however, not in the land of its birth, but in other
lands and among other peoples. Like all other attempts to reform, or
overthrow, the mother faith (and even after it had largely
accomplished this for ten centuries), Buddhism finally yielded to the
mighty absorptive power of Brahmanism, was overthrown as the dominant
religion of India, and lost all power and acceptance among the people.
This was because most of its vital teachings were appropriated by the
rival faith, and Buddha himself was adopted into the Hindu pantheon as
the ninth incarnation of Vishnu. Henceforward, it had no distinctive
mission or message to the people of this land, and died a natural
death.

The well-known passion of Hinduism for absorbing the faiths that come
into contact with it, and the maudlin tendency of the people of India
to yield to pressure and to sacrifice all in behalf of peace, has been
the grave of many a noble endeavour and many an impassioned attempt
for new religious life and power.

Nevertheless, there is no reform movement which has entered the arena
of religious conflict in India, whether it still remains entirely
within the Hindu faith or has possessed vigour and repulsive energy
enough to step outside the ancestral faith, which has not left more or
less of an impress upon Hinduism, and which does not to-day exercise
some power or other over certain classes of the people.

I

All of the many modern sects of Hinduism were originally protests
against the dominant Brahmanism of the day. The most popular Vaishnava
sect, in South India,--the _Visishdadvaitha_ sect of Ramanuja,--was
first a vigorous protest against the austere pantheism of Sankaran. It
was the demand of a thoughtful and an earnest religious man for a
personal God which could bring peace and rest to the soul, in
contradistinction to the unknowable, unethical, and unapproachable
Brahm, which the dominant Vedantism had thrust upon the people.

The _Madhwachariars_ went one step farther and inculcated a dualism,
which many to-day accept as the basis of their faith.

In the region of Bengal, that other sect of Vaishnavism, which was
inculcated by Chaitanya four centuries ago, is to-day the popular
cult. It is a revivalism full of wild enthusiasm and ecstatic
devotion; yet it attracts, in a remarkable way, many of the men of
culture and learning throughout that Presidency.

The Saivite sectarians, who call themselves _Sangamars_, were, a few
centuries ago, a m