1 Baba Ndnak. 19
2 imitated the exclusiveness of the Rajput, and arro-
3 gated to themselves all the privileges of a superior
4 caste. Many Muhammadans attended at the great
5 Hindu festivals, when the mirth and revelry in-
6 separable from such occasions afforded a welcome
7 contrast to the more austere ceremonial of their
8 own faith. The feast of Muharram, at which the
9 Mussalman is wont to relax somewhat the stern
10 discipline of his creed, was attended by so many
11 Hindus that it almost came to be regarded as a joint
12 festival. The superstitions of one faith became the
13 superstitions of the other. " Pirs and Shahids,
14 saints and martyrs, equalled Krishna and Bheiruv
15 in the number of their miracles, and the Mahomet-
16 ans almost forgot the unity of God in the multitude
17 of the intercessors whose aid they implored. Thus
18 custom jarred with custom, and opinion with opinion,
19 and while the few always fell back upon their
20 revelations, the Koran and Vedas, the public mind
21 was agitated, and found no sure resting-place with
22 Brahmins or Moollas, with Muhadeo or Mahomet." 1
23 Baba Nanak was not the first religious reformer
24 who sought to unite Hindus and Mussalmans in the
25 bonds of a common faith. Early in the fourteenth
26 century the teaching of Ramanand, and after him
27 of Kabir, foreshadowed that of the founder of
28 Sikhism. Both these reformers had proclaimed the
29 unity of God, and the equality of men in the
30 sight of God. They had condemned caste, and
31 protested against the authority of the Brahmin
32 priesthood. They had taught, as afterward Nanak
33 1 A History of the Sikhs, by J. D. Cunningham, p. 35.