Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/439

 V.] BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. — 403 When Buddhism ceased to be a living force, The lay a great number of people who had adhered to পরত that faith lost all social prestige in the country, furnishing
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They became out-castes—the Hindu revivalists ing ground having refused to admit them to their society. Vance These people readily responded to the brotherly call of the Vaisnavas and gathered under the flag of Nityananda—the great apostle of Chaitanyism in Bengal in the sixteenth century. Thus the Bauls, the Neda Nedis, the Sahajias and the sects that afterwards went by the name of Karta Bhajas and Kisori Bhajaks, who had originally formed the bulk of the Buddhist masses, now swelled the ranks of the lay Vaisnavas. Some of these people still uphold the doctrines of the Mahayanists though they outwardly profess Chaitanyism. The Mahima Dharmis of Orissa have a vast literature which promulgate the doctrines of Chaitanya and Nagarjuna alike. In some works of this class such as those of the Uriya poets Chaitanya Das and Jagannath Das who flourished in the sixteenth century and are popularly known as Vaishnava poets, the creed of Madhyamic Mahaya- nism is elaborately explained without any excuse, and the names of Dharma (Prajna Paramita), and of Buddhaare of frequent occurrence in them. Indeed one poet went so far as to give an account of the five Dhyani Buddhas onthe lines of the Mahaya- nists, calling himself a follower of Chaitanya all the while. Some of these startling facts recently dis- covered by Babu Nagendranath Vasu will be found embodied in his archzological Report on Orissa which is already in the press. It will be curious to observe how Chaitanyism and Mahayanism haye