CWSA Set of 37 volumes
Vedic and Philological Studies Vol. 14 of CWSA 742 pages 2016 Edition
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ABOUT

Writings on the Veda and philology, and translations of Vedic hymns to gods other than Agni not published during Sri Aurobindo's lifetime.

THEME

Vedic and Philological Studies

  On Veda

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Sri Aurobindo

Writings on the Veda and philology, and translations of Vedic hymns to gods other than Agni not published during Sri Aurobindo's lifetime. The material includes (1) drafts for 'The Secret of the Veda', (2) translations (simple translations and analytical and discursive ones) of hymns to gods other than Agni, (3) notes on the Veda, (4) essays and notes on philology, and (5) some texts that Sri Aurobindo called 'Writings in Different Languages'. Most of this material was written between 1912 and 1914 and is published here for the first time in a book.

The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo (CWSA) Vedic and Philological Studies Vol. 14 742 pages 2016 Edition
English
 PDF     On Veda

Mandala One

SUKTA 2

(1) O seeing Master of Life, come; ready are these pressings of the Wine; drink of them, hear our call.

(2) O Master of Life, thy adorers turn in the Words their adoration towards thee; they have pressed out the Wine, they are knower of the Days.

(3) O Master of Life, thy brimming streams move for the giver wide-flowing to the drinking of the Wine.

(4) O Indra and Vayu, here is wine pressed out, come to us with your delights; for you the moon-pourings desire.

(5) O Indra and Vayu, become conscious of our wine-pouring, you who are rich with the plenitude; so, running, come to us.

(6) O Indra and Vayu, come to the perfected offering of the presser of the Wine, swiftly, with right understanding, O Strong Ones.

(7) Mitra of purified discernment I call and Varuna who destroys the adversary, accomplishing together a clear light of the understanding.

(8) By the Truth, O Mitra and Varuna, growing by the Truth, in touch with the Truth you attain to a vast will-force.

(9) Seers, many in your births, dwellers in the wideness,O Mitra and Varuna, you establish for us a judgement effective in its works.

SUKTA 3

(1) O Aswins, drivers of galloping hooves, lords of happiness with your many joys, take delight in our forces of sacrifice.

(2) O Aswins, O Strong Ones, doers of your many deeds, wise of understanding, delight in our Words with your forceful thought.

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(3) O puissant and formidable in your ways, Lords of the journey, mixed are the wine-offerings and cut the sacred grass, come to us.

(4) Come, O Indra of the brilliant light; these wine-offerings are desirous of thee, they are purified in particles and mass.

(5) Come, O Indra, impelled by the thought, driven by the illumined seer, to the words of knowledge of the speaker of the word, the offerer of the Wine.

(6) Come, O Indra, hastening to the words of knowledge, O driver of strong steeds; uphold our delight in the wine offering.

(7) Benignant upholders of seeing man, O all gods, come, givers to the wine-offering of the giver.

(8) O all gods, doers of the work, come in your speed to the wine-offering, like the Cows of Brightness to the stalls of their repose.

(9) May the all gods, who cast not down nor harm, Bringers who have the movement of creative knowledge, accept our sacrifice.

(10) May purifying Saraswati, opulent with her plenitudes, rich in thought, desire our sacrifice.

(11) Impeller of true words, awakener to right thinkings, Saraswati upholds our sacrifice.

(12) Saraswati awakens us by the intuition conscious of theGreat Sea of the Light and illumines all our thoughts.

SUKTA 4

(1) We call day by day for our protection the Maker of perfect forms like a good milch-cow for the milker of the Cows of Light.

(2) Come to our wine-offerings; drink of the wine, O wined-rinker; thou art full of riches and thy ecstasy is a giver of Light.

(3) Then may we know thy most intimate right-thinkings; manifest not beyond us, come.

(4) Come over to Indra the vigorous, the unoverthrown, question

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the illumined in mind who has given to thy friends their desirable boon.

(5) And may the Binders say to us, “Go forth elsewhere also holding in Indra your work of worship.”

(6) And may the enemy peoples call us blessed, O Puissant; may we abide in Indra’s peace.

(7) Bring for the swift this swift glory of the sacrifice that intoxicates the Gods; may it set on his march him who gives rapture to his friends.

(8) Drinking of this, O thou of the hundred works, thou becamest a slayer of the Coverers and thou hast protected the man of plenitude in his plenty.

(9) So we replenish thee in the plenitude of thy plenitude of the plenty, O Indra of the hundred works, for the winning of the Riches.

(10) He who is a great continent of riches and takes us easily over, a friend of the offerer of the wine, to that Indra sing.

SUKTA 5

(1) Come, sit down, sing to Indra, O chant-bearers, friends!

(2) Together when the wine has been pressed, to Indra the multitudinous, master of many desirable things.

(3) He shall come into being in us in our joining to our desire. He for the felicitous treasure, he in the goddess who holds the city, shall come to us with his plenitudes.

(4) In his meeting and shock the enemy ring not in his two bright steeds in the battles; to that Indra sing.

(5) Pure the pressed offerings go to the drinker of the draught that he may quaff, nectar-juices of wine mingled with the curd.

(6) O Indra well-powered to the work, born to the wine-drinking wast thou and at once increased to be the greatest of all.

(7) O Indra who hast joy of speech, let the swift powers of wine enter into thee; let them be a bliss to the wisdom of thy heart.

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(8) Chant and utterance ever increased thee, O lord of a hundred active powers; then thee let our words increase.

(9) Indra has unwasting prosperities and shall get me this thousandfold plenty in which are all masculine strengths.

(10) O Indra who hast joy of speech, let not those who are mortal harm our bodies. Thou art the lord, ward off the stroke.

SUKTA 6

(1) The great bright horse they yoke and stand around him when he moves; the luminous regions are alight in heaven.

(2) His two desirable shining steeds they yoke and stand on two sides in the car, red, violent, bearers of the god.

(3) Thy fighters create the vision of thought for the visionless and form for the formless and with them in their dawning brightness thou wast born.

(4) O again they have come to birth in the womb by the fixed law of their nature holding the sacrificial Name.

(5) Breakers even of what is strong, bringers even of what is in the secret cave, O Indra, thou by them discoverest the trace of the shining ones.

(6) And they are like men that strive after the godhead and words that turn to the thought that discovers treasures and dawn to light in the wake of the great One whom we hear.

(7) Travelling with fearless Indra you desire sight, rapturous, equal in radiance.

(8) The fighter mightily sings the word of light by the faultless troops that lighten on him, the desirable bands of Indra.

(9) Thence come, O pervading divinity, from heaven, where thou art in the luminous world. Our words in him completely shine.

(10) Hence we desire our getting, or in the earth-region of heaven, Indra desire, or in the great mid-world.

SUKTA 7

(1) The chanters chant vastly Indra, Indra the singers of the

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Rik with songs of light; all our words of speech unto Indra dawn.

(2) Indra comes ever inseparably with the two bright steeds and the car yoked by the word, Indra of the thunderbolt is all a golden light.

(3) Indra for far vision made the sun to climb up into heaven when he parted the rock in the hill with the troop of the rays.

(4) O Indra, increase our weal in the plenitudes and the things of thousand fold wealth by thy bold strong fosterings, since thou art strong and bold.

(5) To Indra we call in the matter of the little and the great wealth, the hurler of the thunderbolt our ally against the covering hosts.

(6) Constant giver, Strong One, uncover the moving lid, come unshielded to us.

(7) In march after march rises to the thunderer Indra an ever higher hymn; but I avail not to compose his perfect praise.

(8) As a stately bull comes to the herds, he comes unveiled to the labouring peoples, lord of us in his might.

(9) Indra, one, rules over seeing men and the Gods, rules the five habitations and their peoples.

(10) Indra for men we call to be all around you; ours may he be and absolute.

SUKTA 8

(1) Bring to us, O Indra, for our increase a stable and victorious felicity ever forceful and fullest of lordship,

(2) by which we shall hold back all obstructing things with destruction of confining limit, strengthened (or protected) by thee as thou warrest.

(3) O Indra, by thee protected (or in that strength) we may make to blaze up thickly the force of the lightning and conquer utterly in the battle our enemies.

(4) We by thy armed heroes, we, O Indra, by thee yoked to us in the fight may put forth might in the battle.

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(5) Vast (now) is Indra and very high, may his vastness dwell with the lord of the lightnings and brilliant might like the heaven in its wide-extending.

(6) Those he beareth up who enjoy in their strength with safety of that which they have created or who are illumined and full of understanding.

(7) For he is a gulf that drinks in the Soma utterly even as the sea drinks in the wide waters that have descended from the mountaintops.

(8) So in him is the luminous Vastness rich in its truth and vigorous in its works like a ripe branch to the giver.

(9) So in thee, O Indra, all wide pervadings and increasings become at once full of perception to him who can hold them, to him who gives.

(10) So is the confirming of him and the expressing desirable and to be brought forth by speech,—for Indra to drink the Soma-wine.

SUKTA 9

(1) Come, O Indra, thou takest rapture by all the bodily parts of this Matter, full of the great, setting thyself to it by thy force.

(2) Increase thy strength, and do ye when the nectar is expressed create rapture for Indra the taker of joy, activity for the doer of all actions.

(3) Rejoice, O swift of mood, with praises that awake delight, O thou all-doer; attach thyself to these outpourings.

(4) When thou comest not to them, O Indra, thy voices laugh up to thee, seeking unfulfilled satisfaction to their lover and lord.

(5) Excite entirely,O Indra, that manifold highest ecstasy below,—that Is of thee which is universal being and supreme.

(6) Us too in that, O Indra, wholly excite to bliss; make us full of strong ecstasy and victorious strength, O thou brilliant in steadfast force.

(7) So do thou dispose to us, O Indra, wide knowledge full of

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light, full of substance, in nature of that greatness, enduring all our life unimpaired.

(8) Dispose to us knowledge of the large, a brilliance of utterly forceful steadfastness and, Indra, those rapturous masteries.

