Page:History of Bengali Language and Literature.djvu/999

 VII. ] BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. 953 Europeans who were attracted by it,—nay had adopted the ‘idolatrous practices’ themselves. The European converts to facts disclosed by the extracts quoted below should Hinduism. be judged independently. The comments made on them are what one naturally expects from the biassed persons from whose writings they are taken. ‘Mr. Twining and Major Scott Waring were joined in their missionary crusade by a colleague in the person of a ‘“ Bengal officer,” Col. Stewart, generally known in India under the name of “ Hin- du Stewart.’ He had abjured Christianity and become a worshipper of the Hindu deities. He exposed himself equally to the ridicule of his own countrymen, by going down in the morn- Hindu ing to the Ganges, with flowers and sacrificial Stewart. vessels, to perform his ablutions according to the Hindu rituals. At a subsequent period, he asked permission to accompany the army in its progress towards the capital of Nepal, that he might have an opportunity of paying his devotion at a cele- brated shrine of Civa which lay on the route. ...... ১১০০০০০০০০০ The Bengal officer exhibited the most profound respect for the Hindu religion, and enter- tained the most lofty conceptions of the morals and virtues of the Hindus ; and he now came forward to denounce the sacrilegious attack of the mission- aries ‘on the sacred and venerable fabric of Hin- duism. In his pamphlet called ‘The Bengal Officer's Pamphlet’ published in 1808, he says, ‘‘wherever I look around me in the vast region of Hindu mythology, I discover piety in the garb of allegory: and I see morality, at everyturn blended with every fable ; and as far as [ can rely on my 120