PARÁŚARA.--The supreme being thus eulogized, upholding the earth, raised it quickly, and placed it on the summit of the ocean, where it floats like a mighty vessel, and from its expansive surface does not sink beneath the waters. Then, having levelled the earth, the great eternal deity divided it into portions, by mountains: he who never wills in vain, created, by his irresistible power, those mountains again upon the earth which had been consumed at the destruction of the world. Having then divided the earth into seven great portions or continents, as it was before, he constructed in like manner the four (lower) spheres, earth, sky, heaven, and the sphere of the sages (Maharloka). Thus Hari, the four-faced god, invested with the quality of activity, and taking the form of Brahmá, accomplished the creation: but he (Brahmá) is only the instrumental cause of things to be created; the things that are capable of being created arise from nature as a common material cause: with exception of one instrumental cause alone, there is no need of any other cause, for (imperceptible) substance becomes perceptible substance according to the powers with which it is originally imbued 8.

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Footnotes

27:1 This creation is of the secondary order, or Pratiserga; water, and even the earth, being in existence, and consequently having been preceded by the creation of Mahat and the elements. It is also a different Pratiserga from that described by Manu, in which Swayambhu first creates the waters, then the egg: one of the simplest forms, and perhaps therefore one of the earliest in which the tradition occurs.