 As Day (1982) notes, the gods "do not govern "Ṛta" so much as immanentalize it through the particularities of divine ordinances and retributions concerning both rewards and punishments.In this sense they do not "govern" "Ṛta"; they serve it as agents and ministers".While the concept of "Ṛta" as an abstract, universal principle generally remained resistant to the anthropomorphic tendencies of the Vedic period, it became increasingly associated with the actions of individual deities, in particular with those of the god Varuna as the omniscient, all-encompassing sky.