ions of
poets. Old songs are mentioned, and new songs. Poets whose
compositions we possess are spoken of as the seers of olden times;
their names in other hymns are surrounded by a legendary halo. In some
cases, whole books or chapters may be pointed out as more modern and
secondary, in thought and language. But on the whole the Rig-veda is a
genuine document, even in its most modern portions not later than the
time of Lycurgus; and it exhibits one of the earliest and rudest
phases in the history of mankind; disclosing in its full reality a
period of which in Greece we have but traditions and names, such as
Orpheus and Linus, and bringing us as near the beginnings in language,
thought, and mythology as literary documents can ever bring us in the
Aryan world.

Though much time and labour have been spent on the Veda, in England
and in Germany, the time is not yet come for translating it as a
whole. It is possible and interesting to translate it literally, or in
accordance with scholastic commentaries, such as we find in India from
Yaska in the fifth century B.C. down to Saya_n_a in the fourteenth
century of the Christian era. This is what Professor Wilson has done
in his translation of the first book of the Rig-veda; and by strictly
adhering to this principle and excluding conjectural renderings even
where they offered themselves most naturally, he has imparted to his
work a definite character and a lasting value. The grammar of the
Veda, though irregular, and still in a rather floating state, has
almost been mastered; the etymology and the meaning of many words,
unknown in the later Sanskrit, have been discovered. Many hymns, which
are mere prayers for food, for cattle, or for a long life, have been
translated, and can leave no doubt as to their real intention. But
with the exception of these simple petitions, the whole world of Vedic
ideas is so entirely beyond our own intellectual horizon, that instead
of translating we can as yet only guess and combine. Here it is no
longer a mere question of skilful deciphering. We may collect all the
passages where an obscure word occurs, we may compare them and look
for a meaning which would be appropriate to all; but the difficulty
lies in finding a sense which we can appropriate, and transfer by
analogy into our own language and thought. We must be able to
translate our feelings and ideas into their language at the same time
that we translate their poems and prayers into our lan