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)

THE BjERIOD Of LYRICAL POETRY. 11

with the'ideas of the West. J}1 these facts have their
influence on the national mind and on the national litera-
ture, and the result is that the literature of our country
; has shot forth with an activity and freedom quite unpre-
cedented in the annals of Bengal.

As in the»sixtesnth century of the Christian era, even
so in the nineteenth century, a political revolution is
accon^anied with a religious. But the religious revo-
lution of the sixteenth century was antecedent in point of
time to the political revolution of the same centurv, and
deeper in its influence on the national mind ; while the
religious revolution of the nineteenth century inaugur-
ated by the great Raja Ram Mohan Raya is not only
subsequent in point of time to„ the conquest of Bengal
by the English, but also shallow in, its influence and
limited in its sphere of operation. The religious revo-
* lution of the sixteenth century was a rekl awakening of the
national mind, the religious revolution of the nineteenth
century is simply a result of the nation imbibing the ideas
of the West. There is nothing in the Brahmaism of the
present day which will compare for a moment with the
daring spirit of the old Vaishnavas, who, at a time when
Hinduism was firmly established, called in question its most
fundamental tenets. There is nothing again in modern
Brahmaism which can for a moment supply the place
of the maddening fervour of faith and love in Krishna
which characterized the ancient Vaishnavas, and tinged the
literature of the period. We have a creed now, fcja,
intellectual phenomenon of the day; the deep feeling,