VII. ] BENGALI LANGUAGE & LITERATURE. 89 who advanced its cause, not only by writing monu- mental works in Bengali himself, but by raising a controversy which has contributed a great deal to the rapid development of prose. Taking this view of matters, it cannot be considered unjust to call him the father of modern Bengali prose. (c) The writers that followed Raja Rama Mohana Roy—Devendra Natha Tagore—Aksaya Kumara Datta and others. After the death of Raja Rama Mohana Roy the spirit of reform lay dormant for a while. Even the Brahma-Sabha that he had established, suc- cumbed to those othodox forms against which the great leader had fought all his life. In the year 1862 it was found that the Brahmins only were admitted to it, and that they held meetings with closed doors against all of othercastes. I¢vara Chandra Nyaya- ratna used to lecture before a select body of Brahmins in the Theistic Hall ; and in one of the subjects that he chose, he argued that Rama had been an incarnation of God. The mission- aries knew Rama Mohana Roy to be their great foe inspite of all professions of amity and peace on both sides; for under the outward form of Uni- tarian Christianity which the Raja seemed to pro- fess, he was founding a new Theistic Church based on the Vedanta Philosophy and on Christian Morals. This would inevitably draw to itself those 2 £ ০ = Renewed educated Hindus who, if sucha society a not sctivities been organised by the Raja, would have gravitated of the missiona- . towards the Christian Churches, and proved willing ries.