(9) Declare ye with your words Indra of the Substance, lord of substance, full of the rik (knowledge); as he goeth we call on him for expansion of our being.

(10) In every pouring of the nectar for capacity, of the large and increaser of the large, for Indra proceeds.

SUKTA 10

(1) Thee the Gayatrins (devatas of mind) chant, the Arkins (also devatas of mind) begin their action; the mind movements, O Shatakratu, strive up by thee as they that climb a trunk.

(2) When one climbeth from plateau to plateau, a rich activity expresses itself, then Indra bringeth the substance of thought into consciousness, he moves a lover (master) with his mate (or vibrates with the force and mastery of his action).1

(3) Yoke thou thy maned steeds, covering with mastery fill the containing soul, then, O Indra, drinker of the nectar, respond with the Sruti to our words.

(4) Come, answer to our songs of praise, speak them out as they rise, cry out thy response; attach thyself to our mind, O King, O Indra, and increase in us the Yajna.

(5) I form fully the prayer I have to declare towards Indra, the prayer (ishita) that giveth increase, that potent Indra may have ecstasy in our nectar-yieldings and in our friendlinesses (acts of friendship).

(6) Him we desire in comradeship, him in delight, him in strong energy; therefore this puissant Indra in his kindliness hath power to give us his substance (or simply, hath power to distribute to us of his substance).

(7) O Indra, wide and untroubled (or undarkened) success has been won, remove the veil2 over those rays, create delight,

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O dweller on the hill.

(8) Over thee the two obstructing firmaments have no power when thou goest stiffly upward (or when thou goest straight); victorious pour down for us on our earths the waters of heaven.

(9) Lend attentive ear and hear my call, now uphold (or heed) my words; O Indra, draw this my song of praise into thy innermost part of the state of Yoga.

(10) We know thee for most supreme in the substantial strengths of being, a hearer of our call; because thou art thus supreme we call to thee for expansion of being strong in stability.

(11) O Indra of the sheaths, drink then the Soma, be steadfast in delight, give us wholly a new being and create for us the Knowledge that preserveth utterly our force.

(12) O delighter in our words, may these our words be all around thee; may all increase follow the increase of our being and all love cling to it.

SUKTA 11

(1) Indra, cleaver of the ocean, all words increase; most rapturous of the blissful; master of being and lord of stable strengths.

(2) In thy friendship, who art stable and strong, we have no fear, O Indra lord of the various light, towards thee we move forward the conqueror unconquered.

(3) The first delights of Indra, his former expandings are not destroyed because for his praisers he collecteth fullness of luminous strength.

(4) He that breaketh the gate, the young, the seer, appeared immeasurable in force, Indra, that holdeth up all action, the thunderer wide-praised.

(5) Thou wert the uncoverer of luminous Vala’s lair, O dweller on the hill; into thee the gods without fear entered forcefully protected (or impelled).

(6) Voiceful with thy ecstasies, O mighty one, I went towards the sea; the doers of action approached (or resorted to me)

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in the knowledge of that delighter in my speech.

(7) By thy containing mights thou camest down to the mighty and containing [    ]; do thou in his revelation fulfilled in completeness lift up their inspirations.

(8) Towards Indra who ruleth in his force our praises yearned, he who hath a thousand delights, ay, they are even more.

SUKTA 13

(1) When thou hast been increased to thy height, bring for us the gods, O Agni, to me who hold ready the offering, O priest of the sacrifice, O purifier and apply thyself to thy work.

(2) O son of force, honey-sweet do thou make the yajna to the gods for us today, O seer, that manifestation may be.

(3) I call here in this yajna on the beloved, the strong expresser of things, the honey-tongued maker of the oblation.

(4) O Agni, bring, adored, the gods in a car of utter ease; thou art the thinker, the beneficent, the priest of the oblation.

(5) Strew the flame without a break, O ye wise of heart, the flame with shining back, where the vision of immortality has been seen.

(6) Let the doors swing apart, the goddesses that conceal the force that grows by Truth, today at least and for the sacrificial act.

(7) To night and dawn in this yajna I call, the clear of eye, I sit beside this our flame.

(8) On them, the bright of tongue I call, the priestesses, goddesses, seers; may they conduct this yajna of ours.

(9) May Ila, Saraswati and Mahi, the three goddesses born of the sphere of delight sit unfailingly beside our flame.

(10) I call here Twastha supreme whose shape is the world; may he be to us absolute and pure.

(11) Let down, O god master of the forest, the oblation for the gods; let the giver get his awakening of soul.

(12) Swaha (O Shakti), perform the yajna to Indra in the house of the master of the yajna. Thither I call the gods.

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SUKTA 15

(1) O Indra, drink according to the law of truth the Soma wine; let the nectar-sweetnesses enter into thee, rapturous, that have there their home.

(2) O Maruts, drink according to the truth, purify the yajna by the process of purification for ye are steadfast and very bold.

(3) About the yajna utter for us thy cry, active and exhilarated drink thou by the truth for thou art the disposer of delight.

(4) O Agni, bring hither the gods, make them to sit in the three wombs, surround all and drink by the truth.

(5) O Indra, drink thou the Soma of the soul’s bliss according to the truths of things, for it is thy friendship that never sinks.

(6) Do you, O Mitra and Varuna whose function it is to uphold Daksha [    ], enjoy the yajna by the truth.

(7) For the rich in substance the lord of substance laden-handed in the sacrifice propitiateth the god in the yajnas.

(8) May the lord of substance give to us the riches of which ’tis told; for these we desire in the gods.

(9) The lord of substance would drink, make the offering and stand forward, be ye subject to the laws of truth by the process of [incomplete]

SUKTA 18

(1) O Master of the Soul, make Kakshivan son of Usijas a sweet soul and a good fighter.

(2) May he who is bold and impetuous, who slayeth all unfriendly things, the knower of substance of being, the increaser of fullness cleave to us, he who is strong and swift.

(3) Let not the aspiration and the eagerness of mortal man in his struggle perish in us, O master of the soul, protect us (or let not slaughter and injury etc).

(4) That hero smiteth and is not hurt, whom Indra and Brahmanaspati and Soma befriend, a mortal man.

(5) Him mortal, O Brahmanaspati, let Soma protect from harm

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and Indra, both auspicious grown.

(6) I have laboured towards the wondrous master of the house, the beloved, the desired of Indra, for steadfastness in weal I have laboured and for capacity of soul.

(7) He without whom the yajna cometh not to fulfilment, even of the man of discerning heart, he hath power over the yoga of the movements of the understanding.

(8) He confirms the offering of the oblation, he carries forward the work of the sacrifice, by the priest of the offering he moves with the gods.

(9) I saw One strong of aspiration, utterly audacious, wide and expanding besieging as it were the seats of heaven.

SUKTA 24

(1) Of whom shall we meditate, of which of the immortals, the divine and delightful name; who shall give us back for our higher being in the vastness so that I may see my Father and see my Mother?

(2) Of Agni first of the Immortals let us meditate the divine and delightful name; he shall give us back for our higher being in the vastness and I shall see my Father and see my Mother.

(3) O God creator, around thee, the master of things supreme, we desire a perpetual enjoyment;

(4) for whatever enjoyment before thus near to thee, I was free from disliking, I held it in both my hands.

(5) May we enjoy by thee when thou takest thy joy and under thy protection, so I may reach the very head of felicity.

(6) Neither thy kingliness nor thy force nor thy passion nor thy wide manifestation could these attain though they exercise mastery, neither these waters that flow unsleeping nor they who measure the might of the stormblast.

(7) In the bottomless abyss Varuna the King, of purified discernment, set his lofty pillar of delight and the lowest depths of these were raised high above. May my perceptions be taken deep within.

(8) For King Varuna made for the Sun a wide path that he might

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follow him; there where there is no path, he made places for him at every step to set his feet and he forbade those who send their arrows into the heart.

(9) Thou hast a hundred messengers of healing, O King, yea, a thousand! Mayst thou have right understanding profound and wide. Fend off far from us by thy superior Powers all wasteful harm and loosen from us whatsoever sin has been done.

(10) Lo these stars that are set on high and become visible at night, whence do they shine out on us? The moon cometh at night declaring in his lustre the unbending laws of Varuna.

(11) Therefore I approach adoring thee with my soul, therefore he that doeth sacrifice, getteth him control by his offerings: disregard me not, O vast-aspiring Varuna, but here awake; steal not from us our life.

(12) This it was they told me by day and this it was they told me by night; lo, this my perceiving mind made it leap for my heart’s acceptance. May King Varuna release us, to whom Shunahshepa has called in his fear of the wrathful and violent Being.

(13) Shunahshepa in fear of the Being wrathful and violent and bound against the Sun (? O son of Aditi) to the three pillars of the sacrifice, him may Varuna the King release, may the Knower unvanquished loose from him his bonds.

(14) We deprecate thy disregard, O Varuna, by submissions and sacrifices and offerings; dwell thou in us, O strong God, be the awakener of our souls, and destroy from us the sins that have been done.

(15) Cleave and cast upward, O Varuna, the higher cord, cleave downward the middle, cleave to either side the lower; then shall we sinless in thy law, O son of the supreme Nature, abide in it for a higher existence.

SUKTA 25

(1) Whatsoever thy peoples, whatever their nature, thou,OGod Varuna, measurest out to them accordingly in sky and sky

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the law of their nature.

(2) Let not thy delight in us be for the mortal piercing of him who is heedless nor for wrath against him who is exultant.

(3) We with the words of the mantra, O Varuna, limit the mind in thee for gentleness, as the charioteer checks his horse in its gallop.

(4) For they who house with me are hastening up for the sacrifice, free from passions, like birds that fly to their nests.

(5) When shall we mould for gentleness—since wide is the vision in him—this strong Varuna in whom warlike strength is the force of his nature?

