Page:Twelve men of Bengal in the nineteenth century (1910).djvu/175

Rh history of the movement. It not only placed the hitherto vague conception of Brahmoism on a sound and rational basis of philosophy but it bound together a growing company of young men eager for the advancement of truth and learning. The Brahmo School at first held weekly meetings every Sunday at which Keshub and Devendra Nath Tagore were the leading spirits, the enthusiastic metaphysical discourses of the one contrasting with the closely reasoned and classical Bengali discourses on the faith of Brahmoism of the other.

Not content with his earnest personal appeals in the cause of progress, Keshub was ambitious of a wider public and from this time onwards sought to spread his opinions through the press. His first tract was characteristically called 'Young Bengal, this is for you.' In it he drew attention to the fact that a period of scepticism and irreligion had succeeded the sudden intellectual revival in Bengal and urged that it was essential for true, progress that religious development should go hand in hand with intellectual advancement. Education, unfortified by religious principles, he argued, leads neither to the social, moral nor political welfare of a nation. This first tract was followed by a dozen more, all deeply religious, forming the first beginnings of Brahmo literature and setting forth with power and authority the principles of the new faith. About this time also he founded the Sangat