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mentioned Babu Dwaraka Nath Tagore of Jorasanko, Babu Prosanna Kumar Tagore of Pathariaghata, Babus Kali Nath and Baikunta Nath Munshi of Taki, Babu Brindaban Mitra, grandfather of Dr. Rajendra Lala Mitra, Babu Kasi Nath Mullick of ·Calcutta, Raja Kali Sankar Ghosal of Bhukailash, Babu Annada Prosad Bannerji of Telinipara, and Babu Baidya Nath Mukerji, the grandfather of Justice Anukul Mukerji. Besides these, there were many others, such as Brojo Mohun Mozumdar, Haladhar Bose, Nanda Kishore Bose, the father of Raj Narain Bose (subsequently, President of the Adi Brahmo Samaj), who sought the Raja's company and frequented the meetings of the Atmiya Sabha.

All of these men, however, had not the same motives in approaching Ram Mohun Roy. Some sought his company from a sense of the great honour done to themselves by association with one so distinguished; others frequented his house for the wise counsel and ready help that he always rendered in all their temporal embarrassments; whilst a few were actuated by a genuine sympathy with his principles. With these last he chiefly established the Atmiya Sabha. The majority of them were middle-aged men, men experienced in the ways of the world, whom he regarded as his friends and equals in life and delighted to call

"brothers." But there were also others, not very many, who were younger in age and who ap proached him as disciples approach their master, amongst whom were the last mentioned,

Amongst the learned associates of Ram Mohun Roy at this time, who materially helped him in quoting and expounding ancient scriptures, were two well-known Sanskrit scholars. The first was Pandit Sivaprasad Misra, who signed some of the Raja's controversial books, and the second, Hariharananda Tirthaswami, already mentioned in connection with Ram Mohun's work at Rangpur. This mendicant-friend of Ram Mohun Roy deserves special notice. His original name was Nandakumar. He was born at Malpara, in the Hugli district, where he had received a good Sanskrit education; but he early adopted the habit of a mendicant and withdrew from the world, devoting most of his time to visiting places of pilgrimage and leading a sort of wandering life. In the course of one of these wanderings hemust have come to Rangpur, where he formed a friendship with Ram Mohum Roy, spending a longertime than usual in his company, and ultimately accompanied him to Calcutta. The Swami, during his frequent travels, often visited Calcutta and spent several months at a time, in the company of Ram Mohun Roy. During one of these pere-

grinations he brought his younger brother Ram Chandra from his village home and placed him under the care of Ram Mohun Roy, who subsequently appointed him to the post of the ministerof the Brahmo Samaj. He was the first minister of the Brahmo Samaj and afterwards became wellknown as Pandit Ram Chandra Bidyabagish.

But the meetings of the Atmiya Sabha were not the only means of propagating his doctrines. For the first two years the Atmiya Sabha held itsweekly meetings in the garden house of Ram Mohun Roy, at Manicktola, where Sivaprasad Misra used to recite and expound texts from the Hindu scriptures, and a well-known musician of the town,. called Govinda Mala, used to sing hymns composed by Ram Mohun Roy and his friends. After two years the Society was removed first to RamMohun's Simla house, now situated on the Amherst Street, and subsequently to other places, finally finding shelter at the house of Behari Lal Chaubay at Barabazar, where in 1819 there took place a . celebrated debate between Ram Mohun Roy and Subrahmanya Sastri, a Madras Brahmin, on the subject of idol-worship, in the presence of the leading citizens of Calcutta, including Radhakanta Deb, a leader of the orthdox Hindus at that time. In this debate, by a rare display of erudition and forensic skill, Ram Mohun Roy is said to have

vanquished his adversary. After 1819, the meetings of the Atmiya Sabha seem to have been discontinued for some years, partly on account of a harassing law-suit brought against him by his nephew and subsequently of another brought by the Raja of Burdwan, and partly on account of his absorption in organising the work of a Unitarian Congregation with Mr. Adam as its pastor, which we shall notice hereafter.

After having laid his battery well in Calcutta, Ram Mohun Roy began to publish in quick succession his celebrated tracts.

The following is the chronological order of his publications during the first five years :-Translation of the Vedanta in 1815; Abridgment of the Vedanta in Bengali, Hindustani and English; and also the translation of the Kena add Isha Upanishads into Bengali and English in 1816; translation of Katha and Mundaka Upanishads into Bengali and English, and translation of Mandukya Upanishad into Bengali, a defence of Hindu Theism (parts I and II) in Bengali and. English, and also a letter to Mr. Digby in 1817; a Bengali tract against the custom of Suttee, the substance of a discussion with a Vaishnava Goswami and a tract explaining the meaning of the Gayatri, and English translation of the Suttee tract, all during 1818, the great

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CHAPTER I

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meeting of the Atmiya Sabha already alluded to and discussion with Subrahmanya Sastri in 1819; and an English version of his second Bengali tract on Suttee in 1820. The fact that many of these publications were issued in more than one: language at the same time will give the readersome idea of his literary and propagandist activity during this period.

Many of these works, as is manifest from their titles, were translations of a number of sacred books. of the Hindus, called Upanishads, books of uncertain date and origin, generally considered by European scholars as not later than six centuries before Christ, but ascribed by local tradition to remoter antiquity, and revered by the people as forming part of their sacred writings called the Vedas. During the course of his researches into the domain of Sanskrit literature, Ram Mohun Roy was struck by the purity of the monotheistic doctrines of the Upanishads as contradistinguished from the prevailing corruptions of Hindu idolatry, and at once decided to publish some of them with his preface and translations. This he considered to be the most effective means of rousing his countrymen to a sense of the superiority of the monotheistic creed. Nor were his expectations disappointed. Their publication, as also that of the other books mentioned in the list, soon pro

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