(6) Therefore do ye two enjoy his equal mood and like harpers tune yourselves in yoga to the Giver whose law of being is constancy,—

(7) he who knows the path of the birds as they wing through the air and he knows the ships that go down to the sea;

(8) he knows the twelve months with their offspring, because his nature is constancy to law, he knows him who is born into the world,

(9) knows the action of the vast rushing and mighty wind and knows those who are seated above.

(10) Varuna, because his nature is steadfastness, has taken his seat in all lordships and is very mighty for Empire.

(11) Therefore he sees with understanding all wonderful things; he looks with knowledge on the things that have been done and on those that are yet to be accomplished.

(12) The son of Aditi, the strong One who has all mightinesses set us on the good path, he carried our lives across safe to their goal.

(13) Varuna weareth his golden robe and hath taken upon him a form and many clearnesses have taken their seats around.

(14) Him the hurters cannot hurt, nor they who do injury to the peoples,—they are not able to measure with themselves the God.

(15) He that has established no incomplete success in mental beings, can well have established it in our deeper selves.

(16) Like cows that troop to their pastures, thoughts crowd to

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me desiring the wide-visioned Varuna.

(17) Ye two must now declare again where ye have stored for me the sweet wine, for as the offerer of Sacrifice thou, O Varuna, eatest of all pleasantness.

(18) O ye my words, do ye cling to the all-seeing and beautiful in his beautiful and spacious car.

(19) Even today, O Varuna, hear this my call and take me into thy grace, for to thee for protection I gaze.

(20) O thou who art able to contain the universe, thou art ruler over earth and heaven; therefore in thy mastery lend us thy ear.

(21) Loose upward the upper cord that binds us, cleave to either side the middle, downward cleave the lower cords that we may live.

SUKTA 28

(1) Where the stone wide-bottomed is upturned for the distilling, there may the mortar,O Indra, preserve of the distillings of the Pestle.

(2) Where, as it seemeth, two buttocks are made a support for the distilling, there may the mortar, O Indra, preserve of the distillings of the Pestle.

(3) Where a woman learns the fall to the stroke and the fall away from the stroke, may the mortar, O Indra, preserve of the distillings of the Pestle.

(4) [Not translated.]

(5) Whensoever thou, O Pestle, art put to thy work in house and house, speak here with deepest force like the drum of conquering hosts.

(6) Since for thee, O lord of the woodland (of delight), the wind blows in its ways before thee, then do thou distil for Indra’s drinking the Soma juice.

(7) She who was firmest in enduring strength was put to the action, for there were two that were high and wielded by one who had great vigour, they ranged like horses that feed in their pastures.

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(8) Today may these two lords of the woodland (of delight), impetuous and wielded by impetuous distillers, express for Indra the honeyed juice.

(9) Fill in here the Soma that is left from the dish; in thy purity pour it forth and fill us with light to the very skin.

SUKTA 29

(1) Thou who art True, who drinkest the Soma, whatsoever thou seemest as if thou wert not to express, do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who hast in Force thy fullness!

(2) O Shiprin(?), O master of plenties,O dweller in Power, thine is the giving; do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who hast in Force thy fullness.

(3) Cast into sleep the two who are false seers, let them slumber without awaking; do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who in Force hast thy fullness.

(4) Let these undelights fall into sleep, O hero, let delights be awakened; do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who hast in Force thy fullness.

(5) Crush thou the Ass, O Indra, who urges us with this spirit of evil; do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who in Force hast thy fullness.

(6) By that whirling one the wind speeds (falls) far from our place of delight; do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who hast in Force thy fullness.

(7) Slay all that cries out around against us, smite down every breaker of our enjoying; do thou yet manifest for us, O Indra, in lustres, in swift enjoyings, in happinesses, in strengths, O thou who hast in Force thy fullness.

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SUKTA 30

(1) We foster for you, as one fattens a ram, Indra the strong slayer; sprinkle him with nectarous rain till he reaches his utmost fullness.

(2) He who is alike the tranquillity of the pure and the force of the strong enjoyers, comes upon us as if pouring from above.

(3) For his forceful delight thus in one’s inner being the sea maintaineth as it were its full expanse.

(4) He is here with thee, and thou comest straying back like a dove to the home of its young; that is the word which is given us for our mind’s comprehension.

(5) Master of ecstasies, strong one who upbearest the Word, may the hymn of praise to thee, since thou art even such, become a wide force of truth.

(6) Stand on high for the expansion of our being, in firm plenty of substance, O Shatakratu; may we express it also in other gods.

(7) O friends, we call for our expansions on Indra who grows fuller of force in every getting of fresh being and in every holding of substance gained.

(8) Surely he comes to us whenever he hears, with mighty expansions, with stores of substance to our call.

(9) I call to his ancient house the strong one who is first in force, to whom even of old, when master of thee, I call.

(10) Therefore we, blessed with all boons, pray to thee (or get control of thee), O widely called, O friend of men, O full of substance for thy lovers.

(11) O Thunderer, O friend, thou who drinkest the Soma of our loves when enraptured they have drunk!

(12) Even so may this be, drinker of Soma, friend, thunderer, so do thou as is done in the heat of thee for the sacrifice.

(13) May our ecstasied swiftnesses that intoxicate with fulfilment, be full of substance of force, that we may mount on the crests of the ecstasy and rejoice.

(14) [Not translated.]

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(15) [Not translated.]

(16) Ever hath Indra by his forces far spreading, high shouting, breathing passionately, won riches for us. He has given us a car of great brightness and he preserves, ’tis for secure enjoyment that he gives.

(17) O Aswins, lo she that is full of strong enjoying, by her in her brilliance do ye come, givers of that which is luminous and full of golden light.

(18) O bounteous givers, your car immortal that is equally yoked, moveth over the sea, O ye Aswins.

(19) Ye have driven, labouring, a wheel of your car over the head of the intangible, the other goeth through the heavens.

(20) O Usha, beloved of [    ] who is the mortal that has enjoyed thee, O deathless one? to whom journeyest thou, O wide-shining Dawn?

(21) For we have filled ourselves with the thought of thee from our last depths to our highest summits, O high-raptured, O richly hued, O rosy Dawn.

(22) Come to us with these plenties, O daughter of heaven, contain for us the energy (of the world).

SUKTA 51

(1) Take rapture by your chants in the Ram of the word of light, in the sea of treasure, rapture of Indra of the many callings; for in him the things of our humanity range freely like the heavens. That to enjoy, sing the word of light to this greatest seer.

(2) His prosperings take joy in him when he gets his fair access and fills the middle world and is surrounded by his strengths. The Ribhus, skilful minds, ascend into Indra when he pours the intoxication of his delight. The swift word of Truth climbs on to the hundred-powered God.

(3) To the Angiras seers thou hast uncovered the pen of the cows and wast to Atri the finder of the path amid the hundred doors and even in sleep thou broughtest to Vimada the treasure when thou madest dance thy adamant bolt in the

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battle while he shone with light.

(4) And thou hast uncovered the veiling lids of the waters and held on the mountain the bountiful treasure. O Indra, when thou slewest the Coverer, the Serpent by thy might, then thou madest the Sun to climb up into heaven for sight.

(5) And thou drovest out by thy powers of creative knowledge the makers of false knowledge who give their offerings into sleep. O strong god-mind, thou hast broken the cities of Pipru and made Rijiswan to advance in thy slayings of the Destroyers.

(6) And thou hast increased Kutsa in thy slayings of Sushna and put Shambara into the power of the King in whom the Ray is a guest, and trampled with thy foot Arbuda for all his hugeness. Yea, thou art born eternally for the slaying of the Destroyer.

(7) In thee all strength combined is housed and thy mind of joy exults for the drinking of the nectar-wine. The thunderbolt is now known to us and placed in thy arms; shear down all the strengths of the foe.

(8) Distinguish in thy knowledge the Aryans from the Destroyers, teach us, make subject to the strewer of thy seat of session those who do not thy works. Be mighty in power and an impeller of the doer of sacrifice. All those deeds of thine I desire in our drinkings together of the intoxication.

(9) Indra ranges subjecting to the follower after his works those who deviate from them, casting down by those who grow to him all who turn not to him in their being. Vamra, chanting of him increased and increasing and arriving to Heaven, smote asunder the limiting walls.

(10) When Ushanas carves into shape thy force by his force, then thy strength besieges with its might earth and heaven. O strong god-mind, thou growest filled, and the mind-yoked horses of the Breath of life bear thee to the inspired knowledge.

(11) When Indra takes rapture along with Ushanas son of the seer, he mounts behind a happy and still happier pair.Mightily he loosed out the waters to their movement in a flood

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and hurled asunder the fortified cities of Shushna.

(12) On thy car thou mountest up in the drinkings of the strong winegod offered to thee by the son of Sharyata in which thou hast rapture. O Indra, when thou hast thy desire [of] the wine we press for thee, then thou ascendest to a glory without enemies in heaven.

(13) To Kakshivan pressing the wine and seeking the word thou gavest Vrichaya, the little to the great one, and becamest the mare of the stallion, O strong in power to works. All those deeds of thine must find expression in our wine-offering.

(14) Indra is lodged in the purification of the man of good thoughts. He is a chant among the Pajras, a pillar at the gate of the house, Indra dwells with us as the giver of our felicity. He is a seeker of the horses and the kine and the chariots and the treasure.

(15) This is the word of adoration that has been made for the Bull, for the Self-King, for the Strong whose force is of the truth. O Indra, in this strength may we abide in thy bliss, all the heroes with us and the happy illumined seers.

SUKTA 52

(1) O greaten well this Ram who discovers the sun-world. His hundred powers perfect in birth speed together on the way. Indra may I set travelling to me for my increase by my clear cuttings of speech like a galloping horse of plenty and a swiftly arriving chariot.

(2) He is like a mountain and unfallen in his upholdings. He brings a hundredfold thriving and increases in his strengths, when he has slain Vitra the Coverer where he covers with his siege the Waters and forces downward the streams rejoicing in his nectar food.

(3) He is the gate in the gated house, in the teat of plenitude, a blissful foundation increased with the intoxication of their delight by the thinkers. To Indra of greatest lavish giving by

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my thought I call in my desire for perfect works. Now is he satisfied and full of my nectar food.

