Page 591 - Lokmanya Tilak Samagra (khand 2)

372 SAMAGRA TILAK- 2 • THE ARCTIC HOME
scriptural texts ( shabda-pramd~Ja ) in various ways. But we cannot
go into their elaborate discussions in this place; nor is it necessary
to do so, for eventually we have to fall back upon the view of
Vyasa and Patanjali, mentioned above, if the destruction of the
Vedas during each pralaya, and its reprornulgation at the
commencement of the new age is admitted.
Such, in brief, are the views entertained by Hindu ortho-
dox theologians, scholars and philosophers in regard to the
origin, character and authority of the Vedas; and on compar-
ing them with the results of our investigation, it will be found
that Patanjali's and Vyasa's view about the antiquity and the
eternity of the Vedas derives material support from the theory
of the Arctic home which we have endeaVoured to prove in
the foregoing pages in strict scientific and historical grounds.
It has been shown that Vedic religion and worship are both
inter-Glacial ; and that though we cannot trace their ultimate
origin, yet the Arctic character of the Vedic deities fully proves
that the powers of Nature represented by them had been
already clothed with divine attributes by the primitive Aryans
in their original home round about the North Pole, or the Metu
of the Punlpas. When the Polar horne was destroyed by
glaciation, the Aryan people that survived the catastrophe
carried with them as much of their religion and worship as it
was possible to do under the circumstances; and the relic, thus
saved from the general wreck, was the basis of the Aryan reli-
gion in the post-Glacial age. The whole period from the com-
mencement of the post-Glacial era to the birth of Buddha may,
on this theory, be approxiniately divided into four parts :-

10000 or 8000 B. C.- The destruction of the original Arctio
home by the last Ice Age and the commencement of the
post-Glacial period .
.8~5000 B. C. - The age of migration from the original
home. The survivors of the Aryan race roamed over the
northern parts of Europe and Asia in search of lands
suitable for new settlements. The vernal equinox was then
in the constellation of Punarvasu, and as Aditi is the pre-
siding deity of Punarvasu, according to the terminology
adopted by me 'in Orion, this may, therefore, be called the
Aditi or the pre-Orion Period.