Dutt, Romesh Chunder: The literature of Bengal: being an attempt to trace the progress of the national mind in its various aspects, as reflected in the nation’s literature from the earliest times to the present day ; with copious extracts from the best writers (Calcutta, 1877)

w LITERATURE OF BENGAL.

I

Vaishnavas were not Hindus properly so called. They
formed a distinct sect, ignoring the faith of the Hindus,
ignoring caste inequalities, ignoring the utility of Hindu
rites and ceremonies. Centuries rolled on however, and,
a strange compromise has now been made. Hinduism
has made some small compromise, and in So doing has
absorbed the religion of Chaitanya into itself.' "Hinduism
allows her votaries to ignore caste for a( season? viz.,
when they travel to the great Valshnava temple of
Jagauoath, Hinduism has also recognized some of the
Vaishnava rites, and by such conciliatory acts ,has
weakened Vaishnavism and deprived it of its power.
Respectable and well-to-do Vaishnavas, in the present
day, tacitly recognize the inequalities of caste, and
practise Hindu rite^s; rigid followers of Chaitanya and
his religion being found scattered about in villages,
possessing no po^er, no influence in the country, and i
, utterly unable to offer any effectual opposition to the
march of Hinduism. The work of Chaitanya has been
well nigh undone.

The beginning of the sixteenth century witnessed one
revolution; a little before the close of the same century,
another revolution, though of less importance, was brought
about by the province of Bengal finally passing from the
rule of the Pathans to that of the Moghuls. The great
Todar Mall, who^virtually conquered the country, and
brought it under the sway of Akbar, signalized his reign
jji Bengal by inaugurating a new system of collection
of rent, and yet more by forcing his co-religionists, the
^Hindus of Bengal, to learn the Persian, by ordering that