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OF THE HINDUS.
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and returned to his superintending guidance, when they had effected the objects of their missions.
The notice that occurs in the Sarva Darśana of any of the sects which have yet been mentioned, has been already incidentally adverted to: this work is less of a popular form than the preceding, and controverts the speculative rather than the practical doctrines of other schools: besides the atheistical Bauddha and Jaina sects, the work is occupied chiefly with the refutation of the followers of Jaimini, Gautama, and Patanjali, and we have no classes of worshippers introduced but those of the Vaishnavas who follow RÁMÁNUJA, and Madhwachárya, of the Saivas, the Páśupatas, the followers of ABHINAVA GUPTA, who taught the Mantra worship of Siva; and the alchemical school, or worshippers of Siva's type in quicksilver, and the Rasendra Linga: most of these seem to have sprung into being in the interval between the 10th and 13th centuries, and have now either disappeared, or are rapidly on the decline: those which actually exist, we shall recur to in the view we are now prepared to take of the actual condition of the Hindu faith.
