rshipers; but some interpret them in the most
literal way possible. This is done especially by the followers of
Vallabha Acharya.[28] These men attained a most unenviable notoriety
about twenty years ago, when a case was tried in the Supreme Court of
Bombay, which revealed the practice of the most shameful licentiousness
by the religious teachers and their female followers, and this as a part
of worship! The disgust excited was so great and general that it was
believed the influence of the sect was at an end; but this hope
unhappily has not been realized.

[Sidenote: Reforms attempted.
Kabir.
Nanak.
Failure of all reforms.]
Reformers have arisen from time to time in India; men who saw the
deplorable corruption of religion, and strove to restore it to what they
considered purity. Next to Buddha we may mention Kabir, to whom are
ascribed many verses still popular. Probably the doctrine of the unity
of God, as maintained by the Mohammedans, had impressed him. He opposed
idolatry, caste, and Brahmanical assumption. Yet his monotheism was a
kind of pantheism. His date may be the beginning of the fifteenth
century. Nanak followed and founded the religion of the Sikhs. His
sacred book, the _Granth_, is mainly pantheistic; it dwells earnestly on
devotion, especially devotion to the _guru_. The Sikhs now seem slowly
relapsing into idolatry. In truth, the history of all attempts at
reformation in India has been most discouraging. Sect after sect has
successively risen to some elevation above the prevalent idolatry; and
then gradually, as by some irresistible gravitation, it has sunk back
into the _mare magnum_ of Hinduism. If we regard experience,
purification from within is hopeless; the struggle for it is only a
repetition of the toil of Sisyphus, and always with the same sad issue.
Deliverance must come from without--from the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

[Sidenote: Influence of the Tantras.
Worship of the Sakti.]
We mentioned the Tantras as exerting great influence in later days.[29]
In these the worship of Siva, and, still more, that of his wife, is
predominant. The deity is now supposed to possess a double nature--one
quiescent, one active; the latter being regarded as the _Sakti_ or
energy of the god, otherwise called his wife. The origin of the system
is not fully explained; nor is the date of its rise ascertained. The
worship assumes wild, extravagant forms, generally obscene, sometimes
bloody. It is divided into two sch