hat the society was founded for
"the worship and adoration of the eternal, unsearchable and immutable
Being who is the Author and Preserver of the Universe, but not by
any other name, designation or title peculiarly used by any men or
set of men; and that in conducting the said worship and adoration, no
object, animate or inanimate, that has been or is or shall hereafter
become ... an object of worship by any men or set of men, shall be
reviled or slightingly or contemptuously spoken of or alluded to
either in preaching, or in the hymns or other mode of worship that
may be delivered or used in the said messuage or building." [252]
This well exemplifies the broad toleration and liberality of the
sect. The service in the new theistic church consisted in the recital
of the Vedas by two Telugu Brahmans, the reading of texts from the
Upanishads, and the expounding of the same in Bengali. The Samaj, thus
constituted, based its teaching on the Vedas and was at this time,
though unorthodox, still a Hindu sect, and made no attempt at the
abolition of caste. "Indeed, in establishing this sect, Ram Mohan Roy
professed to be leading his countrymen back to the pure, uncorrupted,
monotheistic religion of their Vedic ancestors; but his monotheism,
based, as it was, essentially upon the Vedanta philosophy, was in
reality but a disguised Pantheism, enriched as regards its ethics by
ideas derived from Muslim and Christian literature and theology." [253]

4. Debendra Nath Tagore.

After the death of its founder the sect languished for a period of ten
years until it was taken in hand by Debendra Nath Tagore, whose father
Dwarka Nath had been a friend and warm admirer of Ram Mohan Roy, and
had practically maintained the society by paying its expenses during
the interval. In 1843 Debendra drew up a form of initiation which
involved the renunciation of idolatry. He established branches of
the Brahmo Samaj in many towns and villages of Bengal, and in 1845 he
sent four Pandits to Benares to copy out and make a special study of
the Vedas. On their return to Calcutta after two years Debendra Nath
devoted himself with their aid to a diligent and critical study of the
sacred books, and eventually, after much controversy and even danger
of disruption, the Samaj, under his guidance, came to the important
decision that the teaching of the Vedas could not be reconciled with
the conclusions of modern science or with the religious convictions
of