A history of the Sikhs, from the origin of the nation to the battles of the Sutlej.

30

HISTORY OF THE SIKHS

CHAP. II

as separate from, or as identical with one another and with
God. The results were, the atheism of some, the belief of
others in a limitary deity, and the more general reception
The dogma of the doctrine of ' MSya ' or illusion, which allows sensaof' MIaya' tion to be a true guide on this side of the grave, but sees
moral nothing certain or enduring in the constitution of the
applica- material world; a doctrine eagerly adopted by the subsequent reformers, who gave it a moral or religious application.1
General de- Such was the state of the Hindu faith or polity a thousand
cline of years after Christ. The fitness of the original system for
ism. general adoption had been materially impaired by the
gradual recognition of a distinction of race; the Brahmans
had isolated themselves from the soldiers and the peasants,
and they destroyed their own unanimity by admitting
a virtual plurality of gods, and by giving assemblies of
ascetics a pre-eminence over communities of pious householders. In a short time the gods were regarded as rivals,
and their worshippers as antagonists. The rude Kshattriya
warrior became a politic chief, with objects of his own, and
ready to prefer one hierarchy or one divinity to another;
while the very latitude of the orthodox worship led
the multitude to doubt the sincerity and the merits of
a body of ministers who no longer harmonized among
themselves.
X Early Arab A new people now entered the country, and a new element
incsios hastened the decline of corrupted Hinduism. India had
into India
but little but little felt the earlier incursions of the Arabs during the
felt. first and second centuries of the ' Hijri'; and when the
Abbasides became caliphs, they were more anxious to consolidate their vast empire, already weakened by the separation of Spain, than to waste their means on distant conquests which rebellion might soon dismember. The Arab,
moreover, was no longer a single-minded enthusiastic
soldier, but a selfish and turbulent viceroy; the original
impulse given by the prophet to his countrymen had
achieved its limit of conquest, and Muhammadanism required a new infusion of faith and hardihood to enable it
to triumph over the heathens of Delhi and the Christians
1 See Appendix VI.