Page:Chaitanya and His Age.djvu/81

Rh Nityananda, in the course of his religious tour all over India, visiting her various shrines, met Madhavendra Puri at Sri Parvat, somewhere near Bankot in the Madras Presidency. He clasped the feet of the saint and exclaimed "Here is the reward I have at last got for visiting all the shrines. I see, Sir, to day your inspired love which sanctifies my soul." We also find Madhavendra paying a visit to Adwaita at Santipur. Madhavendra had died before Chaitanya was born or when the latter was a mere child. So he could not see the great Vaishnab apostle; but he was so fervently impressed with all that Madhavendra had done in inculcating the Bhakti-cult, that evidences of his extraordinary regard are to be met with in many Vaishnab works. Chaitanya Charitamrita refers to the incident in Master's life where he recites the stanza, beginning with অয়ি দীন দয়ার্দ্র নাথ written by Madhavendra, and declares in enthusiasm that as the Kaustuva is the finest of all diamonds, so is the stanza the most beautiful of all world's poems. He becomes lost in ecstatic joy as he recites the sloka till tears choke his voice, and he can no longer recite the full sloka but merely says "অয়ি দীন অয়ি দীন" and then passes on into a trance.

The Bhakti cult had thus already secured a firm footing in Bengal and secured considerable number of adherents before Chaitanya came to the field. Madhavendra was the first to inaugurate a a new era in the propagation of this particular