[Incomplete]

SUKTA 56

(1) Lo, he flings himself on the many bowls of that wine feasting on it, like a galloper that mounts its mate. One turns hither his chariot of golden light, of shaping knowledge, to which his two shining powers are yoked and one makes his vastness to drink of the all-discerning delight.

(2) The expressions of our thought led by guiding impulsions (or, submitting to him their impulsions) range all over this god-mind and seek to possess him as men in their wandering range an ocean. Even as men who would take delight ascend a hill, so climb by thy luminous energy on to this lord of discernment, this force of the knowledge.

(3) He is the mighty one who breaks through to the goal; in his virile action his force of light unclouded by the battle dust blazes out from very speed like a flame on a mountain, his force by which in those who cast their being into his he in his rapture of the wine, iron, hard to hold, binds back from working the evil strength in us with its illusions as if in a cord.

(4) When the divine strength that thou hast been increasing in thee embraces firmly the God-mind for its expansion as the Sun embraces the Dawn, then he who dispels with his violent light-force the darkness drives vast the dust of battle as he cries aloud in his warring.

(5) Thus he crosses the vital plane that now unmovingly supports the mental heavens and he stands widely exceeding it; rejoicing in the rapture, in the raining down on us of the world of Light, O God-Mind, thou slayest the Coverer, thou forcest out the flood of those waters.

(6) Thy vastness in the seats of our earth,OGod-Mind, upholds by its energy the vital world that upholds the heaven of

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mind. Thou in the rapture of the outpressed wine hast set the heavenly waters flowing, thou hast broken wholly the Coverer’s stony walls.

SUKTA 61

(1) To him, to him, to the strong, to the swift I send my chant like a pleasant offering to the mighty One, to Indra my sacred words of richest opulence, to the equal in the stanza of illumination, to the irresistible Ray.

(2) To him, to him I give like a pleasant offering and bring a song of power that is a clearness cut in the siege and encumbrance; my thoughts are rubbed bright for Indra their first and original spouse by my heart and sense and thinking mind.

(3) To him I bear in my mouth that highest song of power which wins the sun-world’s light, that I may increase this greatest seer by the pure utterances of my clear-cut thoughts.

(4) To him I send my song speeding to get me his strength as a wheel-wright sends a chariot he has made, I send my words, clear cuttings, to Indra who upholds man’s words, I send my all-pervading song to the Wise One.

(5) To him, to Indra I make my song of light to shine with the offering flame and make it like a horse for his chariot by my desire for inspired knowing, and to adore the hero who is a house of gifts, to adore the render of the sealed cities who brings out the inspired knowledge.

(6) For him Twastri the Maker shaped his thunderbolt that is of the sun-world and is mighty for works and gave it to him for battle. He found out by it the vital places even of the Coverer. Speed was of him and speed was of his weapon. He was master and illimitable in works.

(7) His, his, this great builder’s, was the sacrifice of the wine in which Vishnu drank the draught, the delicious food. Vishnu in his mighty violence took by force all that was made ready and shooting his arrows pierced the Boar across the mountain.

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(8) To him, to him, to Indra, the Women, the wives of the gods, have woven a song of light in the slaying of the Serpent. He put on for his robe the wide earth and heaven, but they could not encircle his greatness.

(9) His was the greatness that overflowed around the earth and the heaven and the world of air. Indra, self-king in the house who brings all things to expression, drove, a strong and splendid fighter, to the battle.

(10) His was the strength against which the strength of the Serpent fought, but Indra clove him with his thunder and he with the mind of knowledge let loose the rivers like imprisoned herds to come to us and give the inspired wisdom.

(11) His was the keen blaze with which the rivers played when he worked with his lightning bolt all about them. He who makes man a lord and king, giving to the giver, a swift striker through impediments, made a ford for Turviti, the swift traveller.

(12) Against him, against him the Coverer bring hastily thy thunderbolt, be a master of things and illimitable in work. Cleave open sideways the channels as if the joints of the shining Cow and send to range the floods of the waters.

(13) His deeds declare, the ancient deeds of the swift One, a new man with thy words, his acts when hurling his weapons for the battle, charging in the fight, he drives out the foemen.

(14) In fear of him, the fixed mountains and heaven and earth shake when he is about to be born. Nodha hymns the cherishing power of the happy god and grows at once in his being to puissance.

(15) To him that gift of these was given and he took joy, the one master of much riches. Indra carried forward on the way the White One giver of the Wine when he strove in rivalry with the Sun, Surya of the team of swift horses.

(16) Thus have the Gotamas made for thee, O Indra, a cut clearness, the sacred words that yoke thy bright horses. Place in them then the thought that gives shape to universal things. At dawn may he come soon rich with thought.

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SUKTA 62

(1) We are thinking a hymn of strength, a hymn of power to the great One when he puts forth his strength, to the lover of our words, even as did the Angiras seers. Praising him with clear cuttings of our speech we would sing a song of illumination to the master of the words of light, to the strong god whom on all sides we hear.

(2) Bring for the great One a great adoration, the Sama of power for the god when he puts forth his strength, by which our ancient fathers the Angirases knew the foothold tracks and singing the word of light found the herd of the rays.

(3) In the sacrifice of Indra and the Angirases Sarama discovered a foundation for the Son, Brihaspati broke the rock of the mountain and discovered the herd of the rays and the shining cattle lowed and the Strong Ones cried out with them.

(4) He of the sun-world by stanzaed hymn and perfect verse with the seven nine-rayed sages rent by his cry the mountain; O Indra, O Puissant, thou with the ten-rayed travellers of the path torest Vala into pieces by thy cry.

(5) Hymned by the Angirases, O potent god, thou laidst open the darkness by the Dawn and the Sun and the herd of the rays. O Indra, thou madest wide the tops of earth and proppedst up the upper shining world of heaven.

(6) This is the most worshipful and fairest work of the potent god that he increased in the crooked declivity the four rivers of the upper world whose streams are honey wine.

(7) Ayasya by the words of light that hymned him uncovered and saw as two the eternal goddesses who lie in one lair; then Indra, a doer of mighty works, held earth and heaven in the highest ether as the Lord of Joy holds his two wives.

(8) Two young goddesses of differing forms who are ever reborn, circle eternally to each other by their own motions about earth and heaven, Night with her dark, Dawn with her shining limbs.

(9) An eternal comradeship held with them the Son of Strength, the god of great deeds, labouring in perfect works. Even

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in the unripe cows of light thou settest, O Indra, by thy thought, a ripe, even in the black and the dun a shining milk.

(10) And eternally the immortal rivers who dwell in one house run not dry, but keep by their strengths his many thousand workings; sisters, they are to him like wives who are mothers and serve him with their works and he deviates not from his labour.

(11) That which is eternal seeking, seeking the riches, O potent god, our new thoughts run to thee with adoration, with songs of light. Longing for thee as for a longing husband our minds of thought touch thee, O mighty One.

(12) And eternally thy felicitous riches lie in thy arm of light and are not wasted nor destroyed, O potent god. O Indra, thou hast light, thou hast will, thou art a wise thinker. Master of powers, teach us of them by thy powers.

(13) And for thy eternity of being, O Indra, Nodha the Gautama has carved a sacred word for the yoking of thy bright horses and for thy good leading of us, O mighty One. At dawn may he quickly come rich with thought.

SUKTA 63

(1) Great art thou, O Indra, who by thy mights even whilst thou wast being born, founded earth and heaven in thy strength when all hugest things, even to the fixed mountains, quivered in their fear like rays of light.

(2) O Indra, when thou comest to thy two bright horses which have each its different action, thy adorer sets the thunderbolt in thy arms. O lord of the undeviating will who hearest man’s many callings, thou drivest out by it the unfriendly people and castest down their many cities.

(3) Thou, thou, art true, O Indra, in thy being, and violent assailant of those destroyers, thou art he who dwells in the wideness, thou art a soul of power, thou art one who overcomes. Thou wast with young and luminous Kutsa and smotest Sushna in the strength, in the satisfaction, in the summit.

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(4) Thou, O Indra, thou art the comrade who gavest that impulse, when, O puissant in works, thou didst crush Vritra the Coverer, when, O hero of the puissant mind, with the powers that go beyond thou easily overcamest and hewedst the Destroyers to pieces in the house.

(5) Thou, O Indra, when mortals desire not to remain even in the strong fortress, make that movement free from harms. Uncover the regions to our warhorse, break like thick clouds the unfriendly people.

(6) Thee, O Indra, thee men call in the battle, in the getting of the floods, in the streaming bounty of the sun-world. O lord of thy law of nature, let this increasing in thy plenties be the movement we shall get to through the clash of the battle.

(7) Thou, thou, O Indra, Thunderer, warring brokest for Purukutsa the seven cities. When easily thou hadst cut out the seat of his session for Sudas, then didst thou turn, O King, evil of suffering into good of bliss for the Puru.

(8) Thou, thou, O Indra, O pervading godhead, increasedst for us like the waters that rich and varied moving force by which, O hero, thou extendest to us thy self and thy energy and makest it to stream out in every way.

(9) A song has been made for thee, O Indra, by the Gautamas, and the sacred words spoken towards thee with thy two bright horses; bring us plenty of thy riches in a beautiful form. At dawn may he quickly come rich with thought.

SUKTA 64

(1) O Nodhas, bring a clear-cut song to the puissant host, the excellent in sacrifice, creators and ordainers, the Maruts. I make to shine out as if flowing waters, a thinker skilful-handed with my mind, the words that come into being in me in the births of knowledge.

(2) They are born, the swift Bulls of heaven, Rudra’s strong smiters, the sinless Mighty Ones. Purifying are they and pure and bright like Suns, dire bodies like rushing warriors.

(3) Young, unageing, Rudras, violent ones, slayers, of those take

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not joy, irresistible rays, they drive like moving mountains and make all the fixed worlds of earth and heaven to move by their might.

