Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/756

 The Gakta inter- preters. The terrible, and the beautiful. 714. BENGALI LANGUAGE & Lireratrure. [ Chap, Creator is also the Destroyer. In vain do we dis- course sweetly on the tender aspects of the Deity ; there is no playing fast and loose, no shilly-shally- ing with another feature of the Divinity, the awe- inspiring, the dark and the terrible, the fierceness of which confronts us at every step. The Caktas have proclaimed the worship of Kali to be only possible in a higher stage of spiritual development. A sweet and complete resignation of one’s self to the Divine power knowing it to be terrible, makes the devotee, according to them, grapple better with the problems of life, from a spiritual point of view. Some Cakta-interpreters have explained the dark colour of Kali as signifying the mystery that enshrouds the primary cause of the universe. The worshippers of Kali hold her to be at once destructive and protective. Rama Prasada especially speaks of her as the mother who beats the child, while the child clings to her only the closer, crying ‘Mother! Oh Mother!’’ Here is his song :— ‘Though the mother beat him, the child cries ‘Mother! Oh Mother!’ and clings still tighter to her garment. True I cannot see thee, yet am I not a lost child. I still cry ‘ Mother! Mother !’ ’* Through the fierce and the terrible he sees the sweet moonlight of grace that suddenly breaks forth, and Kali is no more than a symbol to him,— a symbol of divine punishment, of divine grace, and of divine motherhood. She is as mucha sym- bol as the word God. If the symbol of a word is admitted into the vocabulary, why object to the symbol of a figure in the temple 2? One appeals
 * See Kali the Mother, by Sister Nevedita p. 53.