nts that will cast
upon this question more light than has been thrown by the above
account of the latter cults and of their points of contact with
Hinduism. It may be taken for granted that with the entrance into the
body politic of a class composed of vanquished[13] or vanquishing
natives, some of the religion of the latter may have been received
also. Such, there is every reason to believe, was the original worship
of Civa as Carva, Bhava, and of Krishna; in other words, of the first
features of modern sectarian Hinduism, though this has been so
influenced by Aryan civilization that it has become an integral part
of Hindu religion.[14]

But, again, for a further question here presents itself, how much in
India to-day is Aryan? We are inclined to answer that very little of
blood or of religion is Aryan. Some priestly families keep perhaps a
strain of Aryan blood. But Hindu literature is not afraid to state how
many of its authors are of low caste, how many of its priests were
begotten of mixed marriages, how many formed low connections; while
both legendary and prophetic (_ex post facto_) history speak too often
of slave-kings and the evil times when low castes will reign, for any
unprejudiced person to doubt that the Hindu population, excluding many
pure priests but including many of the priests and the R[=a]jputs
('sons of kings'), represents Aryanhood even less than the belief of
the Rig Veda represents the primitive religion; and how little of
aboriginal Aryan faith is reflected in that work has been shown
already.

As one reviews the post-Vedic religions of civilized India he is
impressed with the fact that, heterogeneous as they are, they yet in
some regards are so alike as to present, when contrasted with other
beliefs, a homogeneous whole. A certain uniqueness of religious style,
so to speak, differentiates every expression of India's theosophy from
that of her Western neighbors. What is common and world-wide in the
forms of Indic faith we have shown in a previous chapter. But on this
universal foundation India has erected many individual temples,
temples built after designs which are not uniform, but are all
self-sketched, and therefore peculiar to herself. In each of these
mental houses of God there is revealed the same disposition, and that
disposition is necessarily identical with that expressed in her
profane artistry,[15] for the form of religion is as much a matter of
national taste as is that which i