(4) They shine out with rich and varied lustres to make themselves a body. On their breasts they have cast golden ornaments for the delight of beauty. Burning lances are on their shoulders. Together by the law of their nature are born the strong ones of heaven.

(5) Vehemently rushing they come, makers of men into lords and kings, destroyers of all who would injure, make by their strengths winds and lightnings, press the teats of heaven, stream violently its torrents and speeding everywhere feed the earth with milk.

(6) The Maruts, great givers who are born to us in the coming of knowledge, feed the waters and make them a milk full of the brightness of clarified butter and lead about the master of plenty like a galloping horse that he may rain his bounty and milk the loud unwasting fountain.

(7) Great ones, full of creative knowledge and rich with manifold lustres, moving swiftly, strong in your own strength like hills, Maruts, you devour like the trunked beasts the pleasant woods of earth when you have yoked your strength to the ruddy herd of the lightnings.

(8) Wise of mind they roar aloud like lions, omniscient and like good moulders who knead all into forms, gladdeners of the nights with dappled mares and lances, when beset and stayed, python-passioned in their might.

(9) In the beauty of your hosts you speak to earth and heaven. You cleave to men, heroes python-passioned in your might. A force stands in the bodies of your chariots, O Maruts, that is like lightning and like a might that has vision.

(10) Omniscient are the Strong Ones and dwellers with the riches, inseparably joined to strengths and overflowing in might, shooters who hold the javelin in their two hands of light, infinite strengths with daggers of puissance.

(11) Increasing the waters the Maruts with their blazing lances grind in their ascent the mountains with their golden wheels

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like travellers breasting their path, fighters and marchers moving in their own motion, who make havoc and disturb all firm established things.

(12) We sing with invocation the blazing, purifying, enjoying, all-seeing children of the Violent One. Cling for the glory to the strong and puissant Marut host who move with a straight force crossing the middle world.

(13) Soon that mortal whom ye have cherished, O Maruts, takes his place in might above all men. He gets with his war-horses and his strong ones wealth and plenty and dwells in a wise will that meets the question and increases.

(14) Put in the masters of riches, O ye Maruts, a luminous strength active in works and hard to wound in the battles and may we increase for a hundred winters the Son and offspring of our body who is all-seeing and sung by the word and the [    ]

(15) Now set in us, O ye Maruts, the firm hundredfold and thousandfold treasure full of hero strengths that puts forth its might and overcomes in the movement of the path. At dawn may he quickly come rich in thought.

SUKTA 80

(1) Rightly in the intoxicating Soma-wine the Priest of the word has made thy increase. O most puissant Thunderer, by thy might thou hast expelled from the earth the Serpent, singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(2) That intoxicating Soma which was pressed, which was brought by the Falcon, had made thee drunk with rapture, by which thou smotest the Coverer out from the waters, O Thunderer, by thy might, singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(3) Advance, approach, be violent; thy thunderbolt cannot be controlled. O Indra, for thy puissance is a god-might, slay the Coverer, conquer the waters, singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(4) [Not translated.]

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(5) Indra offended assails the height of Vritra where he lashes his body, and smites him with the thunderbolt, urging the waters to their flow, singing the word of illumination in the law of his self-empire.

(6) On the height he smites him with his hundred-jointed thunderbolt; Indra, intoxicated with the Soma food, desires a path of travel for his comrades, singing the word of illumination in the law of his self-empire.

(7) O Indra, master of the thunder-stone, thunderer, for thee an energy that cannot be moved, when thou slewest by thy wisdom that cunning one, the Beast, singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(8) Thy thunderbolts set themselves abroad along the ninety rivers; great is thy energy; strength is established in thy two arms,—singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(9) The Thousand sang the word of illumination, the Twenty affirmed him, the Hundred moved in his wake, to Indra the Word was lifted up,—singing the word of illumination in the law of his self-empire.

(10) Indra smote out of him his energy, he slew force with force; great is his virile strength; when he had slain Vritra, he released the waters, singing the song of illumination in the law of his self-empire.

(11) Lo, these two great goddesses tremble with fear to thy wrath, when, O Indra, O Thunderer, by thy might, having the Maruts in thee, thou hast smitten the Coverer, singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(12) Vritra terrified thee not by his shaking, nor by his thundering; the adamant thousand-lustred thunderbolt sped against him—singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(13) When thou warredst with thy thunderbolt against Vritra and his bolt, when, O Indra, thou wouldst slay the Python, thy puissance became a fixed mass in heaven. Singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(14) When, O master of the Stone, all that moves and all that is

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stable trembles with thy shouting, Twashtri even is shaken with fear before thy passion. Singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(15) We cannot hold him by our thought; who is above Indra in energy? The Gods have set in him god-might and will and puissances. Singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

(16) The thought to which Atharvan and our father Manu and Dadhichi gave shape,—in him the Words and the Utterances meet together as of old in Indra. Singing the word of illumination in the law of thy self-empire.

SUKTA 81

(1) Indra, the Slayer of the Enemy,3 has increased by his men4 for the intoxication, for the puissance and him we call in the great courses of battle and him in the little. May he foster us in the fullnesses of plenty.5

(2) O Hero, thou art our Lord of hosts6 and thou art the giver over to us of the much, and thou art the increaser even of the little;7 and for the sacrificer who offers the Soma-wine thou bringest out (givest) thy much substance.

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(3) When the courses of battle arise, the wealth is held for the violent One.8 Yoke thy bright horses that drip the intoxication.9 Whom shalt thou slay? Whom shalt thou enthrone in riches of thy substance? O Indra, us shalt thou enthrone in riches of thy substance.

(4) The Terrible, who is great by will of action according to his law of nature,10 has increased his puissance. The swift One of the mighty jaws who drives his bright horses has taken in his hands his adamant thunderbolt to win the glory.

(5) He has filled the earthly region11 and made firm the luminous worlds12 in heaven; there is none like thee, O Indra; not one is born equal to thee nor shall be born. Thou hast carried beyond all that is13 thy course.

(6) May Indra, our Warrior who gives over the mortal enjoyment to the giver of sacrifice, win for us his gifts. Divide thy much riches of substance! let me have joy of thy opulence!

(7) He who is the Straight in will has given us in each intoxication of the wine the herds of his shining cattle. Collect for us the many hundreds of thy substance with both thy hands

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full, and intensify and bring the felicities of thy riches.

(8) Make with us the intoxication of the Soma-juice, O hero, for strength, for opulence; for we know thee to be of a manifold substance of riches and we cast loose towards thee our desires; become the fosterer of our being.

(9) Thine are these beings born, O Indra, who increase every desirable thing; for thou hast seen within the possession of knowledge14 of those who give not to thee, and thou art a noble warrior; bring to us the possession they guard.

SUKTA 90

(1) By a straight leading may Varuna lead us and Mitra with the knowledge and Aryaman, in harmony with the gods.

(2) For they are the masters of substance who become in us substance of being and they are the illimitable by their vastnesses and they maintain the laws of their activity in the universality of forces.

(3) May they work out for us peace, immortals for us who are mortals, repelling inimical powers.

(4) May Indra and the Maruts discern for us paths for our easy progress and Pushan and Bhaga, gods desirable.

(5) Yea and ye, O Pushan, Vishnu and thou who movest in all motions, make for us our thoughts such as are led by the rays of illumination and full of happiness.

(6) Sweetness in the winds of life to him who grows in the Truth, sweet for him the rivers of being; sweet for us be its growths.

(7) A sweetness be our night and our dawnings, full of sweetness the terrestrial kingdom; a sweetness be to us Heaven, our father.

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(8) Full of sweetness to us be the Lord of Pleasure, full of sweetness Surya, the luminous; sweet become to us the herds of his rays.

(9) O Mitra, be peace in us, peace Varuna, peace in us Aryaman; peace Indra and Brihaspati, peace Vishnu wide-striding.

SUKTA 91

(1) Thou, O Soma, becomest subject to perception by the intelligence; thou leadest us along a path of utter straightness. By thy leadings our fathers, O lord of delight, were established in thought and enjoyed ecstasy in the gods.

(2) Thou,O Soma, by our willings becomest strong in will, thou by our discernments perfect in discernment and universal in knowledge, thou by our strong abundances strong and abundant in thy might, thou by our illuminations luminous and of puissant vision.

(3) Thine now are the activities of Varuna the King, vast and profound, O Soma, is thy seat; pure art thou and delightful like Mitra; thou art powerful like Aryaman, O Soma.

(4) The seats that are thine in our heaven and on our earth and on the hills of being and in its growths and in its waters, in those, even all of them, do thou, well-minded and free from wrath, receive to thyself, O Soma, O King, our offerings.

(5) Thou, O Soma, art master of Being; King art thou and slayer of the Coverer; thou a blissful power of Will.

(6) And thou, O Soma, hast control to make us live, that we should not die,—the lord of pleasure who has delight in the song of his affirmation.

(7) Thou, O Soma, both for him who is already great in the Truth and for him who is young in the Truth, establishest Bhaga in joyaunce that has power for life.

(8) Keep us, O Soma, O King, from all that seeks to become evil in us; let not him come to hurt who is a friend of such a one as thou.

(9) O Soma, with those thy increasings that are creative of the Bliss for the giver, become the preserver of our being.

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(10) Come to us taking pleasure in this sacrifice, in thisWord; be in us, O Soma, for our increase.

(11) We, O Soma, know how to find expression and we increase thee by our Words; then with a gentle kindness enter into us.

(12) Become in us, O Soma, a distender of luminous movements, a slayer of unfriendly powers, a finder of substance, an increaser of growth, a perfect friend.

(13) O Soma, take thy delight in our hearts as the Herds in their pastures, as the Man in his own dwelling.

(14) He, O Soma, who, a mortal, has delight in thy friendship, a god’s, to him cleaveth the discerning Seer of things.

(15) Keep us far from the attack that divides, O Soma, protect us from the evil; flourish in us, a friend taking the ease of his perfect pleasure.

