ge of the Upanishads. "When salt is dissolved in water,
what remains distinct? I have thus become one in joy with thee and
have lost myself in thee. When fire and camphor are brought together,
is there any black remnant? Tuka says, thou and I were one light."

5

There are interesting Vishnuite sects in Assam.[644] Until the
sixteenth century Hinduism was represented in those regions by
Saktism, which was strong among the upper classes, though the mass of
the people still adhered to their old tribal worships. The first
apostle of Vishnuism was Sankar Deb in the sixteenth century. He
preached first in the Ahom kingdom but was driven out by the
opposition of Saktist Brahmans, and found a refuge at Barpeta. He
appears to have inculcated the worship of Krishna as the sole divine
being and to have denounced idolatry, sacrifices and caste. These
views were held even more strictly by his successor, Madhab Deb, a
writer of repute whose works, such as the Namghosha and Ratnavali, are
regarded as scripture by his followers. Though the Brahmans of Assam
were opposed to the introduction of Vishnuism and a section of them
continued to instigate persecutions for two centuries or more, yet
when it became clear that the new teaching had a great popular
following another section were anxious that it should not pass out of
sacerdotal control and organized it as a legitimate branch of
Hinduism. While fully recognizing the doctrine of justification by
faith, they also made provision for due respect to caste and Brahmanic
authority.

According to the last census of India[645] the common view that
Sankar Deb drew his inspiration from Caitanya meets with criticism in
Assam. His biographies say that he lived 120 years and died in 1569.
It has been generally assumed that his age has been exaggerated but
that the date of his death is correct. If it can be proved, as
contended, that he was preaching in 1505, there would be no difficulty
in admitting that he was independent of Caitanya and belonged to an
earlier phase of the Vishnuite movement which produced the activity of
Vallabha and the poetry of Vidyapati. It is a further argument for
this independence that he taught the worship of Vishnu only and not
of Radha and discountenanced the use of images. On the other hand it
is stated that he sojourned in Bengal and it appears that soon after
his death his connection with the teaching of Caitanya was recognized
in Assam.

At present there