Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/998

 952 BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. [ Chap. is adopted for convenience. As in the geometrical definition of a line or point the basis is taken for granted, or as in the play of Hamlet the historic facts need not be authentic, so in any subject the ground-work may always be called in question ; but the stupendous facts which rest upon it are not therefore to be ignored or undervalued. The whole civilisation of the Hindus, their vast poetic literature, their architectural achievements, shrines, temples, the geography of India as revealed to them in a spiritual light—the sacred Ganges, the Godavari, the Brahmaputra, the snow-topped Himalaya and the Vindhya hills, all are associated with religious stories and episodes, underlying which there is the Vedanta Philosophy which in- vests external forms with spiritual truth ; and the idea of the Supreme Being permeates all that may superficially strike us as irrational. From the lays of Jayadeva, Chandi Das and Vidyapati to the Kirtana and the Agamani songs of Bengal, our whole vast lore of devotional sentiment Is no literary curiosity to our people ;—it is a perpetual fountain of faith to the humble as well as to the enlightened. The gods and goddesses of the Puranas, like the Usas of the Risis, represent the attributes of one who attracts us through their familiar forms even as the sun approaches us through a thousand rays of light. This vast religious fabric was not created inaday. It has taken deep root in our soil for hundreds of years. Such gods as these could not be dismissed at a word, however great might be the power that cried to them ‘ Vanish!’ Even when Raja Rama Mohana Roy was decrying what he called idolatry .m unsparing language, there were already