80 THE MODERN LITERARY HISTORY OF HINDUSTAN. [§ 319. 
left pupils, who carried on their style with some success, but the century 
now under consideration shone most as an age of commentators. 
Nearly all the great poets of the preceding period found their best 
annotators and explainers in the eighteenth century. Perhaps this, 
too, was a natural sequence. Kesab Das and his followers laid down 
and fixed for ever the canons of Indian poetic criticism, and the 
next generation adopted these lines and applied them to already 
existing acknowledged poetic masterpieces. 
Part I.—Religious Poets. 
[ Arranged as far as possible in order of date. ] 
319. fUNT the master Priya Deis, of Brindaban, in the 
Dodb. FI. 1712 A.D. 
In the above year he wrote his well-known gloss on the Bhakt 
Mala of Nabha Das (see No. 51). He is possibly the same as the 
author of a Bhagauat in the dialect of Bundel’khand mentioned by 
Ward (View of the History of the Hindus , vol. ii, p. 481). See 
Garcin de Tassy, i, 405. 
320. HffT, Gagga Pati. FI. 1719 A.D. 
Author of a work entitled Bigydn Bilas, written in Sambat 1775. 
It is a treatise on the different philosophical doctrines of the Hindus, 
and recommends the Yedantic system and a mystic life. It is written 
in the form of a dialogue between a preceptor and his disciple. There 
is a copy of the work in the Mack. Coll. See Garcin de Tassy, i, 182. 
321. Sib Narayan, the Raj’put of the Neri- 
vana tribe, of Chandawan, near Ghazlpur. FI. cir. 1735 A.D. 
The founder of the sect of Sib Narainis . He flourished in the 
reign of Muhammad Shah (1719—1748). He was a voluminous 
writer in the inculcation of his doctrines, and eleven books in Hindi 
verse are ascribed to him. These are entitled (1) Lao or Law Granth, 
(2) Sant Bilas, (3) Bhajan Granth, (4) Sant Sunday, (5) Guru Nyds, 
(6) Sdntachari, (7) Sdntopades, (8) Sabddbali, (9) Sant Par’wan, 
(10) Sant Mahima, (11) Sant Sagar. There is also a twelfth, the seal 
of the whole, but it has not yet been divulged, remaining in the 
