In the Manava Sastra or Institutes of Menu the origin of the Universe is thus unfolded: “It existed only in the first divine idea, yet unexpanded, as if involved in darkness, imperceptible, indefinable, undiscoverable by reason, and undiscovered by revelation, as if it were wholly immersed in sleep. Then the sole self-existing power, who had existed from eternity, shone forth in person, expanding his idea and dispelling the gloom. With a thought he first created the waters, and placed in them a productive seed: this seed became an egg, in which he was himself born in the shape of Brahma, the great forefather of all spirits. The waters are called Nara, because they were the production of Nara, or the spirit of God: and since they were his first Ayana, or place of motion, he was thence named Narayana, or moving in the waters. In that egg the great Power sat inactive a whole year of the Creator: at the close of which