Rising to the next stage, namely, the theism of the educated class--the blending of their theism with the polytheism of the masses is illustrated in the July number of the magazine of the Hindu College, Benares, the headquarters of the late Hindu revival and of the pantheistic philosophy. In answer to an inquirer's question--"Is there only one God?" the reply is, "There is one supreme Lord or Ishvara of the universe, and there are minor deities or devas who intelligently guide the various processes of nature in their different departments in willing obedience to Ishvara." The Hindu College, Benares, be it remembered, is primarily one of the modern colleges whence the modern new-Indians come. [Sidenote: Monotheism with Pantheism.] Again, the modern theism of the educated, in like manner, very readily passes into the pantheism of the philosophers and of those educated in Sanscrit, which I have described as part of the accepted Hindu orthodoxy. For, whatever its origin, an observer finds the pantheistic idea emerge all over educated India. The late Sir M. Monier Williams speaks of pantheism as a main root of the original Indo-Aryan creed, which has "branched out into an endless variety of polytheistic superstitions." Whether that be so, or whether, as is now more generally believed, the polytheism is the aboriginal Indian plant into which the pantheistic idea has been grafted as communities have become brahmanised, the pantheistic idea very readily presents itself to the mind of the educated Hindu. In any discussion regarding human responsibility the idea crops up that _all_ is God, "There is One only, and no second." We can scarcely realise how readily it comes to the middle-class Hindu's lips that God is all, and that there can be no such thing as sin. The pantheists are thus no separate sect from the theists, any more than the theists are from the polytheists. The same man, if a member of the educated class, will be polytheist in his established domestic religion, theist in his personal standpoint and general profession, and probably a pantheist in a controversy regarding moral responsibility, or should he set himself to write about religion. [Sidenote: Illustration of polytheism, monotheism, and pantheism commingling.] Take a statement of the mingling of polytheism, monotheism, and pantheism from the extreme south of India, a thousand miles away from Benares. "Though those men all affirmed," we read, "that there is only one God, they admitted that they each worshipped several. They saw nothing inconsistent in this. Just as the air is in everything, so God is in everything, therefore in the various symbols. And as our king has diverse representative Viceroys and Governors to rule over his dominions in his name, so the Supreme has these subdeities, less in power and only existing by force of Himself, and He, being all pervasive, can be worshipped under their forms."[66] [Sidenote: Pure pantheism rare.]