3) then follows the doctrine of the personal
'Lord, who is the maker, the Person, who has his birth in _brahma'
(purusho brahmayonis_). That this Upanishad is pantheistic is plain
from 3. 2. 6, where Ved[=a]nta and Yoga are named. According to this
tract the wise go to _brahma_ or to ego (3. 2. 9 and 1. 2. 11), while
fools go to heaven and return again.

On the same plane stands the [=I]c[=a], where _[=a]tm[=a]_, ego,
Spirit, is the True, the Lord, and is in the sun. Opposed to each
other here are 'darkness' and 'immortality,' as fruit, respectively,
of ignorance and wisdom.

In the K[=a]ush[=i]taki Upanishad, taken with the meaning put into it
by the commentators, the wise man goes to a very different sort of
_brahma_--one where he is met by nymphs, and rejoices in a kind of
heaven. This _brahma_ is of two sorts, absolute and conditioned; but
it is ultimately defined as 'breath.' Whenever it is convenient,
'breath' is regarded by the commentators as ego, 'spirit'; but one can
scarcely escape the conviction that in many passages 'breath' was
meant by the speaker to be taken at its face value. It is the vital
power. With this vital power (breath or spirit) one in dreamless sleep
unites. Indra has nothing higher to say than that he is breath
(spirit), conscious and immortal. Eventually the soul after death
comes to Indra, or gains the bright heaven. But here too the doctrine
of the dying out of the gods is known (as in _T[=a]tt_. 3. 10. 4).
Cosmogonically all here springs from water (1. 4, 6, 7; 2. 1, 12; 3.
1, 2; 4. 20).

Most striking are the contradi