(16) Yea, nourish thyself in us, let strong abundance come together to thee from all things and do thou become in the meeting-place of that plenty.

(17) Grow full in us with all thy rays, O Soma of the complete ecstasy; be in us full of perfect inspirations that we may grow.

(18) Together may they come, thy nourishments, and thy plenties and the abundances of thy strength while thou overcomest the attack that would obstruct; so growing in fullness towards Immortality, O Soma, hold for us the highest inspirations in the heaven of the mind.

(19) Those thy seats that they effect by sacrifice by the offering, may they all be encompassed by the action of the sacrifice;15 distending the movement, pushing ever onward, perfect in energy, slaying all weakness travel forward to the gates of the mansions, O Soma.

(20) Soma giveth the fostering Cow, Soma giveth the swift Steed, Soma giveth the active Hero within who holdeth the seat, who winneth the knowledge, who is fit for the Wisdom,

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who hath the inspiration of the Father,—these he giveth to the man who divideth for him the offering.

(21) Unconquered thou in our battles and art satisfied in the throngs of war, winner of Heaven, winner of the Waters and our defender in the Crookedness (or of our strength); born in our fullnesses, firmly dwelling in us thou art rich in inspirations and victorious,—by thy raptures, O Soma, may we be intoxicated.

(22) Thou hast created all these growths of earth, O Soma, thou the Waters, thou the Rays; thou hast extended wide the mid-world,—thou by the Light hast smitten apart the covering darkness.

(23) With the divine mind in us, thou who art divine, O Soma, O forceful fighter, war towards our enjoyment of the felicity. Let none extend thee in grossness,16 thou hast power over all energy; do thou have the perceiving vision for gods and men in their seeking of the Light.

SUKTA 92

(1) Lo these are those Dawns that create for us the perception; in the highest realm of the luminous kingdom they brighten the Light perfecting it like violent men who furbish their arms; the ruddy mothers come, the radiant herds.

(2) Upward have soared the red-active lustres covering heaven; yoked are the ruddy Rays that set themselves perfectly to the work. The Dawns have made the manifestations of things even as before and their ruddinesses have entered into the reddening Light.

(3) For as forces that work the bright Energies give their illumination by entering into all things with an equal self-yoking from the supreme realm and thence they bring energy to the right doer, the right giver (who perfectly effects his aims);

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yea, all things here they bring to the sacrificer who expresses the Soma bliss.

(4) Like a dancing-girl she lays bare her clear forms of beauty, like a Paramour she opens her breast casting aside its defences creating Light for the whole world. The radiant herds have left their pen; Dawn has uncovered herself of her robe of darkness.

(5) Reddening, the illumination of her has appeared in front; it spreads and assails the Black Dense. They adorn her body as if sunshine in the things of the knowledge; the Daughter of Heaven has entered into the varied Lustre.

(6) We have crossed over to the other side of this darkness and Dawn widening makes her revelations of Light; she smiles and shines wide as joy towards beauty; she manifests in a front of fairness that the mind may be glad and perfect.

(7) Luminous guide to true thinkings, the Daughter of Heaven has been affirmed in praise by the Gotamas (the men of light). Thou supportest in us plentifulnesses rich in creations and energies, perceptively received in the nervous movements, led by the rays of illumination.

(8) O Dawn, may I enjoy a victorious and energetic felicity, delivered from the Enemy, perceptively received in the nervous powers, thou who shinest wide by an inspiration perfect in activity giving birth to richnesses,—O blissful one, to a plenty vast.

(9) Divine she beholds all the worlds, wide shines her vision and she gazes straight at things; she awakens every living soul for action and finds the Word for all that aspires to mind.

(10) Again and again is she born, she, the Ancient Goddess, and she glorifies one equal form. She as the slayer and cleaver of the Animal diminishes its strength and in her deity wears away the being of the Mortal.

(11) She has awakened opening wide the very ends of Heaven and continually she pushes away her sister Night diminishing our mortal periods. Paramour of the Sun, she has her light from her lover’s eye of vision.

(12) Varied in light and richly enjoying, it is as if she widens

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her animal Powers and wide she distends like a sea that breaks its way and she limits not our divine activities when she is seen in our perceptions by the rays of the Sun of illumination.

(13) O Dawn with thy energy of plenty, bring to us that varied richness whereby we can found our creation and our extending.

(14) Here and today, O Dawn of the radiant herds, Dawn of the forceful steeds, Dawn of the wide illumination, shine out upon us with ecstasy, O Lady of the Truths.

(15) O Dawn, energy of the plenty, yoke today thy steeds of red activity, then bring to us all enjoyable things.

(16) Ye,Obounteous Aswins, drivers of the Steed, with one mind direct your downward car along the path of the luminous rays, the path of the golden Light.

(17) Ye who have made for the creature the Light of heaven thus a splendour, carry force to us, ye, O Aswins.

(18) Twin bounteous gods with your luminous movements who create the bliss, you may those steeds that are awakened by the Dawn bring to the drinking of the wine of Bliss.

SUKTA 100

(1) He who sits the Strong housed with his strengths and is the all-ruler of the Great Heaven and the earth, the assailant of our assailants to whom we call in the mellays,

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(2) The Slayer of the Coverer whose march is intangible like the course of the Sun, in his greatest strength with his own rushing comrades,

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(3) He whose paths go as if milking the streams of heaven and because of his puissance they are not circumscribed, the overcomer, the breaker of the hostile powers by his virile mights,

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May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(4) He shall become most Angiras with the Angirases, strong with the strong, a comrade with the comrades, a singer of the word of light with the singers of the word, the Eldest with those who make the journey.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(5) Far-moving he goes with the Violent Ones as if with his children and overcomes the unfriendly host in the battle which is a forceful fighting of gods. He makes his way through the things of the Word with the Powers that dwell with him in his lair.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(6) He who forms the mind of passion and is the maker of the rapture, the Master of being to whom these many creatures call, shall on this very day by our Strong Ones conquer the Sun.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(7) His increasings make him glad in the conquering of the Hero; the inhabitants of the worlds have made him the deliverer of their having. He is One and alone and yet the lord of all work that is done.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(8) Strong men have gotten them a strong god for their increase and riches in the holidays of his might. He shall find the Light for us even in our blind darkness.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(9) His left hand represses those who grow too large, his right hand gathers together the things done. He shall conquer by the doer heaven’s riches.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

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(10) This is he that shall conquer with his hosts and his chariots; today he is known by all the nations. His strength overpowers the denials of the Word.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(11) These many creatures have called to him and in his rain of bounty he courses with his Rushing Ones to the conquest of the Waters and Son and the creation from our body.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(12) He is armed with the thunderbolt and a slayer of the Destroyers, he is strong and terrible and far-moving, he is the master of a thousand wisdoms and a hundred leadings. He is in his power as if the nectar-cup of the five peoples of men.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(13) His thunder harmoniously cries aloud conquering theWorld of the Sun and is as if the rending luminous shout of Heaven. Conquests cleave to him and all kinds of riches.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(14) His unbroken word measures with its thought earth and heaven and world to enjoy them in its embrace from each side and all around. He shall carry us beyond them in the rapture of his intoxication by the mights of his will.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(15) Gods in their godheads cannot reach any end of his puissance, nor mortals come to it, nor these waters attain to it. He exceeds by his all-cleaving strength earth and heaven.

May that Indra with his retinue of Maruts be with us for our increase.

(16) His rapturous mare who is red and bay of hue and of a happy lustre and a blaze is upon her forehead and heaven is her dwelling-place has awakened to knowledge among the human peoples for the felicity of Rijraswa and she comes bearing in his yoke the chariot with the Mighty One.

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(17) The sons of Vrishagira, Rijraswa with those who stand behind him and Ambarisha and Sahadeva and Bhayamana and Suradhas, O Indra, speak the utterance that is an opulent joy of thee, of thee the Mighty One.

(18) The Lord of the thunderbolt to whom the many call shall slay, shall crush down on our earth the embattled Renders and Destroyers and with his white-shining comrades conquer the Field and conquer the Sun and conquer the Waters.

(19) Let Indra be ever our spokesman so that unturned to crookedness we may conquer heaven’s plenty. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 101

(1) Sing a word full of the nectar draught to that rapturous drinker, for by this wine of straight-going impulse he has smitten and driven out the mothers of the Dark Nation. Desiring increase we call to the Strong One in whose right hand is the thunderbolt.

Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(2) He has slain in his exultant wrath the shoulderless Demon, he has smitten Shambara and Pipru who kept not the law.He has torn down Sushna and that evil Power had no strength against him.

Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(3) Heaven and earth are his vast force; Varuna and the Sun act in the way of his working; the Rivers cleave to the law of Indra.

Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(4) He is the kine-master of the cows and the master of the horses. Opposed he stands firm in work and work. He is the smiter of even the stubbornly strong who gives not the offering of the nectar-wine.

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Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(5) This is he who is the lord of all that moves and breathes. First of the gods, he found the radiances for the singer of the Word; he has thrust down the Destroyers and put them below him.

Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(6) The heroes call to him and the cowards; the runners cry to him and the victors. To Indra all these worlds of beings turn and they grapple in him and are joined.

Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(7) This is the Wise in sight who moves by the direction of the Violent Ones, and by the Violent Ones the beloved Woman forms a wide field for her swiftness. The thinking mind has hearkened to Indra and it sings to him the word of light.

Call we Indra with his retinue of Maruts to be our comrade and friend.

(8) Whether thou art drinking of rapture in that highest session or in this lowest strength, thence come, O Leader of Life-Gods, towards our sacrifice; for we have made ready the wine of the offering in desire of thee whose joyful riches are the Truth.

(9) O strong Thinker, in desire of thee we have pressed the nectar-juice, in desire of thee we have made ready the wine of the offering that chariots the Word. Driver of the steeds of the Breath, come then with thy hosts. Drink rapture in this sacrifice, on this sacred seat.

