With the development of Brahmanical speculation prayer rises to more abstract ideas: "Lead me from darkness to light, from falsehood to truth, from death to the deathless." The association of prayer and magic is seen in the fact that the very term _brahma_ has the double meaning of prayer and spell, something like the Greek _euchê_ or the Hebrew "bless," which could imply a curse as well as a prayer. But in its higher sense it gave birth to the "Lord of Prayer," Brahmanaspati, a kind of house-priest of the gods, a heavenly personification of the priesthood on earth, in whom resided the power of influencing events by prayer and incantation. Nay, just as the hymns came to be regarded as originally existing in the realm of the infinite and the undying (p. 12), so prayer was said to have been born of yore in heaven. And thus the Lord of Prayer acquires a more lofty character as its generator and inspirer; he is even called the "Father of the gods"; and the very universe depends upon him, for he holds asunder the ends of the earth. In the shining company of deities, moreover, stand Sacred Speech, and Devotion, and Lovely Praise, and Holy Thought, with others of the goodly fellowship of Prayer, to attest its power, and approve its worth.
The subsequent devotion of India aspires { 157} by different paths to reach communion with the Infinite Spirit or Universal Self. The supreme reality is presented in the triple aspects of Being, Thought, and Bliss (_saccidānanda_). To know him alone as the Self of all selves, is the goal rather of meditation than of prayer. Existence, understanding, and joy, these are the ultimates of all experience, and he who has attained them prays no more: "Seeking for emancipation I go for refuge to that God who is the guiding light to the understanding of all souls." This is the note of much of the later mystical piety of Hinduism. It speaks in the language both of religion and of philosophy.
In the first, the believer looks to his heavenly Lord with adoring faith (p. 128) and lowly love (_bhakti_), and feels the inflowing of divine favour or grace (_prasāda_). The long line of mediæval poets transmitted from generation to generation passionate impulses of devotion which expressed themselves again and again in legend and song. "Search in thy heart," pleaded the weaver Kabir in the fifteenth century, "search in thy heart of hearts, there is God's place of abode." Not, however, without conditions: "Unless you have a forgiving spirit, you will not see God." He might describe himself in his humility as "the worst of men"; that only made the marvel of divine grace more wonderful: "I am thy son; Thou art my Father; we both live in the same place."