Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/290

 Chautig¢a, 254 BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. [ Chap, to go through 076. 00400০0৮165 and plots formed | by the deities that would often appear undigni- | fied and unworthy on their part. The propa- ganda of the Gakta-cult however was to restore faith in a personal divinity in the place of the impersonal Civa. All through these poems one is sure to find the mother’s heart in the divinities, eager to stretch out protecting hands to those children that cling to them. Into whatever danger a believer may fall, he cries out for the motherly help of the divinity whom he worships in a patient and prayerful spirit, and she is sure to appear to him with anxious solicitude to protect him. In- stances of this personal element in the deities are to be found throughout the vast literature of the Saktas. The characters of Crimanta and Kalketu in Chandi Kavya, of Sundara in Vidya Sundara, of Lau Sen in Dharma Mangal, as recast by the Hindu preists, and of Behula in. Manasa Mangal, have been all depicted as attaining great success in life by force of their devotion alone. When all resources failed and the great characters were reduced to utmost straits—some of them being doomed to die on the scaffold, they fixed their whole heart on the mother and solicited divine help with tearful eyes, despairing of saving themselves by their own power, and the mother was sure to come to her devotees stretching out the hand of succour. One of the familiar ways adopted by the old Bengali poets in describing such mystic situations was to put in the mouth of a devotee a hymn ad- dressed to her by names beginning with each of the thirty-four letters of the Bengali alphabet. The