(10) Joy and be drunken, O Indra, thou with the bright horses which are thine. Open wide thy jaws, let loose the double stream. O god with fair strong chin, bid thy bright horses bring thee, desire our offerings, lean to us in thy heart.

(11) May we be the guardians of the strength that is hymned by the Life-Gods and by Indra get us heaven’s plenty. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify to me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

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SUKTA 102

(1) Behold I bring thee a thought great and of the Great One, because it is thy thinking mind that has wrought in the song of the human seer. This is that Indra in the wake of whose force the gods take rapture when he puts forth his might in the exaltation and the birth.

(2) The seven rivers carry his word; the wide heaven and earth are his body for our seeing. The sun and moon go cutting their paths,OIndra, that in us there may be vision and faith.

(3) Forward with that chariot of thine, King of Riches, that we may rejoice in its victor wake in the shock, in the battle. Hymned art thou with many voices by the mind. O Indra, King of Riches, give to men who desire thee thy bliss and peace.

(4) Thou for our ally, may we conquer by thee him who besets us; raise up our portion in mellay and mellay, make the path of our right journey to felicity easy to travel. O Indra, King of Riches, shatter the strengths of our foemen.

(5) These human beings would grow luminous in knowledge by thy cherishing aid, O Holder of the Wealth, and all are calling to thee in their several ways; mount upon our chariot for the victory and getting. For thy mind, O Indra, is the intent mind that conquers.

(6) His arms are conquerors of the rays of the light, he is measureless in the power of his will and complete in every act and a hundredfold increaser and a maker of battle. Indra has not his like; by his force he is the measure of all things, and to all sides men are calling to him who desire their getting.

(7) Thy word in the peoples exceeds in its wealth the hundredfold and the much more and the thousandfold. When the thought mind is great, it kindles thee into measureless light and thou slayest the Coverers, O render of their cities.

(8) A measure of might of a triple nature thou pervadest,O master of men, the three earths and the three luminous worlds of heaven and thou drivest on beyond all this universe, and from thy birth thou hadst no slayer and so art for ever.

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(9) First of the gods we call to thee and thou hast been an overcomer in the fighting of the armies. Then may Indra make his upward breaking car of action and passion the power in our front in our creation.

(10) Because thou hast conquered much wealth and hast not kept it back from us, King of Riches, in the little combats, in battle, and in the great fightings, we make thee intense in thy energy that thou mayst give us increase. O Indra, when the calls arise in the battle, urge us upon our road.

(11) Let Indra be ever our spokesman so that unturned to crookedness we may get for ourselves heaven’s plenty. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 103

(1) That supreme Indra-force of thee the seers held of old by their movings to the beyond. One strength of him is upon the earth, his other in heaven; the vision of the thought is brimmed and as if common to them.

(2) He upheld the earth and made it wide and smote with the thunderbolt and let loose the waters. He slew the Serpent and broke the Titan son of Rohina; the King of Riches severed with his powers the shoulderless Demon.

(3) This upholder of birth because he has faith in his puissance ranges breaking open the Titan cities. O Thunderer, hurl by thy knowledge thy weapon at the Destroyer; increase the Aryan force, the Aryan light.

(4) O then for the speaker the King of Riches bearing the human ages, bearing the glorious Name, advancing thunder-armed to the slaying of the Destroyer, when the Son bears the name for the inspired word!

(5) See how this multitude of his having has increased! Put faith in the hero might of Indra! He has discovered the Kine and discovered the Horses and the Waters and the growths of earth and the trees of her forests.

(6) Let us press and give the nectar-wine to the Bull and the

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Strong One and the Doer of the multitude of works, the Lord whose strength is Truth, who like a hero adversary on the path rends away the knowledge of those that do not sacrifice and goes abroad giving of it largesse.

(7) This is the same heroic might which thou madest thy force when thou wakenedst with thy thunderbolt the Serpent from his sleep. The wives of the Gods rejoiced in thy wake and the galloping horses were glad and all the gods drank rapture behind thee;

(8) Then thou smotest Sushna and Pipru and Kuyava and Vritra and the cities were shattered of Shambara. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 104

(1) A house has been made, O Indra, for thy session; come to thy place like a neighing war-horse. Loosing thy galloping steeds rest the horses who bear thee night and day in thy going abroad.

(2) These are the human beings that have hymned the name of Indra for their increase. Now and straight way let him put them on the paths. The gods are breaking down the passion of the Destroyer and they have brought us armour of light for our happy journey to felicity.

(3) He who has the vision of the knowledge of himself is sweeping down, is sweeping down from the tops the foam on the water. The two women beloved of Kuyava bathe in the sweet curd of the waves; let them lie slain in the rapids of the Shipha.

(4) The navel has been set of the higher being and the Hero moves on and shines there with his ancient powers. Anjasi and Kulishi and Virapatni are hastening with all their waters and bring him the milk of their streams.

(5) Now that the guide is seen, now that she goes in knowledge towards the house that was as if the home of the Destroyer, deliver us from the sin that was done, O King of Riches,

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and betray us not into his hands as one ignorant gives his wealth into the hands of the wasters.

(6) But give us, O Indra, our portion in the Sun and the Waters and in sinlessness and in the self-expression of living man and maim not our inner joy; for we had faith in thee and hoped for a greatness of thy proper force.

(7) Now my thought is fixed on Indra and I have set my faith in him. Be the Strong One to me and urge me to the winning of a great riches. Indra to whom the many call, give us not our food and Soma-drink, though we hunger, with thy house still unmade.

(8) O Indra, King of Riches, slay us not, betray us not to other hands. Rob us not of our dear enjoyings; shatter not the bowls, break not the vessels of the wine that were born with our birth.

(9) They have said that thou comest down to man because thou desirest his nectar-wine, and here it is pressed ready. Drink of it till thou art drunk with its rapture, lie in thy vast discovered widths and rain its sweetness into thy belly. Like a father hear us when we call to thee.

SUKTA 105

(1) The moon is lying within in the waters, the bright-winged bird runs in the sky of heaven.O ye gods, your golden-fellied lightnings find not your plane of light.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(2) Yet surely they who seek are joined to the object of their seeking. The wife is joined to her husband. Two have set streaming the milk of the Bull and receive it and milk out the nectarous essence.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(3) O ye Gods, let not the world of the Sun be cast down from its place encompassing Heaven, let not us who were the makers of the bliss of the nectarous Godhead abide in emptiness.

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Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(4) I ask of the lowest sacrifice and the messenger tells it to me, but where is gone the ancient highest Truth or who is he, the new seer, who carries it within him?

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(5) O all you gods that are yonder in the three worlds, in the luminous head of heaven, where is your Truth and where is the falsehood and where your ancient original offering?

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(6) Where then is your upholding base of the Truth? Where now is the seeing eye of Varuna? Whether false and feeble of thought, can we pass beyond by the mighty path of Aryaman?

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(7) Lo, I am very he who of old in the giving of the nectar was able to speak certain few things, and yet me, me my pains are devouring as a wolf devours a thirsting deer at the drinking-place!

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(8) My ribs plague me all around like rival wives and, as a mouse gnaws sinews, my pains are tearing and eating me, yet am I he who hymned thy name, O lord of a hundred powers!

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(9) Yonder are those seven rays, and in them the navel of my being is hung. Trita Aptya knows the truth they hold and is singing the word of wisdom that they may meet and be at one.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(10) Five Bulls are standing yonder in the midmost of the Great

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Heaven, this now is what the word must reveal in the godheads,—and they have turned back together, companions.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(11) The bright-winged birds that sit on the middle ascent of Heaven, stay the Wolf of the path as he crosses the mighty flowing waters.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(12) O ye gods, a new word has been set here to be spoken, that shall make full revelation. The Rivers flow towards the Truth; the light is Truth that the Sun has woven.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(13) O Flame, the word is thine, the new word that has yet to be spoken and it must be won to in the gods. Sit then with us and sacrifice to the gods with better knowledge as if a thinking man.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(14) The Fire has taken his seat like a thinking man, priest of the sacrifice, and has greater knowledge and speeds to them our offerings. He is a god among the gods and a wise thinker.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(15) Varuna creates the word and we desire him because he is the knower of the way. He spins wide the thought by the heart. May new Truth be born.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(16) Yonder child of the Infinite in heaven has been made the path; the Sun is that which my word must reveal; O gods, he cannot be overpassed! O mortals, ye see him not!

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(17) Trita cast down into the well calls to the gods for his increasing; and Brihaspati, the Lord of speech, heard his cry.

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Out of the narrow prison he is making a wide freedom.

Take ye knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(18) Once and once only the red Wolf saw me as I went upon the path, and when he had regarded me he reared himself up like a workman whose back is afflicted with long bending to his carpentry.

Take ye the knowledge of this word that I speak, O Earth and Heaven.

(19) But now by this hymn of power may we possess Indra and all the heroes be in our strength and we prevail and overcome. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 106

(1) Indra and Mitra and Varuna and Agni and Aditi and the Marut host we call to increase us. O bountiful Vasus, carry us beyond out of all the evil like a chariot out of a difficult place.

(2) O sons of the infinite Mother, come to us for an universality of creation. Gods, be makers of our bliss in our battle-breakings through the ranks of the Coverers. O bountiful Vasus, carry us beyond out of all the evil like a chariot out of a difficult place.

(3) Let our Fathers who spoke the revealing word cherish us and the truth-increasing goddesses twain; of them the gods are the sons. O bountiful Vasus, carry us beyond out of all evil like a chariot out of a difficult place.

(4) I make richer here with my plenty the master of plenty who gives his self-expression to man. Our desire goes to Pushan the Increaser with his happinesses in whom the heroes have their dwelling place. O bountiful Vasus, carry us beyond out of all the evil like

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a chariot out of a difficult place.

(5) O Brihaspati, ever make easy the road of our journeying who yearn for that peace and bliss of thy strength which is set in thinking man. Carry us beyond out of all the evil like a chariot from a difficult place.

