THE THIRD HYMN TO AGNI

THE DIVINE FORCE, CONQUEROR OF THE SUPREME GOOD

[The Divine Will-Force is that of which all the other godheads are forms and 'he manifests all these powers of supreme Truth as he grows in us. Thus the supreme state of conscious being is attained and by that our complex and manifold existence is maintained in the Light and the Joy. The Rishi prays that the evil may not be allowed to express itself again in him, that the secret soul in us who is the Father of things but in us appears as the child of our works and our evolution, may open itself to the vast Truth-Consciousness. The Divine Flame will destroy all the powers of falsehood and evil who seek to make us stumble and would rob us of our heavenly treasure.]

1. Thou art he of the Wideness,¹ O Will, when thou art born; thou becomest the Lord of Love² when thou art entirely kindled. In thee are all the gods, O son of Force; thou art the Power-in-Mind³ for the mortal who gives the offering.

2. O thou who possessest self-ordering Nature, thou becomest the might of the Aspirer⁴ when thou bearest the secret Name of the Virgins.⁵ They brighten thee with the Light in her rays as Love⁶ perfectly founded when thou makest of one mind the Lord and his Spouse⁷ in their mansion.

3. For the glory of thee, O Violent One, the Thought-Powers

¹Varuna, who represents the ethereal purity and oceanic wideness of the infinite Truth.

²Mitra, the all-embracing harmony of the Truth, the Friend of all beings, therefore the Lord of Love.

³Indra, Ruler of our being. Master of Swar which is the luminous world of the Divine Mind.

⁴ Aryaman, the aspiring power and action of the Truth.

⁵ Probably, the unripe Radiances that our aspiration has to prepare for their union with the higher power of the soul; Aryaman holds their secret sense, the Name or Numen, which is manifested when aspiration arrives at the light of knowledge and Mitra harmonises soul and nature.

⁶Mitra.

⁷The Soul and Nature. The mansion is the human body.

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make to shine out by their pressure that which is thy rich and beautiful birth.¹ When that highest stride² of Vishnu has been established within, thou protectest by it the secret Name of the herds of the Radiance.³

4. By the glory of thee because thou hast right vision, O god-head, the gods holding all that multiple existence taste immortality and men take their seat in the Force that offers the oblation and, desiring, they distribute to the godheads the self-expression of the being.

5. There is none that precedeth thee as the priest of the oblation nor any mightier for sacrifice; O Flame, none is supreme over thee in the things of the Wisdom, thou who possessest the self-ordering power of Nature. The creature of whom thou becomest the guest, O godhead, prevails by sacrifice over all that belong to the mortality.

6. May we, O Flame, fostered by thee and awakened, seekers of the substance, prevail by the offering, — we in the great struggle, we in the comings of knowledge in our days,⁴ we by the felicity, O son of Force, overcome all that are mortal.

7. The expresser of evil who seeks to bring sin and transgression into us, his own evil do thou return upon his head; slay, O conscious knower, this hostile self-expression of him who oppresses us with the duality.

8. Thee, O Godhead, in the dawning of this our Night the Ancients⁵ made their messenger and through thee sacrificed by their offerings because thou art the godhead that is being

¹The supreme world of Light. Agni is said elsewhere to become in his being the highest of the shining worlds.

²Vishnu has three strides or movements, earth, heaven and the supreme world of which Light, Truth and the Sun are the foundation.

³The highest divine sense of the illuminations of Knowledge is found in the superconscient worlds of supreme Light.

⁴The periods of Light visiting the soul.

⁵ The ancient seers who discovered the secret wisdom.

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kindled by the mortal dwellers in this substance and thou movest to the meeting-place¹ of all felicities.

9. Deliver the Father and in thy knowledge put away evil from him who is borne in us as thy son, O child of Force. When wilt thou have that vision for us, O conscious knower? when wilt th6u, O Truth-Conscious Will, impel us to the journey?

10. Then indeed the Father adores and holds, O Dweller in the substance, the vast Name² when thou makest him to accept and cleave to it. Will in us desires the bliss and, increasing, wins it entirely by the force of the Godhead.³

11. Thou, O Will, O youngest vigour, earnest thy adorer beyond all stumblings into grief and evil; for the creatures are seen of thee who would do hurt to us and are thieves in their hearts, — they whose perceptions are void of the knowledge and therefore they have fallen into the crookedness.

12. Lo, all these movements of our journeying have turned their faces towards thee, and for that evil in us, it is declared to the Dweller in our being. O never can this Will in his in- creasing betray us to the hurter of our self-expression; he will not deliver us into the hands of our enemy!

¹The supreme world of Truth and Bliss.

²The world of Truth is also called the Wideness or the Vast or the Vast Truth.

³The Deva, the supreme Deity, of whom all the gods are different Names and Powers.

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