r bodies. From the wickedness of the body there is much to fear,
because all sins enter into it. Therefore, let your dwelling be with
the fearless, and direct yourselves toward the light of God. For there
neither sword nor poison have power to destroy, and sin cannot enter.
The greatest wisdom is in preventing your minds from being influenced
by bad passions, and in meditating upon the One God. Afford help also
to the poor stranger. Meditate on Him by whom all things were
made."[106]

This tradition of reform is maintained by others without intermission
down to the present century, and the M[=a]dhvas and Sv[=a]mi
N[=a]r[=a]yana, of whom we have spoken above as being more directly
connected with sectarian bodies, are, in fact, scarcely more concerned
with the tenets of the latter than were Kab[=i]r and D[=a]d[=u]. Thus
the seventeenth century sees the rising of the B[=a]b[=a]l[=a]ls and
S[=a]dhus; and the eighteenth, of the Satn[=a]mis, 'worshippers of the
true name,' who, with other minor bodies, such as the N[=a]ngi
Panthis, founded by Dedr[=a]j in this century, are really pure
deists, although some of them, like the Vi[t.]h[t.]hals, claim to be
followers of Kab[=i]r. And so they are, in spirit at least.

THE DEISM OF TO-DAY.[107]

And thus one arrives at modern deism, not as the result of new
influences emanating from Christian teaching, but rather as the
legitimate successor of that deism which became almost monotheistic in
the first centuries after our era, and has ever since varied with
various reformers between two beliefs, inclining now to the
pantheistic, now to the unitarian conception, as the respective
reformers were influenced by Ved[=a]nta or S[=a]nkhya (later
Mohammedan) doctrine.

The first of the great modern reformers is R[=a]mmohun Roy, who was
born in 1772, the son of a high-caste Krishnaite Brahman. He studied
Persian and Arabic literature at Patna, the centre of Indic Mohammedan
learning. When a mere boy, he composed a tract against idolatry which
caused him to be banished from home. He lived at Benares, the
stronghold of Brahmanism, and afterwards in Tibet, the centre of
Buddhism. "From his earliest years," says Williams, "he displayed an
eagerness to become an unbiassed student of all the religions of the
globe." He read the Vedas, the P[=a]li Buddhist works, the Kur[=a]n,
and the Old Testament in the original; and in later years even studied
Greek that he might properly understand the New