(6) Kutsa the seer pent in the well called for increase to Indra the Vitra-killer, he has cried to the Lord of the Lady of Puissance. O ye bountiful Vasus, carry us beyond out of all the evil like a chariot out of a difficult place.

(7) May the goddess Infinite with the gods protect and the god who saves deliver us nor be careless of us in our need. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 107

(1) Our sacrifice travels to the bliss of the gods; O ye children of the infinite Mother, be gracious and take birth.May your perfect and kindly thought come down to us on its paths which out of the narrow press of pain and evil can find a larger bliss and good.

(2) Let the gods, hymned by the Sama verses of the Angirases, come to us with cherishing and Indra with his Indra-powers and the Maruts with the Maruts and the infinite Mother with her Sun children extend bliss and peace.

(3) That gladness may Indra, that Varuna, that Aryaman, that Savitri lodge in us. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 108

(1) O Indra and Agni, come in your chariot of many wonderful lights which looks upon all the worlds. Standing in one car when you have come drink of the wine we have made for you.

(2) As wide as is this whole world and deep with its vast manifested good and bliss, so wide be to your drinking this wine of nectar we give you and sufficient to your mind, O Agni and Indra.

(3) For you have made a twin inseparable blissful name and

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you are slayers of the Coverer close and inseparable. Close united sit, O Indra and Agni, O strong Gods, be strong-copious pourers of the might of this nectar-wine.

(4) When the fires are kindled high, then you two move busily about the sacrifice and you stretch out the ladle and you strew the sacred seat. Come down to us, O Indra and Agni, by the pourings of the keen ecstatic wine, that you may give us the glad and perfect mind.

(5) Come, O Indra and Agni, with all the heroisms you have done and all the forms you have shaped and all your strengths and all your happy ancient comradeships, and having come drink of this nectar-wine we have made for you.

(6) Come to my true faith by which I said at first when I chose you that this nectar-wine of me must be given among the Mighty Lords. Drink of the wine we have made for you.

(7) Whether, O Agni, O Indra, you are drinking of rapture in your own house or in priest of the word or king, O masters of sacrifice, thence come, ye Strong Ones, and having come drink of the wine we have made for you.

(8) Whether, O Indra, O Agni, you are among the Yadus or the Turvashas or the Druhyus or the Anus or the Purus, thence come, O ye Strong Ones. Drink of the wine we have made for you.

(9) Whether, O Agni, O Indra, you are in the lowest and in the middle and in the highest earth, thence come, O ye Strong Ones. Drink of the wine we have made for you.

(10) Whether, O Indra, O Agni, you are in the highest and in the middle and in the lowest earth, thence come, O ye Strong Ones, and drink of the wine we have made for you.

(11) Whether, O Agni, O Indra, you are in heaven or on earth or in the plants or the waters, thence come, O ye Strong Ones, and having come drink of the wine we have made for you.

(12) Whether, O Indra, O Agni, you are drinking of rapture by your nature in the rising of the sun or in the midmost of heaven, thence come, O ye Strong Ones, and drink of the wine we have made.

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(13) Thus drinking of the wine we have pressed for you, O Indra and Agni, conquer for us all and every kind of riches. This letMitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the Great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 109

(1) I hungered after riches of a greater substance and I turned and saw you, O Indra and Agni. I have looked on you as on my own people, even as brothers born with me. This is your mind of wisdom, and none other that is in me, and I have carved to shape a thought which gives me the plenitude of your riches.

(2) I have heard of you as more lavish in your giving than a daughter’s husband or a wife’s brother and I am bringing into birth in the delivering of the nectar wine a new hymn to you, O Indra and Agni.

(3) We are making towards our desire and pray that our suns of light may not be broken, we are striving after the energies of our Fathers. By joy of Indra and Agni, the Strong Ones drink of the rapture, you are two pressing-stones in the lap of the thinking mind.

(4) The goddess Mind longs for the ecstasy, O Agni, O Indra, and she is pressing out with you for her pressing-stones wine of nectar. O twin Aswins, come running to us with your beautiful happy hands and mix the honey in the waters.

(5) O Indra and Agni, I have heard of you that you are mighty to slay the Coverer and apportion a rich substance. O you who see, sit on this seat in the sacrifice and drink the intoxication of the wine that we have made.

(6) Amid the shoutings of the armies for men that see you advance and overflow in your strength earth and heaven; O Indra,OAgni, your greatness overpasses the rivers and over-tops the mountains and your being is outstretched beyond all these worlds of creatures.

(7) Bring for us, win for us your riches,O you whose arms carry

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the thunder, increase us, O Indra and Agni, by your mights. Behold our reins are the same rays of the Sun by which our Fathers came to the end of their common journey.

(8) Renders of the cities, gods with the thunders in your hands, Indra and Agni, get for us, increase us in fruitful battles. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the Great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 110

(1) Woven was my web of work. Again that web is being woven; a sweetest honied thought is finding words for its expression in speech. Behold, this is the nectar ocean in which are all the gods; it is here, it has been made Swaha of the divinities. Take your delight in it, O ye Ribhus.

(2) I give you the enjoyment of that for whose desire you come to me;O you near tome and high beyond, whatever powers, but my friends! O children of Sudhanwan, by the largeness of your movement of action you came to the house of Savitri when he was giving out the wine of his creation.

(3) Savitri the Creator poured out for you immortality and then you moved to make it heard here of knowledge and a thing not to be kept secret, and you made of the one wine-cup of the Almighty, the cup of the wine-drinking, a fourfold bowl.

(4) By entering in, by fulfilling of action, by the traversing of obstacles, by the speaking of the word, they who were mortal, have laid hands of enjoyment on immortality; Ribhus, children of Sudhanwan, saw with the sun for eye and were joined wholly to his thoughts in the year of Time.

(5) The Ribhus have measured out like a field and have shaped as if with a sharp-cutting instrument the one cup that is carried on the paths. Hymned of men, they made for the highest high desiring to hear the voice of knowledge among the Immortals.

(6) Come, let us pour out the thinking mind by knowledge to the strong ones of the Air as if clarified butter with a ladle. The Ribhus who have fixed their abodes, crossing beyond

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Father Heaven, climbed to the plenty of the luminous middle world.

(7) Indra in his puissance is even to us a newer Ribhu and Ribhu joined with Vajas, lords of the plenty, and the Vasus, masters of riches, and giver of substance. O ye gods, by your fostering power may we assail in your cherished Day the armies of the powers who give not the nectar wine.

(8) The Ribhus pressed into shape the Cow of Light out of her skin and joined the Mother with the child. O children of Sudhanwan, in your desire of perfect works you made our aged Father and Mother young again.

(9) Increase us by the Vajas, lords of the plenty, in the winning of plenty; O Indra with the Ribhus, tear for us from its hiding place our rich felicity. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the Great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 111

(1) The Ribhus who do all their works by knowledge have carved by knowledge the fair-moving chariot of Indra, shaped his two bright horses of strong rich substance. And they have made for the Father and the Mother their youthful age and for the child of the Ray his mother to be always at his side.

(2) Carve for our sacrifice a birth in which shall be the works of the Ribhus, carve light in the thought and power in the will, shape an impelling force which shall beget a perfect issue that we may dwell accompanied by the nation of all the heroes. Make them the host of our battle and set in them that great Indra-force.

(3) Carve getting for us, O Ribhus, getting for our chariot and getting for our war-horse.Mass together into form conquest and winning always whose strength companioned or alone shall avail against opposing armies.

(4) I call for my increasing to the drinking of the nectar wine Indra who dwells in Ribhu and the Ribhus and the Vajas

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and the Maruts and Mitra and Varuna, now, the double godhead, and the Aswins, and let them speed, let them charge for the getting, for the thought, for the victory.

(5) Let Ribhu whet our getting into a sharp weapon for fruitful battle and Vaja victor in the press and the fighting help us to thrive. This let Mitra and Varuna and the Mother Infinite magnify in me and the Great River and Earth and Heaven.

SUKTA 123

(1) The wide chariot of the Reason has been yoked, this all the immortal gods have ascended. From the blackness she has arisen who is noble and vast seeking knowledge for the mind’s foundation.

(2) First before all the universe Dawn awoke conquering substance, vast, safely-preserving; high she shone abroad in her youth reborn; Usha came first in the earliest calling.

(3) Because today thou dividest their share to the Strong Ones,Usha goddess beautiful shining upon the world of mortals, therefore here the god Savitri wide-governing utters us free from sin for the kingdom of the Sun.

(4) To house and house the bright one comes towards us, in sky and sky establishing in their place the names of things; bent on enjoyment ever shining she comes and enjoys always the first fruit of every possession.

(5) The sister of Bhaga, the twin of Varuna, Usha, goddess of Truth, thou first of the gods cleave to us; afterwards is he to be crushed who is the establisher of sin; him may we conquer by Reason with the speed of her chariot.

(6) May the true lights arise in us, may those that hold this mansion; the forces of the night flaming pure join them; our desirable possessions hidden away by the darkness the wide-shining Dawns reveal.

[Incomplete]

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SUKTA 179

(1) Many Autumns have I been toiling night and day, dawns aging me. Age is diminishing the glory of our bodies. Now let the males come to their spouses.

(2) Even the men of old, who were wise of the Truth and they spoke with the gods the things of the Truth—even they cast (all) downward, yea, they reached not an end. Now let the males come17 to their spouses.

(3) Not in vain is the labour which the gods protect. Let us have the taste18 of even all the contesting forces, let us conquer indeed even here, let us run19 this battle-race of a hundred leadings, a complete couple.

(4) Let not20 desire come on me of the stream that stays me—desire born from here or from somewhere in those other worlds. Lopamudra goes in to her spouse; she drains deep her panting Lord, she ignorant, him the wise.

(5) Now to this Soma I speak. Drunk near into our hearts, all the impurity we have done, that let its grace wholly forgive: for mortal man is a creature of many desires.

(6) Agastya digging with spades, desiring offspring, the child and strength, he, the forceful Rishi, nourished both the Races (of either colour)21 and reached in the gods the true blessings.

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