TULSI DAS AND THE RAMA CULT 57
defects, and other Hindi poets, such as Sur Das, may- have excelled Tulsi Das in the polish of their verse and their handling of metres. But the Ramayan of Tulsi Das will always hold its place as the work of a great literary genius. The importance of its in- fluence, too, cannot be exaggerated. Tulsi Das founded no sect, and indeed added nothing to the theology of that school of Hinduism to which he belonged, but there is no doubt that the Rmiayan has been the most potent factor in making Vaishnavism the accepted cult of the vast majority of Hindus in North India to-day.
A brief mention must be made of the other literary- works of Tulsi Das. All of them have the object of popularizing the worship of Rama. In the Ram Gitdvali Tulsi Das tells the story of Rama in verses which are adapted for singing. The Dohavali, or DohOr Ramayan, is a collection of dohas and is not so much an epic poem as a moral work. Sir George Grierson thinks that it is probably a collection of dohas from other poems of Tulsi Das, made by a later hand. The Kavittdvali, or Kavittsambandk, also deals with the story of Rama and is written in kavitta metre. The Vinay Patrika is a collection of hymns to Rama and is a work which is very much admired. The Sat Sat is a similar work to that which Bihari Lai wrote fifty years later, but is connected with Rama instead of with Krishna. It contains seven hundred emblematic dohas. It is dated 1585. A great many other works also are ascribed to Tulsi Das, but with regard to the genuine- ness of some of them there is a great deal of doubt. Although the Rdm-charit-mmas is undoubtedly his greatest work his poetic powers are also exhibited in the other works which he composed.
The Bhaktamala.— It marks the greatness of the achievement of Tulsi Das that amongst Ramanandis, or other worshippers of Rama as the incarnation of the Supreme, there seem to be fewer Hindi works of out- standing importance than in other sections of the Vaishnava movement, and this is no doubt due to the
