And the object of Vedic sacriflees being well known to be only the first three Purusharthas, by the worship of the various Powers of Nature, the object of Tantric or Agamic worship was the attainment of the fourth Purusharta or Moksha. By the time we get into the Upanishat period, we could see how a new and spiritual interpretation was put upon the old Vedic sacrifices, and the uselessness of sacrifice as an end in itself was strongly declared. Says M. Barth: "Sacrifice is only an act of preparation. It is the best of 'acts, but it is an act and its fruit consequently perishable. Accordingly although whole sections of these treatises (Upanishats) are taken up exclusively with speculations on the rites, what they teach may be summed up in the words of Mundaka Upanishat. "Know the Atman only and away with every thing else; it alone is the bridge to immortality. The Veda itself and the whole cycle of sacred science are quite as sweepingly consigned to the second place. The Veda is not the true Brahman; it is only its reflection; and the science of this imperfect Brahman, this Sabda Brahman or Brahman in words is only a science of a lower order.

The true science is that which has the true Brahman, the Parabrahman for its subject."

As the story in the Kena Upanishat will show, the most powerful of the Rig Veda deities, Indra, and Agni and Vayu and Varuna were also relegated to a secondary place; and the worship of the only One, without a second, the Consort of Uma, Haimavati, was commenced. The Kena Upanishat story is repeated in the Puranas, the Supreme Brahman is mentioned there as Siva and Rudra. And the story of Rudra destroying Dakshas's sacrifice, and disgracing the Gods who took part in the sacrifice, with the sequel of His consort, named then Dakshayani (the fruit or spirit of sacrifice) becoming reborn as Uma, (wisdom or Brahmajnan) Haimavati, would seem to go before the story in the Kena Upanishat. The story of the desecration of the sacrifice of the Rishis of Darukavana by Siva and Vishnu would point to the same moral. So that, by this time, the backbone of the old unmeaning Vedic sacrifices petrified in the Godless school of Mimamsa was really broken; and it was here that the Agamas stepped in and used the same old Mantras again but with a new force and significance, deleting whatever was unmeaning, and preserving only what was useful. It substituted also new symbols though preserving the old names. And from this time, therefore, Modern Hinduism and Hindu system of worship may be said to have commenced.

But for these beginnings, we have to go far behind the days of the Mahabharata and the Puranas, for the Agarna doctrines and rituals are fully bound up with these.

A clear advance in the use of symbols was also made, at the same time effectually preserving the distinction between symbols and truth, by the use of proper words. The Sabdha Brahman or the Pranava was only a symbol and not the truth, as fancied by the Mimamsakas, and it was called a mark or Linga. And the figured mark of the Pranava, (Linga is merely the Pranava as figured to the eye) the Linga, became the universal symbol of God and object of worship, as the Pranava in mantra or sound form was before. In the new system of worship, the Temples that were built were more on the models of the old yajna-sala; and the yupa stambha (Dhvaja-stambha) and Balipitha, Pasu (Basava or Nandi) and the Gods in their various places were also retained; and a Brahmotsava supplanted virtually the old sacrifice.* In the field of philosophy, it did as much to systematise and build up into a whole what was hitherto in scattered form and it did greater service in drawing out more fully the omni-penetrativeness and transcendency of God over both Chetana and Achetana Prapancha, the world of souls and the world of matter.

The Postulate of God's supreme Transcendency is the special effort of the Agama Philosophy to make out, and as this was the Highest End and Truth, it was called Siddhanta par excellence as distinguished from the Vedanta which led up the aspirant only to certain spiritual stages. It divided all philosophy and religion into four paths or Margas, called respectively Chariya, Kriya, Yoga and Jnana; and these were otherwise called Dasa Marga, Satputra Marga, Saha Marga and San Marga. In the exposition of these paths, it opened out a thoroughly reasoned system of practical Philosophy, neither contradicting our experience, nor causing violence to the most cherished of our sentiments, both moral and religious; a system of thought which was progressive and built on an adamantine basis, step by step leading to higher knowledge; a system* which by preserving and pointing out the essential difference of God, Soul and Matter, established a true relation between them; which led to the highest monistic knowledge, a system which was at once dualism and non-dualism, Dvaita and Advaita; a system which appealed alike

* In commencing and going through a Brahmotsava, the priests observe technically almost the same rituals as in commencing and going through a great sacrifice. There is a Yajna Sala in every Saiva Temple in which the Fire is started by the Dikshita and the Dhvaja Arohana is made by running up a flag with the figure of a bull (Pasu or Basava) on the Yupastambha and tying Kusa grass to the Post. The Pasu and the Kusa grass standing merely for the soul or jiva that was bound and offered in sacrifice. After Avarohana, the soul or Pasu becomes freed and is no more called Pasu, but is called God or Nandi - the blissful. It will require more space for us to draw out here the parallel between the Yajna Sala and a Hindu Temple.

* Cf. Garbe, The Philosophy of Ancient India, p. 30. " As for those who feel inclined to look down slightingly from a monistic point of view upon a dualistic conception of the world, the words of E. Roer in the Introduction of the Bhashaparichcheda (p. XVI) may be quoted: " Though a higher development of philosophy may destroy the distinctions between soul and matter, " that is, may recognise matter or what is perceived as matter, as the same with the soul (as for instance, Leibnitz did), it is nevertheless certain that no true knowledge of the soul is possible without first drawing a most decided line of demarcation between the phenomena of matter and of the soul". This sharp line of demarcation between the two domains was first drawn by Kapila. The knowledge of the difference between body and soul is one condition, and it is also an .indispensable condition, of arriving at a true monism. Every view of the world "Which confounds this difference can supply at best a one-sided benism, be it a spiritualism or an equally one-sided materialism." to the peasant and the philosopher.