Vishnupurana 3.18.p4

3.18.p4

Parāçara said:—In this wise exclaiming to them "Know" (Budhyadwam) and they saying (Budhyate), "it is known," those Daityas were led away from their own religion. They thus renounced their respective duties being impressed by the reasonings and arguments of that illusory figure. O Maitreya, they, impressed, persuaded others to do the same and thus the heresy spread and many abandoned the practices laid down by the Vedas and Smritis. O twice-born one, with various other erroneous teachings, the illusory figure converted many other Daityas. Being thus deluded, the Asuras, in no time, abandoned the doctrines and rites laid down by the three Vedas. Some of them, O twice-born one, spoke ill of the Vedas and others villified the celestials. Some spoke against the Vedic rites and sacrifices and others calumniated the Brāhmans. "The precepts" they preached "that lead to the sacrifice of animals, are highly culpable. To lay that throwing clarified butter in fire produces rewards is simply childishness. If any one, after having obtained godhead by multiplied ceremonies, is fed along with Indra upon the wood used as fuel in holy fire, he is lower than a brute which feeds upon leaves. If a beast, being sacrificed, attains to heaven, why does not the sacrificer slay his father in a sacrifice? If a dead person is satisfied if another is fed at a Srāddha then why does not the food offered by his son reach him who resides at a distance? All these words therefore depend upon individual respect so it is better for you to neglect them and appreciate mine. The words of authority, O mighty Asuras, do not fall from heaven; reasonable words only are to be acknowledged by me and persons like yourselves". By these and similar reasonings the Daityas were led away and none of them any longer acknowledged the authority of the Vedas.