94 THE REV. H. D. GRISWOLB, M.A., PH.D., ON 



the tuition of the blind Swami Virajananda of Mathura. His 

 religious development may be described as a movement from 

 Pauranic Hinduism through Philosophical Hinduism to Vedic 

 Hinduism. He successively deserted Shaivism and Yedantism, 

 but clung to the last to the Sankhya-Yoga as the philosophical 

 point of view from which, in his opinion, the Yedas ought to 

 be interpreted. 



The last twenty years of his life may be called the period of his 

 public ministry (1863-1883). His history during this period is 

 a history of preaching tours throughout the length and breadth 

 of India, from Bombay and Poona on the south to Calcutta and 

 Lahore on the north, of public discussions with pandits, 

 maulvies and missionaries, and of literary work. In the great 

 centres of idolatry his usual theme was, " Is there idolatry in 

 the Vedas ? " He founded the Arya Samaj in Bombay, in the 

 year 1875, and visited the Panjab in 1877. He died in 1883, 

 in the city of Ajmere, Eajputana, under circumstances which 

 gave rise at the time to the suspicion that he had been 

 poisoned. But of this there is no clear proof. 



Some account may here be given of the personality and 

 character of the founder of the Arya Samaj. The earliest 

 contemporary sketch known to me of the appearance of Swami 

 Dayanand was drawn by Eev. T. J. Scott, D.D., at the 

 Kurkora Mela, on the banks of the Ganges, October 29th, 1868. 

 It was when the Swami had gone into partial " retreat " for 

 " further contemplation and perfection of character," as one of 

 his biographers tells us.* 



The description reads as follows : — " In the afternoon I visited 

 a fakeer down on the sand by the water's edge, of whose learning 

 and sanctity I had heard in the crowds of the bazaar. I found 

 him sitting in a little straw booth ; and a splendid-looking 

 fellow he was, with his herculean frame and massive limbs, 

 fine oval cranium and really benignant face. He was sitting 

 almost entirely naked, and entered at once into pleasant 

 conversation. I found him to belong to a class of mendicants, 

 who profess to have entirely abandoned the world, and are 

 living in complete contemplation of the Deity. The conver- 

 sation revealed in him a fine mind and well versed in the 

 ancient lore of the Hindus. He talked only Sanskrit, and our 

 conversation was conducted through an interpreter."t 



* Dayananda Saraswati, by Arjan Singh, p. 23. 



f Missionary Life among the Villages in India^ p. 162. 



